Thursday, February 27, 2014

You have been so good





Some nice things this week:

- Becky made me honey water just cos my throat was bad on Monday, in a bottle with a yellow lid so it was like i was drinking sunshine every time i swallowed

-Auntie Sarah came home yesterday full of life and nice shampoo smells

-I watched Argo as part of my history assignment (it was lovely to just plonk down on the sofa with my laptop-and my ear phones actually worked!!!!- and just vegetate for a while)

-Had a longgg phone call with Ben-it's nice to have someone to talk about faith so deeply to

-Took the bus home and met Guy and Kumar (they both ask after you Hannah-if you're reading this)

-Found out that Jerry is going to CF and likes it

-Laughed over the choir comm's baby photos

-Had one of Senji's cinnamon rolls (Bad for throats but so yum)

-Had the first piano rehearsal for the ballet exam and had a good laugh over the photo session (oh my goodness my leg looks so white)

-Slept 8 hours last night and woke up wit sleep still imprinted on my cheek (blanket lines are beautiful and embarrassing at the same time)

voiceless




So after eating 2 slices of pomelo and some hardcore choral singing on saturday, my voice betrayed me and left, about 6 days before founder's day

It's been very interesting being voiceless

Some observations:

- People tend to whisper back when you whisper at them
- People tend to interpret your hand actions completely wrongly and perhaps thinking of the things you'd say but that you actually aren't saying (which was okay because i realized that i am not as boring and predictable as i sometimes think i am)
- You begin thinking not-in-words (this is difficult to explain...the closest sensation i can get to is when you are thinking of a word and you can't express it verbally or pictorially or even in its dictionary meaning, but you just have a host of sensations that convey its meaning)

I also realised how much of an obligation i feel i have to speak, which made my self-imposed silence to preserve what is left of my voice as it began recovering very difficult.

And i also realised that i can't help speaking to some people, either because they take me by surprise or because they are terribly wrong or misled and i need to tell them otherwise or just because i really want to speak to them and i would even if i knew that speaking to them would mean i couldn't speak to other people for a whole day.


Sunday, February 23, 2014

Saved



So this morning i posted on how worried i was over the chapel fiasco

But God answered my prayers so fast and so simply

i asked done person if she could help out, and she couldn't, so i thought perhaps we would have to have just one sore-throat singer.

But God worked a miracle and the girl we asked asked other people and 3 people actually offered when we only needed one!!!!

And so you know what? I think i know what God was trying to teach me:

1) Ask and you shall receive. Especially this year, when I'm taking on so many things, I've been trying to hard to shoulder it all alone, to not be a nuisance to others, to do everything on my own strength. But i can't, it's impossible. All i need to do is ask and people will help! No man is an island

2) God has blessed me with amazing friends. They were so quick to respond and so sympathetic about my voice and just wonderful. I don't deserve the friends i have but i am so glad i have them anyway :)

3) God has blessed me with the most wonderful school community. One person who responded didn't even know me personally, she was just someone who heard i needed help and offered her help. And that's something i value and love so much about ACJC, people aren't afraid to help, aren't scared of the superficial barriers of familiarity or lack of between people. They just do unto others as they wish others would do to them and that's why school feels like a family even though we're technically strangers. Because we aren't really.



I love these two pictures i got them from completely different sources and in their construction they are so similar (nakedness and vulnerability, rocks and water) But in the message they convey they are so starkly different but at the same time they link


(don't read the bit below if you want to form your own interpretation because i always think pictures usually say different things to different people)

Both show someone in their own little world, cut off from everything else. For the mother and child its a world of love and intimacy, while the lonely boy is in a world of confusion, with the water accentuating their peace/the need to drown out the noise inside his head.

And then in the mother and child photo they are so vulnerable because they are both so physically unprotected but at the same time they are so absorbed with each other that it doesn't seem like anything could touch them, while for the lonely boy he seems so vulnerable because he is so absorbed in himself and also in such a precipitous position, but at the same time his sadness makes this moment so private you feel intrusive looking at the picture, like such sadness is his secret, his moment, and you have no right to empathise or even wonder. (and i always wonder what happens after that picture-does he curl up on the cold rock and cry until he falls asleep exhausted? Does he plunge into the water and try to forget himself? Does he wash his face and bite his lip and carry on?)

i just really like this picture, it kind of reminds me of pangkor

i realise that although all my life i told myself i want to live in england and somewhere 

but really some of my best holidays have to be the ones in desaru/etc. malaysian beaches

trepidation :(



Chapel is tomorrow

and everything that could go wrong is going wrong

We were really excited about playing our chosen song set, and then our 2 favourite songs were replaced with 2 hymns because founder's day is on friday and they want to rehearse the set they are doing on friday

The pianist can't play because she doesn't feel ready (we got a replacement but she might not be able to come for practice today)

The drummer had tonsilitis and is too sick to play (thank God we are doing 2 hymns and so it isn't that bad)

The bassist can only make 1 hour of practice

Agnes has a sore throat

And i completely lost my voice-only air comes out when i speak

It's so hard to trust in God's perfect plan when everything seems to be against what you think will be best

I still don't know what is going to happen tomorrow, and i kind of hope tomorrow doesn't come


Saturday, February 22, 2014

locked out



The other day i got locked out of the house because i forgot to bring home my keys and dad and tim were out and mum was in new zealand and hannah was in china so it was just a little inconvenient to get keys from anyone.

First i panicked because i had so many things planned on my to do list (which i still haven't completed) then i tried to pick the lock with a safety pin i found in my bag, and, failing which, i wrote a heavily bolded pencil note saying "CALL MIRIAM WHEN YOU SEE THIS" Hoping that the bold pencil scribble and the third person (as opposed to first person) reference would make it seem like an amateur kidnapper's ransom note and therefore catch the attention of Dad/ Tim (to make sure they didn't panic i write in small print below "I'm in Wessex Tavern-forgot my keys!" and added a smiley for extra reassurance) and then headed down to wessex tavern

Where who should i meet but Mrs Gill my history teacher 2 years ago

It was nice seeing her, and hearing from her (and it was probably the first time I've seen her without lipstick), because she was always such a nice teacher. Although our conversation was rather generic (How is school?) the actual "seeing someone who you haven't seen for a really long time and when you do see them reminds you of how much they actually impacted your life"  feeling made it a heart warming meeting nonetheless

I had a spinach and mushroom quiche and a chocolate milkshake in the cafe, under the watchful eye of the tavern owner who occasionally burped or dropped cutlery but was rather nice on the whole. I think he felt rather bad for his commotion because he apologised furiously after each one-perhaps he empathised with my struggle to wrestle with vectors (near 2 hours of math)

This is why i like Thursdays when i don't have to stay in school

5 metre radius



Last Monday the class held a fund raiser and it was mostly a fantastic day-we sold out of cookies and pineapple rice within three hours and i was surrounded by my favourite people for the most part of the day  "Tater Tots" or trying hard to convince everyone that tater tots were an absolutely ESSENTIAL part of tehir diet

But somewhere in the day, when i was eating my own (heavenly) bowl of pineapple rice, i was called because apparently there was someone who wouldn't buy anything unless i was the one serving.

If that was in a movie, or even in a book, it would probably be romantic or heart warming, something to do with the longing and need between lovers. But. I did not know this person personally. e weren't more than friends or even really friends for that matter. The closest I'd classify him would be an acquaintance, and so i was rather shocked and squirmy when i heard that.

It was

So

SO

awkward.

And i shall spare the details because they weren't very interesting and also embarrassing.

But anyway. I thoroughly hated that episode because i felt like an object. Something someone who didn't understand my heart or even my thoughts (which is more complex i still don't know) but could still conjure my presence . (This is why i will never make a good waitress/sales girl i would feel thoroughly dehumanised every day)

Anyway now it's supremely weird when i see this guy and all in all i feel rather sorry for him because everything is just so embarrassing and strange.

Friend love



So i have a guy best friend

We study together, talk about our crushes and our stress and why we cry, let each other eat each others' food, and make fun of each other almost constantly.

But its really hard having a guy best friend because people keep teasing and then you feel the imperative need to put some distance in between so that people have no grounds for their over active imaginations and need for scandal/drama

When i talked to Ollie last year about relationships and stuff he told me that NO GIRLS AND GUYS CAN'T BE BEST FRIENDS someone will fall in love with the other but i completely disagree

When you know someone really well, you know whether he's the kind of person that attracts you that way, or whether he's someone you just really want to hang out with and have there by your side as a friend

There's still so much love but like I've said before love is a many splendoured thing and a supremely varied emotion which doesn't always entail romance

And so i think the world needs to accept friend love for its beauty, constancy and necessity rather than warping it into a shameful love or acting over skeptical about its existence

Unsymmetrical





http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/alex-john-beck-both-sides-of


I'm really unsymmetrical.

I have one dimple.
My left ear hole is lower than my right ear hole (because when they put the gun to my ears, i jumped. Who wouldn't-when they pull the trigger so close to your brain?)

maybe that's why i always like doing things in twos

2 H3s
2 CCAs
'2 Minutes more!'
H2s
2 is my favourite number

Before Mrs Teoh left she said balance is so important

But I've come to think perhaps balance is too much. Who are we to demand both, to see two sides of a coin, to have the blessing of time for this AND that?

Sometimes if you leave yourself unbalanced you might just find things a little more beautiful

Sunday, February 2, 2014


i think i am a little passive sometimes

'a little tired'

'indeed'

happiness


So i found THIS on one of my favourite tumblrs of all time and basically i think its wonderful and true. I think i struggle most with number 1, because i often let embarrassment get in the way of cool bean-ness. I actually do find everything cool, but i also feel like the world has a different variation of cool than me (our wavelengths are not in sync) and if i express my cool i will be deemed uncool which would suck i don't know why. (which is why i have besties who understand my kind of cool.) anyway i shall try to undo that strange self esteem-accountability-to-the-world habit and perhaps i'll be happier than i already am (which is rather to be completely honest. Rather RATHER happy)
1. Find Everything Cool
I know that the cardinal rules of youth-hood is to find everything lame, but believe me when I say this: having a boogie to ABBA at your Grandparents’ 50th wedding anniversary is a hell of a lot more fun than sitting by the side rolling your eyes. So is joining in on an impromptu three-legged race, or learning about the Humpback whale, or cooking with your mother. I’m telling you now, finding interest in anything life shows you is hands-down the easiest, greatest, most stimulating way to always remain in the state of happiness. Why are you hating on boybands and vegans and Doctor Who? So you’re not a big fan of chess or basketball or whatever it is that doesn’t get your heart racing, that doesn’t mean its lame. Looking down on things and the people who support them will only make you and everyone around you feel sad. So, next time someone asks you to go kite-flying with them, say yes. For gods sake, kites are freaking cool!
2. Forget To Be Sad
This one might take some practice for those kids who are just really talented at holding grudges, but take my word for it: wallowing in sadness or anger or any other emotions pertaining to unhappiness is HARD WORK. It’s literally really exhausting. The saddest people in this world are the ones who spend hours reliving all the injustice cast upon them, all the mean things people have said, all the bad luck thrust upon them. Please, for the love of god, allow yourself to forget it. Just let it go. As a kid, whenever I fought with my sister, it was over the next day because we always forgot we were mad at each other. I’d say “Want to go shopping with me today?” and then a few minutes later think “Damn it, I was supposed to be angry at her. Oh well, too late now.” It’s now my philosophy. So you didn’t get invited to a sleepover, or you left your sunglasses on the train. Ah well, ce’est la vie. There are so many forces in the world conspiring against your happiness, how dare you let them win! Refuse to be sad, just outright refuse.
3. Be Selfish Without Being Self-Centered
This one is by far the trickiest tip, mainly because this is something I am still significantly struggling with every day. I’m a strong believer in being selfish, which may sound a bit odd to you, but hear me out. Being selfish is about thinking about yourself, for yourself. It’s about identifying the things that will bring you happiness, and then actively pursuing them. Being self-centered, however, is about identifying and actively pursuing these things without thinking about other people. Happiness isn’t achieved in isolation, but it can also be significantly hindered when you don’t do things for yourself either. See that balance? Yeah, I think it’s pretty much the most difficult thing to balance in the world, and like I said, I’m still working on it.
Naturally, these are just the things that I strive to do in my life, and I believe they play a significant role in making me a happier person. Of course, everyday I am working on them. I’m still trying to find everything interesting, (like, have you ever studied linguistics, seriously?). There are still many things I try not to be sad about. And I definitely have days where I think being a push-over would make myself easier. At the end of the day, it’s not about denying yourself of the bad emotions, because I don’t think happiness is the absence of sadness. I think happiness is the conquering of sadness, again and again and again.
If you have any other tips on happiness, please let me know, because despite what my Year 8 peers would have you believe, there are days when I struggle with being happy too.