Just do it

It was terribly tiring.

After 8 hours, I was back in Penang.

Today I attended my Auntie CC's funeral (cremation).

And her sister thanked me for coming.

I almost didn't make it out of pure self-centric selfishness.

But I'm glad - I did the right thing.

This time.

US

We started out a bit ackwardly.

We spent most of 2006 apart, thanks to our offshore schedules. Let's just put it this way - I would come back from offshore on the same Wednesday that he would leave for his offshore work, and vice versa two weeks later.

If we were lucky we'd spend a 2-3 hours in an entire month together, when my helicopter ride cancelled.


Then suddenly we're on the same team.

And then we almost fell apart.

But he didn't give it up. And I'm eternally grateful he did. He fought for me and then forced me to join the fight - for us.

I am one blessed girl. :)

You see, now we've seen each other through some of our toughest times, apart and together.



Working together ain't no mean feat.

But we work at it (working together) every day now.

And we're growing stronger each day. Becoming a whole greater than the sum of its parts.

Love you, my dearest.

Still I Rise

"There is nothing so pitiful as a young cynic because he has gone from knowing nothing to believing nothing"

- Maya Angelou

C'mon Deb, get over it. Get over it get over it get over it get over it.




And so the sun shines, day after day. No matter how miserable one feels, no matter how cynical or disbelieving is somebody, nobody can deny that the sun doth rise, day after day after day.

Can't you see the big picture?

Still I Rise

- Maya Angelou
You may write me down in history

With your bitter, twisted lies,

You may trod me in the very dirt

But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?

Why are you beset with gloom?

'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells

Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,

With the certainty of tides,

Just like hopes springing high,

Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?

Bowed head and lowered eyes?

Shoulders falling down like teardrops.

Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?

Don't you take it awful hard

'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines

Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,

You may cut me with your eyes,

You may kill me with your hatefulness,

But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?

Does it come as a surprise

That I dance like I've got diamonds

At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame

I rise

Up from a past that's rooted in pain

I rise

I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,

Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear

I rise

Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear

I rise

Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,

I am the dream and the hope of the slave.

I rise

I rise

I rise.

The World I Know

I feel like a damn rookie.

Damnit, I've been in this darn company for almost 3 years now.

The past few weeks have been pretty shitty to me. Two days ago I yelled at my mladyconsultant over the phone. I'm supposed to f*cking understand that she's working on another project and thus that justifies a 2-week delay on mine?? - was basically what I told her.

Yesterday I confronted a colleague who I felt was backstabbing me about my work. And I felt better.

This morning I actually got yelled at by my mleadconsultant for saying that I passed something unofficially to him, that it bloody didn't count, that nothing was given, etc etc. Was actually trying to calm him down. Sheesh.

Got myself into a few e-mail wars with other engineers too.

Seems like I'm making my surroundings all the more unpleasant day after day.

And I haven't gotten even a bit of work done this morning, cos am busy trying to recollect myself.

I just found out my Auntie CC passed away last night, after a long-drawn battle with breast cancer.

She was the one who helped me get my post-SPM internship. I remember when we visited her after her masectomy, she was positively glowing and preaching to us about being close to God and how Jesus had plans for her.

She believed, all the way, in miracles, through the fog of pain and extreme discomfort. Tell me, how can someone suffering like that still see hope and redemption while I can't even see through the fog of this work bullshit?

But I suppose this is what I stand for:

Do what you say, say what you do, but don't be mean while saying it.

If I see something that is not right, I speak up. This is proving to be very difficult to do, but I did promise myself that I will speak my instincts, and that if I know I am right then I will defend that thought. Even at the cost of being unpopular.

The more challenging one - if I am wrong then I apologise. It is that simple, and applies to those who are working for me as well as with me. Swallow the bloody pride and do it. Simple as that.

These are my principles, and I will stick to them even as I feel that the much easier route is to grin and bear it, to bluff my way to being right. I could do that, people are doing that. But that's not the person I want to be, or even am capable of being. :)

No one said that doing the right thing at the wrong time was easy.

But you gotta stand for something, or you lose yourself.

Gotta keep telling myself that.

Pouring in the City

It's raining cats and dogs in the Capital of Malaysia.

I do so wanna get to Mercato for another packet of pulasan.

Dinner was a Westin hot dog with two 6" sausages - smoked beef and jumbo veal, with melted fontina on a brioche bun, with beef pastrami on the side and a bowlful of fat chips.

Still hungry after that and an apple and 3 pulasans.

Hungry hungry hungry hungry.

Choices at hand:

1) White lotus mooncake bought yesterday that I intended to take back to Miri and enjoy during my solitary Saturday mornings
2) A packet of Famous Amos no-nut chocolate chip cookies - but believe it or not, don't feel like eating chocolate right now
3) Cereal bar from the hotel minibar


Obviously I have nothing better to do.

Wish this bloody rain would just bloody stop.

*anti-rain dance*

Milestones

I've been doing a fair bit of brooding these days, mostly due to work stuff.

This has gotta change. I have been finding it difficult to identify my worth in this place. I don't kid myself - work is where I spend 80% of my life - one HAS to find something worthy and fulfilling about it or one's entire life becomes a futile exercise of meaningless repetitions.

Thus, in an effort to find the positive in what Iam doing, I will write down the changes that this person has undergone since coming to this middle-of-nowhere town - in no apparent order:

- Lost almost 10 kg since I came to Miri end of 2005

- Visited Europe for the first time

- Flew business class

- Found someone who has stood by me in some of my worst moments, and has brought out the deepest fears/thoughts in me

- Bought my first piece of property

- Invested in the stock market

- Adopted a cat who has grown to become the light of our lives

- Experienced life away from civilization, and whaddayouknow, found a home away from home

- Learnt to cook

- Karaoke'd for the 1st time in my life

- Lived with 300 plus guys for 2 weeks at a time for almost a year

- Realized, for the 1st time, and NOT dreading it - that I'm turning into my mother in many, many ways ;)

Photos are from Bukit Tabur, a hill near Taman Melawati, Kuala Lumpur. An old friend from uni introduced me. Thanks, CS!

Some of the most amazing views I have seen in the capital of our country, no?

Of Grandpa Chin, Devil Curry and Jam Tarts

I remember the periuk belanga, made from an orangey-clay substance, this squat little pot with a slim neck and widening out later; simmering with beef rendang, devil chicken curry. I remember the ladle that we used - it was made with a coconut shell tied with bamboo string to a wooden handle.

I remember Grandpa cooking devil curry again and again and again cos' Rachel, my cousin, told him that she loved it.

I remember "placing" our orders for fish and chips (RM4), chicken chop (also RM4), char koay teow (no tauge, no chilli for Rachel, everything in for Debbie).

I remember telling grandma I wanted dry instant noodles for dinner.

I remember mum saying that grandpa was a way better cook than grandma. I remember him making those stuffed sotong rings - he's mince pork and stuff it into sliced squid rings, and steam them. Mum was so awed by this presentation, she still talks of it sometimes (think I was about eight years old then).

I remember, months before Christmas, Grandpa would be drying out the sugee flour, the cake flour, the almonds, for making the sugee cake. This cake had (still has, actually) the reputation of being not only expensive (10 egg yolks, 2 lbs butter), but it was our Eurasion tradition to bake and distribute this.

I remember helping to roll out pineapple jam tarts, taking turns with my cousins to beat egg whites till stiff, complaining all the way about how those darn clear liquid only had a few miserable bubbles in it (Egg yolks for the sugee cake, egg whites for the chiffon cake). Of course, we were tiny little things then.

I remember making all kinds of shapes with the tart dough - curry puff-like, rolls, etc. But none had as good a pastry-to-jam ratio of taste than the ones we cut out with the tart-cutter, then using a pastry roller, cut half-cm thick filligreed strips to make a criss-cross on the top of the jam. Burning fingers and tongues as we fought to taste our work fresh out of the oven.

Ah, the oven. It was actually an ovenette - a round electrical gizmo with a cover (much like a giant soup pot - but electrically powered) but one couldn't control the temperature, and the glass top would crack if anyone splashed even the tiniest bit of water on it.

And everything was done by hand. Stirring the pineapple jam for hours, standing by the stove. Scrubbing down the pot later.

Hand-beating 10 egg whites till stiff.

In the pestle and mortar, grinding down shallots and chillies for sambal tumis (did I tell you that my mum's family makes the BEST, and I mean the BEST, sambal tumis in the entire universe - I have yet to try one as good. Thank goodness all the maids have learnt to do this so this tradition lives on still).


Which reminds me - Grandma, I would like to inherit those cooking stuff - the mixing bowl, belanga, pestle and mortar.

More from Teluk Cempedak

Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For...

Someone sent this to me when I first started work at Intel. I was twenty-three then.

Today, I belong to the late twenties zone.

My personal life has taken quite a lot of ups and downs since I first read this.

They call it the “Quarter-life Crisis.” It is when you stop going along with the crowd and start realizing that there are many things about yourself that you didn’t know and may not like. You start feeling insecure and wonder where you will be in a year or two, but then get scared because you barely know where you are now.

You start realizing that people are selfish and that, maybe, those friends that you thought you were so close to aren’t exactly the greatest people you have ever met, and the people you have lost touch with are some of the most important ones. What you don’t recognize is that they are realizing that too, and aren’t really cold, catty, mean or insincere, but that they are as confused as you.

You look at your job… and it is not even close to what you thought you would be doing, or maybe you are looking for a job and realizing that you are going to have to start at the bottom and that scares you.

Your opinions have gotten stronger. You see what others are doing and find yourself judging more than usual because suddenly you realize that you have certain boundaries in your life and are constantly adding things to your list of what is acceptable and what isn’t.

One minute, you are insecure and then the next, secure. Y

ou laugh and cry with the greatest force of your life.

You feel alone and scared and confused.

Suddenly, change is the enemy and you try and cling on to the past with dear life, but soon realize that the past is drifting further and further away, and there is nothing to do but stay where you are or move forward.

You get your heart broken and wonder how someone you loved could do such damage to you. Or you lie in bed and wonder why you can’t meet anyone decent enough that you want to get to know better. Or maybe you love someone but love someone else too and cannot figure out why you are doing this because you know that you aren’t a bad person.

One night stands and random hook ups start to look cheap. Getting wasted and acting like an idiot starts to look pathetic.

You go through the same emotions and questions over and over, and talk with your friends about the same topics because you cannot seem to make a decision.

You worry about loans, money, the future and making a life for yourself… and while winning the race would be great, right now you’d just like to be a contender!

What you may not realize is that everyone reading this relates to it.

We are in our best of times and our worst of times, trying as hard as we can to figure this whole thing out.


And yes, in the words of Bono, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For...

Making Waves

Back from Teambuilding in Teluk Cempedak, Kuantan!

I love the pounding East Coast waves - got to do some kayaking and it was the most fun I ever had for a long, long time.

Drank a little wine, danced a lot.
Ate a little seafood, drank a bellyful of seawater.

I've been wound up pretty tight lately, living in a somewhat daze.

But I'd like to believe that life gives me "hints" on what to do, where I belong, and the destiny that awaits.

Oh yes, a destiny awaits. I feel the change in me and damnit, I'm going to make it happen.

- to travel/pay my fines/find dinner company on my own
- to buy the things I know now I deserve, and to actually use them and not wait for the perfect moment
- to make the first move
- to tell the truth, always
- to speak my instincts and not supress them
- to walk away when things are not able to change or improve anymore
- to stand up for myself
- to speak out when something is wrong
- to do the right thing, even when the timing is wrong
- to do my homework

Because, truly, life is about living and not making do.

Oh yes, that's right...most of us couldn't stand up in the 1.6 m-depth pool so we ended up playing water polo on lifevests.....

And so it begins.