the past one week.
written: 5:09 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 19, 2008


So Mag flew off to Manchester at 11.55 p.m. last night. The short duration of her exchange - 143 days - is the only thing that's making her being gone bearable for me. It's like losing a vital organ in your body when one of your best friends ever is gone, and I was just thinking about how thankful I am that she's not leaving for good. It's just no idle Starbucks chatter and random late night calls and random SMSes and seeing each other in between classes in school for this semester.

"Just". Right. Well, one shall strive to look on the bright side of things, and so I choose to say that it's "just" one semester. Et cetera. I'm sure she'll have a fruitful exchange because she's a fighter this way.

Last night's farewell at the new Terminal 3 (exclusively for Singapore Airlines - how elitist, said Chloe, and I agree, said Yelen) wasn't as bad as I'd expected. A lot of her friends showed up and the atmosphere was generally cheery and uplifting - which I'm sure helped her mood too. I can't wait to go to London in June! We're gonna have soooo much fun. And I'm gonna miss her lots lots between now and June. Sigh!

***

I drove to th airport from school after my Infocoms class which ended two minutes past 9.30 which almost made me freak out. I gave myself allowance time for losing my way, and indeed I proved my prudence well thought-out. I followed the road signs that said "PIE" until I saw a left turn for "PIE (Tuas)". And because I had no idea that there was a "PIE (Changi Airport)" after "PIE (Tuas)", I took the Tuas turn.

Thankfully, I wasn't as blur as someone who shall not be named so as to protect his reputation, image and privacy, and I realised, fairly quickly, that it didn't make sense for me to be heading for Tuas because Changi Airport is at the other end of the country. So I took the first exit - Adam Road - and rather stupidly went back to Bukit Timah. HAHAHA.

I called my mom for directions and she got all pissed with me because she specifically told me not to take the first PIE turn but obviously that didn't quite register in my head. Oh well. In the end I made it to the airport before 10.30 which was the mark I set for myself, even though I missed the turn into the car park and had to make one huge round via the entrance to the Departure Hall before making it to the car park. What an accomplishment, right? I think so too.

It was a good night, all things considered. Mag had a hearty send-off, and I ended up having coffee with Chloe, Ping Ying, Kenneth and Mag's friend Seth after that. I really really really think that Kenneth is damn funny but let's not get into that. And yeah, it was good. Nice to hang out with people, even if it was at the airport and for quite a short period of time. I also ran into Pearlyn who told me that a secondary school classmate was going off and I went to say hi/bye and I saw more classmates and it was a bit odd but good, too, in a way. Good to see Pearlyn though! I miss her.

I drove Ping Ying and Chloe home and I'm proud to say that I wasn't as freaked out as before! Yay. I followed behind Kenneth's car which wasn't a good idea for him, because Chloe pointed out to me that I was driving on high beam. HAHAHAHA. OMG I had no idea. No wonder there was this blue light thingy on my dashboard. So poor Kenneth was blinded by my lights every time he looked into the rear view mirror, which would be quite a lot of times if he's a prudent driver - which he is. He's a very prudent driver. Amazingly prudent. After a while I decided to overtake and lost him haha. But I did get my licence months before he did and when I'd just got my licence I was also a very prudent driver.

But then again, Kenneth is just prudence personified, in every sense of the word.

Anyway, Chloe and I nearly got lost in Ping Ying's estate but we managed to find our way out. What an accomplishment! I also suck at three-point turns. I also attempted to park in a parallel lot between two cars in front of the canteen when I went back to school in the evening for Infocoms and I made the stupid decision of driving into the lot which obviously did not work, and so I was stuck between the two cars and had to do a lot of reversing and driving forward, all within the tiny amount of space (I was DAMN SCARED of hitting the car in front), and I did so in front of the whole damn school and it was so embarrassing. Maybe the driving could've worked if I actually knew how to do it but I didn't, and I still don't, and I still can't parallel park. Damn. It was a very good lot, just in front of the seminar rooms block. Stupid parallel lots! Who does parallel parking anyway!

***

In other news, the first week of school has drained me of quite a bit of energy. Wednesday was especially bad: I reached school at 8.45 a.m. for International Law and Asia, and left school at 9.40 p.m., the time at which Islamic Law ended. I swear, if I didn't have Kenneth to keep me company in between while I attempted to read my Islamic Law stuff, I would have died. It's always good to have company when one is stuck in school for the whole day, an innately sickening activity. Kenneth, for the most part, doesn't talk to me while we're studying so I managed to read the prescribed Hallaq article. I say 'for the most part' because we ended up distracting each other anyway.

And you know what? The Islamic Law prof is giving us quizzes before every lecture just to ascertain that we've done our readings, and there were two articles for that class, and most of the quiz questions were on the other article which I'd only glanced through. And it was a bloody easy five-question multiple-choice and I couldn't do it!!! Oh shit. What a waste of the potentially easy 15%. Maybe I should start talking in class. And I think I should, because the only thing I've said to the prof so far was "I'm quite sleepy." (During the break on Wednesday I rested my head on my laptop and I heard the prof talking to the guy beside me and I suspected he was talking about me so I lifted up my head and the prof asked if I was okay and I said that I was sleepy. Which I was, but - way to go to make an impression. Bleah.) I suck.

Islamic Law is a serious mind fuck and I must say that I still don't understand religion, or see a point to it. I don't think it matters what religion I'm attempting to study; the act of suspending my disbelief is half the battle and sometimes I find it hard to do so. I can't fathom how Muhammad managed to convert all those polytheists way back then. It wasn't as if they didn't already have a religion, or religions. And I'm not even sure if those religion/religions was/were inferior to the one that Muhammad propagated. But it is, of course, infinitely interesting, though I suspect it's just one of those things that I won't ever understand. It doesn't mean that I shouldn't try though, because the world is about the people that live in it. And Islam, inexplicable as it is to me, is fascinatingly complicated, but still fascinating. I mean, who would've thought that the popularly-held belief that Islam forbids alcohol isn't actually clearly spelled out in the Quran, and that it's actually debatable whether it's clearly forbidden or not? The two classes I've had so far seems to point to that conclusion. But we'll see how things pan out in the end.

I really should read for Monday's class. I will, after this. Er, hopefully.

I talked to the guy beside me on Wednesday, an LLM student from Chile. How cool right? I think so too.

On another note, because I haven't had time to fully delve into the topic, I must reiterate, not for the last time I'm sure, that I love S!mon T@y (for Simon G's benefit - I LOVE YOU TOO!). I would happily wake up at 8 a.m. every Wednesday to attend his class. He is charismatic, he is hilarious, and his subject is one of those things that I have a dormant obsession with. International Law and Asia. Isn't it quite telling that my Emergencies term paper was on how Western liberal democratic ideas relate to Asia, if at all? I was actually quite fucked for that paper which I'm supposed to have finished by now, but after looking at some of the materials that I've got for International Law and Asia (ILA), I'm quite assured that I'm not that fucked for my paper after all. In fact, I have this vague plan of combining what would eventually be my paper for ILA with my original Emergencies term paper and submit that! Hahaha.

Of course, that means my paper will have to be dragged out quite significantly but oh well, I can't help being bloody lazy you know.

But anyway, ST spent the seminar trying to convince people to drop his class which was DAMN FUNNY OMG. Unfortunately, based on the subject availability list released after soft add/drop or whatever, it seems like his attempts at reducing his class size failed horribly. Who ask him to be so funny right? The seminar was this three-hour history lesson and story-telling and it was riveting and enjoyable and I liked it very much. I'm so going to take all his modules in Year 4. I should've taken Human Rights last semester.

In other school news, Infocoms last night wasn't that bad. D@n!el S. is very super nice and Competition Law had throwbacks to JC Microeconomics, most of which I'd already long forgotten, but it was still quite interesting. Though I stopped listening at some parts. But it was at night and it was three hours and no one listens continuously for three hours...unless S!mon T. is the one doing the talking. But still!

***

In other news, a very recent development had halted and stopped all potential future developments and the status quo is, once again, rock solid.

In the process, I discovered things about myself and reaffirmed other things that I already knew.

At the end of the day, it must be said that I'm really only looking out for my own interests, my own fun, my own amusement, to alleviate my own boredom. Until the day comes when I find myself giving a shit about you nearly as much as I give a shit about myself, it's in everyone's best interest that no one becomes too invested or hinges too much hope on things. Especially when I'm involved. I'm not the answer to all your problems; more likely than not I'm only going to cause more problems for you; and just because I might have made a mistake once, doesn't mean that it's too late to pull out. And even if it is too late to pull out, I will pull out anyway.

And simultaneously, I recognise that if a problem eventually arises, most of it will be my doing. I knew that I was sending signals to the wrong person and yet I did it anyway, pushing away the clear, unequivocal prick of uncertainty and that voice that told me what I didn't want to hear. Maybe I was lonely, but it wasn't as much about loneliness as it was about just wanting someone. And not because of who he is, but because of the fact that he is male. And not because I was looking for anything substantial, but because I needed an ego boost and some form of reassurance of my ability to attract members of the opposite sex. It probably wasn't very smart or prudent; but in all honesty, I was only thinking about myself.

I suppose we all do that at some point, but I have this knack of making it an art and often times not caring about the consequences and the hurt that I can potentially inflict on people. As long as I don't get hurt, right? I do feel bad, but I don't feel bad enough. The reasonable person in my position would sure as hell feel a lot more "bad" than the amount of "bad" that I feel.

Still, I take some comfort in the possibility that whatever exploitation that went on, however briefly, was mutual. So things can just stop there because, truth be told, I'm over it. Completely. I suppose I was trying to milk something out of whatever that propelled things to happen, but I need to learn, once and for all, that the degree of meaning that should be attached to interesting things that happen depends entirely on the context in which the said interesting things took place.

Besides, I've already got my answer. I thank you for that, but that's all I need from you.

before sunrise // before sunset


Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010