Freedom

Release me from the constraints of midterms, worried hours pouring over every inch of the page, attempting to differentiate tildas and hats, silences, BLUE.

And this is only midterm one.

On a hiatus until about 1pm on Saturday where I start my 5 page Paper II for Histart 386. Surprising how the day seems so much nicer after you get back a very high grade for something you thought you totally bombed.

Like the labyrinth of North Stacks. Maybe I've found a way out?

I'm 21.

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Overwhelming thoughts often come to me at the dead of night. This feeling of chasing something, running away from something else, always goals goals goals and deadlines to meet. The noose of life likes to tighten itself until you're at breaking points, then maybe you realize so what? So what indeed.

There's something so final about final year. A last ditch shot to do things, because if you don't do them now, when will you ever? Yet these are but constraints set on us by the systems we choose to be in. Who said ppl should start working at 22, graduate at 21. who set the years?
It's a freedom that is desperate, because you know you'll never do it if you don't do it now.

Brain Whirl

Distractions. Cough. Email. Blog. Chat. Write. Read. Cough. Listen. See. Anthro. Homoskedacity. Birthday. Midterms. Worry. Cough. Stress. To gym or not to gym? Illness. Fucking Sleepy. Brain whirl.


Cough.

Family

Have you ever watched someone grow up? I mean literally held them in your arms at the age of 2 hrs, watched them take their first steps, say their first words, give you a hug. I'm fortunate enough to have being an aunt, and its been amazing.

Even though my nephew at 8 gives me attitude and I'm probably a really fierce aunt to him, "JULIAN, GO PRACTICE YOUR PIANO NOW!"....or my adorable niece who also gives me attitude...at 4...but I indulge her more, coz she's a girl and younger =P

Pangs of homesickness at the 3rd year of being away? Really?  Never thought I'd be one to say this, but hell I'm homesick.

It's something about knowing that you're a model, an adult that they can look up to and talk to. An authority of a parent figure, yet close enough in age to understand them, coz heck, sometimes I feel I'm still 9 myself. It's funny trying to understand how to motivate them, as I think back about me having tuitions and getting the grades I did, and how much I hated practicing the piano. Now it's impossible to get my nephew to sit down for a while and plonk out some tunes, yet I can't help but remember how annoying it was for me to do the same. So how can I be the hypocrite?

When I talk to them I feel my tones change, my Malaysian-ness and lahs and totally wrong syntaxes all come out "Why he didn't go one?" lol. Back to the roots, back to the familiarity of home. You can take someone out of their home, but you can never take home out of someone. I'm still the baby of the family and I probably always will be. Once upon a time I thought being grown up meant taking care of yourself. It's all an illusion. We're always someone's baby and someone will always be our parent.

Fall Break=Break FROM studying or Break FOR studying

Fall break! Relaxing, lazy, indulgent fall break. 4 days and I've forgotten everything I learned already =S. FAIL.

So first day, walked and walked and erm...walked. Explored Toronto, went to Chinatown for Dimsum, down to the harbour to lepak and walked back up to the Shopping mall. We walked a total of 50 blocks! Mad. Went up the CN tower for dinner, was fun eating at the revolving restaurant, but glass floor was nothing to shout about, saw better at Macau Tower. Visited U of Toronto then us extremely lazy people ended up back in the hotel watching Mean Girls and other misc. crap on TV. Went out for Sushi dinner after and all you can eat Sashimi..MMM, was yum. Meanwhile I was panicking over the two midterms I had yesterday. Sigh, they really know how to ruin Fall Break.

In my own words:

Death Valley-"Rocks mah"
Niagara Falls-"Water lor"

lol.

Spectacular water tho. Maid of the Mist was way fun, even though I got drenched and the weather was miserably cold, which probably is the reason why I'm sick now. Bah Humbug.

Now its back to reality and more panicking. Its end Oct already! a month to Miami! woohoo

I'm probably the worse person to teach high-schoolers:

1) I don't remember whatever it is they are learning now =S
2) Staring at the facts been force fed to them, it just makes me want to say to them, eff this...it counts for nothing anyway. All it does is test your memory prowess. Getting a job is much more than that.

Senioritis to the max max.

I used to derive so much motivation from aiming for the top grades, but what for? Just seems like the slog is getting harder and I'm not getting any pleasure from the outcome anyway.

Have you ever stared down into the abyss, willing yourself to fall? That's it really, isn't it? We spend our lives barricading ourselves from feeling, from the worse things that can happen to us, when all we really want to do is fall into it with open arms. Maybe then we can stop the worrying that someday, something bad will happen to us.

Dre@m

I dreamed. Things I never really want to dream of again, because it brings back things that I rather not remember. Or feel. I'd rather shove it to the back of my memories for all eternity, or I'd rather shove it out of my mind forever.

It left me with something missing, for a fleeting moment an emptiness that was soon plugged with the days activities. Dreams that dissipates upon the return to reality, until you're left grasping for the edges, until those too fade. And I awoke wondering whether it was all a dream. Yet again it was.

I hate how snippets of reality unfold like a movie in dreams. A small comment, a fleeting glance and they become more than they actually are.

或者只是我的感覺

Listen to the rhythm of the falling rain

It has rained 24 hours non-stop and going. Wtf weather, I mean rain is nice and all but it really makes me want to go to bed.

I'm hungry. Got screwed over by the chicken. Never steam frozen things.

Tango in a half hour. I think I'm gna have to go warm up the leftover deep dish pizza. gr.

Reality

Sometimes things just don't work out the way you wished they would.



Expectations ---------------------------------------------------------------> Reality

Brain Dead

Mckinsey PST screwed me over. 3 hours of flyering and I'm sick of promoting the event before it even started. But maybe finally the YHO spirit takes over. It's like that last push at the last stretch of a race. Where you feel the lactic acid building up but you push through it anyway. Where your breaths are short, hurried, strangled, yet you take in one last gasp and power on. Pain is good.

At the risk of failing everything else. Balance. I need some right about now.

Lol, I listed the activities of the day sometime ago, and not one included school or classtime. How bout we just get rid of that part? Have everything but class. That's what it sure seems like right now.

Someone

Someone one day said that as long as you keep your head down, your work up you'll get everywhere in life. Someone somewhere once said that that was all it takes. Be good, and you'll be rewarded. Maybe along the way I sacrificed who I was to attain a goal that was set somewhere in the far future. Facing competition I've never ever backed down, neither have I ever liked to admit defeat. Ever. Headstrong, perhaps, controlling, perhaps, domineering, most definitely. An unfortunate trait sometimes. Useful during other times.

How do you find the balance between realizing your own limitations and feeling optimistic enough to try. TRY. I lost the formula somewhere along the way, how do I piece it back together again?

There will always be losers. Otherwise who would the winners stand on?

万物生

Art has never really caught my fancy as being something that I'm highly interested in. This probably stems from the fact that I cannot see myself even attempting to recreate or even knowing how to go about recreating some of the art work that is so astonishingly complex. Layers upon layers of paint, meticulously unfolding to make a 2d piece come alive, to make you forget that what you are staring at is a flat piece of paper. Transporting you to far away lands, places, contexts so far removed from the point at which you are staring at a glass case in a museum which contains it.

Art bring you back to eras that are long gone. I was staring at a pot that was 4000 years old. Freaking heck. Sometimes I wonder where they dig these things from. Especially ceremonial burial figurines. Maybe we shouldn't know.

So I stood in front of a painting analyzing every single brush stroke for about 40 minutes today. Taking in the sensory perceptions, colours, purpose, intent, meaning, patterns. All for 10% of my grade paper. But writing 4-5 pages probably isn't going to be as easy as I think it is going to be. I tend to focus on purpose a bit more than this paper would like. I want to feel the emotions of that little figure holding the water bucket in the small corner, the one who is expressionless, featureless. I want to figure out why red was used to paint in the balustrades, a colour so clashing and out of place among the waterwashed duck blues and greys that are used to express the leaves on the trees. I want to figure out that upside down mountain in the right upper corner that I think would support my theory that I'm staring at a vast lake surrounding the painting. And I forget all I'm staring at is ink on paper. How do you turn the visual into word? Just as hard as turning words into visuals I suspect.

It brought me back to Huangshan, what it felt like standing on what must have been the top of the world. 天都顶. Crossing a narrow bridge like area which was the apex of the mountain. Mist surrounding either side blocking the view of the plummet that would come if vertigo had take over. For someone who's terrified of heights it was a major achievement.

Going to start the paper tonight. For 10% of a 3credit writing class, it might be nothing, but it's probably the most enjoyable subject I'm doing this sem. I'm so doing a dance class nxt. Unfortunately nothing involving a pole.

On that note. Happy Birthday China.

PS: Wishlist item 2983840=Dua bespoke boots