weekend getaway

I was at Pangkor island during the weekend for some Company retreat. The weather was scorching hot and I did not perpetually immerse myself in the water for fear of being judged by my colleagues for having a cellulite ridden ass. I found myself attracted to certain things while isolated on an island, far removed from my normal life, that I would not find myself attracted to otherwise. Like a twenty ringgit kaftan that I would probably never wear again. Or gazing into the deep blue sea and letting time standstill. Or just making empty chatter with fellow comrades.

Wilderness and nature do indeed inspire, rejuvenate and excite.

 

 

foodie piccies from my phone!

...Life was insignificant and death without consequence

All my life (up to the age of 22), I have always thought I would grow up and do something important and be someone. I wanted to create a mark, make an impact and change the world. Perhaps I was too much of an idealist, influenced by characters in the movies that I watched or books that I read. I wanted to be a concert pianist, or a criminal attorney, a journalist (or a columnist like you know, Carrie Bradshaw) or a scriptwriter. I mean does anybody actually wants to become an accountant? Is that ever an ambition for anybody below the age of 30? A stuffy accountant? Of all the careers and professions in the world, how does anybody end up being an accountant?

Well I guess, sometimes real life gets in the way of big dreams. Bills to pay, cars and houses to buy, food to put on the table, people to take care of, responsibilities to uphold. And we all know, poverty more than anything else destroys. It crushes your very soul and destroys families. So we all toil and struggle, days on end just to survive. But of course, so if you work not because you want to but because you have to and if you especially hate your job, the environment, the whole corporate culture, then you end up feeling resentful, bitter, cynical. You begin to blame everyone around you, your parents, your upbringing, your education, even life for handing you such lousy cards. This is when other people's lives, when viewed from your myopic perspective, become a series of never ending exotic adventure. Travels, celebrations, beautiful photography of places you have never been and things you do not possess.

“It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it; but the young know they are wretched for they are full of the truthless ideal which have been instilled into them, and each time they come in contact with the real, they are bruised and wounded. It looks as if they were victims of a conspiracy; for the books they read, ideal by the necessity of selection, and the conversation of their elders, who look back upon the past through a rosy haze of forgetfulness, prepare them for an unreal life. They must discover for themselves that all they have read and all they have been told are lies, lies, lies; and each discovery is another nail driven into the body on the cross of life.”  
(Of Human Bondage, W. Somerset Maugham)

what men want - ntv7 10.00pm every saturday

had the privilege to catch this reality tv series entitled "What Men Want" on ntv7 last night. It was an hour of my life that I will never get back, and I had to waste it on such pretentious drivel. Some background - it's a reality show produced by ntv7 which sets up six young Malaysian men in a penthouse seeking to understand what drives the male pscyche (source, Daily Chilli). There is a sensitive singer songwriter that makes orgasmic faces when he howls sings, a smarmy photographer, a cartoonist who caters to her girlfriend's every whim and fancy, the token annoying joker, another guy that wears business suits and there is this other guy who is also mommy's boy. Between the six of them, I couldn't decide which one I wanted to punch most in the face.

I don't know about you guys but real men don't go around the streets of KL moping with a pensive look on their faces, looking lost and melancholy. Nor do they obsess so much about love lives, be abused by their crazy, bossy girlfriends (in this episode I saw, the girlfriend of one of the characters demanded him to go see her NOW and then proceeded to speak in a baby voice "Come faster ya"), write romantic songs on the rooftop (songs which by the way made my ears bleed), hold hands while driving in the car (in the same scene, the girlfriend of the mommy's boy whiningly pestered him to get married. I'm proud of you girlfriend, NOT!) or mumble monotonously when they speak. Seriously, I was embarassed for all the men and their girlfriends or friends on the show. The real men I know in real life have fulfilling careers, they have healthy relationships with the people around them, their lives do not revolve around love and sex, they do the plumbing, change light bulbs and tyres, take out trash, repair door knobs and everything else that is broken - THEY SURE AS HELL DO NOT MOPE AND MUMBLE AROUND THE STREETS OF KL!

My fucking goodness, words cannot describe how much I detest this dumb reality show! Instead of using the opportunity to dispel the myth that all men care about are women and sex, it further perpetuates the idea and could possibly influence impressionable young minds out there into believing that these kind of men are what women want. We want articulate, intelligent men that have the ability to inspire, well-balanced individuals with diverse interests and hobbies, men who are gentle yet strong, men who don't sit around the apartment with their buddies talking about women (seriously I don't know any men that does this. All the men I know do testosterone laden activities with their guy buddies like discuss politics over beers or play badminton), the men represented on the show are just a bunch of pussies. Do guys really act the way that they do on this reality show or am I just missing something? Fail ntv7, big utter FAIL!

p/s Rest assured, I'll be tuning in next week. I need the unintentional comedy.

how i met ivan

Three and a half years ago, on the brink of self destruction, I made a monumental decision. My failed relationship implored me to remove myself physically from the places that held many fond memories and to venture somewhere new, even if it was just approximately 350 kilometres away. So I picked up the broken pieces of my heart and life, and started on a clean state. I wasn't certain what the future held for me and I dared not to hope that I'd fall in love again, it had turned into an incomprehensible concept, a theory and an equation I could no longer understand. I buried myself in work during the day and by night, I aimlessly read books, watched movies or went for dinners with strangers friends I barely knew. I wasn't happy, but I wasn't unhappy and as time passed by, I no longer thought of him in the way that lovers do.

Somewhere between then and now, I met someone, or rather someone met me. I cannot recollect what our first words were to each other, or where we went on our first date, or what I wore...all I remember was how he made me feel. Of course, cynics will say feelings are fleeting and not at all a good indication of true and sustainable love. Even so, life being as bleak and dreary as it is, the light of love shall be it's saving grace. Ivan made me believe in the existence and possibility of goodness and kindness. He represents everything I've always wanted to be but was incapable of becoming - he is unbelievably gentle, compassionate, selfless and humble. Metaphorically speaking, if he is the sun, I am the moon - dark, moody, unpredictable and prone to tantrums.

I guess for all my grievances in life, I am glad to have found someone I bicker and argue very well with, someone who gives me his unfailing support even when I seem to give him nothing but hell, and the most incredible thing is I cannot imagine anyone else in this world that I'd rather be with, for now, tomorrow and the next 50 years. So in the spirit of Chap Goh Meh and Valentine's Day, this concludes the story of how I met Ivan - fate, divine intervention, destiny.

sputnik sweetheart, haruki murakami

"So that's how we live our lives. No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that is stolen from us - that's snatched right out of our hands - even if we are left completely changed people with only the outer layer of skin from before, we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence. We draw even nearer to our allotted span of time, bidding it farewell as it trails off behind. Repeating, often adroitly, the endless deeds of the everyday. Leaving behind a feeling of immeasurable emptiness".

sunday musings

I left the office at 10.00pm every day last week (with the exception of Friday) and being more than a quarter of a century old, I have no doubts my body can no longer keep up with the demands of my stressful career job. Deloitte (or any other big accounting firm) is where dreams come to die. Many accounting graduates are fooled into believing EY, PWC, KPMG or DTT guarantees you a successful career with fantastic remuneration but I blame this on their PR and Communications department for doing such a great job at brainwashing and monopolizing the freshies' naivety. I've been in this industry for 5 years (5 years is practically an eternity. The turnover is remarkably high with many of the senior staff leaving always conveniently, before the peak season) and I can attest to the fact that the glamour and prestige painted by their PR and Communications departments are misleading, false and grossly inaccurate.

The thing is, I don't know what to do with my life. This indecisiveness is what's preventing me from leaving my current job (although I hate it with the passion of a burning suns and I practically drag myself to work every day). I used to want to be a writer but obviously, that's nothing more than a fantasy now. Why, you may ask? Writers are a dime a dozen, competition is stiff and I, who have no formal education on literature or English simply do rnot belong in this sphere. It's just an insult to the real writers everywhere. I spoke about my identity (career) crisis to a friend before and he said "Not many people have the opportunity to do what they want". If you are one of those with a career that was previously your ambition, please be aware that you are indeed very privileged.

When I was younger, one of my biggest fear was that I'd end up ordinary, living an average life, every day being the carbon copy of the day before. Well, my nightmare is now my reality. At 27 years of age, I am stuck in a job I hate, I have no real estate, I am perpetually in debt, I haven't travelled anywhere out of Asia and the most heartbreaking thing is, I still have not found my true calling. There is no one to blame but myself. I lack the ambition, drive and discpline that is required to succeed. I am trully a drifter with no real destination to reach. Take a look at all the fashion bloggers out there who are 14 years old, or take Xiaxue or Timothy Tiah as examples - they became famous and are successful because they worked hard at perfecting the art of blogging. It's not like they achieved everything that they have today because someone handed it to them on a silver platter. I on the other hand, do nothing more than whine, complain and laze all day, whole day, every day.

For all my lofty ambitions when I was younger, for all my truthful ideals, if a 17 year old version of myself were to meet my current self, she would have been very disappointed with my failure and unaccomplishments. My 17 year old self would not have been able to comprehend that this is all there is to my life. Bills, income tax computations, ocassional consumption of unnecessary things, slaving away at my cubicle doing something I find no meaning in...

She would however be happy to know that I was able to conquer my life long fear of water and l finally learned how to swim.