So Nice To See You Again

Yeah, I've had an epiphany:
Setting quotas for myself hasn't and isn't ever going to work.
From now on, I shall blog whenever I feel like it.
So listen up good 'cause my next post will probably be in... ...
a while.
I blame the media.

How is this related to the media you may ask? Let's face it: the main reason this blog is even here is because I (just like many of my blogging comrades) succumbed to the ever rampant disease which is peer pressure. One of your friends gets a blog, joined then by another, and another and before you know it 80% of your Facebook friends have turned into self-proclaimed professional bloggers, boasting about their new layouts and widgets, posting status updates relating to their newest posts on their cyber-diaries and comparing among themselves which website is a better host for their beloved online journals.

And the media just rides off all this hype. All the sudden, they have a whole section of their weekend paper dedicated to the realm of blogging. Now, reading about famous celebrity blogs in the newspapers, receiving links to web portals of socialites who have no qualms about unravelling their daily drama for gossip-hungry readers, it all kinda makes you want to squeeze your way into this social circle of interwoven networks.

And that is EXACTLY what I did, people! So give yourself a clap on the back for contributing to the media's choke hold on today's society.

I'm not proud of falling into this mainstream trend (as you can clearly tell), but at least this blog is doing its job; it is keeping ME (and you, the reader) entertained. And if you aren't enjoying this, well its OK, because I am. Hmmmm. So yes, I blame the MEDIA. If it weren't for its effectiveness at broadcasting trends and making social outcasts like me feel all insignificant, I would not be feeling guilty about letting this blog of mine die a thousand social deaths.

*phewwwwwww*

I feel like I should type out a detailed paragraph about what I've been doing since my last blog post, but I grow weary of flushing my brains out. Wit and eloquence take up a lot of processing power, which my brain currently lacks. After being on a studies hiatus for about 4 months, it seems my brain has lost its usual stamina. Kinda like a sprinter who quits the team to study for his finals and returns four months later, barely able to run three laps.

And college hasn't even gotten into full swing yet. Tomorrow will be my fourth day at IACT, Petaling Jaya. This Diploma in Mass Communication was not my initial choice, but money talks; with a full scholarship shoved right under my nose, how could I say no? Besides, I know my family could do with one less financial burden to cover.

All in all, life is going great for me now. I don't think I've ever been happier. Sure, theater participation is low for now, but I've already booked some backstage work for May/June and I have more time to watch plays instead of being in rehearsals. Its a nice, relaxing change, not having to worry about costume changes but just sitting in the audience watching actors try their best to please moi.

Let's see... How do I end this post? A witty comment? A happy ever after? Some famous quote from some equally famous movie star? A cute riddle? ... I think a goodbye and goodnight should do.

Goodbye and goodnight.

Sloth

Evidently I didn’t stick to my self-set quota for blog posts per month. I’m such a hypocrite. No, actually I might just be a commitment-phobe. Not to anything else, just this blog. But ultimately I think I’ve just become extremely lazy.

OH AND BY THE WAY, HELLO FREEDOM! Me and the other babies of 1992 are finally done with secondary school and its such a relief. SPM is now a thing of the past for me, yippee. But I can’t wait till I turn 18, I think that’s the only concrete way for me to rid myself of the high school pressure. Right, now I still feel kind of trapped but hopefully it will pass soon. I’m sure that college will flush it out of me.

There’s a snag if I’ve ever seen one. My SPM results will be coming out somewhere in March. I should by now, have come up with a rough list of courses and colleges I’m interested in. Well, guess what; I haven’t. The closest I’ve gone to even registering for a course is visiting the booths at December’s Education Fair in MidValley. That and paying a visit to both Taylor’s and Sunway College’s campuses. Really, that’s as good as it gets.

I feel major bummed. Some of my school mates have already started college and all and I’m… doing nothing of worth.

Except of course rehearsing for Bernarda Alba! (Can you smell the shameless publicity people?)

Synopsis: Bernarda Alba tells the tale of a powerful matriarch who imposes a strict rule on her household following her second husband's funeral: "Not a breath of outside  air is going to enter this house. It's going to feel like we've bricked up the doors and  windows," she proclaims.
Bernarda's five daughters, however, struggle with her cold wishes. The girls' dream and desires challenge their mother's harsh rules and the outside world begins to slowly permeate their isolated existence.

26Feb10 – 07Mar10

Pentas 2, KL Performing Arts Centre (KLpac)

RM48 for Adults, RM38 for Senior Citizens, RM28 for students and the disabled.

For you people with Facebook, do join our Facebook Event Page. We’ve got full details and pretty pretty shots from our publicity photoshoot. So check it out at:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/event.php?eid=235846122777&ref=ts

Awesomeness. See ya’ll there!

MukaBuku

4 down, 7 more exams to go.

Even though I’ve been busy trying to catch my breath with SPM going on, I still found time yesterday to watch my T4YP lovelies perform “MukaBuku” for the Lab 2009 installment. It was so worth the wasted revision time.

MukaBuku is a production consisting of 6 AWESOME plays which all have some connect or other to Facebook. And I LOVED IT!

I won’t spoil the fun for the rest of you who haven’t caught MukaBuku yet ‘cause you should all really just watch it! All I’ll say is that Mark’s first piece really affected me. That monologue was just so painful. Kudos to Ivan for pulling it off. I’m so proud of my ‘son’, Jit for designing half the lighting for the show.

I’m really happy I got to watch Ivan and Ujval in action ‘cause this was the first time I saw them act. And now I know what it feels like to watch a T4YP production, you know? …well of course, you don’t.

Okay, Jun Yee’s here so now I’ve got to get down to Add Math. I’m just counting down the days to my freedom. TOODLES.

Good Enough

And I thought I'd be able to contain the emo-ness till AFTER SPM.
Here it goes.

I don't feel the same way I did at the start of the year. I've been changing and though I know I've changed for the better, there's something that's just nagging at me, like something pulling on my shirt trying to make me turn around.

I went out with family today and I usually enjoy seeing my cousins, catching up. But I just couldn't help feeling alien around them. Even now as I'm typing, they are upstairs playing computer games with my brothers... and I'm down here being anti-social. It hasn't been that long since we last met up, but I felt a real gap today, so much so that when we went to the bowling alley, I told them to go ahead and instead I went windowshopping with my aunt in OU.

I NEVER willingly spend time alone with my aunt because things between us haven't been good since a few years back and the fact that I chose her over my cousins, whom I love despite their wackiness, really doesn't make any sense.

I think perhaps this is my conscience telling me to stop pushing people away. Have I really been neglecting those close to me? I don't know. Have I been neglecting friends and family in light of my recent growth? Probably. Right now, 3 days before SPM, nothing seems to be going the right way. I feel like I might be making all the wrong decisions.

and fuck all this for just becoming clear to me now at the eleventh hour.

Of one thing I am certain: not many people think I'm capable of making the right choice, and at this point I can't help but agree with them.

you have to wipe away those tears if you plan on making 'em proud.

The Return

Whoa.

I cannot believe my last blog post was close to EIGHT months ago.
Funny how I used to cling to this blog, and yet I had no trouble letting it deteriorate to its current neglected state. People change.

Time to make it up, eh.
Let's first start with an explanation.

In March I auditioned to join KLpac's T4YP ensemble.Thankfully I was accepted and I spent the next 6months-ish doing plays and learning as much as I could about theater. The rehearsal schedule was hectic, an average of 4 times a week, sometimes more, sometimes less. Pretty soon, everything else took a backseat: this blog, sports, extra-curricular societies, etc etc. Don't take this the wrong way though: my stint in T4Yp is something I wouldn't trade, not even for the SPM marking scheme. Well, maybe not for the SPM trials marking scheme.

Anyhoos, now that the season has ended, I have too much spare time on my hands. Not many activities or competitions in school now that SPM is a little less than two weeks away, you see. And so I have decided to restart Life Unplugged. Hopefully, this time I'll stick to the quota of at least two posts a month.

*clears throat*

However. SPM. Two Weeks. And my revision is... well, it's coming along at least.

Under all the stress from cramming like a madwoman recently, in a desperate and futile attempt to make up for my past six months of slacking, I have been asking myself two questions very frequently.

The Questions:

1) Why did I not drop Chemistry?

2) Why did I not find an adept English Lit tutor?

My Answers:

1) I assumed that I'd be able to pick up Chemistry last minute since my Chem marks never dipped lower than my AddMaths marks. (I think if I were to take a test now, my AddMaths score would be double than that of Chem.)

2) I assumed EngLit wouldn't be as difficult as it is. (I'm still not sure if it really is that easy or it really is that hard *shrugs*)

Lesson learnt:

DO NOT ASSUME.

I shouldn't be blogging now, but my mind isn't in the right mode for studying/revising. Many of my friends have been talking about college and further studies. I STILL HAVE NOT MADE UP MY MIND. Performing Arts at Sunway, where my heart will be content or Mass Comm at some private college, which my brain tells me is the best choice. O woe is me!

Now that I've got that off my chest,
I'll be signing off.

Byebye.

For this one.

Hello again.

2somes Fest at KLPac came to an end yesterday.
i’ve met some AMAZING people
and i have met so many different personalities,
that now i think i’m probably an inch closer
to figuring out what really goes into a great production.
Everyone involved has been a teacher to me in some way,
probably not upfront, but still impactful.

I unfortunately however didn’t have the privilege
of really getting to know the cast of The Bench.
i suppose the language barrier wasn’t overcome well enough
(The Bench is a play in Cantonese).
also, i wasn’t really working on that play till about the last minute,
so we didn’t really have anything much to build on.

I think what i can really take away from this experience
as an assistant stage manager is that A LOT of effort
is put into a production that goes unnoticed by the actors and audience.
When acting in Oh My God last year,
i never even thought that my stage manager, Xavier
would be doing half the stuff i’ve had to do this past week.
Apart from setting up the sets for all three plays,
i’ve had to work very closely with the Tech Guys
and the stage managing team
to make sure the plays run smoothly throughout,
i’ve had to work too with front of house,
and of course i’ve had to do A LOT of cleaning up. =/

Even though my brain kind of tells me that
taking up more stage managing gigs is not a bright idea,
i know that i’ll still do it again if i get the chance.

Why?

= because i could use the money. XD
= because i know there’s so much more to learn
= because no matter the presence of attitudes, it still feels awesome meeting new people
= because i have nothing better to do with my spare time, except maybe start a youtube channel… …
= because it is the best feeling when the show goes smoothly and you know you are a ’some sort’ unsung hero and last but not least,
= because i love theater, from whatever angle.

**Thank you to everyone who came to watch and of course the amazing cast and crew! not to mention all the random people who helped, especially those who helped with the Bump Out session yesterday! =) mwahh!

Reunion

as the wind brushes her hair,
she sits there and stares ahead,
unaware of the rain clouds above,
she sits there and she waits.

a week goes by,
and every day it's the same,
by the lake she sits alone,
a picture stuck in its frame.

she gives up after a time,
she stands up and walks away,
she doesn't know where she's going,
but promises she'll be back someday.

Busy Weeeeeeeeek.

hooray for sunburned skin and silver medals!
hooray for 2009 personal high jump records!
boo for friends leaving for aussie!
boo for sucky school drama advisers!
and boo for valentine's day!

okay, i'll start with the good news.
after tirelessly training for 2 hours everyday after school,
we clinched the silver medals on friday at the
the Zone Sentul Netball Competition.
i played Wing Defence (WD) and i think i did OK
considering how the odds are really against me.
in the finals, we roughed it out with SMKBBS.

they won 6-5.
its a sucky scoreline, but at least we can say that
we gave them a hard time and were more than worthy opponents.

i didn't win anything at the Sentul Athletics meet,
but i achieved something i am more than proud of -
i broke my personal best for this year.
and also i was not out of the competition after the first two jumps,
which is amazing since it was my first time playing at zone level.

Tarrant is now in aussssssssssie.
asshole didn't even call to say goodbye,
I had to do it. he's such a bitch sometimes.
damned diva.

darling Miss Teacher Adviser for my school's drama team
is sooooo hopelessly unreliable.
she FORCES me into preparing this year's script ASAP,
i get it done, and she doesn't even bother to look at it.
she's had the damned thing for a fortnight, and the script
is barely 8pages long. how hard can it be to proofread it?

not only that, but she totally fucked up auditions.
she could have had it on tuesday, but no.
she wanted to have it on saturday.
today. after replacement classes.
like, what the hell?
who would come for shit on a saturday, after 5 hours of school?
even more so on a saturday that just happened to be Valentine's Day.

And there's the last chapter of my sucky week so far.

As is ritual, i happened to be too busy for valentine's.
with competitions the whole week through,
i woke up this morning exhausted as hell,
completely unaware that it was 14 February.
when i finally realized what date it was, i completely shut down.
not only was (and is) my skin sunburned as hell from sports,
but my classmates' persistent questions about who i was
involved with now just frustrated me even more.

we had an oral english exam where i was
completely cheesed out by my friends' presentation.
the theme of their little text- "What is Love?"
i swear at that moment i could have strangled them.

it wasn't being dateless that pushed my buttons,
it was the fact that nobody had even asked me out, as a friend.
everyone was too busy with their own dates i suppose.
still, it sucked that no one thought that after pushing myself
for the whole fucking week, that i would have appreciated
just a little company on this very lonesome date.

i hate valentine's day.
it is by far the worst chapter of my week.

the only thing i loved about this week
was that one surprising moment by the most
unexpected person...
it was the only thing that had really made me smile.

The Way It Is.

I don't usually hate.
i don't usually have unbearable animosity for anyone.
but this one girl. ugh.

every single time i log on a 'certain social networking client',
i see her status updates or activities and i proceed to her profile.
the reason i do this is always the same:
to see if she has finally gained some level of respect for herself.
every time i am sorely disappointed.

she parades her body on this network in skimpy, trashy outfits.
when i say skimpy i mean, really skimpy.
think undies and tube bra ish outfits (maybe a tad exaggerated) .
full body length shots, mind you. or if its not that,
she's probably lying on her bed in a tank top
and taking pictures which deliberately stress on
her face and importantly, cleavage.
but i have seen her size in real life, and believe me,
she is not that well-endowed.

anyhoo, she has been taking these provocative pictures
since she was about 15.

if you think these lewd pictures are her limit, you are wrong.
at the ripe age of 15 the last thing she should be doing
is broadcasting herself as a sort of "play thing".
however, in her About Me section of her profile she beckons
guys to "message me if you like what you see".

now THAT is what gets me the most.
everytime i read that sentence, i go berserk.
i know i am no angel either, but this "girl" is
completely on another level.
i just think it is so wrong. i guess this is the
price of the materialistic world.

we all know women (and quite a number of men too)
like to camwhore. i think that's no big deal as long as
you have your borderline set right.
i will continue checking her profile and praying that
she will realise what she's doing to herself.

perhaps it is not hate which i feel.
perhaps it is sympathy. or some feeling of
obligation towards this girl.

i really worries me that once upon a
time not too long ago i almost went down the same path.
i used to be engrossed in getting attention.
pretty pictures everywhere on my profile.
never provocatively dressed, but still.
i used my looks for the wrong reasons. however,
i am proud to say that the pressure of the materialistic
world has become something i no longer fuss about.
i am happy that i have found myself and i have realised
that i have so much more to offer than the physical things.

perhaps i feel an obligation towards her because
i need a reason to believe that i have fully changed.
perhaps i am disgusted that i used to be on the same path,
less demeaning but equally revolting, hence her realisation
will prove to myself that there was never a chance that i
would end up like her. that i never went cheap.

anyhoos, i pray that she will recover from this phase.
i'd hate to think that the future generation of women
will be largely made up of young women with little self-respect.
i hope this will not become a pandemic.

M.I.A.

i have been away for much too long.
it seems harder for me to put my thoughts
on paper, or in this case on the laptop screen.
just so much has happened since OH MY GOD wrapped.

belated Xmas and New Year greetings to everyone!
my internet was very the cacat over the past weeks,
resulting in my absence in cyberworld which is my means
of communicating and spamming with everyone.
And also a very heartfelt thanks to all the people
who came for OMG and those who smsed wishes.
sorry for not replying but as you all know
my handphone is currently in my dad's control.

School has definitely dampened the hype i had through december,
but i've made a new years resolution which i know i shall fail to keep:

TO COMPLETE ALL MY HOMEWORK, ESPECIALLY BAHASA MALAYSIA,
CHEMISTRY, BIOLOGY, HISTORY, PHYSICS, ENGLISH AND MATHS.

that's a long list of subjects that weren't taken seriously last year,
homework wise at least.
i never see the point in doing notes. i just don't get it.
and i don't see the point in my compiling exercises neatly
in books and files. i prefer
doing it all in my head, though i know it is not half as effective.
but it has not failed me yet.

even through the first week of school,
i've managed to "forget" to do maths homework.
i am truly talented in the field of forgetting
or pretendung to forget.

but yes my resolution is to terminate that habit.
its a very very long shot.

i'll be stopping by KLPac on he 18th for the open day.
i probably will just lepak around and reminisce.
nostalgia and i are bestfriends.