There is a hello for every goodbye

"Why can't we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn't work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos." -Charles M. Schulz

...so begins a new season of goodbyes.

Amid an eventful and definitely interesting weekend, I lost my wallet, along with cash, my Malaysian ID, and a debit card to pickpockets... but monetary losses pale in comparison to human ones.

The goodbyes looming ahead of me over the next two months make saying goodbye to Malaysian friends seem like a piece of cake. Even though it was hard, somewhere deep down I knew I would be seeing them again.

With the friends I've made and come to love at university, I won't be seeing many of them again for a long, long time. If I even do again, that is.

And then there has been a different kind of goodbye - a goodbye to a story that has been seven months in writing - or eight, if you're counting from the very start. A goodbye to a person who defined an important chapter in my life, but also, a chapter that over the past few weeks, has very quietly and graciously come to a close.

There are many reasons to be sad - many reasons to mourn my losses. What more, the hassle of getting my debit card replaced and having to call the Malaysian embassy to find out what to do about my lost ID card (which is a PAIN in the rear to get replaced, what more from abroad) is like getting salt rubbed into an already raw wound.

But, before you think this is a sad and emo post - it is not. There are plenty more reasons for me to be happy.

And that's the thing about life. For every reason to be unhappy, there is a reason to smile. And vice versa. It just depends which you choose to dwell on.

Today, I'm filling my thoughts with all the happiness around me - wonderful friends who care about me, the opportunity to visit perhaps the most beautiful city I have ever stepped foot in, and the privilege of meeting amazing people who help me see all the beauty in life and remind me that there is so much to be thankful for.

Over the roller coaster ride that has been the past six months (I find myself describing seasons of my life as a roller coaster ride far too often - I should just accept the fact that the rest of my life will be one big, crazy, adventure-filled ride), I've lost more than I expected to. But I've gained much, much more than I had imagined I would either.

Some of the things I've gained are:
Patience
Tolerance
A better understanding of people from different cultures and countries
The opportunity to visit three capitals in Europe / UK - Edinburgh, London, and Paris
New dances moves thanks to the amazing people at Tees Extreme
A (hopefully) better ability to budget

New friends
A friend I met at uni (who very kindly and graciously obliged to be our tour guide around Paris and also my personal translator at the French police station) told me that his mother always said it didn't matter so much losing things, "as long as you have your health".

I thought about it and remembered I have my health plus my family, self-identity, and love for writing and music intact, which is plenty to be thankful for.

Life is crazy, harsh, unfair, and sometimes, even cruel. It's easy to look at the craziness and forget that life is also so beautiful if you're looking in the right places.

Life may give you reasons to cry - but when you find a reason to smile, hold on to it, because all you need is that one reason to remind you everything will be okay. :)

"This world is made out of sugar. It can crumble so easily but don’t be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it." -Sarah Kay

P/S - Paris travelogues will be up soon! :) Look out for them...

Embrace. Then detach. And drop it.

"If you hold back on the emotions - if you don't allow yourself to go all the way through them - you can never get to being detached, you're too busy being afraid. You're afraid of the pain, you're afraid of the grief. You're afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails.

"But by throwing yourself into these emotions, by allowing yourself to dive in, all the way, over your head even, you experience them fully and completely. You know what pain is. You know what love is. You know what grief is. And only then can you say, 'All right. I have experienced that emotion. I recognize that emotion. Now I need to detach from that emotion for a moment.' "

I thought about how often this was needed in everyday life. How we feel lonely, sometimes to the point of tears, but we don't let those tears come because we are not supposed to cry. Or how we feel a surge of love for a partner but we don't say anything because we're frozen with the fear of what those words might do to the relationship.

Morrie's approach was exactly the opposite. Turn on the faucet. Wash yourself with the emotion. It won't hurt you. It will only help. If you let the fear inside, if you pull it on like a familiar shirt, then you can say to yourself, "All right, that's just fear, I don't have to let it control me. I see it for what it is."

Same for loneliness: you let go, let the tears flow, feel it completely - but eventually be able to say, "All right, that was my moment of loneliness. I'm not afraid of feeling lonely, but now I'm going to put that loneliness aside and know that there are other emotions in the world, and I'm going to experience them as well."

-Tuesdays with Morrie, Mitch Albom

"You’re like a dog at the dump, baby – you’re just lickin’ at the empty tin can, trying to get more nutrition out of it. And if you’re not careful, that can’s gonna get stuck on your snout forever and make your life miserable. So drop it.”

“But I love him.”

“So love him.”

“But I miss him.”

“So miss him. Send him some love and light every time you think about him, then drop it. You’re just afraid to let go of the last bits of David because then you’ll be really alone, and Liz Gilbert is scared to death of what will happen if she’s really alone."

-Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert

City of lights

A year ago, if you told me I would visit Paris, I would have laughed.

But here I am, at 21, bags packed, waiting to get on a plane tomorrow to the one city I've always dreamed of visiting.

La Ville-Lumière.

The illuminated city.

I need to remind myself to breathe.

Au revoir Middlesbrough!

Bonjour Paris!

B by Sarah Kay

If I should have a daughter, instead of “Mom”, she’s gonna call me “Point B.”

Because that way, she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me. And I’m going to paint the solar system on the back of her hands so that she has to learn the entire universe before she can say “Oh, I know that like the back of my hand.”

She’s gonna learn that this life will hit you, hard, in the face, wait for you to get back up so it can kick you in the stomach. But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.

There is hurt, here, that cannot be fixed by Band-Aids or poetry, so the first time she realizes that Wonder Woman isn’t coming, I’ll make sure she knows she doesn’t have to wear the cape all by herself. Because no matter how wide you stretch your fingers, your hands will always be too small to catch all the pain you want to heal. Believe me, I’ve tried.

And “Baby,” I’ll tell her “don’t keep your nose up in the air like that, I know that trick, you’re just smelling for smoke so you can follow the trail back to a burning house so you can find the boy who lost everything in the fire to see if you can save him. Or else, find the boy who lit the fire in the first place to see if you can change him.”

But I know that she will anyway, so instead I’ll always keep an extra supply of chocolate and rain boats nearby, ’cause there is no heartbreak that chocolate can’t fix. Okay, there’s a few heartbreaks that chocolate can’t fix. But that’s what the rain boots are for, because rain will wash away everything if you let it.

I want her to see the world through the underside of a glass bottom boat, to look through a magnifying glass at the galaxies that exist on the pin point of a human mind. Because that’s the way my mom taught me. That there’ll be days like this, “There’ll be days like this my momma said” when you open your hands to catch and wind up with only blisters and bruises. When you step out of the phone booth and try to fly and the very people you wanna save are the ones standing on your cape.

When your boots will fill with rain and you’ll be up to your knees in disappointment and those are the very days you have all the more reason to say “thank you,” ’cause there is nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline no matter how many times it’s sent away.

You will put the “win” in "win some lose some", you will put the “star” in starting over and over, and no matter how many land mines erupt in a minute be sure your mind lands on the beauty of this funny place called life.

And yes, on a scale of one to over-trusting I am pretty damn naive but I want her to know that this world is made out of sugar. It can crumble so easily but don’t be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it.

“Baby,” I’ll tell her “remember your mama is a worrier but your papa is a warrior and you are the girl with small hands and big eyes who never stops asking for more.”

Remember that good things come in threes and so do bad things and always apologize when you’ve done something wrong but don’t you ever apologize for the way your eyes refuse to stop shining.

Your voice is small but don’t ever stop singing and when they finally hand you heartbreak, slip hatred and war under your doorstep and hand you hand-outs on street corners of cynicism and defeat, you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother.

The world is full of kindred souls

If you're wondering who on earth takes three days to watch a two-hour long movie, that would be yours truly.

I've been watching Eat, Pray, Love over the past two nights and I still have yet to finish it, though I definitely plan to tonight. :) 

A few days ago, I finished reading the book - which has taken me six months. Not because I don't have the time or the book is boring, but rather because it's jam-packed with beautiful, profound, powerful, goosebump-inducing insights, and I needed the time to slowly digest, savor, and internalize all of it. 

People tell me that when I write, I articulate feelings and thoughts they never found the words to express. Reading Elizabeth Gilbert I feel exactly the same way. I feel like I could have gone on exactly the same journey, had exactly the same thoughts, and learned exactly the same lessons. 

I felt almost reluctant to watch the movie to the end, because now that I was done with the book, finishing the movie as well would be like saying goodbye to Elizabeth Gilbert, whom I've come to see as a friend, sister, and fellow traveller / dreamer / writer / spiritual seeker. 

Then I stumbled across a beautiful blog, quite by accident - while Googling French phrases in preparation for my short escapade there in three days - that reassured me that there would always be someone out there living her life to its fullest to draw inspiration and strength from. 

I just had a quick skim through her blog before subscribing and bookmarking it for future reading pleasure, but here are a couple of quotes that made me go, "I know exactly what she's talking about!" and reminded me that the world is full of kindred spirits everywhere just waiting to be discovered. 

(Thank you, dharmagirl.)

Here's the magic of a fine meal: my imagination is fired, my idealism returns, hope triples, and my heart expands to include everyone and everything that had previously fallen aside with the daily grind of disillusionment. Eating well can be truly transformative, and I pledge myself to making everyday foods and moments so spiritually elevating. 

Inspiring quotes from Eat Pray Love

I love love LOVE the book and the movie, and I love love love Elizabeth Gilbert's writing style. Absolutely beautiful.

Addiction - the hallmark of infatuation

Addiction is the hallmark of every infatuation-based love story. It all begins when the object of your adoration bestows upon you a heady, hallucinogenic dose of something you never dared to admit you wanted-an emotional speedball, perhaps, of thunderous love and roiling excitement. Soon you start craving that intense attention, with a hungry obsession of any junkie. When the drug is witheld, you promptly turn sick, crazy, and depleted (not to mention resentful of the dealer who encouraged this addiction in the first place but now refuses to pony up the good stuff anymore-- despite the fact that you know he has it hidden somewhere, goddamn it, because he used to give it to you for free). Next stage finds you skinny and shaking in a corner, certain only that you would sell your soul or rob your neighbors just to have 'that thing' even one more time. Meanwhile, the object of your adoration has now become repulsed by you. He looks at you like you're someone he's never met before, much less someone he once loved with high passion. The irony is,you can hardly blame him. I mean, check yourself out. You're a pathetic mess,unrecognizable even to your own eyes. So that's it. You have now reached infatuation's final destination - the complete and merciless devaluation of self.

Ruin is the road to transformation

A friend took me to the most amazing place the other day. It’s called the Augusteum. Octavian Augustus built it to house his remains. When the barbarians came they trashed it a long with everything else. The great Augustus, Rome’s first true great emperor. How could he have imagined that Rome, the whole world as far as he was concerned, would be in ruins. It’s one of the quietest, loneliest places in Rome. The city has grown up around it over the centuries. It feels like a precious wound, a heartbreak you won’t let go of because it hurts too good. We all want things to stay the same. Settle for living in misery because we’re afraid of change, of things crumbling to ruins. Then I looked at around to this place, at the chaos it has endured – the way it has been adapted, burned, pillaged and found a way to build itself back up again. And I was reassured, maybe my life hasn’t been so chaotic, it’s just the world that is, and the real trap is getting attached to any of it. Ruin is a gift. Ruin is the road to transformation.

Dolce Far Niente

Luca Spaghetti (Giuseppe Gandini): "Americans. You work too hard, you get burned out. You come home and spend the whole weekend in your pajamas in front of the T.V."
Liz: "That's not far off, actually."
Luca Spaghetti: "But you don't know pleasure. You have to be told you've earned it. You see a commercial that says: 'It's Miller Time!' And you say, That's right, now I'm going to buy a six pack. And then drink the whole thing and wake up the next morning and you feel terrible. But an Italian doesn't need to be told. He walks by a sign that says: You deserve a break today. And he says, Yes, I know. That's why I'm planning on taking a break at noon to go over to your house and sleep...with your wife!"
Giovanni (Luca Argentero): "We call it "dolce far niente", the sweetness of doing nothing."

Possessing your thoughts

Richard from Texas: "You're going to have to learn to select your thoughts the same way you select your clothes every day. Now that's a power that you can cultivate. You want to come here and you want to control your life so bad, work on the mind, ...because if you can't master your thoughts you are in trouble forever."

Hello, friend

"Just admit it," I tell myself.

"You're miserable. You hate Saturday nights. Saturday nights are always the nights you feel the loneliest."

Heck, the entire weekend reminds me of everything I don't have - family and friends to spend a lazy weekend with, Sunday morning breakfasts at the coffee shop next to church, and a big hearty lunch out with friends after church.

But Saturday nights are the worst and the quietest. Everyone back home is sleeping in or at church; everyone here is spending time with their own families.

I think to myself that if only I had someone to keep me company, everything would be okay, and instantly a voice in my head retorts, "No it wouldn't."

"It's wonderful to have people in your life, but you shouldn't make them your crutches," I tell myself.

"You shouldn't let their presence - or absence - dictate your happiness. Isn't that what you're always telling others?"

I sigh. My heart is empty, and my body aching to be wrapped into a cuddle. But the voice in my head is right: I can choose to make myself happy.

So I tell myself that if no one else is going to pamper me, I'm going to.

I clean the toilet, a chore I have been procrastinating for almost a week, so that I can enjoy the rest of the evening without a 'to-do' hanging over my head.

And then I make myself a comforting, indulgent meal - Aglio Olio. Some boiled spaghetti, a few dollops of olive oil - extra virgin, a sprinkling of dried basil and oregano, and chopped garlic. It's my favorite type of pasta - simple, light, minimalist, and yet satisfying - much like the way I like to live my life.

After feeding myself, I hop into a sparkling clean bathtub for a quick shower.

Freshly showered, dressed, and full, I decide to scrap my plans of doing some writing for uni work and treat myself to a movie. I finally give in to a temptation I'd been resisting ever since I bought my Mac and become a criminal by downloading µTorrent and subsequently Chocolat and Eat, Pray, Love.

Just as I am about to hop into bed and treat myself to my first ever solo movie night in the UK, a chat message pops up from one of my favorite girls at uni.

We spend about an hour chatting and I tell her about how much of a hard time I'd been giving myself for well, having a hard time dealing with living abroad. I also bring her up to speed on my woeful tales of love, attraction, and boys.

I tell her that I am such a contradiction - I need to be free, untethered, and independent, and yet I am so helpless without a steady anchor in my life. And she tells me I am my own steady anchor.

She tells me to look back at the quiet girl who sat in shorthand class and didn't say a word to anyone, and to look at how open I am now, and how many new experiences I've had and friends I've made. She reminds me I didn't accomplish any of that because of any of the boys my head is filled with thoughts of. I did it on my own.

And I realize she is right.

As much as it's easy and appealing to hide behind other people, to revolve my world around them and stake my happiness on them, it's not fair to them and it's not fair to me. It's not fair to put the burden of knowing and being exactly what I need on someone else - when no one else can do that but me.

It's difficult. It's easier to be around other people than yourself sometimes, because being with yourself means facing the truth about who you are. And the truth about me is I'm more scared of being alone and I need more affection than I would care to admit.

But just as real friends accept you when your true colors are revealed instead of judging or criticizing,  I can choose to accept who I am. I can be a friend to myself. I can be what I need.

So tonight, needing some company, I curl up under the covers alone, say to myself, "Hello, this movie is going to be fun!" and put on Chocolat.

Two hours, plenty of giggles, and a few tears (I am a sentimental sap that way) later, I feel happier, lighter, and less alone.

In fact, I even feel inspired to bake again - a feeling I haven't felt in a long time, perhaps even as long as a year. I don't remember. But that's another post for another day.

To stop the hands of time

Was just browsing through an old blog... and I stumbled across the story of my love life, summed up in one song.

I co-wrote the lyrics to this song almost two years ago (how time flies!) with someone who meant something to me in some other chapter of my life. Funny how two years on, it still carries so much meaning.

The right person at the wrong time - that's the story of my life. And if there's anything I've learned from having to say so many goodbyes is that when it comes down to it, what makes or breaks love... is time.

wish i had a superpower
to stop the hands of time
wish the world moved a little slower
so you wouldn’t go so fast

wish you didn’t have to go
but the end is drawing nearer
would be nice if you could stay
cos i’m really gonna miss you

if i had one wish
i’d wish for you
to stay with me forever
in this moment
if i had one chance
i’d make you believe
that we can make it through if you wouldn’t leave

wish we didn’t have to wonder
bout the way it could turn out
if we had a different ending
to the page we’re writing on

i dont wanna know if your going to go

The problem with time, I've learned... is that it eventually runs out. -Dear John

"Dreams are always crushing when they don't come true. But it's the simple dreams that are often the most painful because they seem so personal, so reasonable, so attainable. You're always close enough to touch, but never quite close enough to hold and it's enough to break your heart." -Three Weeks with My Brother, Nicholas Sparks

"We sit silently and watch the world around us. This has taken a lifetime to learn. It seems only the old are able to sit next to one another and not say anything and still feel content. The young, brash and impatient, must always break the silence. It is a waste, for silence is pure. Silence is holy. It draws people together because only those who are comfortable with each other can sit without speaking. This is the great paradox." -The Notebook, Nicholas Sparks

"My daddy said, that the first time you fall in love, it changes you forever and no matter how hard you try, that feeling just never goes away." -The Notebook, Nicholas Sparks

Travelogue Durham: Breathless

While standing in St. Cuthbert's shrine inside the Durham cathedral the realization dawned on me that people visit churches and clubs for the same reason.

This reason occurred to me as I was staring up at a magnificent painting of the resurrected Christ suspended horizontally from the ceiling so that one had to turn and look upwards to see it.

People were gathered around, meditating, praying, reflecting - some sitting, some standing, some pacing around, some looking upwards as I was, some closing their eyes. Flickering candles and the dancing shadows they made cast an ethereal glow over the proceedings. The hushed, muted tones of visitors walking around other parts of the cathedral echoed off the massive, towering walls.

Standing there, it felt almost as if the world outside didn't exist. As if everything else was a dream. Or was this the dream?

Time seemed to have slowed down tremendously compared to the bright, bustling shopping centre we had just come from. Every slightest movement was measured and deliberate - the lighting of a candle for prayer, the folding of palms, the raising of clasped hands to lips.

The whole atmosphere of the place felt surreal. And as I stared up at that radiant, gleaming painting of Christ, which in that moment looked very lifelike and terrifying, I realized that people go to churches and clubs for the same reason - to be dazzled.

Whether it's flashing lights or flickering candles, throbbing beats or haunting harmonies, people are looking for something to take their breath away.

Everyone needs a place where, if only for a few hours, they can lose themselves, their problems, and their worries, and be caught up in something bigger than themselves, whether it's a sea of worshippers or of revellers.

Worship and revel. Those two words could be interchanged as easily as any reasons a person visits a church or a club. All worshippers find something about the object of their worship to revel in. And all revelers take part in ceremonious rituals to express their enjoyment.

They're not so far apart, those two worlds, really. Churches and clubs.

There are the extremists in both camps that give each a bad name, those who get drunk on beer and the others who get drunk in the spirit. There are those who go because their friends go. There are those, like me, who go out of curiosity, in hopes of finding out what it is about these institutions that so draw and unite masses upon masses around the world.

I find that people who go to these places are looking for the same things - for an escape, a temporary respite from the harshness of reality, for splendour, for beauty, for something - anything - to make them feel alive again... for something to leave them breathless.

Things I wish someone had told me before I entered uni

1. Don't be afraid to talk to people who don't speak the same language you do. You'll find that some of the most genuine friends you will make are people you don't necessarily have fluent conversation with, because language barriers strip away the subtleties and complications of words, leaving you with the one universal language that is easy to understand and hard to use in a fake way - body language.

2. Join a club (or multiple clubs, if you wish). Don't think of membership fees as a waste of money - think of them as an investment into new friends, unforgettable memories, and a social circle that expands outside your housemates and classmates (whom you won't necessarily share a lot of interests in common with). Seriously, a club is your ticket out of a boring time at uni to actually having a life.

3. Be prepared for change. Your perspectives, habits, preferences, goals, and interests will have evolved and changed so much by the time you finish your course that you won't be the same person you were when you first entered uni. While you do have a choice in how you change and how much you change, you will find along the way that things are very different from what you expected them to be before you started uni. Try not to make predictive or assumptive statements or you might find yourself having to eat your words later. (Eg. I don't have trouble waking up normally; I will never miss a class because I overslept! OR I promise I will write every week! OR I'm sure I won't miss home that much. OR I won't find white guys attractive! - all statements I had to swallow over the last six months, by the way.)

People that make you want to be better

fromtheclouds2themoon.tumblr.com →

I was talking to Mabel about people that come into your life, make a mark on you, and change you forever.

She described those people as "people that give you a higher standard to aim for" - basically, people that inspire you to be better, because they are.

I think love, in its purest form, between two people, has that effect. It makes each other want to be better. Just being around the other person is like a breath of fresh air, and just the smallest things make you smile inside and feel like you can accomplish anything you set your mind to.

It's when two people in love try to own each other, hold on to each other, and make each other the goal - instead of letting their love make them come alive and give them the courage to live a bigger and better life - that things suddenly becoming suffocating, stifling, uninspiring, and dead.

Maybe love is not a destination but a signpost along the journey of life. Maybe there's no way to really make love last unless it keeps moving forward, growing, changing, as the people who share it move forward, grow, and change.

"Appreciative love gazes and holds its breath and is silent, rejoices that such a wonder should exist even if not for him, will not be wholly dejected by losing her, would rather have it so than never to have seen her at all." — C.S. Lewis (The Four Loves)

Dreamsville

I drift into consciousness, my senses slowly waking up one by one to the sensation of your fingers gently stroking my back, the gentle sound of your breathing, and your sleepy eyes looking at me. I snuggled closer against your chest, close enough to feel your heartbeat.

In moments like these, I usually try to fight sleep because I don't want the moment to end.

But this time, I close my eyes and let weariness carry me back to dreamland, because somehow I know I will see you there.

And I do. While the rest of the world spins on, I drift in and out of sleep, unafraid to lose the moment, because each time I open or close my eyes, you are there.

Food for thought

“No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good… Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is.” -C.S. Lewis

"I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia." — C.S. Lewis (The Silver Chair, The Chronicles of Narnia)

"Appreciative love gazes and holds its breath and is silent, rejoices that such a wonder should exist even if not for him, will not be wholly dejected by losing her, would rather have it so than never to have seen her at all." — C.S. Lewis (The Four Loves)

"The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing — to reach the Mountain, to find the place where all the beauty came from — my country, the place where I ought to have been born. Do you think it all meant nothing, all the longing? The longing for home? For indeed it now feels not like going, but like going back." — C.S. Lewis (Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold)

"We meet no ordinary people in our lives." — C.S. Lewis

People are people all over the world

 Some rights reserved by lanier67

I've learnt that people are people all over the world. The things about people that make me smile, cry, upset, annoyed, that make my heart skip a beat... they're the same all over the world. Warm hugs, listening ears, genuine smiles... they're the same all over the world. God, how similar they are.

I'm convinced the antidote to racism and prejudice is not to fight it with more bigotry. The cause of all those things is ignorance - and the cure for it is education and travel.

Despite the different cultures, despite the different languages, despite the different appearances, despite the different habits, peculiarities and quirks... deep down, people are not very different from each other.

It doesn't really matter what a person's history or background is - companionship, kindred spirits, best friends, and lovers can be found anywhere. Race, religion, culture, and upbringing has less to do with it than people think.

Because deep down, everyone shares a common desire for the same things in life - something to do, someone to love, something to hope for. 

I hope you make it to LA

I didn't mean to fall for you. And when I say 'fall for you', I don't mean the usual, cliched, butterflies-in-my-stomach, heart racing, breathless, swept-off-my-feet experience.

It was not that way with you - falling for you was not significantly dramatic. But don't get me wrong - it's not that you didn't make an impression on me. You did. It's not that I don't think you are amazing, irresistibly cute, charming, funny, and sweet all wrapped up in one. I do.

But with you, right from the start, it felt somehow... comfortable. Something about you felt somehow... familiar. It was not forced or rushed; there was no need for wondering or explaining or trying to define what we were. It just was what it was - simple, like the way you see the world.

I still don't understand how in so little words we could have such deep conversations and find so many perspectives and interests we share, but somehow we did, even without saying much. I still don't understand how someone from such a completely different world can live life the way I do and care about the things I care about. But maybe I don't need or want to understand - all I know is, I'm glad we met, even if I never meant to fall for you, and even if we knew from the start that this wouldn't last.

I'm glad I met you -

someone who wants to stay young forever, see as much of the world as possible, be the best person possible for the people in his life, who hears music and sees beauty everywhere, who dreams with his head in the clouds and his feet on the ground, who drifts through life, not trying to hold on to anything but to soak it all in and experience as much of it as possible, who loves animals, dancing, good food, the beach, and most of all, people.

Because knowing you reminds me that I'm not alone, and that it's okay to be who I am.

You might not think so, but I think you're one of the kindest, gentlest, most amazing people I've ever met.

I hope all your dreams come true, and I hope you make it to LA. :)

'You should date an illiterate girl' by Charles Warnke

Nothing sucks worse than a girl who reads.

A girl who reads possesses a vocabulary that can describe that amorphous discontent as a life unfulfilled—a vocabulary that parses the innate beauty of the world and makes it an accessible necessity instead of an alien wonder. A girl who reads lays claim to a vocabulary that distinguishes between the specious and soulless rhetoric of someone who cannot love her, and the inarticulate desperation of someone who loves her too much.

A girl who reads understands syntax. Literature has taught her that moments of tenderness come in sporadic but knowable intervals. A girl who reads knows that life is not planar; she knows, and rightly demands, that the ebb comes along with the flow of disappointment.

Date a girl who doesn’t read because the girl who reads knows the importance of plot. She can trace out the demarcations of a prologue and the sharp ridges of a climax. She feels them in her skin. The girl who reads will be patient with an intermission and expedite a denouement. But of all things, the girl who reads knows most the ineluctable significance of an end. She is comfortable with them. She has bid farewell to a thousand heroes with only a twinge of sadness.

Don’t date a girl who reads because girls who read are the storytellers. The girl who reads has spun out the account of her life and it is bursting with meaning. She insists that her narratives are rich, her supporting cast colorful, and her typeface bold. You, the girl who reads, make me want to be everything that I am not. But I am weak and I will fail you, because you have dreamed, properly, of someone who is better than I am. You will accept nothing less than passion, and perfection, and a life worthy of being storied. So out with you, girl who reads. Take the next southbound train and take your Hemingway with you. I hate you. I really, really, really hate you.

-Excerpt from 'You Should Date An Illiterate Girl' By CHARLES WARNKE

Life is what we make it

I should be nipping to the shops to stock up on some groceries but there's just a bit of coffee left in my mug and so I sit here, typing away on my keyboard, on the pretext of finishing up my coffee before it gets cold, but truthfully, I just want to get the thoughts in my head out here.

Today, I took a mental stock count of the things, experiences, and people I have in my life and it dawned on me that there used to be a day where I would only dream about such things.

There used to be a time in my life when I would try to have deep conversations with people only to be made fun of and laughed at for being so 'deep' and 'intellectual' and for using 'such big words'. It turns out that there are a whole lot of closet geeks and dreamers out there just dying for 'deep' conversation, as I've discovered.

I find these days that I can hardly go a day or at most, two, without having some sort of 'deep' conversation with someone. The best part is, they're no longer just with like-minded strangers over the Internet but with people I know in real-life and have the privilege of calling friends.

There used to be a time when travelling the world and living in a different country and culture was nothing but a fairytale - and despite the fact that today it is a reality, I occasionally pinch myself to see if I'm dreaming.

Not too long ago, I would read books and blogs by strong, capable, independent, self-assured women from all across the globe. I would wish so hard to be as self-fulfilled, confident, content with life yet driven by inspiration, and wise beyond their years as these women were.

I would wish I could find girlfriends in women like them. Women who do not feel threatened by another woman's presence, who are able to speak their mind without manipulation, beating around the bush, and mind games, who are trustworthy and reliable, who do not change loyalties and moods as often as a mood ring changes colour. 

Today, while I still draw inspiration and strength from examples of strong female writers, I find myself increasingly content with who I am - I find myself learning to find satisfaction and purpose in my unique roles, circumstances, and opportunities instead of comparing them to another girl's.

I find myself being able to celebrate the successes of other women while being proud of my own. I find myself able to call other women beautiful and look myself in the mirror and tell myself that I am, too. I find myself being able to share my heart with a company of women whom I trust not to bitch about me, betray me, or backstab me.

As I take stock of all these things I once wished I had, and now, actually have - I wonder if it is indeed true that life is what we make it, and that we attract into our lives what we fix our thoughts and hearts on.

Because from where I'm standing, it's pretty hard not to believe that's true. I've watched so many people who complain about the things they don't have and say they'll never get them and guess what? They're right - they don't ever get them, because they don't even believe they will. They probably don't even believe those things exist, at least not for them.

But you know what? 'Seek and you will find.' Those looking for beauty and purpose and passion in the world will find them, even in the most unexpected places and people. Those looking for things to moan and whine about... guess what? Will find them too, even in the most beautiful of places.

As unattainable as some things may seem, it's not as crazy to hope for them as it is to NOT hope for them. Even if you don't get all that you hoped for, you'll get something. Which is better than not ever wanting anything, not ever trying for anything, and ending up with nothing.

“two years ago, i was afraid of wanting anything. i figured wanting would lead to trying and trying would lead to failure. but now i find i can’t stop wanting. i want to fly somewhere on first class. i want to travel to europe on a business trip. i want to get invited to the white house. i want to learn about the world. i want to surprise myself. i want to be important. i want to be the best person i can be. i want to define myself, instead of having others define me. i want to win, and have people happy for me. i want to lose and get over it. i want to not be afraid of the unknown. i want to grow up to be generous and big-hearted, the way that people have been with me. i want an interesting and surprising life. it’s not that i think that i’m going to get all these things. i just want the possibility of getting them. college represents possibility. the possibility that things are going to change. i can’t wait.” - friday night lights

Imagine a woman

Imagine a woman who believes it is right and good she is a woman.
A woman who honors her experience and tells her stories.
Who refuses to carry the sins of others within her body and life.

Imagine a woman who trusts and respects herself.
A woman who listens to her needs and desires.
Who meets them with tenderness and grace.

Imagine a woman who acknowledges the past’s influence on the present.
A woman who has walked through her past.
Who has healed into the present.
Imagine a woman who authors her own life.
A woman who exerts, initiates, and moves on her own behalf.
Who refuses to surrender except to her truest self and wisest voice.

Imagine a woman in love with her own body.
A woman who believes her body is enough, just as it is.
Who celebrates its rhythms and cycles as an exquisite resource.

Imagine a woman who celebrates the accumulation of her years and her wisdom.
Who refuses to use her life-energy disguising the changes in her body and life.

Imagine a woman who values the women in her life.
A woman who sits in circles of women.
Who is reminded of the truth about herself when she forgets.

Imagine a woman who is interested in her own life.
A woman who embraces her life as teacher, healer, and challenge.
Who is grateful for the ordinary moments of beauty and grace.

Imagine a woman who participates in her own life.
A woman who meets each challenge with creativity.
Who takes action on her own behalf with clarity and strength.

Imagine a woman who has crafted a fully-formed solitude.
A woman who is available to herself.
Who chooses friends and lovers with the capacity to respect her solitude.

Imagine a woman who acknowledges the full range of human emotion.
A woman who expresses her feelings clearly and directly.
Who allows them to pass through her as naturally as the breath.

Imagine a woman who tells the truth.
A woman who trusts her experience of the world and expresses it.
Who refuses to defer to the perceptions, thoughts, and responses of others.

Imagine a woman who follows her creative impulses.
A woman who produces original creations.
Who refuses to color inside someone else's lines.

Imagine a woman who has relinquished the desire for intellectual approval.
A woman who makes a powerful statement with every action she takes.
Who asserts to herself the right to reorder the world.

Imagine a woman who has grown in knowledge and love of herself.
A woman who has vowed faithfulness to her own life.
Who remains loyal to herself. Regardless.

Imagine yourself as this woman.

“Imagine a Woman” © Patricia Lynn Reilly, 1995
www.imagineAwoman.com

This is your life, are you who you want to be?

This is your life. Do what you LOVE, and do it often. If you don't like something, change it. If you don't like your job, quit. If you don't have enough time, stop watching TV. If you are looking for the love of your life, stop; they will be waitig for you when you start doing things you love. Stop over analyzing, all emotions are beautiful. When you ear, appreciate every last bite. Life is simple. Open your mind, arms, and heart to new things and people, we are united in our differences. Ask the next person you see what their passion is, and share your inspiring dream with them. Travel often. Getting lost will help you find yourself. Some opportunities only come once, seize them. Life is about the people you meet, and the things you create with them. So go out and starting creating. Life is short. Live your dream and share your passion.

Dear you back home...

Dear you back home,

Some nights, I lie down on my bed and close my eyes, and as I drift off to sleep, memories of you play in my head like I'm watching a movie, except they're more life-like. They seem so near and so real sometimes I almost think I can reach out and touch, hold, and hug you.

Then a cold draft, the whirring sound of my fan heater, and new music I discovered from new friends playing on Spotify pulls me back here, back to reality, and it hits me that it's been awhile since I left you, 7000 miles away. A very long while, actually.

It's even been a long while since we last talked. I know I might have seemed especially distant lately, but if it's any consolation, you're not the only one from home I've not spoken to in awhile. In fact, I haven't spoken to anyone back home if you don't count Facebook comments (I don't count them) in the last few weeks.

Part of me feels obliged to apologize for being such a lousy friend, daughter, sister. But another part of me knows that those who really matter won't need my apology, and they'd understand that sometimes it gets a little tough trying to live in two worlds, and sometimes detaching from one to fully focus on the other is the best way to cope, even if it is not the ideal way.

So I'm not going to apologize. I'm just going to say thank you for your kind thoughts, words, prayers, encouraging e-mails, letters, and gifts. I'm not going to promise to reply any of them before I get home, so I don't have to break any promises and because these next three months are going to fly by real quick and before I know it I'll see you in person and not have to spend so much time trying to articulate my thoughts in written words and type out all that I want to say to you.

I am also going to ask you, very humbly, for a few small favours, which I will be more than happy to return. All I ask is for you to please remember, when we do meet again, that these eight months abroad will have changed me, just as these eight months back home doing whatever it is you have been doing will have changed you, hopefully for the better. Some changes won't be better or worse. They'll just be changes, whether it's to my habits, preferences, reactions to the weather, perspectives, or ways of doing things.

Please don't expect me to remain the same because I won't expect you to have remained the same. I won't think I'm better than you just because I have had the opportunity to study abroad but it is very likely I will see things very differently because I've had that privilege. So please don't compare me to the person I used to be, because the person I used to be hadn't spent a year in a completely different culture and climate.

Please be mindful when talking about other people that even though I might have once stereotyped and judged people different from us with you, by the time I leave this international and diverse university I will likely call friends people similar to very ones we used to discriminate.

Also, please know you are still very important to me. However, there are and will be new people who are important to me, because they were present to witness a part of my life that you will only know secondhand, through my retelling of it. I will miss these people when I leave the UK as much as I missed you when I left Malaysia, and I will have inside jokes, memories, and secrets with these people that try as I may to explain to you (except the secrets because I'm a good secret-keeper :)), won't quite be the same. Please understand that doesn't make our relationship any less significant.

Finally, I hope you know that no matter how bad I may be at keeping in touch and articulating my thoughts in words (although I may be a journalist I still suck at communicating with regards to matters of the heart), you are thought of, appreciated, and loved, and even though I may not find the words to say or write to you, know that I can't wait to see and hug you in person.

If it feels like I don't want to chat with you or am disappearing every time you send me a message on Facebook, it's true. I don't want to chat over bloody Facebook. It feels so sterile, so impersonal, so cold. I want to wrap you up in a hug and shower you with kisses. I want to hear your Malaysian accent and make you laugh with my various fake sounding British / European accents.

But that won't happen till three months time, so if three months it has to be, then so be it. I'll see you soon, then. :)

All my love,
Crystal

9 March - Today, happiness is...

Marks & Spencer's Italian Collection truffle chocolates at 1.30AM, listening to Whitley and reflecting on the day.

Cooking vegetable stew with Mabel, our usual deep conversations about life and the usual obsessing over cute boys.

"We just needed to let go of what was back home so we could actually have a life here."

For the love of motion

I am a traveller and will likely be until the day I die.

I travel, not just across the world, but also across my soul, across my heart, or across a room to say 'hi'.

 Some rights reserved by Aitor Escauriaza

The reasons are always the same.

I travel to be surprised, for the thrill of the journey, for the unknown, the unfamiliar, the unpredictable - to escape the ordinary. I refuse to settle for ordinary, safe, familiar, and comfortable.

I travel to escape routine, predictability, and the placebo of comfort, because not only do they shrink my world, they shrink me.

 Some rights reserved by Josh Liba

I travel to be scared - to be pushed out of my comfort zone to my limit - to find new limits to conquer.

I travel to doubt - to doubt the things I believe about the world and about myself - that I might learn that some of them are not true and let go of them.

I travel to fall in love - deeply and madly in love with new places, new experiences, new people - because I cannot imagine a life not colored by love.

 Some rights reserved by CW Ye

I travel to see beauty - to touch her, taste her, hold her, drink her, wrap myself around her, be wrapped up in her, because I've gotten glimpses of her, and I'm intoxicated, addicted.

 Some rights reserved by B Tal

I travel to have my eyes washed in wonder - to see with eyes untainted by familiarity - to see miracles and magic in the ordinary and commonplace.

 Some rights reserved by CW Ye

I travel to find myself - in the hopes that by walking away from the things I have allowed to define me I find out who I really am without them.

I travel to kill the idea that I can hold on to people and things, to remind myself that all I can hold on to is me - who I am, how I look at life, and how I live.

I travel because I am not ready to be stagnant - because stagnant is for dead people.

I travel to survive, because the idea of staying stagnant, lifeless, barely surviving, going through the motions of 'living' scares me ten times more than the idea of throwing myself out of a plane or off a bridge.

 Some rights reserved by Stuck in Customs

I travel because life is motion, like a flowing river, always moving forward, and I travel to feel that motion, that rhythm, to hear my heartbeat pounding in my ears, to feel the rush of blood through my veins, to remind myself that I am alive.

I travel because if I have one life to live, I want to live it in the real world, not through a movie or a book or someone else's story. I want to watch the movie of my life unfold; I want to write and read the chapters of my own story.

Big circles

"But there's not enough time!" I said. "There's so many things I want to do, so much to see, so many places to go. I'm not even done exploring Malaysia."

"You know what's the thing about you?" he said.

"What?"

"You draw your circles very wide."

"What do you mean?"

"The circle that is your life - you draw it very big. For me, I've studied abroad, and I think I've seen enough of the world that nothing really takes me by surprise anymore. I draw my circle very small and I've covered or experienced most of what's in that circle.

"You... just being in Malaysia you are always finding new things to do and discover... you don't limit your life to specific experiences or people or acquaintances... for you... (and here he waved his arms around making big circles in the air) your life is this huge, never-ending, enormous circle... that you can never finish exploring.... life to you is so much wider and bigger than for most people."

I took a sip of black coffee and paused to think.

He was right. Still is.

I do. I do 'draw my circles very big'.

And I don't think I ever want to change that.

The movie of my life

“two years ago, i was afraid of wanting anything. i figured wanting would lead to trying and trying would lead to failure. but now i find i can’t stop wanting. i want to fly somewhere on first class. i want to travel to europe on a business trip. i want to get invited to the white house. i want to learn about the world. i want to surprise myself. i want to be important. i want to be the best person i can be. i want to define myself, instead of having others define me. i want to win, and have people happy for me. i want to lose and get over it. i want to not be afraid of the unknown. i want to grow up to be generous and big-hearted, the way that people have been with me. i want an interesting and surprising life. it’s not that i think that i’m going to get all these things. i just want the possibility of getting them. college represents possibility. the possibility that things are going to change. i can’t wait.” - friday night lights

Sometimes I think my life is sadder than the saddest movie I can think of (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) but I wouldn't trade it for anyone else's in the world.

Because if it feels like a movie at the sad parts, then at the high points it feels a million times more amazing than when the soundtrack soars into a crescendo in a movie at the happy parts.

I honestly find my life more interesting (in both bad and good ways) than any movie than I've ever watched. And how many people can say that?



"I am unwritten, can't read my mind, I'm undefined
I'm just beginning, the pen's in my hand, ending unplanned
Staring at the blank page before you
Open up the dirty window
Let the sun illuminate the words that you could not find
Reaching for something in the distance
So close you can almost taste it
Release your inhibitions
Feel the rain on your skin
No one else can feel it for you
Only you can let it in
No one else, no one else
Can speak the words on your lips
Drench yourself in words unspoken
Live your life with arms wide open
Today is where your book begins
The rest is still unwritten
I break tradition, sometimes my tries, are outside the lines
We've been conditioned to not make mistakes, but I can't live that way" -Natasha Bedingfield

Life is beautiful

(via be-the-change)

I soon realized that no journey carries one far unless, as it extends into the world around us, it goes an equal distance into the world within. – Lillian Smith

Life is a mystery. The most confounding of riddles, the epitome of paradoxes.
But we can let the mystery confuse us and scare us... or get lost in the wonder of it.

Life is a battle. A long, harsh, vicious, raging war.
But we can claw our way to stay alive or fight it like warriors.

Life is a romance. A delicious, enchanting, seductive romance.
But we can settle for lusting after life, getting by on fantasies and unfulfilled longings, or actually going all out, living life, and falling head over heels in love with it.

Life is pain and disappointment.
But it is also healing through the very same things that hurt you, if you let it be.

Life is beautiful. So painful but so beautiful.

But life is what you make it.

P/S - On a side note, I always have these great moments of self-realization and remembering what made me me when I look back at my collection of quotes that have driven and inspired me, whether in my handwritten quote book or my Tumblr. :) Awesome stuff. 

An epiphany about the cold

"Epiphany - I has it," wrote one of my favourite bloggers a long time ago (because as forgetful as I am I can have a brilliant, albeit stalkerish memory when it comes to people and things I obsess over).

So yes. Before I start rambling. I have an epiphany about the cold and why I always get so emo and depressed whenever the weather gets cold.

Are you ready for it? Drumroll please... (thank you)

It's not the cold that makes me depressed... but depression that makes me feel extra bone-chillingly cold. Because somehow, when I have something to do, friends to be around, and warm food in my tummy (because life is too short to eat bad food!)... the cold doesn't seem to bother me quite so much, even when I'm wearing flip flops (because I'm Malaysian like that and wear flip flops everywhere and don't care how chav-y people think it is here) in 3 degrees.

In other news (one of many very British phrases I have now become fond of using... oh no I'm going native!!! Bleh... :P), it's been an interesting three weeks that have passed. After partying for a grand total of three Friday nights in a row, I think I might be ready to hang up my party shoes for good. I don't know how people have the energy or interest to party so hard. But we'll see if I change my mind before next Friday. ;)

It feels like in the past three weeks, I've experienced more of UK life, Middlesbrough life, student life, and just life in general than I have compared to the rest of my time here so far, excluding traveling to London and Edinburgh over the Christmas break. And it's been an amazing roller coaster, drama-filled ride (as my life always seems to be). There's probably lessons in here I'll take away with me to ponder over for YEARS to come that I don't realise at the moment.

But the important thing is, in these three weeks I LIVED. And I no longer feel like trapped and frustrated and like a victim of my circumstances, because these three weeks have been a reminder that my circumstances are largely a result of my choices and perspectives. In three weeks, I've seen the worst of myself... and also the best. And while I've made some choices I'm not proud of, as we all do every now and then, I've made some unforgettably precious memories as well.

In a very sweet birthday video, a friend asked me to go "crazy CRAZY - all outs crazy!" And I have to say, I have. :) Oh you have no idea. :)

Before I turn in for the night, I shall leave you with a quote by author Henry David Thoreau:

"How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live."

And some good mood music to suit this post:



This year, is gonna be incredible
This year, is gonna be the one
All the planets are lining up for me
This year, I'm gonna have fun

This year, I'll paint my masterpiece
This year, I'll be recognized
I can feel like I'll fall in love for real

This year, I'll reach the pinnacle
This year, I'll get to the top
People will ask where she get that energy
This year, I'm never gonna stop



You taught me to run
You taught me to fly
Helped me to free the me inside
Help me hear the music of my heart
Help me hear the music of my heart
You've opened my eyes
You've opened the door
To something I've never known before

It takes courage to cry.

It's easier to lose yourself in catchy music, in dancing, in bright lights.

It's easier to drown yourself in the voices of others to drown out the ones in your head. It's easier to fake hollow laughter and pretend you're having the time of your life.

It's easier to let busyness overtake you, easy to feel important, significant, when a million and one things demand your attention.

But letting the tears fall,

that's for lonely, quiet nights nobody knows about, for wee hours of the morning spent with an empty, aching heart, sitting with it, getting acquainted with it, not running away from it.

That takes courage.

People are like sunshine

Coming from a warm, tropical, sun-drenched country to a place where cold winds, cloudy skies, and freezing temperatures are the norm, I've learned that you can spend months despising a place with all your guts and then all it takes is a few drops of sunshine to change everything.

Suddenly, drenched in sunlight, everything looks beautiful, fresh, radiant.

Cold, dark nights fade into a dim and distant memory, and suddenly, all is new again.

People can be like that, too.

You can spend night upon lonely night wondering if you're the only human being who's ever felt alone, scared, and out of place. Wondering if such a thing as unselfish love actually exists.

Then you meet someone, and all it takes it a genuine smile, a lingering glance, and unselfish hug, silences that speak louder than words - that say I'm here, I understand, you're not alone.

Suddenly hope bubbles from a spring you didn't know was inside you.

Sleepless, tearful nights spent tossing and turning and staring at the ceiling become muted memories of what feels like a dream.

Suddenly, the world is new again.

What if we all lived our lives to be like sunshine for others?

What if were not meant to change the whole world but to change one heart at a time?

What if all it took was a smile, a hug, a hello?

What if we all lived that way?

How beautiful would the world look like then?

Dedicated to the new friends I've met who have been sunshine through long winter days. 

How to be alone

"...take yourself out dancing, to a club where no one knows you, stand on the outside of the floor until the lights convince you more and more and the music shows you. Dance like no one’s watching because they’re probably not. And if they are, assume it is with best human intentions. The way bodies move genuinely to beats, is after-all, gorgeous and affecting. Dance until you’re sweating. And beads of perspiration remind you of life’s best things. Down your back, like a book of blessings."

"...Society is afraid of alone though. Like lonely hearts are wasting away in basements. Like people must have problems if after awhile nobody is dating them.

But lonely is a freedom that breathes easy and weightless, and lonely is healing if you make it.

You can stand swathed by groups and mobs or hands with your partner, look both further and farther in the endless quest for company.

But no one is in your head. And by the time you translate your thoughts an essence of them may be lost or perhaps it is just kept.

Cause if you’re happy in your head, then solitude is blessed, and alone is okay.

It’s okay if no one believes like you, all experiences unique, no one has the same synapses, can’t think like you, for this be relived, keeps things interesting, life’s magic things in reach, and it doesn’t mean you aren’t connected, and the community is not present, just take the perspective you get from being one person in one head and feel the effects of it."

Life is like a box of chocolates game

If life was a game, how do you play it?

Do you move through the levels, unlocking and acquiring new skills, weapons, power-ups, equipment, and health points that will help you through the more difficult stages to come?

Or do you take the shortcuts and secret portals that allow you to skip levels to advance to a level that you might not even be equipped to handle?

Looking at life through this analogy, I think I often do the latter. I'm quick to seize opportunities that present themselves to me... without considering if I really have what it takes to rise to the challenge.

And then I fight and struggle and claw my way to survive through that level... when I could have taken my time acquiring more skills and gear and rose to the challenge without feeling like I'm going to die or the 'Game Over' sign is going to flash soon.

I'm not sure if this is the best or healthiest way to approach life.

Everyone has their speed and approach to playing a game... everyone has a different storyline that they play to... why do we try to rush through the game instead of taking it at a pace we're comfortable with?

After all, most of the time, the fun is not even in reaching the end or winning - it's the enjoyment of playing the game itself.

Hm...

What 7000 miles has taught me so far

It doesn't matter where you are in the world...

there are problems everywhere.

there will always be people who complain about the system but don't do anything to change it.

there will always people who manage to inspire people even in the midst of their own problems and challenges they face.

people who inspire others usually have fun doing so, and by putting a smile on others' faces put a smile on their own.

tough choices are everywhere.

it's way too easy to become the person you swore to yourself you'd never be and judged others for being.

things always look a whole lot different when you're actually on the other side of the fence.

people change, come, and go, whether you want them to or not.

in every dark day there's something beautiful to be found if you're looking hard enough.

the best way to embrace the present is to stop comparing it to yesterday and tomorrow.

And finally,

wherever you go in the world, there's a whole lot of lonely people out there.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” -Theodore Roosevelt

Do we live the life that we should?

Do I push too hard?
Or fall too fast?
The moment never seems to last
Will I stop long enough to know

Your words circle in my head
Weigh so heavy on my chest
And I'm crushed by your expectation
I only want to do some good
Too dumb to know if I could
And I just wanna feel the days I'm in

Do I go to far,
Not far enough?
Why can't I keep my big mouth shut?
And do we lead the life that we should?

You know what I was thinking about on the night I turned 21? I was thinking that I was three months closer to the day I would return 'home' to Malaysia - the day I'd been anticipating and looking forward to every single day for the first five months since I first got here.

And instead of bubbling over with excitement that the day I'd been dreaming of and longing for was almost within reach, I started feeling a sense of dread.

Because for the first it hit me that even though I might be going 'home' to where I came from, it's not going to be home by the time I return. I can't just barge back into KL and expect to pick up my life where I've left off. People will have changed; some have left to other parts of the world already; but most of all, I will have changed.

It suddenly hit me that going home will be adjusting back to a new life all over again like I did when I came here. And while adventure and change is always good, it still means leaving someone(s) behind, which is never easy.

I spent the past 4-5 months here trying to hold on to the someone(s) I left behind in KL, trying to bring them into my world here. And for some people, maybe, that does work. Maybe e-mails and Skype chats are enough for some. But it's not enough for me to whinge about the weather to someone who has never been anywhere colder than 20 degrees.

I spent most of my free time here in isolation but mostly because I didn't bother making the effort to get out and get to know people, and now that I have started to, I actually feel normal again having friends I can talk to and see in 3D and live audio, not through a flat screen and tinny laptop speakers. I feel normal, and it feels good to be normal.

Still, trying to bring Malaysia into my world here is like trying to talk about the tropics to people who have only ever grown up in four season countries and wear thin hoodies in the dead of winter while I'm all bundled up in like four layers. It doesn't work when I keep my Malaysian accent around friends here - I'd just sound like a total weirdo; and the other way around - I'd sound like a snobby wannabe.

I finally understand why people lose touch with friends when they move away - a dear friend, who's in Canada at the moment, said to me when she was back in Malaysia for a break... that when she was there, Malaysia felt like a dream, and in Malaysia, here time there felt like a dream. I finally understand what she meant. Took me a little long - five months to be precise - of fighting and trying to ignore the fact that the two worlds I lived in, the two worlds I now call 'home' - were so completely different that I couldn't expect to reconcile them just like that.

I'm tired of trying. Explaining a foreign culture is one thing; trying to bring it into the day-to-day life of another culture is another thing. I'm tired of living between both worlds; I want to actually feel normal - to have my emotions and time invested in the world I am actually physically in instead of being a million miles away in my head in someplace I can't be in in person for another three months.

I spent so long back in KL learning to live in the present and not for some distant event in the future - and it felt like that ability slipped way when I got here, and lately, it's starting to feel like it's coming back. And it feels pretty good actually, to live arms wide, expectation-free, ready to go wherever life takes me.

You know what else I was thinking?

That exactly what I dreaded would happen before coming here has happened. I've changed. I don't think I want the same things as I did anymore before I left. I mean, I knew I would change, but I thought I'd find myself wanting different things.

But at 21, I found myself feeling the very same thing I felt at 18 - trapped and stifled and not knowing who I am, and not wanting to find my identity in a safety net or security blanket or a reliable shoulder to lean on.

I thought I was ready to settle down and live a stable, settled life with a stable job, significant other, and etc, and now... the thought just scares the crap out of me like it did... a couple years ago?? I don't even understand it myself... I never expected to feel this way, obviously, otherwise I wouldn't have hung some of my hopes quite as high as I did before leaving.

All I know right now is that I want to run very, very far away from what was left back in KL, and any expectations and obligations that will be waiting for me when I go back there. And just be here, fully immersed in the present.



I hear the wind across the plain
A sound so strong - that calls my name
It's wild like the river - it's warm like the sun
Ya it's here - this is where I belong

Under the starry skies - where eagles have flown
This place is paradise - it's the place I call home
The moon on the mountains
The whisper through the trees
The waves on the water
Let nothing come between this and me

Cuz everything I want - is everything that's here
And when when we're all together - there's nothing to fear
And wherever I wander - the one thing I've learned
It's to here - I will always... always return