The kids our age aren't the same as us anymore

Once in a while I hear my parents talking about friends from previous lives. A few weeks back I heard them talking about one who's the same age as them, 52. They were saying "Asal muka dia gitu teruk eh???"; why is her face like that, because apparently this person has some skin disease on her face.

My parents are quite great gossipers, especially with each other. They like to tell me things like, "Look at your mother, I'm 52 but I'm still looking young," and sometimes, I think to myself that it could change anytime and she needs to watch her mouth.

But it also got me thinking on something else: we're all at that point of life where people our age are no longer the same as us. Our first 6 years of education, no doubt most of the kids would move up one level together with us. We were all always on the same boat, the only differences maybe being; some of us were in standard form, or foundation, little things like that.

Secondary school wasn't so bad either. Most of us moved on together, maybe some kids being left behind in sec 3 because they needed to repeat that year. The forks in our paths started becoming more obvious when we reached the age of 16.

I was in Normal Academic, so I watched some classmates stay, moving on to sec 5, and at the same time classmates leaving, going on to ITE. I was in the former, and I was even lucky enough to have made it into polytechnic after my O levels, by a hair's breath.

When I think about all the kids from my primary school, I wonder what they're doing now, how they're like, what their personalities are like or what labels have they obtained.

I'll just never know; but if anyone of them thought about me, and randomly searched for my Instagram and decided to read this blog of mine; they would know that I am still the same aspiring writer that I was from all those years back.

Right now, nearly 22, not everyone who's the same age as me would be doing the same thing as I am. Maybe there are some who are still stuck in their dumb classrooms, in university or whatever education level comes after. There are some who have left school and have no intention of continuing their education anywhere. And among those, there are some who are perhaps on their way to traveling the world.

There are the ones who have gotten engaged, or possibly even married. Maybe they've long found their soulmates, their person that they wish to annoy forever. Someone they want to see every single day, with no third party called insecurity. No blank space in their bank accounts. They're probably either the happiest or the most miserable among us.

There are also the ones who have died. Maybe God decided to take them away because they'd been suffering, with grief or illness or how sick they are of the world. Maybe they were taken doing something they loved, maybe they were taken just after arguing with their mothers or other halves, and now they would never rest in peace.

At this age, ambitions are no longer ambitions. When we were primary 2, we would say we want to be a doctor, or a lawyer; maybe there are some who have been studying medicine or law, and are on the way to this career. We just won't know if it's what they want, or what their parents want.

Some are lucky to have their parents' blessings to do what they like, or courses in what they really do enjoy, or both. We're just no longer at the age where we could just say I want to be a this, I want to be a that. We're at the age where we need to work for it, or there's just no point in growing up.

The misanthropist and ailurophile

Have you ever thought of how funny some of us are? We could hate humans with all our might, but once we get home we are the nicest person ever towards our cats. 

You could say hi to a person, and get angry because they don't say hi back. But when you say hi to a cat, all it does is squint at you like you're a nuisance before rolling its eyes at you, and yet you would still think that that is the cutest kitty ever.

In the past hour I've had these two different personalities showing up. The misanthropist, someone who hates the human species so fucking much; and the ailurophile, someone in love with the existence of cats.

____

The misanthropist runs for the train, pissed off with the two elderly women who were walking slowly and blocking the pathway earlier. She hates being caught between dashing into the train and slowly walking to give it a miss; she settles for the former.

On the carriage she's run into, there is an empty seat--obscured by two office women standing in front of it, neither making the move to take it. The woman on the right of the seat has her legs crossed, and one of her feet is practically almost on the empty seat itself. 

The misanthropist decides, Fuck it, I'm gonna grab that fucking seat, screw all these people. 

The office bitches move an itch, and the bitch with her legs crossed makes a very subtle movement to make space for this very angry girl in a black cardigan, green bag on her back.

A family is conquering 4 of the seats in the opposite row, and the misanthropist catches sight of the baby girl in the arms of one of the women staring at her. She stares back and frowns; she isn't the kind of person who would make faces for a baby to laugh at.

The baby is playing with a flyer; she seems cute for a second, when her big brother pulls down her shirt, which was riding up her tummy, to cover her little belly. It's a tiny movement, so significant, but the moment is gone when the flyer drops to the floor.

It's clear that the woman holding the baby saw it. She even bends forward to look at it, and then continues to fuss over her baby. The flyer lies on the floor, forgotten; there's a picture of a bedroom on it. An ad for a new condominium? A hotel? An interior designing company?

The misanthropist's heart starts beating faster, and then she starts to boil. It suddenly depends on her life to have this flyer removed from the floor, but the ones responsible weren't even making the effort to pick it up. 

It stays there from Bedok to Simei, and then the horror: the family is alighting. Still, nobody is making a move or even taking notice of it. It's driving her crazy!!! Don't you dare step off this train before picking up the flyer that your baby dropped, woman!!!

Spoiler alert: they alight, and the stupid condo/hotel/interior designer flyer remains on the floor.

And the misanthropist blows up. She wants to kill every human being on this planet, for that stupid flyer. Right now, I am thinking: why couldn't she pick it up then, and throw it into the bin? Why, because of her ego of course, because she does not want to pick up the rubbish that someone else left behind. 

____

The ailurophile hates being caught between dashing across the road when a car is driving slowly, and waiting for it to pass by first before attempting to cross, especially in a smaller road with no traffic lights.

The road between her neighbourhood mall and community centre is small, the kind that's after a gantry. She watches two cars slowly maneuvering around each other, one towards the gantry and the other from, before being able to cross. That's when she sees a blob of black in the middle of the road.

At first glance, the ailurophile thinks it is a plastic bag, dropped by somebody who couldn't be bothered to pick it back up. And then she thinks of something worse--last year one of the beloved coffeeshop cats, a fat orange one, died in a car accident. This blob looks suspiciously like a cat, a dead one. 

Before she can think of what to do, the blob moves! It's a fluff ball, another coffeeshop cat she calls Jenny; she's been around since the ailurophile was twelve, and she has a meow that goes like an F1 car driving past at high speed. 

She doesn't like having her in the middle of the road, so she calls out from the sidewalk. When she was young, her mother taught her how to make the continuous clicking sound with her tongue, to attract cats' attention. Jenny looks up at her, but she doesn't make any move to come over. 

Looking left and right beforehand, the ailurophile goes over to the cat and asks her What are you doing here? The cat gets up and rubs against her legs like she always does, earning herself a few strokes down her head. 

Come on, come come, the ailurophile urges the cat, and she obediently follows. From a distance, anyone will see a girl in a black cardigan crossing the road, with a little cat walking right beside her, just like old friends. 

The ailurophile and the cat flirt around for a while more. Eventually, the four-legged girl goes back to rolling around on the ground, on the sidewalk this time; and the two-legged girl goes on home, next to the ghost of her twelve-year-old self, waving goodbye to a skinnier version of Jenny. 

Dodged a bullet

Last night I decided to sleep in my parents' room, on my blanket which I laid out like a mattress on the floor. My little brother was gonna game in my room for the next few hours, and the last time I slept in there while he did, I couldn't get the click-click-clicking of his mouse out of my head the entire day.

I'd been asleep for a while, when I was woken up by the sound of my little brother's voice. He was telling my dad that there was a strong burning smell in my room. My dad went "HUH!?!?" but he got up immediately, and so did my mom and I, out of the room minutes after. The clock on the living room wall showed that it was 2 a.m.

I hadn't seen it for myself, but apparently the air-conditioning in my room was breathing out lots of smoke and humming like a train. As well as releasing lots of some smelly gas. We all had the tops of our shirts over our noses, and my dad told my brother to stop gaming, open up the windows and get out of the room. And also wash his face, all which he obliged to.

I can't imagine the disaster that it could have been if I'd been sleeping in my room and if my brother hadn't been gaming and awake. For the next few minutes I thought of it and I imagined a fire raging in my room, destroying my bookshelves and spreading through the papers I have in there. The sad part is, I was more afraid of my things being destroyed than my own life.

You deserve

You deserve a girl who changes her shoes everyday and surprises you with a new look everytime you see her.

You deserve a girl who has worn a graduation gown before, the pictures of which are hung on her home wall.

You deserve a girl who doesn't ask to meet you every weekend because she has her own friends to hang out with.

You deserve a girl with long coloured fingernails and no habit of biting them down.

You deserve a girl who covers her mouth when she laughs, who doesn't laugh so loudly at her own stupid jokes.

You deserve a girl whose only interesting stories are the stories of the dramas she watches.

You deserve a girl who knows the songs that you do and sings them with a voice that gets genuine praise.

You deserve a girl who has her hair tucked beneath a headscarf, most probably one with flowers patterned on it.

You deserve a girl who wears the watch you'll give her on her right hand and with the time set correctly.

You deserve a girl who takes 20 minutes to reply your texts because she was too busy helping her mom cook or do housework.

You deserve a girl who could easily sit and talk with your secondary and ITE friends without them wanting to push her off a building.

You deserve a girl who only gets a little angry when the food you've ordered is taking forever to come.

You deserve a girl whose hobby and talent are singing or photography, just like every other normal Malay girl out there.

You deserve a girl who texts you with emojis and who calls you sayang and who reminds you when to pray and who doesn't call you the moment she goes out for lunch.

You deserve a girl who smells like flowers and peaches.

The list could go on forever because you deserve so much more.

You deserve more than me.

We live just to die

We could wait 20 minutes for a bus that carries us for only three or four bus stops. We could throw away all our time on the playground trying to climb up the slide, and for what? Just to slide back down it anyway.

Why sleep when you'll wake, and why live when you'll die? Maybe there is no point to it all and we're all just going around and around in circles. We spend the money that we earn, we use up our phone's battery after charging it.

Maybe we'd achieve our dreams in our lifetimes, maybe we'd die trying. God knows if our efforts would be considered a waste or not. If I died on the road to my dreams, who would be the ones to say things like She was so young, She had a bright future ahead? Not me.

What if we're already in an ongoing zombie apocalypse? The way we have our eyes glued onto the screens of our phones or laptops or tablets, just about brain-dead. Getting infected by society's expectations, turning into what everyone else is, having our arms and necks bitten until there is nothing of us, that is us, left.

Some thoughts make me laugh and make me cry and make me want to kneel in the middle of the expressway and put my head on the ground until a double decker bus comes along and crashes into me and drags me across the asphalt.

Then again, I guess dying beneath something you love is better than being brain-dead like everyone else.

Buses

When I was younger, I used to play this game by myself, in my head. Whenever I'm in a car or a taxi, usually with my family members, I'd randomly ask myself: "If I were to be abandoned here, would I know my way back home?"

On a taxi in anywhere on the outskirts of Pasir Ris, my answer to this lonely game in my head would be no. My last year of secondary school, I was still unfamiliar with anywhere that wasn't Pasir Ris or Tampines. The thought of going anywhere further than Paya Lebar (only went there to go my granny's house) and changing lines was so damn new to me, so damn scary.

Now, you could dump me anywhere in Singapore and I'd be happy to find my way back home. Slowly though, because I'd probably take my time to explore first; the idea of hopping on trains and buses to nowhere and everywhere, and looking at shopping malls I've never been to, scenery I've never seen.

It's around this period 4 years ago that my other half first brought me on the middle parts of the North South line. When I first stepped onto Jurong East MRT station and got fascinated with it having more than 3 platforms.

But there's something bittersweet about seeing a familiar bus after a long day. There's a tugging in my heart when I'm on a bus and I see the buses I've recognised since childhood outside the window.

In my childhood, I've never traveled these buses farther than necessary; now as an adult obsessed with public transport, I've ridden most of them from end to end, and I still feel safe when I see them on the same road, because I know I'm reaching the most familiar place in the world.

Public transport

Girl in the 4th seat with her book burying her nose

Only looking up to catch sight of a train leaving Eunos
Resting her head on the window to catch the blaring sun
The buzzing and humming, passengers of bus 21

The first to take a seat, watching the others take theirs
Boots, heels, sneakers thumping louder up the stairs

On the top deck, thoughts of love, life, and fate

Never getting tired of the views on 168

People chatting and laughing, it buries beneath

The humming sound that you are obsessed with

Your ears blocked off with your purple earbuds

Fingering, at the top of your ear, your ear studs

An uncapped pen in the pocket, ink dotting your jeans

Watching the people with eyes glued to their screens

"Change at this station for the North East Line,"

And they get up, the workers who started at nine

Being in a train is ten times scarier in a thunderstorm

Books in your bag kept dry beneath your uniform

Eyes, always following the movement of a plane in the sky

Despite the desire for travel never coming nigh

Colleagues/friends/family

Sometimes you truly forget that things don't last forever. Even though you've lost so many friendships in the past five years, you still believe there could be the few who would be there always.

Everyone says the longest lasting friendships are the ones from secondary school, but even that has been proven wrong to you. And despite referring to them as bitches when you talk about them, you're aware that it was your fault the whole time.

It's true when they say time flies when you're having fun; before I knew it, it's been nearly 2 years since I've worked here. The 1st of April, 2015, when I'd so nervously sat on the bench in front of the place that has come to be my second home.

The days melted into weeks into months, the laughter into the gossiping of annoying customers into the hatred for a certain colleague.

It completely slipped my mind that best friends would resign.
That area managers would transfer one of your best friends to another outlet.
That your other best friend is just a part timer all along who is about to graduate poly and would have to find her own full-time job.
That your remaining best friends are no longer teenagers but are actual adults who will have to go back to Malaysia and China when they get married.

It took me 20 years to find the place where I truly belong, only for it all to be taken away so easily. I know I've been a terrible person and I deserve the heartbreak, and yet I can't find myself to accept it.

The thought of having to let go of the only friendship that I have right now, the only friends who have accepted me so readily despite our distinct differences in language. The only thing I still wake up in the mornings for. The only home I have aside from the houses that shelter my blood family.

It took me forever to find a puzzle in which I am a piece of, only to realise that the other pieces are parts of other pictures that I do not know. Slowly dawning on me that eventually, I would be left behind yet again.

A diary entry a day - 2013

20 02 13 // 11:06 AM
Heidiho, my precious diary. Am at the airport now; my second home. When did we start to frequent this place, you and I? Probably after the separation with my clique. When the solitude was kicking in.

I remember the day I discovered a Dunkin Donuts on the "outside" side of the airport. I hadn't written in you much, but I was writing a letter. A letter to my murderers; the younger twin, and myself.

I was waiting for mother to finish work, and had bought Asian Geographic. I felt so independent, I don't know why; being in the airport made me feel like a traveler, someone who never stops moving forward. Someone who's always looking for new places to explore.

In reality, I'm the human who is stuck at the airport, who's bought tickets to the other side of the world but never used them, instead wanders around the terminals clutching the tickets and passport in hand.

I am that measly human, with the intention of moving forward but never having the courage to fulfill it. The measly human who is forever stuck at the airport.

This place. This view, of my legs spread out in front of me against the glass of the windowpane, aeroplanes across the sky and road, and you on my lap,... It reminds me so much of my solitude.

Same shit, different year

Three years ago you left me because you lost interest. You also claimed that I was a bad influence and that we were 'too far deep into sins', even though I'd already tried to stop it from a few months before.

Now it's 2017, after the many times you've said to me that you'll never let me go again, that you've every intention of marrying me, that you've learnt your lesson, and everything else in between.

After everything that we've been through, imagine what a disappoint it was to hear you say we should 'take a break' because of what a friend of yours has said. A friend of yours who doesn't even know me, who doesn't even follow me on any social media and wouldn't know shit about me.

Well aware that I'm a piece of shit, but do I really deserve this after everything for the past four years? Half of the time we were together, there was the existence of a third party, someone unplanned. Do I not deserve somebody who wouldn't forget all that I had to go through? All of the physical pain and the emotional turmoil that still remains to this very day? You may think it's nothing but you're not the one who experienced it firsthand.

All gone, because of the opinion of an outside party. You know how I always had those "nanti orang cakap" sentences, this was one of the things I was talking about. I already knew a handful of your friends have opinions of me.

It's not the first time you've chosen your friends over me. If you really feel that they're important to you, it's fine. I don't know how it feels like to value some friends from secondary school anymore. You and I, we're more worlds apart than you'll ever really sit down to think.

It's different if you wanted to leave because I did something bad, like if I cheated on you or anything. The only times I've lied to you is when I keep my thoughts from you because I know you'll never understand, or you'll make fun of it, or you'll throw it back in my face in a future argument, or all of the above.

I became better at controlling my tears because you once said, well in April of 2015, that my tears are like tap water and they're meaningless to you. Some people would think that I have more reason to leave you but I didn't because at least I know I love you, unlike you, who lets a friend decide for you.

You say it's just a break, but I don't want to go back to someone who's let me go so many times over the past few years over the slightest things. And don't forget this isn't even the first time that the reason for it is because of your friends.

I want to explode but I'm more let down, heartbroken, than I am actually angry. It sucks when the last human on earth that you actually want to hug doesn't even understand, doesn't even want to bear with you anymore, doesn't want you anymore.

1/3 pages

"You know how there are some classics which people enjoy and at the same time lots of people didn't? How these people didn't understand these novels, so they declared their not liking it--I feel that way with my diaries. My nonsensical thoughts that possibly just maybe 5% of the world's population would understand. People who are as crazy as I am; not so easy to find.

My pages made me love myself. It's so easy to drown myself in all this ink--I discovered this in 2012, the first time in my life I'd felt completely alone. Before that I wrote, of course, but nothing more than just shallow pieces, gushing about a boy I wouldn't even look at twice now, laughing about my then best friends' shenanigans. Nothing deeper than the thoughts of an average fourteen-year-old. A normal person, something I've lost touch with over the years. Sometimes I hate it, but now I'm glad for this; the way I settle in like a very sore thumb among the long, slender, manicured fingers. I don't quite belong, but I'm in my place.

Back a few weeks ago, I remember it being the flower's POP, I couldn't stop talking to the wind because I just had so much to say. It's not so easy to run out of things to say when your mind is swirling with all kinds of things--be it jellyfish, whales, and most especially rubbish. My mind is like the sea, contaminated by more trash the more people that pass.

I've completely no idea how big the capacity of my brain is.

My initial plan in coming here was to read this random book I'd picked up from Pasir Ris library a few days ago called The Girl In The Road and you can already tell by the title that I'd taken it just for that. I'm not sure if this would make sense, but sometimes, I feel I've fallen out of my love for books. I'm still very much into reading, but only if I've already gotten hold of a book that's completely worth it; most of the time chosen by luck.

A long time ago (okay, maybe just last year) I thought of this: when you're standing in a crowded bus, look at the person next to you. Look at his face, and take note of how unattractive he is, or at least, how unattracted you are to him.

And then imagine: while to you he's ugly as shit, there's one other girl in this country that thinks he is the most good-looking in the world--she's in love with him. And then think about this: on the other side of Singapore, there is your own boyfriend, the only guy you think is even remotely good-looking. And next to him is a girl that takes a glance at him and thinks he is ugly as shit. She doesn't know that you exist, a girl who thinks he is the world.

Isn't that weird to think of? Maybe that should help in reminding me that it doesn't matter what other people think. There would be someone else across the country who can't imagine a life without you, even if there's a bitch you just knocked into without saying sorry who wishes you would die today for that."

-10/02/17, 2:33PM

"Young Blood"

Nineteenth day of the ninth month, born

Why would anyone keep track of how far I'd gone?

From little booties to size seven shoes

From being bare all around to being loose. 

The adults thinking, when you were five
How cute it is that you have someone you like
Calling the boy beside you your boyfriend
Just because you were happy holding his hand.

Your very own phone at the age of twelve
Using it on a schoolnight, smiling to yourself
"You better not have a boyfriend", warns daddy
His face and his tone scaring you off to sleep.

Fifteen, alone with a boy at a park
Ignoring all the texts asking where you are
Phone snatched away, a hard slap to your face
Daddy's anger, just a little taste.

Few months before twenty, solitary clinic trips
The thought of parents' faces meant she wasn't for keeps
Built up the lies so intricately only for them to shatter
At the arrival of the women's hospital's letter.

First, yelling for mommy from the bathroom

Second, legs spread, back against the wood

Third, screams echoing the hospital at 5 in the morning

Blood, not as young as the songs would sing.

Fingerprints

Most people know me as E'indah, because that's my name.

Some people know my name from the moment I was given it, but they prefer calling me Kak.

Some people probably refer to me as my Instagram or Twitter name, or that girl who is obsessed with trains, or that girl who keeps tweeting bullshit.

Some people only know me as adik Naqib, or Nazriq's sister.

Whereas, some people know my name but address me as matair 'Aamir.

Sometimes, I'm known as the tall Malay girl.

Sometimes, I'm known as the Popular girl, the one who always orders nasi lemak set one.

Sometimes I am just the girl who buys three sugar donuts at the bakery every morning.

If I'm lucky enough to be noticed, I'm the girl who's always reading at the Police Cantonment Complex.

The girl who is always wearing a black cardigan on bus 58, or bus 21.

Or perhaps the ninth floor neighbour.

Maybe one day I am just a girl who dropped her iced Milo when walking out of KFC.

Maybe some other day I am just a girl who was crying like an idiot on the train.

I feel it all the time, but I know I'm not invisible.

Some way or another, I leave an impression. Not one that's deep, perhaps, but enough to be remembered.

Enough to be there, like fingerprints. Not necessarily seen, but if you try hard enough, there I am, clear as day.

Heels on railway tracks

My most recent dream saw me walking on railway tracks.

I would have said they were the ones at Bukit Timah, the ones where I'd gone with the one I called the flower--but the tracks there had been broken off, pieces by pieces, and couldn't have been the same ones I'd walked my whole dream.

It was a long walk, all alone, in my heels because I definitely was not wearing anything flat-soled. A red dress or skirt, something flared, because when the wind blew I caught a glimpse of a little fabric below my waist being lifted, and felt the cold against my legs.

I'm not entirely sure if those tracks were completely abandoned or still in use.

If they'd been abandoned, then it must have been the end of the world, or at least this country must have gone to shit, because the MRT lines are the spine of its public transport. I've grown to believe that a world where Singapore doesn't have its MRT system working must be a dead universe.

And if the railway tracks were still in use, then there had been the possibility of a train coming along, hitting me, dragging parts of me beneath its wheels.

Either way, ...how peaceful.

The best way to die?

My writing is fueled by loneliness. It's in the name Solitary Author, if you haven't noticed. (If there's even any 'you' reading this.) The loneliness that comes with having no friends, and the passion for these words coming out via keyboard or ink; they go so well together. They intertwine, just like vines, and I am the tree that they form to be.

Even though I wasn't a tree anymore, since more than four years ago. A tree can't be a tree if it has bled, a rose can't be a rose if the only red it sheds isn't its petals.

I will never in my life apologise for anything. To say the word sorry--it's heavy on my lips. I do not say sorry to a customer for not having something they're looking for. I do not say sorry to my other half even when it's clear I was in the wrong. I do not say sorry to the girls I've known since high school, or to my own mother. I do not even say sorry to me, for all the harm I've done to myself.

What's the best way to die? By something that you love, or by your biggest fear? Is my better way to die on the railway tracks, dragged apart by a train, or by drowning, my lungs filling with water? Because if it's by my fear--I just have to wait for this world to be taken, submerged and forgotten, gone.

I wish everyone was equal. Nobody missing a limb, nobody left lonely in the absence of children and grandchildren, nobody digging through rubbish bins for scraps.

The people in this world, as strange as they are: I wish they had more time. How contradictory am I? At times, I wish to watch this world burn, perhaps to even be the one to set it on fire. And at other times, I wish time would stop ticking. I wish everyone would have more time to live. I wish nieces wouldn't grow up, grandmothers wouldn't die, grounds wouldn't shake and tidal waves wouldn't swallow.

I have a brain, but I don't make good use of it. Instead I submerge myself in this cryptic writing, thoughts that nobody will ever understand, not even the woman who carried me for 9 months, not even the significant other who's been supporting me for nearly 4 years. It's the truth, nobody will get it--nobody but me.

And that's the funny thing, that only I understand I; but I am also the last person on earth I could care less about.

It's gone

After reading through my blog posts from years before,

my diary entries from last year and 2014,

and staring at the New Post page for the past half an hour,

I've decided

that

I've lost

the flow

for writing.

Pretty

Around this time four years ago, I made my first trip to Orchard on my own. It's true, I never went anywhere further than Paya Lebar on my own back in those days. At 17, Orchard was a big deal and was so fucking scary to me.

At the beginning of the year after that, 2013, I discovered the North for the first time as a teenager. I did go Woodlands and Khatib in my childhood and pre-teen years, but it wasn't anything remarkable. Just Hari Raya at a few relatives' places.

I remember how excited I was when the train went from Yio Chu Kang to Khatib. The view of the lake, that one part when one side of the train seems to be a little higher than the other, the simple fact that it took about 5 minutes to get to the next station. It felt amazing to my unofficially-18-year-old self.

Even now, long bus rides that go on the expressways, and train rides on the North South Line excite the hell out of me. I can't find any reason why; it's just the feeling of looking out the window, watching everything pass, trees zooming past accompanied by the silhouette of a lone bird flying.

It's the views out the window that make me think: this world, this country is beautiful. It's the people in it that are not. And I'm fine with not being pretty. I think just looking at the scenery pass is enough pretty for me.

Small things

Another day closer to my twenty-first. A week before, we were making plans to head down to USS tomorrow. I was ready to get over my... I wouldn't say fear but my not wanting to ride the Cyclone/Human rollercoasters. For you.

On Tuesday, for the first time in my job someone asked me for my name. I've always been so passionate in work and once, it was the one thing in life I still looked forward to. The only thing I found reason to get up in the mornings for. But my name wasn't asked for a compliment. It was for a complaint that wasn't even my fault. I wasn't even rude; he was the one jabbing his finger into my face as I was serving him, and when I walked away, he said it was my service that's the problem.

You came over to have dinner with me that day. I told you everything. I told you I didn't cry. But that incident never even left my mind since.

I thought I'd felt better after seeing you. And then you told me that you couldn't take leave for my birthday. Because there weren't enough staff in the office due to the ones being dispatched for the F1 weekend having their day off on the Monday. Why couldn't you have requested for leave earlier? You explained, but I'm still angry about it, because you're right, I don't understand.

But I'm not the only one who doesn't understand. I've showed my anger to you, and you've snapped, "Why can't you understand I'm working?"; you've said in caps lock, "YOU GET WORKED UP OVER THE SMALLEST THINGS."

I know it's a small thing to you. In case you haven't noticed from the time we've started dating, from the time you read all my blog posts everyday, from the time you realised I get upset easily; it's not a small thing to me.

I know what small things are.

It's when I don't get a seat by the window because the person before me took the last available one.

It's when somebody is standing right in the middle of the path and I'm forced to walk on the grass to get past.

It's when I've been standing by the counter of a food stall for a while and nobody comes out to take my order.

It's when I stand up to offer my seat to an old woman on the train but somebody else already gave up theirs first.

It's when a customer doesn't say thank you.

It's when a pretty girl posts a picture of herself and gets 170 likes.

It's when you post a picture of yourself and everybody comments on how handsome you are.

It's when I post a picture of myself and get just 30 likes.

It's when we've made plans for a Saturday and on the morning itself you say you're too tired to go out anymore.

It's when you told me we'll use your free tickets to catch a movie but instead you use them on yourself and your best friend.

I know these are little things. But it doesn't stop them from affecting me so much, because it's the tiniest things that trigger me. At this point of my life every single little thing is like a hard shove. What I don't understand is why can't you understand this?

Here's the thing, I know it's unimportant to you. I know it's nothing to you. But get it into your head that it isn't to me. It's my special day which I don't even get to spend with you. Which I'm forced to spend alone because I don't have any other friends to ask out instead; because my mom says on birthdays, family is reserved for the night only, whatever.

I'll never get why you can't understand this one simple thing. Our four years together, you've spent just one of my birthdays with me. Yes it is a big fucking deal to me that you didn't apply for leave earlier for me this year. Big enough a deal for me to cry like a maniac on the train thinking about it.

No matter what you think, my twenty-first isn't a small thing. You not going out with me for my birthday isn't a small thing. It's the one fucking day in the year I'll feel special enough to wear something other than my usual jeans out of my own accord. Not the 18th, or 20th, or 21st, but just this one day: the 19th.

I hate birthdays again

I don't want a birthday party. Especially not one where I don't have any friends to take pictures with between those huge '2' and '1' balloons. How do I feel special in the presence of my dad's siblings and my mom's friends, and my cousins that I haven't talked to in like 4 years?

Yes, my mom invited her friends with the excuse of "They invited me to their children's birthdays, I'll invite them to mine." MOM WHAT THE FUCK. YOUR FRIENDS ARE ALL 20+. THEIR KIDS ARE LIKE FREAKING FIVE. WHAT THE FUCK.

What's worse is she's expecting me to pay 300 bucks for her to buy the food and decorations and shit. Why???? IT'S A PARTY FOR ME WHICH I DON'T EVEN WANT AND I HAVE TO PAY FOR IT????

I DON'T WANT THIS! I don't have any real friends to spend it with. A girl only has the rights to have their 21st birthday to be fucking special if she has friends. Real girl friends who actually buy her presents and invite her out. And only if she's ... pretty enough ... to wear nice clothes... I FUCKING DON'T WANT THIS.

Every birthday has been a disaster in their own special ways. This year's, I'll have to spend alone because somebody didn't take leave earlier and he can't apply now. Thanks a lot. "Consider it done" you dare say.

Fucking awful. I fucking hate birthdays. Why must my mom and grandma make such a big fucking deal about my 21st? Guess what, my dad and the only cousin that I still care about aren't gonna be around because of the stupid F1 anyway. My 21st sucks already. That's the only big deal about it. THAT IT FUCKING SUCKS.

24/08/2014

I wonder how life was like before life.

How I was formed in my mother. How tiny I was. How fragile I was; how my parents took special care of me before I was born, how my big brother might have loved me before he even saw me.

I wonder how my family was like, while I was forming inside of her. How my grandmother and father and big brother might have put their ears to her stomach, trying to listen to my voice. Have they ever promised themselves to continue listening to me, even after I was born?

What was it like to learn how to walk? How to talk? My whole life I was on my feet, I've forgotten how it must have been like to struggle on limbs of my own. How it must have been like to use my vocal chords for the first time.

Everything I did back then must have cost a lot of pain. Whatever I was doing or feeling for the first time; it must have been unusual to a fragile being like I was. Maybe that's why I kept crying.

How did my mother ever teach me the things I know today? What was it like to have no idea what a colour is? Who taught me that the sky would always be blue?

It's strange to imagine life in a different way. To imagine myself not knowing the things I know now; not doing the things I do now; not loving the things I love now.

Bliss without pain is a book without stories; a world where you don't cry or feel hurt sounds appealing, but can you imagine not knowing what pain is?

Maybe nobody taught me anything that I know now. Maybe all they did was show me the world, and from there I took my own steps. From there, I took liking in my own favourite things and decided what was beautiful and what was not.

Imagine a place where people told you what to love.
Maybe you are living in there right now.

Maybe I am considered lucky to love things that others don't.
Because it's a reminder that I grew up seeing the world through my own eyes, and not through others'.

A person can truly be called an inspiration if she makes others want to see the world through her eyes.
I want to be one, to make people want to imagine the world I see it. But I also want everyone to learn to see things their own way.

I wish I could be a warm flame to the people I love, and also a spreading wildfire to everyone else, to ignite the spark to discover things their own way.

If I died tomorrow

If I died tomorrow, leave my shelves dusty
Silverfish among the pages so murky
Calendar untouched, on the very month
I would have turned twenty-one

If I died tomorrow, leave my bed undone
Don't forget the way I loved the sun
Don't pick up the photographs that fall
After sticking hopelessly on my wall

If I died tomorrow, let my other half
Have the diary from the year of rough
Let him have the photo of a girl
Black, white, never touched the world

If I died tomorrow, give him space
And time to slowly erase my face
Let him know he has friends around
Help him find a girl, maybe a rebound

If I died tomorrow, don't let them pretend
Lie that they were even my friend
Trying to find a photo from 2 or 5 years ago
Fabricating a long-lost friendship just for show

If I died tomorrow, what would have been
The song that I was listening to on repeat?
What would have been the paperback
That came falling out of my ripped slingbag?
What would have been the graphic t-shirt
That would be dragged along the dirt?
What would have been the last tweet, text, call
The other half, the grandma, if any at all?

Does this justify my lack of fashion

On the very rare occasions where I feel like wearing something other than jeans, I have this unusual thought: what if an apocalypse were to break out today? I'd want to be in something easy to run in, aka my usual jeans and sneakers. 

I know it's fucking weird, but seriously the last thing I want is to be in panic and survival situations in a dress/skirt and sandals or something. Fucking nope. It's also why I sometimes get anxious on days I have to wear baju kurung. I'd be dead way quicker if I were in one when a zombie outbreak were to happen. 

That's also the reason why I wish I had perfect eyesight. No I don't want to have to run about during an apocalypse in glasses. What if I lose them? I'd be fucking blind as a Zubat and that makes me feel so handicapped. And contact lens solution, where would you get them in such a time??? Not that I'd have time to put them on if danger came when I was sleeping or shit, right???

Maybe I'm just making excuses for how I'm too lazy to make effort to dress up, despite complaining how I'm not as pretty or fashionable as all those other girls. I don't know about them but I wouldn't want to be wearing wedges or flared skirts that could get caught easily or sleeveless tops which would show armpit hair after not shaving for a long time. (not that I'd ever survive so long) 

If my blog posts aren't depressing or full of complaints as usual, it just means you're here on the other side of my brain.

Wish I could be normal

Here's what I like to do: I like to read. I like spending hours in a library or a bookstore. I like to go for walks on my own. I like to take long bus rides on a double decker. I like listening to slow songs. I like to stop and squat to pet a cat whenever I see one.

Here's what I don't want to do: I don't want to buy or wear nice clothes. I don't want to explore the world. I don't want to take airplanes. I don't want to attend concerts. I don't want to ever sleep if it's possible just to avoid dreams.

Here's the thing: the things I don't want to do is what everyone else does. I feel so odd. I wish I could fit in, but I don't want to change. I like the things that I like, even if it guarantees solitary days for me. But sometimes... Sometimes I don't want to be solitary.

Still remember this story that our Maths teacher told us in Sec 5; how this guy poked every single part of his body and everywhere hurt. How he'd gone to the doctor and was told that the pain was not in his entire body, but his finger. Moral of the story--to know the source of the problem.

I know I'm the problem, but what do I do to solve it? I'm not sure. Wish I could be normal without sacrificing my love for books and fascination with trains; without forcing myself to put on make-up or listen to the songs that everyone else is listening to.

Please Aamir no more

I'm so sorry. I tried. But the whole of yesterday -- while it was supposed to help me out of this shell that grew on my back whenever the heck it did, instead, it served as a reminder of what happened nearly 4 years ago.

I struggled to get over that night. And there yesterday was, bringing it all back. I did all of said night for my cousin, like how I did yesterday for you. In 2012, a wedding dinner; in 2016, a raya outing. One that wasn't with my friends, but yours, just like how it wasn't a wedding dinner with my family, but hers.

I never wanted to go, but you wanted me to, and that I'd disappoint you if I didn't show up. Work wasn't a good enough reason to excuse me, and you told me to take an MC again, which I really refused. But you insisted.

What possessed me to take urgent leave for you? I guess I just wanted you happy, even though I knew exactly how I was going to feel.

At the age of 21, and I still don't wear make-up like all the girls in your class. Do you know how useless it makes me feel??? I already feel like a nobody when I see their photos on Instagram, what more being forced to sit side by side with them? I appreciate them talking to me and trying to include me, but... Each time they conversed with me I just wanted to turn my head the other side and scream PLEASE. DON'T LOOK AT MY FACE WITH YOUR PRETTY ONE.

I was there because I was with you, and from a whole different secondary school and neighbourhood, while the rest of the group were super tight friends from the same classes. Nobody I knew, nobody I could talk to, except for you, and you kept ditching me to sit on the other side of whatever house we were in.

It got to the point where I didn't even want to eat because I felt like everyone was staring at me and judging me if I took the food for myself, because there is this huge nonsensical mindset of mine that reminded me I'm not part of this friendship, I'm just a shadow, I. Shouldn't. Be. Helping. Myself.

The second last house, when your friend's mom kept asking me to eat. Please don't do that please don't do that please please please leave me alone please.

This. Damn. Anxiety.

All the inside jokes all of you had, all the memories you guys reminisced, and that moment when we were taking a group picture and you all decided to say "Fuchun". I don't know why, it's such a small thing but it broke me. I'm not a part of this at all.

And the moment I separated from you at Marsiling station, I just could not hold in my tears anymore. I swear to God, just tears beyond my control, all the way to Mountbatten. Even now as I'm typing this I'm hoping my mother doesn't pop her head in just to tell me "E'indah I go sleep first ah," like she always does, and see me with my wet eyes.

Why did I have to be the ugliest one? 

Why did I have to be the weirdest one?

Why did I have to be someone disliked by people?

If I tried to include myself, what could I have talked about? The books that nobody else could have read? The things that happen at work that I find hilarious but that nobody else would laugh at? What? What???? What could I have said...???? 

And I've been trying to keep it in, but you always tell me not to hesitate if I have something to get off my chest. I didn't want to text you about this, because you'll say things that won't make me feel better at all, but worse. You'll never understand how I feel, I have to say this honestly, because you are surrounded by so many people you can call friends. People who like you.

I'm so sorry, again, I've tried. But please Aamir, no more. Please when I say no please don't keep forcing me.

A boy named Marish

It's been a while since I blogged about my dreams because I just couldn't be bothered to find words for it lately. But the ones I had this morning was kinda... easy to describe???

Not forgetting to mention, there's been lots of thunderstorms in the middle of the night lately, and well thunderstorms in the middle of the night really do scare me. Fact: since young, whenever I wake up from sleep due to thunder/lightning I'll always shake my granny awake as well to tell her, "Nek, hujan." just so I wouldn't feel so alone.

Ok, so I did say the dreams I had this morning were easy to talk about, but where do I start??? Here are the things I remember, in no particular order: (also not necessarily in the same dream because, you know, I dream up stuff any time as long as I'm asleep no matter how many times I 'tersadar'.)

(1) Me, sipping tea from a cup at the airport. It looked like a diner, just stretched with booths from one end to the other. Aamir was beside me in a wheelchair, and yes that's strange but well I guess my brain isn't over Me Before You yet.

People started running in a single direction; from my angle, they were running towards me, so whatever it was they were escaping from was at the other end of this airport. And errr it was a motherfreaking T-Rex. I guess it was baby-sized, because it just reached about the height of about three people, but still, it was a T-Rex.

What else do I do??? I grab the handles of Aamir's wheelchair and pushed him and ran the fuck for our lives. (which I'm not able to do in real life) I led us to those fire escape stairwells that's always behind closed doors at shopping malls, and said out loud, "Why won't the people hide by the staircase? The T-rex will be too tall to come in anyway." while it goes on a rampage outside the door.

(2) I'm on a train, one of the two lone seats that's always at the end of the carriage. A girl is in front of me with a little boy child on her lap, and at this moment that girl was Farizah.

When she reached her station, she proceeded to leave the train but she left the boy child, to which I called out to her for. She never heard me, so I grabbed the boy's hand and followed her suit, all the way to a medical clinic.

By this time it was a few minutes to 11, the time which that clinic was closing, but Farizah really really really needed a doctor for the boy. (maybe she was rushing so bad to the extent of forgetting the boy completely?)

The receptionist girl told Farizah about another clinic which was 24 hours, to which she and I hunted for. By this time, Farizah became Miko. (yes it's pretty normal for someone to change into another person in dreams, at least in mine)

We got to Chinatown, and I guess I know it's so because of the red lanterns that were everywhere. Miko told me to look for that 24 hours clinic while she hunted for some pregnancy books because it was so damn important to her suddenly, and that's how I ended up on the roof of this particular building all on my own.

And that's where I saw that boy child I first met on the train. Getting beaten and screaming, while this narration went off in my head; "...and Marish went on screaming." Then finally getting stuffed into a plastic bag.

You know how sometimes there's no clear explanation but you just know something, that's how it's always like in dreams. I just knew it was child trafficking. And I'm not at all shocked because (1) these dreams are normal to me (2) it is happening in the real world and we can't do anything about it, I can't do anything about it but dream about it. So that's it for now.

Let's skip to the good part

Been listening to the songs I listened to in 2014 lately.

If there's one thing I envy most about my 2014 self, it's her writing. The way she could sit down alone and go on writing, never stopping even 5 pages later. And I love her way with words. I don't know how my English language has depleted, even with all these books I read.

I'm not sure what's my logic, but I've always felt I wrote better when I was alone, not just physically but in the relationship sense. I always thought it had to be a choice between a significant other and the flair for writing.

My other half is still with me today despite all my thoughts of not deserving him/him deserving better. So I guess I shall stick with this right? Since I can't do anything about my looks (actually I can i.e. make-up or braces or just plain effort but nevermind), I wouldn't mind getting back that natural way of writing instead.

You know, sometimes I think: I may be happier at work, but I was definitely less tired during my poly days. At least I could sleep in class, and I didn't do my homework anyway, and I didn't have much of a social life to keep up with. It was all just bliss, reaching home way before the sun sets. I just didn't have my own income.

I feel more useful at work, and it's the only place in a long time where I've felt better than everyone. But boy am I so tired from it. Working so hard for marriage and a house for me and my other half, even though he or I or this world could be taken away anytime He wishes.

As cliche as it sounds, can I just skip to the part where I'm already married and settled down and very very financially stable??? Someone would be way less tired too if he could just live in Singapore.

Today I had this thought though: me, turning 21, and him turning 20, and we are already struggling to earn enough for our future together, which is in about four years as we've planned (if He is willing). Then what about those who haven't found their significant other yet? Like, are they already saving up money already or are they waiting til they've met that Mr/Ms Right and then start saving? Which would result in getting married at age 30, 35? Which is kinda... 'late'? What??? What am I talking about???

Nevermind, goodnight, til tomorrow hopefully.

All too well

Why do people do what they do? Or maybe, why do I do what only silly little girls would do? Here I am everyday trying to make myself forget, and yet here I also am, reading back the journal from the very year I want to erase from my mind. Stupid, stupid.

And yet I am really taken in. I don't mean to be cliche but the entries showed me proof I've changed over the years. Even my writing, although that's in a negative way because my 2014 entries were really, really good. In terms of language. No joke. I don't mean to be praising myself.

These entries were the very moments when I came up with the Type metaphors, when I found a flower, a bird and a river, and a flame in myself. I think it's really beautiful, but I am the only one who will ever get it.

Maybe I don't regret his leaving me. But I wish the year would have stopped at July. It was perfect (with all its flaws) til August, when my brother got married and when I went out with those people and when I fell prey to the haunting of a Ghost.

If only I hadn't went. If only I'd reached out to the flower and the wind at Jurong Point. If only I'd stayed with the river. If only, if only, if only.

But the reality is: If only I'd known how to say no.

Just one word could have saved my life the year.

The diary entries never mentioned anything about what happened the later half of the year, but I do remember. I'm glad I didn't write about any of it, because it would have been tougher. I loved that year from March to July, with all its screw-ups and fuck-ups. I just wish it hadn't gone beyond August.

I think smells carry memories stronger than any other senses, and I could never forget the scent from September 2014. And it doesn't help that it's still a popular cologne and I smell it quite frequently in public places.

It's still quite a struggle to get over that year, to forget everyone I met or got close to then. It's so easy to leave friendships, but it's so hard to get them out of my head. The way H, E, and M were talking about Running Man and Z and I had no idea. Eating chocolate waffles with SY and F while waiting to catch A's performance. The way A and F gave me that little push to see L at the library. These were pleasant memories and they're still so difficult to think of.

I think April to June were the most peaceful and I wish it'd stopped there. But what's the point of a wish if it's already happened and there was nothing to stop it with anyway?

You know how they say you'll regret the things you didn't do more than the things you did? It's a lie. Remembering the things you did do would be so... much... more... painful.

Done

A little hard to blog this out because I don't want someone saying I'm always trying to make myself the victim.

I should not have taken that bloody picture.

Yea, there you go. You're handsome. Even guys say so. I'm ugly. Nobody has to say it but I know. Obviously we are not meant for each other.

I'm the kind of person who would make your friends say "Why is he even with her?"
The kind of person who would make the people who know me say "I pity her boyfriend."

God knows how worthless I feel. God knows but God doesn't care. He probably thinks I should be grateful He even gave me a face. But what's the point of it? I'm living in a world where my self-worth is my net worth.

You're probably staying only because you feel guilty for last year, or because you know I have this thing where I'd hurt myself or worse if you ever left me again, or both. It'd be easier for the both of us if I left first.

I think you deserve better and I can never be that someone better. No matter how hard I try. I don't have a pretty face, or a pure heart, or money, all of which you deserve. I'm so tired. But you're more so. Call it a sacrifice. If I could leave her for your sake, it should be easy to leave you for your sake.

I'm so fucking worthless. It's not a "feel", it's a fact and this world has shown it.

I think I deserve...

Yea, I'm exhausted right now, but this blogging thing has always been the one to rekindle my energy.

I learnt cashiering at work today, more than a year after I started out at this job. So far, it's fairly easy but it's tiring, considering the fact that I also have to take care of my own department and any which doesn't have staff. I still feel underpaid, but what am I to do?

Really sucks that I'm working so hard in this company and the area manager not only doesn't see it or appreciate it, but doesn't even know my bloody name.

I loved this job because I can handle anything (again, if you dismiss the HOD stuff) and I'm really fully invested in it, making sure everything is done and perfect (even though it isn't my job) and ensuring all the customers I serve get what they wanted (even though they don't say thank you).

And honestly, working in this underpaid job is still way better than being in poly. I just can't study, and I'd rather be in a place where I'm useful than sit down somewhere where I don't know anything.

Popular was a lovely job, but I think I deserve better. Perhaps I'm just waiting for the day when I finally have the balls to leave and to try out for SMRT, or when I finally have enough money to get a diploma to get a better job, or when I stop being shy and make those videos I wanna make, or when I take back my love for writing and write that book I've been dreaming about.

Some things that I think I deserve:
(1) A higher salary, please?
(2) All the books in the world that I want. (and space in my room for them)
(3) At least an entire week off.
(4) More views on this blog and more money on the Nuffnang that I've had since 2012.
(5) A friend.

20 JUN 2016

Tried to write about this in my diary, but my hands were shaking too much.

I saw an accident site on the Tampines Expressway tonight. Traffic jams kinda make me nervous, because they remind me of the road to and fro Woodlands Checkpoint and Malaysia customs, and I'm not used to it.

I was stuck in traffic for 2 hours, when usually it would take me just an hour tops from Woodlands interchange to my Pasir Ris house. Seeing the many cars and buses stuck in one place kinda scared me. What more, seeing the actual overturned truck and all its sand spilled out.

Everyone on the bus was turning his or her head to look as we passed by.

Am I considered sheltered??? Because I'm seriously not used to seeing such things here in Singapore. I can't stop thinking about it.

Sometimes I realise that I'm taking my country for granted. Not just me really, but almost all the other kids here. Right? They don't realise how safe we are, from gun violence or natural disasters. I wish it would stay this way forever, but when the end of the world comes, we could all be gone in one sweep of a tsunami.

After listening to my other half's religious theories, that day is sooner than we expect.

Can't do anything about it.

Titling this post the date since this was originally supposed to be a diary entry /:

All. Time. Low.

Blogger just asked me: "Why not blog in Malay?" I'd show it to you but I don't like pictures on my blog and I've no idea how to do a screenshot on my laptop anyway. 

This year, I set my reading goal to be 70 books. Well, we're not even halfway through the year yet and I've already read 64. I should probably take a break because Goodreads says I'm 32 books ahead of schedule... 

Well I'm not here to talk about the books I've read. In fact I'm not entirely sure why I'm here; whenever one doesn't know what to write, people say "just write how you're feeling." Well I'm feeling down but I'd rather not stain this page with anymore sad stuff. Good vibes, right? 

The first time I made a blog, I was 11 years old. I was so addicted I made a blog for every single thing that I liked: 1 for my anime stuff, 1 for the manga that I was drawing at the time, 1 for the dreams I had at night, 1 personal one. Just imagine the 2016 me, having maybe 4 blogs, 1 personal, the other 3 each for books, MRTs, and dreams??? 

Then in 2007, I made yet another one, but I stuck to it. And that is this very blog you are reading right now =) 

If confidence gets you beauty, is passion supposed to get you recognition for your hard work? It should both work the same way, and yet they don't apply to me. I'm sick of it. That's why I kept quitting this blogging thing again and again over the years, especially from 2013 onwards. It's just too hard for my self-esteem. I hope I'm here to stay this time.

I've lost a lot the past three years, and like an inspiring person I wanna say "but I gained a lot at the same time"... but I won't. Because I didn't. Just stuck staying loyal to the things that won't get me anywhere. Stuck at 300 followers. Stuck at 95 cents on my Nuffnang despite trying everything I could for the past 4 years. Stuck in a 1.2k salary job while doing the work of 4 departments. 

What can a girl like me do anymore??? I don't wanna cake my face with make-up to get followers. I don't wanna spend all my salary on a HD camera to make better videos because nobody will still watch it if I'm not pretty (!!!!!!). I don't wanna suddenly start singing everyday in case my voice suddenly becomes beautiful and I can earn money from it. Ha ha ha. What a joke. 

Now you know it... That I'm at an all time

low low low low low low low low low low 

Why I can never be pretty

The word "confident" makes me cringe. To think that such a word exists? How is it possible for one to walk with their chin held high, knowing well enough they don't even meet the beauty standards of their society?

Maybe not they. But just me. 

I talked about how I'm lacking in looks to my other half and his best friend yesterday, in my favourite place after all the libraries and bookstores of the world--the MRT. There I was, seated between them and going on about what I see makes the beauty standards in this damn society. 

(1) I don't have eyebrows. If beautiful eyebrows are the eyebrows that every single girl on Instagram seems to have, those thick black ones that are sharp on one side and faded on the other: then I'm afraid I don't have any. And that's the first and most important reason why I'm not pretty. 

(2) My teeth are neither straight nor white. Just a few months of light smoking, 4 years ago, and the stains remain forever. My front teeth are humongous, and they're too crooked to match the definition of beautiful. 

(3) I am too tall to be anything. The other girls here in my country are what you'd call petite; and they pretend to be embarrassed of it but anyone could tell they think their lack of height makes them stand out in a positive way. Me? I just get called lamppost and hantu galah.

(4) I have too-small boobs. Those shorter girls I'd mentioned? They're blessed with ample chest, made to look huge thanks to their lack of height. What more when they still wear those push-up bras beneath see-through tees. Makes both girls and boys loco. 

(5) I don't have nice clothes or hair. Pretty is when you have long brown hair, black roots starting to show and still making you look stunning. Your pictures are always with different outfits, from the hairstyle all the way down to the shoes. Me? I am in the same black cardigan everyday and I don't remember the last time I even tied my hair in a ponytail, and that doesn't make me pretty.

(6) I can't sing. I don't have any artistic talent. And apparently this adds to your beauty if you can or do.

(7) Either a headscarf makes you pretty, or a revealing outfit showing off all your curves makes you pretty. There is no in-between. If you cover your legs and tummy and shoulders everyday but you're not donning the hijab, you're not to say you're beautiful. Because you're not. Maybe not "you". But just "me".

Honestly the list goes on and on. And although most of them sound ridiculous coming out of my mouth, it's what I've observed on social media, in this god-forsaken society. It's what gives you friends. It makes me sad, that I don't look like the girls that are praised just for breathing. 

I may have an other half who tells me everyday he thinks I am pretty, but he is no one compared to the many other people who know I'm not, including me. Even if I do have talent, what good would it be against the girls of today's, this country's, society?

Do you remember me?

One pair of legs tangled in the sheets
Two in the morning twenty-six
Slow sighs escape from the lips
At being a page one simply skips

Do you remember me?
Not one to forget or forgive easy
Still know the culprit of your pain
While it is unfamiliar to you, my name

Remember when we first met?
You still wore glasses, head in a hat
The only station with 3 lines
Your obsession with astrological signs

I remember the hands on my shoulders
Pushing me in the absence of my brothers
Down hills laughter ringing through trees
A relationship ends, all friendships cease

Remember how you cried at the atrium?
Your white tee and jacket of denim
3 years on, your graduation ceremony
I don't think you even remember me

Do you remember our day at Woodlands?
Lost in the North, twists and turns
Do you still watch the videos we made?
Fading, fading, fading, your memory dead.

Remember our first words exchanged?
A few giggles and awkward smiles managed
I know you don't remember our better
When the sin against you is still greater

I remember us underneath Dover
Like a bunch of drunk kids except sober
Your endless supply of band tees
Last seen on the bus bound for Tampines

Watching as footsteps went separate paths
Lying down under your photographs
None of them would remember me
A person lesser than a nobody.

Please appreciate me

There was once a time three years ago when I tried to ace my modules, because I wanted to work in SMRT, and I thought my course would give me a chance in it. But of course it isn't my fate, because I'm just too stupid, or lazy, or unmotivated, it doesn't matter.

Two years later I found a job which I deemed the best in the world. I got to work with books and stationery in a bookstore that was a huge part of my childhood. Even though I was eventually moved to the Multimedia department, I was so grateful for my place in this job, to the extent of pasting my confirmation letter from the company up on my wall.

What made me love this job is the fact that I am able to tackle anything that comes at me, as long as it's within my means. Whatever a customer asks for I am always able to answer, be it which department as long as it isn't Chinese. A place where I'm finally better than everyone else, if you exclude the HOD stuff of course.

A year on and I realise that my passion is getting taken advantage of. My dad always says this Malay saying which roughly translates to "give your face and they'll step on your head" which really does make sense. And I'm only now knowing it.

It drives me mad when everything is thrown at me. It drives me mad when I have to take care of more than 2 departments because the rest are not doing anything, or throwing their customers at me because they don't know what they're looking for. My one Malay colleague once said: "Tu lah... Siapa suruh pandai sangat." I guess it is my fault for loving this shitty ass job too much.

It feels worse than being in a relationship where you're not appreciated. It feels worse than studying your hardest only to just borderline pass your exams.

One day, I may just leave. Sometimes when I'm so mad at everything that goes down at work, I plan my resignation letter. Most other people probably copy-paste theirs from some website, but I'd be sure to personally write mine.

You have a staff who loves working with your company, who gets excited when she's given assignments at other outlets or at your HQ. Who never once complained about being underpaid. But when you don't even realise my hard work and only count my effort via the compliments I get, I know I deserve more.

It's only been a year since I've worked here, and I already feel so much stress. It all comes from love; I love this job, I can't change that. I've worked so hard to transform my department from the rat's nest it was before I came, to this neat shit that would please a person with OCD. (but apparently not enough to please the Area Manager so yeah)

Please appreciate me, and don't step all over my head. That's all I ask. Continue not doing so and you may just lose the one person who genuinely loved everything about you, as a customer in childhood and as an employee in adulthood.

The things that make me

I just felt like... typing away. God forbid I use the word 'writing'. 

What are the things that make me happy? Books. Work. Trains. Cats. My colleagues, my other half, and my grandmother. I keep trying to remind myself I do have purpose to live, but it doesn't make it anymore easier.

I am a shallow person in the way I keep wishing to be pretty and popular. I want to embrace the fact that I'm 'different', but it's hard when nobody else likes you for who you are. I'm the one who is difficult; everyone else is normal, and I'm too lowly for them. Right?

That's why work is the only place where I'm happy. I feel like the Avatar, master of all four elements, in the way that I not only know things about my department, but all 4 departments at work, haha. (I can't know about Chinese dept. because well... I'm Malay.)

It makes me feel good about myself to find a place where I'm better than everyone else and where I know how to settle anything that comes my way. The last time I felt this was in English class back in secondary school, where I'd be sleeping the whole lesson and still get the highest score for all the English exams :)

People like me, it's not easy to find such a place. My community, the people of my race and age, they taught me that only the pretty, popular, and the good singers or artists get everything. Writing didn't get me anything, even if I was good at it, because I am not any of those. A pretty girl who can sing writes a shallow piece of "poetry" (that has like 50 grammatical errors) and she gets so much praise. Right?

Another thing that makes me happy is trains: the MRTs in my beloved Singapore, to be more precise, and I think they are beautiful. I love this country and everything in it, and I hate traveling past the borders. Much to the contrast of other people...

I am obsessed with the announcements you hear in the trains, and I always try my hardest to memorise them, be it their words and the announcer lady's tone.  Even in the midst of a conversation with my other half, when the announcement ding comes on, I will stop and recite whatever that comes on. (provided it's in English!)

Why? Because I enjoy it and it makes me happy. My favourite lines of all are The train approaching Platform A will end its service at Jurong East Platform D and If you see any suspicious looking person, or article: please inform our staff, or press the Emergency Communication button, located at the side of the train doors. :)

And cats. They are my friends, even if we don't speak the same language. Just being able to touch them makes me happy, even if I can't bring them home, hah. It makes me happy when I call out to them and they come over to me so enthusiastically, instead of ignoring me or running away.

There's this cat around my house area whom I first met last June or July, and she was really arrogant and always hissed and glared at me if I so much as looked at her. I kept trying to get her to like me, and finally last month I managed to do so, by slowly approaching her and letting her smell my hand.

Now every single day when I get home from work, she'll look at me with her huge round eyes and nudge my foot with her head. After maybe 2 minutes of petting her, I'll get up to leave and she'll follow me. It makes me happy to see how she used to be a bitch and now she's so loving towards me.

Last but not least are all the books in the world. They are all beautiful, even if I have never met them. Whether they are old or new. They're better than people, and they understand me and love me more. They are road trips in the comfort of your own bedroom.

Perhaps I have read more books than I have had human friends, and I think that's just alright. When a person hurts you, they could scar you for life; whereas if a book hurts you, you learn an important lifelong lesson that stays with you forever.

I am trying my hardest to embrace the fact that I do not fit with others. That I do not have friends other than my colleagues and other half and the cats and books of the world. That I am not pretty, or don't wear cute clothes, or can't sing. I am perfectly fine with all that and I've already found my place in this world.

Right?

Parents Day Writing Contest entry

They say our parents make us who we are today.

I don't know who "they" are, but they're right.

Who I am today, it's credits to the couple who taught me the most: my mother and my father.

I am the only girl in the family, growing up with 2 brothers, one elder and one younger. I grew up being the princess of my parents' eyes, and yet I turned out to be a girl who never wears skirts; instead, a girl who is running around everyday in jeans and sneakers.

When I was in primary school, my father used to show me his wallet all the time, full of merely $2 notes. He would tell me he'd spent most of his money on our school allowances, on my mother's groceries, on the electricity and water bills.... My mother, on the other hand, would spend her money like it was water from a tap. Restaurants, shopping, holidays, pretending her debts didn't exist. My brother, despite having had a full time job for about 5 years now, have never given them a single cent. They depended on me financially for their own reasons, thus they taught me that having money is more important than anything else.

The year I turned 17 was the year  I grew quiet, shunned myself from friends and classmates, made myself the constant target of discipline masters, refused to go to school every morning. My parents chose to see it as a rebellion of some way, assuming the reasons of my attitude without sitting down to talk to me first. They taught me that there's no reason for me to confide in anyone about my problems; they wouldn't care, and even if they do just let them assume.

At the end of the year, they couldn't take it anymore. My father kicked me out of the house, his exact words having been "I disown you." He taught me that blood is not that much thicker than water after all; with a snap of your fingers, a daughter can be cut out of your life as you please.

My whole 2 years away from them, my parents never once called me or visited me at my aunt's place. Not for my birthday, not for Hari Raya, not just to say they missed me. They taught me that our ego and pride are more important than admitting you miss someone, than even saying a simple sorry.

When my sister-in-law gave birth to a baby girl, my parents cooed over her, made such a big fuss over her. They called her the names that they used to call me; sayang, princess, princess of the family. When she turned one, they wrote her a birthday wish that was exactly the same as the one they gave me for my past birthdays. They taught me that anyone can be replaced; out with the old, in with the new.

I didn't start my polytechnic life with this couple who raised me from birth. Instead, the couple who paid for my new laptop and school fees was my aunt and uncle. My mother and father, they taught me that the words "mother" and "father" may not necessarily refer to the ones who gave you your life. That the word "family" may not always refer to the ones you grew up with.

While true that our parents make us who we are, sometimes it's not in the most perfect way.

Here I am, the person that I am today, the shape of my parents' hands making me: a person who writes her feelings and problems onto Post-its and paste them onto the wall instead of talking them out with someone.

A person who cut off her friendships with her secondary school friends, assuming they didn't need her anymore because they have their new polytechnic ones.

A person who would sooner cut off her finger than say sorry, even when in the wrong; who treasures her pride and ego more than her relationships.

A person who would rather starve herself than spend $5 on a proper meal, because having and saving money is more important than her own life.

A person who doesn't value her parents and brothers above all else, because blood is not that much thicker than water at all.

A person who calls work instead of her house "home", who regards her colleagues instead of her parents and brothers a "family", because they just don't seem as such.

This is the person that my parents have made me today, their flaws more moulded into me than their strengths.

What for

I miss the times when I only had one option to go at the end of the day. When I didn't have to ask myself which house am I going home to today, when will I be sleeping over at the other? How I wish I didn't go back. I hate this house.

Working full time, I am obliged to give my parents money which is what I have been doing, albeit the fact that my father rejects it because of his ego, hence I always gave his share to my mom instead. But the longer I keep giving her money, the more she asks me and the less she bothers to ask her first son.

Her first FUCKING precious son. The motherfucker who leaves his plates to rot at the side of the sink the whole day because he doesn't know how to wash them; the motherfucker who hasn't given a single cent to our parents after like 5 years of working full time; the motherfucker who keeps showing to the world how he "loves" his family but in actual fact treats them like fucking shit. THE MOTHERFUCKER WHO IS STINGY, USELESS, AND A HYPOCRITE ALL AT ONCE. AND ALSO A MENTALLY RETARDED FUCK. WHAT A RECORD!

What am I even working so hard for? What the hell do I even want to save 10 fucking thousand for? To have it all robbed away by a couple who doesn't even appreciate me? The mother who is taking all the money I am giving her for granted, the father who is too egoistic to even regard me even after 8 months?

They've forgotten me anyway, that pair. They've replaced me with my niece, calling her the things they used to call me. Is it because I'm 21 and too old for that? Is it because they don't love me anymore, or grown to see me as invisible? Is it because I'm not forgiven for losing my own?

What am I working so hard for? I'm gonna fucking die anyway. This family has no point, all this saving money has no point, even my relationship has no point. Why should I even fight for anything when I can't be bothered to fight for my own life?

Letter to beloved

I have lost interest and I want to leave.

When I first laid eyes on you, I liked you.
I got to know you, and I wanted to stay with you.
I saw all your flaws, and I accepted you.
I loved you, your beauty that nobody else appreciated.

But all that is gone.

I don't miss anymore the way you kiss me on my face the few times you were there when I woke up.

I don't love anymore the way you make my heart beat fast.
The way you mess up my hair.
The way you make my tummy ache with butterflies.

I don't see my future with you anymore. I don't see any purpose of staying. I hate your flaws so much, and I don't love you anymore.

I tried so hard to get you to love me back but you choose to give your love to everyone else. I'll give you up to them, these people that don't even accept you.

You are the sun, the wind, the waters, the trees. You are long gone, and I don't want to stay anymore. The people that you harbour are ruined, not only do they not love you but they don't love me either. They don't love each other. They don't love what you give them.

I hate you for not giving me what I've given you and I am waiting for the perfect moment to leave. There is nothing for me to stay for anymore.

This is my letter to this world that I've lost interest in and don't love anymore.

Her

Why
should
you
be
happy
when
you
stole
the
one
thing
that
I
wanted
and
got,
only
because
you
didn't
want
it?

Her.
because
you
didn't
want
HER.

Who am I?

Are you happy?

I think we're really fake.

I don't think I'm important to you.

After all my sacrifices,

to which you've just said

"what sacrifices? you call that a sacrifice?"

you don't even notice me.

You don't realise my existence,

what more my importance.

I don't feel like I belong with you.

Your friends don't accept me now

your family won't accept me future.

Even I don't accept myself.

Who am I to you?

I don't belong to you.

Or more so you don't belong with me.

You should go free

for you are the wind, after all.

You shouldn't be with me

and I need to let you go.

I thought I belonged, but I didn't.

Cheering competition, apology won hearts over

A gifted camera, sweat-soaked PE shirts, soccer

2012, half left behind, groups falling back

2013, own paths, no effort to contact 

I thought I belonged with 4/2 2011,
and 5/1 2012,
but I didn't.

First day of school, in the auditorium, shy

Sitting in a circle, awkward, block 5

Age, race, country of origin, different

They moved forward and I didn't

I thought I belonged with 1A1 2013,
but I didn't.

People never met, like a family from the start

Random name that grew on our hearts

Singing happy birthday, in baju kurung, midnight

Bad blood with one, with all I am not right

I thought I belonged with Heroine,
but I didn't.

5 years of high school past, promises made

2015, making plans, no replies, nothing said

She with her projects, she with her art, she with her dancing

Photo of 7 girls, just the same as nothing

I thought I belonged with my secondary school best friends,
but unfortunately
I didn't.

April first, to earn money for what I don't want

Opening up after a day, a week, month

Laughter spread, anger shared, sadness felt

Loved, accepted, hope for this candle not to melt

I thought I belonged with my colleagues at Popular,
and I did.

I do. 

Taking a break from you

I

don't

understand

how

you

can

treat

me

like

this

It's

clear

how

less

you

love

me

than

you

think

On the nights I search for you

I

don't

think

we

are

meant

for

each

other

I 
think
my
soulmate
is
not
you
but
my
daughter

Found on a Gelare receipt

I

am

sorry

for

stealing

you

from

your

friends

I 

am

sorry

they

don't

even

say

hi

to

me

when

we

bump

into

them

I 

am

sorry

for

not

being

society's

standard

of

pretty

I

am

sorry

for

not

being

your

mother's

standard

of

perfection

for

you

I

am

sorry

I

find

myself

ugly

I

do

not

believe

your

words

what

you

see

in

me

Found on an Auntie Anne's wrapper

There

is

this

mechanism

in

me

that

will

always

feel

relieved

when

I

meet

the

little

flower

for

he

was

the

very

first

person

I'd

set

eyes

on

after

being

suffocated

by

a

ghost.

Found on a flower

Remember

when

your

little

flower

asked

you

"does

he

ever

use

force

on

you"

and

you

said

no

because

you

were

just

defending

the

person

you

call

your

other

half

I didn't realise I was in so much pain

I don't love my niece the same way I did when I first saw her.

She isn't as cute anymore. She can't compare to you.

I'd sacrifice my own parents just to be with you if I could.

I am working so hard for you but you're gone.

You're dead and I only have a black and white picture of you.

A screenshot from my first and last ultrasound scan of you.

I gave you up for people who couldn't care less about me...

I am the ugliest person on earth.

You were the only one who could have gone your whole life believing I was the most beautiful.

I threw you away.

For people who couldn't care less about me.

I have three photo frames of many different people looking down at me,

and none of them are even here for me.

It hurts in my chest, physically, and I wish it didn't.

My breathing gets harder each time.

And when I say something, my other half only laughs and mocks me for it.

I'd sacrifice him to be with you if I could, too.

Every song reminds me of you. Every night I hear you. Every dream, I see you.

I miss you so fucking much and I'd burn the world down just to be with you if I could.

And no one understands.

I am this close to putting myself into oblivion.

I don't do it because the only thing still pulling me together is my job.

"You're not alone", but really, I am.

Because who else could be there even if they wanted to?

Just fucking kill me already.