dot

:p

Sukaa..

I lost 4 kgs! yay! (although it will definitely come back masa raya)

:'(

I've been spending what was left of the working week in my (parent's) house in SS2, since this weekend, my husband and I are due at his parent's place, and later on, raya in Muar, his hometown.
As I was 'salam'-ing my grand aunt before we left, she said something with that sad look on her face that finally made it hit home: "Jumpa petang raya ya?". It hit me that for the first time, I won't be spending the morning of raya with my family. A wave of sadness crashed into me then, and I went over to Papa trying had to withhold whatever emotions I felt. He must've felt it too, though, because this was the first time, since I got married, that he walked us to the gate. I know that it can never compare to that feeling one gets when one is hundreds or thousands of miles away from home during raya, but it's sad, nonetheless.
I'm not a little girl anymore.

Disappointment!

A few weeks ago, our faculty announced that our Pre-Graduation Night was going to be organized by them, instead of us. I'm not sure what the official reason is, but word went around that they wanted to take extra precaution that our night doesn't end up the way our seniors' did.

How was our seniors' Night you asked? Well, some genius who obviously either didn't make it to his/her own prom at school or was not the popular prom queen she hoped to be, decided to make it prom themed! With the crowning of a king and queen and everything! Well, sukahati la kan, if you're happy living life everyday like you're still in high school then that's your business. Tapi, this is a formal function, kata cikai sangat sampai you need the RM1000 the faculty doles out for the event, then ikutla dress code university. You invited the dean and a lot of other lecturers, tapi you decided to make the dinner macam ala-ala teenage movie/the o.c/gossip girl/one tree hill macam tu. Don't get me wrong, I watch those too, but never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine my Graduation Night to be like those parties they have in those movies. I'm not kolot, believe me. Nak pakai tube dress ke, hot pants ke, bikini ke, dulik hape aku, tapi ikut occasion boleh tak? If you KNOW that it's compulsory for the DEAN OF YOUR FACULTY FROM YOUR UNIVERSITY WHICH HAS A DRESS CODE to come and officiate the ceremony, please justify the reason you decided to don these outfits, despite the fact that you know it would be considered inappropriate? Not only that, was it so absolutely necessary to have slow-dancing sessions where perempuan and lelaki yang belum kahwin peluk2 macam dah? OK, kau nak make out dengan boyfriend kau ke, nak peluk sampai horny ke, suka hati kaula, tapi jangan buat kat official function DEPAN DEAN boleh tak, bodoh? Now, your juniors are left to sweep after your mess and suffer the consequences of your actions.

Oklah, some people might accuse me of being stupid. If the faculty organises, after all, we get free food, right? Right. But it's not about the free food, it's about the camaraderie. The feeling of being special because it's our last semester. The reward of going through 4 years together, especially the last semester where we worked hard to complete our AE requirement.

See, it wouldn't be so bad if the function was held especially for us. The problem is the fact that they decided to selit-selitkan function tu into the MALAM ANUGERAH DEKAN. Pandai tak? It's like the committee thought "Hmm. What shall we do for these seniors after all they've been through for 4 years? We should make it special, right? I mean, everybody else did something special for their pre-grad night. Tapi.. masa dah suntuk... kitorang bz.. I know! Let's put them in with the DL night. shall we? only we'll call in MALAM PENGHARGAAN sebab nak appreciate seniors AND the pandai juniors jugak!" and everybody else cheered and patted this person in the back for being such a genius at problem solving.

We are not books, okay? Takde maknenye kau ingat kau bleh selit2 je kitorang macam kau selit2 buku atas bookshelf penuh?

To Whom it may Concern,

With all due respect ma'am/sir/dr/prof/datuk/datin, whoever thought of this idea, we, the Part 8 TESL students, class of 2008 would like to formally REJECT the offer of the integration of the Pre-Graduation Dinner with the Dean's List Dinner. Thank you.

.

You know, one day, you're going to wake up and realise that EVERYTHING you've done to make lives miserable has come around and splashed your face full of the mud you've been rubbing other peoples' faces in, and they don't even have to lift a finger for that. You'll suddenly be jolted awake and pushed off that high horse you've so voluntarily put yourself on without anyone's consent and that's when it hits you: You're bullshit. You're nothing. You've worked so hard to push everybody away and then jerking them back like puppets on a string that by that time, the strings have snapped, and you find yourself stranded and alone because all of your little puppets have had enough of the bruises you've inflicted on them and are tired of watching you walk away. And on that day onwards, no matter what you do, how hard you try, no matter how many brand new unsnappable strings you try to buy, you'll be scrabbling around with desperation because you know what? It'll be too late. They'll have forgotten all about you. And that includes me.

Dwindle

Going through life, I realise that you can’t keep everybody. There are some people who you absolutely cherish the companies of, but if they choose not to care, then there’s nothing you can do. You’ve tried your best but things are just not meant to be I suppose. That’s just life. Most people hate confrontations. They much prefer backing away silently, acknowledging your presence less and less until finally, they disappear. You forget about them, which is precisely what they want, until one day, you come across photos or anything that reminds you of them. By that time, all you’re able to do is wonder what happened to a friendship that seemed so strong and unbreakable.

That's life. So cliche, but true.

I want...

.. to read this book.
And I will! As soon as I finish my AE!
Tapi mahal la, 70 plus bley?

Public Tiff, 2008 Style!

Okay, okay, I realise that it's the facebook era now, and nobody goes on friendster anymore. My husband even deleted his account (but he's not on facebook, he just despises online communities :p). I stil retained mine, for reasons unknown even to me, but i check it like once every two weeks instead of as frequently as I used to.

So anyway, when I log on to whatever online community that I have an account in, I like checking for updates on the people on my list of friends. I saw a very sarcastic-looking shoutout on said person's page and I decided to just click on this person to see what was going on.
Lo and Behold! A Bona Fide lover's tiff, on the friendster comment boards, no less.

I suppose it's their prerogative to fight wherever they want, I mean couples have tiffs in public all the time, aye? (Although I secretly believe that no one plans to have public arguments, it just explodes and somehow errupts all over the place) This is different though. Why? Well, maybe because when one posts a comment/testimonial, one KNOWS that everybody has access to it. ANY Tom, Dick or Harry (Jessica, Anne or Mary? LOL) is able to read the damn thing.

As if that wasn't enough to make someone feel like gagging, a busybody (I can verify that she's like that in real life) decides to add fuel to the fire by egging one of the parties on. Seriously, if you're a friend, you try to make things better, not worse.

Personally, I find it narcissistic and exhibitionistic of them, but if they like it that way, then I suppose more power to 'em!

Then again, I'm being harsh. Maybe they ran out of credit and were completely broke, so they couldn't call or text each other and thus, HAD to resort to this. Whatever the case may be, I wish them well and I hope they get over those differences (and maybe kick that busybody in the ass?) for their sake as much as for everyone else's! :p

Of Car Stickers, Dress Codes and Idiots( not necessarily in that order)

When we came back to Shah Alam yesterday, a friend of ours alerted us to some posters that were put up at the faculty, detailing new dress codes. He seemed quite happy about it, which made us curious. And so we checked it out. Whoa! Guys are allowed to wear round-necked t-shirts to class on Tuesdays to Fridays, Girls are allowed to put on anything as long as there are sleeves on it (they can even wear shorts to play certain appropriate sports which weren't stated in the poster). I did think at the time that it seemed too good to be true and that the regulations weren't detailed enough, but whatever works, huh?

So today, I put on a t-shirt but I decided to wear a jacket with it because I wasn't that confident in the "new" ruling. My husband, though, was all too willing to comply with the ruling and donned a round-necked T. Imagine our surprise when a female guard stopped him and demanded that he changed. Apparently, someone or other had declared a cancellation on the new dress codes. The notice was put up outside the guard house (come on la. Passing by a guard house, most people want to get away from the prying eyes of the guards as soon as they can, even if they've done nothing wrong. For some reason, even being decked out in Baju Kurung makes me feel like I might be doing something wrong when I'm walking past the guard house. NOBODY stops and reads those notices, okay?) and nowhere else. So my husband had to go back to the car to get his jacket. Unsatisfied with what happened, he went back to the place where the new regulation posters were put up and lo and behold! They were still there, with no indication of the new notice ANYWHERE.
So siapa yang salah? Weren't the office notified by the higher-ups? Couldn't the guards at least notify the office? I have no clue, but that's Idiotic story #1

Idiotic story #2
During class today, some of our classmates excused themselves. When they came back, they were holding a bunch of car stickers which were given to them by the office. It was the whole Bumiputera/Malay issue coming up again *sigh*. I refused to take one, and so did most of my friends. According to one of them, if she takes one, she'd stick it on her bathroom window so that when she's constipated, she can look at the sticker and get so angry that she'd "teran". LOL. She's part Chinese, btw.

Y'know, looking back, I suppose I'm lucky in a way. My parents were never racist. They never taught me the "kita orang Melayu. Orang Melayu bagus. Diorang orang Cina. Orang Cina makan babi dan jahat" and so on and so forth. I grew up with chinese friends and we accepted each other for who we were without any discriminations. I went to a kindergarten where I was the only Malay girl and all the kids accepted me readily. Throughout promary and secondary schools, my bestest friends, the ones who were most loyal to me were chinese and indians, while most of my malay friends played hot and cold with me. I remember going to their houses for lunch or dinner and their moms would make sure the dish I was eating was cooked in a different pot because they knew what muslims could and could not eat. That's my idea of being a Malaysian.

Going into matriculation, I was lucky because the two classes I got into were those who accepted everybody, Muslim or not, Malay or not. So while other people were discriminating agaisnt the Non-Bumis, most of the people in my two classes walked hand-in-hand with them.

So I consider myself lucky that I was never hit by the racist bug and my first glimpse of it comes now that I'm old and mature enough to know what's right and what's wrong.

No offense but...

I hate the phrase "no offense". No matter that I fall culprit to the crime myself, but I find it completely redundant.

See, there are many, many words or phrases in the english language that are redundant, (for example: "not to mention, honest truth etc...) but I find this one the most annoying. Go to Urban Dictionary and you'll see just how annoying it is.

Countless of times, people come up to me saying "Zurin, no offense but..." and proceed to tell me something that totally offends me. Or they say something that I would normally find no offense in (because it doesn't involve me) and suddenly end the tirade with "no offense". For some reason, I get offended when that happens even though it's totally irrelevant.

For example, the other day, a close friend of mine and I were watching tv when a commercial from a well-known phone service company came on. Just to clarify, I have never used this service in my life, nor do I have the intention of using it. Also to clarify, I get annoyed at their ads as much as the next sane, normal person does. So after the ad finishes, my friend says
" ______(insert service provider name) adverts suck!" and then said person proceeds to look at me and say "No offense".

"To whom?" I ask.

"To you" he says.

And I go from totally agreeing (to the declaration of how bad their adverts are) to totally offended that he would associate me with such an ad.

"Why would I get offended?" I say. "I've never used this service, nor do I intend to"

"Manala tau".

Haih. To said friend, if you're reading this, it just oocured to me how much I get annoyed when anyone uses that phrase, no matter what their intentions are, when you used it on me. No hard feelings, dude.

There is a malay equivalent of this, fyi. It's "...bukan nak kata apa la kan..." followed by insult.
Another friend of mine came up to me complaining about a coursemate of hers who had this to say while they were having drinks at a mamak. "_____(name of my friend), bukan nak kata apa la kan, tapi boleh tak jangan buat muka camtu? Annoying kay?" (No offense, but could you not make that face? it's annoying). And what was the face that so offended this girl? My friend, staring off into space because she was bored. I would've snapped back a reply like "Habis, ko tengok cermin hari-hari tak annoyed pulak?" (What, and looking at your own face in the mirror everyday doesn't annoy you?") but my friend was totally flabbergasted and speechless, so she chose to ignore the comment. Hmph.

So I've decided that I'm going to try my hardest not to use this very offensive phrase anymore.
To those who think I've mentioned you in this post, NO OFFENSE! ;p

...

I'm so determined not to let things people do or say bother me so much. I want to be like that person who can just walk up to someone and give them a verbal slap to the face. I tell myself everyday that I'm lucky with what I have and anyone who resents that or has a problem with it really isn't worth it and should affect the way I feel.
I just don't know how.

I want...

... this

I love my country...

...but it scares me sometimes...

Specifically, the people scare me. The politics, the racism (it's there, people just don't want to acknowledge it), the HATE... Yes, I'm perfectly aware that other countries aren't much better, thank you, but I find all the goings-on of late really disturbing, considering I've been living in this country and watching life go by through rose-tinted glasses. I realise now that things aren't always as they seem.

I came across an entry, while blog-hopping, about a boy who blogged (on friendster, no less) about how much he hated Malaysia and how much the US was much better than this country. He talked about racism and how people are so sexist. Sadly (or otherwise), I missed the opportunity to really see everything he wrote about since his blog got removed due to the sensitive content. His friendster profile was ladden with hate comments from people no better than him. Curiosity got the best of me and I googled his name to see if I could actually read some stuff he wrote, and I found some blogs which quoted him. I won't bother writing them down here since they're probably old news anyway, but I find it sad that I can actually see validity in some of his points.

No, before anyone accuses me of it, I am not overly westernized nor have i forgotten my roots. This boy ( I call him a boy because despite his points, he can't seem to get past all the emotions of his probably sad childhood and write maturely about them. What a shame.) as I said, has some good points, in SOME of his posts, particularly the ones I got to read. He does need to take an English language course, but i digress. I do believe that whatever views he has/had they are/were personal to HIM. Other people took his views too personally and found the need to insult the heck out of him, thus, proving themselves to be even worse than this boy they despised so much.

Let him be, for goodness's sake. Let him say whatever he wants. If you really love your country as much as you say you do, then prove it by improving yourselves instead of condemning others who probably have their reasons for saying things the way this guy did. Why stoop to such levels beneath you? You harass him on his profile and send him death threats - so this is considered a Malaysian thing to do? It's considered Islamic and proper and rightful? You go so far as to accuse him of not even being Muslim, so declaring someone else apostate is a very Muslim thing to do, have I got it right?

Blogs are a way for us to vent our feelings, let out some of that pent up emotions that we hold inside. People complain all the time about not being given the freedom of speech in their own blogs, but then when these very same people come across some content of some other person's blog that doesn't suit their fancy, they forget their complaints and be the very people they whined about in the first place. Please, look in the mirror and grow up.

Eh, bongok lah...

My keyboard is screwyyyy..
I've noticed several posts with seemingly HORRIBLE grammar jut (<----- see?) because my 's's won't come out when I'm typing really fast. I'd love to edit it all but seriously, malas la nak tengok one by one...
So kalau ada tersilap tu, please excuse my keyboard (tak nak mengaku because I know I've got good grammar. In fact, I'm married to a Grammar Nazi so there's no excuse). It doesn't know any better. ;p

Frenemy?

You're great friends with someone. You hang out together all the time, yet you dread seeing them sometimes because you know 8 times out of ten, the person will either tell you how fat/ugly/horrible you look in that dress. Or if you tell them stories, they reply with "Since when were you ________ (cantik/putih/cute/kurus- fill in the blank)". Sakit tak hati? Sakit kot, tetiap kali jumpa kena kutuk kaw-kaw punye...

I mean, you know it's bad when people (yours truly) who have never worried about their weight start thinking they're fat. Padahal takde pun gemuk, if I calculate my BMI. In fact, I went for a blood test and I'm actually quite healthy, but I look in the mirror every day and ask my husband if he thinks I'm fat.

Seriously, sakit hati ok, everty time someone makes those kind of comments. Kalau constructive takpe jugak, tapi comment tu memang sengaja nak sakitkan hati aku. Taula orang lain joke kau pon nak joke jugak tapi isu2 sensitif ni jangan sentuh bleh tak? kalau aku cakap ko pun gemuk, makan banyak, ko pun tersentap kan?

Ermm, ok, enough of the emo-ness... If you think you might have a friend like this but have no idea how to determine if he/she really is a frenemy, read on...

How to Spot a Frenemy

Step1

Understand frenemy variations. Frenemies can range from calculatingly callous and manipulative to obliviously selfish and unkind. Just because a person doesn't "mean" to be mean doesn't erase the hurtful impact. Sometimes an unaware insult is more damaging than a deliberate jab.

Step2

Pay attention to how you act in the presence of your potential frenemy. Do you recoil at the thought of spending time with her? Do you clam up whenever he comes around? Do you often talk bad about her to others? Do you feel competitive when he discusses work, hobbies, love life or finances? If you continually act less than the highest, most loving, centered version of yourself when the two of you get together, take note. A frenemy may be in your midst.

Step3

Trust your initial reactions. The first feelings we have about people and situations are the most accurate. These pure, uncensored observations give us all the information we need to classify somebody as a frenemy. You do yourself a disservice (not to mention set yourself up for more abuse) by analyzing interactions, questioning whether or not you are being too sensitive or making excuses for why a person behaves the way they do. If you feel like you've just received an emotional kick in the gut, then you have just received an emotional kick in the gut. No analysis needed!

Step4

Look for patterns. If somebody lets you down or acts insensitively on occasion, that doesn't necessarily qualify him or her for frenemy status. Humans are flawed and friendships inevitably follow suit. On the other hand, a person who continually uses you for his or her personal agenda, dishes out insults, breaks promises, ignores your requests or manipulates you with passive-aggressive behavior goes beyond the acceptable friendship margin of error.

Step5

Acknowledge your paradoxical feelings. Frenemies are hard to decipher because most of the time they have as many, if not more, positive qualities than negative ones. Frenemies will often share your interests and values; if you didn't have these things in common, it would be easy to qualify your frenemies as enemies and move them off your emotional radar entirely. Love-hate relationships are typical for frenemies.

Step6

Compare and contrast. When trying to decide if a friend is actually a frenemy, weigh the person in question against somebody who you know with complete certainty is a friend. Personality traits become more apparent when viewed this way.

Step7

Seek validation. If you can't sort it out, talk to a trusted friend or mentor. Perspective from a third party can help you get clear about the nature of your mucky, indefinable relationships.

Did you know...

that a study by Peterson and Roscoe (1991) found egocentrism in female college freshmen to be at a level higher than is typically found in some high school students?

For those of you who don't know what egocentrism is and want to find out just a bit more, (I'm a bit lazy to type everything out here since I'm doing this between assignments, which is how i found this article, btw. Bagus tak saya? Ber-blog pasal assignment. hoho) click here.

That would explain the level of egocentrism apparent in many of my female juniors. EVERYTHING is so clear to me now - NO WONDER so many of these girls are so rude and arrogant.

Let me explain what some of these juniors (pre-degree, no less! although most of the degree students share the exact same traits) have done. One very glaring incident of their stupid-mindedness happened during our post-practicum course.

Our lecturer, after observing our torture and hard work (really?) for the past 3 months decided to treat us all to breakfast on the very last day of the course. She put out the buffet table outside. Now, if you were a junior at a university and you came one day and saw that there was a delicious spread of food outside a hall obviously occupied by seniors, would you

1. tell yourself that the food probably belongs to them
2. think "waitaminute, my university is too cheapskate to provide food for EVERYBODY. There must be some kind of function going on that doesn't involve ME"
3. help yourself to the food, with seconds to boot.

If you answered no. 3, then congratulations, you are now on the same par with my tesl juniors! Pat yourself in the back and then get someone to punch your lights out because you are now officially an asshole.

Tip of the iceberg, this one. If any TESL juniors are reading this and you are not one of those bitches who think you own the faculty, I apologise, but please, on my behalf, give those girls a kick in the ass on the behalf of your seniors aye? Thanks

Let me clarify. I am not one who imposes my seniority on people. In fact, I despise seniors who walk around and demand juniors to bend down and lick their boots just because the happen to be older. However, I do NOT remember being such a bitch when I was a junior. While I never fanned my seniors' backsides, I also respected them and never stepped out of line because I know they've been through more and have been around longer.

Tapi, budak2 sial ni, ingat diorang tu bagus sangat. (hah, bila aku mula cakap melayu, ko tau la kesabaran aku dah tahap sini- sambil letak tangan paras kening). Seriously la, ko tu baru setahun jagung kuar sekolah nak berlagak sakan macam ko tu Permaisuri Agong pehal? Ko tau tak Permaisuri Agong yang lepas tu pon sangup menari poco2 dengan student UiTM? Tau tak? Kalau ko perasan sebab bapak ko tu lawyer ke, doctor ke, baik takyah la. Bapak ko kan, bukan ko? Kalau kaa tahap gaban sebab usaha sendiri takpe gak ni harap nak ride on the coattails of your parents? pigi dahhh. Aku lempang sekali berbekas jugak muka ko, sama macam orang lain so jangan la rasa macam ko bagus sangat. You've obviously been disillusioned all these years so let me give you a reality check. You're not that special.