Today,

four-twenty-one on a disgustingly

hot afternoon.

head drowsy, eyes heavy

fingers tap-a-tapping on the keyboard

stringing words and

breaking apart sentence

structures

the cooled peppermint tea tastes

sour.

calculus test tomorrow in the

back of her mind

she has to write

more

about everything.

and nothing.

I Write Like

Oh my God so I found this app? website? on R's blog that analyzes your writing and compares it with famous writers so you can check with whom your writing style is similar. Here're my results:

And finally, the one that made my day, that made me jump from my chair and kiss the ground - not really, but I would have if I had gotten more than 4 hours of sleep last night - is:

I feel like crying, really. H.P. Lovecraft and James Joyce are enough to make me happy but Anne Rice? I feel that I've fulfilled my purpose on earth. :')

I'm Back!

I know I haven't been posting much lately but I've been swamped with the SBC paper. So, these are what I've been up to lately. Well, before the paper, anyway. :)

Chilling by the pool with George Orwell and Oreos.

Chilling in Starbucks after college. And I finally found Truman Capote's In Cold Blood! So happy.

Fish tortilla with salsa and parmesan cheese and yogurt caper spread. Tastes super.

Went for Indian food with Yianthin, Wenjuin, Yanying and Shuenwen. Apparently this is an Indian pizza and you can probably see from the picture that it's fantabulous.

Indian desserts! They all taste heavenly. The only name I remember is the coconut burfi but the others are awesome too and arghhhhhh, I wanna wanna. Wenjuin, be prepared to be dragged there again.

A Story of Teeth

I remember when I was 6 and my baby teeth were dropping like flies throughout the year. Remember how the falling off of baby teeth would form a border in the transition from being babies to being full-fledged children? Despite the initial horror of toothlessness (which I then overcame by trying not to show my teeth when I smile) I was delighted that I was finally getting rid of whatever categorized me as a baby. It was when I was trying to grow up too fast and had no discernible idea of what growing up meant. 

Anyway, I started a collection of baby teeth after deciding that I couldn't bear to throw away a part of myself. I think I was scared that all the teeth I dumped over the years would come together and form the phantom of a mouth I once had but without my lips or my tongue or my oral cavity. It would be two rows of vengeful, malicious teeth snapping their way into my bedroom when I sleep and haunt me for the rest of my life. Far-fetched, I know, but you know how kids are. 

So the first two teeth were given the royal treatment. I used to brush and clean them individually then rinse them in Listerine every night before placing them back into their little bed of cotton wool in a matchbox from England that my aunt gave me. I lost both of them in an unfortunate incident in which they were washed down the sink when I drained the water. The next three survived for another year before I grew bored of cleaning baby teeth every night and just left them in their bottle until they rotted. I washed them down the sink, this time of my own free will. I traded the succeeding one with my brother for dominance over the TV remote control. (He wanted to watch Ed, Edd and Eddie but I wanted to watch The Book of Pooh) I still don't know what he wanted with my tooth. 

I lost more teeth as the years went by, mostly due to similar incidents and once because I planted two teeth in the garden after the dentist told me about teeth having roots and all. I now have approximately ten more in a bottle filled with mouthwash (because I am too lazy to have to clean them every night or even every month) and they have all turned Listerine blue. They remind me of floating fetuses in jars of formaldehyde and I certainly have developed a kind of... maternal(?) feeling towards them over the years. The first two even had names: William and Harry. Dead serious. 

I don't know why I'm remembering this now but Born to Die is making me strangely nostalgic. It makes me sad to think of William and Harry and the others. It's like having a cemetery of unborn babies. 

(Not) The End

And it terrifies me that
it would come to a screeching
halt.

Wonderland

I used to have the same fever dreams over and over again; an endless dream sequence set in a place like wonderland.

There, people walk around in a stupor with half-smiles on their faces. They talk about how the sun is shining so brightly, or compliment the precise diamond-like shape of raindrops but when asked about their names or who they are, they fall silent.

You are walking in the middle of a crowd of people; suddenly you stop, turn around and there's no one around you at all. You're standing in a narrow hallway and you can see no end to it. You put one foot ahead of another because there's really nothing else you can do.

She looks at me, her face utterly devoid of emotion and holds out her palm to me. WE'RE ALL MAD HERE, written in faded black ink. She continues licking the ink on her translucent skin.

There's a mirror in front of me and I see you in it; or rather, you see me. And I realize that we're the same person after all. And all the people walking in circles, with their zombie-smiles and their apparent lack of sound minds are more clones of me.

Then the dream would start all over again.

19th of March

I want to be able to walk alone. I want to be the girl who pirouettes on the thin line of Loneliness, singing softly to herself in the reverberating echo of emptiness. I want the air to be filled with only particles of me: my breath, my scent, my heartbeat, my essence. I want to be alone and yet I am too afraid that if I were truly solitary, I would cease to be a person altogether.

Outrun My Gun

This pretty much sums up everything I felt this week:

1. They exhaust me,

    I bore them. 

2. I would like to 

    be able to speak again. 

3. I've got a blister from 

    touching everyone I see

    the abyss opens up; 

    it steals everything from me.

4. Beaten black and blue

    from the inside
    now I can only be thought 
    of as a bruise.

5. I am sorry

    if you think I'm a zombie,

   but I'm just 

   too empty. 

6. Crushed beneath the gaze of strangers. 

7. I'm sorry for hating all of you. 

8. And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming

   Or the moment of the truth in your lies

   When everything feels like the movies

   Yeah you bleed just to know you're alive.

9. And I don't want the world to see me

    Cause I don't think that they'd understand.

10. Silence entombs me. 

      I could fade into silence.

      I dissolve in its silky flux.

      I am Silence. 

Happy New Year

Can't really believe it's 2012 already. I'm skeptical about the whole Mayan prophecy thing, but in any case, I really hope that the world doesn't end this year or anytime soon.

I started 2012 reading Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, having read the abridged version a few years ago and for some reason this gives me the confidence that it's going to be a good year. I mean, I know it's a downright depressing and even slightly maniacal book but, I don't know, it soothes me like all depressing things do.

Anyway, quote from the book:
"We all have such fateful objects -- it may be a recurrent landscape in one case, a number in another -- carefully chosen by the gods to attract events of specific significance for us: here shall John always stumble; there shall Jane's heart always break."

Joyeux Noel

I am not alone at all, I thought. I was never alone at all. And that, of course, is the message of Christmas. We are never alone. Not when the night is darkest, the wind coldest, the word seemingly most indifferent. 


~ Taylor Caldwell 

Shopping Trip in KL - Part 3

Well, not much happened in Day 3. We slept late - I mean, they slept late. Yianthin and I were up for ages. Then we walked to KLCC (again) for our last meal in KL.

KLCC

How can people not like Helena Bonham Carter? She's phenomenal.

Oh, by the way, I would say that it was a productive shopping trip. =D

Shopping Trip in KL - Part 2

And Day 2 starts with a relaxing swim in the hotel pool where the view is awesome if you float on your back.

Then to Midvalley Megamall and The Gardens, where we had to take the commuter back to KLCC. And let me tell you this: the commuter was a ride in hell. I think I'm going to be traumatized for life. It was like being cramped into a gas chamber during the Holocaust only the gas used is carbon dioxide and human sweat.

But then, we did survive and even managed to shop and take pretty pictures in KLCC. We're professional shoppers, I tell you.

Hotel Pool

Midvalley, The Gardens and KLCC

Shopping Trip in KL - Part 1

Sorry for the lack of updates. I just came back from a trip to KL with Yianthin, Wenjuin, Yanying and Shuenwen. This is Day 1.

On the road:

This is my beloved Bobo and I. I've had him for seventeen years and I bring him everywhere. =)

Yianthin and Wenjuin at the back.

And Shuenwen who ate all my pink guava.

In Ikea:

We're all admiring the golden mirror, haha.

Yanying. The kids were watching us go crazy over the toys. And their parents too, I think.

In Pavilion:

To-Do List

To tell you the truth, I've been feeling really empty ever since my exams are over. I don't know, maybe I'm just not quite used to total liberation yet. Anyway, I wake up every morning to watch Mummy Autopsy and then have my breakfast, then watch another movie, then have lunch, then read American Gods by Neil Gaiman (of which I totally recommend), then watch Ancients Behaving Badly or something from History channel, then wander around or stare at the ceiling or sit in front of the fridge deciding what to eat then end up eating nothing, then watch America's Next Top Model re-runs, then have dinner, then watch How I Met Your Mother re-runs, then go online, then read The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch, then sleep.

So, I've decided that I really need a To-Do list or I'll wake up one day to find that I couldn't get up because my legs had already rotted away.

Things to do:

1. Driving lessons. Not looking forward to it. =(
2. Shopping for New Year. =D
3. Learn French. 
4. Christmas shopping!
5. Russian literature. I refuse to be intimidated. But I am. 

Game of Thrones

So you know I've always been an absolute movie maniac and my not-so-recent movie obsession is Game of Thrones. It's based on a series of fantasy novels by G.R.R. Martin about the... well, the game of thrones. It's about people who are willing to do anything for power, people who already have power and trying to keep it and people who've lost their power.

And yes, like most movies that I like, it has an abundant number of hot people. You know I can never resist armour-wearing, sword-wielding, arrow-shooting, horse-riding guys. With thick British/Scottish accent. And soft, curly hair.

First of all, there's Jon Snow

Then, Robb Stark

And Renly Baratheon,

And finally, antagonist, Viserys.

Hello December

December brings the promise of all things wonderful. The absence of winter has failed to dwindle the pre-Christmas excitement and I'm beginning to really anticipate Christmas. I don't know why but it has an indescribable hold over me as something magical and immeasurably heartwarming.

Exams would be over by then - thank God - and the holidays would commence. And I would finally be free of high school and though it's a sad and daunting thought, it fills me with undeniable enthusiasm about what the future holds for me. 

It's only the beginning of my life and be it a happy or difficult one, (please let it be the former) I'm determined that it should have an absolutely rocking takeoff. 

And as usual, please be good to me. =)

Event Horizon

(noun) - the point of no return where escape is impossible

Son of Sam

By serial killer, David Berkowitz, aka Son of Sam

I've always had an unhealthy obsession with serial killers, psychologically wise. It's magic how their minds work. More than half of the serial killers have disconcertingly high IQs. It's fascinating how twisted their minds are. One of my favourite serial killers, (sounds weird, doesn't it?) is David Berkowitz, who wrote beautiful letters to taunt the police. The above is also a letter of his. My favourite is this poem:


Because Craig is Craig,
So must the streets be filled with Craig (death)
And huge drops of lead
Poured down upon her head
Until she was dead -
Yet the cats still come out at night to mate
And the sparrows still sing in the morning.

Happy 17th Birthday, Love

It was my birthday yesterday and I'm officially seventeen now. Imagine, seventeen! I've dreamt about this before, way back when I was maybe eight? I thought that I'd be so grown up, so sophisticated. I thought that I would be one of those super cool graduates, you know, fun yet hardworking and stuff.

Never have I thought that I would be like I am today. Sinking deeper and deeper into the proverbial merde. Here I am, lazing away while my future looms ahead, portent and foggy. That's the word - foggy. I haven't the foggiest idea what's going to happen. I still feel as small I as felt ten, fifteen, seventeen years ago. 


But enough of all that emo shit. What I really want to say is thank you all. Thank you to all Facebook friends who greeted me. Thank you to all my friends who endured me for all these years. Thank you, everyone who touched my life, even for the briefest of seconds. And thank you, thank you, for the lovely pressies. I solemnly swear to cherish them for all my life. *guides' honour*


And most importantly, thank you to all those closest and dearest to me. I know that I used to (and will probably still) hurt you most. You watched me break down, you endured my occasional mood swings, you excused my crazy PMS behaviour, you know all my weaknesses and love me through it all. You guys rock my world and I hope I rocked yours too.


I know that I can't end my seventeenth birthday post without making any promises so here goes: I promise myself that I will study harder and I will love myself more. I promise my friends that I will try to be less maniacal during my PMS period. I promise my family that I will try to be more patient and well yeah, less PMS-bitch with them.   I promise that I will try to keep my promises.


So thank you, God, Yahweh, Buddha, Allah, Zeus, Jove, Brahma, forces of the universe, unknown beings... Thank you for seventeen years of (despite all my complaints) wonderful life. Please continue loving me. =)

A Tribute To Harry Potter

First of all, thank you, J.K. Rowling, who basically built the columns that supported my childhood. Thank you, Harry Potter, for surviving till the end so that I can have the fairy tale ending. Thank you, Snape, for proving me wrong. Thank you, Hollywood, for making it into a movie and not screwing things up (too much).

This is my favourite two sentences in the whole series. Yeah, as in, seven books. 

Thank you, Voldemort, for wanting to kill Harry and making the whole story possible. Thank you for being so evil. I love you and I miss you. 

My second favourite Hogwarts teacher, after Remus Lupin.

Underneath all his tough, evilness, Voldemort is just a sweet, lonely man. 

We've all grown up watching Harry Potter and it's just sad it's ended. I remember waiting for the Hogwarts letter on my 11th birthday till like, 4 am in the morning. 

I love you, J.K. Rowling, forever and always.