Voila, la deuxième tentative.

I blog when I’ve got deadlines coming up…essays to write, exams to revise for, applications to send in, those sort of things….(this time it’s a 5000 word essay on Multiculturalism/Liberalism due on Friday. I have no doubt I’ll get it done, but not without some head hurting and gut wrenching I’m afraid. f*ck. I’ll never learn will I. I just get more brazen and knuckle headed each time).

Anyway, an assortment of random thoughts this time around.

I’m fascinated by my country. By the parts of it that I know, by the parts of it that I’m only starting to find out, after reaching the unripe age of a quarter century. I’m fascinated by her history, by her many layers of history yet waiting to be told, that’s being told by those who dare to question the hegemon on history as told by the victors/powers that were and continue to want to be. I’m fascinated by her geography, her changing geography — gurney drive comes to mind, memories of when Ah Ma (grandma on Mum’s side) was still alive - I do remember, despite most of my memories that I can remember starting only after Mark was born (which was just right before she (grandma) died), those times that she and Ah Kong and sometimes my aunts and my mum and dad would go for an evening stroll along the drive…the malay word is so much prettier/apt. Persiaran is it. I wonder if it’s because it’s simply a longer word…which reminds me of how long Gurney Drive is….a long slinky smooth drive along the beach…well those days, and the years slightly after that (we’re talking mid-late 80s) you could smell the sea, see the waves, feel them, hear them. As the mid-90s came along, the sea by Gurney Drive started to recede…and then smell….and as the twenty-0s came…well. Let’s just say you don’t want to have the misfortune of being splashed by the "waves" when they come in at high tide…or get the chance to look down at the mess muck that is that part of the island from say, the 20th floor of the G Hotel overlooking the drive.

I have gone on….I wanted to make reference to the East Coast of Peninsular M’sia as well, which I only ventured to last year…amazing doesn’t even come close to describing it. It felt alien, foreign to me…not because I wasn’t capable of feeling that Malaysia could contain such beauty…but because I guess I’d internalized this kind of nature as being a treat for foreigners visiting M’sia only. I know. a little weird. What was also weird was that it was on a beach, in the wee hours before the crack of dawn, in the dark, with only the light of a nearby bonfire and the occasional lighted cigarette, on a little island of the coast of Terengganu that I had a proper heart-to-heart with another Malaysian…on the basis of our common bond of being Malaysian. Religion, race, class…those topics came up…differences in opinion, wry laughter, the usual…but it was one of the most honest and surprising conversations I think I had in 2007. Odd. I hadn’t thought about it until this stream of thought….

Anyways, more thought spillage. You know what else fascinates me? People with Downs Syndrome. I think I might’ve mentioned this before, but today as I was walking along the South Bank I was arrested by the sight of a photo exhibition by a charity associated with Downs Syndrome at a gallery in the OXO tower. I was pulled in, and my God, the pictures were beautiful. I think part of what fascinates me is that DS cuts across all hues of the human race, and somehow makes people look similar. Also, they are special people. not just because of the way they look, but because I’ve found that there is some kind of innocence, or something, something innately good, it seems to me, that radiates from these people. I’m not sure how to describe it, but even the cheekiest, sneakiest/volatile/uncommunicative person that I’ve known with DS hasn’t ever made me feel the way that some "normal" (obviously they’re not normal if they give you the heeby-jeebies..hmm) people do. I dunno.
Anyways, so yeah. I wandered into a gallery and was struck by what I saw. Openness, tenderness, love.

Another thing. So maybe I have to mention love everytime I blog, sue me. But today, I made yet another conscious note to myself to love unconditionally. It’s not easy. It’s way easier to stick to the routine, stick to the safe….and I must say, after learning about loving and being loved, I’ve been more than inclined to stay on the safe side. It’s just so much easier, and one feels so much more in control. This isn’t just with regards to romantic love, but love in all senses of the word/emotion/feeling/concept/way of life. But yet, there’s that tug, that challenge to go all out. So that at the end of the day….you can say, I really truly did. love.

And death. With life comes death. Everyday we live, death occurs. It’s been happening closer these past month though. Today I learnt of the death of somebody whom I’d gotten to know during my year back home. I only ever met her in person twice…but she was someone who loved, and laughed loud, and was just alive. It’s hard to believe that she’s no longer alive. I was speaking to Mum earlier on the phone, and all I could say was that "Mum, she was just so FULL of life." I know everyone has to die at some point, but she was one of those people that you just didn’t think would. You met her, she touched your life, and because she was just so full of life, thoughts of death would be the furthest thing from your mind, I think. So it’s a sobering thought that anybody really, can go.

There’s a wise man I know who starts off each email he sends with a greeting "Let your hearts not be troubled". And although a little paradoxical, I find it particularly calming especially when I’m being sent news about how fucked up the world we’re living in is…that there is this exhortation to "let not your hearts be troubled". I try. I’m trying. Searching. I do think I’ll find it. that place. And I do think it is findable in the midst of chaos and confusion.  (see picture on right! pointing! ever hopeful!)

What else am I fascinated by that I’d like to share this time around?
Food. I love the way food is such an experience. Explosions in the mouth, I love those. And familiarity, memories evoked, by the taste and/or the smell/texture of something you put in your mouth….mmmm.
On the flipside. I’m also extremely fascinated by how our body processes food and turns it into poop. Seriously. is quite fascinating. The end product is *nothing* at all like what goes in. And in between all that, we harness energy from the process. Amazing. hehe.
You must understand, I come from a family in which a member of will surely bring up the subject of "toilet" "poop" or "fart" or "bowel movement" during mealtimes (usually dinner). So you see where this fits in, no? (it’s no family secret, btw, though Dad tries to keep things in check when non-family members are at the table…heehee, small mercies, alleluia!).

Besides that, there was one more thing. Today, I met another Malaysian at an event that I attended. Post-event we were chatting, and he asked me where I was from, and instead of the usual "Wa si Penang-kia" reply, I thought to ask him to take a guess. He took a few seconds, and said quite surely "Penang". Is there something about not just being Malaysian, but being a Malaysian hailing from Penang that’s evident on all of us Penang-ites? I’m pretty darn convinced there is….don’t anybody tell me it’s all about deduction and general knowledge about the ethnic distribution of Malaysia (it well may be, but I’d prefer to think about something else a little less "technical"…something intangible, yet remarkable).

Ok. well I should go sleep now.
tomorrow’s D-Day. or well. D-Day Before. in which I *must* finish that essay. or else cringe up like a centipede being poked at and shut my eyes tight and wait for Saturday to get here already…that’s so not an option.

bye for now.
love to all as always,
~m. xox