Yay for bad Japanese!

時々遠く逃げたいとおもって, でも自分の自由を追いかける方は全然解らない。だから、私が教えられてくれる人の何時も待ってる。ま…それ事を思って、私に教えたできる人がいる事を何時も信じているよ。でも、今解った。その事が教えられない事です。自分の自由が自分に見つけなきゃ。

Remembering the small but big moments

Two nights ago, just before I slip to sleep, I recalled a memory I had of an old couple I met when I was touring in Korea two years ago. It felt strange because I wasn’t the kind who recall things or events clearly. But I remembered that encounter I had with them in detail – or at least in more detail than I would have with any other memory:

I was travelling with two other friends, and was lucky to have a Korean buddy take us around. His girlfriend had helped us book an apartment at a condominium for a couple of days while we were there. I remembered the weather being slightly cloudy, or maybe it could have drizzled a bit. Right in front of its main doors, there was a statue of a hand, as if it struck out from beneath the ground and was reaching out for something. The staff wore black formal suits and I remembered thinking that the male staff looked very smart in the suits. We were in Busan, and the air smelled of the sea.

While we waited for our Korean guide to help us check in and settle other administrative matters, I looked around and couldn’t help but notice curious stares directed at us. Everybody in the lobby was Korean. So I guessed it was because we were foreigners, and the condominium apartment wouldn’t have been accessible to foreigners like us. They were probably wondering what on earth were we doing there, like a bunch of donkeys trying to blend in with a herd of horses. As I combed the lobby with my eyes, there was an old lady seated at a couch nearby who was looking at us. She didn’t look away like the others did when I looked straight at her. Instead, she smiled.

She gestured for us to come forward. I was puzzled at first and turned to Sarah, who was the only one among us that could speak Korean. Sarah caught on and pointed at us. Speaking with our bodies, we “asked” if the old lady was referring to us to go to her. The old lady nodded her head and gestured even harder, urging us to come. Cautiously, slightly taken aback by the sudden request, and wondering what to do with the language barrier, we went forward. “Oh my god, what does she want with us? Oh no,” we mumbled to ourselves.

When we approached her, she started to speak in Korean, and I could only make out a few familiar words (thanks to Kdramas).

“You guys don’t look local, are you guys Korean? (We shook our heads) Where are you from?”

“We’re from Singapore,” Sarah replied. The old lady’s eyes lit up and she spoke faster with more enthusiasm.

“Oh, I’ve been there before! (At this point, Sarah was translating for us) My husband and I went there lots of times because he has business there.” I was just nodding along, as if I understood every bit.

“I see. Is it fun?” Sarah asked.

We were all expecting a polite reply; The kind most strangers would reply with. Things like “Oh yes, it was divine.” or “Oh yes, it’s a beautiful country.”

Instead, she let out a frustrated sigh with a frown, “Oh, it’s not interesting at all! It’s really boring!” Her refreshingly honest reply got us all laughing. She started talking about our weather and really bad fashion so there wasn’t anything to buy from there. And just when we thought the conversation has ended, she switched the topic and talked about our health. She used to practice Chinese medicine and knew a bit of acupuncture, something about pressure points on the hand which Sarah could not understand completely.

She told us that she noticed us from afar and from our faces, she could see that our health wasn’t doing so good. (At this point, I was wondering if she was about to sell us some Chinese medicine. I looked at my other friends and I could tell they were thinking the same thing.) We simply nodded.

Turning to me, with a worried expression on her face and raising her tone for emphasis, “Oh~! Your body constitution is the weakest among you three!” My two other friends laughed. And as soon as Sarah translates that, I went “eh.. EH?!?!”

Without any notice, she took my hand gently, like a mother would with her child, and started talking about pressure points again. Sarah wasn’t completely sure of what she said, but the old lady went on anyway, thinking we could understand. Something about heart or the liver, Sarah was trying her best to make out bits and pieces of what she was saying.

Then, I guess the old lady figured the only way was to show us. She pressed her finger on a point on my hand, where the joints of the thumb and index finger meet. It was painful at first, but as soon as she released it, I felt a strange calming sense of pleasure, if that was even possible.

“If you keep pressing this point, your health will improve,” the old lady said. We all followed and went, all bright-eyed, giving enthusiastic responses, “Ohh! Wow! Whoa!” At this point, I thought we were acting like kids.

My Korean buddy joined us, wondering what all the fuss was and why we were all crowding a poor old lady. We updated him on it, and he started conversing with her for a bit. Then came an old man. It was her husband and he spoke fluent English with a slight British accent. He had the presence of a successful businessman. In a suit, he stood with his hand in his pocket. Yet, his stance was not of arrogance. He was firm and collected. Such presence, I thought. Calmly, he spoke. And somehow you knew he spoke every word with careful thought put into it. He, too, talked about his experience with Singapore (“… It’s so boring!” the old lady chided as soon as the word Singapore was mentioned). I couldn’t help but think they were an adorable couple.

They seemed like two different individuals – one is warm, kind and honest. It feels like there’s still an inner child in her who’s still seeking adventure. The other is strong and silent, like a tree, firm and dependable. Yet, here they are, spending time together. I wondered if they had children. It seemed like all they have are each other, and that’s okay, because they have each other. And I thought that was rather sweet. Without a word, I watched him help her up from the couch with care, and gently held onto her arm. She looked like she didn’t want to say goodbye. But we did so anyway, and went to settle down in our apartment.

I didn’t tell my friends. But for the rest of that day, I couldn’t help but think of the old lady from time to time, like how kind her eyes looked when she smiled, how nice she is to strike up a conversation bravely despite knowing the language barrier, and how her love seemed so simple and sweet. Though it was a short and simple conversation, I felt like I was allowed a small glimpse into someone else’s life. I don’t know just how to describe it completely, but perhaps it was this sense of ‘unity’ that overwhelmed me – I felt her happiness in that moment. It almost seemed like she wanted to share a bit of that with my friends and I when she decided to strike up a conversation with us that day, and consequently, I was happy too.

It warmed my heart. And I couldn’t help but think how nice it would be if people were less afraid of each other, pass on a smile instead of a frown, and be able to strike up random but genuine conversations with each other, despite the differences.

I think I’ve forgotten about that for a while – that we are actually capable of touching someone’s life and pass on happiness with just a small and simple gesture. Amidst the hectic pursuit of success, I’ve grown skeptical and cynical about people in general. I became disenchanted with everything around me. I kept people at arm’s length away from me because I thought to turn my back on the world before the world turned its back against me. Indeed, it seems I’ve lost and missed out too many things along the way.

But somehow, two nights ago as I laid there on my bed waiting for sleep to happen, as if I’ve received a spiritual touch of some sort, I remembered the old lady. I remembered that moment of pure happiness, and that I was capable of being happy for someone else even if I might not be on my own.

Maybe it was nothing special for the old couple, they may have long forgotten what we’d looked like, or that we even met at all. But I’d like to remember them for years to come because as cliche as it sounds, they gave me something really important, and I want to write this down so that I won’t forget again. That, and I also want to share this moment with whoever stumbles upon this blog, and I hope this’ll make them take a moment to remember those moments again.

And I do hope that wherever that old couple is right now, that they are healthy and happy. I wish for only good things to happen to them. I really do hope so.

Travel often. Meet lots of people. Share your stories. Make connections. Be bold. Be nice. Be good.
お婆さん、いろいろの事を教えてくれたありがとうね！

School’s Out! … What now?

I guess I haven’t been blogging as regularly as I would have been in the past. I’m not sure if this is a part of growing old – that you want to keep all the special moments to yourself and share them only with the ones who matter.

Moreover, there were times I clicked on ‘New Post’ and I’d just stare at the screen thinking of what to write. All of a sudden, it feels like all these things in my life don’t seem significant at all. Okay, I understand that everyone’s life probably isn’t that significant anyway. But the point is I feel like I’ve stopped participating in life, that’s all. So what does it matter if my life is smooth or rough, or that I’ve retreated back into my shell away from people, or that sometimes I find myself struggling with conflicting feelings of unbearable loneliness and yet a desperate need to be alone at the same time. I can’t figure out these feelings, and I guess I’ve come to accept that sometimes you don’t know things, and that’s okay. We don’t have the answers to everything and it’s possible that we will never know. And I guess that’s okay too.

The reason for this blog post today is that I want to find the words back. I want to try to find a way to see my painfully uninteresting life again in an interesting way. Maybe if I managed to do that, I won’t feel this jaded and disenchanted with everything around me all the time. I’m not depressed. I know what that feels like. And I don’t really know what this is. But it feels like… it feels like growing up. And it sucks. And there’s so many things I want to say but I think if I were to describe everything that has happened since my last blog post, I think I would bore people to tears, so I’ll just talk about the bigger moments:

I’m on school vacation for a week now, and I will be pulling myself out of my comfort zone soon by jumping into an internship for 6 months with a PR agency. But, more on that later.

The semester was a wreck for me. I felt like I was on a Viking. There were moments of highs but there were moments where I felt like I was sinking just as fast. The tight deadlines, group conflicts that arose because of personality differences which I had to try to manage (again, I’m not sure why I always seem to fall naturally into the role of a mediator), and immense pressures and challenges being placed on me was far too emotionally draining – And it was all because of one horribly coordinated module. At one point in time, I could have sworn I literally felt like I was suffocating. Yes, literally. I mean that. I’m just glad I could put all that behind me. But as horrible as it was, I learned a lot too, about myself in general. And about life, in general.

Under immense amounts of stress, I guess it was easy for my group mates and I to become just batshit crazy and bitchy. But bitchy in this unified way since we had a common ‘enemy/authority’ which we could direct our angst at so that things wouldn’t be so bad and we could still finish our work with our sanity still in tact. Sometimes, I think to myself that in some situations, perhaps this is exactly what an ‘authority figure’ exists for in the system. Someone has to play the bad guy so that everyone can work with insane conviction towards a common purpose and unknowingly achieve something that this ‘bad guy’ wants them to achieve. But as soon as I had thoughts like that, I quickly dismissed them as being ridiculous. I must have been reading too many comic books, I thought.

In between the hectic schedule and crazy deadlines to meet, I managed to nail a couple of interviews for an internship. That was when I realised just how near I was to the city. Every agency I knew was practically a few streets away. One of the interviews I had was just a few blocks away from my home. At times like these, I count my blessings and feel grateful for them, really. I’m not going to deny though, going for these interviews, what with all the work I had to do in between, was still very mind-boggling and incredibly mentally exhausting. On top of that, I was playing Aunt Agony to several people at the same time. Not that I hated being Aunt Agony, mind you, but there are just some days you wished you could be left alone, and yet you couldn’t just ignore other people’s problems completely either.

“Have time out for yourself,” they always say. But what happens when life just doesn’t allow that kind of luxury, and what happens when time out for yourself never seems to be quite enough? I pulled my brakes, of course. I pulled out from a number of unnecessary situations, took them off the list and put them under things I could afford to do later, and decided that these things should just either slow down at a pace I’m comfortable at or they can just go fuck it. I guess I’m a lot stronger than I thought I am.

So note to self: It’s okay to not give 110% in everything all the time, and you’re not as weak as you thought you are. You’re okay. You’ll be all right. You won’t crash and burn. One mistake doesn’t make up who you are entirely.

And suddenly, I’m reminded of what someone told me, “It’s unavoidable. Making mistakes, that is. But I think as long as you get it right more than 75% of the time, then I think you’re doing all right.”

I thought to myself that if someone really think that, then perhaps wherever this person is at, that place would be a place where people could grow. Not many places like that are left around here. These days, it’s expected of people to be perfect. And so I wanted to see for myself if such a place exists. Not too long ago, my hopes were crushed (no pun intended). Maybe it’s the reason why I’ve been feeling so disenchanted with everything around me, or maybe not. Either way though, I kept a flicker of it hidden somewhere in a place no one could go near to, because I think it’ll be a terribly sad thing to feel hopeless about everything. I still hope. But my cynicism has kept me from doing it excessively. In another few weeks’ time, I’ll be heading to that place soon and there could only be two possible ways it could go down from there.

But whichever path that is, I pray that the outcome won’t blow that tiny flicker out completely…. or perhaps even if it did, I hope it reignites another kind of hope altogether.

… Still, I count my blessings for coming this far on my own anyway.

The Visitor

“You will be safe here,” the Visitor said. It was a dark hollow figure and it bore no face. It spoke with an icy cold and rational tone. And it was clear that it was just business as usual for the Visitor.

“I will take care of things from now on,” it said. “There’s no need to worry anymore.” Without turning behind, it walked towards the door.

“Hey,” I called out to it, unsure of this arrangement. “Will you come back for me? When… when things get better?”

“Sure,” it spoke reassuringly, but its tone remained static and eerily cold. “Sure, I will. So just rest and enjoy the quiet for now. Things are going to be okay, and I promise, I will come back for you.”

I smiled. Then suddenly, I felt weightless, like all the energy has left my body. I was so exhausted. My eyes struggled to stay open. Yes, indeed… I’ve been fighting this for too long.

-BAM- I heard the Visitor shut the door.

Then, there was silence and there was pitch black darkness. There was absolutely nothing here. Nothing for me to worry about. The Visitor was right. It has it all figured out. It said it’d come back for me. So for now, I’ll rest while I wait for his return. Yes, I’ll just leave the rest to him.

And so I closed my eyes. Like he said I should.

And so I rested. Like he said I should.

And I slept. I slept for a long time. I don’t even know how long I had slept for. I guess I was just so tired, and it felt so good to finally rest.

And in between moments between sleep and wake, I waited for the Visitor’s return.

Then soon, I was awake, waiting for sleep to happen again.

Then soon, I was awake.

And I don’t know what I was waiting for anymore.

Sounds familiar

From Being Human (s2e7)

It’s ironic how I relate so much to a ghost sometimes.

Sally Malick:

Have you just been waiting for me?

Reaper:

You came to me.

I knew you would.

Sally Malick:

I’ve been thinking about what you said. …And I want you to know that you’re wrong about me.

…I’m not special.

Reaper:

What are you then?

Sally Malick:

I’m miserable. When I was alive, it never even entered my mind that I could exist on another plane when I died and watch everyone move on without me…and… eventually forget me.

When I met my roommates, I thought, “This is amazing. It’s easier now. We’re in this together.”

…But then they moved on without me too.

Everybody else has something else to think about…

…somebody else to be with.

And I have nothing.

So maybe it’s time to stop running.

The Constant Struggle

If it’s one thing I’ve learned since I picked up drawing as a hobby, it was that the creative process, be it in writing or illustration and design, is almost always an internal warzone for the creator.

Something can always be improved. It’s never enough. I would spend hours in front of my laptop and tablet, trying to push myself to spot the mistakes and correct them. I would keep spamming the undo button, tracing and retracing my steps over and over again just to get the perfect outline.  I’d get frustrated at myself sometimes when I cannot visualise the scene out perfectly.

Yet, I still do it. Finishing the product is always cathartic. It’s an addiction. That sense of euphoria knowing you’ve successfully pushed past your limits and extended the boundaries a little bit more. I can never get enough of it. But this feeling fades after a while and pretty soon, you’ll start getting the itch. But in order to feel that way, you need to fight a fierce battle against yourself and do it all over again. It’s a never ending cycle… but most of the time, it’s worth the struggle.

The Story of the Black Sheep and the Golden Child

Do you know how the conversation of the black sheep and the golden child went?

The black sheep said to the golden child, “You’re lucky you have me for everyone to compare with. That’s why they love you, you know.” The golden child smiled softly at the black sheep, her eyes faint and tired. “You’re lucky you don’t have to live up to people’s high expectations of you, you know. I’m doing that in your place so you can be free.”

Winter reflections

It’s been a long while since I last opened my wordpress to blog.

Close friends would know by now that I’m prone to disappearing and not hearing from me every once in a while. And they would know that this isn’t because I hate them or anything. Sometimes, there’s just so much clutter in my life that I need time to reorganise and restructure my life again. A timeout, that’s what most people would call it, I guess, to get my life back on track again.

So what have I been up to?

I got myself a one-month internship stint. I won’t say where because I know they have some pretty awesome media monitoring shit in place. Not that I have anything bad to say about the place though, since I was there for the ‘honeymoon’. People are generally nice to the newbie just as long as the newbie don’t get in their way. And well, for the most part, I stayed clear out of anyone’s way and helped out as much as I can while I was there.

Christmas was surprisingly good to me this year.

They had this Christmas party and employees (including the interns) had to form groups and perform an item. The interns were mostly reluctant to perform and had asked me to do it. So I thought, oh what the heck. Much to their surprise (and mine), I agreed to it. But it was one of those spur of the moment decisions you make where you regret seconds after you agreed to it. I started worrying if I would embarrass myself and all. Thankfully, one other person whom I’ve gotten fairly close to offered to perform alongside with me and play the guitar. But we kept procrastinating and ended up practicing only on the day of the party itself. And on top of that, I had some last-minute revisions to make to a video, and I had to finish editing before the party. Cinderella had to return by 12 midnight, whereas I had to finish a job by 12 noon.

Seeing that I might not have enough time, my supervisor told me that I had to skip the performance if I have to. I knew that I had to finish the job but at the same time I couldn’t just back out from the performance. So I did the best I could to edit the video out in record speed, in between practicing and rehearsing, for the entire morning. Somehow, I managed to pull it off and my supervisor was actually pleased with my work. On top of that, the performance was quite a success, although they said my part of the performance was too soft (well I was nervous singing in front of so many people!) . Well, if that wasn’t good enough, I also won some $300 worth of vouchers in a lucky draw at the end of the Christmas party.

It was really funny because I was a newbie who’s only around for a month, and I lucked out $300 from the lucky draw. When my name was called, everyone went: “Gina? Who’s Gina?? *looking left and right* Do you know who Gina is? Where’s she from? Wait, what? SHE’S AN INTERN? How long has she been with us? WAIT, WHAT? 1 MONTH?!”

Well, in the spirit of giving, I decided to give it back and spent more than half of it giving out christmas gifts to my supervisors and the other interns in the department. The rest went to my parents who bought new clothes for themselves. What the hell, right?

Overall, I had tons of fun there, partly because of the interns, some of them whom I still keep in contact with on Twitter from time to time. And well, that’s that. After an eventful stint, I went back to school. 13 weeks of invisibility, once again. It’s week 7 now and I have tons of projects and essays due. I’m starting to get the Senior Syndrome, where I’m starting to learn not to sweat the small stuff and just do my best. Of course, sometimes my neurotism kicks in and I start worrying whether I’ll do well enough, or start blaming myself for not working harder to get the results I want. But at least, right now, I’m trying not to be too hard on myself. It’s funny because I dish the “take it easy” advice all too often and yet I almost never seem to be able to follow them when it comes to myself.

Well, a good start to 2012, wouldn’t you say?

A short post

Once upon a time,

there lived a girl who lived her life constantly trying to please others.

And when others were happy, so was she.

As days went by, she felt pieces of her fading away

And though her eyes went cold,

she kept her smile for everyone to see.

One day, she fell into a little hole in the ground,

where she met a fairy who felt sorry for her and so she asked,

‘Dear child, if I could grant you one wish to make yourself happy, what will it be?’

The girl, surprised by this question, blinked once, twice and bit on her lips.

But slowly, she opened her mouth and began to speak.

With bated breath, the fairy waited to hear her wish.

… Her wish, what could it be?

Protected: I feel icky. Pw is my favourite Pokemon

This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below:

Password: