- Hello. I’m back. Long hiatus. A friend said I shouldn’t ever promise to write sooner, because I never do, and it would just seem like yet another broken promise. Which is bad form. So, no more. I shall write whenever I fancy.
- I had a mini panic attack the other day knowing that I’m running out of Marmite soon. Thankfully that problem was solved by my bestie who visited the UK, procured them, and mailed two jars to me. Trust your bestie to know what you want and need most. For those who don’t know what Marmite is, it’s a kind of spread made from yeast extract, and you could do anything with it- either spread it on bread, make soup with it, or if you’re as crazy as I am, eat it directly out of the jar. Bit of umami mixed with a hint of bitterness, it soothes my soul every time I have it. It’s true when they say food has a way of finding its way into your heart. Every time I have a taste of Marmite, home feels like it’s just around the corner… and some days that’s what you need to keep you going.
- I sat around pondering why people choose their profession, or if they just let life choose for them. How do some people just “know” what they wanted to do at a young age, or at all? I mean, how does anyone ever know? Is there a tiny bird that whispers into their ears when they’re asleep? Is there an angel that nudges them to their ‘right’ career path? Or do they just stumble into it? It bothers me that I never had that little bird to help me get clarity. /sigh. But I am glad I stopped myself from spending too much time pondering away and missed out on the opportunity to live it. Best get on with it and see what happens, before life slips away and all that’s left is but a bag of bones and a few teeth.
- Enough random bits for the day. Saving others for another rainy day.
Category: musings
Kopi-C Peng With Love
I lied. I said I’ll write more, but so many things happened since my last post, and I couldn’t muster enough energy to put my thoughts and emotions into words. Or maybe I just didn’t want to. Words elude me when sadness overwhelms, and all I want to do is just to run and hide.
I dreamed of a 20-foot Sandman who was chasing me everywhere. No matter how far I run, he’d still get to me. Friends and family tried to protect me by allowing me to build secret passageways underneath their living quarters, and eventually I managed to create a maze of an underground passage that led me to somewhere ‘safe’ where I didn’t think he’d thought to look for me. That morning when he came for me, I ran and ran until I got there, and there it was– a small poorly vented underground room that was once a prisoner’s cell long ago and had now been abandoned. The self in my dream was quite smug for finally outrunning Sandman, but that smugness lasted about 2 seconds- I remembered, then and there, that while I was tucked away safely in this cell, Sandman would still be looking, and I knew how relentless he could be. What would happen (or rather, had happened) to those people who partook in hiding me?! Sandman didn’t look like a compassionate thing that would allow any accomplice to get away. I knew then, that I was responsible for that, and there was nothing I could do about it. It’s too late; I had blood on my hands. There was no such thing as safety; sooner or later Sandman would get me. I couldn’t stop crying, and all I want to do was to undo everything. But there was no chance for that- I woke up, covered in tears and snot.
Such a morbid dream; so much to unpack from that stream of subconsciousness. Grandma passed away four months and a week ago, and I’m still coming to terms with it. Early on, my mind kept replaying all the memories I had with her, and I couldn’t help but think that I’d never have the chance to create more memories with her anymore. I selfishly wanted more time with her. I was going to go home for Chinese New Year next year! Why now? Why so soon?! Then it hit me- how hypocritical I was, for saying I wanted more time with her. How was I going to do that when I’m all the way here in another country thousands of miles away?! Going home once every few years does not cut it. Just like that, my anger on whoever it was from the Otherworld who took her away from me, and my regret, turned into guilt. And guilt–is the worst feeling of all. The early days just after her passing were filled with spurts of lacrimation fest, of which faucet I had almost no control over (at least I could stop self from doing that when around people).
It got better over time. Work kept me busy, so I didn’t have to think about it too much, or at all. The daily hum-drum became a soothing balm, and if work wasn’t enough to tire me out, there’s always the endless TV shows that I could turn to to numb me up. I was doing quite a good job at that until about a month ago. It was just another day not unlike any other, except I incidentally found out about a dear friend’s tragic and unexpected demise. To say I was in shock was an understatement. How could a seemingly healthy person just suddenly be dead? I just saw him a little over a year ago and had a great catch-up session after 8 years of not seeing each other. I have questions, but none of which would ever be answered. They probably didn’t matter anyway.
Death has a way of reaching inside and squeezing the life out of you, figuratively (and perhaps also literally). I was deeply shaken, and for the first time in months, I saw how I was not-living. I thought I was doing fine after Grandma passed away, but in truth I sealed off a part of me, and was going through the motions of living without really doing so. Grandma wouldn’t have wanted me to live like this, nor my friend. This was a wake-up call; I have to do better. So here I am, writing about this, cherishing all the memories I’ve had with them, and letting all the emotions wash over me. Tonight, I’ll sip on Kopi-C Peng – Grandma’s favorite beverage – and just, feel. Sandman will always be after me (us), whether I like it or not. If it’s futile to run away, why not just live every day like it’s the last?
Hello 2019
The past year has somewhat gone by in a haze. Bits and pieces surfaced as I tried to recall how I made it through the year. Lots of stress eating, some heartaches, and definitely a lot of repressed memories. It’s not all that bad: there were lots of booze, plenty of laughter, too much ice cream and duck fat fries than I cared to remember, and tears, the latter of which I hate to admit. It’s the Asian culture that I grew up in that I can’t yet shake away, that taught me- tears are for weaklings. And a weakling I am not. Thank goodness for a few good friends whom I can always count on. But even then, people come and go, all the time. That’s just how it is. 2017 and 2018 were filled with a lot of growing pains; I learned so much about myself, some of which that surprised me and that I’m not proud of. But at least I know better now, and I’ll learn from those mistakes I’ve made. This year though, will be a better one. I’m sure of it… or at least the optimistic self believes so. The goal for this year will be mastery- through perpetual progress, and building habits. The more zen goal, as trite as it may sound, is to be present. As Ferris Bueller puts it, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” 😎
News vs. Facts
If a tree fell with a thud, but no one heard it,
has it really fallen?
If words of truth were written but no one read it,
are they still legit?
If one was loved by another but he/she alone was utterly blind to it,
has it really happened? Does it still count?
Humans. Most of the time we seek evidence, trust only our senses and what we can concretely grasp, especially when it’s in our favour or when it’s convenient to us. When it’s not, or when it’s too complicated/overwhelming, we either a) choose to believe whatever we were taught when we were little (fall back to the primitive model instilled in us in our early years), b) jump to the next most convenient explanation (even if it’s absurd), or c) simply walk away and ignore the problem.
Sure, these choices are tempting- they’re easy solutions. They don’t require much thinking. Believing what we were told when we were kids is probably the easiest, most convenient, and natural thing to do- because it felt ‘right’- when ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ were as clear as ‘black’ and ‘white’ as a child. It gives us and easy way out. But that’s why we educate ourselves. We go to school not just to get a piece of paper that helps us secure a job, but to learn to think for ourselves. To think through the information we’re fed, to parse out the right and wrong (subject to individual moral codes, but that’s a different matter altogether), the truth from lies.
These days though, it’s increasingly hard to do so. A large part of it is because of the technology that is a double-edged sword- it provides us an abundance of information all just a few clicks away, but it doesn’t separate truths from un-truths/lies/propaganda. There’s hardly any information police or regulatory body that fact-check everything, because it’s just an impossible task. The onus then is on us to do the hard work ourselves, to check the sources, to analyze what we’ve read and make up our mind about it. Yet too often we fall into complacency and just reinforce what we already believed in by reading the opinions of those whose ideas align with ours, which makes it easy to skip the thinking part and just drink in what we’ve been fed. The danger of overly accessible information is like the sexy, seductive mistress who keeps flirting with you, completely intoxicating, irresistible, and- costly.
Too much has been said and written on the election results, and I don’t think my two-cents on the postmortem of the event is worth mentioning. Everybody has an opinion, everyone has something to say. Most of them are unhelpful, and are noise. I’m more interested in how things move forward from now on, especially on the healthcare front and the environmental issues / climate change. One example- Standing Rock’s fight on the Dakota Access Pipeline is something worth keeping close tabs on, and take action if feasible. Whatever it is, I think it’s high time we all start caring about something and work to protect what’s important to us and to those we care. Because if we don’t, we might find ourselves losing it sooner than we realize. If there’s a lesson to learn from recent events, it’s to take nothing for granted. Nothing.
Peace,
J
The Girl
It was a rainy day but she needed to get out. Nothing could stop her, not the thunder or lightning, or flash flood warning texts. It was that kind of day.
On days like those, her yellow boots seemed to have a life of their own, and so off they went, taking her on a path that she had never come across. But she could hardly care. Or maybe she didn’t even notice. If every thought process, every neuronal activity makes a sound, you’d hear the cacophony of clicks, buzz, and ticks inside that skull, going a little overboard not unlike the time machine that had gone wrong and trying its very best not to explode. Why is all this happening, she thought. She wanted answers. She needed to talk to a friend.
And just like that, she took charge of her path again, finding her way to the coffee shop. It’s a hidden gem, on the second floor of an old mansion with a flight of stairs on the right, while the left side of the house was rented to an old tailor. Skipping her way up the stairs, turning right, zig-zagging past all the tables with very chatty customers talking over the soothing 20s’ jazzy background music, and not really bothered to only step on the white squares on the floor, something she usually did when she wasn’t in this harrowing mood. A dose of bff-pep-talk will make it go away, she mused, crossing the common area, turning left into the corridor with private rooms on both sides, and through the double doors into the kitchen, where her friend was helping her mom making coffee and toasts. Business has always been great, but it’s even better when it’s gloomy or pouring outside.
The relief of finding her friend lasted about as long as two milliseconds, which instantly evaporated when she caught a glimpse of her. Another two minutes into the conversation and she found that she couldn’t possibly burden her friend with her problems when her best friend was having her own crisis as well. After helping out in the kitchen for about an hour, she excused herself, after giving her friend a hug and promising to call later to talk more.
So much for talking to a friend. Outside the color of the sky matched her own dark clouds looming above her head. Again she took off wandering the streets until she chanced upon to a man who seemed like he was expecting her. Out of curiosity, she asked if he knew her. “Come, girl, I want to show you something,” he replied. Usually she wouldn’t have agreed to that. But it wasn’t a usual day, so she followed his lead. A few broken and battered paths away, there they stood, in front of a misplaced apple-green-turquoise minivan with huge floral patterns on it, one that looked like it got teleported from the 60s. To her surprise, the van was like Doctor Who’s blue police box, only it wasn’t just that. Inside was an entire world of itself. But there was something odd about it. Soon she realized it was a spaceship that was about to take off. And to accommodate as many passengers as possible, everyone had only a tiny caged space slightly taller than the height of a coffin. They were all stacked in twos, and the entire place was jam-packed with rows and rows of caged bunk-beds.
The man led her to her space, with her name labeled on it, and he left without any explanation. She was speechless. Were they expecting her? Why? Where were they going? She never signed up for anything! Was this a punishment for being pathetic? Were all sad and lost souls to be sent off to a faraway prison? So many questions! She didn’t have energy to find or ask the man, though. So resentfully she climbed into her space on all fours, and lean against the bars, observing others. Soon enough she realized, the others weren’t forced to do this! They actually looked excited, preoccupied with their handheld devices, perhaps thinking this was some exploratory expedition to outer space or something. Was it?
She had no clue. All she knew was that she’s tired, and she just wanted all this to go away. Disappear. She wanted to disappear. Can the ground crack open and swallow her whole? If she closed her eyes long enough, maybe it would happen.
After a long, long while, what felt like an eternity of denial and refusing to face reality, she opened her eyes. And there she was. On her own bed. Alarm clock next to her bed blinked 03:38. A nightmare. It was all a dream. Felt real though. What bizarre subconsciousness has she been suppressing that had to resurface as such in the dream?
More questions. But at least this time, she didn’t have to fear being deported into an unknown space while she pondered upon the message of the dream.
Another Year, Here We Go
I used to reflect on the year before, and making new resolutions for the ‘new’ year, either here or in my journal. But for the past few years I haven’t really been keeping track of whether I checked off the list of stuff to do. Part of it is because it’s been the same resolutions, and they’re more about self-building than a concrete thing to achieve. So this year I wrote myself a note on the eve of New Year’s Day, and I thought I’d share it here, mostly just as a reminder for myself if things get tough this coming year, or if things don’t happen as I’d hoped for. It’ll be okay, I’ll survive, and it won’t be the end of the world. To all my good friends still reading this, cheers! Here’s to a brighter, better year!
A Note To Self
Words are cheap; promises even cheaper. Do not make promises you can’t keep, not to others, ever more so not to yourself.
Always be positive. When things don’t happen the way you had hoped, it doesn’t mean you don’t deserve it; it simply means you deserve more.
But that also means you need to pay your dues, work for what you deserve. There’s no free ride in this world, and you’ve got to work for what you want. Be contented, be grateful by all means, but strive to be your better self every single moment.
Be strong, be resilient. Never let the next obstacle stop you from getting where you want to go. If you’re serious about getting there, you will. Anything – given enough time – is possible.
Know what you want. Be curious, be passionate. Choose what you want to excel in. No one can have it all, nor can one do it all. Time is scarcity; time is luxury. Pick your passion, or poison. Stick with it. With enough effort and determination you will be great in it.
Have a plan. But know that it’s okay to change your plans or directions too. No one will fault you for changing your mind as long as you don’t keep doing it just for the sake of doing it, or because you give up too easily. You have a right to choose your path, and it may change over time.
Be kind to everyone, but most of all be kind to yourself. Practice self-compassion. Learn to love yourself, that is the first step to loving anyone else. That means knowing how to take care of your health- physically, mentally and emotionally. Again, you can’t do it all. Do not be greedy. Do not be too harsh on yourself either when you can’t meet all your goals.
Learn to take failures in stride. Every failure that happens is a learning opportunity. It is also a data point, to let you know that it doesn’t work, but that also means you’re one step closer to the thing that does work.
Always read. Read as much as you can. It’s the portal to the world you may never have the chance to see in person. Let it open your mind; learn from others’ experience so you won’t have to make the same mistakes. Expand your mind just as the universe is expanding every moment.
But more than that, write. Write everything that comes to mind, even if it’s silly, or politically incorrect. Sometimes it’s for entertainment, sometimes it helps to keep you sane. It doesn’t have to be shown to the world. Just let it flow, and do this for no one else but yourself. You will learn so much bout yourself and this Earth we call home, and everything in between.
Travel the world, go to places, see the extraordinary things built or created by mankind, talk to people. Learn their culture, learn the good things and bad- the good so you can emulate, the bad so you know not to repeat them. There’s so much out there to learn, see, know. They’re all beautiful in their own way, you just need to find a way to appreciate them.
Do something to contribute to the world, to humanity. Our time in this world is so short it’s probably just a millionth of a millisecond in the entire timeline of the universe. Maybe even less. But that shouldn’t stop us from adding value to humanity. We take so much from the world, the least we could do is give a little back during our however transient lifespan.
Most of all, always remember to be present. Live. Open your eyes, feel your surroundings, use all your senses and really live. Tomorrow is promised to no one; the past is nothing but memories. Live every moment as if it’s your last. Spend not all your time and energy anticipating for the next big break, next whatever, while you trudge through the now and forget to live, because when you get there you’ll find that it’s not enough and there’s always another next thing you want. It’s the classic cat-chasing-its-own-tail picture, because you will keep hoping for the next big thing that will change your life and make you happy, but you will get exhausted before you even get there, and you’ll have spent your time sulking and being unhappy, when you’ve already got what you need to be happy. Really- focus on the now, and you will find peace and happiness.
Hello 2015
It’s halfway past the first month of this ‘new’ year, and I’ve been seriously contemplating shutting down this blog. In fact, maybe stop writing altogether. Or maybe start a new blog. With a clean state, no history, no past. And then maybe I can reinvent myself, be anonymous. Be anyone I want to be but myself.
But the thing about new blog / new year / new self is this- it’s just an illusion. I can start a new blog every year, with a new personality/character, but for all we know- I’m still the same person. And unless there’s a time machine to bring me back to the past, I’ll still be here and nothing is really ‘new’, and we don’t really get a fresh start.
So no new year resolutions this year. No reflection about 2014 either. I’m just glad I managed to bring myself here to write something. Honestly after such a long time of not writing, I forgot how to write. And all the things I’ve wanted to write about has left me, and right now there’s only an empty shell waiting to be filled with new ideas/thoughts to be shared. But I’m not going to make a promise to self to write every day or every week or whatever, because the last time I did that, it ended horribly.
This year to me is a year full of uncertainty. I have no idea what’s going to happen to me- whether I’m going to graduate as planned, what I’d be doing after graduation, where I’ll end up etc. But I’m done worrying. So I’m just gonna let it play itself out, trusting that things will work out just fine. 🙂
Signing off, xoxo.
October, Resurfaced
Why hello there?! Hellooooo… (hello oo ooo ooo…)
I can almost hear the echo that bounces off the virtual wall of this blog, which reflects the emptiness and dead space in between (and quite aptly so), thanks to yours truthfully for not updating this blog for so many months.
It feels so strange to be typing away on the keyboard, and leaving traces of thoughts on this white space, pausing every now and then with the blinking cursor waiting eagerly to move on. I forget how it feels like to put down thoughts in words. Not like this, at least. Everything I’ve been writing since August has all be patient notes, full of jargons and standard descriptions completely void of creativity or imagination. Steer away from the standard writing and risk being seen as unprofessional rigmarole. It’s easy to get used to that though. But now that I’m back here in my own space, I’m not sure if I can write like I used to anymore.
I know not what prompted me to open a new tab, come here and leave a note. At this moment I don’t have anything particular on my mind, all there is is an itch to type, and leave something here. As if to prove to the world (or myself) that I’m still around. Still not forgotten. But by whom? Who cares? Does anybody care, or notice my absence?
It is end of October, two more months to a new year. I can’t believe how time flies, and I’ll be heading home soon. So much for wanting to write more, and jot down notes on my stay here. So much to be said; and yet, sometimes it’s better off kept to self.
《那些年》感言
平时很少用中文写部落格的我 （uh 不对，是 从来 没用过中文写的我）
那晚 看了《那些年，我们一起追的女孩》之后，突然好像在这儿乱涂一两句
别人说， 拥有过类似暧昧的感觉的人，都会深同感触
而我，却因为没有属于我自己的故事而深深的感慨
想想当年 17 岁的我，好像缺少了什么
是我让青春白白溜走了吗？是我在很想闯入成人的世
界里的当时，失去了那一点点容许我天真无知的时空么？
有人明白我在写什么吗？
＊＊＊
时光是一去不回头
但就算时间真的能倒流
我想，凭我了解自己性格的我
应该也不会改变我所做过的选择
所以其实 也没什么好感慨的
虽然，有过一段自己的 “沈佳宜” 或是 “柯腾” 的故事
好像蛮令人羡慕的
但错过了，也不差啦
毕竟，每个人都有自己精彩的故事
我的故事，少了这么一个特别的人
但却多了更多很特别，要好的朋友
也让我有更多的精神和时间去关心其他对我非常重要的人事物
做人嘛，开心就好！:)
Pieces, Remembering
Throughout our lives, people come and go all the time. Some became friends and stayed on as significant people in our lives; those are the ones who will always stay with us till the end of time. Some were just acquaintances we barely knew or remembered before we all moved on; either we didn’t care enough to know more about them and vice versa, or the time of contact was so brief there wasn’t enough opportunity to get to know each other more. Yet others were people we cared very much and would like to keep in touch but alas the feeling wasn’t mutual (or vice versa). Those were the kinds that usually end up in broken pieces, not unlike the photo above (pardon the double negative).
Had I known if things were to end up in tragedy, would I still go ahead and gotten to know them? I don’t know. Maybe yes, maybe no. Life works in a mysterious way, and in its interwoven mysteries it somehow will lead us along the path that is meant just for us, and nobody else. No one has the boon of knowing the future, so we are all equal in that sense. Every step we take shapes our paths; every choice we fail to make draws us away from what could have been. We will fall, we will hurt along the way. But if all the pain and heartbreaks we have to endure is in exchange for some happiness, love and peace, even if for only a fleeting moment, I reckon it’s worth it. After all, we only live once. And we’ll never be young again.
Mulling
Have you ever encountered a situation whereby you wish to keep certain things to yourself because, technically speaking, you can and you have the right to: it’s your personal life and your ultimate decision to let it be known, or not. Yet, the reality that we live in, governed by certain societal norms, has it that we should share with others our personal stories or incidents or what-have-you’s – because we live in a society, and we’re all connected to each other, no (wo)man is an island, or whatever reasons to justify such sharing. And perhaps there is a physiologic explanation to it too: we humans can never keep secrets. We just can’t. We are not built that way. We are social animals bound to share and communicate with others, and so, in that regard, you can almost argue that there is no such thing as privacy!
Indeed, in the past, our grandparents or great-grandparents used to know everyone in the village or town. Everyone knew everyone and everything everyone was doing, and I doubt the word “privacy” existed in their daily vocabulary. So what then, brought about the concept of privacy? When exactly, in the history of mankind, did the idea of separating private from public life spring to existence? I have no answer to that, but my “guestimate” is – and I may well be wrong about this – it probably occurred some time around when paper was invented. When paper technology was invented, it gave us an avenue to jot down whatever ideas, thoughts, opinions, secrets, etc., that we wished to tell others, and pass it down in written form. In the case of which we do not wish to tell others yet needed a way to “get it out of our system”, it allows us to do that too, as long as the written words are hidden from others. It is most likely that it goes a lot deeper and is more complicated than this, but for what I’m referring to in this post, this simplistic view should suffice.
My question is, where do you draw the line with regard to when it is appropriate to tell and when it’s okay to not tell? Here I’m not talking about those apparent choices that involve legal actions or moral values. I’m referring to those grey areas between friends, family, relatives, coworkers, bosses etc. There’s probably no significant impact if you make the “wrong” choice (if there’s such a thing as the wrong choice), so it probably doesn’t matter much what we choose to do. Indeed, this is more like a rhetorical question. I’m just wondering out loud, if there is a moral implication when we choose not to share some information we believe is rightly ours and which is part of our private lives, whilst the majority of the outside world believe otherwise. Is there?
Pondering. 😛
Suspension
Clear sky, spotted with few fluffy clouds. Light breeze caresses skin, as if trying to soothe her nerves. It would’ve been a perfect day, had it not been this ‘thing’ that’s been bothering her. Why, she wonders. Why is this happening, that is. But more importantly, why is she letting it get to her. It feels as if she’s hanging from a cliff, not knowing whether she’ll be rescued, or if she’ll fall. No amount of nature’s beauty will be able to tranquilize her in that situation. Or, will it? In another point of view, there isn’t much she can do, so why not try to enjoy the surroundings and find peace in it? Perception is a very strange thing. We all know that it can change our behaviors, and all it takes is just to change our perception. Yet it is, sometimes, more hard-wired that we allow ourselves to believe.
Like in this case, she could very well choose to think that this irritant, which she has no control over, is but a pimple. One that is irritating to live with, but it will either be ‘ripe’ and be popped out, or it will eventually go away. Either way, it’ll be fine. This ‘thing’ that’s bugging her will eventually be resolved too. Patience, and a different perspective, are all she needs.