Reasons

"Just give me a reason
Just a little bit's enough
Just a second we're not broken just bent
And we can learn to love again
It's in the stars
It's been written in the scars on our hearts
We're not broken just bent
And we can learn to love again"

Sigh, where to begin, where to start.

I would like to be positive and happy about where I stand, but truth be told I'm not. I don't like being tired all the time, having a perpetual short fuse and being emotionally apathetic to keep myself from breaking down.

Sometimes I think blocking things out will help, that if I close myself off to my emotions and feelings things will be okay and they will eventually pass. I'm trying to channel that whole Zen Buddhism thing, where you let feelings go instead of letting them fester inside you and consume you into a pit of unhappiness.

I refuse to be that sort of person and let that happen to me again.

But, lately I feel I am slipping into that negative state of mind, these sort of questions and thoughts pop up all the time in my mind:

"Are they secretly judging me?" 

"Why should I bother anyway? Not like anyone will appreciate my efforts."

" What am I even doing?"

"Why do I try so hard?"

Or something along the lines of just being negative and second-guessing everything and everyone. I dislike that cautious front I get nowadays, that I watch myself when I say things and to whom I say them to. I'm letting my past hurts and wounds fester up. Old insecurities come back and my guard is up again. I've tried to hard to cover it up, mask it so that I pretend that it's okay and that I'm fine. But what happens to wounds that don't air out or time to breathe? They begin to rot. They decay slowly and infect the whole limb, before taking and consuming your being.

I need to stop this infection before it consumes me like it did before.

It's easy though, and vastly tempting to fall into a state of ever-consuming bitterness and join the ranks of self-reveling misery.

But, I wish for different things now.

I've been stuck in ruts before, I believe we all have been in that position where we feel lost and we hold onto the pain and hurt because we don't know what else to feel because we've been holding onto it for so long. That we hold onto our pain despite knowing it's poison because we're scared to try something else lest it be poison too.

I don't want to be dependent on my misery to fuel me forward, because from my experience it won't. It'll be like quick-sand and drag you deep into its dark, earthly embrace and shatter your body as well as your soul, if you let it. Only, if you let it.

There will always be pain, there will always be hurt, there will always be misunderstandings, there will always be bruises, there will always be tears and there will always be fear.

But at the same time there will be comfort for the pain, there will be relief for the hurt, there will be joy, there will be hope, there will be grace and most importantly there will always be love.

:)

xxTsui

p.s. in other news, the brother just got back his results and I couldn't be more proud of him :')

Time to Work Harder

Hello hello~

Promised myself I'd get back into the habit of blogging again. Been procrastinating too much these past two months. I promised myself that despite everything, I would still work hard in school, how wrong could I be on that account.

School's been okay. Okay, scratch that it's been a roller coaster of insurmountable pressure. It's like what Augustus says to Hazel in the Fault in Our Stars: "I'm in a roller coaster that's only going up."

That's how I currently feel at the moment, with IB making me feel like I'm just going to drop any minute now with no warning whatsoever.

I'm actually glad I kept going back to school despite applying elsewhere. I'm glad I kept up the rhythm of working and getting stressed. It made me rethink my options and re-evaluate where I stand. It's not hard honestly and I hate to sound like a coward but the truth is: I really am scared.

Scared of a lot of things. If someone's going to ask me what I'm afraid of I'd probably say:

It scares me to the point that my mind balks at its measure, sometimes I try not to think about it so much but it's hard when the people around you are. My brother Andrew just got back his results, he's going to join SAF and then go onto University. Emma's left for the US and is trying to get into NYU and people around me are just going places and I'm just scared to move. Too scared to move.

 I know I told my parents I would try to adapt over there if I got in. I assured them that I wouldn't be so bothered not having family and friends beside me. But it's hard, in all honesty. Having the recent Chinese New Year celebrations and my friends with me to celebrate my birthday made me rethink how much I really need people in my life to support me. It's funny, because half my internal lamentations is just me wanting to just rant to someone about everything, but I catch myself because one: I tend to be really melodramatic and negative when disillusioned and two: I shouldn't impose myself and my feelings on other people just cause I feel like it. If I can deal with it without involving other people I tend to do that, but I find I tend to bottle things up a lot too so IDK man.

Now that I'm staying, I gotta:

 

 Thank you to Nat, Gwen, Amelia, Ching Yi, Sing, Ethan and Diego for dealing with my rants and breakdowns for the past two weeks. I can't thank you enough for honestly dealing with moods and self-induced situations. 

Hope y'all have a great weekend!

Desperation

Haven't blogged in quite a while :(

The year is coming to a close and I'm not sure how I feel about that honestly. 2013 is coming in less than 2 months and I don't think I'm ready for it...

I debated against putting up a very angsty rant-y post, because didn't seem very fair to the people around me who were there. And I was focusing on the negativity instead of looking at the good I had in life. Sorry to anyone who's had to hear my rants on my qualms against humanity, I know I can get pretty negative.

I really want to blog about my OSL to Cebu and my recent trip to Hong Kong but the words I have in my head just get stuck in a jumbled-tumbled mess and knowing my own INFP perfectionist nature I tend to read and reread all of my posts before I ever post anything to make sure I'm coherent or if anything really makes sense. If not I just scrap the whole post all-together and this almost always applies to my writing and or art making.

(Which I am very sad to say I have lost much inspiration for the latter)

More often than not I find myself struggling to keep up and prove that I can do something for once. Or at least be able to move on to places that can appreciate and or see that I may have some talent in what I do. It always sucks to be the one in the family that everyone just gives the patronizing stare or glassy-eyed look when you tell them you want to spend your life writing. To them it's probably just preposterous, writers just pale in comparison to doctors, lawyers, bankers and businessmen. You can't be successful in life whilst being a writer, unless you're J.K Rowling, then you're amazing.

I guess to me it's not about being successful in life. It's about doing something with my life that I will be satisfied with. What's the point in me being something and doing something I really do not care for and love. I'd rather devote my life to doing something that I love, despite the set backs financially, than not at all.

Maybe that's just me being incredibly Idealistic.

Remember Remember November

I meant to blog about my last day of school, but due to some unforeseen turn of events lead me to a 2 day trip to Hong Kong and I forgot about this entry entirely.

This year, to sum it up hasn't been great, but it hasn't been all too horrible either.

For starters I got into an amazing class B2.

They've been nothing short of an inspiration to me for the past year. Fun, energetic, spontaneous, supportive and nothing short of awesome. I owe you guys, you made Year 4 not suck so bad for me :)

I spent the last day of school with Amelia and Ethan, interesting mix, I've never been out with them together at once so it was fun. Had a really late lunch at Itacho Sushi and chilled at Starbucks to talk for an hour before heading to Kino for some books :)

Got home on time, changed and went for All Soul's day Mass at St Teresa's church. Cried like crap for a really long time because I've finally made up my mind to leave Singapore and go apply for the schools in USA. Not guaranteed I'll get in, but its the thought that I'm probably making the biggest decision of my life. Aunt Christine supports me, so do my cousins Nicholas and Stephanie. The parents are behind me for everything and so is Andrew. Still feel really upset though, like there are a lot of things I haven't resolved yet...

Had a short but important chat with Ms Mels after the she handed out the report-books. I haven't seen so much red swathed in there before and it was taking a lot for me to hold myself together. She told me to go for it and if my gut and God said yes I should take the plunge. I should.

"The more you know who you are and what you want, the less you let things upset you"- Bob Harris, 'Lost In Translation'

November has always been one of my favourite months, its up there with December, October, June and February. Here's a tentative list of things I'm doing this month:

• Nation Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) - probably going to abandon my novel halfway cause I have way to much to deal with but meh its worth a shot.
• Reading everything and anything I can get my hands on.
• Going to make playlists and probably spend my afternoons with them.
• Draw/ get back into art- realised I really let my love for art slide this year because of people and teachers and school. Really shouldn't let that happen anymore. 
• Write- most likely working on poetry and short stories and maybe a full novel. We'll see. I've got such big dreams for someone so small. 
• Eat
• Sleep
• Meet up with old friends and hang out with people I haven't seen in a while.

I certainly hope I get this. I've never wanted anything more than getting into Stevensons or Vivian Webb since SOTA. 

Hope all of you are well.

xxTsui

The Perks of Being A Wallflower

Just watched the above movie with Gwen today :) really glad I got to meet her and talk to her, I need to hang out with her more.

 Feel like an angsty post so heck, I'm just going to go with it.

I honestly did not really like the book (Perks) that much, to me it was quite simplistic and I didn't really understand the hype (read the first chapter and found it hard to believe the narrator was in AP English, but that's just me). Added to the fact that the book and the quotes are incredibly over-used by people who try very hard to be 'cool' just irked me even more (the ones where Charlie talks about being 'infinite', which is actually quite profound, sad to say that the beauty of the line is dissolved because of the people who overuse and spring that quote EVERYWHERE). One, because they claim it is a fantastic piece of literature and two, the book serves no purpose than to be a stepping stone for their attainment of 'hipster-dom' and 'indie-ness'.

I think the movie, however, was incredibly well done. Logan Lerman was amazing and so was Ezra Miller. Emma Watson was okay, personally I felt that her character was quite the stock-type so there wasn't much challenge for her to pull of. The cinematography was brilliant and so was the editing. The tasteful music was also a plus point.

I cried at the end of the movie and during certain scenes (and I was probably the only person to cry in the whole cinema), not because I was moved to tears by a certain development in the plot, but because of how I related to everything that was happening throughout the whole movie. Probably because I've always felt like I never truly fit in anywhere and my long-standing obsession with writing and literature of any kind and form. I relate to Charlie, I guess, because I tend to go through those weird periods of time feeling incredibly lonely and awkward in most social interactions and events it's just quite sad. And I guess it's really easy for me to relate to someone who just sits and watches everything and just bottles it in, probably because I spend a lot of time doing that.

Thought about the film and my churning emotions and thoughts all the way home. Cried on the bus ride back and had awkward stares in my direction the entire time. Been thinking a lot lately, not really ready for anything coming my way. Still deciding what I want to do for next year and whether I really want to stay or I really want to go. I sound so much like an emotional mess, but funny because that's what best describes my current emotional and mental state.

Sometimes I wonder if anyone else out there feels the same way I do. Or if they feel like how Charlie or I feel sometimes when things happen.

Guess I'll never know.

Tsui

Paths

Where do I go from here?

"Should I choose the smoothest course? Steady as the beating drum? Is all my dreaming at an end? Or do you stil wait for me dreamgiver, just around the river bend? 

At a cross-road of my life again, like I always seem to be. The problem is I hate having options and choices to make more decisions. I'm incredibly indecisive and I jump back and forth between decisions weighing the pros and cons till the time for deciding ultimately passes me by. Is it safe to say that I maybe making the most rash and impulsive decision of my life that may have many implications in the future? I don't know

All I know is, I don't know where my path may lead me and take me. And I honestly couldn't be more excited to see what's in store for me. I just don't know if I'll be doing my journey alone from now on. 

Got back my results this week, never cried so much over grades in such a long time. Told my parents and all they told me was they weren't upset with the grades I got, but more that they couldn't do anything to help. And despite what I was awarded, I am their daughter and nothing will ever change that. Then my dad asked me if I wanted to leave SOTA and go to a prep school in California. To him it seems like a good idea; my relatives are there, weather in there is milder than anywhere else, the school is endorsed by a good and trusted friend of his who's kids got into NYU (New York University) and UCL (University College London), which are incidentally both schools my mom wants me or my brother to get into. Seems like a very good plan, other than the fact that its thousands of kilometers away, in the United States of America, from Sunny Singapore and from my family and my friends that I love really dearly. 

I don't want to leave really, but if I stand a better chance going over and getting into a good university I would take it. 

I know I sound silly, a sixteen year old tearing her hair out over admissions criteria and doing a good job by getting into a prestigious University like her parents did before her. We all have dreams right? And for now this is mine. Getting into a good University to do Literature or Creative writing is of paramount importance to me. Getting there seems to be the challenge.

Should I stick to the safer option? Stay in Singapore and finish the IB that I've devoted 4 years of my life to? Or should I pick the more 'dangerous' one? Go to a prep-school in California and live apart from my family and friends for years, even if it means I'll get a better education. 

I don't know.

I hate making decisions. 

P.S. Hi Ching Yi if you're reading this :) 

Judgement

Credits to Kelcey from 356 Days of Words here

I absolutely love her blog and her writing. The way she strings the words to form sentences with such emotion and sensitivity is riveting and somehow always incredibly apt for me at any moment in time.

I went back to the place where I found myself the happiest and yet the most conflicted. Went back to the place that has brought out the good, the joyful and the wonderful yet the ugly, the proud and the conceited. Being back made me wonder a lot about how I stand with certain people and how they view me, I feel that their attitude hasn't changed much to be honest. And I really couldn't care less about what the think and what they say about me. Because isn't that the person that you've judged me to be? Pretentious, selfish, close-minded and opinionated with pride issues? Well thats who I'm going to be now, because when I'm nice and try my best, I do it out of the pure knowledge I'm going to get rewarded and not because I just want to help.

I know for a fact that I am human and I have come to accept my flaws. I do not do everything out of wisdom all the time. And I will act out of pride and jealousy only because I am human. And I do know for a fact that I have my flaws and my drawbacks. But using what I share to prove how much of a worthless wretch I am from our closed door sharings is incredibly low for anyone. You hate it when people judge you, so why do it to me?

I feel like you shouldn't be the ones judging me when you yourselves have condemned so many others. But sure just some food for thought.

Isn't the saying "let he who is without sin, cast the first stone"?

You tell me.

Taylor swift is really my guilty pleasure

Listening to her new song We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together is really apt for me at this moment.

"We are never ever getting back together"

Because it is honestly really exhausting to be with you recently, keeping up with your expectations of what I should be to you and me just never being good enough. So it was you being mad with me and me trying so hard to please and you still pinning the blame on me whenever I felt completely shit about myself. And you never admitting you're wrong even when everyone is telling you what an insensitive jerk you are and me never wanting more than just an apology. Is apologizing honestly really that hard for you?

You told me once before that you knew in your heart we could last forever and how much you really wanted to be with me. But then you though of all the things that could go wrong once we were together and that just scared you. So you bailed on me and left. But you still wanted to be friends, you still wanted us to be somewhat platonic. Sure we were really good friends and we were good together for that period of time. But you chose your grades, you chose Community, you chose everything and every other commitment but me. You shouldn't deny it because you know its true. Sorry I wasn't good enough for you lol. But I tried I really did.

You only want to hear me tell you how much I care and how much I really do like you so you can just go back on your words and leave again once you've heard it all.

No, not now, not ever again.

We are never, ever, ever getting back together. I do care, but I'm tired of you taking me for granted. I have had enough of being your personal errand-runner/punching-bag/doormat/ literally the girl that almost all boys school boys want thats completely crazy about them and just basically does every single thing to please you type of girl.

Sometimes I wish I could be content with just being your doormat, things would be a lot easier no? Sorry sometimes I have way too much pride I would like to admit and honestly, being a doormat is just incredibly downgrading for me.

But we are never ever getting back together because you chose everything but me. So stick with that choice. Stick with it because I'm not coming back. Not now and ever.

Manners

I honestly look at some of the juniors in my school and wonder if their parents have brought them up properly.

I know I shouldn't jump to conclusions and generalize because that is a fallacy, and personally I believe in the good of others, but it's just one of those instances, like today, that I really question how my generation is being brought up.

Just today as I was queuing up for food since it was break, I got insulted by a group of juniors two years younger than me that I don't even know personally at all. I was standing in between one of the girls and another pair and had probably my typical sleep deprived look (I got 4 hours of sleep last night because I was up talking to Andrew). And out of no where when I was about to order and get my food, one of the girls behind me just says quite loudly, "I feel so tall now!"

And in my head I was like, "what the shit...?"

Obviously she wasn't talking about anyone else in the vicinity, and definitely not about her other friend because she was taller. So I deduced that it was about me, the only one who seemed to be the shortest one in the queue. It did not help that her other friend in front of me in the queue stepped back to measure her height against me, laughing as she did so. 

Okay, I know I'm really short in stature. I'm only 1.5m, and I honestly have nothing against my height at all. I get teased for it quite often by my peers, but I've already resigned to the fact that I'm never going to hit 1.7m, much less 1.6m.

What bothers me most is that these girls have the gall to do this to me when I don't know any of them personally at all. 

It doesn't bother me that their younger than me, because I really can pass off as a Year 1 or 2. But it really irks me to see them be so rude to someone they don't even know.

It wouldn't bother me at all if you actually knew me personally before you made a jibe at my height because that is very uncalled for and seriously unbecoming.

So of course, pissed as I was, I went to tell Clare and Ching Yi about it, who were in the line next to me. And Clare (who is quite short as well) responded with quite harsh comments about how they have no respect and other things that were equally as funny but I've forgotten at this point.

Funny thing is that they walked away without even looking them in the eye. One girl even bumped into me and shuffled off before I could apologize for bumping into her (see I have good manners). 

After this I went to rant to probably ever other person I knew to tell them how rude and disrespectful they were. And of course most of my peers asked if they just mistook me for a junior, like them, cause of my height.

Its not a matter of respecting your elders, or anyone older than you, because I firmly believe that respect should be earned, not just an entitlement. But this is having the common decency to be mindful of other people who clearly have nothing to do with you and have not offended you in any way at all.

I honestly don't think it was right for them to do that, probably to them it was just a harmless joke and they never meant it to be malicious in any way.

But honestly, do I really know them? I don't. And do they know me? I don't think so. Therefore should they take a jab at someone who has never done anything to them in their entire lives? Absolutely not. And I definitely do not condone such behavior because it is childish, uncalled for and absolutely rude.

It doesn't reflect well on you as a person, and it definitely does not reflect well on your parents' upbringing. And if they're so conceited to think they'll get into anywhere they want with that kind of attitude, they are sorely mistaken. (PS. Yes the girls were dancers and this is a view not just shared by me, but by their dance seniors who think that they need to sort out their attitudes)

Because if there is anything that my parents have taught me it is to have basic manners and not to offend others despite their physical appearance or status in life. And if there is anything that I should be respectful to people even when they sometimes do not seem to commandeer my respect. You don't see me rolling my eyes at teachers when they're giving me a lecture, do you?

No, because I have basic manners. And my parents have brought me up properly.

ugh