because i will blog anyway

Walking home from the supermarket, late afternoon. Earphones in.

The Wombats-Let's Dance to Joy Division

I cross the road to avoid those people who stand in the middle of the way and and ask you to support something/answer a survey/do something related to some persatuan. I walk along the road eyeing them on the opposite side thinking "why am i doing this? Because i am nervous at the idea of being approached". Which is ridiculous because by right the person doing the asking would be more nervous at the idea of approaching a stranger, right? Why should i be scared? just say tak nak and move on la. But then i i feel guilty because i'd have to do the polite yet aloof but somehow friendly brush off. So the best way to avoid the messiness of it all is to cross to the other side of the road. You get to avoid the whole shebang, plus you burn more calories from the extra walking.

Let the love tear us apart, i've found a cure for a broken heart.

Several steps forward. I'm crossing the road again(after passing the danger zone).

Ingrid Michaelson-The Way I Am.

I pass by a couple(i presume they're a couple). They've obviously done some shopping, both are holding nice multi-colored paper bags. I glance at the bags wistfully and become fully aware that rather than carrying a cool-looking Lacoste shopping bag, i am instead carrying a plastic bag with my newly bought toilet paper rolls. Damn.

I walk pass one of the RMIT buildings, and i see this lady and a girl walking in front of me, i take them to be mother daughter. I peek at the bags they're carrying, the mother's carrying a pack of toilet paper rolls too,whoo! but then again, she's not walking alone. she's walking with her daughter. Which reminds me. i miss my mom. i miss home. it's funny, the things that trigger homesickness. Seeing products that have 'made in malaysia' stamped on the back. spotting a plane descending. makes you think of a plane ascending, with you in it, to go back home.

'Cause I love you more than I could ever promise,
And you take me the way i am'.

Flash forward, i am sitting at my desk, trying to read some intro micro notes, and suddenly i feel inconceivably angry. it all comes down to this? memorizing a definition, memorizing what a production function is, recalling the difference between fixed and variable costs,etc? just this pathetic act of remembering something to be able to spew it back out for an exam? this determines your grade and therefore how smart you are? bullshit.

So. I turn to Kings of Leon-Ragoo.

I know, I know. I'm learning with the wrong intentions in mind. We're not learning for the sake of passing exams now, are we? ok. Don't worry. i am aware exams go beyond memorizing. QM1 is a fair example of that.yergh.

I'll be alright long as I ain't seen it all
And I'mma holding tight to that night we had a ball,
We had a ball.

i want pancakes

wei. wei,everyone. Kings of Leon.

I was doing some accounting yesterday, and while calculating figures i was youtubing them. There are 3 things to be noted down from this:

1. i know youtubing while doing homework is not ideal.
2. But how often can you youtube search a band and like practically every song you click on?
3. I discovered their song My Party, wow wow wow wow wow.

Saya-tak-tahan-suke-sangat-dari-pertama-kali-dengar. It's one bloody good song. the bassline is unbelievably catchy, and it just has so much attitude, i love it. can't make head or tails of the lyrics, but i wouldn't have it any other way.

I spent the next hour replaying it, bopping up and down in my chair idiotically. this song is so catchy, did i mention that? It makes me want to dance to it(even though i'm not sure how and may look retarded in the process).

and the thing is, it's not just that song. it's practically all their songs! the ones i've heard so far, anyway. I mean, i was psyched when i heard Knocked Up, but when you combine that with the fact that plenty of their other songs satisfy you on the same level, now that's fantastic. How many times have you adored a song by a musician, then listen to their other songs and go 'meh'?

i would ramble about how it's super awesome the way their songs are so diverse and talk about how Charmer has this gritty edge that just works, or how Caleb's voice makes King of the Rodeo stand out from being just a regular nice indie-band tune, or that Four Kicks is a bloody fun(if short) song, but i am inarticulate, and maybe you already know and agree(or not) with all this, or don't really want to know.

haih. this is good. i'm excited to listen to their albums. must get them.(Ya Allah i saw their latest one Because of The Times in the cd shop back home even before i left for melbourne, why oh why didn't anything point me to buy it then?it was under my nose!)

i'll wait until after exam to get it. yeah, that's it. it'll be like an incentive(wheeeee!)

this is good.

i'm going to go on a rampage in the supermarket tomorrow. my groceries are finished.

Taking off in a Coupe De Ville

i'm super-damn-terrer at wasting time, and i wish i had studied more today, i really do.

of course, it is idiotically idiotic to write(type) a sentence like the above, because if i really had wanted to study more, i'd have done so, wouldn't i?

I read that we lost Pulau Batu Puteh. no shit?

I like looking at good pictures taken by amateur photographers. it's like, 'wow.' i feel a bit a jealous when it seems like they've managed to convey a little bit of their soul into the picture they've taken.

Kings of Leon, people. Kings of Leon. Why in the world don't i listen to them more? they seem pretty awesome. I love Knocked Up. I think it's...beautiful. i don't know. it touches a nerve. well, fine, it touches one of my nerves.

I don't care what nobody says,no, i'm gonna be her lover.

If you read the comments on their videos on youtube, you'd see that the lead singer Caleb's been described as just about everyone. Leonardo Dicaprio. A clean Ozzy Osbourne. Ashton Kutcher with a bad wig. But his voice is pretty amazing. I really dig Charmer! I watched a clip of them playing it live, he pulled the screeching part off perfect, just like the recorded version.

Last week of classes,yo. just need to pull myself together for a couple more weeks. couple more weeks. couple more weeks.

friendships. what's in a friendship that looks good on the surface, but really, you know that it's lukewarm underneath? no,wait. not lukewarm. it's just that we're all fine when we're laughing at something hilarious and taking pictures or giving good-willed comments on facebook, but what about if you're sad, or if i am? would you tell me? would i be there for you? would you just annoy me and make me switch off? would you not trust me to say the right thing? would we be content with one another if we didn't have anything to talk about? can we do comfortable silences? and i wonder, seriously, does the person on the other end realize this and just accepts this lack of depth in our friendship? or do they honestly think all friendships are like this and that it's normal?

In line with my newfound spiritual optimism, i want to turn all my superficial friendships into proper, warm-blooded, deeply-rooted ones. now. how do i go about doing that exactly?

in line with my still-existing pessimism, i don't think it's actually feasible.

or maybe, boleh je have proper friendships, it's just that i've been doing things the wrong way.

Just in case you couldn't take a hint. Nah, saya present kepada awak, Knocked Up. The day i go to my first mat salleh gig, i wish it would be like this.

Baik!i will go study!i will!(exclamation marks used to boost semangat)

Theoretically, a 5 minute break. Realistically, a 10/15/20 minute lapse in studying momentum

Do you listen to Adele? Famous for Chasing Pavements, and apparently her song Hometown Glory(a gorgeous,solemn song) was featured on one of the new Grey's Anatomy episodes. Anyway, her voice has this sort of amazing quality(and everyone keeps comparing her to Amy Winehouse, but ntah, i don't think i would), and she's got this fantastic control over her vocals, it's just lovely to hear.

Listen to this. Daydreamer. Aptly named, it's such a dreamy song.

Daydreamer, sitting on the seat
Soaking up the sun he is a real lover,
Making up the past
And feeling up his girl like he's never felt her figure before
A jaw dropper
Looks good when he walks,
He is the subject of their talk
He would be hard to chase,
But good to catch
And he could change the world with his hands behind his back,
Oh

You can find him sitting on your doorstep
Waiting for the surprise
And it will feel like he's been there for hours
And you can tell that he'll be there for life

Daydreamer, with eyes that make you melt
He lends his coat for shelter plus he's there for you
When he shouldn't be
But he stays all the same, waits for you, then sees you through
There's no way I could describe him
All I say is, just what I'm hoping for

But I will find him sitting on my doorstep
Waiting for the surprise
It will feel like he's been there for hours
And I can tell that he'll be there for life
And I can tell that he'll be there for life.

preparations for studying.

When embarking on a mission to study a subject, in this case the much lauded Quantitative Methods 1, it is perhaps unwise to publicly declare war on said subject by posting statements such as "QM1, prepare to be kicked in the balls!" on one's blog.

Therefore, i hereby proclaim i have made peace with QM1, and have established diplomatic relations. we're quite chummy now, in fact. All thanks to our new mediator, that is Australian Business Statistics, by Antony and Saroja Selvanathan, Gerald Keller and Brian Warrack.

Due to the fulfilling relationship i have managed to achieve with my once arch-nemesis, i now wish to extend the same olive branch of friendship to Accounting Reports and Analysis as well as Introductory Microeconomics. Let us join as a united front. Rather than fight each other to the finish line that is the examination, let us embrace one another as old friends! Let us tango like latin lovers! let us be assimilated to one another like the threads of a friendship bracelet! Let us BE AS ONE!!!

see? see how i'm setting up good vibes for studying? i bet you can't beat that enthusiasm. now, let's hope that these subjects acknowledge my efforts and reciprocate my affection.

macrobiotic

i'm trying to plan out next's week meals. i'm trying to figure out a way to portion my groceries in such a way that i will not have to go to the supermarket next week. and i'm trying to ensure that i will have adequately filling meals, so that i won't go off and binge on cheerios and shapes crackers like i did just now.

i have a feeling i will fail.

so the exam thingie has been swinging into gear. do you ever get the feeling like you're doing work(you think), but when you review what you studied at the end of the day it doesn't seem like much? And so you recap and see that you probably spent more time doing things like printing notes, eating, washing and drying the dishes as well as taking breaks rather than spending it on proper, fully-concentrated studying.

yesterday was nani's birthday!yay(waves pom-poms)

I have a lot of zits at the moment(i know, gross, but would you rather me use my fingers to type this and tell you or use them to pop my pimples? haha, i'm kidding!i don't pop zits. usually.), and i'd like to think they're caused by exam tension, but unfortunately i must concede that's they're probably not. i'm too perky at the time being to be tense.

Anna tagged me and i'm raring to do it(because it's long! i like long tags), but i'll have to save it for when i have earned a proper break after devoting a respectable amount of hours studying secare betul2. or until i have less zits, whichever one comes first.

oh!oh!i know a lot of people already read Yasmin Ahmad's blog, but just in case you don't, check out this video she plugged. i think it's unbelievably cute and funny, as cliched as that may sound. cheers.

Un foulard gris

you see, the way i see it is this. If i do all the procastinating things NOW, then i won't have any excuse to procrastinate further when I've actually finished procrastinating and start doing the work. and therefore, that it why i am blogging, when i actually have QM1 homework to do.

I'm in the mood for acoustic sentimentality tonight, so:

Step 1: Listen to Toothpaste Kisses.
Step 2: Listen to the now famous Moldy Peaches' Anyone Else But You.
Step 3: Listen to World Spins Madly On by The Weepies(props to Aijud for enlightening me on these folks)

I bought a gray scarf (je achete un foulard gris) and i adore it, i really do. Sometimes i feel like anyone could just pull on the two ends of the scarf while I'm wearing it and asphyxiate me to death, but aside from those moments, i really dig it. I used to think that a scarf wouldn't make much of a difference and was more of a fashion accessory rather than a properly functional item, but that was dumb, and I'm wrong, i know. A scarf makes a whole lot of difference.

You know what? To whoever it is that's reading my blog, and not ridiculing or scoffing at it; to you i say thank you. If it's kakak, or nani, aijud or anna, anyone who knows me or doesn't, thank you for reading. thank you for bothering to peruse the nonsense i come up with. I don't know why you're reading it in the first place, and you may not even think much of it, but just know that i find the idea that you're reading absurdly cool. and quite mind-boggling, to be honest.

I was, am, very happy today, for no apparent reason, not really. But I am, even though i can feel the last tinges of cheeriness and incomprehensible giddiness fading away even as a type this. Allah has been so good to me, so good. Alhamdulillah. To be honest, i don't think i deserve to feel this happy. I am happy to be happy, but at the same time, i keep looking over my shoulder to look out for the next stroke of bad luck or mood-swing. Which indicates something bad, though I'm not sure what. It's bad to have grown so acclimatised to feeling down that you're wary of feeling good without legitimate reason.

i made a pact to get my shit together today, and though i've made that vow and broken it countless of times, maybe, just freaking possibly; it'll be different this time.

God, i love good music. and i love my gray scarf.

Optimism at its best.

Bonjour!

Right, I have just finished watching this movie called Les Choristes, and it’s left me feeling all warm and fuzzy. I am delightfully optimistic at the time being, and therefore this moment must be documented in order to be referred to in times of doom and gloom(as things go boom…..in DEXTER’S LAAAAAB!!If you’ve never watched Dexter’s Lab, you are deprived and this will be irrelevant).

I tend to see things as half empty rather than half full, betul? Ok. Mari kita lakukan aktiviti bina jati diri. Senaraikan perkara-perkara yang menyedihkan anda pada masa ini, dan kemudian tukarkannya kepada perkara yang menyenangkan hati:

1.
Sedih: Got some bad news about the apartment. Well, not so much sad as annoying. And the unreliability of some people can drive you crazy!
Gembira:My roommates have been more than understanding about it, to which I am extremely grateful. Props to shao and jia yee. And we managed to stuff in some stress-induced laughter, woot. It’s good to have good roommates.

2.
Sedih:I think we’ve finished up our internet usage quota for the month. This means that our current connection is slow. Very ma fan.
Gembira:At least uni’s near by, so I can go to the computer lab there. Plus, I took this whole broadband usage quota thing as the topic for my microeconomics essay, so ask me why Aussie has caps on broadband usage while Malaysia doesn’t. ask me why ask me why! I can at least tell you my theory.

3.
Sedih:I am still lost in Quantitative Methods 1. I am as lost in it as penguins would be in the Amazon basin.
Gembira:I look forward to tackling this whole mystifying subject when I actually start studying for exams. Quantitative Methods 1, prepare to be kicked in the balls. KA-POW!

4.
Sedih:My headphones went kaput. Sebelah dah tak dengar.
Gembira:I can buy new headphones. I’ll get cool-looking ones. Headphones that cradle your ears lovingly and keep out the sound of noisy trams and lorries that prevent listening pleasure.

5.
Sedih:Bouts of grumpiness, due to lack of understanding in QM1, growing panic over exams(only a month away! And all the exams are one after another on consecutive days! Blimey)
Gembira:Bursts of cheeriness due to songs like The Maccabees’ Toothpaste Kisses. The ‘whoo-woo’ at the beginning of the song gets me every time. Thanks kakak!

6.
Sedih: I am sleepy.
Gembira: I am going to sleep.

Hummingbird

I thought i was sleepy, but the coffee i had at Azrieal's place just now had me wide-eyed and blinking in bed.

Kakak answered my plea for new songs and gave me a bunch of really are lovely tunes. Kakak, that song by The Maccabees is pretty! And that french song Mon Coeur Mon Amour rocks too. I will email you and gush more about the songs soon.

I have run out of things to blog about. i realize that my repertoire of blogging material has revolved around the following main topics:

• apologizing over the fact i never blog about something substantial
• apologizing over the fact that the things i blog about are self-indulgent
• feeling shitty(and the causes of said shitty feeling-mainly social awkwardness and low self-esteem)
• the food i eat
• the songs i listen to and the movies i've been watching
• benda-benda random yang merapu

ok,ok,ok. Because of the lack of material to blog about, I am going to tell you one thing that's made me very happy since coming here to melbourne, and it's not even some attraction in melbourne in the first place. I call home once a week, and whenever i call home, i usually talk to each member of the family present. Whenever i talk to my dad, and the conversation's about to come to an end, he'll finish by saying "Ok, I'll talk to you again soon. I love you".

Oklah, i won't be all soap-opera-ish and bore you with the details of family relationships and whatnot, but to those who don't get what the big deal is, you're probably accustomed to such phrases up to a point where you might take it for granted. Don't. Don't EVER EVER EVER take expressions of affection for granted.

this may sound supremely pathetic, but i'm reading my old posts. I've gotten up to about early last year so far, but man. Man,oh man,oh man. i feel like the person who wrote those posts back then was naive, slightly pathetic(the movie post still annoys me), and perhaps a bit too perky(but also moody) at times, but God, i kind of wish i was her. No, not exactly. I mean, i'm still all of those things i think, but i don't know. i feel like i've changed a bit. Just a bit, because how much can a person change in a year and a half anyway? but i think there is some sort of difference, and not necessarily for the better. yergh, how do i put this? i read my old posts and get this sort of wistful, somewhat regretful feeling. It feels like you've lost something you want or had, and regret the fact you didn't do anything to retain it.

That's it. i feel like i've lost something, some better part of me that may have existed back then.

AISY. so much for not blogging self-indulgently. are you bored with all of this? i am too.

oh please, gimme me a break

oooh, i've just finished watching The Devil Wears Prada, and i liked it.

ok, i have fucked up my econs assignment, but never fear!it's due in 4 days. nevermind the fact i spent the whole afternoon doing it, that i have to erase all that and start afresh. takpe!four days is good. four days is fucking adequate. and i suppose i should get cracking and start on it now, but i know that if i do, i'll be resenting the wasted afternoon the whole time, and won't get anywhere. so. blog first, assignment later.

WAAAAAAAARAGAH!!bengangnye bengangnye.

I wish, i wish, i wish i had a coffee guide. i need someone to show me the finer qualities of coffee. Someone who could tell me which one is french-roasted coffee beans(apparently they're the darkest roasted coffee beans of all,whooo), or urge me to try coffee made out of beans called blue jamaican something something, or arabica apetah nama die. it all sounds bloody exotic and highly intruiging, a far cry away from my average cuppa in the mornings. and this guide would be able to tell me exactly what's the difference between espresso and cappuccino, a macchiato and a cafe latte, and what about a mocha? A coffee connoisseur.

Did you know coffee was once considered haram for muslims for a while back in the 16th century? well, that's what wiki says.

Time seems to be passing by very quickly here. It’s Monday, it’s Tuesday, whoops, it’s Wednesday! Halfway through! Then it’s Thursday, Friday(wheee!) and the weekend’s here! But not for long, before you know it we’re trudging through Monday morning again, then it’s Tuesday, then whoops, Wednesday! And you see how it goes. Weeks seem to be flying past and we’re just getting through the assignments, going to the lectures, buying groceries, walking to uni, it’s all melded into this monotonous, repetitive routine.

Don’t get me wrong, if anything, I like monotony. Because I am one of those headless chickens who are too afraid to step out of their comfort zone and try new things.

If you youtube search Damien Rice, the first song that'll pop out will be The Blower's Daughter, which i think is an awesome song. If you, like me, have just started listening to songs by him, try Volcano.

Go on, click the play button on this bright yellow rectagular strip ni. ala, yang benda kuning kat atas ni, you can't miss it. click play.

oh come on, who am i kidding.

i hate the idea of doing my assignment now. but no matter. soldier on.

i'm pretty sure it's colder than that

in these past days, i seem to devote more and more of my time to two things: eating(i mean, memang dah banyak pon masa allocated for eating, but now it's even more!), and blogging. and i believe neither are doing me any good.

i came home from my lecture, and walloped 2 burritoes. and then, amazingly enough, i was still hungry. my stomach felt like i hadn't eaten any burritoes at all-that kind of hungry. and so i made pancakes(ala, yang instant tu), and had them with a (un)healthy drizzle of maple syrup. then the beast that is my appetite cooled down a bit, and we both agreed to chill and browsed the net for a while, and washed the dishes, then it decided to have a lovely big fat fuji apple.

and so here i am, chomping down the last bits of my apple, blogging. the extent of my hunger is fascinating, if not worrying. is it because of the weather? or is it because i've gotten used to the bigger portions they serve here and am no longer satisfied by my usual definition of a decent meal size?

alamaaak. i have this sudden urge to go to seven eleven across the street and get a packet of barbecue chips yang crinkle cut tu, apetah brand die. the one in the orange bag. smith's? it's only 8, technically it is still a decent hour to munch something.

not by Oprah's standards though. i think she's the one that advocates the no-eating-past-7 rule.

and then there's blogging. gah. sometimes too much blogging, i believe, is a bad thing. especially when you're the type who allow your fluctuating moods to dominate what you write.

how much cyberspace are you allowed to waste with your moaning and your so-called woes before you yourself feel like you want to take a whack of a shovel to the head? and yet i still want to do it. because after dinner when i'm contentedly facing the computer, it's usully still early, so there's not much to do but blog. well there's plenty to do(i.e:assignments and reading notes), but blogging is the preferred option. obviously.

saje je.

creep

I think my former crush has a thriving social life. Whereas I, in turn, am still walking around with a neon sign blinking ‘social reject’ on my head.

Now, when I say crush, I mean that it was a fully one-sided affair. I liked this guy(though I could see no reason why and tried at regular intervals to stop the sentimentality), and it went for quite a while, and then I saw that he probably wouldn‘t be infatuated with me anytime soon, and besides, we didn’t have much in common. When you like someone, and that person doesn’t like you, you can’t do much, can you? And I’m fully convinced that it was simply a dumb thing because a) we had, as I said; nothing in common, and b) just because someone makes you nervous and flustered doesn’t mean that it amounts to an infatuation.

So that was that. However, in the time where I was befuddled and-despite active efforts to tell myself otherwise- infatuated, I managed to cause quite a mess. I told him things I wouldn’t have told my friends. I think I once told him, somewhat jokingly(but meaning it quite seriously, of course), that I liked him, and God knows what else. I suppose I made quite a fool of myself. It creeps me out to think what his perception is of me. It makes me mad to think I’m somewhat in a vulnerable position because of the stupid things I said to him.

Why would I tell him things that would otherwise have been personal? I don’t know. I suppose that in liking someone, you conjure this best image of them. You picture that as someone understanding, someone who’d listen, someone who’d fucking care, and give a damn. That’s what liking someone is about, isn’t it?

Well, he’s capable of all of the above, I suppose. The catch is, just not with me.

The trouble with unrequited like(I can’t say unrequited love, because a) hello? We don’t know what love is yet. At least I don’t, b)it’s too damn melodramatic, and c)it reminds me too much of the literature questions back in form 2 and 3. Remember? ‘What are the main themes in The Phantom Of The Opera?’.)is that you wonder what is it about you that person you’re infatuated with can’t like you back. Is it your looks? Am I too fat? Too dark? Am I too tall? Is it your personality? Am I too boring? Am I not ladylike enough? Not morally upright enough? And, unless you’re very sure and cocky of yourself, you’d probably start wondering whether you’re likeable material at all.

I think Thom Yorke gets it.

I want you to notice,
When I’m not around,
You’re so very special,
I wish I was special.
But I’m a creep,
I’m a weirdo,
What the hell am I doing here,
I don’t belong here.
-Creep, by Radiohead.

And you bounce back from it, because after all, in the grand scheme of thing, what’s a fucking crush got to do with anything? but sometimes you still wonder.

Wah. I update very regularly now, yes? I wanted to go the bed, but it was still too early.

cabbages

bonjour, mon ami. comment ca va? je suis bien. Aujourd'hui, je vais a Bridge Road avec Jia Yee pour shopping. Les vetements, ce sont cher! mais, j'achete trois choses-un pantalon, un manteau, et un sac a main. je suis tres heureuse! Aussi, j'ai faim.

haven't learned how to do past tense yet. sorry.

So yeah, we endeavoured to go shopping today. My wallet became bulimic. it vomited out all the money that was put into it. but i am trying (quite successfully, too) to justify each of my purchases. i needed a coat, it's getting colder and my awesome purple jumper won't quite cut it any more. and the slobbish blue sweater is so far ok, but with this new jacket i bought, i can alternate it with the sweater and this jacket's longer, so i can wear my tunics with it(it looks ridiculous when i wear the sweater over a tunic because the bottom part of the tunic sticks out). see?a good buy. and i got it at a reasonable price.

justify,baby. justification makes the guilt go away. nevemind that i haven't justified the other two purchases.

Don't be fooled if you think you're poor and can't afford to go shopping in Melbourne(like i did, when i first came). Why?
a) You'll definitely be able to find your place amongst Melbourne's shopping hierarchy. of course there's the let's-not-even-go-there level, reserved for the Chanel and Prada and Louis Vuitton boutiques littered in the CBD. and there's also the next level, the we-don't-offer-haute-couture-but-we're-still-pretty-damn-exclusive level, places like Nine West and David Lawrence, which might be affordable to the affluent some, but i am not affluent some. after that, there's the even-cheaper-and-our-store-still-looks-nice-and-classy level, which comprises of your typical Country Road, Witchery, Jeans West and such. and which i would like to have as my own level, but yet i groan inwardly when reading price-tags in those shops. and therefore i belong in the subsequent category, which is the you-can-tell-we're-cheap-by-the-way-we-longgok-things-in-piles-and-racks level.

where was i going with this? ah yes. my point is, you'd belong in any one of these levels or in multiple, depending on your income/allowance status. so yeah. no worries.

b)when they say sale, they really mean sale. not the measly 20% or 30% off we find at homes(sure, there may be some that get 50% or 70% slashed off, but usually it's the ugly stuff). but here a sale means that chances are more than likely that you'll find really good bargains. and people here seem to find endless reasons to have sales. Easter sale. mid-season sale. end of season sale.

i can't believe i'm blogging about shopping, for God's sake.

My parents did not spend so much money to send me here to shop.

Cabbages have got to be the best vegetable here. i can't say in the whole world, because in my opinion that title's reserved for pucuk manis and kangkung, but as neither of them can be found here, i'll settle for kobis cooked with oyster sauce and telur. wah. sungguh lazat.

why is it that tomatoes are treated like veggie when they're in fact fruits? why don't we eat tomatoes like we eat plums or peaches(the plums here are yummy,btw. and jagung too).

i think that the prettiest yellow is ripe jagung-yellow. and the prettiest purple is a split between eggplant-purple for dark purple, and purple dragonfruit-purple for light purple. and the nicest red may be tomato-red, depending on the tomato, or it could be capsicum-red. or maybe it started off with the jagung, and ended up being a game to find a example of something organinc for every colour. i'm not quite sure. but eggplant-puple really does rock.

i'm going to mandi, then cook and eat dinner, while watching To Catch A Thief, starring Cary Grant and Grace Kelly. i hope it's good.

A swift orderly change

i'm watching this 1978 tv adaption of Agatha Christie's Death On The Nile, and even though there's about a quarter of it before the end, i have to say, i'm quite dissappointed(i can never remember whether 'dissappointed' is spelled with one 's' and one 'p' or double 's' and one 'p' or one 's' and double 'p' or double 's' and double 'p'). It was ok, but i don't think it did the book justice(isn't that what we say about all book adaptations except for Lord of the Rings?). and the blood looked fake.

I'm taking french as my breadth subject(subject(s) we take outside our disciplinary), and i'm really digging it, wheeee! i became a french-nazi after we stopped learning it at school, because i was growing increasingly disgruntled at the fact that whenever anyone asked me to translate a french song or dialogue ina french movie(read:kakak), i couldn't get past elementary words. very frustrating. and we all know i crumble at first hurdles. but now i'm learning it again, so right on. so far it's been the usual beginner's stuff, but it's getting increasingly hard, and it's fantastic! oklah, i can't translate french songs properly yet, but i can say "he has blue eyes", or "you have blue eyes", or "they have blue eyes". which i couldn't say last time. so...yeah. if i ever run into a cute french guy with blue eyes, i can screech adoringly at him "Tu as les yeux bleus!!!!".

i was thinking, if any language would be hard to teach, it'd be malay. sure, french can be puzzling in the sense why would they want to give a gender to every single damn thing, but surely malay is just if not more confusing? all the tatabahasa and stuff. Memblog. Diblog. diblogkan. memblogkan. terblog. berblog. pemblog. and even if you get it all, i doubt if it's applicable as spoken malay(unless the person who's learnt it wants to become a pembaca berita).melayu pasar may in fact be a whole different language.

i have this sudden urge to be angry. i want to be annoyed at something. but there's nothing to be annoyed at, and Coldplay's Shiver seems to abate the inner demon.

i can't wait to wake up and have breakfast. my days here seem to consist entirely of me looking forward to the next meal. not a very good thing, if you think about it, but i'm going with the flow.

there it is again!that impulse to be irritated.

ok. too sleepy to continue this crap.

Adieu

i've been tagged by Chinny, and i've actually had the good fortune of doing this tag before(i think it was Firdaus who tagged me on that one), but as we all know, i love to talk about myself (favourite topic ever), so i'm nothing but happy at the prospect of doing it again.

ok!mari kite lakukannya.

The rules:-
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.
2. List eight (8) random facts about yourself.
3. Tag eight people at the end of this post and list their names.
4. Let them know they've been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs.

1. I only know one Springsteen song, the really famous one that was in Jerry Maguire(it's called Secret Garden), and the version i have in my ipod is the one where they stuck in snippets of dialogue from the movie(the meanigful bits i suppose)between verses. and it's a pastime of mine to recite along with the dialogue, especially the one at the beginning. it's come to a point i've hafal it completely, siap with intonation. observe:

"I was just about to tell you...that I love him. I do! I love him, I love him! and I don't care what you think. I love him for the man that he wants to be, and I love him for the man that he almost is, I love him Laurel, I love him, I-love-him!".

And it's not that i like to say-along with it because it's sentimental and jiwang or whatnot, it's just cool the way Renee Zelwegger(sp?) changes her intonation throughout the lines. Kakak looks at me funny whenever i do it in front of her though. lame-o supreme-o.

2. I REALLY like cereal with cold milk and banana slices tossed in. It's kind of scary how good it is.

3. i don't like my earliest blog posts. and i hate that post i gave several months ago about 10 movies i liked, because it seems so shallow and superficial. if i could do it over(and i have a feeling i might when i get bored and run out of things to blabber about one of these days), i'd tell you why i like Eternal Sunshine Of the Spotless Mind and Amelie in a proper way that won't make me cringe when i re-read it again in the future.

4. If i had been a teen in the eighties, i would have LOVED the mainstream pop scene. i'd have been the ultimate teeny-bopper. Everyone says that the eighties were all bad hair and atrocious clothes, but 80s pop is infectious! I would have adored Starship(hello? We Built This City? Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now? You can't get more feelgood than that), and be crazy over Rick Astley('Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down, never gonna turn around and desert you'), and dance around to Wham('Wake me up, before you go-go, don't leave me hanging on like a yo-yo').

5.
Her name was Lola, she was a showgirl.
With yellow feathers in her hair,
and her dress cut up to there,
she would meringue(sp?), and do the cha-cha,
and while she tried to be a star,
Tony always tended bar,
across the crowded floor, working from 8 to 4,
they were young and they had each other, who could ask for more?

If you can identify this Barry Manilow song and like to sing along to it, you must be a fun person. a kindred spirit, in fact.

Ok chop. this is not a random fact about myself. but whatever. i've always from time to time tried to think of a way to sneak in this song into the blog somehow. so ta-da.

6. I think i would really like Rock Band, given the chance to play. even though it may look weird to be playing a plastic toy guitar/drum. but it looks like so much fun!

7. I can arch one eyebrow up, like Ziana Zain did back in the nineties when that stupid movie Sembilu was in.

8. when i was younger, back when i was 5 maybe; i didn't like my name.because i thought it was so childish compared to mom's name, or dad's. and since back then they were the only adults whose proper names i knew, and both their names sounded grown-up-ish, i came to the premature conclusion that all adults have have mature sounding names. and that conclusion was quickly followed by the assumption that all kids have childish names, but when they got older they'd get to change it to a proper grown-up one. and i remember being relieved when i figured that out, because how could i ever be a grown-up with a name like Atiqah?

oh, dah sampai lapan dah. that was quick. alritey, i tag afiqah, jia yee, fatin, juwa!, elaine, nani, wee, aki. props if you do it, but it's cool if you don't(why do i feel like i have to say this everytime i tag people?).

so long, farewell, it's time to say goodbye.

i can do the dog-paddle. at least, i think i can.

I'm drowning in Quantitative methods 1. shit.

This is getting serious. Even during lectures(when i'm actually paying attention), i get lost. and it was fine the first few weeks when we were learning more or less stuff that's been done in A-levels, but now that we're venturing into the not-so-familiar, it's a sink-or-swim scenario. and i can't even swim in real life, much less metaphorically, through statistics.

oklah, i can paddle my legs and propel forwards a few millimetres or so. but i'm terrible at swimming with the arms sekali,(freestyle? breaststoke?) where you have to alternate between looking forward and jutting out your mouth at the side to inhale at intervals. When i do that, it's a lose-lose affair. I don't get air, I don't see anything when i look in front(just splashes and flashes of what i assume is the water), and in the end i don't even propel forward.

but wait, we're going off on a tangent here. QM1. The thing is, back at home, we're very much into learning the formulas and applying it to exam questions rather than analysing what we're learning actually means, yea? well, maybe not. but if you had asked me back in college what a variance is actully for, i wouldn't have been able to explain. not in an eloquent, sure-of-myself way, that is. I suppose i'd have gone "variance?um.. that's the one yang measures the spread of the data from the mean, is it? is it? oh, but that's standard deviation. but standard deviation is the square root of variance, so they must be related in that sense somehow."

see? SEE?! I don't even know what a variance is for! and the thing is, it's not that my teacher didn't explain(i'm pretty sure i remember Ms Wong making tremendous effort to try and explain the concept of variance, and the difference between population mean and sample mean, and why you write down the distribution the variance for one of them has to be divided by the number of trials,etc), but when it came down to it, i didnt really need to know it, did i? i mean, it's not as if they asked what a variance is for, in exams they usually just ask you to calculate it. calculation, check. applying calculations? ape?

But one thing about QM1, i like my tutor. she's completely in control of things, and she's really nice. plus, she wears torn jeans and manages to make really big dangly earrings look cool. and there was this one time i came early and she was listening to classical music while prepping for the tute. which somehow seemed pretty cool too.

but coming back to the main topic here, i have GOT to get a grip on quantitative methods. i have to try and wrap my head around coefficient and covariance and correlation(which we learnt in the first couple weeks, and which i still cannot bloody understand what is it actually that they're for), and why is it that you have to add at least 2 standard deviations to the mean when trying to obtain the range of something. APE NI?? my parents did not agree to spend so much money on me to not understand what correlation is.

ooh, sidenote: i've been super tempted to skip QM1 lectures sometimes. i think i've mentioned this before, my lecturer is super nice and grandpa baik-like, but the lectures are so boring, i cannot tahan. half an hour before the lectures end i want to fidget,cry with boredom and sleep all at once. not exactly productive. but me and jia yee did some small calculations(well, jia yee did the laborious task of calculating, i just expressed awe and shock appropriately), so we estimated that in terms of tuition fees, the cost for this first semester spread out over 12 academic weeks comes up to about a grand per week. and so folks, if you're ever thinking of skipping class, repeat this mantra: my parents(or sponsors, for some) did not spend this much money for me to skip class. Repeat. my parents/sponsors did not spend this much money for me to skip class.

say it a few hundred times, and the guilt somehow overcomes the urge to go home and eat something.

sidenote keberapa: why is it that the nickname for William is Bill? perasan tak? if someone's name is william, then close acquaintances call them Bill. like my lecturer. that doesn't make bloody sense. why Bill? why not Will? why choose a nickname that is also used as other people's proper names? unless Bill Gates is actually William Gates.

i'm going to go defrost chicken.

Name Game

Just a quick note while i'm waiting for the accounting thingie(we're moving on to computers now! no more tedious handwritten ledger work!)

My name is no longer Atiqah M*khtar. Nope. Since coming here, my name has now been changed to I'm Sorry I'm Not Sure How To Pronounce This Atiqah M*khtar ?

Notice how my new and improved name has a question mark at the end. Damn unique.

Another variation of my new name is Atiqah Did I Get That Right ?

I'd forgotten that mat sallehs can't grasp the phonetics of Malay names. I've been trying to make my name mat salleh-friendly, but cannot la. I'm usually called A-tee-quh( i don't get it. I tell them my name is Atiqah, and they still go A-tee-quh. cannot pronounce 'Ah' is it?).

When they introduce me to someone else, it's like they're going, "this is a Teequh". like i'm some exotic plant or animal called teequh.

Maybe i should just shorten my new name. make it easier for everyone. "Hi, my name is I'm Sorry I'm Not Sure How To Pronounce This Atiqah M*khtar, but you can call me I'm Sorry."

cheek to cheek

people people people, i just can't get enough of Strange and Beautiful, despite the obvious stalker tendencies in the lyrics.

I put a spell on you,
You fall asleep when I put a spell on you,
And when I wake you I'll be the first thing you see,
And you'll realize that you love me.


see? see? those kind of lyrics hover delicately between poetically expressing the pain and longing of unrequited love, or conveying the sense that it's only a matter of time before it turns into fatal attraction and the guy ends up killing the girl in classic extreme stalker fashion.

I just finished watching Casablanca, it was nice! Humprey Bogart isn't drop-dead gorgeous, but he's so macho. Old movies are great la. They can be romantic without being corny. And they don't need sex scenes to make them work(it's practically a prerequisite for the modern rom-com to have at the very least a making out scene that implies intercourse happened soon after). I should watch more of these. I want to watch something with Fred and Ginger in it!

I swear, the total number of accumulated hours watching dvds far outstrips the number of hours spent studying. don't tell my mom.

i'm going to go eat something. and regret it in the morning.

les yeux bleu

The reason why i love the Kings of Convenience is because their songs can break your heart.

A song for
Someone who wants somewhere
to long for

-from 'Homesick'-

I was typing my econs essay, and i thought that the plural for 'walkman' was 'walkmen'. thank God for those red lines that appear under mispelled words.

I found myself beating eggs to make french toast the other day, listening to Beirut on my headphones, and i found myself thinking, "i can do this. I can listen to Beirut. I can beat eggs and make french toast. things will be okay. i can do this".

that was supposed be yet another self-obsessed/centered/indulgent analysis, but let's leave it at that.

Listen to Aqualung's Strange and Beautiful. Or if you have, listen to it again.This is another sentimental, slow, bordering mushy song by Aqualung, and the lyrics may teeter towards downright creepy, but there's just something about those opening piano chords that makes you want to close your eyes and let it wash over. whatever that means.

I am trying to keep a tight reign over my cash flows, but it's proving difficult. and do you want to know why? do you want to know my achilles heel in terms of saving money?

Groceries. bloody groceries.

i can't help it. i have a weakness when it comes to groceries. i want that spaghetti sauce. I must get that jar of stir fry, who knows when i'll need it to make dinner? Give me the box of crackers, i can eat with tuna if i get hungry and need a snack. speaking of tuna, better grab a couple cans, so i can make sandwiches to bring to uni. What about cereal? my cornflakes are almost finished, better get another box. cheerios ok?yea, cheerios are good. milk? i still have a carton, so that should be enough. i only need it for cereal or if i cook scrambled eggs. ooh, i should make an omlette with the eggs. for that i need mushrooms! where's the mushroom aisle?

and it just goes on and on and on. and i am perfectly content to wander lazily around the aisles, reading the back of jars, comparing prices, and mentally planning out the week's menu. Pop on headphones, and it becomes a thoroughly enjoyable activity.

i have class in 45 minutes. And i'm going to brunswick today to get meat. and it looks like it may rain. Listening to Strange and Beautiful, it seems like i'll be able to get through the day, and maybe have an enjoyable time while doing it.

I'll wear my sneakers today.

Mini Mars Eggs

hey beautiful people. (i'm saying this in remembrance of that Mix fm ad that features serena c pretending to be Mariah Carey, giving out a community service message to not litter. Don't litter, glitter!)

It's friday, amigos. the weekend's about to arrive.

Jia Yee and i have made an intelligent fashion observation. The days of flip flops, itty-bitty shorts and t-shirts are gone. Make way for boots, cleverly knotted scarves, and for some, coats with fur(faux fur, hopefully)-lined hoods. Autumn is here!

it's properly cold. and since our apartment unit uses a centralised heating/cooling system, none of us dare to switch on the heater, for fear of racking up electricity bills that would pummel us into debt. no, we'd rather walk around indoors with our sweaters on. Jia Yee will be all cute and fluffy in her peach sweater, Shao opts for chic with a black jacket, and i'll be the slobbish lump in the oversized jumper.

Tomorrow's Saturday!the papers get delivered to the apartment,whoo! I'm going to make pancakes, double whoo! the instant one la. the one where the mix comes in the bottle and all you have to do is add water to the marked level on the bottle, shake it, and pour it onto a lightly greased pan.

Pancakes with syrup and butter and a mug of coffee and a mug of juice, and the papers, WHOO!

Over the past week, i've been bingeing on chocolates. When Shao came back from Perth, she brought back bags of mini chocolate easter eggs. Bloody addictive. They're so cute, who knew Mars in the shape of mini eggs would be so irresistable. Mini Malteser eggs. Mini Milkyway eggs. I would eat 10 of them consecutively, they're THAT cute. And my supply of fruits for the week was finished, so whenever i felt like munching something(which, unfortunately, was 16 hours a day, the remaining 8 hours unaffected only because i was asleep), i'd help myself to an egg, tell myself to stop, then come back for the next 9.

As a result, i feel like roly-poly-oly(betul ke ejaan ni?)

ah-ha. salah. i googled it, it's Rolie Polie Olie.

So when me and jia yee went to Vic Market today, we bought fruits like we wanted to open our own stall there. Shao was mildly surpised when she opened the fridge to see the fridge light eclipsed by the mounds of fruit-filled plastic bags stuffed in there. I will no longer eat 10 chocolate eggs a day. I will eat one(or two), and then eat a fruit(or fruits) to curb my insatiable appetite.

Adrian Mole is getting on my nerves somewhat.

saya masih sayang akan Flight of the Conchords.


eh,eh have you guys checked out that Alicia Keys song featuring John Mayer? i like it. it's very soothing, sorta has that 'Slow Dancing in a Burning Room' vibe.

on the other hand, if you want a cheerful, perky song, I suggest Sara Bareilles' Love Song. or maybe it's out on the radio back home already and you already know the song. it was on TRL even before i left for Melbourne. In that case, ignore this paragraph.

You want to know something? about three weeks ago, i was riding the tram, and i was getting up because my stop was next. Sidenote: In one of Nick Hornby's books, How to Be Good, the heroine's husband is a columnist who writes about stuff that irritates him, and one of them is the way people get up before the train's stopped even though they know that when it does they'll lurch forward. Well, yeah, i now can't help but feel guilty whenever i do that. Why can't I wait until the tram's stopped?well anyway, three weeks ago i was in the tram alone, coming back from Big W, and i was carring a lot of stuff. The tram was quite full, and there was a lady sitting next to me plus people standing around.

When the tram was about to reach my stop, i got up beforehand, grasping the bags i had with me, and stood up to wait. before i had a chance to hold on to something to steady myself, the train slowed down and came to halt. with panic and embarassment gradually increasing with every nano-second, i sort of flailed around, failed to regain balance, lurched forward and did the classic comic manouvre: i ended up smooshed against the partition in front of me. I almost wish someone had been there recording it happening.

Needless to say, i regained my composure(quite quickly, if i do say so myself), and pretended no one saw. i hoisted my bags up and got down from the tram.

so. pengajaran yang boleh didapati daripada cerpen di atas adalah bahawa kita hendaklah tunggu sehingga tram telah berhenti sepenuhnya sebelum bangun untuk beredar, agar kita tidak penyek pada pengahadang dan mengalami peristiwa yang memalukan.