And 4 months later... Well, almost, anyway.

Between 4 and 5 days ago, most of the friends I made during university life had their convocation back at the hell in which I have suffered for the past 3 years. These are people whom with most contact has been lost entirely, while a handful of others I do what I can to maintain irregular contact when regular is not possible, some I still secretly stalk through Facebook (not so secretly now that I’m putting it out here in the open) and some others I wish I had less fucks to give. It’s the same sort of feeling 5 years ago, when I just finished secondary school; wishing I’d be able to keep in touch with a handful of people yet realizing that from that point on it would be more difficult to do so, as everyone gets on with their lives and the involvement of one another in it isn’t largely possible.

Which reminds me; having zero fucks to give is apparently an unhealthy way of being. I say apparently because this is opposed by 3 years’ worth of psychology classes, but supported by the counselling subtopics within. While psychology will tell you to not give a flying toss about what people think of you, how they judge you and whatnot while asking that you don’t judge others either, counselling will tell you to care about your interpersonal relationships, to work towards strengthening it and the like, in other words, telling you to give some fucks about what you think of others and what they think of you.

Life experiences, however, tells me that counselling is bollocks. This is because the more you care about it, chances are (when I say chances, it actually is 100%) that at some point you will be disappointed. Every time I actually cared about something and worked towards that something, the end result will almost always be exactly as if I did not care one bit, sometimes worse.  It’s kind of like the English proverbs, one going “distance makes the heart grow fonder” while another goes “out of sight, out of mind.” Life tells me to go with the second one as the first one is clearly bollocks. Otherwise there would be no such thing as losing contact with friends. The irony? I thought so too.

So yes, the irony of my life is that I have learned to care as little as possible about matters not directly concerning me in order to protect my sanity but at the same time the act of not caring makes me a clinically depressed person. And for real this time, too; I’ve been officially diagnosed as clinically depressed about half a year ago so you fellas who are not sick in the head reading this might want to take things I say with a pinch of salt, seriously. Yes, I am aware of the irony this time as well.

I am actually even seeing a therapist semi-regularly according to whenever she schedules the appointments, and the stuff she tells me just further justifies my opinion on the whole matter. I am being given the impression now that whenever I see something pointless and mundane on the internet, instead of merely being indifferent like I always do, I’m supposed to feel strongly for or against whatever that piece of information might be. Instead of just going “meh, might be some rumour mongering, I’ll check it out later,” I’m expected to explode with emotion, “I KNOW RIGHT!? THAT IS SO TOTALLY TRUE!” or “WHAT ABSOLUTE NONSENSE IS THIS SHIT? THE AUTHOR DOESN’T KNOW WHAT HE/SHE IS TALKING ABOUT!” So as a result, I’d feel really good about myself because someone agrees with me or I’d explode with anger and compromise my sound mind if someone disagrees with me.

And if you’d notice, this also means gambling is good for your mental health. Checking out the internet is like checking out the table. Act indifferently to whatever you see or read on the internet is like acting indifferently and not placing your bet. Once you place your bet, however, you’re very likely to explode with the same kind of emotion is the same way as well, because when you win, you’re actually just getting agreeable results like you’d get from agreeable info off the net, and vice versa when you lose. The only difference is when you gamble, there’s anticipation that further amplifies the emotion, while when surfing the net things tend to be more spontaneous. Probably explains why previously only the rich bother with mental health while middleclass people and lower don’t really care too much; because only the rich can afford to gamble. Fortunately for me I got the psychiatrist to refer me to a therapist who works for a semi-government hospital, so I don’t have to pay for the treatment. For now, at least.

So there you have it. I am mentally ill because I have gone through more shit than most people who are mentally sound have. So my words are words of wisdom gained from experience which people should heed, but then again they should not because the very experience that made me wise also made me mad.

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all.

The Plight of an Objective Person.

The painful moment when an objective person is forever alone because he is unable to accept people for who they are, as he desires others to be the best they can be.

That, in a nutshell, describes my life.

In my mind, to be an objective person, one needs to both be vengeful and hold grudges, while at the same time remembering every virtue of every person around. This is something I consider myself as doing quite well. I don’t remember important stuff, that’s why I get such shitty grades for my exams; nor do I remember insignificant things, since no one does anyway. But things slap bang in the middle of the continuum between significance and insignificance do not escape my memory easily, if ever.

It isn’t a pleasant experience, to say the least, to watch someone berating another for some offence or other, while remembering a time and place when the same person was committing the very crime he/she is now berating another for. It is even more so when someone reprimands another for one thing, and moments later chews another person out for doing the exact opposite of what the first person was criticized for. I’m sure it is definitely far more unpleasant for the transgressors of said inconsistency and hypocrisy to have their own paradoxical behaviour pointed out to them, but that, perhaps, is the point in which I’m trying to get across.

There is a problem with the human psychology: we don’t like to be wrong. This is because it harms our self-esteem. We feel bad about ourselves when we discover that we are not right. The opposite is also true: we like being right; it makes us feel good about ourselves. We also like to correct others as a result, because this makes us feel good about ourselves for two distinct reasons. One being the fact that we’re right; what this means I have already explained. The other is the fact that we are of a more knowledgeable position, thus of greater perceived importance than the one(s) we correct. In effect, this also means that we don’t like to be corrected, because we will feel bad for ourselves because we were wrong and because there is someone more knowledgeable than we are. I think by this point the problem implied by this paragraph should be apparent enough.

Some people can take criticism. That’s fine; it gives them the chance to be right in the future.  Some others strike back with righteous fury. Some go the extra mile and foam at the mouth by going on and on baselessly about how the criticizer is wrong and how the criticized is right for 10 years straight without stopping to sleep, eat, drink or even breathe. Fortunately, more often than not, such people end up dead by the time they’re done, or even when they’re not. Others develop arthritis or carpal tunnel.

People should be aware of two things. First is that we are all learning. And so, when we criticize our fellow learners, we do it rationally, ethically and calmly. Likewise, when we are criticized, we take it rationally, ethically and calmly. This is because we are all aware that at some point in our lives, we were wrong. We have changed our perspective at least once, or at least have looked at things from another, and thus have no right to defend said perspective with righteous fury, simply because it is impossible to discount the possibility that we may come across another that we find more agreeable, which completely invalidates our defending the previous one. The only ones who do are those who live in their closed world where there has never been the possibility of another perspective. These people criticize the view of others and defend theirs to the death simply because, if they were wrong, then their entire life has been a lie. And they can’t take that.

Before anyone points out the subjectivity of the above paragraph, let me continue. Secondly, when you criticize, do so objectively, with facts and a neutral stance, and not with bias or prejudice. While a perspective is definitely subjective, the facts behind them are not. What this means is that while there are certainly things that are wrong, not everything else is perfectly right. Things do not come in two states of right and wrong, but rather, they fall in a continuum; a line in between two extremes. Where we place something within this line is subjective, but we can, and should, do so objectively, with a neutral stance and with facts to back the decision.

All this leads to the point I brought up at the very beginning of this entry. How does an objective person point out mistakes done by people he cares for? Rationally, ethically and calmly, sure, but would it be better to just let the person be? Will the criticized person be able to take it just as rationally, just as ethically and just as calmly? Should he accept people for who they are, and endure the hurt every time he sees them commit paradoxes in his face, or should he point it out and risk hurting the relationship he has with these people?

In a way, for putting all these words in public view, I have forsaken my objectivity. But in the end I still hope that it is a worthy sacrifice, for the benefit of my own psychological wellbeing, and for the growth of all who read this.

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all. Food for thought for until the next time.

Fathers' Day or Foodsters' Day?

Fathers' Day was bad for a number of reasons; first being it is the day that I got an unexplainable swelling in my mouth where ulcers usually show up thanks to the upper left wisdom tooth, only this time there wasn’t any sign of an ulcer at all. So yeah, this is the infamous killer microbe(s) that has made me feel very sick indeed. Sorry if I sounded cold the other day bro. Good thing it left (or rather, is leaving) as quickly as it appeared suddenly.

Fathers' Day was also the day that I reevaluated Tony Roma’s. I now place it below Chilli’s because on a busy day, service was a little poor. Might have to do with the fact that they had a newbie on duty, but it does not change the fact that they made 2 mistakes on that day which they didn’t when I showed up on a weekday, when there was literally only one other table seated with customers. Sure, their food still tastes slightly better, but considering Chilli’s much wider variety I’m very much inclined to rate them better in general.

Something about this week that is a bit odd. Six days felt like seven. It is usually the other way around, and much more exaggerated. But this is a good thing because it gives me the opportunity to rush what I was given 2 weeks to do in 8 days. Then I can probably reward myself with something expensive to fuel my pride. Here’s hoping all goes according to plan.

Speaking of fueling my pride, I ran Adobe Audition for the first time since I got it. Thanks to my internship I became so lazy that all the stuff I intended to do with it was put on hold. But when I finally found the spirit to get one of the many projects done, boy was it a great moment. It was so long since I was so full of myself. A very long time since I last got the chance to practice my sinister laugh Rau Le Creuset style to go along with the unjustified sense of overachievement.

Also, as an unintended result of putting my old plans into motion, I’m now having the PSP playing my RLBGM most of the time. Unsurprisingly, when I think about it, since the OST for games that I play nowadays are either too impossibly rare to be sold locally or to even have any torrents, or non-existent altogether, leaving me with the task of making a homebrew sort of OST. Which means another project to add to the already stretched list.

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all.

Committing the perfect murder… On the self…

It has been a while since the last time. It would’ve been sooner had things went a little smoother. But then again, this is life we’re talking about. My life, to be precise, which is good at nothing but making itself miserable.

Picking up from where I left off the last time, I now conclude that:

Tony Roma’s > Chilli's > The Ship > Victoria Station > TGI Friday's

It should be noted though that while the food is better at Tony Roma’s, Chilli’s does have a greater variety to their menu and is more flexible with their drinks. As before, anyone who doesn’t agree can feel free to keep your opinion to yourself.

Actually, this was decided very long ago; probably about three weeks. I did not announce it back then because something else happened that killed the mood completely: someone nicked my PSP, and along with it, 48 hours of my life spent on completing G Generation World. And this reminds me of one of the reasons why religion exists in this world: because most people (myself included, and I am very ashamed to be admitting this) are incapable of accepting the simple fact that shit happens, and endlessly foam at the mouth demanding an explanation as to why said shit happened in the first place, though I maintain that bastards who commit crime for a living should be shot in the head in front of their family.

But despite all this I took a cue from 9gag and took a deep breath, and proceeded to fuck this shit. And it works. And that’s quite the bombshell since it came from a completely nonprofessional site.

Also, before this if anyone asked me if I was a pampered kid or ‘anak manja’ as they say in Malay for being an only child, I would have much trouble responding, not because I’m ashamed to admit it if I was, but because I genuinely did not know as my father never bought me anything I wanted and never kept promises whenever we made a deal that I’d be rewarded whenever I achieved some sort of outstanding academic achievement, except for that one time when he bought me the entire first season of Digimon Adventures series for my 5As in UPSR. He’d also break anything that I bought with my own savings or that my mom bought for me without his permission. Now though, if anyone were to ask me if I’m a pampered kid, my answer would be ‘yes’ without a doubt. Because my mother agreed to replace the PSP that was nicked. On the same day the incident happened.

Life went on after that, with me occupying 5 days of Yat’s study week because he didn’t feel like studying and we were both bored to hell. And today with me heading out of the house for the first time since the incident, meeting up with JY for a short morning tea followed by a whole lot of rotting in Times Square, although I did catch a movie. Or two; the second one was being played outside some DVD shop. Was an interesting Korean movie about 2 POWs, one a Korean POW to the Japanese Imperial Army, another who was a Japanese military Colonel before being a Soviet POW. I did not get to watch the whole thing, but it was quite the touching story of how they both end up being POWs of the Soviets, then the Germans, and how they deal with their differences and how their friendship grew as they struggled to survive the war, which ultimately the Korean did not. Though throughout the movie and explicitly so in the end, it was implied that they were childhood friends. The title eluded me for a bit, but after some research, I discovered that the movie is titled ‘My Way’. I would highly recommend watching this; it is one of the few war films that actually touches the deeper emotions IMO.

Some point during the day today mom reminded me to think properly of the things I plan to do and don’t think about it after it is done. However as soon as I reached home, I was presented with a massive gamble. After some much consideration, I decided to take the risk, and moments right after, I realized that I have killed myself, metaphorically speaking.

And on the plethora of bombshells tonight, adieu to y’all.

Taking out the trashy world... wait, what?

We live in a really appalling world. A world which I realized hasn’t a single corner where things work out as expected. A world where there is strife as far as the eye can see. A world where peace exists only as an ideal.

This is a world where people call each other elaborately degrading names, even when (and more often than not) the name fits the name-caller more than the called. The kind of world where you find lard-bags calling eccentrics scumbags. Who knows if those eccentrics aren’t just mildly autistic? Then again, I shouldn’t be surprised. In a world where educated idiots think all autistics are so severely retarded they can’t say “papa” without spitting, anything goes. A world where you think if you travelled you’d be free from hell, but then discover your destination is no better than where you came from.

In the course of my life I’ve come to like a few places in this world. I like Japan because almost every cultural element that I like comes from there. I like the United Kingdom of Great Britain because the currency there is massive; for the price of a car there I can buy a house here and for reasons I will never disclose, I’ve come to like one particular country within the Union as well: Scotland. But in the end, as much as I may like those places, I might actually prefer this hellhole that I am currently in because Japan is very prone to natural disasters and the political scene in the UK is much less civilized that I envisioned. When I later learned of Scotland’s possible secession from the union, some part within me died a bit, even though I’ve never actually been there. Or any of those places for that matter.

Ultimately, there is no heaven on earth. Everywhere I might have thought of going turns out to be hell. The only thing is that I am already used to the local kind of hell that adapting to a new one might be difficult. Also the fact that this here is a hell I know more of than any other hell.

This here is a hell where people who are supposedly in a position of knowledge and authority tell those who are not the overused sentence, “if you’re so smart, why don’t you try it?” but never have the guts to let others who know better actually have a go, for fear of being ridiculed by their own incompetence. And in this hell there are people who think that the guy in China, what’s his name, Liu Xiaobo I think, should face the firing squad for ‘betraying his country’ instead of being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, because his actions has weakened the image of the Chinese internationally and it is imperative that China maintains a strong image for Chinese elsewhere to thrive. By that sort of logic, Chairman Mao should have been successfully assassinated, all opposition to local governments of every country shot because they attempt to weaken the country’s image, which is bad for their citizens who are currently abroad.

Again, by that logic, Scotland should be nuked for possibly making the United Kingdom lose a country.

Not that agree with this logic anyway because none of this makes sense to me. Then again, I never did bother to make sense out of them because I couldn’t really care less. I haven’t the time and energy to be patriotic, even, when I can barely handle my own problems as it is. Besides, why should I bother, when the fruits of my efforts are not mine to enjoy? What’s more, why should I mess my priorities up by neglecting myself and fighting for the benefit of others who seek my undoing? In the long run, why work toward a system perfect on a societal level, when in the end after that is achieved, people seek to quench their own greed anyway, undoing the whole process? So that we could live to die another day? Thanks but no thanks; I very much rather die now so that I don’t die another day.

Back to what I was saying about autistics. People seem to have this perception that those only mildly retarded aren’t considered autistics. When you have an autistic sharing ideas at TED Talks, you know that in some cases, the retardation can be so minute that the potential genius totally overshadows it. And the person I saw to make such a flawed remark wasn’t some rural fool; said person was a Psychology student. That said, that person is also an alpha-wannabe beta male who would do anything to put himself on the top; no depths of hell is too low for him. But who am I to judge? I have a personal grudge against that lard-cum-scumbag anyway, so it is unlikely that anything he does would fail to offend me.

However, something does worry me. If behaviour can be passed down through genes like how the selfish gene is more likely to be passed down than the altruistic gene, is there a scumbag gene that is passed down from one generation to the next? Will the children of scumbags inherit their scumbaggery? Or worse, have I inherited the asshole gene from my arsehole of a father? Because if there are such things, then there is an easy solution to world peace: shoot everyone who doesn’t have the virtuous gene in the head. Well, I say easy, but of course the first step (and I imagine, the hardest) is to identify this gene and the people with it.

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all.

Embracing insanity to avoid it

It’s no surprise to people that I am a quite unwell in the head. Or at least I try to make that fact as clear as possible. I also made it a point to fix myself the moment I am free for extended periods of time i.e. after I graduate and before I actually get a job, but I’m afraid the residual damage that’s been done is now beyond salvation. It’s something like cancer, really: when you discover it in its early stages, it is very much curable. Now that it has entered the equivalent of Stage 4, however, permanent damage has been done and the only thing left that can be done is to say goodbye ahead of time.

As a result, I like to shower at night with the lights off, among other things. I especially love doing this now because it reminds me of my childhood when the light bulb in the bathroom back home was still yellow and my parents still bathed me. Back then I liked to close my eyes and imagine I was at the beach and the yellowness of the light really helped set the mood, where I imagined I was looking at the golden evening sun. Then out at sea my childhood hero Ultraman would be doing battle of epic proportions with some monsters. It’s quite the same now, except that I try to add hot steaming rain into the whole atmosphere. This failed mainly for 2 reasons: the shower can only dispense so much water at a time, and the floor was too clean for it to feel sandy as a beach should, not that it’s a bad thing.

Like I said, I do that because it reminds me of my childhood, and I want to be reminded of it because that was a time when I had a mind too simple to understand the hell that is life; a mind that did not allow me to realize that I’m a nuisance to others, and thus allows be to continue being one. A mind that continued to anger others instead of getting angered by others, yet too immature to give a flying toss as to why they’re angry in the first place. A simple life that was not plagued by societal expectations and worries about the future. I miss that blissful, innocent ignorance.

It was also a time when I wasn’t such an angry person myself, and I really miss that. I really miss not breaking things when something stopped making sense. Then again, hammering away at a pillow back then seemed to work wonders while now the only things that work are things that actually put up some resistance, something solid that properly breaks, thus usually something expensive.

Of course, there are other things that have not specifically happened to me that have depressed me as well. First that I’ve noticed is the slow death of the blogging culture. Most of the personal blogs written by people who don’t own a multimillion and multinational business are not getting the amount of dedication and time that they used to get; all of this have gone to Facebook. This gives me less things to read, less things to get me off my own mind. This means that I have nowhere to go to when I want to look for inspiring writing, because no one writes descriptive essays for their Facebook status updates. And since most of the time a picture really does say a thousand words, that’s the medium people go for. And that is a medium that I will never use because no camera, not one, can capture an image as properly as the eye can see it. Pictures are either too blurry and not worth the attention it gets when taken by narcissist amateurs or overly glossed and edited by professionals, narcissist or not. Until the day the eye becomes a camera and the human memory can be transferred to digital format, words will still be my best friend if I have a story to tell.

And with that, the Gates of Destiny on the right shall be closed, leaving only one path left to be taken because one of the other destinations it leads to is dead, the other has become invite-only and those who are invited probably would go there straight rather than through here first and the final one is quite volatile, as it changes a little too frequently than I would like to adapt to it. It may come back once in a while, who knows? But the other two are gone for good.

As will the chat box because the ones running it decided that since they’re going bankrupt they might as well speed the process up.

Now on to something completely unrelated. My current taste in music has led me to think of a lot of potential plot ideas for a novel, but all of them will have the cliché of a love story somewhere in between. And thanks to my lack of proper creativity, especially in the ‘thinking up fictional names’ department, most of the key plot elements will have me end up in a copyright infringement suit of some sort or other. But draft after draft does not fail to race through my head recently, especially when I’m supposed to be studying for my finals. That and the fact that Yat hasn’t come up with his original story and I just continuously grow impatient of making use of the friend of his who knows a publisher. Maybe something soon; something that is completely original, or at least original enough that I won’t be involved in any legal nonsense.

As I attempt to end this post which has taken me 2 days to finish, I’m starting to like this bitter self of mine, for it is this self that actively seeks reminders of a really fantasy-filled childhood and that really calms the otherwise unwell mind. Perhaps it really is as I suspected long before; I actually have to stay as close on the verge of insanity as possible in order to not lose my mind.

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all.

Taking out the trash and sorting stuff out.

The time has finally come when, even if I did not want to, I have to move on. Not saying that I don’t, though I must admit, I was unable to at some point. And for that I must apologize to a friend which I may soon forget for doubting the truth in her words.

Which reminds me of another friend I once had. I’m not sure if the person is even alive at this moment, but I remember him saying something along the lines of “the term ’friends forever’ is one of the greatest lies one can tell.” And he’s right, mainly because it will be one of the most repeated and overused ones despite not being heavy on its own. Of course there are exceptions, where one is so close with another that their bond becomes that of family instead of mere friends, though that is a privilege I grant to no one until the day before my death. Sorry if anyone’s feelings got hurt, but there are few things I despise more than sounding sure about something and then being proven wrong while I’m still alive. Then again, if you know me well enough to deserve such recognition, you would also understand this fact and thus not be hurt in the first place.

Like I was saying, the current phase in my life is coming to an end. This means that most of the people in it are likely to be forgotten, some more completely than others; some as if they never existed. Some you wish never actually did but you end up remembering them only because you cannot afford to allow what they did to you happen again, while some others you remember them so well because of something pleasant they done to/for you that you wish they’d constantly remind you of it, just not with the words ‘did you remember the time when…’. And I am glad that the end has come, because this phase sucked real bad.

Nowadays I rarely have enough time on my hands that I actually have any time used for overthinking things; most of my free time I now spend fantasizing about me being the main character of some epic ultimate illusion. Or Final Fantasy, if you will. The times I actually spend on thinking these days, however, have proved to be more fruitful than before. I’ve recently come to realize most of the big stuff in life are the ones that hurt me while it is the little things in life that makes, and keeps, me happy, like when a stranger says “thank you” for a deed you’re not even intentionally doing. This has then led me to realize that I was more juvenile than I’d like to think.

I also realize that I’m not as hurt as I thought I would/should be when I found out that I’m now a complete stranger to the person that I talked with the most (if not the only one) outside campus hours and regarding non-academic stuff during my foundation year. Sucks to have the fact that you’re getting old smack you in the face like that. 

And so, with that, young brother, seek not happiness; let it (or her, for that matter) seek you instead, for happiness is like a butterfly: actively seek it out and it flies away, but stay still where you are and it might just rest on your hand. Take pleasure in the small things in life, and make sure you don’t have even a single fuck to give to those who seek your ruin, people and situations alike.

And with that, adieu to y’all.

Don't grow up; just wise up will do.

Often, you see someone doing something silly and deep down inside your heart you’d wish they would grow up. Or when you see people doing something you find distasteful. I used to do that too; whenever I see people feeling proud about embarrassing themselves I’d think to myself “grow up, please,” or when someone does something stupid and thinks aloud that it’s the best possible course of action to solve whatever problem they are currently facing. Like when someone clasps their hands together getting all schizophrenic thinking that that, coupled with lounging around all day, is going to make their wishes come true. Now, though, I’d just tell them to ‘wise up’ as opposed to ‘grow up’.

You see, there is a major difference. To grow up is to stop doing funny things, be self-conscious, be less optimistic and of course, be wiser. To wise up, on the other hand, is just to be wiser. Of course when I say wiser, more often than not I mean just merely smarter, or at least less daft as opposed to the complete package of wisdom which includes being smarter and more understanding. What I am saying here is to wise up is to gain all the benefits of growing up with none of the drawbacks. It is possible to wise up and not grow up, though such a thing isn’t exactly common.

So what I’m saying now is that when people do silly or distasteful things, I’m merely asking that they know if what they are doing has a proper point to it. So when you’re being silly, if you have a point, then I guess to a certain extent it is fine, but if you’re being distasteful, then you should realize that it is not only that, but has no point to it at all other than making you seem like an arsehole.

Why am I saying this? Because people who have the benefit of being humorous and optimistic should continue to be so. Sure, to grow up is also to accept the harshness of reality, which often results in a suffering level of optimism. Sometimes though, it is better to just be incapable to accept the harshness of reality and keep being optimistic. When I say optimistic I’m not saying that you be daftly hopeful that you get schizophrenic and laze around hoping for miracles to happen; I’m saying that to the things you do there will be something you look forward to at the end, while still being aware that in life what you look forward to and what you actually get don’t usually match.

I’m saying all this because I didn’t exactly have the stereotypical childhood everyone else experiences. Thanks to a paranoid father with paradoxical values, I don’t have the luxury of a social life as a kid and thus, as an adult, don’t have the many luxuries that come with it, like friends, or a sense of humour, or the benefit of being able to open up to people, to be able to know that there are others who are willing to share your burden when things get too heavy, and to allow them to do so. This gives me a lot of time to think, to reflect, to ponder and as a result, to wise up.

The problem is that for a boring person to wise up is the same as for the average person to grow up; in the end, both of them are boring and not optimistic. In other words, I’ve been denied the luxury of being a wise but interesting and optimistic person before I had the autonomy to make such a choice. But for others who do have the luxury of a choice, don’t let it go to waste because more often than not it is a one way thing; there’s no turning back once you’ve crossed the line.

Just yesterday, a close friend told me that he’s starting to get bitter about life and that he’s starting to be like me. That is a really major thing for him to be saying because as far as I can tell, he is a funny guy with optimism as far as the sky is blue on a clear morning. It really takes a lot for an optimist to lose their key defining feature. Sure, his childhood wasn’t much better than mine, as far as I’m aware of at least, but he has one thing that makes all the difference, especially at a young age: a social life. And with what little first-hand experience that I have, that really makes all the difference.

So to answer your question, no, it isn’t a good thing, because if you become like me, you’re not you anymore, are you? You’re just another me, and that’s never a good thing, no matter how you look at it.

To everyone else, no matter if you’re as daft as hell or if you’re just plain insensitive, just wise up, please. To the wannabe schizophrenics, I know telling them to wise up, and expecting it to happen, is as impossible telling the sun to freeze up, but I’ll do it anyway. So guys, wise up please.

And with that, adieu to y’all.

With none of the good that's supposed to come together.

This week, before the weekends, was a time where almost everything went wrong. Not so much for my personal well-being, but it worries me what these wrongs will do to those who have no mental immune systems.

University is such a beautiful place. A brilliant place where religious bigots who speak of out casting or exiling homosexuals for ‘spreading’ homosexuality are allowed to lecture students on community psychology. Probably sometime in the future we can expect to legally murder or commit suicide just to get away from such idiots, so that they don’t ‘spread’ such bigotry and idiocy to others.

Saying homosexuality is contagious is like saying, I don’t know, a penis (or a lack of one) for example, is contagious. Unfortunately, however, bigotry and idiocy IS contagious. No more than chicken pox, but still contagious nevertheless. Because there is a staggering number of people who have literally no mental immune system. These are people with no in born morals or virtues, only fear and fear-mongering, probably out of envy for not being capable of kindness at birth.

I used to say ‘hope for the best, prepare for the worst’. I now realize I was wrong: you shouldn’t hope in the first place, because it will only get you disappointment. If, however, you are obligated by reasons unknown to mankind to hope, then hope for the worst as well, because the worst is infinitely more likely to happen than the best. This way, you have 100% chance of not being disappointed, as Jeremy Clarkson once wrote in his newspaper column, "Disappointment is a word for people who don't think ahead."

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all.

P.S.: on a more cheerful note, bro Yat says he has a friend who knows a publisher, and has suggested that we both collaborate on a novel. And make millions overnight like Rowling, I hope.

It's like starting an old car without petrol.

Not writing a blog post for so long is probably showing its effects now, as I sit here for more than 10 minutes thinking of how to begin. Now that I have, things are that much easier.

I’ve just finished reading a self-help book that my mother bought for me. It has an interesting title, to say the least, but I’m afraid the contents do not reflect the same emotion as the title does.  The subtitle is ’10 simple truths that will set you free’, but honestly, after reading it I feel more confused than free. The fact that it was written by two professional therapists with Dr. tagged to their names makes it all the worse.

I remember once upon a time where I mentioned psychology was a subject full of lies, in the sense that it tells us to lie to ourselves and to help others lie to themselves; and got into a pretty petty argument with two of my friend’s friends who were fellow psychology students themselves. Now though, I realize that I was wrong, but not in a way that makes them right. I still maintain that the subject is all about lying to the self to live a better life, but that description was not meant for psychology. Rather, it was counseling/psychotherapy. Especially so now that I’m done with that book.

Why am I so enraged by a mere book? Good question; I wish to know the answer myself. I mean, it’s just a bloody book, right? The authors probably have bollocks for brains and they can put down whatever junk they feel works and then publish it as some self-help book with the impression that whatever works for them would work for the rest of the world too, right?

WRONG

Okay, maybe not wrong after all. But what makes it wrong is that the fact that the authors are in a position of knowledge, and is supposed to impart stuff that, at least, isn’t complete cattle crap if it can’t be 100% correct. They do have the ‘Doctor’ title for a reason, and that at least proves that their head is somewhere we can look for signs of intelligence and not mere instinct-based bestiality.  Or at least I hope so.

Firstly, it says that, and I quote directly from the book, “The fool is the one who deceives, not the one who is deceived. Your kindly grandmother who falls for the insurance scam is not a fool; she trusted that the scam artist would do exactly as he said he would do. She is a person of her word, and she expected him to be also. That makes her vulnerable to deception, but this does not make her a fool. To choose to trust another does not imply naiveté or foolishness, but a choice to take another person at his or her word.”

I’m sorry, but isn’t that the perfect description of a fool? I don’t know what kind of English is being taught to American people but as far as I can work out, a fool is a silly, weak-minded, stupid or possibly even idiotic person who lacks judgment or sense. So how on Earth is someone who falls for a scam NOT a fool? Someone who is vulnerable to deception is someone who is probably simple-minded and cannot tell if something is too good to be true, therefore a fool. The scammer, on the other hand, is a genius because he knows what he’s doing and is good at it. It may not be morally right, but that’s beside the point. I really couldn’t for the life of me work this out and I doubt anyone who speaks the kind of English I do can. If you beg to differ, please enlighten me, but throughout the duration of your attempt please make sense. I doubt I have any qualms with splattering your brain matter on the floor literally if you do the same with mine metaphorically.

Next. There is a sentence in the book that mentions “to avoid the responsibility that comes with happiness and success, to protect themselves from the scariness of loving someone, and so on.”
What sort of responsibility ever comes with happiness and success besides keeping it up? I’ve yet to hear of anyone being told that once they are happy, they will have to remain happy or else some politician will be assassinated or if they are successful they have to remain successful or the World Bank will go bankrupt. And who the fuck would, in their right mind, be scared of loving someone? And why turn something as beautiful as love into something so morbid that it’s worth being afraid of? It’s not love that people are afraid of; it’s the heartbreak that comes after it. Heck, people love love. So much so, in fact, that people don’t give a flying toss about the possibility of the heartbreak. Saying that people are afraid of love is like saying people are afraid of money; the only two things in the world that people would commit all sorts of vices and atrocities for.

Finally, there’s this. Near the end of the book, it tells people to use guided imagery, imagining a traumatic event, to let go of it. In other words, we must recreate our greatest nightmare to get rid of it. To me, that is along the lines of saying “kill yourself so that you won’t die.” Sure, how are you going to die (again) if you are already dead? Isn’t that defeating the purpose? It’s bloody hilarious now that I put it this way, I must admit, but I digress. Point is, if you’re trying to let go of something, why do you need to get to it first? Sure, if you want to throw away, say, a bottle you need to pick it up first, but this is ridiculous in the sense that if it is already lost or gone missing, do you still need to go looking for it and then personally put it in the rubbish bin just to make sure it is gone?

On a side note, I am reminded of the nonsense people say to their youngers involving the words ‘now is not the time to’, ‘this is just the beginning’ and ‘you’re still young’. From experience, my father used to tell me “UPSR is nothing; it is PMR that will determine your future.” Then three years later “PMR is nothing; it is SPM that will determine your future.” And just before I entered university, I got “SPM was nothing; your results in university will determine your future.” Yeah, I’m sure now he’d just say when I graduate that it is my job that will determine my future. I’m just wondering what would determine my future when I retire. My death probably, though that idea is as hilariously impossible as committing suicide to be immortal. Then there’s my mom who told me “high school is not the time to be looking for love; wait ‘till university,” and is now telling me “don’t look for love when you’re still studying; wait until you’re working.” Yeah, sure, when I’m working I should wait until I retire before looking for love, right?

I’m sure I’m not the only one getting this sort of bullshit, so to those who share the same problem, here’s a tip: they’re always going to tell you that either you’re being one step too far ahead or that it is just beginning; the next step is the important one. I say, “Fuck You” because according to that logic, there is never the right time for anything because either it’s too early or what you do now does not matter since the big one is only just coming up.

And now I don’t know how to end this episode of ranting because I can’t think of anything interesting to say.

And on that bombshell, adieu to y’all.

Biting the settling dust.

I see others take the path I once treaded,
The path which destination I've since dreaded,
A place of absolute extremes,
Where one is either in cookies and creams,
Or in anguish beyond expressible screams.

I would forsake my happiness,
If it means freedom from sorrow,
I would embody eternal coldness,
If it means a tearless tomorrow.

The flames have died and the ambers have cooled,
A dead passion that can never be refuelled,
The path less travelled I no longer choose,
Instead I'll be a hermitic recluse.

The eternal flame now eternally dead,
I realize I was in over my head,
As another cycle has just begun,
The tangled web of fate has again been spun,
After all that has been said and done,
It all amounts to absolutely none,

When all hope was lost.

Here I am once again in Kampar, where I am to spend the next 14 weeks in the purest form of suffering known to humanity.

It’s a Monday today as I am typing this, but I have no idea when I will be able to publish this online as the new place I am staying at has no internet connectivity. Hell, I don’t even know the other tenants (if there are any at all) to discuss with them the solution to this problem. I realize I was in a rush when I got this place and didn’t think several things over before I decided that I wanted to spend one more semester here. Fortunately, Plan B is easily available. Of course, like all back up plans, it isn’t as ideal and there will be extra complications to deal with, but in this case I’m quite grateful that it isn’t totally unreasonable of a plan.

I still remember the Saturday that I arrived here. The moment I set foot on the familiar streets, I was immediately filled with this overwhelming surge of sadness and sorrow. I was instantly depressed and felt intense weight around my eyes. But, as always, letting those tears out is the hardest possible thing for me to do. It was so bad that I actually decided that for once I might actually benefit from spending the night with my parents at Grand Kampar Hotel.

Fortunately for me, Sunday was a much better day. The morning spent with mother and father was actually quite enjoyable. Again, never thought I’d say this, but that’s how it turned out to be. Ironically, I might actually have that bout of depression to thank for getting my father back to talking terms with myself, after almost half a year of deliberately not talking to him. Lunch with the family actually did not feel irritating, even with father’s usual blatant self-embarrassing. After they left for home, I killed the entire afternoon at the local cyber café, Fecca. Got a damn good friend (probably the best I have over here) to help me kill the evening. We went to the local McDonalds and talked about the good old times during our first year, how the second year became the point that tore everything apart, for both his course and mine, what were we planning to do after graduation and so on. Then just when we were about to leave, our Tae Kwon Do instructor showed up with his assistant, and we decided we should get some other fellow students to come over and talk crap until midnight.

So thank you Vingent for being a friend in need, a friend indeed.

I was about to talk about what happened during my semester break as well, which was actually spent very meaningfully, but I guess I’ll just leave that for another time. All in all, those 4 weeks were the time where I potentially fixed some broken bonds with my ‘19’ family, made a small number of friends halfway across the globe and otherwise having a jolly good time on PSN with said friends, as well as chilling with another brother of bonds.

And to close, to every one of my friends out there with a PSP, please pick up a not-too-old game called Phantasy Star Portable 2 and join us, The Grey Army, online.

With that, adieu to y’all.

P.S.: This is finally published on 17th