Are You An Alien Or A Robot?

October 24th, 2007

i was latelatelate as usual this morning, and while rushing into the car, i hit my head rather painfully against the doorframe part thingy of the car. the result was a huge bump on my forehead that just wouldn’t go down (thank you, fringe) and a wake-up call, in more ways than one. things just seem a lot clearer sometimes after you’ve been given a big smack in the face. or in this case, on the forehead.

i’m growing up. it’s a strange thing to realize about yourself, but it’s true. things, and people, look different to me now than they looked a couple of weeks back. i’ve lost my appetite for lollipops. and somewhere along the line i also lost myself. there are days when amidst all the period cramps and coffee table magazines, i wonder to myself where my identity went. who is this person holding this book and walking and talking on autopilot? i mean yeah sure people change.. but there’s always a core of themselves that they maintain. but i don’t know if i ever knew that core. i think once upon a time, i did. but it’s probably lost somewhere in all those yellowing high school yearbook pictures.

oh haha, i was such a character back in high school, which of course was not very long ago. lemme tell you what i was like. being in the top class of the form has its expectations, and in the words of West (Heroes reference, is Season 2 boring or what) - when in the top class, you’re supposed to be a robot, not an alien. but i was an alien. robotness just wasnt in my blood. which explains why i was really mad when Claire didnt do that backtuck off the tower. hands up how many people felt this rumbling disappointment in their stomach when she turned around and said, ‘you’re right, cant do it’ like a really bad imitation robot. cmon girl let that alien in you out! but i am digressing.

so yeah i’ve been in the top class all my life. but like everywhere else, there’s always a certain character type that people expect you to be when you are lumped in a stereotypical category, and if you dont fit that prototype, sometimes it confuses people. my classmates were all really bookish and tight-laced people who were always eager to please, and sometimes this robotness scared the hell out of me. i remember how i had this really huge screamfest with one of my teachers, and every single one of my classmates were looking down at their tables the entire time. i mean, no one even dared to look up and watch, let alone say something on my behalf. for goodness sakes lah, what’s so scary, she’s just a teacher with a short fuse. anyway i ended up in tears in the bathroom; that sense of total alienation was just looming all over me and it pissed me off that i could be affected by something so little.

if there is anything that taught me the pains of conformity, it was being in that class for years and years on end. being a top class student, you were expected to be really goody two shoes and stuff. there was them, and then there was me, in my skirt cropped 2 inches too short and only turning up in school once or twice a week or something. i could have been like them, yknow, apologizing profusely for the littlest mistake or kissing Cikgu ass every lunch break, and it would have made my high school life so much more pleasant, but i just couldnt. i liked my skirt even though it got me a lot of flak from the more conservative teachers. i liked not being in school because school didnt make me happy. i liked sleeping in class during the boring lessons. i just did. i mean, i totally understand why teachers and some of my more super uptight classmates thought i was being disrespectful, but i was really just being an individual. i was never rude or anything, everyone can tell you i have the biggest smiles when talking to people, and i’m always very warm and friendly .. but geez.

i never understood it. the thing that got me really angry was when i wanted to run for student council president, and i thought i would have done a great job at it. apparently a few of my classmates didnt think so, and they voiced this out to the pihak-pihak berkenaan, and so my nomination was withdrawn just on account of that. yah i dont get it either. what do these people have against someone who is not like them? i dont judge you despite the fact that you are a boring kiasu shoe-polishing twerp robot; why should you judge me for having some colour and knowing how to speak my mind?

i remember how teachers used to tell me in Form 3 that i would probably be the one person in my class who wouldn’t do very well in PMR. yeah they would always say this to my face. i ended up getting straight A’s and a few of their apple-bringing pets didn’t. they said the same thing to me in Form 5, i would probably fail this or that if i kept up my ‘indiscipline’, but look who came up top student for SPM. look who got 12 A’s. suddenly there were all these warm smiles and claps on my back, and murmurs of well done, we knew you could do it. yeah right. i remember every single word of discouragement you gave me through all the years, encik-encik dan puan-puan sekalian.

aiyah i dont actually know how this post turned into such a rant. all i wanted to say was that back in high school, i really knew who i was and i would never compromise my identity, despite all this pressure to conform to the goody top-class mould. i was the butt of all absentee jokes, a lot of teachers would have loved to see some proper punishment slapped on me, and it was hard to relate to many of my classmates, but i really stuck to who i was and i was darn proud of it. darn proud of the fact that i was an alien, and not a mindless robot.

but these days… i dont know. i’m getting a lot of robot vibes from myself. help.

happy days from school :

Entry Filed under: Rants

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