exaggeration and tall tales galore

Friday, August 29, 2008

Kakak Saya

Hi. Ini kakak saya.(Yang di sebelah kiri, bukan yang di sebelah kanan).

Saya ingin menceritakan serba sedikit mengenai kakak saya.

Ketika kami kanak-kanak, kakak saya suka menyakitkan hati saya. Dia sering mengusik dan mengejek saya sehingga saya berasa tertekan. Pada suatu hari, kakak saya mengusik saya sehingga saya hilang sabar. Tatkala dia sedang berjalan ke arah bilik tidurnya, saya hilang kawalan dan menerkam ke arahnya dengan mulut terbuka. NGAP! Saya menggigit bontotnya sekuat hati. Kakak saya menjerit. Saya berasa puas.

(Walaupun saya telah menceritakan kisah ini berberapa kali, saya tetap mahu mengulanginya, sempena hari yang istimewa ini).

Satu objek yang dikongsi oleh saya dan kakak saya merupakan kereta Kembara berwarna merah. Kakak saya menggunakannya ketika dia sedang menuntut di Kolej Sunway. Setelah dia berangkat ke negara asing untuk meneruskan pelajaran, saya pula menggunakan kereta tersebut. Kereta ini menjadi punca perbalahan antara kami pada suatu masa. Kakak saya telah menamakan kereta tersebut 'Sascha', tanpa meminta persetujuan saya. Saya tidak puas hati apabila mendapat tahu tentangnya ("Apa KEJADAHNYA kereta ini dinamakan Sascha?!"), maka saya pun memberi nama baru kepada kereta itu, iaitu 'Madeleine'. Walau bagaimanapun, sekarang setelah memikirkannya semula, saya tidak suka akan nama 'Madaleine'. Saya berpendapat kereta itu harus diberi nama baru yang melambangkan kegagahan(kerana warnanya yang merah). Apa kata kita berikan nama Melayu kepadanya?

Ha, saya telah mendapat ilham. Mari kita namakannya 'Keris Merah'. Saya rasa begitu sesuai. Tapi janganlah kita hilang fokus utama post ini, iaitu untuk megupas tentang kakak saya.

Kakak saya seorang yang bijak. Sepanjang hayatnya(yang InsyaAllah masih panjang), dia sering mendapat keputusan cemerlang untuk semua peperiksaannya yang utama(peperiksaan percubaan tidak termasuk). Bak kata orang putih, dia sentiasa lepas dengan warna-warna berterbangan. Dia baru sahaja selesai mendapat ijazahnya daripada universiti yang berprestij(adakah wujud perkataan 'prestij'? saya tidak pasti) dalam bidang undang-undang. Dia juga merupakan seorang yang sangat aktif, dan sentiasa terlibat dalam pelbagai aktiviti . Dia telah memenangi pelbagai pertandingan dan anugerah sepanjang zaman persekolahannya dan juga ketika dia menuntut di kolej dan universiti. Saya sungguh bangga dengan semua kejayaannya, walaupun perasaan bangga itu sering bercampur-aduk dengan perasaan cemburu yang teramat. Bak kata orang putih(sekali lagi), saya hijau dengan cemburu.

Kakak saya juga mempunyai minat dan hobi-hobi yang menarik. Dia seorang yang sangat suka akan muzik, dan telah menghadiri banyak konsert yang dianjurkan oleh pelbagai pasukan pancaragam(band) ketika dia di negara penjajah, termasuk Coldplay, Radiohead, We Are Scientists, dan sebagainya.

Nota rambang: Cubalah terjemahkan semua nama pancaragam yang disebut di atas ke dalam bahasa melayu. sungguh menggelikan hati, bukan?

Kebanyakkan artis yang saya minati telah diperkenalkan oleh kakak saya. Saya terhutang budi kepadanya di atas perkara ini.

Selain itu, kakak saya suka membaca. Tetapi ini suatu hobi yang sudah biasa didengari dan tidak menarik, maka saya tidak akan menyentuh tentangnya secara mendalam. Pendek kata, dia telah menghabiskan beratus-ratus buku. Ok, isi seterusnya.

Tapi sebelum itu, gambar yang cantik:

Dalam gambar ini, kakak saya nampak cantik. Susu goyang(milkshake) yang saya minum nampak cantik. Cuma saya sahaja yang tidak berjaya nampak cantik. Tapi tidak mengapa. Kecantikkan itu hanya sedalam kulit.

Kakak saya juga gemar menari tarian buaian!(swing dance). Pada pendapat saya, ini adalah satu hobi yang sangat hebat. Dia mempelajari cara menari tarian buaian ketika di universiti, dan sungguh giat menghadiri acara-acara menari buaian secara beramai-ramai. Malah, dia pernah menjejak kaki ke Sweden(ataupun negara IKEA) semata-mata untuk menghadiri bengkel tarian buaian. Walaupun saya tidak pernah melihatnya menari dengan mata saya sendiri, saya yakin dia seorang penari buaian yang mantap.

Ok, beralih pula ke agenda yang serius. Walaupun kakak saya pernah membuatkan saya sungguh marah hingga menggigit bontotnya, dia juga telah banyak membantu saya seumur hidup. Tatkala saya sedih, dia merupakan satu-satunya manusia yang boleh memujuk saya dengan kata-kata yang tepat. Niat saya bukan untuk berkata kawan-kawan saya memberi kata-kata yang salah, oh tidak. Maksud saya di sini adalah kakak saya memahami saya secara lebih mendalam dan mampu memahami situasi yang dihadapi oleh saya.

When I'm sad, she knows how i feel, and says the things i need to hear. She gets it right, every time. It may be cool to have a sister who went to LSE, who listens to good music, is outstanding in whatever she does and wherever she goes, and does something out of the ordinary like swing dancing. But at the end of the day it comes down to the fact that I have a sister who I can laugh with, who helps me unconditionally, and is there for me when i need her.

Saya bersyukur kerana mempunyai kakak sepertinya.

Hari ini merupakan ulangtahun hari jadi kakak saya yang ke dua-puluh tiga. Apabila saya cuba menelaah situasi ini, saya kadang-kala tergamam. Kakak saya sudah berumur 23? Ya Allah. Dia sudah dewasa. Adakah ini bermaksud saya sendiri juga sudah dewasa?

Ah, tidak mengapa. Soalan itu boleh di jawab di lain hari(dan lain bahasa). Yang penting di sini, hari ini ulangtahun hari lahir kakak saya.Satu perkara yang saya perhatikan sepanjang masa berlalu adalah bahawa semakin umur kita meningkat, ulangtahun hari lahir kita semakin kurang istimewa, dan tidak berebeza dengan hari-hari yang lain. Tetapi saya berpendapat hari lahir kakak saya harus disambut dengan seberapa meriah yang boleh. Biar meriah sampai mengalahkan hari jadi saya yang ke-sembilan, di mana saya memakai skirt kembang dan mengadakan parti serta mendapat pelbagai hadiah, termasuk anak patung Barbie yang mempunyai mekanisme beroda yang membolehkannya bergerak seperti sedang menari tarian bilik bola(ballroom dancing).

Happy birthday,kak. You deserve an awesome one.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

roti jala

Lyrics that make you tingle:

And I find it kind of funny
I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I'm dying
Are the best I ever had
-
Garu Jules, Mad World (which apparently is a cover of a Tears for Fears song)

I made roti jala.

with a can.

into which i poked holes.

awesome.

I mean, it's awesome that i've resorted to innovative yet rudimentary techniques to achieve my objectives. The roti jala itself is pretty decent i guess, not as great as my mom's but hey! it looks like a jala. and that's all that counts. I would have liked to make curry according to step-by-step instructions nani gave me to accompany it, but i don't have chicken nor curry powder. oh well. i'll make do with instant korma. Does korma go with roti jala? Mari kita cuba.

The Bureau of Meterology's website shows a forecast of pretty decent temperatures in Melbourne for the week(and Sydney too, aijud!). Spring's coming,yo. and summer thereafter. start stripping, folks.

Diyana Izzati told me good news yesterday. I can't say this enough, I'm super happy for you! you derserve this, and I couldn't be more glad. alamak. terharu la pulak. ok, moving on.

Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale(bless them, for some reason I hope they stay together forever) named their newborn son Zuma Nesta Rock. ape?

Kings of Leon. Only By The Night. out September 23rd. Just in case we forget. My mid-sem break would have started by then. perfect. Hmm. Will the record store have them by that day? We'll be fasting by then!it'll almost be raya! whoah.

Floating petrol prices back home? who knows, maybe it'll work. but i had to stifle a snicker watching the video of the Domestic Trade minister proclaiming that the reduction in the price to RM2.55 wasn't a political gimmick or related to the by-election.

Homework. must get on with the homework. but first, lunch.

oh!try checking out the trailer for The House Bunny, Anna Faris' new movie. It looks like the perfect fluffy movie(think Legally Blonde). The thing she does when she tries to remember peoples' names is freaking hilarious. I watched the full clip of that scene on the movie website, had me in stitches.

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Chicken Stock

A brief post, as the madness of tests to do and assignments to start on swirl around in dizzying proportions.

I had to call the health cover people the other day, and as I finished resolving my predicament with one of the phone consultants, I said the usual chirpy "thank you so much!", to which she replied "no problem" or "no worries" or something like that. and then there was a moment of silence, where neither of us ventured to end the conversation gracefully. A couple of seconds ticked by awkwardly, so in the end I found myself exclaiming in a wonderful sing-song voice worthy of being on Disney Playchannel, "Well, i hope you have a nice day then! BYE!"(extra lilting tone at the end) and as I said those words, I found myself thinking 'Wow. i can practically pass off as one of them'. The phone consultant was practically struggling to keep up and match my over-joyed cheerfulness.

Three things I am tired of reading in the news/magazines:
1. Rape incidents(I feel like rapists should be punished in some way that violates them just as much as they violated their victims).
2. Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, and their twins.
3. Anwar, Saiful, and everyone urging Anwar to swear on the Quran.

Malaysian music! I've had the good fortune of coming across this Malaysian singer named Yuna, and wow. her voice is some kind of special. her myspace page only has one full song and her EP teaser, but even that is enough to keep me captivated, replaying them a number of times. I'm happy she's coming out with an EP. she should! I mean, my exposure to local female singers singing in english has been limited to Sarimah and Cheryl Samad and, uh, let's just say my impression wasn't very good. so it's fantastic to hear her stuff. and she cited bob dylan as one of her influences! aww. i'm so impressed whenever i come across someone very into bob dylan. I easily awed liddat.

wishlist item number #46: to be better exposed to the malaysian independent music scene. there's good local music out there. i just don't know how to get to it. pertolongan dialu-alukan.

I must go off to do the twice daily ritual off splashing water all over me. tally-ho.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

I came up with a post title but then decided it sounded too bloody jiwang

Today, for the second time, I noticed how coffee makes me happy. and not just in a figurative sense either, but seriously. i think there was a biological effect, as a result of an addiction I've cultivated for it.

For one thing, I was feeling quite disgruntled this afternoon. The causes of the disgruntlement were trivial of course, but nonetheless, I was trudging off from my Business Process Analysis class (do you know what this is about? me neither. I barely understand what it really is for even though this is the third week of the semester) in an un-bunny-prancing-happily way. I spent about an hour doing homework while waiting for my next lecture, and then, as I headed for the lecture theater, I decided to grab a cup of coffee first.

Ah!The joy of holding a warm cup of coffee(cappuccino, one sugar) in your hand while you trudge to class on a semi-cloudy winter's day! The most excitement I had all day.

Unless you consider walking to class in the rain clutching your umbrella and praying that the wind won't blow it upwards and turn it into a rain-catcher like last time exciting. I call it nerve-wrecking.

Anyway, I got to the theater, spotted a friend and soon got seated, all the while taking sips of the lovely nectar. Flash forward about 20 minutes later into the lecture, I was HAPPY. All disgruntlement forgotten, I was happily thinking about cupcakes, birthday cards and optimistic plans to socialize.

What was I doing thinking about cupcakes during an accounting lecture, you ask?(or don't ask, whatever). ntahlah. I have no idea. Gah. and here I am wondering why I'm finding our tute work so troublesome. Tulah Atiqah, fikir lagi pasal cupcakes. Bagaimana anda hendak menjadi pelajar yang bijak dan berhemah?

Anyway, the point is, that was the second time I noticed that drinking coffee made me feel a whole lot more cheerful. I suspect I'm properly addicted to it. Well, I concede that I've always needed a cup in the mornings, but that was because it jolted me awake and had me all bright-eyed and blinking. It never made me happy.

I googled to see if coffee's been known to cause happiness, and I came across this site that said it stimulates dopamine, a hormone apparently related to happy feelings. So I wiki-ed dopamine (not the best of references, but oh-so-handy), and! and! it says, among other things, that

Dopamine is commonly associated with the pleasure system of the brain, providing feelings of enjoyment and reinforcement to motivate a person proactively to perform certain activities. Dopamine is released (in particular areas....) by naturally rewarding experiences such as food, sex, drugs, and neutral stimuli that become associated with them.

Hah-ha! see? I think that happened. I had coffee, I felt happy. My brain/body now associates an intake of coffee with the release of dopamine. And before you ask, no, i didn't have sex,or take drugs, or recall any particular neutral stimuli during my accounting lecture. So i think we can pretty much pin it on the coffee.

Aisy. or maybe it was merely one of those weird things that just happen. no chemical reactions involved.

Little bunny foo foo,
Hopped into the forest,
Scooping up the field mice
and kissing them on the head.

haha. nasib baik kakak taught me this delightful song(nursery ryhme?)

oh!oh! feel good song. Go, be off and feel all warm and fuzzy!
God Only Knows - THE BEACH BOYS

edit: la hai, i checked the post and saw there was actually 3 different play thingies all for the same song. haish. over-excited

Monday, August 11, 2008

Perubahan Ketara

It has just turned 7.17 am, according to my computer clock. A new day. If you look out the window you'd see that it's another cloudy one. The ground is wet, and as the cars pass by you can hear the squelch of water beneath the tires.

I am listening to Don't I Hold You by Wheat(excellent song, excellent), my roommate is still tucked safely under her blanket, and I'm reveling in this quiet moment and the opportunity to blog. It's still early. Plenty of time to panic over homework to do and things to get into order later on.

I find that it's best to properly listen to music when the you are lying in bed and it's dark(i.e: before going to sleep at night or early in the morning). Maybe it's scientific. Being in the dark and not being able to see probably heightens your sense of sound. ye ke? probably. Anyway, i was listening to Death Cab's album Plans, and i must concede it's quite solid. I like it. And i got the soundtrack for Once! whee.

Things i've learned in the past week:

1. Quality alone time is delicious.
2. Decent socializing sessions can be just as good, if not better.
3. Don't cling on too hard to the people whose company you enjoy. it's better for everyone that way, including yourself.

Let's see. my clock now says 7.34 am, Selfish Jean by Travis, roommate's up and about, and there's some motor running outside. a new day all busy already.

Sunday, August 03, 2008

Manhattan

hello. point form!

  • I'm supposed to be reading up on the structure of court hierarchies at the moment, for my additional law subject. but it's getting less fascinating, and my attention span has expired for the moment.
  • speaking of law, isn't it weird that i'm learning the basics about Australia's constitution(and finding it somewhat interesting-for now at least), padahal i'm malaysian and don't really know much about our own constitution? shameful! well, technically we did learn it back in sejarah form 5, but i've forgotten most of it. i should reread the whole shebang. anyone got a sejarah form 5 buku teks lying around?
  • Grazias banyak2 to the people who did me the favour i asked in the previous post!: Ferociously Fantastic Fiqah, Alarmingly Awesome Aijud, Indescribably Incredible Inaaz, Atrociously Amazing Aman, Deliciously Delightful Diyana, Killer Krazy Kakak. haha.
  • I thought up all your super-dipuji-names last night while i was trying my damnest to fall asleep. terrer,no? or, failing that-lame, no?
  • i couldn't think of any flattering words starting with 'K'. sorry kakak.
  • oklah, Stunningly Superb Shazana.
  • to all of you yang tak jawab my question(except shao min): Hey cepat jawab. find the decency in your heart to humour me. if you don't know what i'm talking about and are all bewildered, refer to previous post.
  • Nani!my dose of Montreal Marvelousness(couldn't think of any nice words starting with 'n'. well. besides the word 'nice' itself). repondez ma question, s'il vous plait!
  • ouch. dah pening looking at all these bullets.
Oh wait! i got one. Never-endingly Nice Nani. haha, this is fun. my new pastime.

Have you ever heard Kotaro Oshio's guitar cover of Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence? i never even considered you could play guitar like that. a mind-opener. I am pleasantly awed.

Kings of Leon. New album. Only By The Night. September 23rd. HOLY SHIT I'M EXCITED. if they. come to Melbourne. to promote new album. i. must. see. them. i. HAVE.TO.

Roar. they put up this teaser clip on their website, and i'm half in love with that snippet of a song already.

seriously, if they come here, i won't miss them/only take notice when tickets have sold out. like Vampire Weekend. and The Wombats. and, um, Death Cab for Cutie.(Hoi Ayang APESAL YOU MISSED SO MANY SHOWS? dulu kat malaysia you were the one going on and on about taking advantage of Melbourne being on the gig circuit. bite your tongue).

aisy. I knowwww.

phwoar. i'm listening to one of their other songs that's going to be on the new album, called Manhattan. damnit, they're awesome.

Take 274. lights, camera, ACTION!