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.

The Masterplan

I will come full-frontal and tell you this: I make lists for everything. Well, at least I try to. Grocery lists, to-do lists, shopping lists, bill breakdowns; those are a must. About a month after my return to the blogging arena, I came up with a list of things I wanted talk about. I even coined cool (or so I think) titles to complement them, none of which ever came about.

A list of "Songs To Be Downloaded/Copied" also remains on my widget notepad to this day. My most recent endeavor was to prepare a list of books I wanted to read for my 3-month break from college and you know this is not happening because I promised myself to only buy used books online. A list of "Books To Be Bought On Amazon" would soon be drafted and--I'm almost certain--left untouched.

The irony is that I made a "Things I Would Never Do, Just Because" list that I seem to be checking off (or unchecking-off, depending on how you choose to perceive it) one-by-one. For your reference, the list:

1. Do anything to my hair (including perm, but especially color). CHECK (By perming).
   
2. Smoke (shisha or hookah not an exception). CHECK (Twice, on hookah).
   
3. Have more than one piercing. CHECK (Ear cartilage piercing, birthday treat to myself from myself)
4. Swim in a swimming pool with clothes (I believe in swimsuits for swimming pools). CHECK (I was doing well until yesterday, goddamit).
5. Vomit (self-induced or not).
6. Go on a diet.
7. Take painkillers.
   

To digress a little, yes, I have never puked in my 20 years of life. To go through life without puking is my aspiration, and we will have to wait 10 years down the road to see if morning sickness gets the best of me (I do plan to have kids, you know?). And god forbid I should ever have to go on a diet or take painkillers.

So there is a conundrum. I am itching to make a list, a list of "Adventurous Endeavors I Shall Partake In".

Before I die and utter the Kalimah Syahadah (InsyaAllah), I may want to go sky diving with a colorful parachute; take a jumping snapshot on the Y of the "Hollywood" at Hollywood; camwhore on a hot air balloon; drive a mini lorry; try bungee jumping, walk backwards on the Taman Negara Pahang suspension bridge; go skinny dipping (but wear a lifejacket since I'm afraid of deep waters) with my husband somewhere in the Caribbeans.

But once they are set in stone, written in black and white, typed on a screen, whatever it may be, I will not be able to attain them, won't I? Shall I make a non-list; a list that finds form in my thoughts and dreams, only to be coughed out once realized? For starters, here's one:

1. Rock-climbing. CHECK (Thanks to climbing enthusiast, Zyra. And to the Almighty that I am still in one piece despite my angst and "Takde tenagalah" screams on the way up)
2. Get dumped into the sea 6 times (no, 7, if you count the time when my wonderful friends leaned backwards, making us all vulnerable to the big, open Port Dickson sea) from a banana boat. CHECK (with a bruised left cheek and aching limbs to account for it)
3. Ride backwards on a banana boat and get dumped into the sea. CHECK (activity was carried out with screams that pierced the blue sky, most definitely).
4. Flying fox, abseiling, repelling. CHECK (achieved throughout my 10 years of schooling, but hope to be checked twice).
5. Bathe stark naked in the dark, with friends AND random acquaintances of the same gender, from a suspicious looking kolah. CHECK (Kem Terendak, Melaka was all military style; need I say more?)
   
6. Walk around naked in a dormitory bathroom. CHECK (I was after all, a victim of a friend's towel-hiding scheme).
7. Leave my brassiere (the common term sounds, well, too common) in a male friend's car and be forever scarred and humiliated. Sigh, CHECK.

Keep the adventures and misadventures coming, buddies! I have but one life to live and we all know that life's row boat should go merrily up the stream. "Bare" with me here, ha ha.

Singing In The Shower

Sometimes it's as simple as sharing a cake in the car, this pursuit of happiness. Other times it's singing in the cold shower after a sweaty, manic Monday or finding yourself lost in tangles of dreams as you pore over pages of a good book. Some prefer the intangible feeling of remembering the tune to a song they were struggling to recall. I wish it was all that AND finding the missing piece to the puzzle that is me.

NJ Like New Jersey

N
Nurjannah Iman Hani Komar
Buang sayok
Jannah
Mak Nenek
Anak Cik Mat
Nurjannah
Syaq
Qek
Yoda
Njill
Memerang
Njot
Njos
Nurjanni
Amani
Pendek
N*jis
Murai

Despite this list of appellations designated to me, I don't grasp why people say Angie instead of NJ. The nama timangan Mak Nenek circa 1990s doesn't irk me as much. Go figure. Ha ha.

Sediakan Payung Sebelum Hujan

What do you do when you finally get to meet someone you've always wanted to meet?

This person is the present day Batman, who so mysteriously appears and disappears from your life, and of those times, mostly during the night. You may want to personify him like the Chipsmore, "sekejap ada, sekejap takde". But when the other is there, you share stories--some intimate, some serious, others silly, and most, random.

And so, you've counted months and weeks to match this persona you think you know, and the voice and laugh you definitely recognize to a person you've never physically met. Again, what do you do when this reverie decides to come true?

Do you conjure up a list of 1001 topics to talk about? Do you talk like you know each other or do you just act cordial and slightly formal? Do you lean on old jokes you've cracked, or do you rely on new ones you've just learned? Do you ask the person if "he saves the best for the last, or eat everything all at once" like you've always wanted to ask?

I chose to fire him a raging spitball instead. Which, by the way, landed peacefully on his left forearm.

"So, how is MY summer so far"?

I raise the white flag. Nobody can be as geeky, and un-cool as me, raging spitball and all. And all summer long I'll keep that in mind.

The Hard Business of Hard of Hearing

There is a private joke shared among us in the DH50490 household: we are hard of hearing people because we talk loudly. It runs in the family, this tendency to speak a few decibels louder than the laypersons.

I don't mean to denounce the Ismail family name and set you off running in the opposite direction when you see our clan, but it is not news that we are one loud bunch. Perhaps it was the volume of the TV I grew up with. Maybe I can blame it on the constant babel I had to battle with to be heard.

My days in INTEC as a frequent KTM commuter taught me how to tone down as friends reported back on overhearing inappropriate or mushy conversations I've had on the trains. I am now like a chameleon, ready to adapt to the decibels of my surrounding as is required of me. My voice comes in gradations: Softer among new acquaintances, soft among friends, loud with close/old friends, and comfortably loud with my next-of-kins.

All the same, here I am, a 20 year old female who is still hard of hearing. Maybe it IS because I talk loudly. It makes sense, complete sense when you think of the ear/headphone scenario. People speak louder when they can't hear well. People speak louder when they can't hear themselves. The private joke just may just be a fully acceptable hypothesis.

But could it be. . .

Could it be the possibility that I have accumulated years worth of earwax? Could it be that my earwax has been pushed back, way back, only to be compressed into an odd shape and a rubber-like consistency? Could it be that I am molding; my earwax blackening and thickening, becoming awfully sickening to the eyes that see?

Well, I did spend an ungodly RM190 for a two-hour visit (plus waiting time) to the ENT specialist this afternoon and came home with a few "rubber erasers", a throbbing ear from all the probing and picking, free from hard-of-hearing, and a broad smile. So what did you think it was?

On a side note, this is a bona fide advice from the ENT to both me and you: never ever ever ever ever x33 try to clean your ears with a cotton bud. The evil invention pushes earwax further into the ear canal. You don't want to be a victim of an ENT's probing, trust me. It hurts more than a swine flu screening test up your nose (which I will not elaborate further). Throw away those cotton buds, this is your license to run free and be wild.

Be a slob. Just be a slob. It's the best gift you can give to your ears.

5454 S. Shore Drive, Shoreland 606

A once 5-star luxurious hotel accommodating notable figures like Ernest Hemingway and Al Capone and beautifully located on the feet of Lake Michigan - this is what The Shoreland is. Chancing my eyes upon this 12-floor grandeur of 20's style architecture some time in September two years ago, I never expected it was going to be the place far away from home that I call home.

The Shoreland is a stellar example of beautiful on the outside and not-quite-beautiful on the inside. For a second, its exterior may fool you into expecting lavish, velvety tapestries, shiny glimmery chandeliers and plush red carpet. Once you step inside the lobby, you are left cold with the shattering reality of its dirty windows, peeling paint, loosen pipes and cracked floors.

There are "vintage" mismatched sofas flanking your left, shopping carts on your right, a TV corner and a harpsichord with missing keys on the far right, and a shabby reception desk before you electronically swipe your ID and consider yourself home. (What enigma holds behind the shopping carts? Left-over carts from the nearby Walgreen's and Treasure Island, possibly pushed over all the way to the Shoreland by lazy persons like me who think it's okay to leave a cart to be reused again and again, for the greater good).

Enter elevators - the kind that creaks and heaves, forcing you to pray hard that it would not crash down or get stuck like that movie called Speed that scared jack out of you when you were six. It is also the moody kind that selects the floors it wants to take you to; mysteriously leaving out the 3rd, 7th and 11th floor on many occasions.

The real thrill of exploring this rundown hotel of a dorm is felt as you navigate your way through childishly mural-painted walls. Each floor - all seven floors of houses - have adopted the mural way of life (pun intended), establishing house themes and colors to orient disoriented first timers into feeling at "dorm".

The sixth floor, my floor, happened to choose the worst theme of time travel, and possibly boasted the worst-skilled student painters. Images of distorted dinosaurs and the same moustached man in an astronaut suit, mexican poncho, roman robes one wall to the next will creep first timers like it did me.

Yet again, with every trivial detail, creepy mural and all, The Shoreland just grows on you. From the boiler that clangs all through winter and rudely intrudes your (okay, my) wildest dreams, its frequent annoying fire drills that magically always sets off at 3am, its falling-apart dressers and headless showers, to the dilapidated ballroom, The Shoreland earns your fondness. It becomes your home.

Next year, when greedy developers raze this beauty to the ground, or remarket it as a prime condominium completely removed from its identity, I will look upon the lake and smile to myself. I have indeed gained a place far from home that I call home. If not through pictures and legacy, The Shoreland will continue to live in our hearts.