Encapsulation through words

You start to miss people when they're gone. You start to miss people more when they're gone and you're not.

It isn't easy coming to terms with so many unfamiliar faces taking the place of familiar ones. It isn't easy going to my locker room every morning and not being able to use the locker I've grown fond of over the past 3 months. Locker 181-- The one with the unscrewed ledge. At least it isn't being used by others, or I'd start feeling very violated.

It isn't easy going through tea breaks and lunch without the usual company, which usually comes with some table tennis, marvel versus capcom, some chit-chat (anything from "prove earth is not a living thing" to how music creates sensations in us--some of us, anyway-- to "have you ever chased a girl before?"), some laksa on a rainy day, some carrot cake on others, and, of course, some horrible song-singing. It is when you walk alone through the paths you once walked with others that you see the forest as a forest, not as a meadow with some cottage huts and a lake in the middle. It is then that you see things from a third-person perspective, like a ghost.

Things look hollow now, several shades darker, sometimes agonizingly so. It's like the alternative dimension in Silent Hill, which is incidentally 1 hell of a show, in every negative sense of the term.

Hardship bonds, yea, but tea sessions too.

It has become apparent that, in my life, good things come in periods of 3 months. My stay in SR was great. So was my stay in the ordnance engineering training institute, probably the only sanctuary there is in the whole of saf.

I dont understand why good things can't last longer. I dont understand why I cant get to keep the people who are close to me close to me. I'm going to miss the times we cleaned the toilet together, the toilet which had a serious attraction for cockroaches--believe it or not, we once killed ten in a single day. I'm going to miss the times I splashed water at them with a broom. I'm going to miss laughing in the theory classes, Im going to miss all the talking sessions we have, because there was so much free time there. I'm going to miss the table-tennis sessions we had during tea breaks, all the meals we had over at the canteen. I'm going to miss all the outings. All the romps downtown, all the board games sessions, all the nights spent over playing mahjong. I dont know how all this matter now.

In a cruel twist of fate, I'm going to walk a different path from all of them now. I'm posted to become a recovery technician. (Ironic that Im going to learn driving, when I've got absolutely no interest in getting a car in the future) My stay at the institute continues, but it's going to be a very lonely stay. I'm going back to being alone again. I've done it before, I can do it again. It's nothing new. I feel like I've become frodo baggins, separated from the party. I feel like throwing away the ring and run back to the shire. But you cant do that.

I didnt get a chance to say a proper goodbye to those outside the group I belong to. They were nice people, we bonded well--how can you not with so much free time-- but they are all gone now. I dont even have a picture of them because you cant bring cameras into camps.

People who believe in the saying money can't buy you time often face moral or monetary issues of their own. Money can buy you time. It's just a matter of whether you are willing to forsake common ethics. It's just a matter of whether you are willing to pay the price. It's just a matter of whether you appreciate time more than money.

It's very good art for me

Disney may be dying and giving our children thrash but with films such as Cars it's hard to support such arguments.

Cars is worth all 4 stars of it. And please, for goodness sake, it goes beyond the visual. There's a reason why I've watched Madagascar 4 times and there's a reason why Im definitely going back to watch Cars another time, at least.

Moderation is over-rated

If you spend more than half of the weekend with your friends you feel discomforted on sunday afternoon because you're just hours away from another 5 days of work. If you dont do anything over the weekend, choosing instead to rest yourself for 2 days, you feel well-rested, but dissatisfied that you had an uneventful (or, if you like, boring) weekend just before another 5 days of hardship.

It would be nice if I could strike the correct rhythm between rest, work and leisure. I know it doesnt exist.

My heart is in a poor state after all this

Death and the Ploughman may seem a pretty draggy affair but from an objective point of view, it would, I suppose, have a strong effect on people who have experienced the loss of a loved one in the past. Im still inexperienced.

Someone mentioned about a prestigious scholarship holder not knowing where canada is. I felt repulsed then and I still feel repulsed now. Yes, he may possess superhuman capabilities in many areas, including the ability to lead us normal human beings effectively, and surely general knowledge is but 1 facet of intellect, which is in itself but 1 facet of a person's character, and surely such a display of idiocy would be confined only to the area of geography (that, I sincerely hope). But still... It's worse than university students not knowing who our prime minster is.

Elsewhere,

FRIEND I: 1 of my friends in OCS applied for a 5-month extension of his NSF term so that he can lead his men in Brunei.
ME: What!? Do such idiots exist?? [Splutter and cough] Hes crazy! What is the world coming to?? Does he have any idea what he is doing? Doesnt he have anything to look forward to in his life? Oh man...What men? Who cares about the men? Who would care?? Stupid. He should care about himself. Is he a man? Which decent man would even bother about HIS men? Hes not a decent man, I tell you. He only cares about HIS men. He doesnt care about himself at all. Stupid idiot. I cannot believe [and so on]...
FRIEND II: KC calm down. This is why are are not commanders.

Well anway, theatreworks has barred previous winners from entering this year's stupid 24hr playwriting thing. It's absurd. I dont think it's fair merit--past merit, at least-- should get discriminated against in such an exclusive way.

Tehehe

When it comes to the task of putting pen to paper I have observed that I have no spine of my own. I get influenced by the sharp witticisms of mark twain as easily, and strongly, as the poetic sentences of, say, italo calvino; I appreciate the minimalist chekov as much as I admire the absurd (or phantasmagorical) nature of kafka, I like ishiguro's subtle irony as much as hemingway's pronounced realism, and camus and murakami both present equally strong cases for their writings despite harping on the same old issues, albeit in widely differing styles. I have no identity of my own, I am spineless, and perhaps that is an advantage.

Anyway, since we're on this, allow me to suggest putting The Remains of the Day on your reading list. It has a most ironic, and poignant ending.