Love Thy Neighbour

This is an ironic entry after the "Human Onion", but one must vent.

I live in a typical double-storey terrace house, without two cats in the yard..but unfortunately with limited parking spaces for a family with three cars.

Now I don't know about you, but from where I come from (which is just about 4 states and 7 houses all over Malaysia..) there is an unwritten but widely understood code which transcends race and religion when it comes to parking vehicles outside one's house:

Rule #1: The space in front of your house, i.e. your frontage is yours to park at even if it is technically "Kerajaan" land (same principle with people planting rambutan trees and the like outside their gates, no?)

Rule #2: If that space is left EMPTY (ha..now it gets tricky), neighbours/guests/strangers are welcome to park their vehicles there...or are they?

Being Malaysians and the muhibbah people that most of us are..I would say you can park there for as long as the person LIVING THERE clearly does not need that space for their vehicles. YES there is a first-come-first-served practice to a certain extent, but if we all kept that up persistently, where would we be? We would have people walking 10 roads away to the least inhabited/most haunted street to pick up their vehicles, and why?

Because their own street is cluttered with cars belonging to the guy with one Mercedes in the porch, another one on his frontage and his brother's Wira on his neighbour's. For the past six months...and counting.

In short, it is a matter of common sense. If you have one house, don't go and buy 5 cars la bruder! (Goodness knows you have money to buy another house!) And if you somehow end up with 5 cars...don't have to park them all outside your house right dude! Try the taman, the tasik..or the closest junkyard.

And this to my neighbour.. having a race with you daily to park on my OWN frontage is not my idea of constructive competition. Which was what we argued with him about a year ago. Which he responded to last Sunday by pulling up right behind our car when my parents were parked temporarily outside our gate, causing us to not be able to budge. Let me be petty for a minute and show you what I mean:

A rather ugly argument ensued I will admit, to which his grand contention was..."You can reverse your black (Kembara) car. I am parking on my frontage". Breathe..and count to 10. The narrow-minded and sempit-hearted ones can be so unreasonable that even poor Logic, forget Human Decency can't seep through their saturated pores.

He is migrating to Australia at the end of this year on grounds of a better education system overseas. "Uneducated people are like that" we heard him tell an onlooking neighbour last Sunday evening. If he represents good education, then good riddance I say and hope fellow Malaysians agree. He truly does not deserve this country.

The Human Onion

Shrek was right. People are like onions, they have layers. Sometimes there are so many that even the person him/herself has yet to fully discover what they look like holistically. Some people I think, never ever really find out.

I always believe that there is a reason behind the way people act, and the things they do. Behaviour often boils down to one’s happiest and darkest experiences, upbringing (yes, I will admit this after 25 years of living), and surroundings - note to Singaporeans: walking from one end of Orchard Road to the other end is NOT horrifically far.

It really is tricky, this behaviour thing - it catches you just when you are not looking, and gives you away. Can’t take the village out of the girl, the village just keeps on “shinin’ rite through”…a chorus to a bad song.

But. With the old "human onion", you get surprised sometimes. Not every layer is the same! Sometimes people learn and they grow, and they get better. Sometimes it’s just a blind spot - big as a dinner plate, but still, a blind spot.

You just really have to take the time to peel the whole thing through to be able to say “oh..it looks like this actually..”. And as with all of God’s creatures, when you put all the layers back together again, it will make sense and it will be..acceptable, if not beautiful after all. So to those who push my wrong buttons at times; the elitists, the name-droppers, the One Who Speaks Too Much In The Loo, the shamelessly-oblivious…maybe we just haven’t spent enough time. In all honesty, I am not sure that I want to spend more time with each and every one of you.

But in the mean time before we decide, I will take a good friend’s advice and let it slide.. (truly, the male mind is a wonderfully forgiving thing in its opaqueness)

Peace to all this weekend.

quote of the day

" Two feet on the ground, one head in the clouds "

-me-

the perfect job

My idea of a perfect job is as a Travel Channel host (preferably Globe Trekker, because I just simply love that program).

Why is this a perfect job?

1. Travel, travel and travel - ze world zis my oyster!
2. It's relatively safe - although travellers are often featured alone in potentially dodgy places..there's always a crew with them, remember? I finally realised that that's how all the food that they feature on such shows (you know the ones where one person gets served like a 10-course meal) gets finished...ahh..
3. It's a good deal - you get PAID to travel AND no more hotel bills :)
4. You get to tell everyone in the world (who is watching, that is) about what's great about the place that you are at from your point of view (this could be a double-edged sword of course, if you can't find anything great about the place you are at).. and
5. Your job is pretty much one amazing recording of your life..how many of us will get to tell our grandkids while watching videos "look kids, that's me in marrakesh"?

5takes (have you seen it? it's not as good as globetrekker i think but alrite as well) is hiring right now..see http://www.travelandlivingasia.com/5takes/season2/join5takes/index.shtml

And why am I not jumping at the opportunity yet?

Because.because.and because.

:) see you on the other side when i find out.

Blind faith and the World Cup

There is no such thing.

From not knowing a thing about the World Cup and its teams to one tutorial on "seeds" and "groups", I have been betting with my boyfriend - sans success..twice!

So much for rooting for the underdogs.

Match #1: Iran vs Portugal
Iran - 0
Portugal - 2

i had a 1.5 ball-handicap (god knows if this is the right term...yes yes laugh insanely) on this game, which led me to buying breakfast on saturday. thanks, iran.

Match #2: Switzerland vs Togo
Switzerland - 2
Togo - 0

in a "never say die! but do put some handbrakes in place" fashion, i put another bet on this game..with a whopping 2.0 ball handicap. According to ns, 0.5 of that was already a "girlfriend premium" after much pestering (i.e. the handbrakes) as apparently NO ONE gives so much handicaps on a World Cup match (alrite, alrite, keep your hat on baby..)

Macam itu pun tak menang! Goodness, what does a girl have to do?

Oh well, considering i had to ask around like 5 times (togo vs who again, afti?) before getting the facts right for this entry (yes i forgot who were the teams playing although it was just yesterday)...maybe it's time to put a halt to this under-educated betting.

But it would just be you know, a real triumph to pick an obscure team out of the blue and have them win against all odds. Not so much in a diamond-in-the-rough-team triumph, but rather the unanticpated-wild-guess-wow!i won! type of triumph.

should have gone for america.

keep the aspidistra flying - george orwell

This is what i am currently reading. It is incredibly depressing, but yet written so well that you can't put it down. In fact, it is incredibly depressing BECAUSE it is written so well.

It gets under your skin and in your head and suddenly you are living the thoughts of the protagonist, in this case a fledgling poet battling severe cases of anti-capitalism, male ego and an inferiority complex the size of China (this is all my humble opinion, btw).

Not that I am a male egoist nor anti-capitalism..helo i have a car sticker which advocates retail therapy, but...there are definitely moments where i identify with the writer about going on doing things that depresses you, but you do it anyway out of habit/fear of looking foolish/ simply fear of not having done the alternative before (see Chapter 4 on the bit about him not going into the pubs). Point being, all the fear is in your head - actually that's where most of a person's biggest obstacles are anyway, don't you think?

My sister does not understand why I bother with such books because they are so painfully real they give you heartburn after reading them. But that is exactly why i bother, and love George Orwell's stuff - clarity, which is so important, and finally something i can say "yes, i totally agree" to.

I found a website with an online version of the book (check out www.george-orwell.org/Keep_the_Aspidistra_Flying/0.html if you are interested heheh..)

An excerpt i find memorable; this is Gordon Comstock (the protagonist) describing his lower-middle class family:

"It was not MERELY the lack of money. It was rather that, having no money, they still lived mentally in the money-world--the world in which money is virtue and poverty is crime. It was not poverty but the down-dragging of RESPECTABLE poverty that had done for them. They had accepted the money-code, and by that code they were failures. They had never had the sense to lash out and just LIVE, money or no money, as the lower classes do. How right the lower classes are! Hats off to the factory lad who with fourpence in the world puts his girl in the family way! At least he's got blood and not money in his veins."

liberating thought, isn't it?

what shall we do this weekend?

from discussion with several couple-y friends, there seems to be a consensus that THERE IS NOTHING TO DO IN PJ on weekend dates.

apart from the oneutama-midvalley routine, that is.

of course, one could always be a leetle more cultured/intellectual and visit like the national science centre, museum, watch theatre etc etc...but for the less motivated people (like myself and boyfriend, heheh)..here's a couple of easy-peasy date ideas that can be re-used and re-cycled fairly successfully - yes we have tried them!

note to nice young men devoid of first-date ideas: personally, these would make fairly good first impressions if i may say so myself..have a go and cross your fingers :)

1. Flea market shopping - the one at The Curve which runs during daytime on Saturdays and Sundays is AMAZING. Truly, good selection, good prices and quite a few finds which are not your run-of-the-mill made in china or korea stuff.

2. Sushi and dvd - rent a dvd and pot at home with takeaway sushi. Jaya Jusco at One Utama has a really yummy selection.

3. Nice long breakfasts - somewhere to stretch your legs, read the papers or look into each others' eyes (whichever fits your situation more), eat good food and enjoy the morning. i would suggest pizza uno at centrepoint bandar utama if you don't mind paying for a wholesome brekkie.

4. Jigsaw puzzles - fun way to bond and inexpensive as well! Word of caution about puzzles though...choose the illustration carefully, or you may wind up with an undone piece of artwork left in the living hall till kingdom come, with either you or your other half tearing the other's hair out, depending on whose house the puzzle is left in.

5. Board games - while kind of reminiscent of high school and not exactly uber-cool in certain circles, this can be really fun especially when friends are included. Yippee Club in One Utama (bubble tea place at the old wing near TGV) is quite good for this but unfortunately the games are only placed in the enclosed smoking area (why is this dear Yippee Club Management? tsk tsk..) Alternatively, i guess you could bring your own not-too-rowdy games to not-too-fussy coffee places for an evening of fun...just don't be the kiam-siap type that only order one drink la k?

ha..itu saja untuk hari ini,kawan kawan. please do share any other inspired weekend ideas - i am sure there's more to life than trawling shopping centres.

p/s: Forever 21 just opened recently in one utama ladies, and it's got really fun clothes :)

in the beginning

one of the reasons for this is to make a mark on the "virtual society" as currently i am googled as an asian restaurant chain in the States, which is somewhat impressive yet depressing.

another is to join the little club of mushrooming bloggers (yes, i realise this has been done for a million years already) at the workplace - hello ladies!

another is to try out this "bare your soul on the internet" business which currently feels rather strange since a) there isn't really an audience if your purpose is to be self-absorbed and b) if there is an audience, you may not really know who they are and that's kind of like hanging your diary out to dry.

so. i guess it is a roadtrip of sorts, and therapy of others. my thoughts to share..and the challenge as always, is to keep them just mine.

welcome all.