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read between the lines
outdated world news i have free time to spare on my hands, and i don't feel like sleeping just yet, so i've decided to put up some old news i wanted to put up some time ago but never found the time to or just plain forgot about.1. yet another unfortunate victim to the sweeping trend of bastardisation that good-looking men worldwide have succumbed to. (see ballack's pre-botak look here.) previous followers have included matt damon, brad pitt, leonardo dicaprio, george clooney and...just look around at your local community. my personal belief is that they get chased by too many women that they have to bastardise their looks a bit to attract less attention. he (ballack) still looks quite hot though. the lip/ tongue action never quite left him, thankfully. (photo credits: sports network) 2.  the real guy who inspired nacho libre. and no, unlike the movie, the real Fray Tormenta (as he is called) wins more times than he loses, and is a serious inspiration to his children in the orphanage which he literally wrestled to get donations for.the movie was pretty funny, even though most people didn't quite get that kind of comedy. (if you were one of our rare locals who appreciated the movie napoleon dynamite, which made jon heder totally rock by the way, you'd probably appreciate this.) the following lyrics come to mind everytime i remember the movie: "i tink i yam, i tink i yam, a reel reeligious mann." hahaha. (photo credits: the star) 3.  despite its cliche title and tacky UK-released poster, the prestige is actually a smart movie, one of those rare ones you'd wanna shelf up next to the matrix and the truman show. (i found out online that the US-released posters are so much cooler and way more attention-grabbing.)the only reason i went for the movie, without knowing anything about the above comments i made about the poster, was because it had the dashing and charming hugh jackman in it, and i even waited a few weeks for the ticket sales to go down because i thought it would just be the usual crap that movies these days are made of: forgettable plotline, predictable ending. but i came out feeling i had gotten way more worth out of my rm7 ticket than just eye candy. this movie actually makes you think, long after the movie has ended, about who actually did what, how they managed to do that and other stimulating questions. i won't go into a rave about the whole movie here, but basically it's a very sophisticated whodunit tale of which magician can outwit the other, back in the days before photoshop and television existed. what makes this movie so engaging is the fact that it has so many twists, right till the very end. just when i thought i'd guessed the ending and that was it, a twist to the story came round the bend. and if that wasn't enough, yet another twist appeared in the final 5 seconds as the camera panned away into the walls at the side. (photo credits: chud) -- yawn. okay now i feel satisfied enough to go to sleep.
the helpless independent this week has been kind of a limbo for me of sorts. i was supposed to start work and move out of this place i've called home since childhood, but things got delayed.while i start to think about my potential room, i realise i am largely ill-equipped to live on my own. i have no idea how to cook (maggi mee, eggs and instant porridge don't count), iron nor use the washing machine. and it's not like i never wanted to try, or was never interested (believe me, i always was), but somehow or other my parents, in their derided minds decided they couldn't trust me with the relevant machines. i would waste water if i washed my own clothes. i would burn the house down if i learnt to cook. ditto for using the iron. it kind of makes me resent them for purposely leaving me so unprepared for independent life. this was their tactic, to refuse to teach or allow me to experiment on my own so as to render me helpless and forever dependent on them, which is what they want and expect me to forever be, even though i am past the age of coddling (not that i was ever really given much attention or pampering; signs of affection are almost a taboo in this cold household). there'll always be more to say about overprotective parents who let their paranoia and incessant worrying get to their head but i think i shall stop here for now. let's just say that the only family i'll miss (and deeply too) is my dogs, the bouncing bundles of joy that are ever-ready to greet me everytime i come home and provide great playmates as well as sources of the affection, love, loyalty, assurance and understanding that is so lacking in a place that can be, at its worst, frigid. later note: i am not saying my family has never loved me. but i just don't know why they find it so hard to express their love and choose to bury it instead under a layer of antitheses of love, be it criticism, overanxiety, provocation(what my brother is best known for), irritation or anything similar. re: decisions, decisions Two roads diverged in a yellow woodseems like my life has always been the road less travelled. while i read somewhere (in some quote from a bookmark in a bookstore) years ago that if there isn't a path or a way out, that's because you are meant to make the path, aka. be the trailblazer, this also means that as a pioneer, the road can get kinda lonely. not the euck-bgr kind of lonely, but the where-is-my-kind kind of lonely. sometimes you cross paths with similarly like-minded people, and you sort of have a pit stop and sit down and have a break, but then time's eventually up and you go your own ways, paving your own paths through the rain and the mud and the snow and the burning sun. but even then, no one ever really knew or understood you, and you feel like no one ever really will. sure, the Big Guy does reach in sometimes, like when you run out like a flat tyre before your time; that's when he scoops you up into his Big Hand and carries you for awhile, but then it's back on your own two feet again, walking on until your work is done. decisions, decisions rudolph the red-nosed reindeer was playing over the stereo above the cubicle i was in tonight. i was red-nosed too, but for a different reason.tonight was the first adult decision i made in my adult life. adult decision as in, this isn't one a kid would make, unless he or she was emancipated from his or her parents, and adult life as in, of the legal age to drink here, i guess. it was kind of a tough one to make initially, because the fog of confusion was so thick and i couldn't see past anything, but i thank god that at the time that things were most dire, when i really needed the clarity and guidance that only someone looking from the top can provide, he led me to the answer. and it was in faith that i accepted that it was the right thing to do. in fact the whole answer itself required faith. and trust. ah, the recurring story of my life. i mean i know everyone takes a leap of faith every now and then but some do it more than the rest, or do it to a greater degree. but like who was it who said it, greater profit comes with greater risks.
re: birthday blogging it's amazing how god continues to amaze everytime. got my second job offer as i was about to sign the papers for the first. second job wanted to match or raise my pay for the first but i decided to stick with the first. and tonight i got a third job offer, albeit a part-time one. but, as the deadline's two days from now and i'm not exactly free, i decided not to play hero and ambitiously undertake to finish it, though the thought of extra money in twice my native currency was tempting. but then again i was never really a money-driven person. material things have never really been my motive for anything, at least after the point that i realised there was more to life than what we can see.i thought about it and decided it would be best not to edit and carry on from the drivel i originally posted up on my previous post, because for one thing, i will probably never sleep all night if i do and for another, i think the things that happened that day are best left for me and me alone to know in full. i can shed a bit of light on that day, though. that day was a significant day for me (it always is) not because i am narcissistic and i think i am the best g'damn creature ever created on the face of this earth, but because it marks the anniversary of the beginning of god's great work unfolding through what is better known as my life. the fact that i came out alive and well is a miracle in itself considering the billions of stillborn babies delivered every year. it seems pointless (and tiring) to say what i did on this year's significant day, but i will say i am glad there was a lot of 'god' time in it. and i was really really thankful that god provided me a quiet, uninterrupted, personless spot to spend the evening with him in what was probably the most populated place in that area, what with all the people studying, trying to study, or trying to try to study. there are other things that made my day (including the record number of well-wishes for which i am appreciative of) but overall, it was a good day. good because it was one of those rare days where i didn't have to deal with that little devil called the blues. the day also provided a good excuse and reminder to reflect on my life and how one year more has made a difference to it. i would say this year's recurring theme that god was trying to get through to me in my life was trust. trust and faith in uncertain futures. futures that seemed likely, by this world's standards, to hold no hope. but, as is his specialty, god overturned the situations and gave them a hope and a future as he so promised in his word from that familiar verse in jeremiah. i aged a lot in the past one year that i really didn't feel my age this year. i felt i had to be at least one year older. not to sound like a prick, but the baggage of this year that carried on from the last really took a toll on me, that's all i'll say. i was so disconnected that when one of the potential landlords (or landladies, if there is such a word) i met said she had a daughter my age, i didn't even realise that was my age until i spoke to her. but at least one good thing about my age is, people can more or less accurately tell my age. it used to be unintentionally insulting in the past when people always used to guess i was older than what i really was, because i had this 'old' (a more whitewashed word would be 'matured') look and it didn't help that zits decided to declare war on my face and bomb each other, thus resulting in craters and casualties (millions of dead skin cells). but enough about that. there. looks like a long post but it's actually quite short compared to what i could reeeeally write. old vs new --imported from LiveJournal (since closed)--btw sometimes i miss my old life. true, i've grown and learnt a lot through pain, but sometimes you wonder where your friends are, where that familiar comfort zone is. that's not to say i have no friends. but sometimes, in infinite sadness, i realise no one can take the pain except god, and that i have to face it alone, not with friends' hands to hold on either side as i charge forward. everytime i settle down it is time to go and i know my work there is done. and if i try to hang on i suffer. sigh. but sometimes i would want my old bolster to cuddle. my bolster being the symbol of comfort and security in familiarity. but no, we are on unfamiliar territory, sent out like lambs among wolves, with one shepherd watching over us. i had that urge again to smash things up and break them in the moment of great emotion. emotions too many to mention that they meshed into one bursting pot of soup. i also had the desperate and wistful urge to take the first express bus out of everywhere that is familiar here. if i was speaking purely in the moment, i would say i hate the things i have to deal with, i regret the people i met, i regret the circumstances i've had in life for the past two years. i just want to be alone, i just want to hide in god, i don't want to talk to or see anyone or anything familiar, i just want to start anew in an unknown hidden corner of the earth. if i was speaking purely in the moment, let me reiterate. oh well. we have to move on, i guess. pick myself and my cross and keep on walking.
blogger down again --imported from LiveJournal (since closed)--grr. blogger got problem again, why am i not surprised. dying and just dying to say how i feel. i feel....well i don't know why (actually i think i do), but the last two times, i've been getting depressed after playing for church. no reason why, but i just feel like crying. nothing on the surface to provoke me. and then i just go downhill from there. tonight was one of those nights. and yes, i did play for service today. was supposed to play last week but i'm glad i was in the audience instead of up there playing, because i learnt a lot from the sermon than i would have had i been in the back (prone to mind-wandering and all that). i'm not sure about a decision i'm supposed to make tomorrow, and after all that thinking and praying, i am still unsure it's the right one. i'm kinda hesitating actually. the decision is whether to stay in a room in sg with an altar in the living room outside or not. everything else about the place is perfect except..that. it's not that i'm the religion's version of rascist--contrary to that--but i do have my concerns that who they pray to might disrupt me when i pray. oh well. gonna talk to god now. and release those tears i've been keeping in because my brother only just went to bed after i alerted my parents he was up, out of annoyance. birthday blogging i actually have to get up for what might be my last day at my beloved workplace here in jb, but, because of the significance of the date (ok so it's past midnight but i still count it as the same day) i just have to get something down.today i received the best present god could ever give me for this year: a job offer doing something i actually like in a strategic place with relatively friendly people. i was inwardly esctatic the minute i heard the lady-in-charge offering me the position. i have yet to accept it but i plan to tomorrow. why? because today another present was in store for me: it was the first time i have ever had two interviews in one day. comparatively, when i look back at the months where people didn't even want to interview me, to the past two months when interviews started trickling in slowly but surely, that (the fact that i had two interviews) is definitely a step forward for me. --stop. okay the rest i blogged when i was half-drunk on words, thereby resulting in an entire postful of drivel so i shall re-edit it and put it up again when i have the time. for now, work in jb still beckons (they won't let me off till thursday) and i have less than a week to find a decent place to stay in sg (i start work monday) so....this will have to wait. so if anything, yes, pray that i overcome this hurdle (small by comparison to the mammoth task of finding a job in the first place) of finding a decent room to rent by monday. sorry to all the people whom i said i would email and furnish with further details about my complicated position and bla bla bla and all that. for now, this post will have to satisfy you, unless i see you in person. --
what the blog? wad?? i come back and all the dates and timings of the november posts are missing. and it has nothing to do with my coding, because it works perfectly fine for the other months. now november just looks like an extremely long journal written in one sitting. hargh."don't lose faith" someone forwarded this rather encouraging read by Steve Jobs, co-founder of the great almighty Apple (Macintosh, etc.) to the mailing list i was subscribed to. the speech was supposed to be advice for graduates just coming into work, yet it can be applied to other areas of life as well (and indeed, that is indirectly the speaker's conclusion, at the end). i would've loved to reproduce it here but since it's so long i'll just insert the bits i like:"Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future...This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life. ...It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith...You've got to find what you love...Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. ...Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. ...Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. ...Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you." |
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