What

does one do on days like these?

25 comments June 19th, 2010

Friday Already?

thanks everyone, for all the lovely comments about Kafka :) i gave him Kafka on the Shore by Murakami the other day, as an insight into his new moniker. but really, once upon a time, in our first gchat conversation, he referred to giant cockroaches as ‘Kafkaesque’ and it made me laugh.

i have a midterm on monday so i’m in my usual reading room at the wonderful Butler Library (recently placed on CampusGrotto’s Most Beautiful College Libraries of the U.S. list — see #4. though i am sure we deceptively earned our spot). i’m wearily crunching numbers and squeezing as many optimal bundles as possible out of the Lagrangian, and by crunching numbers, i mean procrastinating. i actually haven’t gotten very much done at all, and already i’m contemplating ditching the stacks for dinner and drinks. it is friday night after all……. but then there’s a guy behind me who is hard at work creating the most comprehensive set of notes you’ll ever see. it looks award-winning and quite intimidating. so i guess i’m staying in…

but not without sharing some funnies!

first, for all Little Mermaid fans, especially those who know all the words to the movie by heart:

and a cute conversation with my dad, after an average of two emails a week for the past month asking me to buy him an iPad (and i DID):

dad: your papa wants this… http://www.apple.com/iphone/design/#design-video
me: hehe i am getting mine in 2 weeks!
dad: buy one for me
me: no money ah… very broke lately
dad: dun be so bad… get me one. I really want it.
me: WOW YOU WHAT ALSO WANT! SUPER GREEDY LOR. u think money grow on trees is it???
dad: How can you say your father GREEDY. I am SAD !
me: so fierce for what…
me: hellooooo
(no reply)

and today i went to the bank only to find out that my malaysian credit cards no longer work. WTF. lesson of the day: parents are expensive and very sulky, so don’t buy any.

also, kakicucuklangit recently told me that Istana Budaya is staging Tun Mahathir the Musical. i froze, processed it, and then dissolved into uncontrollable giggles for about 5 minutes before going on twitter, plurk and facebook to announce it to my friends. i’m SO EXCITED but incredibly bummed that i won’t be in KL to watch it when it opens in September. like i keep saying – it has such creative potential! bound to be the hiroshima of humour if the right people were allowed to develop the script. but alas, we all know none of that is happening. so we cracked our own jokes in anticipation. some samples:

me: THEY’RE MAKING TUN MAHATHIR THE MUSICAL????? HAHAHAHAHA
response 1: it’s titled RENT(seeking)
response 2: now the question is .. will ur tickets be subsidized?
response 3: the tickets won’t be subsidized. in fact they will raise prices for it and offer protection by slapping ridiculous taxes on foreign musicals
response 4 : i can see it now – there will be a song titled: (If They Can Make Avatar) They Can Do Anything
response 5: I’d go just to hear the so-do-mi chorus.
response 6: it will be sellout shows by phantom watchers
response 7: dilemma: protagonist says he owns the land the stage was built on
response 8: dont forget the crooked stage
response 9: “mahathir mahathir… he reminds me of a look-east story!”

hahahahaha. oh. /dabs at tears of joy

lastly, i’ve been catching up on Glee episodes, and really loved that episode called Bad Reputation! the show’s been getting a little redundant but this episode blew it all out of the water for me. it featured all these gloriously tacky songs like Physical by ONJ, Can’t Touch This by MC Hammer, Ice Ice Baby by Vanilla Ice and Total Eclipse of the Heart by Bonnie Tyler!!!! excitedly, i plurked about it, and Alvin then showed me the funniest/weirdest ever cover of Total Eclipse of the Heart that you will ever watch, performed by Hurra Torpedo, a Norwegian band that plays using kitchen appliances. my favourite dude, by far, is the headbanging percussionist:

okay, great. library admin just walked in to say that the library closes in 20 minutes. blasted summer school schedule- i’ve barely gotten any work done! so much for studying all night so i can guiltlessly watch US vs England tomorrow. boo, bring back the 24-hour library schedules :( but then again it is friday night…

19 comments June 11th, 2010

Kafka

new york: i once heard in a song that these streets will make you feel brand new. i often stumble onto the cobblestone looking for nothing in particular (many times bleary with sleep or indifference) – but sometimes, just sometimes, i emerge holding something rare. as always, i was late that afternoon. i think i made up a silly excuse about a problem set i had yet to finish, when i’d actually finished it the night before. see, there are times when you know that you’re about to encounter something curiously interesting- and i had a feeling this was going to be one of those times, so i really needed the extra time to look extra cute. i ended up being an hour late. granted, it made for a rather lousy first impression, but he was already taboo guy and i was already bee gees girl from that one time so long ago. though i must say those accolades from our past lives didn’t make an immediate difference– because i didn’t remember his name then and he didn’t think twice about me. he was just the guy who played taboo with style, and i was just some girl who liked the bee gees. brunch afternoon feels like just yesterday. games night, on the other hand, feels like a lifetime ago. i keep telling him now how awful he is for being 1.5 years late. at least i was only an hour late for brunch. well, i’m not sure what exactly he’s late for, but it seems to me that he was late for everything.

i also heard that in the streets of new york, there is a space in between indignation and anticipation, where one can be doomed to wait in the name of fate. that’s where i’m trapped right now, as he sleeps in the next room, completely drained from a long night out with friends and too many bottles of sake. i wish he would wake up because i miss him. but he’s reached some kind of oblivious world and i have a sinking feeling i’m not going to be able to talk to him until the afternoon.

so, while he sleeps, and i have this rare pocket of time to myself, i’d like to introduce you to Kafka. he’s tall, lean, deliberate, intelligent, tender, kind, and eternally conscious. occasionally judgmental but in an affable way. he loves music, movies, inappropriate jokes that no one else gets, narrow alleys, plaid shirts and bright colours. when he smiles, mischief springs into his eyes, and his lips will dart into that lopsided smile– and i can’t help but wonder if i’ve ever met anyone this irresistible. whenever i forget my keys and he comes to the door to get me, with open arms, those eyes and that smile, i realize with something like a painful slice how nearly we almost missed each other. and how fragile everything i hold in my hands is. one insensitive utterance, one day too late, one email not sent out, one train not taken, and i’d be somewhere else. on that brunch afternoon, we chanced upon a den of lamps, and the manager amicably suggested to Kafka that he buy a lamp for his ‘girlfriend’, i.e. me. we played along with the stranger but Kafka would later ask for my thoughts on what had happened- what do you think it is about us that made him think we were a couple? i think i said, aiyah i dont think it was anything, probably accompanied with an eye roll – but it was quite actually everything. 1.5 years late, but still, everything.

this introduction is unraveling itself quite differently from how i’ve been envisioning it, but for once i’d like to just do away with the veils and nebulous ideas – and simply tell everyone that i’m in love.

78 comments June 6th, 2010

Traversing Istanbul

don’t you think, life has a funny way of assaulting you over and over again with a recurrent theme, or pattern, or any thing – as if afraid you’re just not getting it? i’m getting it, okay, i really am. these things all hover over me like some dark shroud, how could i not? they manifest themselves in books, photos, behind posters, and even in back-up vocals when i’m not really listening to the song. but i’ve been having these out-of-body experiences lately. it’s like a bad dream where i keep watching myself intrude this holy space and dirty it with my feet, and i can’t say anything or stop myself, because it’s too late. i’m a frequent hearer of the overbearing phrase, there’s nothing you can do about it, but i always disbelieve it, because i i think it is always possible to do something about anything. if you look hard enough, there will most definitely be a sliver of a space for you to edge your fingers through, or breathe into. creativity and relentless amounts of determination is the answer. but because i’m so lazy i often think it’s not worth the work. if it’s meant to be, it will be easy. but then, i’m a frequent hearer of the overbearing phrase, there’s nothing you can do about it, and i always disbelieve it…

anyway i just realized i’m turning 22 this year. how very old! i’m inclined to believe that my life before i turned 19 was an illusion, and that the beautiful world i lived in with all those kind and loving people so long ago is merely some fluttering veil cut out from the fabric of my imagination. because lately it seems that everyone is breaking away from the system that i (once) understood. so either the world is going renegade, or i misunderstood everything for 19 years. either way, i’m horribly left behind, and i must catch up. so i’ll take the red pill for now.

more photos from Istanbul follow!:

#1 tourists at the Topkapi Palace

#2 haha i love this photo! timtam looks like he belongs in a cologne ad

#3 that must be one emotional audio guide

#4 adorable, camera-friendly children!

#5 awww they all loved timtam!

#6 obligatory tunnel shot

#7 obligatory tunnel shot II

#8 conned a group of ladies into taking a picture with me! i was, by the way, dressed so uncharacteristically ‘decent’ because timtam (practically) forced me to, for fear that we wouldn’t be allowed into the palace grounds -_- (like i couldn’t enter the sistine chapel in Rome because i was wearing a short summer dress……………. )

#9 <3

#10 americano

#11 cemetery in sultanahmet, that housed a little tea garden in its shadows!

#12 one of many fresh orange juice vendors on the streets of istanbul. they don’t make a lot of money at all

#13 after getting his permission to take a photo, i waited so long for the flag to unfurl so that i could get my shot. but it never did :( hence this is the photo that never was.

#14 lamp shop! where we did The Forbidden according to SATC2 – followed the salesman into a hidden room in the back, where he showed us… more lamps. but he was the ONLY vendor in all of istanbul to correctly guess that we were Malaysian on first attempt! we were getting so annoyed at being called singaporean -_-

#15 on the periphery of the Grand Bazaar

#16 genie lamps at the Grand Bazaar

#17 istanbul is littered with wash basins like this one. at first i thought it was for pre-prayer ritual (actually, it just may be), but i think turks just really like their washing. they’re so clean with everything!

#18 tamtimtamtimtimtam

#19 a funny sight- watermelon vendor that plopped his stand right in the middle of a street that cars frequently went through. so each time a car came by, he’d have to pick up his stand, move aside, and then return to his spot after the car had driven by. ???? but that watermelon looks so good…

#20 a little dustbin vendor

#21 HAHAHA this is the most poser photo ever!!!!!! hat + tshirt combo, check. posing for photo while exhaling smoke, check. reading book on existentialism, check check check! but i still <3 u timtam!

#22 blue mosque at sunset

#23 overfriendly ice cream vendor!

#24 fat cat

22 comments June 4th, 2010

The Margins of Summer

finally!- an afternoon caught by its coattails. am currently at my regular starbucks outlet on campus, where many a study evening has been whiled away not-studying. it feels a little strange to be in new york while it’s all hot and the streets are paved with girls in long legs holding together short summer dresses. sherbert carts have sprung up like daisies overnight, and suddenly, out of nowhere, on the corner of 110th and Broadway, there’s a frail old man playing buttery tunes on a saxophone. it’s my first summer here, and it feels much like a different life.

sophomore year has come and gone, taking with it half of my college career. this year has been very long, and in some segments has been as annoying as a bad itch crawling in a corner of your skin that you can’t seem to locate. i’ve engaged so much in this span of time, and have also been moved around unwittingly (like an indignant chess piece) – but one thing remains a constant: that i am still falling into blessings. sometimes when it becomes overwhelming, i try to guess when it is that my luck will run out, but i find that for the most part i am holding my breath for nothing. surely someone as indolent and unintelligent as i am doesn’t deserve all of this? yet at the same time i’m glad that the school year is leaving. i’m a bit of a packrat, but even i can’t bear the taint from what seemed like a dirty kitchen sink that would never wash itself or go away.

summer classes have been quite fun so far, albeit tedious and entailing very many 8am alarm rings. actually, waking up at 8am is easy peas compared to the string of all-nighters that are/were native to regular school semesters– but there’s just something very inhumane and nature-inconsistent about waking up this early in the summer, this time for nautical skirts and frolicking with books in parks! and so it’s always that much harder to get up. though i swear on my Hedonist Association membership that much debauchery has been going downnnn to make up for my ante meridiem discipline. what debauchery? tales soon!

i was in Istanbul last week for a five-day flee before summer classes started. oh Istanbul: an ethereal city with higgledy-piggledy homes, destroyed so often throughout history but rebuilt and restored with such love, where people are shy and generous with their smiles, where coffee is thick and musky, and the sounds of solat punctuate the skies five times a day just like at home. i was reunited once again with my favourite judgmental friend, Timtam – but we timed our visit to coincide with Mesut’s return to Istanbul. Mesut is my other favourite judgmental friend, a fellow sophomore here at Columbia. we were doing so many of the same things and taking so many of the same classes in freshman year that we felt perhaps we should try to be friends. here, i was going to insert a funny joke about him, but i couldnt bring myself to, because he’s left me to study abroad in Paris for a year, and i miss him muchly already :( so i’ll just put up some pictures from Istanbul:

#1 tourist Timtam striking a pose for an audience of Istanbul cotton candy clouds

#2 conned a group of very excitable kids on a daytrip into taking a picture with me. with the Asian Emblem no less :D

#3 gorgeous view of the Marmara sea from a terrace at the Topkapi Palace, framed by an earnest tourist

#4 whaddup

#5 yummy turkish coffee- folds soooo nicely on the tongue. and effectively rousing, too

#6 a shelf of curios at the Grand Bazaar

#7 copper coffee serving pots

#8 this vendor said he’d give me a free shisha pipe if i went out for a drink with him, haha. i politely declined (upon timtam’s angry furtive glares), and then he offered a discount if i were to take a photo with him. why not! (sorry timtam)

#9 but i ended up not buying a pipe from him :P bought it from another store instead, for the irresistible price of $25! the unfortunate twist is that we smoked so much shisha during our 5 days in Istanbul that i now have a very strong aversion to it…

#10 windy day out in town. this is one of the many streetside ice cream vendors, and me, trying to keep my sticky ice cream upright in the wind

#11 fanning stairs of apartments near Ankara Road, against dusty white air!

#12 a comedian of a sweets vendor at the Spice Market! quite the camwhore too- we took many funny photos with him

#13 steps of a building that looked like a mosque, but surely it was a marketplace in masquerade because there was a man selling alcohol on its foyer…

#14 cerulean eyes of the man running some famous sweet shop timtam ducked into for a box of turkish delight

#15 at the Eminonu ferry docks, where we boarded a ferry that chugged us along the Bosphorus!

#16 onboard the ferry, sipping tea and feeling excited. portrait artfully composed by Timtam

#17 timtam and mesut

#18 us three. gorgeous day out for us and seagulls! portrait artfully composed by me

#19 mesoot gool, kaninabeh?

#20 whispering couple on the ferry! and our empty glasses of turkish apple tea, which is delicious – like apple juice with a round, thick, heavy finish

#21 flags on women on Istiklal Street. not sure who the dude is. Ataturk maybe? it was a public holiday that day, which explained all the flags around the city, much to Mesut’s displeasure

#22 birdhouse

31 comments May 27th, 2010