Swing-- a) Moods
b) The swing I always go to when i feel down--somewhere between East Coast and Kembagan MRT station.
c) Jazz. which I can't stand
d)How I feel right now--ungrounded and unstable--even when I'm not moving I'm still hovering some distance above the ground wondering at which moment-- will I fall or will I be left hanging?
Full--a) my physical state, my stomach is bursting.
b) The total opposite of my mental state--Feeling a bit confused and lost, My thoughts just don't seem to come naturally.
c) A mental feeling of coming close to the threshold beyond which I will explode--sadly not creatively, but all the nitty gritty concerns which fills up my brain and consume all my energy that I have little time for the spiritual, and intellectual.
d) Of feelings. I can usually handle with mental effort when it is balanced with reason. Recently that equilibrium disappeared.
Extreme--a) The extent of my homesickness
b) Things I see in news and that photo of the man squatting, crying over the dead body of his brother in Iraq. Unforgettable.
c) THe change in weather
d) and hence the stress my body is undergoing to adjust.
e) Extreme Makeover home edition where they rennovate home for poor American Familes with a sad story to tell--a tear jerker, sometimes a source of inspiration, sometimes a source of irritation.
Christmas--a)A simulant or catalyst for homesickness.
b) A season where peolpe shop like mad here, but I am in a cashless and strange new situation.
c) A time when my sec school and JC friends will meet up and something I always lok froward to, celebrating with them.
d) But not this year.
e) When I think about what it means to me if I still question the reason for the season. A virgin, a birth, a miracle (a myth?)
f) a synonym for : I wish I was a child.[optional: forever]
By: Nippy | Wednesday, November 29, 2006 at 12:39 PM | | 
So Sally can't wait she knows it's too late, cos we're walking on by...
For some reasons my sis and I talked about rotten food today and we laughed about how the TPJC bookshop Aunty--aka the scary, no conscience business woman she is. Denying that her sweets had any ants while simultaneously crushing them with her index fingers. "Ants, what Ants?(in Chinese) and of course her infamous and unforgettable one liner that I will remember for life and have now become my life motto when faced with suspicious food items. "Aiya! Can't die one lah!" (in CHinese) when we told her out of kind-heartedness that her riccola sweets have changed colour from a normal delicious looking red to a faded rusty/misty brown. She very boldly in her raised voice told me that i can't die from eating it. how true. So that is how I'm gonna look on at life now. Not with an ill intend to poison my guests and friends but "what can't kill ya only makes you stronger." I wish I was always this optimistic. Tell me about those times I cried for no apparent reason but only missing the warm, wet climate or a bowl of Ban Mian. Not to mention when I think of Macaroni Cheese at Kenny outlets. Yes "Aiya Can't Die one lah!" Chant it enough and I might even believe it if I ever flew out of a 27 storey window.
And yes Chunhui talking about bad food we mentioned your cancerous strawberries. I can't believe we were brainless enough to stuff ourselves with black-coloured strawberries--one of the strangest looking strawberries I've ever tasted. I suspect they are close to what radioactive strawberries with attitude would look like in early stages of decomposition but ok I do tend to exaggerate. I don't think we are really that stupid. Although I think it is enough to atone for giving maggot infested gold-coin chocolates to your sister in return for her kindness in helping me remove my earrings when I just had my ears pierced and it was so swollen and slippery I couldn't get it off and simply freaked out. Some grateful friends you have there Chunhui. Anyway we went to that same MAma shop and witness a family of happy baby cockroaches inside the bag of cuttlefish snacks. Are you still patronizing that mama shop? I wonder...
yes but to stick to my post title don't look back in Anger all these weird and sometimes horrible incidents are actually great nuggets (gold not chicken) for me to laugh at whenever I feel horribly down. My sis can be a witness to my sometimes horrible moods--I just had one of those day. SHe claims it is madness not mood.
Yes when I cry because of stupid things as weird and stupid and frivolous and any of these mentioned incidents. SO you guys see we all have our sad days, but after they've blown over and I've cried reaching the pit bottom, Li would understand, suddenly the world is beautiful again! And there's so much to laugh about and reminiscent about. So why look back in Anger or sadness when I can look back with a smile to cheer me on and remind me to keep looking forward to more of these small gems in our short span of a life in this "yes once again" Weird universe.
By: Nippy | Sunday, November 26, 2006 at 1:56 PM | |
It is going to be one week since I arrived in SF tomorrow. 7 days. One week. FOr some reason my sense of time seems to be a bit loose. Maybe it's jetlag, maybe it's missing home, everything seems elastic, stretchable. I keep thinking of everything in terms of Sing dollars, how everything seems unbelievably expensive, I wonder what time it is in SIngapore and how it would be great to just wander out onto the streets, without all that heavy burden of winter wear and enjoy that permenant summer, the air warm and sweet, tropics. I think of the sound of crickets I hear lying in my bed in afternoons and the creaking lizards at night when I creep downstaris to get a drink of water. How sometimes before a tropical storm I can feel the air heavy and tense the sky grey, masjestic. How I know some places hold certain memories and secrets only shared by the few for whom places have meaning.
I think about you guys. I wonder what you all are doing, are you all going about life as per normal, how we all have a kind of freedom in the place we are so familiar with, not that insecurities of a stranger in a foreign land. Travelling to a new place, always is exciting and the thought of starting a new life breath-taking. I still feel excitement, only sometimes mingled with a longing for home. Because this place is not yet mine. I have no one here except my sister I can truly call mine either. I read the letters you guys gave me again. They make me smile.
Travelling to a new place is like being in a permanent present, the future is not yet envisioned, because everything is so new. The past seems too distant, I must admit sometimes when I get too caught up in the new environment, the past just seem unreal. It is as if, that was another Oi Ying form another time. It can be very liberating, in a rather Buddhist kind of way. A firm ground only of the present and no ties to a past nor illusions of the future. An illusion almost that I have shaken off some unhappy past, or some desires for the future we all feel certain would past when we're in a familiar setting. But then that freedom sometimes hang in balance, sometimes it breaks down, and I feel lost. As if that past became suddenly disjointed, like after some earthquake, the continuity fractured. I still look for signs to speak of a underlying continuity in my life. Letters from you guys, ornaments I took along from my old room, my old blanket--now propety of my sister.
IT is perhaps a lesson on the impermenance of things. It is also lesson on the permanence of things. Chunhui, your letter speaks to my heart, maybe I'm a romantic but I choose to believe that places hold that resonance they preserve memories, but even being divorced from the places, the sights, the smell, the temperature...The vibrations on the strings which form a complex web in our lives still resound. But sometimes it is hard to believe in invisible, untouchable, intangible things--like a dream, a memory. like home--how we often forget it is not the place we are born into but something we build around ourselves, layers upon layers. It takes a cleaning of the slate to remind us that it is created, built by many. And so I miss it, now that I'm a little cold in my Uncle's room thinking of my place, things which give my life meaning. And wondering if it is meaningful to forget ourselves? Our past, is it truly removable? What would make someone choose to cut all those strings--how is it a form of self-discovery or how do people let go of their past and identity and devote themselves to a practise--a way of life which I can barely understand. And do they like me suffer from homesickness? Pastsickness? Identitysickness?
By: Nippy | Thursday, November 23, 2006 at 9:32 AM | |
My spelling is atrocious
By: Nippy | Sunday, November 19, 2006 at 8:03 AM | |
People, I'm considering setting up a new page to start the chronicles of my life in SF. Anyway, I arrived yesterday. No Jet LAg, thankfully. Ok but best not to boast yet. Ok still jobless, but if I've already got a job by today, I might rushing things a bit: blaming the bad timing is always a wonderful justification for bumming around. Another common one is of course: I'm not ready. There you have it the reasons why I'm not actively looking for a job yet. I'm still adapting ok? I'm not prepared yet! OK, crapping aside, Things have settled down in a nicely quiet sort of way. Things move slower here, for some reason (maybe that's the bum's piont of view.) One of those office workers in downtown area will have a drastically different view. But oh well.
I went to the DMV today (Dpeartment of Motort Vehicles) and will take my driving test WHEN I AM READY. I took the handbook and will have to study the road rules and road signs. MAybe after blogging, watching some tele, listening to some music, playing some video games, I will get down to it. (you can see how I am a wonderfully well planned person with good sense of priorities).
Hm... I have my own room, thankfully, I need my space, and things have been ok, my parents are not around, but I have my UNcles and Grandma who happens to be in some ways more conservative than my parents but I hope things work out ok between us.(fingers crossed) Adapting to another family's lifestye will take some time, but I hopw things work out and we will have stronger relationships.. (Appeal to the eternal optimist in me)And of course there's also letting them get used to having us around.. they still see us as kids worrying that we will wander off and get kipnapped that kind of thing, but everything will take time. And I loce what Suede has to say: "EVERYTHING WILL FLOW"... I hope that excludes blood,tears and pee.
By: Nippy | Saturday, November 18, 2006 at 2:13 PM | |
Hey Hey Hey guys!!!!!! Finally some news! It's damn hard looking for places to use internet in HongKong because apparently everyone here either has computers of their own or the cyber cafes here are porno cyber cafes..(so there you have it). Hey Jing you idiot! I read your letter and you made me cry again! Thank you girl! And Li thank you for the funny box of stuff (the box looks suspiciously porn-like)where did you get it? Anyway, Ｉcan't talk much here because I'm standing at some information counter and everyone can read what i'm writing... And because there's this timer ticking down limiting my usage to now 7 mins and 18 secs.... Sim! The gift (which I suspect is your idea is very sweet! Thank you! I'll read it whenever I'm down and need encouragement (if I can't get you guys on MSN first that is!) I'm ever so thankful for you guys--I'm one lucky bitch to have made such friends and to have grown up alongside fantastic people like you guys!
Ok not to ramble on and on.. you get more news once I reach San Francisco! The timer is now 4 mins (the com is crazy too it keeps rebelling) oh well! Hey guys till we can chat on MSN ok? MIssing you guys already (shuts)....
Saying Goodbye is never an instance. It is never Goodbye, the end. It is always a process.
By: Nippy | Saturday, November 11, 2006 at 9:38 PM | |
