Journey mercies

I forgot to check out the pictures my aunt sent me, which she took during Chinese New Year. A little late, but I thought I would still post them anyway.

Sigh... my best friend, the love of my life, Gurjeet Calais has flown Down Under to do her Masters for a year last Thursday, leaving me, her best friend and love of her life behind. This time, parting is so much more painful than when I left for UK.

Her message to me at the airport (I only saw her off from her house because I wasn't feeling well):


"I'm boarding now... don't call me. I love you... take care... bye."


I hate her choice of words. It sounds so... final. It makes it sound so... sad. She cried buckets of tears when she was leaving for the airport, and though I so valiantly tried to appear strong, ended up shedding some tears (alright, bawling!).

I miss my Guju Wuju already. Who's going to take me shopping (Ee Von, you're now my sole fashion guru)?! Who's going to go for afternoon movie dates with me?! Who's going to take me out for dinners to expensive restaurants and get me high on wine?! Who's going to tell me I look gorgeous and can compete with any models (sometimes)?!?! Who am I going to bitch with (thank God I still have Ee Von for this... kekeke)!?! Who's going to come and take me out for lunch during working days?!? Who's going to call me at random times to tell me she loves me?!?

I miss you sooooo much, Guju. *Sniff* I'll come find you soon. Bloody hell! Call me already!

The past few days, I've been waking up slightly late, about 8.30am, which is still early, I know, but I usually get up earlier than that. And when I woke up during those times, my head felt heavy so I knew my body wasn't feeling very well.

This morning, I woke up about 9am, and since it's a Saturday I thought I should pamper myself to a good rest but my head felt lighter this morning, which meant my body was feeling better, and well, for some reason it was protesting at me lying down anymore. So I got up, read the newspaper and surprised my mom for being up early, and surprised her even more after I disappeared and came back with paper towels and cleaning liquid. Since I have been diligently ignoring any house chores for the past two months, she didn't expect me to start cleaning the windows without being told to.

Then in the afternoon, my mom dragged me to go see some showcases because my sister wants to buy an apartment. Sheesh... I had to hang around at the showrooms for hours and pestered by my parents and my sis to consider getting one myself. I could literally feel a stone mask settling on my face and was emotionless when they dragged me around the showroom, with my arms folded across my chest.

There were many reasons why I did not want to buy a property yet, but since they didn't ask (persistently), I didn't share. I think I became even more stubborn when my dad was trying to convince me to purchase. I hate it when he tries to force me to do something and act flabbergasted at why I do not comply as if I was the most daft person on earth.

But good thing that my mother and sister decided not to push me too much and my mom slyly commented that I could have an 'ulterior motive' for not wanting to buy. Hmm... either that was a lucky guess or my mom does know me after all. I'm just surprised she didn't try prying.

All in due time I guess.

I am sick. And these days I can detect my sick days a lot more easily now. When I wake up late for work. Hehe... sick of work!

But this time round I really am. It's ironic. In my previous company, when I want to pretend I'm sick to stay at home and sleep, my mom would rudely wake me up and call my bluff. But now, when I want to go to work but can't wake up in time, my parents pretty much ignore me. Not even a quick question about why I'm still in bed! *Scratching head*

Of course, it could be because they see me working late into the night, it would only be natural for me to sleep in a little. And when I do wake up late sometimes, instead of wasting time getting ready to go to work and driving to the office, I literally snap my laptop open and start working in my pajamas. So maybe they are no longer suspicious of me waking up late as a sign of tardiness and laziness.

But yeah, I'm sick. My head feels heavy, my legs are weak, my cheeks are flushed and I can feel my throat itch. But still not sick enough to stop working though my pace has definitely slowed.

I'm gonna go to bed soon... after I get some work finished up. ;)

Shiva : We're going trekking this weekend...

Me : What?!?! And miss my Saturday morning sleep-in?!!?

Shiva : If you don't come... I will NEVER call you for a single thing ever again! And you were the one who asked me to organise this!

Me : *Grumbling to self* When I said organise an outing, I was thinking of walking in the air-conditioned shopping malls.


So a merry group of nine went for a morning trek to Chillin Waterfalls at Kuala Khubu Baru.





I'll never ever complain that there is nothing to do in Malaysia again. I also heard there is a place you can go, where you have to swim underwater through submerged pathways to reach some caves you can explore. Cool! And I thought Malaysia was a boring place to be in.

Before I went home from the office, I had drinks with my peers, two other guys from the management trainee batch, and another guy who was a contractor. And our topic inadvertently drifted to our work and we started comparing our managers and our work.

The BU we are all in breaks into five different teams, four of it the main tiers while the fifth one comprised of a tier that supported the main four (but less glamourous). One colleague commented once that those from our BU were considered as the superstars of the company, because the business was competitive and tough.

The interesting thing was, all of us, from myself who was considered aggresive and having the ability to speak eloquently and brimming with potential, to AT who shared the same status as 'the chosen' as it seems to be when it came to management trainees but who was part of the fifth tier, the contractor (who are unfortunately usually sidelined by the permanent personnel because of their temporary status), and finally to the one of the most popular guy around, who people were eyeing to reach the top ranks one day, felt that we were all part of the lowest rank of the food chain. And we were all sitting down there, sighing and frustrated.

Seems like I'm not the only one feeling glum and frustrated. Thank God.

The flip side of things. I'm getting to know my colleagues better. And one of them, during a recent business trip opened up and shared some pretty personal stuff. It was a surprise, but very humbling, for this colleague to share such things when I didn't know him very well. Which is the opposite of me, I find, because during the whole trip I kept the door tightly locked when it came to personal things.

But I'm finally reconciling with the fact that no matter how much I want to remain quiet about my relationship with God, it's somehow inevitable that I talk about it. Not that I'm ashamed of God and of my faith. But the memory of high school, the over-zealousness of my first love with God and the mockery of it, keeps me cautious. I don't doubt that God loved me for my love for Him and excitement then, but there is always this lingering doubt in my head that if I had been more level-headed, more wise, more mature about how I approached things. If I had only been more moderate, could it have stopped people from trying to avoid being touched by a zealousness that seemed so repugnant in its overbearingness. If I had only been more piquant than overwhelming.

So many ifs. God probably had His reasons, or maybe it was just who I was, or maybe it was meant to happen to be a reminder for the necessity to balance things.

At any rate, I find that to know me is to know of my relationship with God. It somehow always seems inevitable that someone will ask me if I am a Christian, or how did I know so-and-so, who is through the Christian circle, or about why I chose to stand by certain principles. It's in my blood, God defines me. And I am so strongly who I am because His goodness and holiness well and truly defines me.

It defines me a sinner.

Make that a sinner sitting in the lowest rung of the food chain.

I just got back from my business trip at 7pm, and found a bouquet of roses and lilies waiting for me in the office. It's the first time I'm receiving flowers from someone with romantic intentions! And I must say, despite having always thought that flowers was the most impractical gift of all, since they wither and die, I am very much humbled to say, I am a real female after all!

Flowers are a beautiful gift, and what is even more beautiful is the gift of a man's sincerity. I guess the flowers would have had little impact on me if I knew that the sender was one that was just trying to woo me to win as a trophy of his own pride. Then again, I won't be so quick this time to judge. But I guess the sweetness of this particular person's sincerity is particularly whelming.

Although... I wished I was actually in the office when the flowers were sent, so that its arrival and parading it in the office would have fed my ego. I would have then be able to hold my head high with the silent message to other girls, hah! eat your heart out!

But... I guess God would not have been pleased with that, so it was good that I only collected the flowers after the general office crowd had left. There were a number of bouquets lying in the office though, with the owners missing. I was tempted to leave my own bouquet so that people knew that I too had had flowers given to me on Valentine's Day. But I actually found myself more excited to bring it home, get this, for my mother!

I couldn't help think that the flowers would brighten up the living room once I had it in my mother's vase, and how pleased my mother would be at that. Hmmm... with the history in my relationship with my mother, such a reaction is... interesting, to put it mildly.

At any rate, when my colleague who was dropping me home saw me carrying my bouquet to his car, he questioned me in his usual dry manner, why I didn't leave it in the office to show to other girls that I also had the flowers. His words revealed to me that we shared the same conclusions of the bouquets that were left in the office by the other girls.

Let's see... maybe diamonds aren't as wasteful a money either...

It's a Sunday, and I'm at the East Coast for a business trip. It's been a 7 working day week for me after coming back from the Chinese New Year break. Phew... it's a personal record for me. I used to absolutely ABHOR working on weekends. My brain would just shut down and I could not go near work at all. Used to anyway.

Now it looks like I broke the threshold. If my ex-uni mates did not insist I join them for the final CNY dinner before Chap Goh Meh, I probably would have stuck my face in front of my comp for the rest of the weekend.

Stress level has shot up so high that I've even begun ignoring my mother. Even her usual jibes failed to bait me from my over-worked stupor, and only earned her a stony face glaring into the laptop and short grunts indicating to her that no other replies would be awarded to her. It was only when she took a nap in the afternoon yesterday and woke up hours later to find me still sitting in the same position with the same stressed face that she realised I was seriously over-working.

And since I am her daughter, who freakily mirrors her the most among her three children, she began to choose her moments and topics to ensure she got response from me. And when I say I mirror her, I'm not joking. I noticed I actually talk like her, have the same facial expressions, sit in the same position, slouch the same way, hold my chin in my hands like her, drive like her, sleep on the couch in the same position as she does, grouchy like her, use silence as a weapon like her, and well, a workaholic like her.

I got her to drop me at the office this afternoon to meet my other colleagues before we took off for the East Coast, and one of my colleagues went to ask her if she was worried because in his experience, there are parents who get worried too much (in my previous company, there were even parents who accompanied and waited for their kid's interview to be over... I don't know if it's just a Malaysian thing). And my mother proudly replied to my colleague that she understands, because she's in sales as well!

And when I say she says it proudly, it's not because she's proud of me, but because she's proud of herself. I know her that well. I say this all of course in utmost affection. My mom's been a great guru in my life, and believe me, it's taken us long and hard for us to get to this point.

Some pictures from the Chinese New Year week. I joined Yvonne, Daniel and Leo in Ipoh (pronounced as Ee-poh) with the other Ipoh people after my time in Taiping. We ended up going back to Taiping to visit the Taiping Night Safari! Sorry, limited pictures as I'm waiting for everyone else who had digital camera to supply me with pics. I know, I have to get myself one of those!

We took a visit to one of the many limestone caves in Ipoh, which most have temples built into them. The one we went to had a great landscape, with ponds filled with koi fish and jogging tracks.

"You're what?!!? What am I going to do without you?!?!"

"Your ex is getting married!!"

"Are you ok?"

"Just taking a break before I go back into Hotel California..."

"Remember what I said, you want me to commit suicide ah?!?"

"You know, you should drive your own life. You can do anything you want. If you want to work in UK or anywhere else you can do it today!"

"You know, I expected someone slightly older, with a belly and balding."

"I'll put on weight and shave my hair just for you next time..."

"Hmmm... are they blind or what?!"


Today seemed significant. It felt like a turning point. It felt life changing.

Back to the grind. Sigh. The one whole week off with just food, sleep, games, TV, family and friends have spoiled me terribly.

It was so HARD getting back to work.

I was so restless that I hardly got any work done and walked up and down to find different people who I would just normally message through our company's IM to get my work done (and get a bit of exercise as well). Figured I might as well go meet them to do some work PR while I'm in the mood (and burn some Chinese New Year flabs at the same time).

At least I got loads of work PR done today. Ended up going for a super long tea break with a colleague and barely half an hour getting back to office, left for dinner with another group of colleagues.

But you know... despite the slow and not very productive day I had in the office today, I still found myself enjoying work during the brief spurts of concentration on it. Freaky ain't it? And when I paid more attention to my colleagues than my work, I found I really began to bond with them and enjoyed the friendships that are beginning to take shape.

I know that last bit may sound a bit weird but bear in mind that I dislike being pretentious. If I don't like a person, I don't try to pretend I do and vice versa. If a person doesn't like me, guess I prefer them not to pretend to. Saves a lot more energy. Because of that I've taken a more cautious approach towards people in the last year or so, where I'm a lot more reserved these days.

Okok... I'll stop trying to justify myself. Just thought that you might be interested to get to know how my mind works, since you're reading my blog. :P

"We're here, we're here!! I can't believe we're back!!"

I remember shouting that when my mom drove my sister, brother, cousin and myself back to Taiping to our grandparent's home during our schoolbreaks. She would leave us there and head back home to KL while we spent our holidays with our grandparents. It was the best days of my life.

I love Taiping with all of my heart. I love it for all it holds for me. The memories of a great childhood, when the four of us would run about doing the craziest things. When I see my cousins who are at the age we were, I pity them because they hardly do anything without their parents or at least some form of adult supervision.

My grandma used to just let us do anything, from sitting outside the house burning candles till we were tired enough to call it a night ourselves, to running about and exploring the house and the compound alone with adult supervision only appearing during meal times. I remember we watched TV until late at night and when we were hungry, our grandma would cook maggi mee (instant noodles) for us and I could swear that she cooks it like no other. It always seemed more delicious eating food in my grandma's house.

So much sweet memories... but I think I'll keep most of them private and hidden in the recesses of my own memory. There are just some things too good to be shared with just about anyone, or even understood. This year's Chinese New Year was one of the best I've had in a long time, minus my maternal grandma's absence. Maybe it's because of it that I appreciated being in my paternal grandparents presence more.

Taiping was good. Really good.