To the Queen of My Heart

“舒怡来！帮我拔白头发。”

I would joyfully take the red firetruck wooden box, which is supposed to be a holder for children cassette songs, hop behind mummy's back and rest both my arms on mummy's shoulder. I would run my tiny fingers through her thick black hair. Flipping here, flipping there. Letting my fingers go on an adventure through the thick forest of her hair to hunt for the white witch that has to be found, prosecuted and exiled away from mummy's scalp.

When my fingers finally lay on a wicked white witch, I would slide it in between two of my fingers from the tip of the white witch right down to its root, to make it stand out from the others. Then, I'd curl it around my index finger. After having made sure that I have a good grip of it, I'd take a breathe and 'pluck!', there goes the white witch off the scalp and into the firetruck.

Although I always get the same answer, I would brush my fingers lightly on the spot where I have uprooted the white witch, and ask mummy,

"Painful?"

"Nolah, not a bit."

A smile would draw across my face, before starting another adventure.

As the years pass, the adventures became less challenging. Opposed to that, the number of white witches in the firetruck compared to the year before would be more.

Until mum would say,

"Still got ar?"

As the years go by, slowly I learn to only prosecute the very outstanding, obvious white witches without venturing deeper in the layers of her hair. And then I would declare joyfully,

"That's all mum! I can't find anymore."

Not wanting to make her feel old with more and more white witches residing on her scalp.

But today, I won't have those adventures anymore.

Mummy: "I have Obama's hair!!"

We would all give a belly laughter. And I would.. gently pull off her head scarf revealing her newly grown hair. Soft like a baby's that carpets her scalp, I would.. brush my hands all over it, feel the tenderness of the hair under my palm...

..and smile.

头发长出来了！雨过天晴了！

Toast to your undefeatable strength, to your humongous courage, to your unfading love and your everlasting beauty.

Happy birthday mummy!

~♥~

I love you!

Crossroad.

15 minutes from now.


I don't know what to expect.

But then maybe there won't be any crossroads.

*silent scream*

~~

It's okay honey, God is and will be with you, always.

Update: I was not offered JPA. =)

For you. =)

Fyi, that's me dad on facebook.

There. That's my decision.

Byebye matriculation.

Missing Punctuation

I got

Tahniah! Anda telah ditawarkan ke Program Matrikulasi, Kementerian Pelajaran Malaysia.
Nama:	LIM SHU YI
No Kad Pengenalan:	910604*******
Program Pengajian :	PROGRAM SATU TAHUN
Kursus:	M001-SAINS
Nama kolej:	15-KOLEJ MATRIKULASI LABUAN (KML)
Tarikh Mendaftar:	11 MEI 2009

matriculation

Note that there is no punctuation. I don't know whether it should be an exclamation mark or a full-stop.

nyehehe.

Postcards from Far Away

If you're reading this, it means that I have successfully hit the 'publish post' button without deleting all I have written as I did for the past few update attempts since the last post.

Feels like months ago since the last post, considering all the events that happened in this short period of time. There were so many things that I wanted to write about, to be remembered and make me go 'did this really happen??' in future.

SPM results. (i know. ages ago. doh.) Followed by all the head cracking decisions, hustle bustle scholarship applications, to interviews.

Taking one step at a time. | Borneo Highlands
[That's dumdumb peeking out from my pocket =P]

After a gazillion trips to the school to certify certificates and stuff, I'm really starting to miss school. The whole routined life with friends and all the little crazy nonsense in between.


Apart from missing friends especially stewpid loh loh wence far far away in peninsular who hasn't got his landline yet, I'm not complaining. I'm gonna fully enjoy the luxury of lying in bed, suddenly remembering there's laundry in the washing machine to hang. staring idly at all the colourful little stick notes on my wall, and a daily dose from Val of her new busy busy busy school life, secretly enjoying the fact that I'm still free to do what I like to do. hehe

----

Note : I found the piano scores for 'postcards from far away'!!! weee!!!

A Slice of Joy

Mum: Do you and koko fancy pizzas?
me : Err....okaylah.
Mum: Wanna go eat pizza?
me : *freeze* (we seldom eat pizza u see, and that coming from mum is kinda rare)
err.... sure!! but... why?
Mum: (watching asian food channel) I feel a sudden crave for pizzzza. *giggles*

~~~

Pizza Hut.
I looooove their tropical chicken pizza!! *winK*

Dumdumb

Introducing.... dumdumb!!!
hahaha

It's the polar bear I'm referring to.

Dad bought it for me from an airport sometime ago. You see, its eyes are barely visible. Which makes it so adorable and cute!!

But daddy would always pick it up and say,

"You should trim the fur above its eyes. It doesn't look bright at all!! It looks....dumb. Like you.".

And so, its name he gave.

dumdumb.

All these photos were taken out of boredom in Borneo Highlands. It rained bah. Got nothing to do, so I decided to make it an indoor dumdumb photo shooting day. *grins*

cheeeese!!

Frozen in Time

Have you ever wondered how nice it would be to be able capture a moment and jump into it whenever you want to?

Borneo Highlands - 30th Jan 2009. Photographer : ember

***

This is one of those moments.

***

This is one of my favourite photos taken in Borneo Highlands. Reward photo from koko for carrying his tripod all around. :p

The title? I initially wanted a livelier colour for this photo, but my brother thought this would be perfect for a 'frozen in time' feeling.

I'm happy.

weee~

=)


-------------------

Footnote : Happy birthday Agnes!! *for shouting out loud* (=

Birthday Boys

Happy Belated 18th Birthday to the two very different guys!! hahaha

Thanks for being part of my life. Thanks for all the thoughtful moments, thanks for the poem, the soup, the chocs, the jokes, the wise words, the crazy moments, the teases, the company and most of all, the memories together, that made my days better than all other days!!

Dear John and kwangyan,

Happy 18th Birthday!!!!!!!

Tears are Contagious

Nope. I don't know whether they do but not as in tears bring disease as what I am trying to relate here. Tears are contagious. I know Val would be hitting me with all the 'no, I don't agree' when she reads this, coz she's a no-crying-business girl. XD But at least it's always true for my case.

As soon as we arrived at the airport this afternoon, daddy said to me in a nostalgic voice, "Mummy must be feeling very sad". Seeee.. call me emotional, I got it from dad.

A knot started to form a little in my throat but I got rid of it. I told myself it's no biggie, it's not that we're not gonna meet again. And I definitely didn't want to make it such a sad parting.

We headed to the check-in counters to .. check-in of course. Since it was still early, we all hanged out outside the departure entrance for a last moment together for this trip.

Then time's up. They've got to go means they've got to go. Waipo [grandma] started to teared as she hugged mummy. Hastily telling all the 'don't ....' and the 'remember ah..'. Every mothers' tradition upon parting. Tears started to well up in my eyes as I felt the powerful love of a mother who'd care and love unconditionally and would never stop worrying about their children and always hoping the best for them.

Waipo hugged dad, then my brother, until it was finally my turn. Waipo gave me a heavy hearted look, and said what every adult would say to a kid :

“舒怡，要乖乖哈！”

She squeezed me tight. She was so full of tears that I could feel my shoulders wet. At this point, I could no longer hold back my tears. They just carefreely streamed down my cheeks. There were so many things I wanted to tell her. I wanted to tell her how amazing I think she is. I wanted to tell her how thankful and blessed we all feel to have had her around. I wanted to ask her to come back again after the new year. But my throat was so tight I couldn't even blurt a proper 'byebye'.

As we see them off into the imigration counters through the glass dividers, my brother gave me a hard pat on the back, "hoi, pull yourself together!". And I was like, yep, even mom isn't crying. Why am I always the only one left with tears. ish.

If waipo wasn't so teary in the first place, I might have successfully leave the airport without a tear in the eye.

That's why I say, I think I'm allergic to tears.

Note: Photos above were taken by my brother. :)

My Sister-in-law

My brother was commenting about his new DSLR being put on the floor in its bag.

"Oh no.. Why is it on the floor??", in his most worried voice. "It must be dad. How if someone steps on it?"

"It's much better than falling from a table.", I said, nonchalantly.

"Nolah. Imagine this."
He posed with his leg stepping on an imaginary thingy. With his added sound effect, "K-k-k-k-krush!!"
"Oh so heart breaking!"

"How about this," I said, "'thud!' and 'priak!!'".

"Arrrgh ...it's equally heart breaking!!! ", he shrieked.

This thingy right, is my bro's new wife. :)

Muted

Psssssst!! I 've got something to tell you...
But you've got to listen reaally closely.

DO YOU HEAR ME??

no?
nevermind.

2008 Recap

It has been a ____ year.

I can't exactly find a word to fill in that blank. I welcomed this year full of enthusiasm. Can't help of a little bit of the superstition, for the fact that is a '08' year, I believed that it was a good year in store for me. Perhaps partly also as a motivation for my major exam. So did God thought it was a good year for me to grow I guess, He threw me aplenty of tests, but none that I was able to pass without lots of negativity.

The emotions now are overwhelming and especially amplified now that I have reached the end tail of the year.

It is the time we look back and reflect upon the whole year. I have not achieved anything solid. I have been wasting time on dwelling on trivial matters, round and round the garden, heading nowhere. Sad to say, of all 17 years since being born on earth, this year is the most unfruitful year of all. My sense of accomplishment is near zero.

All the ups and downs, with God's grace, God let me fall but held out a helping hand for me to stand again. However, I got too caught up with the bad rather than the good that I became a selfish, arrogant, self-centered hermit crab. Hiding from one hole into another. I snapped. I hid. I ran. I escaped. Until God say it was enough. I was too submerged into my own world that God had to give me a good knock in the head.

Those were expensive lessons and I mean it. I guess sometimes we just had to wait til catastrophe hits only will we be awaken huh?

I have realised it does not need to take what we did to ruin things, but rather even what we did not do would cause irreversible damage.

So, if I were given a chance to live 2008 again, I would not want God to take away my problems, but I'd rather live them all over again and deal things with wisdom, humility and courage.

Yes I got the message.+.+

She mentioned about the analogy Uncle Robert told her that day.

You can't swim. You are about to be drowned.
Water up to your height, leaving the tip of your nose gasping for air.
Then someone came by and said something to you.
That instance, it was as though the words went pressing you further down into the water.
+.+

***

We had a little casual group conversation last night. To reflect upon how we have been living our lives lately. She reminded us of God's great protection last year. The car accident. That nearly took our lives. We were liberated from that bloody incident. She made us think why. She reminded us of our family's condition.

She shared what she read, and what she had learn during the past 3 months. I intently listened, nodded, listened. She'd pause and look at me once in a while, repeatedly ask me "do you get what I mean?". I know very well what was the message she was trying to carry across. Still, all I could do was just nod.

Until she had to ask the question that hit me real hard. "Do you feel the seriousness of the condition of you and your family right now? Because I do."

She didn't have to scream through my ears. That question slapped me real hard. The inner conflict in me started to build up until I could no longer suppress. It was as though having tonnes of bricks on my back, struggling hard to stand again.

***

It is always the issue of : 'balance your time!' . 'Give yourself time for God!'
I know. I know. Yes, I do. Do you hear me? I KNOW!!!

***

She just had to bring it up when I'm gona have Sejarah test tomorrow.
She knows I'm sitting for this huge test end of this year.
A test that I am expected to do well.
She could have tell me some other days.
No, honey. She was just being real concerned.
...
Yeah, I know.

***

I'm not lost. I know what I am facing. I know what I am lacking. I know what I am supposed to do. I've got to persevere.

No, I don't know what to do. I don't know. Somebody!! pick me up!! I'm lost!!

Silent Plea

Dear God,
Please help me fathom the things I don't understand.
Please help me be grateful for the things I despise.
Please give me courage to face the nodes of life.
Please give me strength to pass your tests.
Please give me the will to continue.
Please give me the faith to always stay by You.


Thank you very much, God!