I don't know what to call this.

I’m aware that I haven’t updated in a long, long time. Not that there isn’t anything to write about, I just didn’t feel like writing. But today was a tipping point in my life, and I think it would be criminal if I didn’t write about it.

I’m not even sure where to begin or what I really want to write about, but I know that my state of mind at this very moment needs to be recorded in the servers of Google. I think I’m normally quite careful with what I put up here, disguising everything I write with a thick veil of mysticism. I don’t think it would be necessary today. I don’t think my regular readership stretches that far.

Sudden realizations that my things are not as they could optimally be seems to be some kind of permanent fixture in my life. I’ve had enough epiphanies to start questioning if they were really epiphanies to begin with. These things are supposed to be rare and life changing. If it happens too often, then I’m either ridiculously good at self reflection or the realizations that I have been having are much less epic than I seem to make them out to be.

Anyways, I don’t know how far this new one will go, but the last one brought about change that has held together quite well thus far. It’s been what, two years since I decided that blatant cynicism and constant caustic remarks to strangers don’t work in my favour? This new found vigour for all things seems to be a little harder to sustain, but I suspect it could be here to stay. It is somewhat ironic that the person who caused this second moment of realization is somewhat skeptical my ability to affect such change upon myself. I can still vividly remember the life drain out of me when I read the explanation to the speechlessness that I seemed to have caused. I was quiet for the evening, thinking and fretting. But I smile when I recall the follow up to the message that had made my guts sink. “Hoping for external factors to change you. That’s tough” or something along those lines. I almost replied, “Well, you’re an external factor, and I think you just changed me”. Perhaps she underestimated the kind of effect that she had on me. Perhaps I was the one to blow a seemingly innocuous spark into a solar flare. Whatever the reality of the situation, what has happened has happened, and I think I came out of it a better person. The results are yet to be seen, but for once, I have a sense of anticipation for life. All the clichéd lines that we hear from the likes of ‘Stranger than Fiction’ suddenly start to make a little more sense. I know I can. So why not?

Of course, like every other sticky situation of this nature, there will be issues unresolved. But in this case, I think they are petty. The big questions have already answered themselves, and although I would love to have a chat to satisfy my curiosity, I can live without having asked those questions.

Of course, there are regrets. Aren’t there always, eh? I wish I had told you how lovely you are without having minced my words. I wish that I had the courage to be a little more honest and not have played the game of cloak and dagger. I wish I told you how much I enjoyed your company and the conversations that we had.

But I suppose you always were the wiser one. The one with the clearer head to see what we had for what it really was, and to nip it at the bud. I could sense it too, but that voice was drowned out by a cacophony of lonely moans and curious squeals.
I really doubt you would read this, but I want you to know that I will always think of you as a friend. You make that part remarkably easy.

So there you have it. I give up. Probably should have a long time ago, but some blind sense of optimism and the aforementioned chorus of voices kept driving me on. I shall respect your broad and tactfully dropped hints and leave you at peace. And I wish you luck, not that you are going to need much of it. =)

Pretty fun stuff.

I haven't been posting for some time, between my dad being discharged from the hospital, L!m's assignments and a final commentary piece for Model United Nations, I haven't really had the time.

The weekend spent in Singapore was what I would have called a complete experience. For me, it had everything. A sense of achievement, embarassment, elation, depression, the whole works. On the bright side, my team won best newspaper. And I had 2 articles published front page. And my editor really liked my analysis. So did the head of the press corps. I went from reporter on day one to analyst on day two. All in all, enough to make me wonder what I'm doing in engineering all over again. I became a mentor to a journalism student, which was a little weird to be honest.

Then there was the hour or so that I spent on the verge of tears. I still managed to churn out a decent article in that state, probably because I had all the ideas already preformed before I curled up into a small ball and started whimpering. I haven't felt that way in a while, the shortness of breath and actual physical suffocation still catches me off guard.

I had fairly high expectations for the Model UN and I would say that NTU has fulfilled them. I feel a sense of vindication, like I proved something to myself. I suppose you were right when you told me to go with what I felt was right for me, even if it seems like the encouragement served a secondary purpose. Whatever it is, I just hope I didn't cock up too badly. Sorry.

Tired at wrong times of the day.

Work is annoying. But interesting. And somewhat frustrating.

Its annoying because its tiring. And it eats my weekend up. And leaves me looking forward to Wednesdays and Thursdays as my days of rest.

So far, it has remained somewhat interesting. There are still subtle little things for me to learn, and unlike most of my colleagues, I actually look forward to taking down orders. Walking someone through what he or she wants sure beats cleaning up the bloody mess they leave behind. And seeing different kinds of people eat, handle their children and work makes for an interesting spectacle.

And its also frustrating. Because I know that the job pays peanuts. And I also know that I would slip into severe depression if I came to a realization that I would be doing the same routine thing for the rest of my life with little chance of escape. I suspect those are to prospects that face some of the long term staff there. Its hard to take pride in the work I do. With the kind of pay it receives and the rate of staff being hired and leaving, I can't seem to shake off the feeling that I'm doing something anyone else can do. I think I'm getting a clearer picture of how some people end up finding their jobs meaningless and hollow. But have to do it anyway, because its just what they do. And I hope it never happens to me. I am really scared of getting stuck in a 9 to 5 job that has me groaning every morning and staring blankly at the wall in the evening.

The temptation to quit is there, but I'm going to see this through. Just need to keep telling myself that it could be much worse.

Raikonnen, hats off to you.

Well, you did it. I didn't think it was possible, but you are now the world champion. The Iceman finally gets the credit he deserves.

Sure, you needed rookie Hamilton to self destruct in the last two races. But it doesn't mean you don't deserve the title. You won more races than Alonso or Hamilton. That in itself should be enough justification for your winning.

And you winning means that perpetual whiner doesn't. For doing that, you are a hero to many. Some didn't care if Sebastian Vettel won the world championship. We just didn't want to see Alonso win it for the third time in the row. Thanks for stopping him.

And thank you, whoever it may concern for the last 3 races of the season. It put the race back into racing, and for once, motorsport became exciting. I have never had this much fun following Formula 1 before, even if I didn't watch the races, but read about them in the news reports.

Its a freakin miracle.

I dunno how it happened, but it did. 4 hours of drilling, screwing and bolt tightening led to the creation of a functional garage door for the Micro-P project that we have to do.

Why is it amazing? Well, because we hardly used the bloody ruler. Which is fucked up when you think about it. Everything was done by visual estimation. And it actually turned out alright.

I was so certain that something was going to go horribly and unrepairably wrong, but it didn't. Whatever little problems we faced, we dealt with fairly easily.

And the bloody contraption was built the very same way I write my essays. I have a general idea about what I want to say, but I never actually plan the whole thing out. I improvise along the way. Except that planning everything on paper is standard procedure for an engineering design process. Obviously, we can't plan for everything, but a certain amount of forethought is normally given. What we did was to come up with a new idea whenever we saw a problem. A problem that would have been avoidable if we had just given it a bit more thought.

Anyway, the thing works fine, so I'm happy. The gears actually meshed, and thats a real relief.

Little green book.

Heh. I found it. I thought I had lost it forever and for a while, I felt a bit annoyed at myself. But then again, I'm not the type who dwells in nostalgia. So I shrugged the loss off. My reliance on sheer neuron power for such tasks will probably take a toll in the future, especially when I'm required to reproduce parts of my life and I have no artifacts to jog the memory or to prove anything I say. But thats a worry for when I'm 60.

Anyways, I found the book. When I first started writing it, I told myself that I'd probably look back at the stuff I wrote and laugh. I was right. Partially. If that book had remained lost for a longer time, and then showed itself, say 5 years from now, my assumption would probably be true. But I guess looking at it now could only result in me smiling a crooked smile and feigning indifference, even if I have no audience. Fooling one's self is a complicated process, and if I can't even fool those around me, then there is no point even trying.

Burning the book is an interesting option, though one that I would probably regret at some point. Plus, its Earth day. No point in any unnecessary burning.

So it remains on the shelf. There is a half-hearted attempt at preventing trespassing, in the form of a written warning on the inside of the cover. That warning is pretty pointless now. The stuff in there will probably make anyone puke after reading 3 lines anyway.

How male or female are you?

Pretty stupid question eh? Male is male, female is female. Even in the mind. Gender differences in the brain are pretty well documented, and while not always true, provide a pretty good basis on which we can make assumptions. But then guys can have female brains, and girls can have male ones. (Oh, I've seen them. Makes very good thought fodder).

So, I was mucking about on BBC when I saw this test to tell you just how male or female you are. I normally don't do these tests, and even if I did do them, I'd be too embarrassed to admit that I did them. But this is BBC. It had to be somewhat credible.

The test itself took something like 20 mins to complete. And I learned that I have a very much male oriented brain. Slightly above average spatial ability, full marks for rotating 3D objects in space, but hopeless with finding words (a bit of a surprise there) and utterly useless when it comes to empathy (fit right into the stereotype).

But the one big surprise was the eye emotion matching test. I scored 9 out of 10. Thats a good deal further away from the average female (who is supposed to be good at this). I can tell what a person is feeling just by reading the eyes.

Seeing these results makes me think that I have the faculties to show empathy. I just don't do it. All this while, I thought I was just mentally handicapped in that area. I wasn't particularly ashamed about being cold and uninvolved. It was just who I was. Sometimes I got to thinking about whether or not caring for others is part of humanity but with examples of perfectly respectable people being just as cold (my own paternal grandmother and Kimi Raikkonen to name two), that problem didn't bother me all that much. I've sometimes wondered if having the principal of one of the most successful private schools in the country as a role model has turned me into what I am. It probably has, but to what extent, I don't know.

As things stand, life seems to be screaming to me that whatever I am right now just will not do. Its telling me "Sure, you'll survive, but you're not going to be happy with mere survival now are you?". Its a raging debate, one that status quo is having a fairly comfortable time with. The only problem now is, there is no end to this, and it doesn't look like the reformists are letting the case go that easily.

Nothing to write about.

Seriously, I can't really find anything that I would be bothered to put on this blog anymore. Heck, I can't even remember the blog post I made. Not to say that nothing happened during my one month hiatus, just nothing worth reporting.

I suppose now that I actually find myself before a computer with the option to post open to me, I'll mention a few things. First up, stress. Assignments galore, and ones that matter too. Not the usual engineering 'here, do this question' token assignments that I normally get. Actual meaty assignments that cannot be copied and must be worked on. Still on the topic of stress, mid-terms. They suck, and getting one a week is annoying. The barrage has stopped, thankfully. (Which is why I am typing this in the first place.)

Now, F1 in Melaka. And Command and Conquer 3. Fun. Nuff said.

Actually, this is like proof that I don't need to write. Writing is not my release. Never really has been. Talking is more of my thing actually, and I think I tend to talk even when no one really cares about what I am saying. I recently had this strange idea about the differences between the 'emo' people and the 'calm' people. Its badly undeveloped and probably already well researched by proper scientists. Then I had this idea about reclassifying marriages since there are so many kinds and so many purposes that go with marriage. (While we are at it, might as well create a distinction in the English language between the many kinds of love that people feel). I guess in the past, those things might have been considered blog material worthy. Not anymore.

Loss of identity, life changing experiences. I suppose those are the only things that will actually make time to blog about. Which brings me to the question of whether or not its loss of identity that caused this indifference to writing. Or am I just indifferent, period?

Relief

Geez.. How I could have completely forgotten that the lab sessions on Wednesday start at 9am is beyond me. But I did. And I thought that I had 10am class on that day. So as I looked at the timetable, I felt like killing myself. Especially since the lecturer who is coordinating the subject has reminded us that we have to make formal application for lab session transfers. I was late, so no such reprive. I could only hope that the other lecturer tasked to teach the subject would be the supervisor today. I think I might have mentioned him in this blog before. L!m is his name.

As luck would have it, he was the lecturer in charge today. Still, I wasn't expecting an easy time. I went up to him, said I was sorry. Before I could go on, he said to replace on Friday. He hardly even blinked. No show of disappoval or displeasure. He just asked me to come another day. Its really quite hard to express the kind of relief I felt when I heard him say that. I really didn' want to get barred from this subject.

So, here is to Dr. Lim. A truly practical man whose priorites lie in getting the job done and not in the bloody anal world of protocols and procedures.

The myogenic little fellow.

He was normally encased in a steel box, with a little slit at the side to see the outside. No one sees inside, and he hardly ever looks out. He didn't think it was worth his time.

So life went on that way until one day when he decided to have one of those rare peeks into the outside. It was then that he saw it. The effect was mild, but it was there. But it wasn't the first time such a thing happened, so he ignored it. For a while.

He was considering a course of action when it disappeared. In a blink, it was gone. But it appeared again. And again. But each time, it showed up in the distance. Deciding that there was nothing that could be done, he kept moving. Just as he had been doing for as long as he could remember.

Then it appeared one day, closer than it had ever been before. Slightly surprised, he watched it for a while. It didn't move. So he shuffled closer to it. Still it remained motionless.

Intrigued, he decided to grab it. The lid of the steel casing creaked and groaned as the force from the outreaching tendril pushed against years of rust. His movements were tentative at first, but as he drew closer, his confidence grew.

The tendril touched it gently, and still it did not fly. It hardly even flinched. The lid opened a little further, and then a bit more as he slowly came out of the only home he ever knew.

He drew it close and examined it, wanting to take in every detail. As he explored the surface, he knew that there was much more to it than what he saw, and he resolved to find out.

But it was not to be. Before he knew what was happening, it jumped out of his grasp. It danced about in the air for a while, as if willing him to reach out and grab it. He was about to do that when it suddenly surged forward and planted itself firmly on the lid of the chest. Aided by gravity, the piece of metal came crashing down, sealing the chest, while parts of his body were still outside. His reactions hadn't been fast enough, and the lid caught the aorta, severing it.

He has never known such horror before. He could only watch as his innards came gushing out in a stream. The remaining bit of the aorta that was still attached to him flailed about like a flimsy garden hose. He screamed.

The response was quick enough. Neighbours came quickly and slapped on a clip at the open end, sealing it temporarily. Others cleaned up the mess and tended to the severed tissue.

It would be a while before he would be able to return to duty fully functional, and even if he did, he wouldn't be doing it the same way. But return he will, however long it might take.

New Year Resolutions

I didn't make many in the past, and I don't think I have ever kept one. And that isn't about to change. If I reviewed the year 2006, I think it would easily be the most significant year of my life thus far. And I'd also find that if there is one year that I need to make resolutions for, its 2007.

To be honest, I don't know what I want to change. New perspectives show themselves faster than I can digest them. Too often now, opposing sides present themselves as viable options. Sometimes its a case of what I want to do versus what I need to do to get what I want. Sometimes its a case of suppression of a perfectly natural instinct (in my perspective) to ensure things take a more natural course. And sometimes its swallowing my substantial pride to do something that I want. What do I want to do? Where do I want to stand?

I suppose I'll just have to deal with them as they come. One thing is for sure, I must rein in the past.

Happy New Year, people.

Bloody floods.

I have never actually experienced floods like this before. It could have been much worse, for for sheltered old me, this is the worst I have ever experienced.

Taken near Pokok Mangga. The fence encloses a restaurant. The entire compound was submerged.











This is the back of my house. TNB reserve land, actually. The papaya trees in the pictures are now half dead from suffocation. There were kids paddling about in an inflatable rubber boat the other day. I don't know whats wrong with them. Not only did the place look like a swamp, it smelt like a swamp. I suppose they don't get to use that boat of theirs very often.






And driving through the flood waters, I actually broke my front number plate. The right bracket gave way and I was driving with the plate half hanging down. Occasionally, it would scratch the road and make funny noises. I really thought that my engine had taken a drink and the sound was the groans of my dying engine until I saw a random stranger point at the front of my car as I drove past. I had to remove the number plate and drive without it for a while. Ended up being half an hour late for class.

Well, the worst is over (at least according to the met. services) but I type this looking out at a cloudy sky and predictions of thunderstorms heading my way. Some holiday season this is turning out to be.

Anyway, as out of place as this might seem, here is to a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.