was god saying something??? :)

giant turkish ice cream anyone?

the giant lanterns, clarke quay, singapore

the man who swing giant beads, orchard street, singapore

clubbing, drinking and random people talking to us? old men doing the finger dancing, women LITERALY falling all over kit and karine stealing the lead singer's hat. just another ordinary day!

6.00 am, alexandria hospital, singapore, dr. mike gives us a description with his hands about.... sandwiches? hmmm doesnt look like it.

so good id curse

dear jess,

i just have to post this. i like the way talent works. its unfair and you cant really blame yourself for not having or having it.

i couldnt believe it when i saw nick's photographs. it was so good, i cursed! and at the same time im completely god-stricken and now think the world of his photos. damn i hope he doesnt read this.

i now wanna go around telling people i have a friend who takes awesome photographs and is so humble. i myself, just started the interest this year when i got my first decent camera and im so proud that nick's taken pics without a digital slr. like my bro in law says, its the person and i believe so, it is the person not the camera.

heck what they say about talent. im gonna go do the water drop experiment and ill show you what crap shots ill get. HAHA.

nicholas cheong's pics can be found on flickr.com

drooling and idolizing,
jess

all rights to this picture belongs to nicholas cheong. hmm altho i did take it.. *dont sue me* :) nick did this as an experiement and got his lens wet too. that boy has some amount of patience.

very quickly now

dear jess,

technology was suppose to make my life easier, but instead its made me work three times as hard. for example. i want to update all my pictures right now and i do it here, on flickr and on facebook. the same damn thing because everyones connected everywhere. it feels stupid. however i think facebooks the best because it has everything you need in one.

the weeks have gone like crazy, i had the worse ear infection because of my piercing and didnt even get to show you the pictures, yet. it went red and swelled HUGELY and then it bled. it bled right down to my the tip of my ears and wouldnt stop. i hate piercers who dont know an ounce of what theyre doing.

anyway's the dutch were in the historical city this weekend. i think ive rediscovered this city over and over again and i still love it.

so now we're down to me just updating you on my life.

ive arrived.

laughs,
jess

http://www.flickr.com/photos/81691123@N00/

i love the dutch cows :) there were six brightly painted ones, i caught three, skipped two ugly ones and missed one.

the dutch brass band came to town, fully dressed with their clogs and all, and they were great fun

hotel anyone? it comes with spiral steps too.

ringo's bar. quaint. nice.

portuguese bake fish. awesome. but not as nice as the otak otak :)

i tried these, the big shells (bigger than my whole hand) had the skins FULL and alive but shrunk to a ball once they were cooked. it tasted like salt water :) haha

we are here again

dear jess

it shames me to say that i had forgotten. i tried hard to remember but i couldnt remember your date.

she.

she was my ally. she would say that it was okay if i got back late and would always take my side against my mum. she would back me up and i would take her to movies.

the last time i took her to one, i still remember which it was, she would laugh so loud; imagine that; an old lady laughing so loud i was slightly embarassed. then she would say a million times that coming to the cinema would be imposing on my fun.

whenever she went to the shop, she'd buy me egg tarts because i loved it, and i would buy her the 'split' ice cream or the chocolate ones because she loved those.

she was always apologetic and never wanted anyone to go out of their way for her, and yet even in her 80s she'd clean my room!

you know, i have a problem till today because of her. i simply cant look at another granmother or someone aged. i found that it literally made me cry and i have had once broken down in the most unpredictable of times because i was completely surrounded by them.

there is no way, as i initally wanted to, to write to you eloquently about her. it wasn't always what she did or said but it was who she was. she was an old woman who had so much of energy, a grandmother who made everyone around her laugh and be happy, she was my mama.

it made me feel so handicap that i had no grandmother anymore, and for some years already. i had no one to open the door and ask her to come down for supper, no one to watch wash her long white hair in the bathroom, no one who wears a sarong in the house, or tell us not to take pictures of her, no one she would call penis in portuegese, quite literally translated, no one who would sundry the eurasion pickle, no one to love, and all i still want to do is love her.

im sure she's retained every ounce of her sense of humor in heaven, im not sure about the cursing though.

*helen theisera passed away third september, 2004.

yours,
jess

who am i really?

dear jess,

who am i when you're not with me?
who am i when ive stopped moving,
who are you when you've stopped travelling,
when you're all alone and there is no one to define you, but you.

i become me, when you're here. i become great, when i am with you. i become who i think i was always meant to be.

how is it possible that i can only be me, with you?

yours,
jess

back to school

dear jess,

in the hype of my craziness, we had decided to search out the tattoo shop, to get a piercing. and then i just decided to get not one, but two piercings, rather spontaneously.

the massively tatooed piercer gave me a pen and told me to mark myself and i looked at my cynical half who laughed and then subsequently refused to pen me.

he countdown and my mind tried to imagine what the pain was like because it had been at ages since i had pierced the ears and probably six years for that other spot. so i hadnt any idea. the first one hurt and then we went lets get another. HAHA. and it wasnt all that bad. well not till later.

so, i have my three holes on ear. next time i do something spontaneous, it should be less painful. its been three nights sleeping on one side. still, it was fun.

yours,

jess

it almost feels like its a new year..

Dear jess

Ever since Saturday I had consciously made a decision to be happy. Well, no, its not one of those self help indulgences. Instead, it’s a conscious effort to be this expression I call crazy happy. I wonder if i excel, id be like avril lavigne and loose my “mojo”

Or perhaps quite the opposite, id gain back who I thought I always was. I use to be completely spontaneous and mad. And that shall return, just as much as my beloved cynical half has. And with that, im going to pierce something.

I had gone to the auditions and for once, it completely didn’t matter if I got it. I was singing myself home. I had done something I wanted too and I was feeling complete. Like the thought that it doesn’t matter anymore if I can be this or that, as long as I have done it and enjoyed doing it.

I’ve learned so much about people over the weekend and in return learned about myself. Ive seen the ones that try to include their boyfriends in their conversations, and the ones that try to include themselves in it. And ive also seen the ones that despite being so exhausted, still manage to make everyone laugh.

As for me, ive been completely blessed by a bunch of teenagers, a quick talking 12 year old who I miss greatly and all she has as a memory of me is a spongebob keychain. How appropriate.

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new lands, but in seein new eyes. Marcel Proust.

yours,

jess

k, can someone explain to me what that is on the right side of a photo that looks like a pic of a family or something.... i don rmbr anything being there!

moments of madness

dear jess,

ah! talking to myself is getting boring. in this hideous manic mood, everything seems possible. yes, a man once refused to be treated for his manic depression, simply because he said "i must have my manic moments."

well, whilst i still havent been diagnosed, my manic moment appeared in the form of extreme energy, positiveness of taking over the world and just being crazy. all proper symptoms of the former mentioned psychosis, mind you. i sat down at the table and was disturbing the person opposite me with singing from my written down notes, taking a hanger and shooting at his pimple and then going back to singing, amongst many other odd things.

its true, if you have your moments of manicness, you dont want to trade it in. you feel almost like a high, without even sipping a cup of coffee, you feel that your personality is capable of taking over anything and anyone, you find everything humorous and innumerable amounts of energy to conquer anything.

i remember being manic for more than a short time once. when i was young. i suppose getting grumpy is not necessarily manic deppresion as much as it is, ageing.

or perhaps the manicness can be attributed to the subconscious knowledge that the near future promises adventures and companionships. doesnt matter.

the only problem with anything, manic depression or mood swings; is that everything that goes up eventually comes down.

bah!

jess

swinging it

dear jess,

i rushed to pull the two boys away from each other. the punch was swinging and i was headed right in the middle of it. i closed my eyes and anticipated the punch to hit me. i realise this only much later. but, it didnt. i opened my eyes and as i tore the boys apart, i pulled them by the neck and headed the both of them to the disciplinarians office.

just another day, in a public school..

i surely didnt sign up for this and as long as i teach in a public school, ill always have stories to tell. do i hate it? hell no, i love those boys to bits.

punch or none.

yours,
jess

loneliness

dear jess,

when its late and i have no one next to me, a vague and yet slightly familiar friend visits. he sits with me and makes me fear him. he makes me think a little too much and feel slightly empty. i try in vain to search for something to watch, or do so that i dont have to be with him.

but, alas, all my attempts fail.

he continues to sit with me.

and i look him in the face and ask him. why does he visit me even when im with other people? why is he there even when im busy or when i have things to do?

as usual, he never answers. i suspect his silence is part of the ploy that he is here with me.

every now and again, i get lonely. even when im next to the one i love. i wonder and asks, and he still keeps silent.

yours,
jess

brazillian barbaque

i discovered recently that there is a brazillian barbaque buffet where meat is served on skewers and a salad bar where how much u can eat depends on your stomach. it was a really nice experience with my family. mmmm the garlic bread was soooo awesome ;) this one was chicken ham...

in essence

dear jess,

its officially half a year.

there is a certain amount of repetition in our lives that we become accustome to that we forget that its a repetition. alot of things become one too familiar. i know thats why people leave, migrate, but even somewhere else, repetition repeats itself, finding its place in the security of our lives.

we plan the same camp year after year. and then i realise that the year i dont, it doesnt make much difference because, really, we do the exact same thing.

some people have gone away and come back, and they are, the same. they have neither increased in a better etiquitte or reason.

change comes slowly. for sure.

sometimes all too slowly that we wait for it. i know. i should do more. everyday that i havent, everything else around me changes.

perhaps some days you wish you woke up to a musical, and everyone breaks into song and dance. and then you realise, you never would.

its been half a year. i look forward for the next half.

yours,

jess

in todays news, the korean christians in captive under the taliban movement has said that they will kill if their demands are not met by wed 730 GMT. two out of the group of 23 has since been shot, the first was their leader and pastor on what would have been his birthday, last wednesday..

lets keep them in prayers.

these are salted egg crabs, and yes they taste as good as it looks.... jusstttttt aweeesooommmme

on this side is rice dumplings, freshly made, on the other, a car workshop!

poker time!!

my first ostrich meat

congrats, mr and mrs drieberg, 777

a cost for the cause?

dear jess,

i dreamed i found my cable. and in reality i havent. my camera cable is missing, hence my long silence for i wanted to mail you pictures instead. i think they speak louder than my broken english does.

having woken up from the dream and into reality, my cable is still missing.

so.

perhaps i really do have nothing to say and its my frail attempt to try to tell you what's happening in my oh so interesting life.

or not.

im a letter druggie, in case you have somehow failed to notice that. in which i usually and only ever write when i am emotional. and hence when i don have such a drug, i write letters to you about my camera cable. *blink*

its like one of those conversations when you just sit and stare and update each other that the school will be showing a superb musical this weekend and you got the tee shirt which you think rocks or that tomorrow's a long day.

but really. there was something initially.

simply this.

after more than three years of doing what i call an obscure job and the prospects apparently might grow, do i then share what i have taken years to build? here, take the books and materials i use so that someday you can be better than me.

remember those aunties that leave out the ingredient in the recipe? i get them now, completely. and yet we still think the food rocks. imagine.

once a druggie, always a druggie.

yours,
jess

heaven be my strength

dear scholar,

im not sure if i preferred it when my life was dull and filled with naps which i enjoyed thoroughly or that it has now ejaculated into a frenzy of hard work, fear, and frustration. when the confusion of an established and renown person telling you that your work is good enough for publication versus that who has power over you telling you that your work is merely surface.

i vowed to take it in stride, to learn and improve and to slowly open the pages praying that my emotions will not be involved. and that i did, trying to be a true professional, until i saw words from what was suppose to be the scholar that reads etc, etc, .. "for heavens sake"

had my unscholarly-scholarly only heaven knows what made her so irrate that she had to bring heaven into the matter? certainly i admit that my writting had been less than scholarly but at least it should only make that one of us in this case.

this "thing" that i had believed i was destined to do, this "thing" that i had continually fought for, this "thing" that has made me poor and without a proper job for hundreds of years, this "thing" that still continues to persist that it stays with me and that it will be worth it and in the process let me loose my sanity. this "thing" that keeps me constantly angry and disatisfied, confused and incapable.

how sweet would life be if i was a comic artist.

yours,

jess

i am edgar

there is no other name that knows my pain

than the beautiful annabel lee

loved by him in the chilling wind

edgar's annabel lee.

dear jess

there is a curiosity in when you read, you find that his love for her was great. the curiosity lies in what happened when he died, and not so much she. for edgar allan poe, the great, the mysterius, revealed bodies in his backyard, of the women, all he had loved.

how can one love so greatly and murder so lightly?

we are all great contradictions. our love and passion as much as our hate and despise for the people and the things we are.

do i want to be annabel or edgar? am i either?

as much as we are repetitious, we are all contradictions.

on that note.

yours,

jess

for the moon never beams without bringing me dreams,
of the beautiful annabel lee;
and the stars never rise but i feel the bright eyes
of the beautiful annabel lee;
and so, all the night-tide, i lie down by the side
of my darling, my darlin, my life and my bride,
in the sepulcher there by the sea,
in her tomb by the sounding sea.

-part of edgar's annabel lee-

LiVe shOws roCk!!

i wore heels that made me a head higher because we were promised seats. we ended up standing the whole few hours but it was fun. the best were the hijau number and of course, judi's choreographed piece, altho i was too mesmerized with the violinist. enjoy the videos.

the anniversary of the diary..

dear jess,

i think that my cynicism is hugely attributed to the fact that i have met one too many people who think too much of themselves. they think they can write, or they can take a photograph and they pride themselves in that. however, the one that i find are true geniuses are those that never have to say how good they are at what they do. its because they have become a living (an oxymoron) prove.

monday, the 60th anniversary of the book "the diary of anne frank." i have cried reading this book, and none before or after. but years later this book inspired and change the lives of freedom writers - students who plagued with gangsterism, violence, death, racism and cruelty come to realise their worth and wrote "freedom writers," a compilation of their stories, now a movie, featuring hilary swank.

i suppose we continually look to be inspired by the wit and yet brilliancy of literary work at a painful and scary time of a twelve year old. get over ourselves. theres a world of difference one girl has made that we have yet to come close too.

you still make me cry, anne.

*anne passed away of typhus in march 1945 at the Bergen-belsen concentration camp, at age 15 two weeks befor the camp was liberated.*

yours,

jess

biTchInG thErApy?

dear jess,

its indescribeable. i sit days, if not weeks on end with no plans of entertainment except sitting in front of the television absorbing E! entertainment and being encouraged by the fact that there are actors who have faced rejection even at the height of their day.

days and weeks on end, when my escort is back from flights i spend hours being thoroughly in contentment. it feels like this imbalanced is in between advertisements when i start to think if i actually do have friends.

when you were growing up, having friends was nothing to shout about. i suppose being lazy and endlessly critical never helps.

for example i would try for a few seconds, if only to make a getaway or to slip in something sarcastic to endure the crotch-scratching-know-it-all. i would definitely endure longer times, the ones that have been real friends at points of my life but have somehow made catching up into an endless need to pry into my life. on the other end of the stick i somehow end up bearing with those that know nothing about me and seem to always be around me or those that i would crack a joke, on my way out to drive home and just go back to watchin E!.

the people who share my heart and soul are all around the globe, and those that are here are either too busy with work, or something else. we can take pride in the one dimensional world where our work has become gravely important that we hate it, bitch about it to our wives, and then quickly wake up the next day to go back to it till the sun sets.

its true, i do the pathetic self pity thing so i eventually get to a point where i feel better than you. Dont worry. i am not friends with you, to know you , to feel better than you.

i learned something recently: our true friends are those who are with us when the good things happen. they cheer us on and are phased by our truimphs. False friends only appear at difficult times, with their sad, supportive faces, when, in fact, our suffering is serving to console them for their miserable lives.

from The Zahir

yours,

jess

speaking of fathers...

homer simpson has been stolen!!! its true!!!!!!!

i dont condone stealing, athough i do find the whole thing amusing. seriously, who wouldnt give to have a larger than life homer in my crib?????

*well, apparently the stolen one is from one utama, not the cineleisure one that i got my pics taken with.*

who's your daddy???

dean asked me "is your dad some kind of celebrity?" i thought a while and said, "yes, he gets recognised when we go to one utama". and then grin silently

my dad wanted to be a pilot (id be getting free flights) but now he has authored four books, lectured in several countries, several television shows behind his belt, and knows herbal cures for all sort of ailments. one day i will be an ounce the man you are ;)

*book signing at the book fair, PWTC, 2007*

ive reached the end of my road

dear jess,

i want to jump out of a plane.

i resist the temptation to tell you that im tired of you because that wouldnt be right. but today, all that doesnt matter. today i felt like i have just reached the point where the road goes no more. today i walked in the rain and tried hard to cry.

and im tired of it.

i am.

people think that deppression is somthing you can change or grow out of. and as a psyche grad, let me educate you, it isnt.

but there is something you can change. oh wait, there is something i can change.

its true. i hate this point of my life where i feel like killing some thirty kids i teach and in the proccess people who have marked my research paper without understanding it.

and who wouldve thought? i got inspired watching the lifestyle of a hollywood star. and i want to take life by the buls horns. im tired of all these people around me bringing me down, and me not seizing life.

i want to sky dive. and i know only one person who would do it with me. :) god knows he'd probably push me out.

dont take my word for it. after all im manic deppressive and heck, this could be a manic moment.

"do you regret not having any children?" "it didnt happen, did it? How can i regret something that didnt happen?" Coehlo, the Zahir

jump with me?

jess

baCk to WorK

malacca, genting, frasers and then malacca again. well that was my holiday now back to the daily grind.. *groan*

the sun sets in malacca

carved pictures of malaysian history below the santiago of bastique, remains as part of a whole area that includes the infamous fort

the engraved waterfall in dataran pahlawan.

the man who makes his ketupat dish.

topped with coconut, peanut sauce, sambal and "tempe" or other ingredients you wish

some pretty darn good rojak mee

rowing his boat in the make shift venice..

one of the best parts of having a friend who owns a bar, and cooks reallllyyyyy well.

i.g.r.i.d

dear jess,

"i want to change the world, instead i sleep."

ingrid michaelson

i want to be young again. not because i need to look younger or feel bouncier or have more energy to talk more nonsense. i simply need to be younger and to be filled with that sense of being able to be anyone i want in the whole world and being able to change the world.

in the past few days i have been able to learn more about people, and it never seems to be something i can come to like. people, are clearly strange. and they, like animals, seek out security. they work in packs and tend to stick in those groups. i remember over the weekend that i had wanted to hang out with that one person, but he was clearly too busy being in his pack, and i tried to make new friends but breaking into their pack probable meant becoming their dinner.

so there i was. alone but with people who somehow manage to be with me, but was never part of me. what was i looking for? acceptance? love? solace? trying to break into the normal social acceptance of these people sticking with those?

or the truth that i dont have a pack and am okay with that?

i'd like to think that im ready to face the world again. that i can stop being conscious. that i knew i was holding my wine glass wrongly on monday night and actually not be bothered by it. that i can stand before you and not be afraid to be flawed.

that i don't need a pack. and in reality i don want one.

so the question you must be asking is if it doesnt bother me, then why am i so bothered with it?

i dont know. perhaps its because if im sleeping things may seem better than if i woke up to find that i would rather just be sleeping.

yours,

jess

counting down..

my jaw dropped as they showed the preview, it was too hard to imagine that my favourite cartoon characters were larger than life, and it was then i realised how much i loved...

and oh! they look soooooo awesome in life size

i guess after this my simpsons comic collection will be worth more? of course id never trade my 'family' for cash. candy, perhaps ha ha

so be it

dear jess,

theres a strangeness in the air. if you care too much, you self destruct, if you dont, you will self destruct too. we really know the things that we only grow up with, and we usually end up thinking that they are right. life pattern, religion, sexual preference, violence, love, freedom of thought and speech, anything and everything.

very rarely do we break the role that we have been predestined in by people who bore us, or are friends with us. breaking the role, means breaking familiarity and that scares the hell out of us. very rarely, indeed very rarely are we allowed to truly be free to be ourselves.

who are you have you asked? if without someone telling you you shouldnt, or you couldnt? who am i, have you asked, and will you be surprised and perhaps disappointed?

and the after a few seconds of questioning those fine wonders, you and i go back to the masquerade because in the end, fighting takes too much for too long and that too is self destruction. when will we be our true selves and be loved for it?

yours,

jess

bEst kEpt sEcReTs oF tHe sOuTh aNd mAdNeSs oF tHe miNd

dear jess,

I know you will believe me when I say I don’t want to come back. Its only a couple of hours away but still.. I suppose being away makes you feel that for once you don’t have to live up to everyone else’s expectations.

We do so many things to please people. family, friends and the ever saying yes to easter plays so that the confrontation of finding a better excuse other than “I don’t feel like it” won't be too awkward.

But when you’re away, all people expect of you, is to enjoy yourself. And sometimes, you realize that people back home, all they want you to do, really, is what they want. Or what needs to get done.

As usual. Just like the degree I majored in, I have more questions than conclusions.

Here’s my take on the best kept secrets down south, some i've discovered for the first time too, and well some other madness that kept me sane.

i have gladly drowned you with pictures after pictures after pictures..

yours,
jess

mosT exoTiC raNgE oF sEafOOd

needless to say, im still in shock and wondering what meal a snail the size of my palm with polka dotted body is cooked into? all the food displayed is still alive and moving. a stall at settlement, some of the delicacies are only available when the tide is high.

huge, and i mean HUGE snails