Showing posts with label thoughts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label thoughts. Show all posts

Thursday, April 1, 2010

On the roads in Malaysia...

On the roads in Malaysia...

...when it comes to traffic lights, green means go, yellow means go faster.

...car A's signals when cutting into car B's lane is an indication to car B to go faster so that car A can't cut.

...all motorcyclists are snatch thieves.

...zebra crossings are really just decorations on the road.

...when car A successfully cuts into car B's lane, a machete may be involved.

...when a motorcyclist rams into your stationary car, it's your fault.

...hazard lights are for rainy days.

...motorcyclists are invincible.

...policemen in police cars do not wear seat belts.

...all bad drivers are apparently female drivers.

...you may be fined if you or your passengers do not wear seat belts, but so long as all seat belts are used, you may stuff a gazillion people into your car.

...you're dead if you wander into Mat Rempit territory.

...I hate ants.

...particularly in KL, if you leave work at 5pm, you reach home at 5.30pm. If you leave at 6pm, you reach home at 9pm.

...pedestrians need 2 umbrellas on a rainy day. One above the head, and one at the side.

...traffic lights don't exist to motorcyclists.

...yellow boxes with the big X in them are also just decorations.

...a laptop left in the car is as good as gone.

...when an accident occurs and you're bleeding by your car, people stop and get down from their cars to stare at you.

...one finger 'salutes' are normal.

...spoiled traffic lights ease up traffic jams.

...the white arrows on the roads indicating road directions for motorists to follow do not apply to motorcyclists.


...thieves steal your nice nice cars to tear them up into pieces.

...motorcyclists are really invincible.

...when a car bangs into your car, you speed off, because they're really just gonna rob you.

...speed limits are really speed minimums.


Only on Malaysian roads... only on Malaysian roads...

Friday, February 12, 2010

A Random Story

In the attic where the medals and plaques lay, 'displayed' obscurely in a place where no one can admire, speaking of past glories and of days of old in which they stood for someone who was in their proudest moments, which have all come to nothing but a mere memory or a mention on the lips, she lays down the box.

She pans the room, taking in all that's in it, realising that she's now at that stage - a stage where she never thought she'd ever be at. Fury. Disgruntled. Discouraged. A sense of loss. Thoughts and emotions that engulfed her at that very moment. She shakes her head, trying to convince herself that she's doing the right thing while denying any sense of desire in her to continue the dream that began in her since she was a little girl. Refusing to admit that this is a mere moment of weakness, she storms her way down to retrieve what's left of it.

The one who had blown the fuse in her head was out of sight, probably in an equal state of emotion, but perhaps, more than anything else, feeling unappreciated and angry for the thankless-ness. After all that's been given to fuel the passion in the girl and the dream that has stayed with her all this while, this is how repayment is made - with shouts of angry, heartless words accompanying the stern refusing of her little request. Well, little in her opinion. She knew that the dream was being lived out in the girl who was aware of it, and eventually shared it. But the thing that she didn't realise was that what she really wanted was her dream to be the one that came to life, with the girl's taking the back seat.

As the girl haphazardly packs what remains into the box, she wipes off the sweat and the tears that were forming. You see, she really thought she could find pleasure, and perhaps a future, in the tinkling of the black and white keys. She devoted the past 17 years of her life to this, and had plans to bring it to a whole new playing field. But having been denied the pleasure, inspiration and the encouragement that's been horribly needed for several months now, with the 'little requests' taking precedence everytime she had just started, she couldn't take it any longer. She probably felt like she was taken for a ride - tricked into thinking that all this was really for her; tricked into imagining that she could get better, go further, reach higher - when in fact all this seemed like they were just to fulfill someone else's unfulfilled dreams.

Remembering how, at one point of her journey, the dream almost fell out, and what kept her in was one moment that she had to herself - one moment of badly needed encouragement which she could give to herself with just that uninterrupted space and time - she breaks into tears. All that high.... probably just illusions, she tells herself.

Like a ballet dancer who hangs up her ballet shoes after an injury, perhaps putting them on again every once in a while just to bring herself back to that season in which she was in her element, but yet knowing that she'll no longer pursue it professionally, the girl inserts the last of the files - the hanging of her 'piano fingers', if you may.

No more. No longer. That's the end of it, she says.

She commits musical suicide.

Friday, December 25, 2009

The Passage of Love

"1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."

- 1 Corinthians 13

Of all people, I think I've the most to learn when it comes to love.

Teach me, Lord, to love like you do.