exaggeration and tall tales galore

Sunday, March 30, 2008

12:01

14 minutes until midnight. ready?

go.

13 minutes. but i don't know where to start.

You know how if you watch a movie or read a story and you come to the part where the main character asks the supporting character if she/he had the chance to live life all over again, would they change anything? and the supporting character will, without doubt, say something along the lines of

"no, i wouldn't change a thing. because then i wouldn't have learnt from my mistakes" and bla bla bla, something of that sort.

i don't get it. if i had a chance to live life all over again, would i change anything? YES! a big fat YES!

i'd change that time i won the story-telling competition and told the reporter that that the parent that helped me prepare for it was dad. dad did help. but mom deserved the credit. i should have said it was mom.

i would change that time i read kakak's diary(yes, i was the monster little sister from hell) back when i was 9 or something. i shouldn't have read it. i should have just put it back.

i would have changed that time when i was 17 and overheard dad discussing his expectations for my spm results with kakak. i shouldn't have eavesdropped. i should have turned up the volume of the tv.

i'd change the time i snapped at Amira back in form 1 when she asked me a question. that was so bloody mean of me. i'd change that. i'd answer nicely this time around.

i would change the time i lied to my parents about my results when i was 13. i was so scared, i knew they would freak when they saw how badly i did. and they found out anyway and i got into hot water for that. if i could do it over, i would tell them the truth from the start.

2 minutes.

sometimes, i honestly believe i'm too messed up to be able to set things right.

oh, sometimes it seems this will be as good as it gets.

midnight.

Thursday, March 27, 2008

everybody's gotta learn sometime

I just finished watching Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind, and i think(or i'd like to think) i appreciate the movie a whole lot better now. I've always been a fan of it, but i'd like to believe i can understand it better now. at least, a lot better than how i comprehended it the first time i watched it. and because of that, i can say i like it with more conviction.

now, i think the best way to watch a movie is on a laptop with headphones. it seems to enable you to just drink the movie in so much better, as compared to watching it on tv. and you can pick up the soundtrack so much more adequately. like the song that's on during the scene at the beginning where Clementine and Joel 'meet' and talk in the train, i never noticed it playing in the background the last time i watched the movie. watch it in bed with the notebook on your lap.

i made tortilla's for dinner today. the instant one la. the one that comes in a box complete with the seasoning for the filling and the sauce, and all you have to do is cook minced beef. but just wait and see. i'll become a good cook. at least, i hope i can. the idea of cooking is comforting. I like cutting meat into pieces. i like it when my fingers smell of bawang and garlic. i like stirring a pot of something. for now.

and jia yee taught me how to cook sayur. i was squealing at her "how much soy sauce do i put in?? how much???say stop say stop!!"

The tomatoes they have here are delicious. I can eat them raw constantly, they're that good.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Axion Baru

Remember this one?

Mari, mari puan dengar ini cerita,
Suami saya asyik, balik awal saja,
Ada pembantu baru katanya,
Tentu dia perempuan muda!

"Kan abang dah kata, Axion namanya!",
Axion ke Aziah? Tunjukkan pada saya!
Something, something something tak ingat,
Axion Baruuuuuuuu!

Hahahahahahahaha. I love it. i think i used to sing it at regular intervals back at school, and Asiah and Ina would indulge me by singing along.

Here's a tip on how to make A Satisfying Breakfast. it's not a perfect breakfast, but it's A Satisfying one.

1. Boil water. Make a mug of coffee and set it on the table to cool.
2. Put two slices of bread in the oven to grill.
3. make scrambled eggs.
4. Put eggs in a bowl and pour a glass of apple juice.
5. Take bread slices out of oven and bring everything to the dining table.
6. Take some scrambled eggs and spread it over a slice of bread.
7. Now, for toppings, i highly recommend drizzling on the sauce that comes with baked beans. You know the red sauce canned baked beans come in? yeah, that's the best. but if you're like me, that is, someone who dislikes the beans themselves and has no family members around to eat them, then i'd settle for barbecue sauce.
8. Bite. chew. savour.
9. sip some juice. bite again. chew. savour.
10. and when all the bread and scrambled eggs are gone, and you've downed the remains of your juice, stretch contentedly and see to your mug of coffee which is now the perfect temperature to drink.

oh,oh, shao if you're reading this, i hope you're having an excellent time in the land of sunny perth(it's sunny kan?). have fun and don't stress over your assignment. fresh perspective, yea?haha.

with shao gone, it's been just me and jia yee during easter break, and so far it's been pretty active. we went shopping,woot! we actually didn't spend any money at all during the week leading to easter break, all in the name of saving cash for the better purpose that is to shop. and we went to the beach, so that was hot(literally). but i think i most enjoyed lepak-ing with jia yee on the lawn in front of the library. The state library has some green turf out front, so whenever we pass it, we'd always see people lazing and lying about, and the green grass did seem inviting. so friday night we proposed to go down and try it for ourselves, and it was nice! weather was perfect, and i had donuts. i finally tried krispy kreme. they're very soft.

Back when we first moved into the apartment and had to buy cleaning fluids to do massive spring-cleaning. look how quizzical shao min looks. bukan senang tau nak pilih cecair pembersih yang tepat.
St. Kilda, woot.
Friday night, state library lawn, jia yee's coloured contacts. did you notice that my face is about twice as big as her's?

this whole post has been hardcore procastination. i should be doing my homework.

Friday, March 21, 2008

blisters

I am sleepy.

When i'm sleepy, i behave similarly to people who are drunk. i tend to ramble and sprout out nonsensical and often incoherent words. so don't mind me.

i got back from meeting my dad's friend about half an hour ago. I had dinner with her, her son, and a couple of her son's friends. I had a pleasant enough time, good food, and good enough conversation. But i had one heck of a time going to and coming back from that rendezvous.

We planned to meet up at her hotel, so i had to take a tram downtown to flinders street. but, the tram stopped at la trobe street(pretend you're drunk and know melbourne geography), and i assumed it was because it was good friday or whatnot. so i had to walk the rest of the way, which was fine, really, the weather was perfect for a stroll, and i had time to kill before i had to be there. but then when i got to flinders street, a huge chunk of the road was blocked off and road works were going on, so i had to take this somewhat significant detour before i could cross the road. i ended up walking behind fed square and walking around it before i could finally cross the river and get to southbank, where the hotel is. and by that time i was aware that i was cutting close on time, so i scurried along(my pumps making this nice 'clack-clack' sound as they hit the pavement, and i got to southbank.

then i got lost and couldn't locate the entrance to the hotel. and i realized i was on the verge of late. unfuckingbelievable. excuse the foul language.

but not to worry, i got there, and the auntie was all nice about it. so we went for dinner, and i met her son and his friends, and she even took us for dessert too. i had an eclair. yay.

and then we seperated, and her son went off with his friends, and i walked the nice auntie back to her hotel, where i bade her farewell after assuring her a number of times that yes, i would be fine, and no, she needn't accompany me, and started off back to swanston street. i walked along the river, and it was cold, and the moon was out and brilliant, like a spotlight in the sky. and i found myself thinking, just a few steps after i started walking, was that i wished someone was walking with me. and then i got blisters and my feet hurt.

at first, i think it was a practical wish. as in, it was a lovely night, perfect for taking a walk, and it was such a shame that i was walking alone. and then it became sentimental. i wanted someone to walk with, so i could have someone to talk to. It was a beautiful night, and ought to be shared with someone i cared about.

and then i reached the city, and there were loads of people walking about, and suddenly i thought 'isn't the city dangerous at night? especially on friday night, what with the possibility of drunkards at all the corner pubs?' and 'mom and dad told me not to walk around by myself at night', and found myself wishing for a guy to be walking with, to offer a sense of security. and, put together the practical wish, the sentimental wish, and the safety wish, and i found myself concluding that i wished i had a boyfriend.

suddenly wanting a boyfriend so as to have someone to walk with is absurd. it's like wanting to have boyfriend so that you'd have someone to lift all the heavy stuff.

sidenote: i can hear people laughing and screaming outside on the streets. hello, drunk people. Good friday, eh?

anyway, where was i? boyfriend?yeah. it was a stupid impulse thought. don't remind me, and i'll forget it in the morning.

but, for the moment, i can recall, besides the the blisters, wanting quite badly to have the soft shuffles of sneakers beside the 'clack-clacks' of my pumps.

Blue

aloha folks. it's cold again in melbourne, wheeeeee! after a series of days with 40 degrees celsius hot weather, temp's dropped down somewhat. leaving the sliding door open, it's like natural air-conditioning. makes me want to eat, sleep, and golek2 around in my quilt.

First things first. i still adore Fight Club. i watched it for the fourth time in the past few days before reluctantly returning it back to the library. The soundtrack's awesome, people. The scores during scenes are great, and the selection of songs popped out for me. Like the scene at the very end, they used this song by The Pixies called Where Is My Mind? which just fits it perfectly, perfectly! and another song, it came on during the scene where Edward Norton(jack?) and Tyler walk into the club to host the first ever official meeting of Fight Club. I looked around on the net, it's a song by Tom Waits called Goin' Out West, and it's just so badass! haha, i really can't describe it any other way. It was just made for macho guys to strut their stuff to. It's so badass, i can't stop smiling when i listen to it.

oh, and you know what? i dig So You Think You Can Dance here. Really entertaining(did you that in french, entertainment is 'les distractions'? how appropriate), and thanks to the show, i've come across a couple of excellently catchy songs. So catchy, i keep jiggy-ing around when i'm washing and drying the dishes listening to it. It's tricky business, thought. i have to keep a wary ear out for shao or jia yee if they're in the apartment, just in case they come out of their rooms and barge in on me dancing my emabarassing head off. Anyway. listen to this, Idlewild by Outkast:






and this, Are You the One? by The Presets:





I haven't been keeping up with any news(malaysian or australian), so i feel like an ill-bred ingrate, but whatever. about the election, i think it's good the BN coalition had to relinquish powe over some of the states. that just makes more sense, i think, a more even distribution of power, i suppose? yeah, well, what do i know. But whenever i read malaysiakini i can't help but think 'well, we're going into a shithole', but that's exactly the opposite of things, isn't it? i mean, isn't the recent election a signal of change, and isn't change supposed to be good? I don't know. it just seems like they are so many things wrong, and everyone says they'll do the right thing, but nothing seems to be right in the end, and there is always someone someone else is ridiculing, and you're not quite sure who's right, and who's better.

oh, dear. I'm going out to meet a colleague of my dad's who's in melbourne, and i'm worried i'll be the awkward bumbling idiot who spills over a glass of water and stumbles on the steps of the restaurant. classic. wish me luck.

Monday, March 17, 2008

tagging tequila

yes. i was given the tagging tequila by wei leong(or chinny, his name manje,haha) and wui ling (or old lady, her secret nickname, hee).

Instructions:Remove 1 question from below, and add in your personal question, make it a total of 20 questions, then tag 8 people in your list, list them out at the end of this post. Notify them in their chat box that he/she has been tagged.

1. If you were to be stranded on a desert island, who are the 3 blog buddies you would take with you? Why?
Let's see....nani. for tales of ubi quam, montreal and whatnot. Aijud. so we could sing the fray and kate nash songs together, plus discuss the most appropriate Grey's Anatomy quote for our predicament. and kakak. so i could chew her brains out over why she hasn't updated since forever.

2. Where is the place that you want to go the most?
As in fantasy vacation destination? i don't know. istanbul. south africa. Or do you mean like a metaphorical, meaningful place? like, i want to go where the grass is greener. if we're thinking short-term, as in right at this very moment, i want to go to a halal kfc.

3. If you can have 1 dream come true, what would it be?
I couldn't actually think of one, because i was arrested by so many ideas at the same time. It's like in a comedy where two fat guys get stuck at the door when they both try to exit. Neither gets out.

4. Do you believe you can survive without money?
Yes. i'll live off the fruits of the land. I'll grow grapes and i'll dry the ones i can't eat and make them into raisins(a trick i learned from Robinson Crusoe). I'll make sandals by cleverly weaving coconut leaves together.

5. What are you afraid to lose the most?
This frail grasp i have on what's important.

6. If you win $1 million, what would you do?
Keep it in a bank in the Cayman Islands. whoooo.(the 'whoooo' is supposed to represent a mysterious, intriguing sound effect. yeah whatever).

7. If you meet someone that you love, would you confess to him/her?
I dislike the association of the word 'confess' with telling someone you love them. it's sounds so...bleh. just say 'i told him/her' la. anyway. i haven't met someone i love yet, so ntah. I'd like to imagine that love is something that gives you the assurance that the feeling is reciprocated, but i guess not. what am i saying?not answering the question. yes, i would confess. if i wasn't too chicken shit to actually do it.

8. List out 3 good points of the person who tagged you.
Wei Leong:
-he's funny! great sense of humor.
-friendly. i think we only hung out together once, during that time we went to sunway lagoon, and yet from there on after he'd always give me a 'hi' and a wave whenever we bumped into each other. not everyone would do that, you know.
-smart. and he's got super stylish hair too.

wui ling:
-she likes to joke around. and she goes ice skating too!
-she was willing to be the last person to get back up on the banana boat in langkawi!! and that memory always makes me giggle, so she cheers me up.
-sweet girl!

9. What are the requirements that you wish from your other half?
let me put it this way. there's this scene in Fight Club(did i mention that i love this movie?) where Jack confronts Marla over being a tourist in help groups, and she in turn asks him why he himself goes to them.
Jack:i don't know. when people think you're dying, they actually listen to you, rather than...
Marla:rather than just waiting for their turn to speak.

I want someone who doesn't make me feel like i'm delaying their turn to speak. and vice versa. among other things.

10. Which type of person do you hate the most?
Rude ones. Australian phone operators(tech support, bank customer service, etc) are a lot more friendier than back home.

11. What is your ambition?
to be a kickass accountant. to be a better person, inside out.

12.What is the thing that will make you think he/she is bad?
For fuck's sake, what a juvenile question.

13. What do you think is the most important thing in your life?
I don't know, and that's scary.

14.Are you a shopaholic or not?
Yes, but if shopaholicism is akin to alcoholiscism, then i'm in the stage where i'm still in denial. Long way to go before i hit bottom and start saving money instead.

15. If you have a chance, which part of your character you would like to change?
The part that takes things for granted, and the part that complains too much.

16. Who is the person that you can share all your problems with?
Tricky question,that.

17. What's your weakest point?
Low self-esteem, i suppose?

18. What's the thing that you're most proud of?
Nothing, really.(ok stop it with the 'deep' questions!)

19. Rainy day or sunny day?
Rainy day. so i can sing a la Gene Kelly. (I'm siiiiiiiiiiiiingin' in the rain...just siiiiiiiiingin' i the rain....)

20. What mini-resolution have you decided to make as of 1 minute ago?
I have got to take more pictures.

ok, i tag nani aijud fatin fifa anna(even though u don't blog anymore ;P) firdaus(will you please consider the merits of having blog at blogspot or wordpress?) shao min afiqah. whew. and it doen't matter if you don't do it, i won't take offense,yada yada yada. you know how it goes.

cheers.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

copy-paste. edward norton club

12.16am. Now 12.17am. I’ve just finished watching Fight Club, and now I’m alternating between Microsoft-wording(the new blogging) and browsing through all the extra features on the dvd. I must say, I thought the movie was great! In my humble opinion.

Ok, when it comes to movies, I am satisfied with bubblegum. Does that make sense? It’s hard to make sense when you’re keeping an ear on a dvd commentary. Right. If movies were music, then I would be satisfied with Fall Out Boy, Hilary Duff, Hannah Montana, and whatever else that’s brilliantly pink and mainstream. Give me romantic comedies, give me movies with shallow plots that are wonderfully entertaining, give me the same bloody cliché of boy meets girl, boy misunderstands girl, boy makes up with girl, I love it all!

It suffices to say, I thought Fight Club was brilliant, but I don’t actually trust my own judgment because I'm so easily pleased. But it’s the first thing I’ve seen in a while that made me feel.. I don’t know…refreshed? It was refreshing. Yeah. Whatever. And I thought it was funny.

I have a crush on Edward Norton. Fuh.

I confess, I couldn’t finish The Constant Gardener. I returned it without getting half-way past. It’s interesting, but for some reason(maybe i wasn't intellectually stimulated enough), I didn’t like it enough to continue reading it.

Tim-tams here are better! No joke.

Oh, oh. I read this in Nick Hornby’s A Long Way Down:

‘You know that things aren’t going well for you when you can’t even tell people the simplest fact about your life, simply because they’ll presume you’re asking them to feel sorry for you. I suppose it’s why you feel so far way from everyone, in the end; anything you can think of to tell them just ends up making them feel terrible’.

1.04 am.

One of my lecturers is an old man, whom I(affectionately) think of as the Grandpa, and I bet he’s the nice sort, the one that buys ice creams and lollypops for his grandchildren. But his voice and the way he lectures just beseeches you to not pay attention and let your mind wander elsewhere.

I am a devotee of the cult that strives to perfect the art of mind-wandering while keeping a perfectly attentive face, as if you are wholeheartedly, with every fiber of your being, concentrating on what the teacher/lecturer/penceramah is saying. Back in form 2, I was still a novice and horrible at it, like the time in agama class, when there was a boring presentation going on, and I started doodling(that in itself was a no-no. NEVER doodle, unless you’ve mastered the technique of doodling in a manner that looks like you’re scribbling down notes professionally). I broke the cardinal rule of being always aware where the teacher was. I was pleasurably doodling away, when suddenly the ustazah was right behind me, looking over my shoulder! Needless to say, I got the evil eye and a sharp word from her. But with time, I got the hang of it, and by Form 5 I was a pro, if I do say so myself. You should have seen me in biology classes! The ones in the lab. Where the teacher was talking about something to do with plants(in biology, the parts to do with plants were always the most boring ones). I’d look like I wasn’t thinking of anything else but xylems and floem, whereas in reality I would probably have been having my favourite daydream at that point in my life, the one where evil beings(humans, but with fighting skills and some forms of super powers) of some other world storm into the lab to pick a fight or to attack someone(usually the victim would be the teacher/lecturer/penceramah in question) and I’d be the good being(human too, but I’m good), the one who until now had to keep my powers and martial arts prowess a secret, and I’d fight them until they’d slink away.

Yes. I was 16 going on 17, and the level of my fantasies were still at the good-vs.-evil and super powers level. So effing what?

When I was small, in standard 1, there was this one time mom actually had the decency to entrust me with a thermos that was lined with glass inside. This was back in the days where I brought my own lunch to school to eat mase rehat. And I remember mom was reluctant to let me bring it. After all, it was glass and therefore breakable. But for some reason I ended up bringing it anyway. Hmm. Maybe we didn’t have another water-bottle handy mase tu kot, back then if I’m not mistaken we’d just moved back here from Kerteh.

Anyway, I remember mom reminding me a few times to take extra care of the thermos and to make sure I didn’t bang or drop it. And I was extra careful! I made sure I was holding it steady. After I finished eating at the canteen, I went back to class with my friends, but rehat time wasn’t over, and as we all know, it’s a sin to be in the classroom during recess period. So we were just waiting around, maybe we played something, I don’t know. The thermos was still safe and sound, and it was almost a couple minutes until the bell would ring. Almost home free!

I can’t remember what happened right before, but I recall the point where the bell rang. And I had been talking to a few friends, among them this girl named Alia, a bit chubby, fair, wore glasses. She moved away in standard 3. Anyway, the bell rang, and there was the mad rush to get back to classes. Well, Alia rushed off, and in doing so, she bumped into me. She bumped into me, and I dropped the thermos. She didn’t notice I guess, she continued careening off to class. I picked up the thermos, and hoped that the worst hadn’t happened. Yeah, well. No such luck. When I shook the thermos, you could hear all the clunks and ker-chunks the broken pieces of glass made as they bumped against the thermos shell. And I think it almost sounded good for a second, because it sounded like ice clinking against the wall of a big glass of deliciously cold juice or ribena. But of course that notion was dispelled in the next few seconds and I realized I wasn’t careful enough to show mom that I could be careful enough.

When I got home and showed it to her, I was still hoping the thermos would be salvageable in some way, like maybe we could take out all the glass pieces and use the thermos anyway, seeing as on the outside it looked just fine. But mom said we couldn’t use it anymore and threw the thermos away.

When I first started blogging, back in that friendster blog, I didn’t use paragraphs. I would just type a whole block of text for a post. Why on earth did I do that? What part of my brain forgot paragraphs?

p/s: Wei leong and wui ling(damn matching la your names), thanks for tagging me! honestly, i like getting tagged. Gives me a valid reason to talk about myself. anyway, sorry i couldn't get around to doing it yet, still internetless at the apartment, and it's a real bugger. but i'll do it soon. hopefully the bloody internet will be up next week.

Monday, March 10, 2008

cherries

being in the computer lab doesn't come in handy for people who are trying to create wonderful, meaningful, emotional posts. doesn't come in handy at all.

but you should have seen me yesterday!all emo and shit. it was crazy!i was dying to blog, but i couldn't because the broadband connection still hasn't been set up yet at the apartment. and there i was, trying frantically to get across to someone(someone as in, random sesiape reading the blog), to tell them the day i had and how it made me felt. someone shoot me.

now that it's now and not yesterday, things have toned down, and i still want to tell a random sesiape things, but between now and then, i've become aware that whatever it is i was trying to say yesterday will sound unbelievably like idiotic, self-pitying crap. which it always is, btw.

so yesterday i tried to substitute the blog and instead just type it as a normal, microsoft word document. and it was cool and everything, but it didn't feel 100% satisfactory. because that's the whole point of a blog, isn't it? a public blog. you post with the hope that whatever it is you write, there's someone out there who can identify with it and comprehend, and maybe even laugh sympathetically. the idea that someone out there understands is enough to make things slightly better.

if someone wants to tell me off and say i'm blogging for the wrong reasons, then i apologize. i'm sorry.

would you like to know what it feels like?

it feels like sitting with the nicest, friendliest bunch of people, and still feeling alone. and you want to burst into tears, because you've gone through this a bunch of times and you've sworn or at least conjured the longing to change things and make it better, but apparently you haven't or you can't. and you fully comprehend that this is probably what drives people away in the first place, but you don't understand what is it that you're doing wrong. what is it? what are you not doing correctly?

and, at the back of your mind, you worry if it's going to be like this the next time. and the next. until you stop making effort at all.

well, there you go. a snippet of insanity. or irrationality, whatever.

Monday, March 03, 2008

poulet

i am:

waiting for the phone line to get set up so i can get bloody internet for the apartment.

trying to remember where i put my driver's license. (i just can't recall where i put it! don't tell me i lost it. gah)

killing time until my very first class(transition to commerce, which, by the way, i still don't know where it'll be held).

feeling a bit sleepy, and i think it's due to the lack of coffee. we don't have a kettle yet.

reminding myself to get kettle, coffee, sugar, juice, creamer.

a bit tickled at the fact that kawan kepada kakakku eliza put up the song 'Sideways' by Let's Go Sailing on her blog. i had written a post few days ago to be published when i got a decent broadband connection, and i had that song on repeat while i was writing it. which may explain the fact that the end product is a tad too melodramatic. but yay for 'Sideways'!pretty, pretty song.

pondering how many books and dvds i will have to borrow from the rowden white library in order to justify spending a bunch of cash on student union membership. i borrowed 4 items today, so we're off to a good start.

missing CHICKEN!MEAT!WHOLE CHICKEN DRUMSTICKS!should stop by norsiah's or something later on.

going now.