Nothing that’s worthwhile is ever easy

Follow your heart, they said, but my heart is a liar that's totally disconnected from my mind. My mind knows exactly what I should feel, but my heart is a clueless idiot. It has no self-protection mechanism, no ability to judge. It lies to my mind, leaving me to think that I'm doing okay, but eventually, the truth comes out and I'm so far from the direction I know I should be heading. What a stupid mass of muscle tissues.

Have you ever tried so hard to forget someone that you mentally slap yourself when you let them cross your mind for even one second? You survive, weeks and months and years, but suddenly, they appear out of nowhere, physically and literally, and you just let all your guards down again. You say yes to every invitation, pulling on every single strain you've been building previously, and sometimes, you let them break. At the end, you realize you're vulnerable and alone, and you have to start from square one. You curse yourself for letting it happen, but deep down, you know that if you were given a second chance, you'll do the same thing all over again.

You have no idea how long it will take, but you're just hoping that one day, your heart won't race and you won't smile with this insanely huge amount of excitement when their names appear as the caller ID on your phone screen, or you won't be dying to eavesdrop when they talk to other people. You're just holding on to the tiny piece of faith that you're gonna meet someone, some day, that will make you feel the way they do, and that someone will feel the same way too.

This above all: to thine own self be true

Follow your heart, they said. 

'You must follow your parents and be a doctor, or at least a lawyer. No. Lawyers are not that well appreciated. You must be a doctor,' said somebody that I've never met my whole life till yesterday afternoon. I felt like standing up and tell her son to follow his mom and be a nosy bitch.

Who are you to tell me what I ought to do to my own life? Try walking into a house that's under renovation and tell the owner to paint the walls orange cuz you think it's the best color to suit the deco.  They'd probably give you the finger and call security and have you arrested. People can be so irritating sometimes. *grunts*

I am not overreacting. Try having random people telling you what to do with your life almost everyday. I swear you'll be fighting the urge to tear their faces off too. And apparently, most of my parents' friends sons of my age is aiming for medicine, which makes things 100% worse. (Or my mom, too, is just predicting that everyone who studies pure science for AL wants to be doctors.) I should really start interviewing them, starting from my neighbor, to proof to myself that people are really not that predictable.

Nobody expects a businessman's kid to go into business, or an accountant's child to take over his father's firm, but hell, it's compulsory for a doctor's daughter to be a life saver as well. All they see is the glamorous side of doctors walking in white coats with stethoscopes hung around their neck. Well, sorry to burst your bubbles, but my dad doesn't even have a white coat and he doesn't even bring his own stethoscope to the ward. And no, he doesn't do resuscitation everyday, or open patients up. He's the most reachable person in my contact list cuz his phone is never more than 5 feet away from him. When he gets a call at 3am, then he has to work at 3am. When we're halfway through dinner and some old chap collapse, he'll have to leave, with the car, and we call a taxi or just wonder around until everything is okay again. And he still can't tell me how to cure hiccups.

My point being... No, actually, there's no specific purpose of all this crap. I was just a wee bit angry at the auntie. And frustrated cuz my mom thinks that it's weird if none of her children inherits the medical gene. It's not even a freaking gene. It's passion and knowledge. You have the passion, you work hard and get into a med school and study and graduate, taadaah, you're a doctor. As simple as that. No rocket science. And it stops there, no need to carry it on to the next generation. 

The thing about typical old-fashioned Malaysian Chinese is that they don't believe in creativity or imagination. Children don't have the right to dream. Being astronauts or a ballerina is considered a childhood fantasy that expires once the kid 'grows up'. 

Who are you to take away somebody's dreams? Who are you to deny the possibilities? 

Every new beginning is another beginning's end

I'm not sure if I've used this as a post title before, but it's totally apt for this entry, so forgive me if its a repetition. 

Good morning and happy Friday! It's the last day of the semester, the start of a 2 weeks long holiday before a new semester begins. So here I am, typing away on my iPad in the midst of my breakfast, more like my desperate attempt to clear all my food, before walking to college for the final bio class of the semester.

The phrase 'time flies' is an understatement. It teleports. With a velocity so high that nobody even notices. I remember how Janice was a stranger living solo in her room when we first came into the unit. I remember how we went to the city to play until it was past 10. That's when the reality of being an A Level student was still a distance away.

I have never been so positive about the choices I've made, but I can confidently tell you that coming to study in MCKL was no mistake at all. I just learnt that we are probably the only unit in the residency that have dinner together everyday. We basically spend most our time in the common area until its bedtime. We study and laugh, and dinner normally takes 2 hours. I love spending time with these people, my sister from different parents. Be it laughing at Janice's lame jokes, or watching random animals videos with Carissa or debating about economics with Melissa ( She's an econs student and I don't know shit about the economy and I still do it anyway.), I know these will probably be the memories I remember most about this home when we leave for good.

Sometimes, when I'm back in Ipoh, I really miss our long dinners and everyones laughter. We have the most cheerful study time anybody can have. Like seriously. Being with them is never boring. You can trust them with your happiness, you really can. Buying somebody's favorite snack and, hiding it under her bed and drawing her a picture so she'll go search for it, I think it's something that only happens in our apartment. 

As for school ( yes I still call it school although college sounds cooler and stuff), I love it too, although I really dread double period maths and physics. Movies with the dudes after Friday classes, and sometimes 2 movies straight. Going to the arcade and watch them drive, playing laser tag and pool, these were all my first-times in my entire life. 

And to my driver, YAP WOEI CONG!!! (He made me edit and add his name in capitals.) THANK YOU! See! I said thank you, and dedicated a whole new paragraph to you. Thank you for your rides back home, to Sentral, to Publika, to Subang, to wherever we're gonna go in the future. (And he complained that his paragraph was so short -.-).

Oh crap my stuff is still all over the place and I have 5 minutes left. Bye people! In another 8 hours I'll be back in Ipoh again. Brining Shiloh to the vet later :)

We'll come clean

It's the first of June. About 2 weeks to be exactly halfway through year 2013. 1/3 way through college. Man time flies, like really flies. Just moments ago, I was loading half of my life into the trunk of my mom's car, ready to start all over in a familiar-yet-not-so-familiar city. Just moments ago, everything was full if excitement and adventure. Basically, I haven't really done anything epic that's worth being carved on a stone to be remembered forever. But I've met people that definitely made the to-be-carved list.

I don't know how I've gotten this far. I mean, sure, there were ups and downs. Tears and laughters, but this 5 months was really breezy. Like taking a walk along the beach. I had lots of fun, lots of love, lots of joy. If I were to live this 5 months again, I'll definitely do it. I can't say that I don't miss the town-life cuz I do. I really do. 

I miss having food all prepared, lying on the table when I come home. I miss walking out from the school gate and hopping into my moms car and be magically transported home. I miss being out all day without a phone and money (I'd panic if I realized I left my apartment without my phone now... -.-). And of course, I miss having a sister lying next to me, and talking to her until we both fall asleep. 

Since young, I hated sleeping alone. I've never wanted my own room. I've never complained about my sister leaving her stuff all over the place. To me, life is about waking up and seeing someone you love being asleep right beside you. Life is about having someone to wake you up when your alarm clock failed you. My sister throws temper when she wakes up later than planned, but I've never ever gotten annoyed by it. I find it funny, and I know I'll definitely miss everything when she grows up and learns to control her emotions. She'll always let me use the bathroom first when I'm late (or we just use it together) and help me make my bed (it's sort of a house rule). 

It sucks, knowing that from the moment I started another life in college, it's a one-way journey. I'm probably never going to live in my home permanently again. I'll come back during breaks, and stay here for the 3 months before university. I'll come home during summer breaks (If I don't study medicine, cuz if I do I'll probably have internships during summer.), and that short interval before finding a job, probably in a whole new place. But that's all. Honestly, I feel like crying every time I think of this.

Back to the past 5 months, I won't say it was the best time of my life, probably cuz being my own maid isn't fun at all. But I've grown a lot. Really. I can handle so much more now, without having the tension stretching me inside out. I've learned to appreciate, to let go, to forgive and forget. I've learned to laugh, to be happy, although the situation isn't perfect. I've learned to give, and to want less, to have hope, and to deal with disappointment without losing faith. I think I've probably changed the most, the steepest gradient on my graph of change against time. 

To those that were right beside, behind, around me for the past 5 months (and 17 years), thank you so much. Even if your presence brought frustration or harm, happiness or love, thank you so much for making me grow. But to be honest, the people I've met since January 2013 were great. They made me feel glad that I insisted on not going to Taylor's. I can't guarantee that I wouldn't have a better life there, but I know I wouldn't swap them for anything. I love where I am now, and I love the fact that I love it (Love-ception omg!!!). 

So yeah, happy June. And may you have the time of your life.