KimbeeTurns 21

Hello, kenalkan kawan saya yang tak handsome ini, namanya Mohammad Shazwan bin Azizan. Please get his name right, it's Shazwan with an (H) aitch and not a (Y); dia tak suka orang salah type/tulis nama dia. Namun begitu, Shazwan lebih famous dengan gelaran Kimbu--an ugly nickname I never quite understood the origins of. Budak boarding school memang nama pelik-pelik, and Kimbu, despite it being derived from Kimi Buto, wasn't the worst in its era.

What you need to understand about Kimbu is that he is one of my two oldest, most ancient friends (the other being Sofia). Bak kata orang, we go back, waaaay back. It's now 11 years and counting for us. But if one wanted to be technical, out of those 11 years, we've only really been friends for 11 minus 2.5 years. 2 years in SKBD when we were never really friends, but mere acquaintance, and another half a year in 2006 when our friendship went on hiatus.

Ya, kami tidak bercakap selama itu dan persahabatan agak terputus begitu sahaja selepas saya meninggalkan our fellow schoolmate for another guy Kimbu deemed poyo. For what it's worth, the poyo guy was kinda poyo, but he was a really nice guy. Anyways, macam mana pun, pusing-pusing jugak, we patched things up dan perkara itu tak pernah kami bincangkan out in the open.

But I've never been more glad that day we became friends again. Kerana, kerana, Kimbu itu duduk 5 minit sahaja from my grandmother's place and we've been threading on the same path for as long as I can remember. From SKBD to KYS, from ADFP to the States, from all that to serving a 12-year bond in Bank Negara, you can say it's going to be awfully difficult for us to avoid each other kalau dah kena pandang muka each other for the rest of our lives, kan?
Jadi, walaupun bukan hari-hari sekarang, pandanglah Kimbu dekat muka saya yang berblackheads dan berspek ni, dan pandanglah saya muka Kimbu yang gelap, berkening tebal dan berhidung tinggi, eh silap, mancung. Dan jika kamu ingin membuat speculation kitorang patut just hook up and kahwin each other, please, please don't. . . don't make us puke.

Kimbu has seen me sleeping with my mouth wide open one too many times, and I've seen his lurah dendam if that matters. Kami mungkin serasi sebagai kawan, dan bapanya mungkin sayang saya (although Nasya mungkin lebih disayangi oleh Uncle Azizan), dan saya mungkin boleh tolerate Kimbu dan OCDnya, dan Kimbu mungkin boleh tolerate kegilaan saya, tapi that's all there is to it: kami akan kawan sampai mati, God willing. Kimbu's take on this is somewhat more practical--"our height difference makes it susah for us to cium". Bagus, at times like this I'm thankful I'm ketot binti spendot.

Now let's move on to the more serious matters, that is, Kimbu's severe OCD. Kimbu is very OCD. Did I mention Kimbu is suffering from a terrible case of OCD? Dia ni jenis yang kalau nampak tali bra orang terpintal-pintal, he'd be itching to straighten it. He is the sort of person who spends long hours Wiki-ing songs and syncing the spelling of his songs on the Ipod so that it matches those of the Wiki entries.

Alas, I find it very contradicting that he is such a cincai boncai person when it comes to cooking. A pinch of this, a spoon of that, throw in this weird ingredient, that ingredient, and voila, you get a taste of Kimbu magnificence. Yes, Kimbu can cook, but weirdly, he cooks like a normal guy, unlike his usual neurotic self in other matters. Tak konsisten sungguh.

Tapi yelah, Kimbu ni pandai memasak. Where I can even destroy something as simple as Maggi Instant Porridge, Kimbu can bake a pumpkin pie to perfection. He, along with Nik Munawwar, gave me a tutorial on egg-cracking, that is, after they laughed their booties off at my inept way of doing so.

Another thing we can all come to appreciate about Kimbu is that he is a wealth of information. For those familiar with How I Met Your Mother, Kimbu can be likened to Ted Moseby. Unlike Moseby whose every line uttered is always teaching someone about something, Kimbu comes annoyingly close. But I've learned aplenty from riding in the car with him, and you might wanna try that if you intend to become smarter. I swear, I'm probably 265-information smarter out of the 265 rides Kimbu has given me, heheh.

Tapi cubalah cari nahas dengan Kimbu pasal spelling, grammar and punctuation and he'll turn into the rightful bitch he can be. Cuba lah berbroken English dengannya, and you'll never hear the end of it. Mungkin dia ungkit balik setelah sebulan, mungkin dia letak status memaki hamun aksi itu di Facebook, mungkin he writes a lenghty post about it at shazwanazizan.blogspot.com. Gedik sungguh mungkin, tapi I agree with his sentiments no less.

Kawan-kawan kami juga pernah berbincang tentang satu lagi keistimewaan cum kecacatan si Kimbu ini, yakni dia ingat segala detail pasal segala detail. Ask him which exact seat he sat in the History Room in Form One, and he can point to it in a jiff. Only he can recall random stuff like the Geography teacher asking a classmate to drum on the table, or what someone said about someone 10 years ago. Dan sebab ini lah maruah saya tercalar, sebab saya tahu dia akan masih ingat lagi warna, bentuk, pattern, brand dan SIZE coli yang saya TERtinggal dalam vannya selepas lawatan kami ke PD tempoh hari. Cis bedebah.

Apa-apa hal pun, saya sebenarnya selalu tak sure birthday dia September 20 atau September 21. Ke September 22? Sebab dulu dia pernah mention lagu M2M yang berbunyi "I remember, date and time, September 22nd, Sunday, 25 after 9, in the doorway, with your caaaase" ada kaitan dengan birthday dia. Jadi saya ambil jalan mudah untuk tulis blog post pasal dia, sebab kalau salah hari pun it's still such an honor and oh-so-sweet, kan?

Kimbu--also known as Sazwan also known as Kimbee, who is the cucu of the renowned Pilus (Pilus was a common name on our tongues back in high school, maklumlah zaman-zaman ejek atuk orang)--will turn 21, tak kiralah September 20, 21 or 22. Dan pokoknya, he deserves to be remembered.

Happy 21st Birthday, Kimbu! You're no longer a juvie, sila buat baik. Seribu maaf dipinta if aku tersalah bahasa, musim-musim Aidilfitri ni we must forgive and forget, weh. Minal Aidil Wal Faizin. I lap you, you lap me (though I am still counting on you to discard that obscene, obscene picture of me on stage as Muna)! Sekian, salam sayang jangan lupa potong rambut every 6 months from me.

Salam Merantau

The roads to Jalan TAR are bottlenecked with cars transporting people young and old, male and female alike, who are there to shop till the cows come home. For the adventure-seeking, hot-blooded individual (like yours truly here), public transportation is the best alternative turned worst nightmare as it takes you traipsing along the trails of sin and spending from Masjid Jamek all the way to what was then called Batu Road.

I took to the wild city of Kuala Lumpur, scorching sun, impending rain and all, with the sole goal of claiming my grandmother's baju kurung from the tailor. The tailor was located rather unstrategically--right smack and center of the Hari Raya bazaar, close to Semua House. Naturally, I came back with no less than four plastic bags and a dwindling supply of the advanced duit raya I received from two aunts.

I emerged triumphant with the cutest slip-on tudung I'll probably only wear once, a striking green and fair imitation of the Rayban shades I cannot quite afford, three boxes of Pop-Pop (bought becaused I pitied the man, what else is new?) and another I<3KL t-shirt as a souvenir for whom?-I-haven't-quite-figured-out-yet.

So yes, I know it is the time of the year again as I bring my petite self across oceans of bodies that displayed a plethora of smells (BO being my least favorite). Raya songs were blaring on loudspeakers in the background while mountains of kuih raya were displayed under stuffy tents.

I wasn't fasting yesterday (for obvious and allowed reasons by virtue of being a female), so the feel of Raya did not really hit me until I was in the safe--not to mention cold--premise of the STAR to Masjid Jamek and PUTRA to Sentral (I took the transfers because 1.it was raining cats and dogs, 2. I was flat broke and couldn't deal backtracking on the bloody path of consumerism).

It is Hari Raya Puasa is Aidilfitri is Eid Fitri of the year 2009! It's also my third Raya as a college student without a Salam Perantauan in tow. This in mind, Salam Merantau is born.

Nurjannah Iman Syaqirene Ahmat mengucapkan Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri kepada keluarganya yang akan beraya bersamanya di Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (wohoo, jealous tak you 'ols?). Seterusnya beliau yang mesra alam dengan panggilan NJ juga menyampaikan ribuan kasih dan sayang Aidilfitri kepada regularsnya yang sering ke hulu dan ke hilir bersama-samanya pada cuti summer kali ini (you know who you are).

Juga kepada sahabat-sahabat handai dan seperjuangannya di Amerika Syarikat, terutamanya di University of Chicago, University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign, Carnegie Melon University, University of Pittsburgh, Rochester Institute of Technology, Pennsylvania State University, University of California-Davis, Purdue University, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Indiana University-Bloomington, Ohio State University serta rakan-rakan yang lebih tua dan sudah berkerjaya seperti kamu di Chicago, dan kamu lagi satu di Milwaukee (you guys know who you are). Salam sayang Hari Raya turut diluahkan kepada family-family yang baik hati terutamanya Kak Nana, Kak Ain, Aunty Jaz, Aunty Lin dan crew MSD Chicago.

Salam Lebaran tidak dilupakan kepada rakan-rakan di Australia dan New Zealand, terutamanya kamu di University of Queensland yang saya sangat rindui, dan rakan-rakan di United Kingdom (KYSERs di sana, teman-teman scholars serta orang random yang telah saya temui melalui dunia siber yang bersekolah di Dur-ham-I-tak- nak-sebut-Dar-rum), rakan-rakan di Russia (okay, seorang teman sahaja) dan Europe (Germany dan bekas-bekas teman sebilik Blok 2/504 Akasia saya di France).

Terima kasih dan seribu maaf dipinta kepada pendidik di SKBD, Sekolah Agama Masjid Saidina Umar Al-Khattab, KYS, ADFP INTEC (terutama guru Kalkulus merangkap Ibu). Saya juga sayang dan ingin mengirim kucupan Aidilfitri kepada 2 kakak angkat/kakak besar dan adik angkat saya yang gelap tapi masih comel serta junior-junior lain yang kian merata-rata juga. Di sini, saya turut menyusun sepuluh jari memohon maaf dan 'menyalam' aidilfitri kepada rakan taulan dan kenalan di UiTM, UIA, UTP, UKM dan USM. Walaupun kita jarang bersua, saya tetap sayangkan anda semua!

Last but not least, Selamat Hari Raya to you readers, random or not, followers or not, friends or not, and thank you. Yet another Ramadan has come and gone, and I pray that you're blessed with hope and happiness, health and faith and all good things that leave you warm and fuzzy.

Selamat!

An "Inside Joke" Is Never Funny "Outside"

PJ, 11 September--NJ picks up the office phone authoritatively, putting on her no-nonsense, most professional voice. She dials for Richard Ng, with much gusto and style, punching the numbers as she reads it aloud.

Richard Ng is one man, one Malaysian man, who operates a cab. His business card reads: "Taxi service, from your doorstep to any step away; KLIA, Inter-city, Intra-city; Please call at least an hour before your trip."

NJ: Hello, Mr. Richard ah? I'm calling from Amnesty International in PJ.

R: Yes yes. What? NST what?

NJ: Oh, no no. Amnesty International, from New Town PJ.

R: Uhuhuh.

NJ: Anyways ah, I'd just like to ask you if we can reserve your cab for 2pm today? From 8 Avenue here at New Town PJ ah, Section 8, to Central Market. Well, actually not really Central Market lah, but Annexe. You know ah?

R: How you got my number?

NJ: Oh, I have your business card, a staff took your cab once. You said to call in advance, maa.

R: Ya ya. (Silent for 2 seconds) Oh, I ah, no longer do cab business ah.

NJ: Oooooh. (Silent for 4 seconds) Okay, nemind. Thank you ah Mr. Richard Ng. You have a nice day.

NJ to others in the office: Oh, Mr. Richard Ng has moved on to better things in life. He no longer does cabs.

(Office errupts in laughter)

The Rise and Fall Fall Fall

It's eerily peculiar that we say we are 'into someone' when frankly human beings can only go 'into' cars, houses and coffins. The transcend into the 'falling' phase is another mistreatment of language, in the most literal sense. 'Falling' in love--a wistful catch-phrase that gets the better of most people who don't know any better.

But time and time again, you hear whispers of the truth, lying beneath stories and layers of histories of familiar faces, of hearts you care about, of lessons learned yourself. Your body tremors with laughter insulated with shame for you see it now--it is called 'falling' for accurate reasons.

It is, half the time, not by virtue of circumstance, space and time, but by failing to watch your step. That is how you 'fall', even 'falling' in love. Failing to find requited love upon 'falling', you end up at the darkest, deepest trench on earth--your aching heart.

Unmistakably, when the zenith of heavens are reached, and all goes well, you 'fall', too. You 'fall' into a rhythm so new yet so familiar, like it was set in stone, as are the moon, sun and stars veiling the universe.

I 'fell' in love with Colbie Caillat's Falling For You, and hard, too. But this is one of those "falling-s" that I can pick myself up from, though, thank you.

p/s: My 9.09pm of 09/09/09 was spent in no better way than I could imagine. I had my regular girl on her special day sans the regular guys, but it was worth every minute lying on the pavement waiting to capture a snapshot of the digital clock turning 9.09pm at the Maxis tower. Oops, yes, we missed Tarawikh. Apa pandang-pandang, haa? JK. Okay, roger and out.

Because I Don't Want To Forget

"There must be an answer for everything, if only you knew how to set forth the questions."-233

"Some lived careful lives and some lived careless lives, and everything that happened could be explained by the difference between them."-254

"A person who'd been moved around a great deal never acquired a fixed point of reference but wandered forever in a fog--adrift upon the planet, helpless, praying that just by luck he might stumble across his destiny."-115

Those feeling lost and are in the losing, pick up The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler. Nothing like curling into a good book once you feel like you're losing the groove. Drug yourself with some Alice Hoffman magic too, while you're at it. A sure cure for those going back to school blues. I feel thankful ma thrust-ed these books under my nose. Now, if only I can permeate through this writer's block; have but one article and an intern testimony to fuss about. Sigh.

Saya Pelatih Melapor Diri Pada Tahun 2011

At times it pays to have a brother who's bengkeng. After he has so kindly (to me) and unkindly (to them) chided the PLKN officers who screwed up my 4-year deferment, the verdict is out.

It's now 2 years before I have to lug my then 22-year-old (and hopefully NOT pudgy) unfit self to bootcamp.

Why? Because Bank Negara has spoken, and thy files are marked and stamped. There is no escape. But wait there is; to defer until I'm old and thirty OR get married and have kids, whichever comes first (preferably the latter). Ok, just kidding. I'll do it, you bet I will.

Pant through an obstacle course like I did throughout my 5 years of boarding school, use "hardwater" and get pimples like I always had in camps, march under the scorching sun and grant myself a tan like the one I have lived with for so many years? For Yahoo! fun as such, who can complain? Wait, then there is the privilege of donning those blue heavy uniforms and running around in those UGG-ly boots? Ah, sheer pleasure.

Oh, so you noticed the sarcasm? No, no, really, learning how to handle a gun and actually do some community service may be the only two things I'll value from PLKN. With the first, I am armed with the security, confidence and physical knowledge that I can blow off the dick of the next dickhead who breaks my heart; and the second, for obvious reasons.

Sure, this is going to be legen-wait for it-dary! Wait, no, really, I'm dead serious about the gun, no the community service. Eh, no, the community service, yes, yes.

And no, I am not usually this gedik, if that's what you're wondering. I just hate this serving-PLKN-before-I-work business with a passion.

Little Miss Butterfingers?

Sila gelakkan saya. I did the unthinkable and deleted my Recycle Bin last night. "Mana boleh delete recycle bin", you say? Cuba try test right-click on that Recycle Bin icon (for PC users) and select "Delete". There you go, you've just deleted your Recycle Bin. Congratulations for screwing up, and let's all join my club!

Some would argue that you can never "delete" your Recycle Bin per say (Thank God for that), but you know, when that familiar icon is gone, and you get that racing heartbeat like all the times you know you fumbled, you call the cards for what it is: your recycle bin has disappeared! Oh no-s!

But Google lives for dunce people like moi. In fact, I should think Google was invented for people who thrives at fumbling like ol' bumbling me! Mr. Goo linked me to Mr. Pedia, who had all the answers when Yahoo!Answers and other random forum sites where inaccessible (Read: Server Not Found and Page Cannot Be Loaded).

The scoop is right about Recycle Bins being un-delete-able. It just gets hidden. Silly people like me who use Windows Vista (not that we're silly for using Vista, but rather, we are silly AND we use Vista as our OS), heed these beautiful words:

If the Recycle Bin icon has been deleted from the desktop screen, the following actions can restore it (in Windows Vista ) - clicking: Right click->Personalization->and then click "change desktop icons" from the left-hand column at the top. From there just check Recycle Bin and click OK. If it doesn't appear on the desktop, restart computer.--Wikipedia

Problem is solved, and you are one step closer to becoming a full-fledged IT geek. Awesome possum, innit?

Jason Mr-AZ Should Teach Me Some A-Z

It's been 4 weeks that I'm left without prose, leaving this blog abandoned without a single decent topic to talk about. Or rather, I have been formulating entries in incomplete circles, for I come up with something to talk about and lose interest in the middle (to use someone's phrase, ha ha), all in my head.

But sometimes when you're left wordless, you tend to see things in a different light. You see that with or without words, we're doomed. Sometimes what is unsaid hurts more than what is uttered. A person who leaves you hanging gives you more shit than a person who fucks up your life with cruel words, am I not right?

Talentime, one of the many testimonies to Yasmin Ahmad's brilliance in film-making portrays the truth about the power of words, or rather the power without words. Mahesh, a lad who's speech and hearing impaired (and who, I must say, is extremely hot that he makes me salivate the whole 2 hours in front of the TGV screen) punches me with the staunch truth that sometimes we speak too much and fail to listen to what the universe has to tell us.

Alas, living in a world without words and speech can be devastatingly difficult. Emotions are wrongly read, especially with those who are EQ-ly unsound, and messages are lost, in the middle. Anyone who's ever been to a team-building seminar or whatever kind of workshop would know what I'm talking about if they've played "Chinese Whispers" or some game that requires non-verbal communication or blindfolds and all that jazz.

What would a sigh be if one is voiceless? There is no signal for "eh" or it's English counterpart "you know". Tell me what kind of gestures would substitute our playful "tsk tsk"s? Writing, you say? Of course, to write, solves one problem.

But then again, when both written and spoken words fail me, I do it with pictures. 4 weeks of joy, sadness, camaraderie, learning, love, growing, realizations and absence, all rolled into 5 collages. Maybe then you'll understand there is so much to talk about, but too little is the capacity in me to cough it all up. Pictures, pictures would keep you company for the time being.

p/s: Here's a thought--Instead of just exclaiming "Happy 52nd Merdeka" on Facebook and tweet about the stupidity of the newly-coined Salam 1 Malaysia, next time let's take a ride down Merdeka lane, trace some old national landmarks and teach your kids some stories they'd want to keep for their kids.