Life as it is

Life is so fragile.

When I was 9, I lost my uncle to cancer. He was 40-odd/50-odd years old with 2 secondary school kids. At that time, I was too young to understand anything. All I remember was the blurry 2 months before his passing that the family gather as often as we could to spend his last moments together.

Last year, I lost a cousin to the same disease. He has just graduated from the local university. He was a fit young guy, serving as a diver, one of the toughest unit in NS. Though he has always been active in sports, he still lost the battle to cancer. While I might not have been close to him, but his death really hit close to my heart.

Today, I lost my grandaunt, the same grandaunt who lost her beloved grandson last year. She too, was in a tough battle with cancer. The doctor found the cancerous cells early this year and it was too much for anyone to do anything except to enjoy the time she has remaining.

Last Saturday, she was admitted in the hospital because of the unbearable pain. Soon, she was depending her life on the oxygen tank while everyone was told to be prepared for the worse. My grandaunt stayed on for 4 days, before taking her last. Everyone is visibly upset but glad that she is now in a much better place, away from the pain she has suffered for the 5 long months. Like my cousin, I am not particularly close to my grandaunt. But her death hit me a lot more than I thought it would be.

Cancer has long been a family health problem for generations (almost all of the family passed on because of the disease) but with each death, the disease strikes closer and much scarier to the heart.

Life is really unexpected, you just don’t know what will happen next.

RIP my grandaunt. We might not be close, there might have been differences between my grandpa/grandma and you that have never been resolved but deep down I know, my grandpa love you as a sister, and so do we.

2 weeks ago  /  0 notes

alittlelights:

2 months ago  /  45 notes  /  Source: alittlelights

Goodbye and Hello.

So I procrastinated again on that reflection.

One of the bad habits I picked up in 2012 was procrastination. I realised when there are things that needs to be done which does not involved a deadline (eg like writing or cleaning my ever messy desk), the said thing will only be done after 2 months of procrastinating, sometimes even longer. I should be ashamed of myself but really, I don’t quite care. This is bad. Maybe this should be my New Year Resolution. Ha, I doubt I will even remember it after February.

Aside from this particular bad habit I picked up in 2012, the year has been rather adventurous. To be honest, I never thought I will use adventurous to describe a year for a person like me, who hates adventure, by the way.

It has been adventurous not because I went for a crazy road trip around the world with just a backpack and $1000 to survive the whole time so I had to hitch rides along the way. Nope. Far from it. None did I make any risky or big decision that will affect the rest of the life.

The roads after graduation hasn’t been as clear-cut as I hope. I remember after my last paper in Poly, for a month, I had no clue on the road I was going to take. Study or Work. Each day I went back and forth on the choices, do my research, talk to people, went for job interviews despite the fact that I have no idea if I was going to step into the industry next. I am very grateful to some of the interviewers who provide me wonderful advice on the path I should take next and I will be forever indebted to them (& the people I spoke to) because they really made this decision easier and clearer to me.

While waiting for Uni entry, the period I had termed it as, the gap year, though it is just 10 months (2 months short of making into a year but who cares, it is still a gap year to me!) I had the opportunity to return to MV and also worked in a new environment after.

To be honest, when I returned to MV, I totally underestimated the workload. As a intern there, they trained and expect everyone to be more than just an intern. Gave us responsibility and naturally when I made my return, I thought all I had to do was just what I had done previously. Boy, was I so wrong. As the story goes, I was faced with many bumps while working on Memento and the 4 months there could easily be one of my worst 4 months in 2012 aka the horror nightmare as I liked to call (yeah, I like to name things or period of my life).

After I’m done with horror nightmare, during the period when I was jobless (for like, 3 weeks, I think), I was offered a chance to work on a international project by a multimillion technology (multi-billion probably, everyone own at least a piece of their products before!) as a 2nd Assistant Director. I am truly honored and humbled, considering the size of the project and the fact that I have never done AD work before. It was quite stressful for me whom many on set held high expectations since my previous boss speaks (too) highly of me, it is very honoring but quickly turned into stress when many pairs of eyes are looking at my every move and the fact that the director and producer are Americans with accents that I have to adapt quickly (and on my end to stop using lahs, lehs, lors at every other sentence). The 3 days shoot turns out brilliantly and I can’t wait for the documentary to be out.

After the horror nightmare, I had a chance to work in a total different nature of production. The environment and nature of things are so different that it was really difficult to adapt to the point that I actually miss the craziness during the horror nightmare (and at a point of time, I swear I would trade this peacefulness to do horror nightmare project again, WHAT WAS I THINKING!!!) Well, my wish was granted and things at peaceful got crazy and I got a chance to work with one !@#$%^&*)( director and DP. While at that, I went on my first ever overseas shoot (albeit it is just Malaysia) and things got crazier there (another story for another day). Nevertheless I survived the drama, everything just fell into place and things ended well.

Aside from work and its related dramatic stories, I finally visited Japan (YAY!), see (and play with) snow for the first time in my life, go DisneySEA (despite the fact that I am super non-adventurous, I took 3 rides - the boat, the train and the car), go Shibuya 109 (not my style of dressing but it’s nice to step into the building after seeing all those photos on tumblr). Then on my 21st, after 5 years (I think), I am back at Bangkok (our planned trip previously was cancelled because of the massive political riot)! It is really great to be back there after so long, witnessing the different changes and growth as a nation while the shopaholic side of me got better of my brain.

The 21st turns out to be quite awesome, being in BKK and all. In all honesty, nothing much happened on that day itself except the really expensive dinner (shark fins, abalone and birds’ nest at this really popular restaurant, all while in my t-shirt, shorts, slippers and sunglasses) we had the day before. Friends in MV and the colleagues at BDA surprised me before my birthday and I am really touched by their gesture. Especially the new colleagues, whom I barely knew them for more than 1 month, and I wasn’t someone who will be staying in a long run. Yes, it was a awkward celebration (everyone knows how awkward I can be!) but still, very touched and grateful for the love. Since it is the 21st, the big birthday where everyone choose to throw a huge once-in-a-lifetime party and since I had no party of such (never been a party, center-of-attention girl in the first place anyway), I brought an iPad, named Angie (half paid by yours truly and half by the folks). Never regretted getting it since my first love, Silver is getting old and cranky.

Then Maggie (my iPhone 4) just had to get all upset and die on me so I got Whitney, my 1 month old Galaxy Note II. It burnt a huge hole in my bank so Whitney better give me more love than Maggie.

Gap Year has been quite an adventure in terms of the hits and misses on the bumps during the journey. An adventure into new opportunities to learn new things and do beyond what you are called to do. Many a times, I was given a role without much guidance and it was all learn-as-you-make-mistakes and as such, you learn much more when you have someone to help.

Gap Year was also really a good (and much-needed) break from school when towards the end of the final weeks of school, it felt so suffocating that I was so close raising that white flag after all these years of education to get that paper of achievement. During this period of time, I learn so much, grew much more, be less naive of things and more realistic of life. Being in the society allows you to realise how life is really not a bed of roses. The world is cruel, sometimes even make you doubt your faith in humanity. I am glad to have made some really good friends in the workforce despite the twisted world.

School is officially starting in 2 days time. Anxious, new environment, new friends for the next 20 months. As quoted from the song ‘Feeling Good’,”It is a new dawn. It is a new day. It is a new life. For me. And I’m feeling good!”

It is a new year, a new beginning, a new life station. 2013, let’s make this good!

4 months ago  /  2 notes

The year of adventure - I need to find a proper time to do this

I really want to do a 2012 reflection. This is a year where I consolidate my learnings from the 14 years of education and enter a whole new adventure into the world.

The past 3 days have been hell for me in terms of my health. Insomnia, headaches and the whatnots. I just hope things will be better tomorrow so that I can sit down to do this.

4 months ago  /  0 notes