RACONTEUR-ESQUE SCRIBBLINGS

I have this weird obsession of being anonymous on the blog.  No doubt that I have made some friends here who went on to being friends with me on a certain social networking site, but I was never opposed to making new friends. See, from the very beginning stages of the blog, I had a deep seated fear of having someone I know stumble upon the blog, and say to herself/himself - "Hey, I think I know this person" and share it with all their other friends because that's what I'd do if I were in their place. I suppose my stance on this is if you know me personally, I'd prefer knowing that you know of my blogs existence than you accidentally finding it. But then again, freely giving away the link to everyone I once knew is not an option either - *say if I wanted to write about an experience and mentioned friend C in the post, friend K might start whining - "why don't you ever blog about me?" Being anonymous is not easy, though. Back in 2009, ...

About slightly more than a year ago, my sister and I decided to take our parents on a *holiday outside the country. After some deliberation, we finally picked Sri Lanka because none of us have been there before, and it seemed like an interesting place to visit, and (ahem) didn't have any visa requirements. We also got a local tour agent to help us with the booking of the accommodation and recommended places of interest because we didn't have the time to plan one on our own.   Almost a year later, I finally sit down and attempt to transcribe the experience of the vacation that was - the 4 days in an island known to the world as Sri Lanka.  (insert sound of a tape rewinding in an old cassette player) Feb 02, 2011 - Leaving and Arriving Cheap flights come with a price - your sanity and sleep deprivation. Having the flight out of the country so early in the morning meant that none of us slept well the night before. We reached the airport without a problem though. ...

If you could pick one mythical creature which deep down you knew must have existed, what would it be?  Mine, with unwavering certainty would be the dragon, the majestic creature known for it's ability to fly across the sky, breathing fire on anything in it's way, holding princesses hostage in caves until a mad prince decides to behead it. Of course if it were real, holding princesses hostage may have just been a tall tale kings and queens would tell their princes and princesses so that they wouldn't sneak out of the castle and get kidnapped or something, because lets face it, being kidnapped by a dragon only to be saved by a prince is way more romantic than say, being kidnapped by a kidnapper who called your parents for some ransom, and the person who finally rescued you was the negotiator for the police, or a very clever detective.  I have always been fascinated by dragons for as long as I can remember, which was why I was extremely excited about a certain show ...

For some people, maybe. I've had people tell me before that it's not worth it giving your all to your job. "Just work hard from September" they'd say if they saw you working late in January, as we get appraised only in mid December, and three months of 'good' work is apparently sufficient to fool your bosses into thinking that you've been good the whole year. I suppose they get away with such behaviour because their superiors are probably fools anyway.  Now, while I don't think what you do should dictate your life (although sometimes you can't help it when it's in the manufacturing field), I believe that people should be responsible enough to perform tasks they are supposed to do. Feigning ignorance is just unacceptable. Allowing others to pick up their slack when they say that they do not know how to do their own bloody job is just an excuse for laziness. And their superior not giving them an earful for such irresponsible behavio...

This morning, despite suffering from a horrible pain due to a relentless migraine attack, I whipped out my phone, logged on to Facebook and convinced my thumbs to type out the following:  "Insomnia or migraine, which would you pick?"  Looking back, it sounds as though I consider both the migraine and the insomnia to be simply irresistible treats that everyone wants a piece of. Sigh. That's what you end up doing when you post something while suffering from migraine which may have been a result of the recent insomnia. It seems like they've decided to take turns and visit me like relatives and friends visiting you when you're sick! Plus, I'm actually really lazy to type out stuff on my phone, and made the status update as short as I possibly could. Seriously though, if you are familiar with both, which would you rather have? (The (ahem) lesser evil, so to speak) In my case, right now I think I'd rather go with insomnia.

A first year student stood up and asked the following question: "I have a pen pal from Russia. Am I allowed to correspond with him from here?" I can't remember what was the answer to that fairly odd question, because it happened way back in 1998, when I was a first year student as well. This question was asked during our long and tiresome orientation week where we learned the university song (laughed at it too, of course), and where people droned on about the rules and regulations and explained the many different ways you could get yourself expelled. That was also the time when we all found out about AUKU (University and University Colleges Act) Being 18 and politically ignorant then, my friends and I never did find the act get in the way of our daily lives. Many things have happened since then, and thirteen years later university students are actually rising against the act. For some reason, they believe that political freedom and participation is a must in orde...

January is crazy, and it's not even half way through. I haven't had time to blog and all my blog ideas (which always make their special appearance when I'm driving, unfortunately) have evaporated into a place where it's never to be seen again, the graveyard of dead blog ideas. Anyway, just to fill up the space, I thought I'd post something I wrote back in April 2011 but never published.  I suppose it's easier when you have good lighting and a professional camera person, but try taking a photograph of your hairstyle by yourself, and all you'll get is a big black blob (if the hair is black, that is) So after several failed attempts with and without the help of a mirror, I have officially given up on capturing a photo of the most amazingly awesome haircut I have ever had. What's even weirder is that even my mom was less than pleased with her 'chopped up' hairstyle as well (we got it cut on the same day), and a few days later another c...

I learned a strange lesson last Friday. I'm not a frequent user of chilli sauce, except when I eat something that actually requires the use of chilli sauce like a certain local chip-like junkfood, and that was when I thought that the sauce tasted strangely bitter as opposed to being hot (It was an 'extra hot' variety, by the way) Only after consuming a considerable quantity for chilli sauce standards, and wondering about the bitter taste, I realised that the bottle should have been tossed into the bin over two months ago! Thankfully there were no disastrous consequences. On the other hand, over a few months back, I was feeling a bit extra peckish one night and thought I'd cook some instant noodles. I noticed with a slight dismay that they had expired about a week or so before that but the peckishness got the better of me and I figured that I'd just eat it anyway. After all, how much harm could one week do to food?  Turns out, one week did cause quite...

Back in September 2007, I came to a rather abrupt conclusion on how sampling killed the *classics (just like how video killed the radio star) after listening to a song that sampled Africa by Toto . A few years later, I still have the exact same sentiments. The other day (edit: which is not at least somewhere about two weeks ago!), I was just browsing through some websites and came upon one which had a list of the top songs in 2011 that were remakes or samples. I thought it was interesting for various reasons, the first one being the length of the list, as there were about 30 songs on it, and these **30 were considered the creme de la creme of the remake/sampling world which means there were definitely much more remakes and sampling that didn't quite make the cut. First question: Have they seriously run out of original ideas? My ***curiosity got the better of me, and I checked out some of the songs in the list. I have to admit I really did want to know how Wonderwall by Oasis...

source: freeprintablecoloringpagesdotnet Note: This is a story I wrote on 1st January 2011, inspired by the speed 2010 passed us by and also a comment on a friend's FB status update. Although it's been a year since then, the way 2011 sped by was no different, so I figured it's only fitting that I use it as the first post for the year. This story was first published in Selangor Times on 25 Feb 2011.  2011 sat nervously at the edge of her seat and fidgeted with her new sparkling white robe as the International Date Line shimmered in the silence of the arena. The only sound that was audible was the careful footsteps of 2010 as he made his way towards the end of his reign. He was noticed soon enough, though. As he took the bend, he was seen walking with a confident swagger, one arm raised high above carrying the Torch of Time, which most of the folk not involved directly with Time believed stay lit forever, and would only diminish at the sudden death of Time himself. ...