Voila, la deuxième tentative.

So I was wrong. here’s another blogpost before I turn 26.
A couple of things this time, as always, writing is a form of catharsis.
I intend to write the introduction to my thesis tonight before I go to sleep. At least so I can have a little something to look at tomorrow to continue off on, or stare at in amazement that it’s actually coming to life, nevermind that it’ll prolly change shape at least twice before being handed in.

But 3 things this time.
Home. Nostalgia. Music.

I’m thisclose to deciding what’s going to happen next year. Let’s just say that the realization of having upheaved and moved and adjusted and re-adjusted to living on three different continents in the past 3 years (actually, 4 different countries in the last four years if you think about it. 2004 started off with throwing myself in the melée that was the South of France, 2005 saw me finishing up my last year at Grinnell and then transitioning to post-graduate life, mid-2006 saw my return to Penang after my 5-year hiatus, and 2007 saw my calamity-ridden intro to living and studying in London)…well yeah, all that has factored in my decision for what comes next once my big baby of a D gets handed in.

Which ties in to coming back home. The first time I left home - in 2001 - there was a sense of freedom. Of I don’t care when I’m coming back next, I just know I’m FREE for now….and suddenly, 5 years went by. And then I decided it was time to go home once again, to reacquaint myself with the 4/5ths of my life that I’d left behind (because leave it behind I did, I have to admit somewhat ashamedly. I was more concerned about the Iraq war than I was about the impending stepping down of Mahathir in 2004, and more in tune with what happened with Hurricane Katrina because I fell in love with New Orleans back in 2002 when I visited, rather than with what happened with the Christmas ‘04 tsunami). And this time around, being home made me realize that even though I was hankering to leave, it wasn’t about escape this time. It was about needing to find the space to grow, to experience and savour the opportunities offered by the world, that I was privileged enough to grasp, outside of Malaysia….but that it wasn’t a matter of if, but when, I’d be back again. And back to make more of a difference than I did in the 9 months that I was participating in Malaysian society. This time, even though abroad again, I’ve kept track of the going ons back home. And while it heartens me that the people that I met while back, and the events that had just started to unfold then have progressed beyond belief, it still makes me extremely … I can’t find the right word. it’s not morose, neither is it depressed, nor angry, I dunno. There’s just so much crazy happening back home right now, it’s hard to see if there’s anything decent that can come out of it. I know, I know, come on right, there is. Heck my dissertation’s all about the possibility of change and all that….but really? it’s just all crazy.

I found myself explaining my Malaysia to friends last night, and it didn’t make sense. To understand it all, one has to submerge oneself in some kind of hegemonically twisted ideological world with flawed logic and subverted sense of justice….it’s just so warped. And it took a non-Malaysian to tell me "But Marie, that just doesn’t make sense at all" for me to realize how I have two selves, one which tries to see things objectively…and the other which has internalized this confusing, roiling, rotting mess of what makes Malaysia Malaysia (the Malaysia that I gleefully left behind the first time around).

And it’s hard to believe in the hope, or the small pockets of reality that do exist, where an alternative Malaysia can and will exist (the Malaysia that I caught a glimpse of while back last year, and that I want to claim and build for myself and possibly my children). One where you don’t have to convince yourself that a certain policy has logic to it if you were to only look at it this one way…from a certain viewpoint.  A nation where its people are allowed to thrive regardless, or perhaps BECAUSE of their diversity and spontaneity and ability to adapt and change and create and reclaim.  A homeland to be proud of and to love because, and not in spite of. Maybe I’m dreaming of being in the wrong historical era, or pining for a Utopia where manmade divisions based on "race" and religion and "gender" and age and class and language don’t play that important a role in our lives both private and public. but oh well.

I’ve gone off again, rambling away…and there went a good couple of hundred words I could’ve used instead for my intro to the big D. ha.

I guess I’ll end with just this short mention of music. Just in the past 3 days I’ve become obsessed with finding a version of "You Belong to Me" that isn’t butchered into sickly sweetness (Carla Bruni and Bob Dylan especially, SHAME on you two!!!!!). The original, released in 1952 sung by Jo Stafford is pretty awesome, but I do believe I’ve found my favourite in Kate Rusby’s version of it. And what creeps me out, besides the fact that the key phrase in this song is "You belong to me" is the haunting melody that just draws me into a orange-purple hued sunset of a nostalgia in my mind — for what I don’t know…but the internal workings of my mind tell me that I may be thinking of a certain boy and how things turned out with him (and I dare mention this openly because he knows not of the existence of this blog, and quite possibly, if he ever stumbles upon it, things will have evolved such that this is all neatly tucked away on the shelves of memories already…or who knows, maybe he’ll still be in my life and will turn around and ask "was that me you were making reference to?" and I’ll just give a smile and not answer yes or no) when I play this song on repeat….continuously for hours on end. I do do that quite often though, get fixated with just one song, and play it over and over again, or find different versions of the same song and play them on repeat, my all time top repeat hit was Bobby McFerrin’s Siamese Cat Song, I used to even play it through the night…and oh, once upon a time, Build Me Up Buttercup too (used to drive Katia mad…and an ex-boyfriend too…but that was when I kept singing along to it…on repeat. hehe). But yeah. so just weird. I guess I should just stop listening to this song if I want to let this weird mood dissipate but do I really want to? I guess the answer is no. I have a bit of a masochistic streak in me that way.

On the whole though, I’m reminded daily of how blessed I am, and I do try not to lose sight of that. I’ve been eating well, and staying quite in love with being alive, and laughing a lot. And trying to pass it all on. Most days I feel like I haven’t passed on as much as I’ve received, that how (I hesitate to say good) it’s been. But I’m constantly surprised by Life, I am, be it through people, events, tastes, moods, smells, textures encountered. For that, I whisper a grateful alhamdullilah in my heart.

Well then. On that unabashedly soppy note, I shall end with a picture, as always, it says a thousand words more.

Love to all,
~m. xox