Why Summer is Sweet ;)

Comin’ home to walk those well loved roads again :)

We're officially 6th years and I should be jumping for joy and grinning like an idiot, but instead a thousand thoughts are running through my mind. I have NO IDEA how to pack my two suitcases and a million last minute things have seemed to crop up out of nowhere. Every year, I get this feeling, this tightness in my chest as I wait to see my loved ones. Waiting. Packing.Flying. Transiting. Walking around, sight-seeing and shopping. Flying. Landing :)

I hate take-off but love the moment we land. The moment those rubber tires hit home soil is something I could never describe.

I hope there's crab kootu curry waiting for me. Oh, wait. That can't happen because the only one who knows when I'm landing is my brother, keeper of secrets and driver of the Vios :)

Then I'll hope for crab kootu curry over the weekend once my family's gotten over the shock of seeing me. And I REALLY wanna see the girls again.

Woo-hooo!!! No exams for 2 months :)))))))

National Exams

they wanna abolish 2 out of 3 currently in place. WTH?

while i agree that national exams make some extra competitive and add pressure, why doesn't anyone else find it to be a good thing?

Everything has the good and bad and as much as i complain about our current education system, I think that the exams are one of the GOOD things.

1. i NEVER studied for any major exam in school, except for the final one before graduating high school, and even that i did mere weeks before. ask my mum if you don't believe me.
2. i doubt more than a handful actually did
3. the exams sort of gave us a sense of purpose
4. while being able to demotivate when results come out, even the failures form resolves to do something with their lives. i have friends in this category. i have friends who completely gave up too. and i have friends who fall in between both of these extremes. so don't tell me that exams bring out the best or worst in people. they just assess, it's how a person responds to the assessment, but that would spark a conversation about mentality and i'm not going there.
5. marking the papers actually gives senior citizens a chance to earn some extra money. these aren't high flying corporate successes. these are people who live on their pensions or EPF. it gives THEM a sense of purpose
6. exams help with streaming.... i know it sounds biased but it does help identify ppl with artistic inclinations and science inclinations. ppl who probably don't have a solid career ambition yet. won't streaming help them figure it out?
7. term-based assessments are nonsense in my opinion.everyone's gonna take it lightly. plus, how can you know the standard of the exam questions? it'll probably vary from school to school. what's gonna stop schools who want better results from not setting easier questions? or giving 'leaked' questions?

too much pressure. isn't school a means to teach kids how to HANDLE pressure? instead they're trying to protect us from it like overzealous parents.

if they do wanna make a change, change it to continuous assessments + exams. like in the south australian matriculation. or they could just hand us play dough in school.

yeah, i'm more than a little irritated. call it nerves if you want to.

A Reason

This is for you guys at home.

My family, My Pillow

And I’d take the mighty moments of crazies,

With the bits of peace interspersed between,

I’ll also cherish the worrying parents,

And hold close to heart my protective siblings,

I’d gather the habits of all their lifetimes,

The good, ignorant, pleasant and the mean,

And would keep them under my little pillow,

The place each day upon which I choose to lean:

My spring of solace and determination,

That which fuels each day the fight in me;

My haven of comfort; the many moments of glee;

You hold up my aspirations, wishes and dreams,

With eternal hope that in the blackest night gleams…

Thank you for caring to bear the weight of me,

Do move over, let me too your pillow be!

Happy Fathers’ Day, Appa. Had it not been for you I wouldn’t have known what ‘acceptance’ means.

Happy Fathers’ Day to Annai, Attan and all other Dads out there too! :)

p/s: I used to be cynical about celebrating Mothers' and Fathers' and Valentines' Day and all those other days that so many of us think is 'commercialised' and 'cheesy'. Perhaps they are commercialised and cheesy, but they don't mean any less to me, because at the very least they give us a reason to be nicer to each other on these days.

That's what I think the world sorely needs... more reasons to be nice to each other.

Hope you guys have a great week ahead! :)

FB Conversations

I don’t like adding people I don’t know and love hitting the ignore button on those friend requests. I’m irritable like that. If I do add a person, I either know them by name, sight, smell, sound, blog, or through another friend. At times I do the unthinkable and accept unknown people’s friend requests. The things an insomniac can do!

Anyway, a couple of unknown people have been initiating FB conversations with me and while I’m aware that the whole purpose of a social network is to, well, socialise, I would rather not. 

Being friendly and approachable might ruin my chances of one day ruling the world and achieving world dominion, see?

*Evil laughter which makes my roomie crack open an eyelid before falling back asleep*

Right. Here’s a little sneak peek at my conversation skills and PR capabilities. Do take note, ya? ;)

Unknown: So what’s cooking tonight? (Obviously he read my shout out the day before about hunger and the woes of having to cook one’s own meal. It’s a long story…)

Me: I don’t know yet :) Roomie’s cooking pork, I think. Wait. Did you literally mean what’s for dinner, or was that like a ‘what you doing’ question? I like to be really precise when I answer questions, so what exactly did you mean by that?  

I add in another smiley as an after thought  :)

Unknown goes offline for some reason. My innocence, perhaps? :P

Unknown2: Hi, you look so good in your pictures. So, you live in KL?

Me: WAA. HOW COME YOU TALK ENGLISH SO GOOD, AH? YOU GOT LEARN WELL IN SKOOL IZZIT?

Unknown2: Haha… I’ve read your blog. I like it.

Me: WHAT? WHERE GOT BOG HERE? WEATHER VERY HOT LA… HAIYA. WAIT AH. I’M SHAVING MY HEAD BALD AGAIN LA. THE HEAT MADE THE LICE COME BACK…

Unknown2 also goes offline. I suspect the capitalized letters irritated him as much as they irritated me. Oh, and the lice remark might have done the trick.

Unknown3: Hello. I’m your friend’s neighbour’s cat’s breeder. How you doing?

Me: Naan inggu nallam. Bomb yeppedi seyyanam endru kattrukolla muyirchi seigiren. 2012 varum pothu intha tholil uthavipadum endru ninaikiren. Ungga idatthil ellam nallama?**

Well, he blocked me. He either doesn’t understand Tamil or figured I’ve got terrorist connections.

 Hmmpphh. Nobody wants to have a decent conversation anymore nowadays.

**rough translation : I’m good here. I’m trying to learn how to make bombs. I think this trade might come in handy come 2012. Is everything all right at your end? 

Movement

I was browsing through my D and a few pictures caught my eye. Without realizing what it was that made me open each file, I had 6 pictures minimized onto my taskbar, each one showing movement.

So I grouped them chronologically and found each one represented one year, except for the last two… weird, huh? Anyway, here they are :)

2005-06

First snow fight ever. Everyone’s moving and the picture’s blurry due to poor focusing, but I like the way everyone’s in a different position. Talk about a literal cold war :P

 2006-07

It was a tradition when we lived together during our orientation period to celebrate each birthday with a bang. One of the ickier traditions involves covering the birthday boy/girl from head to toe with flour and eggs.

This was when a friend cracked an egg and flung it at the birthday boy. Hehe… it made Ki duck for cover and the hovering egg overhead looks pretty unbelievable! Cool, eh? ;)

2007-08

During our outing to Yalta, Herb was trying for a star jump off a ledge, but it ended up looking like this! Maybe it was the Nike shoes...? Just do it! ;)

2008-09

I love this shot, which unfortunately I did not take :P I like the way the two at the side are closing in on the ball, eyes upward at the opponent and how the guy in the centre in taking a leap toward the ball, attempting to kick it midair. The energy in the shot is kind of incredible, I think.

2009

The quiet ones are usually up to something... If his eyes were visible, I’m sure they’d be sparkling with mischief! Notice the way the snowball is breaking off at the edges as Nav bounced it up and down in his gloved hand.

2010

A few weekends ago, at Saki. We lined up in a row and tried to toss the beach rocks back into the water. The winner was the one who tossed it out furthest, and the one who won it incidentally shares my name, except that hers is spelt with an E, as in to l-o-s-h-e-n-i :)

Can you see the blur of the pellets in the air before us? 

She shared with us later that the rock should be flat and fit comfortably into one’s palm for the best momentum and apparently we need to throw it with a flick of the wrist upwards, but by that time we had already managed to bury her in the sand and we couldn't hear anymore rock throwing tips... Hehe! :)