Reflections

An old essay I wrote in Sec 3. Rather crappy, at that time I was still stuck in that ikari shinji mood. Hope you guys enjoy it as much as ms pereira did.

Reflections

Harsh light blinded his eyes.
His hand was raised instinctively to block the rays.
Silhouettes emerged at the doorway.
His eyes widened with terror.
Strong arms held him tightly.
No, he thought.
It was not meant to end this way.

The jail cell was empty except for a makeshift toilet seat and a straw mat for a bed. The sun had already set, and it was now deep into the night. Adrian Lee huddled into the corner, resting his head against the padded wall, eyes once again trailing off with a distant look.
How dare they, he thought.
My plan was brilliant! Foolproof!
Yet it failed.
Just like before.
Just like....
Before.

“Why did you do it?”
The question echoed throughout the cold jail cell. The resident psychiatrist was attending to the newest arrival to the prison, a boy barely out of teens.
Raising his head slowly, the cold and vacant eyes of Adrian peered into the psychiatrist’s, sending a shiver down her spine. She had seen this look before many times, but it was her first time seeing it on someone so young. “Why? It was not my choice. I was compelled to do it.”

“Let’s talk about your childhood,” she continued.
He let off a strange hollow laugh. “What childhood? My parents abandoned me when I was young, leaving me to fend for myself. I was often taunted in school, being called all sorts of names. The things that they said hurt me deeply. About me not being good enough to have parents or that my parents must have hated me so much. I should see their faces now. Now that I have got my own back, I would love to see their faces now.”
He laughed again. The eerie sound echoed off the cold, claustrophobic stone walls.
Although slightly shocked, she persevered, asking another question. “So is that the reason why you killed him?”

Andrew Wong glanced nervously behind his shoulder as he walked towards his car. The multi-storey carpark was deserted at this late hour, and he shrugged off that uneasy feeling he had in his gut.
Reaching his car, he felt his pockets for his keys, which he then fished out. But in his nervousness he accidentally allowed them to slip out of his fingers and land underneath his car. Cursing under his breath, he stooped to retrieve his keys.
Stop scaring yourself, he thought to himself, see you are so jumpy that you actually dropped your keys.
Then, he heard the soft sound of footsteps.

“He deserved to die. He humiliated me, made fun of me, made me feel worthless, and made other people not appreciate my worth. So what if he is rich? I am also a human being! Have you ever felt that way? If you have not, you will not understand the feeling of worthlessness I felt. Everyday I felt like I was fading away slowly, like I had no reason to continue existing. All I did was not dying.”
“That is not true. All of us have a reason to live. It is just that sometimes we do not know for what. All we have to do is to look for it.”
Adrian stood up angrily, his eyes immediately blazing with great intensity. “Do not expect me to believe this nonsense! I have no family, no friends, no relatives, no one to turn too. My classmates shun me, my teachers are biased against me, and when I went out to work, everyone was against me! From the start, everyone was against me. I tried my hardest, but the harder I tried, the worse the disappointment.”
He paused for a second, before continuing. “When I was in secondary school, I wanted so badly to be a student leader. I tried hard for a year, doing as much as I could for the school. But in the end? I was ‘rewarded’ by an empathic ‘No!’. I was brought up by those hypocritical teachers that taught me that as long as I work hard I will be justly rewarded. Lies, all of them! I now feel so foolish, thinking that I could succeed if I tried really hard. It really went downhill after that. I never tried again. I was too afraid of failing again. I realised I would not feel hurt if I did not try.”
His eyes reverted back to being glassy and void of life. “It was all his fault.”

He turned around, and he gasped in horror as he saw a masked figure brandishing a hunting dagger standing above him. He pressed himself against his car, legs turning into jelly.
A raspy voice came behind the grotesque mask. “Do you remember me?”
The dagger moved rapidly, slashing his throat into two. Instinctively Andrew grabbed his throat as blood poured forth in torrents.
The last thing he saw before his life force was drained from him was the dagger being cast upon the floor and the dark figure answering his own question.
“I did.”

“Do you even have the remotest idea of the feeling of being lonely? The feeling that no one needs you? No one thinks you are of value? I really wanted to disappear after that much disappointment. All I wanted was some recognition for some hard work, is it too much to ask? And it was not the first time. There were many occasions before where I was never rewarded for my good work. It is extremely ironic that I actually tried so hard before. Some things just do not work out. The real irony is that the harder I tried, the farther I got from my goal.”
“So you stopped trying.”
“Why should I continue to play by society’s rules then? I worked hard, therefore I DESERVE some recognition. Why play by the rules when they only benefit other people? That lowlife actually sabotaged my project. His company had just acquired the company I was working in, and immediately seized my plans and claimed them as his! See where playing by the rules got me? I should have done it long ago.”
“Society probably made me the public joke. But now I have taken my revenge. This society I live in does not play by the rules, did not appreciate my worth, did not give me the warmth and happiness that I am due! Not only does he deserve to die, society should too! Remember what made me this way? Society!” Adrian yelled, obviously frustrated.
Actually, he was not frustrated.
In fact, he was merely confused.

The psychiatrist sighed, before looking back into his dark eyes.
“Your mind has confused truth with reality.” She started in a slow voice. “The things you perceive and recorded in your memory is the truth, and out of so many truths, there will be one that changes through time. Your truth is that you want to feel that no one likes you, no one appreciates you. You are only thinking that way. You do so as you fear failure, fear being disliked, fear seeing the weakness within you. You want to disappear because you feel worthless. Whether that is reality is another thing.”
“Stop it! Society does not care for me! Who did? Nobody! Never did, never will! They made me this way! All I wanted was to be accepted. But they never accepted me for who I am. Therefore, I am not to blame!” Adrian was enraged, but she could sense doubt creeping into him.
“What is reality? Reality is the real world. The world where how to accept things and how to perceive things is entirely up to you. You chose to view it from an angle that most people do not usually take. You chose to see society as the cause for all your problems, and created a world of your own. Where you live by your truths that people hate you, society is the cause of all your problems. Actually, you are running away from reality. There is a good and bad side to everything and you choose instead to stop trying and look on the bad side of everything. You wished for an empty world, where only you would be comfortable, in order to protect your joy, to protect your weak mind.”
At this point in time, Adrian slammed his fists on the table and stood up. “NO! You are wrong! Just like the others! There is no such rubbish about truth and reality! The truth is that…is that…”
A flicker of doubt passed over his face.
He gripped the wired window, breath coming out in ragged gasps.
The psychiatrist sighed, closed her record book and stood up to leave.
“We shall finish this another day.”
The door creaked open, allowing light to flood the darkened room.
She sighed again as she looked back at the mortified face of Adrian Lee.
No amount of reflections would save his soul.

"In the long run, we're all dead." J.M Keynes

Econs s madness at work.
The last few days been getting home late, if it is not inter-OG frisbee it is training or faction meeting. Still playing catch up with my academics, still sleeping in lectures, albeit lesser now (cold comfort), still hating maths, still sleeping late.
Bah.
Strangely enough, I now view sleep in a far better light now, and actually look forward to it.
Only in my dreams can I be closer.

Bushido

Damm, ever since Auron's arrival on FFX I've been intrigued by all things samurai. Their code, their way of life, bushido, exemplifies the person we should try to emulate. Just don't go about dismembering yourself each time you fail a test.
Watched spider-man again. Still can emphatise with good old peter parker, the screwed up guy with great power.
CNY holidays are over, I'm recharged in terms of spirit, if not in body. (thanks again to my late nights)
Time to add another chapter to my life. Whatever comes my way, I'm ready for it.
Hit me with all you got.
I'm ready.

Electrophilic addition: Looking for an electron rich species

So much for sleeping early...
Today was a typical lazy 2nd day of CNY, spent most of it mugging (yes, shut up) chem and bio. Othewise, I was napping after flipping through transport notes for 2h 30 mins, which must be the cause of my alertness now. Or like 15 mins ago.
Been watching westside vcds, thanks to christelle for lending me. It gets better, but no way man, I won't want to look like huo jianhua, he is just moderately handsome, but his character is a bit too weird for me.
Been ahem, accquiring utada hikaru songs, damm nice, although they all sound the same after a while. Love Sakura Drops and Simple and Clean (Hikari) the Kingdom Hearts theme. I now realised I should have played KH during the holidays. Damm. But KH2 is coming out soon, and add that to FF12 I'll have a happy and sleepless dec holidays this year. But first there's the As....
Still got that chem test to study for...sighz...sing yong says it is bad luck to study during CNY, but what the hell, still got that econs s essay to do... Work is stagnant now so I better take the chance to clear it out ASAP.
Haha and my OG is trying to figure out why my nick was sakura drops...

Happy manjan new year!

Seems like everyone is blogging today so I have to as well I guess.
Went visiting, complete without my nokia headset, and with a box file of my notes. At the end of the day, I only got through a few pages of firm objectives, a bowl of leftover buddha's jumps over the wall, 3 slices of bak kwa, 1 bowl of tong shui, 2 cups of longan drink, at least 30 assorted nut goodies, 4-5 glasses of water and 1 plate of yusheng. And add a lunch of nasi pandang to that and you have my menu for today.
Some stuff i want to point out:
1) relatives love to warn me about army
2) they didn't show a jackie chan movie this CNY
3) we started visiting damm late this year (1130 to 1830)
4) relatives love to point out bert is taller than me (lies, all of them!)
Yah, happy manjan new year guys. Tommorrow is work day, so I have to sleep early to pia work tmr.
And finally, the albatross is gone.

Death, then rebirth

I'm back.
Sorry for being a listless bastard for the past few days, I have rediscovered my zest for life again. Thanks to all those who showed concern, it's nice to know that you have friends to help you out in your time of need.
Watched Last Samurai with my OG today. It was a real moving piece, although it had a black and white ending, no shades of grey. But the ending was spoiled by some machams who were laughing at the emperor's japanese-accented english. Idiots all of them, they were talking loudly through the movie as well. Oh well, not that I'm elitist or anything, it is just that I feel that this world needs stupid people like them to make the smart people look good.
Will be using this CNY holiday to recharge my batteries, at the same time consolidate my work, hopefully things go the way I want in the next few months.
My fortune cookie from Ms Lui: Do more social work to expand ur circle of friends.
To all my friends, Happy CNY! Especially to Mogilan and Murugan, who get a damm long holiday while we do visiting!
Anyways, life is beautiful/handsome and so are you who is reading this now.
Final note: 3???? You're blind

Turning my back on life

Sighz, I'm so frustrated with myself. Lost my temper twice today, can't seem to rein in my emotions properly. Getting frustrated never helped anyone, but still I fell into that trap of releasing my pent-up emotions on other people. No one deserves that. I'm sorry guys, shiming, al, muru.
Feel myself losing it a bit. Haven't done any constructive work these few days, competition took up some time, and my natural reluctance to abstain from work also played a part. As a result, I'm stuck in a quagmire of undone work. Can't for the life of me understand numerical method, econs is a total bore with my tutor (whisper her name), bio is the usual with my tutor (also whisper her name), uninspiring. Honestly I cannot remember one time I was actually enthusiatic about bio tutorial, either you draw cells or copy transparencies. Chem with mr tan is a joy, somehow i understand arenes, but it's the hardest subject so I'm keeping my hopes low first. Econs S is fun, but the non-fiction text one has to read puts me off so I'm rather afraid of getting Us all the time.
Had OG outing yesterday, at annabelle's house. They watched the video, yea I know, it was a bit flat at times, should have edited it a bit more, but got lazy towards the end. Anyways, annabelle's father was talking to me about suicide in july, and we had a short talk about it. I could sense his concern, and our stand was the same, peers can detect such signals earlier than others.
Saturday, got wahcked upside down by salva's (sp?) son zee fencing team. 45-20. Edwin was not feeling well, and the stupid president was blind. Was fuming at the end of the bouts. Watch the girls fence, lost narrowly, amanda hurt her arm and didn't fight well for the rest of the points. They then fenced sabre, was comical at first, until yeng yong started hyperventilating, I had to get her out of the sports hall to rest. Steff was commenting sabre suited her aggressive nature...Had dinner with family, teppanyaki at jurong, I'm surprised to see the place is stilla round, must be a good 5-7 years since I was there. Returned home to watch wes brown slip up (argh!!!!), and went online to kaobeh till sleep came.
My chronological order is screwing up, sighz....
I'm quite fed up with my masquerade. Life is as screwed up or as good as you perceive it to be. I have been looking at the bright side of things, doing a lot as a OGL, faction member, CT rep etc. but now I'm really tired. I feel like all I have been has been just over glorified errand boy stuff. Sure it takes up my time but after the pomp and fanfare it leaves this hollow feeling in my heart which I can never ignore, yet I yearn for the distraction, so much so I dread going home to those 4 faceless walls. It is unnatural, and I hate the dependence on it. The old excuse of wanting to learn new things, every experience is a learning experience seemed rhetoric from long ago, spoken by the same person here. The old zest, zip, seemed to have left me, now I feel like I'm floating in LCL.
Purposeless, aimless, and ultimately, a nobody whom only a few people actually care about. I shouldn't be putting myself down like that, I know I'm better than what my depressed mind thinks, but still being fallen has this delicious feeling of helplessness which I seem to remember, those dark sec 1 years come to mind.
I don't want to collapse. I don't want to fade away into the never-ending darkness. I want to stand in the light and be truly happy, of no worries, of no problems, each day being as simple as the previous.
Yet, I know, the darkness will never leave me. My own shadow tracks me like a relentless bloodhound.
I can't always be a clown, contary to popular belief.
I'm still human.
And humans are emotional creatures.
This place already echos.
The old fear of crowds is coming back.
Friends are there, but the sight has blurred.
And of grief unspoken.
I guess it is time for me to grow up....

Don't leave me alone with the maddening crowd

My birthday came and went. I am now 18 years old, the legal age to drink and drive (not at the same time). I had 3 cakes, 2 from O-team, 1 from my kindest OG. I had a collage of notes given to me and a small something as well.
But it all didn't matter in the end.
It's amazing what one sentence can do to another person.
It's now 12 am, and I'm feeling that profound sense of loneliness again. It comes and goes, especially when I'm fed up with handling annoymous 3rd party data ie homework. Sometimes I just feel like to talking to someone, just to alleviate this feeling. Sometimes this feeling consumes me so much that I start writing poems, or start blabbering to myself in the death of the night.
I wonder how many of you ever feel this way, where you do so much yet once you stop being busy, you feel that your life is empty. You do so much yet when you go home exhausted your family doesn't understand what you go through. Thankfully my parents are very supportive about what I do, trusting me to make correct choices, only nagging me to sleep earlier etc.
I sincerely wish that at the end of the day, I can come home exhausted, but at least I know there is someone willing to hear me out, and I'll do the same likewise for that person.
Sighz, who am I kidding?
I guess the maddening crowd got me before you did.

I should have stayed

It has been an eventful week for me, what with orientation and competition, but now things have settled to their normal routine again. Before that, just one look at the week that was.
Jaxoras 2004 was a real blast, I must say. Sure, we had a few hiccups here and there, but the enthusiam and energy of the J1s was so strong that they affected even me. 5 stars to my OG Apsytus, for being a great OG, all 23 of them were model Rafflesians. Although some were quiet and shy, and I didn't manage to engage all of them, but I hope I still did a good job as an OGL. And another thing is that I'm probably the OGL who has the most uninspiring gifts, so I hope the video that I am rushing out would make amends.
Fac I. Kudos to the med fac comm for doing things efficiently despite the fact it was pretty last minute, I was rushing sovenuirs on Monday night. In any case, I got a nice but very expensive faction shirt, and had some fun with my junior class playing taboo with them.
O night was very memorable, as although Mr Liew came up with 101 regulations on the fire, I still managed to pull through, and the hall programme was a blast. Jaxoras Idols (ie. 01 idols updated) was a great success. 3 cheers for O night comm as well, especially to the effervescent comm leader brandon.
Competition. Bleh, so much for my dreams of grandeur, they were just that, dreams. Got whacked like nobody's business, leaving me really demoralised.
Oh well, life goes on.
And finally, note to self:
I should have stayed.
Note to you:
I hope you know/remember

Jaxoras

Orientation rocks. Will write a longer entry once I sort out my homework and this lousy template of mine.
Oh yah I got Econs S. Damm happy, but even more work now. First time I'm happy over extra work.
Oteam 22 we did a great job. Last few days were great.
A new year has truly dawned on us.

No hotlinking?!?!?!?!?! Screw those coporate bastards...

It's Gonna Be Alright

Yesterday has passed
It's time to write a new beginning
So let's get going now
For another brand new start

Things won't be the same
Come tears and pain
Goes joy and laughter
Life is full of choices
It's up to you to write your own story

Chorus:
Take everyday in your stride
Cos' life's just only a bumpy ride
Take a step back now and you'll see
It's gonna be alright

Bridge:
It seems like it's only last week
That we forged our sweet memories
Hold to (hold to)
Those dreams (those dreams)

To my selffars of Apsytus, let it be known that I'm damm happy that you are in my Ja'rox. We have 5 more days, let's make them the 5 days to remember.

The breath before the plunge

It's here upon us again.
The Day of Days, where another year ends, and we look forward to another beginning.
The shadow of a year past shall disapate, hope springs eternal.
Tommorrow is orientation, where I worked hard to reach.
And then from there, another year awaits us.
Here we go.
Again.