All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. ~ George Orwell, Animal Farm

i want to make this perfectly clear. we are all human and we are all the same people. i bleed red blood, they bleed red blood. we all know what hardship means in our own way and even though we do so for different reasons, we all cry too. they are human. ordinary, oxygen breathing humans. we all have our own stories to tell. we all have gone through different experiences and yes, they are different, but that does not mean that some experiences are more important that others. it simply means we have different stories to tell. we have all made sacrifices. more importantly, we have all made mistakes, and been hurt, and somehow, in our own way found a way to move on from there, in different ways. this tapestry is what makes us human. what makes us this species of flesh and blood called humans.

someday, i will be rid of this vip-treatment mentality that infests the minds of people around me. oh vip tak boleh makan pakai tangan sebab dia vip. vip tak boleh drive sendiri, kena ada driver, and kena ada police outriders because vip tak boleh be seen in a traffic jam sebab dia vip. vip tak boleh pijak rumput sebab dia vip. mana boleh kita bagi vip beratur sebab dia vip. vip kena ada meja special. kena bagi makanan special. kena bagi tempat duduk special. lepas tu kena entertain nanti vip jadi bosan. lepas tu kena bagi dia gift cenderamata so dia happy… eh, souvenier plastik mana boleh, dia vip… kena bagi pasu crystal swarovski, or at least pewter royal selangor.

you and me fall into the category of rakyat jelata, people who sit in the crowd and are expected to clap enthusiastically, and look up with admiration for being the the aura of someone who is more equal than others. wait, unless you are some kind of vip and you… you’re reading this blog!!! omaigad, let me roll out the red carpet for you and pull out my very very very best silverware! the kind that i would never use for myself but you… you are a vip and only your saliva is worthy of gracing these cutleries that i am now so terribly envious of now!

sigh.

we all laugh. and cry. and sweat. and bleed. all in our own ways. all to our own degrees. this does no make one human being superior over others. never forget that.

 

16 tonnes ~ Johnny Cash

 

Happy Year of The Dragon! Gong hei! Gong hei! It is not even evening and I am already hearing firecrackers. This is a good sign, aye? :D

 

Milo dinosaur. Yes. Simple things that makes me happy. And now a good book that barks positivity. If only afternoons like these lasts…

 

People Get Ready ~ Jeff Beck and Sting

 

A great many years ago I purchased a fine dictionary. The first thing I did with it was to turn to the word “impossible,” and neatly clip it out of the book. That would not be an unwise thing for you to do. – Napoleon Hill

cardio and yoga five days a week is starting to really beat whatever lazy ass muscles, more like lemak, into shape. i really don’t know which is worse. cardio, with all that running and all, is like being served a jail sentence on a silver platter on just how blatantly unfit i have let myself become. and yoga! here i was, thinking how bad can some slow stretching and breathing exercises be lah kan? OH MY GOD! my ankles and knees has never been kneaded like that before. i feel like very old, hard dough, being brutally tortured by… um nevermind. someday MW might find this blog.

but in my defense, it is not like i am not making improvements! i do all my jumping jacks and knees up running with all the guys and walaupun when i started i could not do that yoga move, i can now lean backwards to touch my ankles in that breathing position number entah berapa. yoga still leaves me light headed but i’m gonna try drinking more water throughout the day to try to fix that. speaking of eating, i’m also tryning to adjust my eating schedules to be… well… i guess healthier. aku dah tak sanggup membawa beban lemak ni any further with this five sessions of cardio and yoga a week. even if the sessions are less than an hour.

anyway, we have all been tentatively cast into our roles already. which is a good thing la, even thought we have been told that people might still be switched around. it is nice to have something to focus on. i am learning a lot about how big productions are developed. its all new and interesting to me. god knows that this production is currently what’s balancing the drama of work life. which is quite ironic, kan? drama balances up drama. heh. this is when i make lame observations about my own life and laugh at myself. excuse me.

i have somehow been persuaded to get myself one of those canggih tab computers. i hope this means that you guys will get more updates on this blog. yeah, i hope so too.

 

Alarma

 

Setelah lama mengidam char kuey teow Penang FAM, akhirnya kesampaian juga

 

I have not met you in over 20 years. I remember going to your house for birthday parties when I was eight or nine years old. Your call for help on fb tugged on those memories, so here’s my small contribution to your SOS. I sincerely hope uncle gets better soon.

 

That’s absurd. I love it. ~ Dr Gregory House, MD

the moment i open facebook and twitter today, i am flooded with friday the 13th announcements. macam gila paranoid sangat. it is not that rare of occurance even, i realise. last year berapa banyak kali friday the 13th and we were screeching like anything even then but guys seriously lah, we’re still here, right? we still have all our limbs and most of our motor functions, right? the world did not come to an end, right?

ya ya ya, its friday the 13th, so what?

well since so many people are talking about this day, that oppourtunist part of me is sitting up straight and taking this as an auspicious sign to update this blog. chinese new year coming up mah. and two weeks into the new year seems like an interesting enough time to tell ya’ll about some things happening in my life right now.

went for a casting session for a new theater production. a musical! i know, this all seems so sudden and i have only just started to put my toes in performing arts since, like what, late last year, and here i am, armed with that one dot on my back to say that i have acted in short+sweet, plunging into this huge production. i can’t say what it is just yet, you can be sure i’ll poster it here as the date draws nearer, but its a big deal. big playwright. big director. big names in the cast. speaking about casting, that’s been going on for almost a week now via a series of workshops. so i know i got a part in this production but i don’t know what is my role just about yet. i think we’re going to find out this weekend.

theater is such a new experience for me. one of the things i am discovering about myself is that i am more introvert that i thought i was, in the sense that a lot of the emotions i feel is an inward experience. i realise that with the exception of very few individuals, a lot of who i am is, well, how shall i say, manufactured. so much so that when i am asked to express certain emotions, even in acting, i find it difficult to bring it out of me.

but i am learning. to bring that out of me. both act-wise and real-wise. because if it is not real, i won’t be able to convince the audience of that emotion. one of the things they were teaching me is even if in that moment i don’t feel it, i need the draw that emotion from a past experience.

and this is where i re-learn, re-analyse and perhaps, in re-experiencing some things in the past, i feel, for the very first time, something outwardly. i don’t know how to explain it. things i should have expressed in the past, i draw from it and bring that out now. and that is emotional for me. it feels like i am re-exploring incidents and experiences where i manufactured an emotion, emotions that i owe outwardsly, and expressing it now.

in this sense, theater is my therapy.

one of the codes of theater rehearsals is that whatever happens in the rehearsal studio, stays in the rehearsal studio. and i appreciate that. because i don’t know if i am ready to be that kind of person in real life. i appreciate to have the chance to feel what i should have felt in the past and more importantly express it. but whether i am ready, or will ever be ready to share it with the world, well, i guess time will tell.

its a lot of work, this theater thing. and i probably will not have a life outside work and theater for the next three months. but i like this now.

 

The Akurians take on Pangkor Island. Again. Yes. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

 

Adele – Set Fire To The Rain (Live at The Royal Albert Hall)

 

The Road Not Taken ~ Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
and sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
and looked down one as far as I could
to where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
and having perhaps the better claim
because it was grassy and wanted wear;
though as for that, the passing there
had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
in leaves no feet had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –
I took the one less travelled by,
and that has made all the difference.

 

Caravan ~ Passenger

 

Last lunch of the year. Yeah. The rice really is green and the chicken really is orange. Does not taste freaky as I thought it would. Chica who sold it could do with a smile on her face, tho.