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Disclaimer - Everything on this website is done pretty much without thinking. Any offence or mental disturbance resulted in interacting with this website and its author is completely unintentional and sadly regretted.

Some posts were lost when pitas broke down.

Thursday, October 23, 2003

05:50 a.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

More on Marriage

My elder sister's solution to How Tariq should Tell His Parents that He Wants to Marry Me:

"Parents, I have good news and bad news.

"The bad news is that Hani's pregnant.

"The good news is that I was lying, but I want to marry Hani anyway!"

Tariq has concluded that my family is very evil.

But he says he still wants to marry me anyway.

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031023

Wednesday, October 22, 2003

12:10 a.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

More problems with groupmates

It has been a very exciting two weeks, and I wish I could have blogged all about it earlier. Unfortunately, beloved pitas had drive problems.

Let's start with last Monday, around five in the afternoon. One of my Consumer Behaviour groupmates calls me up. We had an essay due that Friday, and I thought he was going to ask a question on the part that he was writing, or something like that.

Turns out, he told me that he had already written an essay individually and he will not be working with my group for the essay due on Friday. I was shocked, but accepting. "Okay, but tomorrow, bring the stuff you researched for our essay, because your part is crucial," I told him.

Unfortunately, the next day, he told my other groupmate that he forgot to bring the stuff. My groupmate and I had half of Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and half of Friday, to write a ten-page essay that took us three weeks to research. Without the crucial part that the asshole forgot to give us.

So we wrote a different essay altogether, in record time, and handed the damned thing forty minutes after it was due. I neglected all my other assignments to get the damned thing done, so this week I'll be rushing and playing catch-up with all my other assignments too.

I'm proud of myself. A year ago, under these circumstances, I would have just given up and failed the semester. This time around, I've actually managed to get the work done, regardless of how hard it has gotten.

Now, I'm gonna reward myself by catching up on the sleep I haven't had since that asshole abandoned his groupmates at the last minute.

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031022

Thursday, October 16, 2003

07:12 p.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

90% of your mind is gullible

Things are mostly tedious work. Piles of survey results inserted into computer. Piles of net-surfing for essay-content. Piles of informant-harassing for presentation-content.

I'm trying to focus only on getting things done, and ignoring the consequences of failure.

I spent RM50 attending a motivation talk. It was worth every sen. In an amusing, hobbit-like manner (minus pointed ears), the fantastic Skip Ross explained that the unconscious mind can't tell the difference between truth and make-believe. Practicing driving or playing basketball in your mind results in the same skill as doing actual practice or play (minus the muscle-build, obviously). So when you imagine failure, you result in failure.

Well, that's my version of a summary. I'm not as good at explaining things as Skip Ross. Anyway, what he said made me realize that the more I dwelt on how difficult it was to do things, the more difficult they actually got. So now, I'm filling my head with images of me actually doing positive, productive things in positive, productive manner.

So far, it's working! I need to go for motivational talks more often!

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031016

Wednesday, October 15, 2003

12:51 p.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

The Usual Panic

My final exams are a lot more important and urgent than a wedding. First exam is on the 28th, and the second, a weird take-home essay, is assigned on the 31st, to be returned by November 3rd. The final exam is somewhere in November.

In the meantime, I have a group-written essay due Friday, two presentations next week, and the Marketing Research report. Who cares about weddings when I want to murder am ex-groupmate for going solo four days before our incomplete essay is due?

To top it all off, I have insomnia, where I can't fall asleep any earlier than 3a.m. despite exhaustion! I'm too tired late at night to get any coherent work out of me either. What is it with me, stress and insomnia?

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031015

Monday, October 13, 2003

10:46 p.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

I'm getting married!

My mother has apparently decided that it is no longer necessary for me to graduate from university before marrying. Yesterday, she has decreed that Tariq has to marry me when he comes back, or I'm not allowed to see him anymore.

After a lifetime of being taught that one should enter a marriage only when one has income of one's own, this sudden about-face disturbs me somewhat. I have so many questions in my head.

Where are we supposed to live? Am I to live off my boyfriend's (oops--husband's!) fresh-graduate income? Must I really go through all those first-married-year fights while trying to pass college? What are Tariq's parents going to say?

Then again, all these questions are superficial nonsense. You can bet that once we talk to both sets of parents, we'd find out the answers soon enough. Both sets of parents love strongly suggesting their children's lifepaths.

You know, all this time, I've been talking of marrying Tariq eventually. The idea that the wedding might actually be soon is a bit daunting. I had gotten so used to the idea that my life won't be changing in any way until after I've gotten my degree.

A part of me feels ecstatic. Finally, finally, finally! No more guilt! No more desperate horny frustration! No more missing Tariq!

Yet part of me knows there's no way this is going to be easy. There are too many issues that have been temporarily put aside that will surely rear up with the formalization of my relationship with Tariq. Every year Tariq and I have been together has been stormy. You think our wedding will be smooth sailing?

More likely that I'll get high distinctions for every subject I take from now on.

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031013

Sunday, October 12, 2003

10:57 p.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

Natural Rider

The last time I went horse-riding was in New York. It was a UNIS weekend class trip to a horse ranch.

We had to climb on platforms before we could reach the stirrups to climb onto the horse. Then the horses moved in a single line, following each other on our pre-determined trail, led by a horse rancher.

All the ranchers taught us before heading onto the trail was pull reins left to go left, pull reins right to go right, and pull reins towards you to stop. I wasn't even sure how to get the horse to move! That wasn't a worry, though, because the horse just followed the horse in front of it.

I remembered a few horse-riding tips I had read in my romance novels. (Yes, you learn all sorts of things in romance novels.) Keep your back straight. Keep your heels down. Many of my classmates were afraid, while on the horse. Me, I loved it.

The horse is so big and strong. I felt so safe on it. Its gait was soothing and it amazed me to be on another living creature. Then I started getting the hang of the reins, and I managed to guide the horse away from mud patches, and to slow it down when I wanted to look around the trail. A rancher told me I was a natural and I should take horse-riding lessons. That pleased me.

Admittedly horses stink, and the various horses would defecate right where they stand. Since we were all in single file, more often than not, we got to see various horses shit. Some of my classmates were quite loud in their protest.

Me, I wish I could have stayed with the horse longer, to get to know it better. It was so fascinating to communicate with it without using a single word. It's so strange how I felt like it listened to me, though I never said a word.

I was a lonely girl, and in those days, I didn't have the ability with words I do now. It was nice to have someone to talk to without saying a word.

I've always wanted to go horse-riding again. Maybe, someday, I'll have the money for lessons. That would be very nice.

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031012a

Sunday, October 12, 2003

01:54 a.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

Are you going to rape me?

Recently, Tariq has been gaming online as a girl. I won't tell you what game or his identity. Let online gamers out there worry a little. My poor boy is apparently a very attractive online female, and lots of guys have been hitting on him. He says it frightens him, since he knows exactly what's on their minds, being that my boy, himself, is a male.

It left me pondering on the fact that I am not afraid of men hitting on me. I do recall a point in my life when I was afraid of men being interested in me.

In the olden days when I wore Extremely Skimpy Clothing, I used to be terrified of guys hitting on me, because I knew I had no legal leg to stand on. You just know that if some guy comes along and rapes you when you're skimpily dressed, he'll pull that "she was asking for it" card.

Somewhere between then and now, I just got used to shrugging off the sexual interest of the men all around me. Hell, nowadays, I count the amount of guys who check me out. It's amusing!

I have no clue how I got from Point A to Point C. There doesn't seem to be a Point B anywhere in the middle. Maybe it was really gradual. Tariq suggested that I just got used to guys drooling at me so often, that I stopped being scared. After all, day in, day out, after so many years of being an object of sexual lust, and I've yet to be raped or even stalked!

I think, that though I refuse to be frightened of silly men with one-eyed hard heads, I should be a little more wary than I have been lately. No harm comes of being just a little more careful.

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031012

Saturday, October 11, 2003

11:14 p.m. Kuala Lumpur Standard Time

Another Nappy-Eww

I paid a little visit to my new nephew at the hospital. For now, we're calling him Mohammad Baby, as the parents are still being indecisive about his name.

When I first arrived, it was just the baby and his parents in the room. I got to hold the baby for quite a while, and he just slept quietly. Then Tina came with her friend.

Tina is a cruel aunt, she is. She wanted to hear the baby's voice, so she made him cry. He gave one wail, and went right back to sleep.

Later, after his father re-swaddled the baby boy in a pink blanket, I held the baby again, and I got to see his open eyes for the first time. He sneezed twice, and looked at me like I'm really strange. His face is so wrinkled and wizened, and the way the pink blanket hooded his head made him look like a small, old Jedi.

While Afiq is a warrior and Adam is a prince, my new and nameless nephew seems to be a sorceror. Then again, I'm being fanciful. He's only two days old, after all. Only time will tell if I'm right. Then again, with Afiq of the Tiger and Adam of the Dragon as brothers, what else could a Baby of the Goat be?

Be honest.
Link to the start of entry: #20031011a