i shall close this blog with effect from the publication of this post. i wanted to delete the whole blog, but i didn have the heart to, so i shall just let this grand dame go with one last post.
thanks for being my venting outlet for the past year. happy or sad memories have been shared with you, and it will be kept here always.
my sister is the biggest asshole in the world. she’s ignoring me just cos i didn change the bed sheets yesterday. wtf. not the first time alr. dont know why i still keep giving in to her. she needs someone to teach her a good lesson.
my heart feels like a thousand needles knifes/swords have stabbed it. i’m hurting so badly. where’s lawrence? i need my therapist for the night. :(
my blog is now 500 years old! haha. okay lah. not 500 years old. but 500 posts old! hahahaha! been a long journey, and my dear blog has always been here for me. iloveyou bloggy! (: hahha. okay okay. i’m so crazy. haha. not really crazy crazy. but yeah. hahahaha. i need money! to take out my braces! 400 dollars. any sponsors?
i feel like changing my blog. changing the url too. but.. hahaha.
sighhh…
mains coming up soon.
no mood to study.
and i feel like ditching lcoms on tues.
2 hours of lpb.
jialat.
This post shall be a dedication to verisa… since she was so nice to dedicate a post to me on her blog, I shall do the same. (:
Dear Verisa,
Thanks for being my friend. From that first impression you had of me during week zero orientation, that I’ll be on the last person on your list that you would want to be friends with, to being one of my closest friend in TP, that’s a really big difference. I know I’m not an easy person to hang out with, cos of my random and odd mood swings… but still, thanks for taking it all in, and being high and crazy with me whenever I am. :D and just, being there for me when I’m down.
To you, please don’t do that again. ):
I saw it the other day, when you broke down, but I dared not ask.
But now that I’ve read your entry, I know I was right.
Whatever that happened to you, whatever that you’ve told me/us….
kinda make me feel that I’m such a lousy friend.
It’s like there’s nothing much I can do to help you.
If there’s anything I can do to make your day at least a better one, I’d do it.
I miss seeing you being genuinely happy.
Our group was supposed to be one spreading the Happy Virus, remember?
I’m not trying to say that you have to pretend to be happy,
but it’s just that, I miss those days when we could openly talk/laugh together.
I’m not sure if it refers to me, but it seems that way.. in response to that, I’ve never changed ver. I’m always me. I’ve always been like this; it’s just that I’ve slipped back into my reverie. I was never truly happy, maybe for one or two hours, but whenever I get home, all happiness I have slips away. We can still talk openly and laugh together, but it’ll always be the same. I’m not sure what you saw the other day, but I have a feeling it’s that mark on my wrist. I’m not sure if that will change the opinion of me, but I’m still the same person you met on the first day of school. I’ve never changed; it’s just that the situation has made me this way.
In life, everyone has to make choices. Good choice or bad choice, a decision on a certain issue MUST be made. After that decision is made, there would be two reactions. One, if a right decision is made, the decision maker would jump for joy and be the happiest person in the world for that period of 5 minutes. Two, if a wrong decision is made, the decision maker would howl, cry and moan about how life is unfair and how god hates him/her.
As for me, for 17 years of my life, I seldom regret the decisions that I have made. Even if I did, I would still move on and just treat it as one of a bad choice in life.
But now, I have to make a decision between 2 choices. And after spending the whole night thinking about it, I still cannot decide on which choice to make. There’s the right choice and the wrong choice. The right choice being the one that all grownups and my mother deems right, but of which I deem wrong, and the wrong choice being the choice that all grownups deem wrong and the choice that I deem right. If I were to follow my heart, I’d definitely pick the wrong choice, which I think is right. But if I were to pick the wrong choice and let my mother find out, I would be in such big big trouble…
Which is why, I’m in such a dilemma now. I really really want to pick the other choice, but I don’t know what’s gonna happen if I really picked the other choice. Would I really be the happiest person in the world not for 5 minutes but for the rest of my life? Or would this be the biggest mistake of my life? I’m confused, I’m in pain, and my head is hurting me. I have been losing sleep over this issue for I don’t know how many nights, and its making me very 憔悴. My mother wasn’t working yesterday, and she was inspecting me, and she said my face looks really pale.. and now she wants to boil lots of funny drink for me… just to 补我的血.. of which, I don’t like. Joyness.
I’m having a splitting headache now. I wish this was something that would be resolved as easily as a flip of a coin. But I know I can’t possibly flip a coin to decide my fate for the rest of my life. I really don’t know what to do. I wish there was someone I could actually talk to and help me make my decision. I spoke to saisai just now, and she said I have to make the decision by myself. But I really don’t know what to do…
Someone please kill me now.
where’s lawrence when you need him? :/ i think he should be able to help me on this, putting aside all his nonsensical cheek pinching and all… *prays that lawrence is reading this*
You are seeking protection against anything which might seem to be exhausting you or tiring you out. It would appear that you are seeking a life of security and physical ease, free from any problem or disturbance.
You want what you want and you need all that you want and, as they say in the movies, you are the sort of individual that ‘By hook or by crook’ you will, by fair means or foul, endeavour to get what you are looking for.
You feel very lonely and frustrated at this time but your shyness and modesty precludes you from establishing any deep form of relationship. You feel rather isolated and alone. You are egocentric and you believe that you are always right – well maybe you are – but you have a short fuse and are likely to take offence for the slightest reason.
Having experienced considerable disappointment of late and not knowing quite what to do about it this has led you to suffer a great deal of agitation and anxiety. You are trying very hard to make favourable impressions all round. You feel that you have a right to do anything that you wish without being condemned for your beliefs. Everything seems to be going against you and you feel helpless to change the situation. The possibility of failure is most upsetting and this situation is leading to untold stress. You honestly believe that the situation is not of your making – it is not your fault – you have been misled and abused by those that you trusted, but you are trying to look at the situation quite dispassionately. Would you perhaps not agree that this situation could be regarded as unrealistic self justification?
You feel worn out – you have no energy and your depleted vitality has created intolerance for any further stimulation. You feel inadequate and this subjects you to agitation, irritation and acute distress from which you try to escape by refusing further direct participation. You have become very wary and cautious but you have an inner strength. You have that determination to get your own way and succeed in the end.
Don’t work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.
I must say thank you to the faculty and staff of the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information for inviting me to give your convocation address. It’s a wonderful honour and a privilege for me to speak here for ten minutes without fear of contradiction, defamation or retaliation. I say this as a Singaporean and more so as a husband.
My wife is a wonderful person and perfect in every way except one. She is the editor of a magazine. She corrects people for a living. She has honed her expert skills over a quarter of a century, mostly by practising at home during conversations between her and me.
On the other hand, I am a litigator. Essentially, I spend my day telling people how wrong they are. I make my living being disagreeable. Nevertheless, there is perfect harmony in our matrimonial home. That is because when an editor and a litigator have an argument, the one who triumphs is always the wife.
And so I want to start by giving one piece of advice to the men: when you’ve already won her heart, you don’t need to win every argument.
Marriage is considered one milestone of life. Some of you may already be married. Some of you may never be married. Some of you will be married. Some of you will enjoy the experience so much, you will be married many, many times. Good for you.
The next big milestone in your life is today: your graduation. The end of education. You’re done learning. You’ve probably been told the big lie that “Learning is a lifelong process” and that therefore you will continue studying and taking masters’ degrees and doctorates and professorships and so on. You know the sort of people who tell you that? Teachers. Don’t you think there is some measure of conflict of interest? They are in the business of learning, after all. Where would they be without you? They need you to be repeat customers.
The good news is that they’re wrong.
The bad news is that you don’t need further education because your entire life is over. It is gone. That may come as a shock to some of you. You’re in your teens or early twenties. People may tell you that you will live to be 70, 80, 90 years old. That is your life expectancy.
I love that term: life expectancy. We all understand the term to mean the average life span of a group of people. But I’m here to talk about a bigger idea, which is what you expect from your life.
You may be very happy to know that Singapore is currently ranked as the country with the third highest life expectancy. We are behind Andorra and Japan, and tied with San Marino. It seems quite clear why people in those countries, and ours, live so long. We share one thing in common: our football teams are all hopeless. There’s very little danger of any of our citizens having their pulses raised by watching us play in the World Cup. Spectators are more likely to be lulled into a gentle and restful nap.
Singaporeans have a life expectancy of 81.8 years. Singapore men live to an average of 79.21 years, while Singapore women live more than five years longer, probably to take into account the additional time they need to spend in the bathroom.
So here you are, in your twenties, thinking that you’ll have another 40 years to go. Four decades in which to live long and prosper.
Bad news. Read the papers. There are people dropping dead when they’re 50, 40, 30 years old. Or quite possibly just after finishing their convocation. They would be very disappointed that they didn’t meet their life expectancy.
I’m here to tell you this. Forget about your life expectancy. After all, it’s calculated based on an average. And you never, ever want to expect being average.
Revisit those expectations. You might be looking forward to working, falling in love, marrying, raising a family. You are told that, as graduates, you should expect to find a job paying so much, where your hours are so much, where your responsibilities are so much.
That is what is expected of you. And if you live up to it, it will be an awful waste.
If you expect that, you will be limiting yourself. You will be living your life according to boundaries set by average people. I have nothing against average people. But no one should aspire to be them. And you don’t need years of education by the best minds in Singapore to prepare you to be average.
What you should prepare for is mess. Life’s a mess. You are not entitled to expect anything from it. Life is not fair. Everything does not balance out in the end. Life happens, and you have no control over it. Good and bad things happen to you day by day, hour by hour, moment by moment. Your degree is a poor armour against fate. Don’t expect anything. Erase all life expectancies. Just live. Your life is over as of today. At this point in time, you have grown as tall as you will ever be, you are physically the fittest you will ever be in your entire life and you are probably looking the best that you will ever look. This is as good as it gets. It is all downhill from here. Or up. No one knows. What does this mean for you? It is good that your life is over.
Since your life is over, you are free. Let me tell you the many wonderful things that you can do when you are free. The most important is this: do not work. Work is anything that you are compelled to do. By its very nature, it is undesirable. Work kills. The Japanese have a term “Karoshi”, which means death from overwork. That’s the most dramatic form of how work can kill. But it can also kill you in more subtle ways. If you work, then day by day, bit by bit, your soul is chipped away, disintegrating until there’s nothing left. A rock has been ground into sand and dust. There’s a common misconception that work is necessary. You will meet people working at miserable jobs. They tell you they are “making a living”. No, they’re not. They’re dying, frittering away their fast-extinguishing lives doing things which are, at best, meaningless and, at worst, harmful. People will tell you that work ennobles you, that work lends you a certain dignity. Work makes you free. The slogan “Arbeit macht frei” was placed at the entrances to a number of Nazi concentration camps. Utter nonsense. Do not waste the vast majority of your life doing something you hate so that you can spend the small remainder sliver of your life in modest comfort. You may never reach that end anyway. Resist the temptation to get a job. Instead, play. Find something you enjoy doing. Do it. Over and over again. You will become good at it for two reasons: you like it, and you do it often. Soon, that will have value in itself. I like arguing, and I love language. So, I became a litigator. I enjoy it and I would do it for free. If I didn’t do that, I would’ve been in some other type of work that still involved writing fiction – probably a sports journalist.
So what should you do? You will find your own niche. I don’t imagine you will need to look very hard. By this time in your life, you will have a very good idea of what you will want to do. In fact, I’ll go further and say the ideal situation would be that you will not be able to stop yourself pursuing your passions. By this time you should know what your obsessions are. If you enjoy showing off your knowledge and feeling superior, you might become a teacher. Find that pursuit that will energise you, consume you, become an obsession. Each day, you must rise with a restless enthusiasm. If you don’t, you are working.
Most of you will end up in activities which involve communication. To those of you I have a second message: be wary of the truth. I’m not asking you to speak it, or write it, for there are times when it is dangerous or impossible to do those things. The truth has a great capacity to offend and injure, and you will find that the closer you are to someone, the more care you must take to disguise or even conceal the truth. Often, there is great virtue in being evasive, or equivocating. There is also great skill. Any child can blurt out the truth, without thought to the consequences. It takes great maturity to appreciate the value of silence. In order to be wary of the truth, you must first know it. That requires great frankness to yourself. Never fool the person in the mirror. I have told you that your life is over, that you should not work, and that you should avoid telling the truth.
I now say this to you: be hated. It’s not as easy as it sounds. Do you know anyone who hates you? Yet every great figure who has contributed to the human race has been hated, not just by one person, but often by a great many. That hatred is so strong it has caused those great figures to be shunned, abused, murdered and in one famous instance, nailed to a cross. One does not have to be evil to be hated. In fact, it’s often the case that one is hated precisely because one is trying to do right by one’s own convictions. It is far too easy to be liked, one merely has to be accommodating and hold no strong convictions. Then one will gravitate towards the centre and settle into the average. That cannot be your role. There are a great many bad people in the world, and if you are not offending them, you must be bad yourself. Popularity is a sure sign that you are doing something wrong.
The other side of the coin is this: fall in love.
I didn’t say “be loved”. That requires too much compromise. If one changes one’s looks, personality and values, one can be loved by anyone. Rather, I exhort you to love another human being. It may seem odd for me to tell you this. You may expect it to happen naturally, without deliberation. That is false. Modern society is anti-love. We’ve taken a microscope to everyone to bring out their flaws and shortcomings. It far easier to find a reason not to love someone, than otherwise. Rejection requires only one reason. Love requires complete acceptance. It is hard work – the only kind of work that I find palatable. Loving someone has great benefits. There is admiration, learning, attraction and something which, for the want of a better word, we call happiness. In loving someone, we become inspired to better ourselves in every way. We learn the truth worthlessness of material things. We celebrate being human. Loving is good for the soul. Loving someone is therefore very important, and it is also important to choose the right person. Despite popular culture, love doesn’t happen by chance, at first sight, across a crowded dance floor. It grows slowly, sinking roots first before branching and blossoming. It is not a silly weed, but a mighty tree that weathers every storm. You will find, that when you have someone to love, that the face is less important than the brain, and the body is less important than the heart. You will also find that it is no great tragedy if your love is not reciprocated. You are not doing it to be loved back. Its value is to inspire you. Finally, you will find that there is no half-measure when it comes to loving someone. You either don’t, or you do with every cell in your body, completely and utterly, without reservation or apology. It consumes you, and you are reborn, all the better for it.
Don’t work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone. You’re going to have a busy life. Thank goodness there’s no life expectancy.
i got this off shaun’s blog, who got it off FB. i think its really meaningful. haha. and at the first part, for all the guys out there, dont quarrel with your future wife. or if you are married now, dont quarrel with your wife. cos, no matter what, the wife is always right. HAHAHA. this is what you get for being pampered too much by your boyfriend. HAHA.
i screwed OP wet run presentation today. everything just flew out of my mind when it was y turn to speak. and i was so nervous that i even forgot which slide i was supposed to start from, and in the end confusing jas and jiat. sorry. :/ lots to clear up for OP ppt before the actual one friday. and thanks, bruce, jas and jiat for staying in sch till so late last night.
but i’m even more pissed cos of something else. LCOM class was dismissed late cos of the OP presentation, and she called me at 6.35, when i just boarded the bus. told her presentation over ran etc etc. then she said, orh, then you have to stay at home and do your work alr. i was so confused, i said, har? then she said, yah what. you every morning go out so early, afternoon class also go so early. you stay at home and do your work lah. you always do your project online what. i was like, no. have to meet right. who say i go out, i go and do project lah.
wtf. c’mon lah. who wants to wake up so bloody early every damn morning? then when i got home, she asked me why i took so long. wth. the fucking bus doesnt fucking fly. and oh. she said. how come do project dont have to bring laptop? wtf. i’m not the only in sch who owns a fucking laptop lah.
when i was at my stop, i didn want to alight from the bus. i wanted to go somewhere where no one can find me, far far away. somewhere where i dont have to go through this nonsense every single time. cant she just understand that i need the time to do my project? i know my limits, and anthony is a good guy. a much better guy than anyone out there. so why cant you just put aside your prejudice for men and take a good look at him?
and i’m sorry i broke my promise, but i cant help myself. i’m sorry i went back to my old habit. i’m sorry darling. i really am.
