*eyes still slightly glazed* I’ve just put down Memoirs Of A Geisha. I’ve been seeing that book in the stores for years now and all it took was the Geisha-hype to make me pick up the book. Definitely one of the best reads in a looong loooong while. Now I can’t wait to see the movie! I know it’s just fiction, but just imagine! A book on your life!
It does make me wonder..what kind of story could I possibly write about me?
I don’t fall into a particular category of people as specific as Sayuri is with her Geisha community. Well,oh!! I’ve actually written one before. Hahahahaha. Memoirs of A National Service Trainee. But that was short lived! Perhaps another more long term category that I belong to. Memoirs Of A Dental Student will probably only be bought by my parents just because they love me so much. Let’s put passion into the picture and think.. OH! Memoirs of A Blogger! Hahaha. A diary about a diary.
A story about a girl who creates situations for herself so that she has something to share. It’s true, okay? I put myself into situations knowing clearly well that it’ll make a good story to tell. “Something to tell the grandchildren about,” I always say after a peculiar incident.
Haha..man, that Geisha book had me enchanted for a total of four days. I know it’s a relatively long time for someone to read a book, but I had to study for my upcoming assessment as well. Which explains why I stop studying at 2am and then indulge in Memoirs Of A Geisha until 4am.
It was such a night again last night. I stumbled into class to the front row and since we were late, the entire class had nothing to do but look at us as we descended the steps to our seats. Since the flip tables on our chairs were so freaking small in area and me being me had so many files and loose papers and notebooks and my waterbottle with it’s ever infamous affinity for gravity, could never quite settle down in class gracefully.
So in I would swagger into the class after my long night of fiction indulgence….anyone would have thought I was suffering from a hangover. Today, all my things kept falling to the floor in front of my lecturer(the one who called my friend ugly?) and I think I muttered, “fuck”. It’s really annoying because the things don’t just fall to the ground, but down the next step and so forth. He must have caught side of the blackness of my face for he announced to the entire class, “It’s one of those mornings where women have their pre-menstrual syndrome,” and he gave that smile of his which suggested that he was the best comedian there ever was.
The class gave a soft chorus of giggles that rippled through which annoyed me really. Because it was the type of giggle given to someone who was to be laughed at, not willing to be laughed at.
I really wanted to pipe back and said, “Sir, my period does not come until the 23rd of January.” But there’s no point in embarrassing myself in front of the entire class that way. I suppose that this is just one of my more sensible moments because I really would have given that answer in my slightly “tak-lalu-kepala-dulu” moods.
–
My 19th birthday came and went. Late at night on the 15th of January, as my housemates and I were studying together in our long row of study tables, they turned around and sang “Happy Birthday” to me when it was midnight. I bopped my head along to the tune and sang along because really, I didn’t know what else to do. I never know what to do when people sing birthday songs to me. Which is why I’ve never really liked celebrating my birthdays and have only celebrated ….on four big occasions in my entire life. At age 1(for I had no say whether I wanted a party or not), age 4, age 10 and age 18.
Ck called me half an hour earlier just so that he could be the first. Hehe. He said he had to call me then because he was worried that he might interrupt any cake cutting ceremony at the stroke of midnight. But there was no such event. A flurry of sms came in and a few phone calls(a surprising one was from our dear Jason Mumbles!) My father and I contacted each other simultaneously wishing each other a very happy birthday and telling each other to “sang sang seng seng lah, tai kor chai/lui laa..”(Be good now, you’re a big boy/girl already) which sounds really cute because he is hardly a “big boy” at 49! Sometimes it is still so hard to believe that I was am actually my father’s birthday present.
This year, my father requested for a deck chair as his birthday present from the rest of the family. Hahahah, this is a very obvious sign that he is getting older. I guess he has put away his hopes for a spankin’ some-fancy-branded-watch that costs many thousands of Ringgit that he has been hinting for year after year. We always knew that he was joking. (or was he?) Don’t worry, dad! When I am financially able, you will get it. 🙂
It was a very mundane birthday for the first part of the day. My housemates kept apologizing to me that they would not be able to buy me a birthday cake and asked me if I was sad. They asked me this like every other hour or whenever the looked at me. Duh. Who would not be expecting something after all those ‘pityful’ looks?
It was very sweet of them to surprise me with a birthday cake(a piece of every flavour available at the shop because they did not know what flavour I liked best). So I actually have a birthday cake to see me into my 19th year! I’ve never been a fan of cakes and its cream….but it’s always so nice to have a birthday cake to blow the candles off.
Thank you Lishen, Lie Yuen, Wuan Phing, Narjit, Cze Yin, Steven, Thong, Jamie etc.. thank you for the cute glitter fairy plaster mould thing too!!! I love glitter! Photos soon!
I am now the same age as all my closest friends, my boyfriend, my Aunty who went for national service(1st batch) and who just completed her STPM, my second cousins Christopher and Yee Teng/Hazel ….and…..a couple of childhood friends, but whatever.
–
I’m sorry I cannot stop my train of thoughts because I have not blogged for a grand total of four days. Things in the hostel has been changing. Xiong Khee has accepted Manipal’s offer to do medicine and left us last December. A girl who is 25 years old came to take her room and is pursuing pharmacy in my university. We asked her what took her so long. She said that she was already doing pharmacy in Sedaya but because every morning there was no parking space for her and she got so annoyed that she decided to leave. She said, “After 2 and a half years of enduring it, I’ve had enough!” . Wow. Two and a half years of pharmacy school and starting anew again just because there’s no parking space? Oh well, if that’s how some people decide to live their lives.
Good news: Vinnie found a room in another residential area and would be moving out after the Chinese New Year. It’ll be a sad time for there won’t be any bitchy stories to regale but a happy house is always better than a drama-rama house.
Life as a student as most of you would attest to, proves to be difficult on one’s diet. It’s kuay teow th’ng every freaking day. On a good day there’d be Bak Kut Teh. Kai Fan. Wan Tan mee. Repeat step 1. Or if I’m really lazy, maggi mee with veggie that I cook with my magical rice cooker.
An imbalance diet causes my mother to worry. I became a little more dramatic when she asked me if I was eating well. Wrong move. Both my parents went silent for awhile on the other line(one listening on the upstairs phone and one listening on the phone on the landing of the staircase) and I asked, “Hello? Why no sound?” and Dad said, “We’re just sad that our daughter is not eating well.”
LOL. I am also sad that I am not eating well. But what can I do?