Down

I fell down last night. I was going down a tiny, tiny slope, wearing my Ipanema sandals when suddenly I was on the ground. I didn't know what hit me. Guess the shock must've gotten to me. I lay there stunned and took a moment to get myself up. It was a painful process.

I hate the feeling of falling. It's as scary as the feeling you get when you're on a roller-coaster. That feeling of being out of control .. I really, really hate it.

3 Hours

What was I doing for 3 whole hours today?

A. Had a glorious afternoon nap
B. Had a long lunch
C. Something productive
D. Stuck in the bloody jam

Guess what's the answer, guys ? That's right.. today is a historic day for i was stuck in the jam for 3 whole hours from KL back to my office in Kota Damansara. A journey that under normal circumstances, would take about 30-45 MINUTES. There was a stretch that was so bad i took 1 whole hour to travel over 2 KILOMETRES. WTF. I now fully understand the meaning of traffic at a standstill. What a day..thank God it's over!

Ostrich

One of those days when i just want to bury my head in the sand till the day passed me by.. stressed out. wished i'd done better.. i could.. i just didn't. SIGH.

The Gardener

The Gardener by Rabindranath Tagore is one of my favourite poems. I actually don't really like poems that much coz most of the time i don't get what they're trying to say.. haha. However, this poem, recited by Ah Long from the famous movie 'Sepet' left an impression on me. This is just an excerpt.. enjoy.

The Gardener (an excerpt) by Rabindranath Tagore

"Your questioning eyes are sad.
They seek to know my meaning
as the moon would fathom the sea.

I have bared my life before your eyes
from end to end,
with nothing hidden
or held back.
That is why
you know me not.

If it were only a gem
I could break it into a hundred piece
and string them into a chain
to put on your neck.
If it were only a flower,
round and small and sweet,
I could pluck it from its stem
to set it in your hair.

But it is a heart, my beloved.
Where are its shores and its bottom?
You know not the limits
of this kingdom,
Still you are its queen.

If it were only a moment of pleasure
it would flower in an easy smile,
and you could see it and read it
in a moment.
If it were merely a pain
it would melt in limpid tears,
reflecting its inmost secret
without a word.

But it is love, my beloved.
Its pleasure and pain are boundless,
and endless are its wants and wealth.

It is as near to you
as your life,
but you can never
wholly know it."

Happy Valentine's Day :)

Singapore **Updated**

Before i knew it, time pass by so fast i have no more time to delay on my Singapore trip post! Anyway, i'm actually really amazed at those bloggers who have a lot of pictures on their blogs. I discovered something : i don't have much patience to wait for the uploading process and then the tedious labelling.. or editing the pictures so it won't be copied without you knowing it... blah blah. Therefore, this post will be without pictures. Maybe i'll upload some later when i'm bored or something. Also, there's nothing much to talk about my Malacca and Kelantan trip therefore that can be skipped. Haha!

Ok. So back to Singapore. Hmm.. what do i think of Singapore? First impression : very clean, systematic, safe and surprisingly, very green in the city. Also, it felt a little sterile .. like a bleached city. Not necessarily a bad thing i guess. Oh oh, and the local food s.u.c.k.s. After my trip to Singapore, i can understand why a lot of my friends are working there and probably will continue to live there.

So while i was there.. i went to :

a) Bugis - like Petaling Street, didn't do much there. Had my first meal in Singapore here which is nasi lemak! Haha.. their nasi lemak comes with otak-otak one. Interesting and not too bad. Also tried the katong laksa.. which is served with a spoon only! This is like curry laksa served with asam laksa's kind of noodles.. ok only.


b) Singapore icon, Merlion - saw some foreigners risking their lives to climb up to the statue. Can you see them?


c) Esplanade - just next to the Merlion, nice place.

d) Sentosa Island - overpriced cable car and it was raining while i was there!

view from the cable car : construction site of the first casino in Singapore

e) Orchard - went inside Takashimaya to view the infamous queue at Louis Vuitton, Gucci, etc.. it's true guys. There was really a queue in those shops. Bought a pair of much loved Ipanema sandals. Also had dinner with Xiang and bf, who kindly bought the dinner :)

orchard road
the prettiest christmas tree on orchard (IMHO)
a close-up look
cute or not? me and xiang
sinful dessert at Canele :) the infamous queue at LV !!!
my favourite purchase in Singapore :))

f) Clarke Quay - beautiful riverside place, all lit up at night. Had my dinner at Hooters there.

the Singapore river

g) Underwater World - this place is located at Sentosa, saw Gracie the dugong! Haha.. Also saw pinkish dolphins at the Dolphin Lagoon.

gracie the dugong hehe ..
this is definitely my favourite picture of this trip. i think the seahorse is absolutely beautiful. i forgot what this was but they are definitely alive!
sea angel?
how they really look like

h) Singapore Zoo - i spent almost a whole day here. Most enjoyable. I have to say this is much better than our national zoo. I saw a polar bear there!

killer white tiger! There is a really funny story about this crocodile/alligator. It's name is false sangria or something like that. After watching it for a full minute or two, i seriously thought this was a fake crocodile because it really never moved.at.all. Sure i thought it was strange why would they put a fake thing in a zoo right.. hahahaha.. it was only after we went to the reptile section and see more of this "false" things around did we know that they are actually very very real.. hahahaha.. polar bear!!!! I forgot his name.

this cheetah/jaguar looks so graceful here

can you see how close i am to this ferocious cat?? There was only a sheet of glass separating us..look at the cute giraffe behind me! TOooO cuteee!

this is me and Ah Meng. I think he's from Malaysia too :)

somebody tried to blend in but failed.. hahaha..how often do you see pgymy hippos sharing a kiss? Seriously.

i) Chinatown - also like Petaling Street, just much cleaner. Tasted the weirdest char kuay teow, bak kut teh and hokkien mee here. Of course i didn't eat all that by myself la!

this is bad. this is worse!

j) Hangout @ Mount Emily - where i stayed. Highly recommended. Very safe and clean. Also located near MRT stations. The only catch is it's located on top of a hill. Also! I had the best salmon in my life at the Wild Rocket restaurant in Hangout. Not cheap though.

Hangout @ Mount Emily This is really the best salmon steak i've had in my life

k) Random pictures i find amusing :

random sculpture out of nowhere

this little girl trying to save somebody haha!

i don't really know what is this but i think it looks cool

Hmm.. basically that's all i can remember about my trip right now. Maybe i'll do a part 2 with pictures after CNY. Which reminds me .. HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR PPL!!!!!! Gong Hei Fatt Choy .. Hope to see you all during the holidays... byebye! :D

Note: Sorry Ze Ming, i haven't been to that Thai restaurant since i told you about it .. be patient k. Hehe.

Hello!

Dear readers (hie to all 3 of you *waves* hahaha),

I've certainly been guilty of not updating my blog for damn long .. I've been all over the place for the past 2 months.. I owe Ze Ming a post on my favourite Thai restaurant in the world.. i guess i should also post about my Malacca, Singapore, Kelantan trip .. i will do all that! Before the end of the year. Stay tuned! ^^

My Dear Child of the Enemy

I was at the gym the other day. I plugged in my earphones to the StairMaster and turned the channel to Discovery. Recently i've developed a liking towards documentaries.. guess it ties in with the sleeping early and getting old thingy.

The title of the show was My Dear Child of the Enemy. Within 15 minutes into the show, i was hooked. Transfixed on the tv in front while my legs were moving on their own. This documentary, was about Chinese foster parents who adopted Japanese children abandoned on the streets of Manchuria, China after the defeat of Japan during World War II. About a million Japanese were living in Manchuria at that time.

The documentary shone the spotlight on 4 people, Miss Li and her adopted daughter, Yuri and another pair of mother-daughter that i can't remember their names anymore. Miss Li was 1 of the 6 elders living in the China-Japan Amity House in Changchun, China. The Amity House was built by some Japanese to show their gratitude towards their foster parents. I guess.. it's just an old folks home with a different name.

Miss Li was 80 years old and lived in the Amity House with her sister and brother-in-law. Her adopted daughter, Yuri returned to Japan in the 1980s with her husband under some sort of program offered by the Japanese government. Almost all of Japan's abandoned war orphans returned to Japan during this period. Yuri promised to send for her foster mother after settling down. However, since she returned to Japan, she lived on government handouts due to difficulty in getting a job. She couldn't speak nor write in Japanese. Her life in Japan, in her own words, was very lonely.. with her husband being her only friend. Back in China, her foster mother was getting very sick.. to the point she couldn't ingest any solid food. Her mother begged her to go back and visit her in China to fulfill her dying wish. Yuri used up all her savings and even had to borrow money to go visit her dying mother. She could only be in China for 10 days .. but this fact was unknown to her foster mother..

Back in China, she wanted to bring her mother to the hospital, but again, she was penniless. She tried to ask from her cousins there but they said she should have tried harder instead of borrowing money from people all the time. Miss Li, who was sitting on her bed listening to their conversation, cried silently. On the last day of her visit, Yuri made some dumplings for her mother.. it was her favourite. Even though Miss Li had been eating nothing but porridge for the past few weeks, she looked really happy and take in the dumplings slowly. It was at this time that Yuri had to break the news to her foster mother that she had to return to Japan.. the dinner ended in tears, again.

Yuri packed all her belongings and said goodbye to Miss Li.

"Please come back soon.. having you by my side is the only wish i have now..."

She merely nodded, knowing this could be the last time they will ever meet in this lifetime. Then, she left. The camera continued to linger on Miss Li's face, capturing the unspeakable sorrow and grief etched on her wrinkled face .. and the silent tears on her face matched those on mine.

The 2nd story was also about a Chinese foster mother and her Japanese adopted daughter. The difference lies in this Japanese adopted daughter chose to stay in China instead of returning to Japan, her ancestral land. However, it was her son, an engineer, who decided that migrating to Japan would bring them a better future.. so the whole family, including the old Chinese woman all prepared to venture into the unknown, leaving their whole lives behind..

Towards the end, i keep hoping they would portray some sort of happy ending to both the stories. Maybe some kind people heard of Miss Li's plight and raised a fund for Yuri to stay with her until her last breath.. maybe they will show footage of the other Chinese foster mother adapting well in Japan... maybe.. maybe... but they didn't. The documentary ended with a group shot of the remaining 6 residents of the China-Japan Amity House.. still waiting for their foster children's homecoming.

I was touched by the documentary so much, it haunted me for a few days. I googled it up, but found no further information on the documentary other than it won the NHK Japan Grand Prix Prize in 2005. I wished that i could read about the whereabouts of Miss Li, Yuri and the other pair, i wished that i could read that they live happily ever after .. but i didn't. I guess real life doesn't work in that way..

I haven't prayed to God for a long time. But that night, i prayed hard to God that Miss Li would get her dying wish and wouldn't die as a lonely old woman.