It almost feels like we're back to the old days where kids have to start working as soon as they're able to move.
R's little nephew seems to agree and is jumping straight into the idea.
"Sigh. Can't even afford a proper stool for myself."
I loved how cute he looked while he was playing around with the spade. Don't worry, we weren't really hiring him as our gardener. It was just one of those days when he likes to act like an adult and mess around in the garden.
So I met up with a couple of friends last Friday, sitting around and talking, when I had a passing thought - would someone who has a crush on a person with a twin, inevitably have a minor crush on his/her twin? Then, Sany told me she read somewhere about some guy pretending to be his twin for sex. Though it doesn't really answer my question, it brought up another possible complication to being romantically involved with identical twins.
I looked it up and it's quite a recent event back in August. Apparently, this woman has been dating this guy, Joe Rohrig, since March. Joe happens to have an identical twin brother, Jared Rohrig, living with him. One day, Jared called the woman up on the pretense that he's Joe and asked her over to their family home. So she came over and even though Jared seemed to behave oddly, it wasn't enough for her to think it wasn't him. They got into a hot tub, made out, and finally went to bed upstairs and was in the midst of having sex when, *gasp, she noticed that Joe's cowboy tattoo on his left butt cheek was gone.
Realising the gravity of the situation, the poor woman started crying and demanding to know where the tattoo disappeared to. Jared (still pretending to be Joe) then said he never had a tattoo and that she must have been hooking up with his brother behind his back. That was the confirmation that it was not the same guy she had been sleeping with. She tried to leave, but he grabbed her back to bed, covered her face with a pillow and continued to rape her.
After the whole traumatic ordeal, he sent her home (or, tried to) in his car. He got lost and didn't know the way back to her place even though Joe has been to her place multiple times.
In the arrest affidavit, she asked Jared, "When did you think I was going to find out? When I realized you didn't have a tattoo? When we didn't use Joe's car to drive home? Or when you didn't know how to get to my house because you've never been there?"
It sounds like a joke story initially but turned out to be so real. I just feel terribly sorry for the woman. And one of the most furious things about this event was the fact that Jared was on his way to becoming a police officer. With 'officers' like him, who can trust the law enforcers? What he did was just a betrayal of trust on so many different unspeakable levels. Rape is already bad enough, the idea of raping someone who means so much to your best friend/family. And so reports have said, he was not only going to lose his job, he was going to lose his best friend - his twin brother.
He is to be arraigned on Sept 8 (tomorrow). He might as well continue acting as his brother in jail. I don't think his cellmates nor guards will take lightly to the knowledge he was training to be an officer.
Life is as uncertain as I make it out to be, it turns out. For the most part, at least. (I love oxymoron-ic statements!)
I realise through the years, I'm not exactly a dull person with lack of imagination, lack of ideas. Yet, I've not really done something I can be absolutely proud of, fists in the air, screams of joy and streams of tears pouring down my face in pride. Nope, not just yet. (To be kind, I've just entered the 'real world' sort of.) Well, something close to that was way back when I'd gotten a high aggregate score in my Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE), making me eligible for the top stream in secondary school and eligible for a third language (which essentially started my interest in foreign languages of all kinds) after years of not doing anything extra from school homework. Yup, that was about the closest bit to absolute euphoria I had. I never got the same 'high' ever since.
I've made little wrong choices here and there that affected the life I'm leading now. It's amazing how at decisions implicating me would have an effect as drastic as this many years on. Who would have known. Maybe that's why 'they' say we should never live life with regrets, seeing you could regret just about anything in your life. Focus on the positive more than the bad.
Fine, no huge regrets then. But it's still interesting to extract the lessons from these near-misses. I guess I didn't have much of an ability to look forward, plan what I wanted to be in future. I've been living in the present all those years. And I was extremely ambitious to the extent of being naive yet not having enough to fuel my interest. It's like having a one-off exciting idea, but having not enough fuel for it to be shaped to its full potential. Up until meeting R. The whole journey so far, painted a much clearer picture of what I want in the future. Plus, I have a couple of side projects I want to embark on, as long as it takes. And slowly, I backtracked from the destination I wanted to reach - Before that happens, what would I need? Before that, what would I need to change? etc.
It makes living life so much more bearable. Now it's just focus, dedication, tears and pinch of luck for everything to gradually settle into place. Patience, patience. Even if we don't end up at the destination, having a focus will allow us to move forward in life, no? And hopefully, open up more opportunities along the way to switch courses, compared to where we're standing now.
Of course, there'll be painful setbacks every time. It's just a long learning process and for me, a more positive mindset is a start, at least.
I haven't been getting enough sleep since I got back. And it's really beginning to affect my mood and my almost-gone social life. Since when did I start using "I'm totally and utterly knackered" as an excuse not to go out to meet friends?
Dizzy spells, headaches are nothing new to me this week. I need to adjust my sleeping pattern as quick as I can. I've adjusted the time on my phone to Singapore time for a start.
And it's utterly heartbreaking whenever I wake up from my short snooze and start to reach out to feel his warmth and he's not there. Sucky, sucky feeling. Been happening every night or rather, every time I got to fall asleep. Not looking so good, not feeling it either. Aw, bless!
A friend of mine told me there're lots of young couples on the buses these days. Well, they're everywhere really, but especially on buses getting home from school. Yesterday was the first day I started using public transportation again since I got back. And I realised what my friend said was true!
All these secondary school kids enveloped in tight embraces throughout the bus journey. It made me frown a little, but at the same time, slightly amused. I was frowning because I noticed how young they appeared to be and probably naive to the ideas of "love". Yet I was amused, realising my friends and I used to have massive crushes on boys during then too. Come to think of it, I have friends who probably never tasted singlehood ever since they started the habit of dating from secondary school. And that thought was funny to me - the whole idea that we used to be one of those gushing couples, never taken seriously by any adults. (And finally only understanding why years later) Gosh, we were fucking annoying.
I'm quite nervous about tomorrow. It seems like I have the faith in everyone else but myself. I feel like I stand no chance against all those degree graduates pitting against me but I know I should have much more faith in myself to at least give my best. Because it sucks to have lost the battle before it even started.
Even if things don't work out and I'm not what they're looking for, it'd be an experience going through a real working interview after so long. (Internships aside). So yes, I'll give my best and whatever the outcome, I must not dwell on it and move on with my life. (Is my prep talk succeeding in calming my nerves? Not really.)
It's a pain knowing how wonderful it'd be tomorrow evening - finally meeting the rest after a long time but having to go through some life-changing event right before that. Life-changing, yes! I know I sound like I'm over dramatising things but I always feel that based on how your interviews or evaluations go, you'll always find out something new about the industry + yourself. So life-changing it is.
I know I get 'stage frights' and often let nerves get the better of me during things like these. I'm just hoping I get to show fully what I've got to offer and that if I face rejection, it's because I'm not what they're looking for - rather than having my nervous wrecked persona screw things up for me... You get the picture.
[Edit @ 3PM, Friday: Postponed to Monday. Just when I thought I was ready to get it over and done with. Haha. While I was in a mad rush to prepare my portfolio and organise everything, I was also wishing the interview was on Monday instead. Well what do you know...I guess my prayers were answered at the wrong time.]
Anybody who knows me, will be used to the idea that I'm pretty much more openly patriotic about Singapore than the normal citizen is. BUT, that doesn't mean I'm a blind follower, agreeing to every single policy. There are certain things that do bug me about this little island city. The most apparent one is the harsh and often unnecessary film censorship. I'm not going to talk about freedom of speech. It's so passe and we know we never had total freedom of speech (which I don't really believe in anyway. I find a certain level of control is definitely necessary in this small city) in the first place. That doesn't mean they shouldn't be transparent about the process nor does it mean they should disallow topics that really, is as offensive as a harmless baby. Banning films preaching hate is understandable. Banning films showing indisputable reality, encouraging the end of prejudice... I cannot comprehend.
The development of stigma against homosexuality, against sex is completely unnecessary. It's just like how the media years ago planted the seed in everyone's mind that breast feeding is embarrassing and should not be done in public, even if you're fully covered. The idea of breastfeeding itself is thought to be sexual instead of seen as a motherly act. It's the same as to creating the idea that gays are abnormal by banning films showing homosexuals leading normal lives. I'm very much sure homosexuals have existed in high numbers way before any movies were shown - Closeted, that is. Married with kids, and thoroughly unhappy.
Having watched a variety of films away from Singapore, I realised we are missing so much. I've always thought it great to have something like the Irish Film Institute, showcasing top notch films from around the world, handpicked by the management. But I realised if this censorship madness continues, there's only so many films we could enjoy in their full glory. What stands after all these over-censorship is the lack of imagination, close-mindedness, immaturity and plain prejudice. Films have the power to educate, and open minds. We're just not given enough of a chance to do so.
If this film act is brushed up accordingly and followed through for future films, Singapore might just be a step closer to being perfect in my eyes.
...that's exactly what it looks like. Though it's more likely it's a newborn piglet seeing it's all pink and the other is black and they're surrounded by hay-looking things. The real identity of the creature is as clear as the picture. Which is obviously not very clear at all. But well, what really caught my attention is the message that came along with it.
"Feeling down or confused? Make an appointment for a comprehensive face to face fortune consultation" !?
Whaaaat? Or as R would have put it, "it not a-made no sense." That has not the slightest ounce of relevance to the picture. Aside from the very confusing identity crisis, that is. Then again, maybe that's exactly what the advertiser was going for.
Sigh, the things people put out there these days just for people like me to waste time analysing them and write useless posts about.
I cannot believe I did not have a taste of that edible rainbow while I was in France! I never even knew of its existence till a few minutes ago, while I was searching up unique pastries of the world on a random whim. A macaron is, as I've hinted, a traditional French pastry made from egg whites, almond powder, and icing sugar - and contains a flavoured cream sandwiched in the middle. It's supposed to let you feel like you're biting into a cookie and then melt in your mouth.
They look so pretty too! I'd hang them on my wall if they weren't edible. I'm dead serious. they're almost too pretty to be eaten. And so delicious (at least from the sound of it). I want to try one so badly now.
I have a phobia of meeting my extended family. Being indirectly or directly included into the family politics, drama and vicious gossip. The term "extended family" has earned its stigma of people who're not close enough to know you, but close enough for their ignorant judgments of people to reach you. Pissing you off but at the same time, not enough for you to take action and put them back into place. You just, move along with your life with the pretense you've heard nothing but you've heard every single thing you had to understand the extent of their self-created drama.
It's sad that that's the way I view it now. It seems like the more I hear of them and the things they say about everyone else aside from themselves, the more I realise the extended family doesn't really care about you, they just use that as an excuse to add sparks into their lives through vicious gossip. It's like the paparazzi are to celebrities, that's what the extended family is to me. Nearly pests you can't really get away from. You get some good ones here and there, the rest are just out to make themselves feel superior while getting some new leads on a hot story.
I've never enjoyed family gatherings where they serve the latest skewed news on a silver platter, as I was growing up. Being part of it multiple times recently, didn't change my perspective one bit. I seem to exist at functions just as a formality. Nice to see certain faces, terrible to hear what most have to say. The saddest thing is, I don't feel a loss at all. I was never close to them. My childhood memories of them weren't the best either. I learnt the meaning of favouritism at a very young age, shaken about by people I barely registered as 'family'. I guess that was never rid of through those years. How can I, when they've never given themselves a chance to get to know me and continue pushing me away with the things they do or say unto myself and everyone else?
Sure enough I know they're happy the way they are, and probably are nice to people they want to be to. But it's not me. And as long as I get my own space, I'm quite fine with it.
