Armpits on FIRE

Its so hot today, as I write this I feel as if my armpits are on FIRE.

So to make it less "fire-y", I've spread my hands really far apart as I type; sorta like a gorilla in the heat. It doesn't help that my mother comes in and laughs at my position like a gorilla too.

Now I know where the stupid idea came from in the first place.

What is going on with the climate these days? I know we're in the Equator and all, but it wasn't this hot about 5 years back. Not that I can remember clearly, but I don't recall having "fire-y" armpits when I was twelve. I can only imagine what it must be like for Jal in NS. He must be losing weight just by sitting still and letting his body sweat it out. Don't even get me started on his armpits.

Maybe it's me, MAYBE, just maybe, (a very BIG maybe), I've put on weight. But that can't be it too, I was way fatter back when I was twelve. If I didn't have heated armpits then, and I have it now, it can't possibly be the weight.

Maybe its my shirt, I'll go change into something else.

*scruffles*changes*

Nah, my armpits are still fire-y. I'll make a mental note to start conserving the environment from now on; in hopes to stop global warming.

Not that I'm being environmental-concious, I'm just worried my armpits will feel like volcanoes in the next 20 years.


My my, that does look very very hot. Are the both of you burning to death this Chinese New Year period too? I don't know about you two, but I am. Even the air-conditioning is NO help.

He "Pop-ed" Dead

Just one day ago I woke up at 6.30am to go to work.

6.30 friggin' AM.

So I guess you can sort off picture how I looked like. But thats besides the point. So I was like some mindless zombie skulking into the car. Switched on the radio and air-conditioning while my dad drove.

Suddenly JJ and Rudy on Hitz.fm announces that they have some form of Hollywood Scandal and will tell us after a song. It hit me like lightning. My eyes pop-ed open and I was suddenly excited.

I mean, who had sex with who and who this time now?? You know how its like with these Hollywood stars. And it didn't help that they chose to play Britney's "Pieces of Me", which is so provocative, it makes any scandal sound soo much more scandalous than it really is.

When the song rolled to an end, they announced the news.

"HEATH LEDGER FOUND DEAD ON RESIDENT HOME"

It didn't hit me for like 5 Seconds. First my mind had to find out who the heck Heath Ledger is to begin with, before I start hyperventillating. The name sounded so familliar I was so frustrated that I didn't know who he was on the spot. Then, it struck me.

Hes that BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN GUY, the one I was just reading about on Lisa's blog the night before. The guy who kissed Jake Gyllenhaal!! Who won an Emmy/Academy Award for playing a gay on TV!!

After that I was like "WHAT THE F*CCCCKKK", How did he die???". Was he raped to death by raging homosexuals?

But NOOOOO, of all things, he had to die of drug overdose.

So me being me, started screaming in the car saying "I can't believe it, I can't believe it!"
But my dad hushed me on the spot because he doesn't like people screaming in the car and he doesn't know who Heath Ledger is. So I pulled out my cell and did the most sensible thing.

I sms-ed Lisa to tell her the whole ordeal. I had to tell someone. I felt obliged to. The inner gossip bitch in me is telling me to SMS someone.

That was pretty much it, sigh.. why did the stupid chao ah pek take soo much sleeping pills? I can already imagine what the tabloids will say about his death. He'll have no peace at all despite being dead.

It'll be like that fight in Jal's dorm. Two groups of brainless people fighting over a dumb, unknown cause. The analogy is, opposing tabloids will try to guess the story behind his death, end up trying to sell more papers than the other tabloid, and make up zillions of lies dogging his death. Whos to blame them though? Heath Ledger just had to "pop-ed dead" after starring in a worldwide gay hit.

Anyhoo, all of us should just have a moment of silence for this guy. In the midst of all the scandal, he was nonetheless a world class actor. And the death of a world class actor deserves a moment of silence from anyone, including those who have no idea who he is. (yes ka hui, I mean you)

Maybe I should stop auto-repeat-track for Christina Aguilera's Beautiful. Its clearly making me more emotional than usual.

Toodles~

Week 2 & 3

As I write this, its late; at 0032 hours. A good sign actually. These two weeks have passed like a bowel movement after 2 bottles of laxatives. That quickly.

The activities have increased in terms of number and number of hours. We have talks, lectures, marching, TTS (Tempur Tanpa Senjata) etc.

Most of them, especially CB (Character Building) class is a terrible, terrible bore. But you try to make the best of it. But sometimes you just go "where the F**k is the silver lining"

Most of the time it's because of the trainees' behaviour. Many don't take things seriously, they play around, don't pay attention. It annoys the heck out of me. But maybe I'M the one who needs change.

Note to self and future NS-ers : Don't take class seriously.

Still sticking to the topic of the people here. There are many nice people, but there are those rotten ones that will make even Pn. Molly suffer a sore throat due to excessive "Rotten!" shouting.

These bad eggs are hard to write and explain. Their mentality differ greatly to what I am used to. To give you examples is a hard task for it's extremely hard to grasp what exactly they do that annoys the heck out of me. Maybe its the "don't take things seriously" attitude or the immaturity these 18 year olds possess. I don't know. But these rotten people are REALLY frustrating.

The good guys are my type of people. They respect you, they don't play a fool when things need to be done, yet they are jokers all the same.

There was a clash between these two groups of rotten and un-rotten people.

There was a fight. It involved two gangs of rotten people whilst the un-rotten people watched and disapproved of such actions.

The fight took place in my dorm. I don't know who started it or why did it happen. There were weapons in the form of metal and wooden sticks involved. I was only a few feet away, on my bed, witnessing the whole ordeal. No one got seriously hurt, but that was only because law and order in the form of the NS trainers stormed in, one brandishing an army knife. They stopped the fight and both gangs got punished and soon it became old news.

The trainers are really cool people though. They crack jokes, have a few laughs with us, but when it comes time for serious work, don't mess with them.

My type of people.

There's this police guy, he's a trainer here, Mohd Noor who is my favourite trainer. He's still in PDRM unlike majority of the other trainers are ex-army/police. He's the one that has authority to bring a culprit "downtown". This is very assuring. He has actually managed three cases already here at camp. One theft and two bully cases.

Great guy. He's funny when he wants to be. which is very often but he's also very no-nonsense type of guy. He goes straight to the point, not long winded and very precise in getting his words across. I salute him.

It's seriously getting late. I'll end by just saying to all readers out there and of course my other one and a half that everything is fine and great. Starting to enjoy NS and don't worry...every lil' thing's gonna be alright.

TTFN.

Ask Cheeks 2

YAY!! Finally I have a chance to do a sequel to Ask Cheeks.. Ask Cheeks 2! XD.. Sorry for the burst intro. Okok serious now. Back to the topic! MING I'M HERE TO HELP!! TENG TENG TENG!!!

Well Ming, honestly I'm really sorry to hear about what happened. I know you were all excited and this had to happen.

However, the phrase giving up is a phrase that I feel that you are using too early. Basically what I'm trying to say is.. Cheer up! Not ALL hope is lost. Then again, I think it's a good thing that this has happened to you.

Why do I say that? Its because you're resolve is being challenged, and how blessed of you that you are getting challenged NOW instead getting challenged halfway doing your medical degree. It saves you the pain of regretting later than now. I think this is truly a blessing in disguise for you.

I know how you feel about your resolve being not as strong as you thought it was, though I can't really describe it in words, I understand, truly. But Ming, you shouldn't feel so hard done by. I think its unfair that YOU blame life, think about it, what does life OWE you? Instead I urge you to stay strong because this incident will either break your resolve or make it even stronger. Put more effort into thinking about it again and I believe whatever decision you make under these circumstances won't be one that you would regret, I can't say for 100% certain but I do have hope that you won't. I know that doesn't really what you want to hear but its reality, again.

On the other hand, the way I look at it, you still have plenty of options for yourself. If after thinking about it and doing medicine is what you really want and is passionate about, what is wrong about doing Form 6? I'm not being selfish because I want an extra companion with me in Form 6 but I don't think its truly THAT bad. What Form 6 is is that its a risk. I know friends aren't exactly to approve of their friends taking risks but if its what you want, you'll be hungry to achieve it, in a good way. Plus, from what I heard, Form 6 is quite well recognized which I'm sure you know and I believe local U's aren't the ONLY option like how college counselors put it. Form 6 opens you up to a lot of private and overseas U's as well,but of course there is still the problem of expenses. But think about it, you can already save at least RM 20,000 by going for Form 6 and in that 1 and a half year maybe you'll find yourself being able afford it more, or you can always opt for scholarships. I think there is A LOT of options for you either way, but since your parents has come clean with you about their situation, I suggest you think about the possibilities of Form 6. Don't just think that Form 6 equals to local U, but also the other possibilities. If Form 6 is ALL bad, then I don't think it is even fit to be an option. Its a risk, but it might also turn out to be a detour, don't forget Ming, life is full of surprises as well! =)

However, if you find yourself considering another ambition after this, don't be sad or anything. Like I said it is a blessing in disguise. Give it more thought, because there is still time for you to change and decide what you REALLY want.

I hope that not just Ming but everyone who reads this and is in this stage of life should really really give in a lot of effort thinking about your future. As you can see, Ming's biggest fear is regret and it should be everyone's fear as well. For those of you that are taking pre-U programs, you still have time to decide. For those who are doing foundation programs, I hope you stay true to your resolve and challenge it while you still can before you take a step too far till the point that its nearly impossible for you to turn around.

Well Ming, I hope you'll sort things out properly with yourself and your parents. Again, cheer up! I'm not exactly the best example for the best advice but you can always choose to open options for yourself. Just so you know, nothing is ever easy, nothing will be no matter what you choose, that's why choose wisely, choose what your passionate about, choose what you love. Before I end this post, I'll post a piece that I did recently that I hope might be able to inspire you a bit or if not at least its something nice to look at? Hehe =P! All the best Ming and God bless! And to everyone else, God bless you too and thanks for reading!

Giving up

What I'm about to post will probably be the most personal thought I have ever pen-ed down on this blog.

After Taylors counselling today with my parents, they have come totally clean with me and gave me only two options to go about my future.

Option A : Do A-levels at Taylors (yahoo), but give up on Medicine later because they cannot afford it (zomg). I'd have to pursue another career.

Option B : Go to Form Six (yuck) and try my luck at entering local U for Medicine (which according to everyone and the counsellor, the chances are next to zilch)

So clearly it has made my choice so much "easier".

This news has sent my life into a total tailspin. I mean, I probably should have seen this coming. And I did. I just never expected it to be such a BIG dissapointment.

I'd always pity others who, because of financial constraints, had to give up on pursuing a career.
I never thought that one day, I'll have to be pitying myself.
I know I sound kind off dramatic right now, but thats how my parents have made me feel. Not that its their fault.

My mother is now trying to convince me to pursue another career. And I'm very pissed off at myself for allowing her to even persuade me. I mean, clearly my resolve to become a doctor isn't as strong as I thought it was. Otherwise I wouldn't even be thinking about this, I would be jumping straight into Form Six. My only chance at Medicine.

I can't believe that I'm actually THINKING about giving up. But thats reality. I've heard all the pep talks from friends and family. How "If you have hope you can do it!"

But dey, this is reality we're talking about. Not a page off some Disney story.

Whatever I choose, will determine what happens to me in the future. I don't want to have many regrets. But I just feel at this point, life is being very unfair to me. I know living is supposed to be full of unfair-ness, but I didn't expect to face so many dissapointments already at this age. It makes me afraid to think off what waits for me tommorow.

But I have comfort thinking that life isn't only unfair to me. It's unfair to a zillion others out there. Down to those in Africa, and those who have to die before they could learn how to speak.

Sigh. Looking at this perspective isn't making me feel any better. I need my other two men's advice.

I hate giving up, but in this case, I think I have too.

Pundek!!!!

Hey Jal! Its excellent to receive post from you all the way from NS! I must congratulate your brilliant idea to write and have Jit Sun post it on the blog for the world to read. Good for you and Jit Sun.

Camp doesn't sound too bad by the looks of it. Maybe you've made it look less terrible than it really is by being so hilarious. But the again, I'm glad you're surviving well. I was so worried about all of you when you guys left.

Working is going fine for me. Unlike Cheeks (who complains about it all the time), I love my job except for certain moments.

Like when I'm being told off by a PUNDEK who totally has no right to scold me at all.

I'm not about to give names and all, because a blog is pretty public. But sometimes, I tell you people can be real bitches. And I am not saying it in a joking-kidding sorta way (since I practically call everyone a bitch). I seriously mean BITCHY.

Oh well. Its not like Im not a bitch myself sometimes =)

But working in TGIF has gained me alot of new friends whom are really nice people. I guess that more than compensates for the bitchy bits.

Yet, I still miss school so very much. Truly, everything about working pales into comparism to school.

Oh about those people who laugh at you about language and all. Jit Sun, just tell Jal to call them PUNDEKS. haha. No, I'm just kidding. Don't call them pundeks or pukimak or anything like that. I don't want Jal coming back with bruises. Just bear with them.

Gotta pen off now. My cat just peed on the balcony and it stinks.

PS: Excuse me for saying Pundek, my colleagues influenced me into using it. those pundeks. =P

Purpose

Hello all! Sorry for the absence, you know work and all, which is going to be the main focus of this post. Before I start I just wanna give a shout out to Ming, Jal(in NS,but I know he can hear me,lol) and all you faithful readers of the 2 and a half men blog.

Note : I'm not going to complain about work again trust me. More like going to preach this time XD

The main issue(yes this is classified as an issue) that I want to blog about is

"Purpose"

"Why la this Cheeks so sound emo?"

"Why is purpose an issue?"

"What's his problem?"

Well I actually thought of this post while riding in the LRT on my way to work. It felt to me like I was like one of those mindless drones you see so often depicted in movies, you know the scene where you see tons of people coming in and going out the train at the same time.

"What movie are you talking about?"

you may ask and my answer to that would be, EXACTLY! Mindless drones don't have a major starring roles in a movie, because they are just there for backdrop as far as the director is concerned, agreed? Doesn't the mere thought of being a mindless drone itself scares you? Repeating the same routine everyday and practically having no time really for yourself as you slave away for an employer or even if you have your own business, you too slave yourself away, and the only motivation for this is, money. The scariest thought is that a mindless drone does not have control over their own life. They lose focus on what is really important and chase after temporary highs. Mindless drones have no purpose for their existence other than being a background for others.

It is easy to see why people change as they go through this stage of life. The reason is quite simple really, our lives are governed by money. We need money, we work for money. This is the simple fact that governs one's life when we are in the working stage of our lives. Earning money is fun. Knowing how much we can earn is the motivation. All of us would at least once in our lifetime, sit down and just predict how much we could earn this month. Its the result of the torture of repetition. But its fun, especially when we get to spend it. Now this is where the psychology comes in. We always imagine what we could buy or what we could get ourselves with the money at hand and always the first things that comes to minds are earthly things that fascinates us the most. Clothes, cars, houses, all these slowly come into picture, we dream about it, day and night and slowly it becomes our goal, our obsession, and the fact that we MIGHT be able to attain it one day becomes our motivation. Slowly these things replace our real goals and dreams in life. These are the temporary highs slowly takes over our lives. But who can blame us? We finally can get that beautiful car, on our own, our parents have no say in it, it would only be just a couple of months of savings and 3 years of installments. We have all sorts of this thoughts going through our mind constantly. This is how money govern our lives.

Slowly we begin to lose a sense of purpose in life, or at least I do. Everyone has dreams and aspirations. Everyone has ambitions. Why else then do we pursue education for? Because education has the power to bring us closer to our ambition, aspirations, dreams. Yet, when we have finish our education and begin to venture into the working life, how many would testify that they truly love this job and feel that they are closer to their dreams? Only a handful. The other majority would debate that they are merely taking a longer detour. This detour which we slowly find out turns out to be really procrastination and a cover up for the regrets and the hypocrisy that we got ourselves into.

I am not stating that they have given themselves in for money, but I'm merely stating that they had lost their original sense of purpose, dreams and goals. That is the main thing I want to say to everyone here, that we have to keep our dreams and purpose in life clear as so that we would not stray off the beaten path.

Here at work I really admire my boss, Mr. James. Though his post "General Manager" says otherwise, he is really in fact no different than a waiter, only with more responsibilities. Everyday I see Mr. James going through stock checks, food quality checks, cleanliness checks, checking through the sales and accounts, checking on staff progress and ultimately having to answer to his own boss or even bosses. He is no different really than myself, only that he is struggling to keep his sense of purpose. Mr. James is a true family man, that is one of his main priorities in life and I can tell. As strict as he is, the only time he breaks the rule of making personal calls is to his wife. He loves his wife, he loves his family and they all love him back as much. His wife would call and ask what time he would return, even working night shifts, after work he would return home and have supper with them or whatever. I remembered on New Years Eve, his family stayed up till 3am to wait for him to return and have supper with them together as family as how they had done for so long, a tradition he calls it. And this might come as a surprise because it is to me, is that Mr. James doesn't drink nor smoke at all. Here is a perfect example of a man that has his sense of purpose, but is struggling to keep it. Work itself takes up half of his time, while the other half he has to divide it with his family and of course sleep and other stuff. Its a struggle. Mr. James is a great person. He is more a cheerleader than a boss itself but he has his moments but who can blame him.

Dear friends, I urge you to really think about this. It might be awkward,weird or whatever but it is important. Ask yourself, Is your ambition to become a veterinarian solely based on the fact that you love animals, is that reason suffice to determine the future of your life? What if you found out you love animals but you do not like being a vet? How then? Scary isn't it. I'm not saying there wouldn't be a remedy if we make such a mistake, but as they say prevention is better than cure.

Lol, don't you worry. I'm the one who has the most pressure of not committing hypocrisy since I'm the one saying all these, and I'm sure you all would testify that this is truly written by me, regardless of my alias and all, I have no where to hide. But really I just want to point this out because I felt that I have the upper hand of experience that I want to share and ultimately hope to be able to help all of you to avoid such circumstances.

Then again I'm not a very good planner. As far as I know I had nothing planned that ever succeeded accordingly to plan. I more often than not always deal with things as they come but not everyone can afford and should risk their future by living this way. However if you really have true passion and a clear vision of what your true purpose is, and I mean NOBLE purposes, one that can make this world a better place, by all means go ahead and I pray that you will not stray off the path you make for yourself.

This world has many stories of hope and inspiration that always are a great source of motivation. I hope everyone, will make the world a better place, each one of us, by achieving our dreams.

Sorry if I might have bore all of you with yet another long post on nothing. Be assured that this blog has more to offer than just me rambling on about stupid topics haha so feel free to browse through my other one and a half's posts. This is all for now. This is Cheeks here signing off. Have a nice day and thank you for reading!

Week 1

Greetings from NS! I'm fine. No injuries, no mental traumatic experiences. I'm still in one piece and in one week have become somewhat accustomed to life here. I use the term "somewhat" very strongly.

Let me first start this post by bitching about NS. The dorm I'm in fits 32 single beds. You can just imagine the immense sense of comfort a boy of my; let's say "measurements" feels sleeping on a thin, constant itch inducing single bed. I turn and I fall off. On to a dirty, dusty cement floor that will excite a vacuum cleaner to life. Each bed comes with a metal locker, very useful, now if it only close properly.

The bathrooms. Ohhhh, the bathrooms. The bathroom has both the communal bath, the one you use the scooper and fill it with mountain-dew coloured water from the communal pool and pour it all over yourself, and showers. I prefer showers. I SO prefer showers. The communal baths are okay when.....when....When I find out I'll tell you. The bathroom is always wet of course, and the toilet stalls are always dirty. You know, like any public toilet in Malaysia. Same old, same old.

The activities this week were zero, zilch. Well we DID have classes, morning exercises and creating our company's cheer and stuff. But nothing of the real NS stuff I looked forward to. We have morning assemblies every morning at 6.30; sorry, I mean 0630 hours. And we TRY to march but fail spectacularly. But I can't blame them, many of the trainees haven't marched in their lives, but the trainers should be teaching us. Most probably next week I hope. Because these past few days have just been a long wait. We seem to wait for everything here - Before we start our assembly we wait, before classes we wait,during classes we wait for it to end, wait, wait, wait. The management here is poor but what can one do?

The food here isn't bad. There are two places to eat here at camp. The Dewan Makan and the Kantin. At the D.Makan, you don't pay but at the Kantin you order and pay. At both places the food is okay but my bowel movements say otherwise. Won't go into too much detail about that.

The clothes they have provided us are all themed the classic PLKN blue. The sports clothes are okay. They're comfortable to wear but the track pants doesn't exactly fall properly around the middle region, exposing, well you know. But they're comfortable. The class shirts are itchy though and very irrelevant. I don't see why you can't just wear sports clothes. Instead of giving us 2 pairs of class and sports clothes, give us 4 pairs of sports clothes their more practical, comfortable and probably cheaper. I have no other complaints about the clothes but I WILL have a go at the towel they give.

According to many dictionaries and encyclopedias and most often of all, common sense. A towel is supposed to absorb water, drying the user or the object the towel is used on. I don't know if it's some kind of endurance and/or patience test, but the NS towels never do what is generally expected of a towel. Thank goodness I followed the wise words of Ford Prefect.

Now on to the most important thing that either makes or breaks NS. The people. Since I AM bitching, I will start with the negative.

The negatives for the people here are few and very difficult to explain. Please bear with me.

The worlds we are from seem extremely distant. Many of the things I find appalling, seem like common demeanour among others. A few of which is the actions some of the male trainees take when near the girls. They whistle, howl, and what I find worst of all is they actually throw stones and even mock and condescend the girls. How do these actions attract the opposite sex is beyond me. But like I said, this I think is common for the boys and I think the girls as well. There are many other things they do. They slack ALL the time, the leader as well. I haven't been happy with my company's leader but I don't want the post of course. He should be better than this. At least try and learn. He does nothing of the sort.

Some of the other trainees also mock me and my other English speaking friends when we speak in the international language. I don't think they understand thats why but it really is annoying. I remember once, when a guy from my dorm just screamed a loud YES! when we were talking. I laughed my head off there and then. He actually interrupted mid-sentence, and answered a question I asked. The conversation went like this

Me: Are they idiotic or what?
Annoying guy: YES!

At that point I lost it.

The language barrier is a big issue for myself. It's not easy finding English speaking folk here. So I've had loads of BM, cantonese and mandarin practice here. But because of this barrier I find it more difficult to fit in but it's definitely nothing to worry about. I'll just give myself more time and practice.

This post is long enough, I'll have something better to say next time. Hopefully. Thanks for reading.

To all my friends and family I'm fine. No worries.

And a very special shoutout to my other one and a half : Hormat! Hormat ke depan....HORMAT!

Rain and Smiles

It rains so badly at my place everyday around 5pm. It could have rained earlier when there was nothing to watch on Astro or anyone to chat with online.

But NOO... it has to rain when I'm in the middle of a stimulating coversation with Estee.

Bloody f**k

Opps, scratch that. I promised not to swear online.

Worst still, this rain comes fully equipped with lightning bolts and earth-shattering thunder. So every five minutes it feels as if Zeus sneezed and let go one of his bolts by accident.

"HAAA CHOOOO" Just look at the idiot and his bolts, shouldn't he be old enough to at least know not to hold those deadly things when people enjoy talking behind his back so much?

"HAAA CHOO" "KABOOM"

...... see what I mean?

Then, the power fuse trips and the electricity goes off. My dad will then refuse to switch the power back on. He claims that if we turn it back on, the fuse will trip in a matter of 5 minutes or less.

"But it's so hot" I whine. So my rebellious mom and I decides to switch it back on ourselves. Five minutes later everything was still fine. Mum and I were so smug we laughed and teased Dad for being a paranoid freak.

Sigh, but on the sixth minute..

"..." the fius tripped again.

We sat in darkness for half and hour after that with lighted candles, the only visible smile coming from my dad.

He is so bad sometimes, but it did make me laugh in the end.

PS: Why can't the lightning at least be as pretty as the one from the picture?

Mish

I mishhhh you guys. When are you coming back? I know the answer to that, but I insist on asking. When are you guys coming back????

Working at TGI Fridays for me is now part of a routine. I go to work everyday, every week, thinking about when my off day is. Its not that work is all that bad, don't get me wrong. I like the new friends I have made and I enjoy the conversations that we have.

But I want my close friends back. I can't exactly share all the private stuff with my colleagues can I? I miss telling you guys every blinking detail of my life. Most of all, I miss being myself around my friends. I am anything but myself at work. I'm distant and I don't talk that much. For some reason, although my colleagues are great people, I can't share with them despite wanting to.

I hate having to talk to a million strangers everyday, without even one being the person I can tell about what happened. About washing the bar, about weird customers, about the stories and experiences I've learnt from work, about my colleagues and what I think about them and most importantly I need your point of view, so that waking up to go to work has more meaning to it.

Bottom line is, I misssh you guys so much. Please come back fast? Not just the physical self, but your emotional presence as well.