However, there is a certain segment of society who has facial issues, literally. I for one, empathise with them. Or maybe I am one of them. I do try to look presentable, most of the time at least, but still, it is just not enough. Since adolescence, I looked the “type” who disobeyed her parents, smoked up and hooked up with random boys. Maybe the penultimate and the last phrases have been blessed with hyperbole. Point being, I looked “that” type.

In reality however, things weren’t as rosy. I was given freedom, apparently lots of it – as I was told by some of the kids who grew up. But I never really found the necessity to well, misuse it. I’d rather stay at home and sleep with no disturbances as opposed to bringing friends over and throwing Hollywood-inspired house parties. The only house parties I did enjoy were the ones I threw for my Sims. I was allowed to go wherever I wanted to, and leaving aside the exception of say, two or three instances, my Mum and I never seemed to disagree on where I could and could not go.

Also, I apparently have a very cool Mum. She is cool, I agree. But I think what makes her “cooler” is the fact that my Sister and I made it a point, since childhood to tell her things, as opposed to keeping it away from her. Thereby we were given freedom, and most importantly trusted.

But that is not the point is it? Maybe due to the overlapping of ethnicities, us siblings may not have the typical Melayu babath mukha or sharp Kandyan features. So what if my sister likes experimenting with her hair and I enjoy drilling my ears with jewellery? Conventionally speaking and observing, such activities speak of questionable upbringing, indecency and of course the unfailing “that” type.

So I am told that I look Indian now. Furthermore, my accent compliments my features.

In non-Indian clothes and regular jewellery, all I need is a bottle on my left and a cigarette in my right.

Passive smoking is cool, the cigarette tastes a little blah to me though.

Bottles are a big no-no.

It doesn’t make a different though does it?

She is still “that” type.

Oh fuck em all. Re-evaluate your own kids before you make your pass your blessed verdict on others.

Possibly as a result of watching too many serials, – yes besides the fact of transforming to a bed-potato, since “couch” doesn’t seem to work in my context, – it gets you thinking about: how much of time you waste, how you could be productive otherwise, why the director made him stand that way while saying those lines to her, why does the storyline seem familiar and to an extent applicable to your own?

A good friend was telling me lately of the story of the idiot box. How information is easily available and  how we make even less of an effort in extracting it. We are indeed in the “Age of the Stupid”.

I say I can’t write any more because my muse – Heaven forbid the existence of any months before – has found its way out of my, uhm soul? Whatever I do write now, or blog, since that has become synonymous to writing, is pathetic. But then, it’s not as though good writing for equivalent to my writing anyway.

I hardly read. My writing is horrendous. I’m worried about how fucked up the world is that I refuse accept my own fucked up life.

A title finds it self to the post.

I assume that I find my work-life balance.

We all live in our own little assumptions, interpretations and complexities. No one really gives a rat’s bottom about an awful post, an equally awful blog and a fucked up title. Nope, no one really cares.

It is one that is defined by unwanted telephone calls, verbal lashings – silently endured and responded to from one end – heights of disrespect from either end, but still it survives.

I wonder if there is a mutual ground that we both stand on. We work for the same cause I agree. The other’s motives maybe slightly different from mine. Clearly, it has to be. However, it is not as though we even have a common enemy that we are up against.

The binary of the two is obvious. One is undoubtedly more authoritative than the other. Yet, the other knows that the relationship has to co-exist.

What I do not understand further is that we do have our moments of mirth, sometimes perhaps unknown to others.

I do acknowledge that God is great. I also do acknowledge that sometimes, some things were not meant for our understanding.

With all due respect to Indians, this is not me being my usual racist ways but I am truly and deeply concerned. The country has astounding rates of poverty – no I do not know the figures but I know it is bad – it is overpopulated – contradict me, but when there isn’t room to budge in the street, yes it is crowded – and no one is doing anything about it.

The place where I live: a reputed girls hostel in an even more reputed educational institution. I was surprised at how much of food – purchased from outside – was wasted, how many lights were left on, taps unclosed but then my bewilderment was nothing in comparison to what it was upon the dawn of Christmas. While gaudy may perhaps be the ideal term to describe the decorations, the number of lights used – not even CFL mind you – were just, so many. To my utter amazement, while most electricity was consumed by these ugly – I know that everything is beautiful in its own way, but even the term grotesque beauty would not suffice to describe the pathetic state of the driveway.

That’s when it dawned on me. Please note that my observations are entirely objective.

The West maybe is not so keen on letting the East come to power because they wouldn’t want consumers of a similar nature in this world. On the contrary, like most in the East, I do agree that the West would not want to share their resources with the rest of the world. Bah. There goes our Economics lesson on the equal distribution of resources flushed down the toilet.

But then again, I cannot help but blame natural human tendencies. The more we earn and the more our purchasing power increases, the more we buy. We make ends meet and even surpass it, at times.

I agree that God did not create us perfect so that we could find our purpose in this world. Just today I was justifying man’s flaws and the search for purpose. But what happens when all our flaws submerge to the same big fat ugly truth?

I used to be an environmentalist. Then I grew up. I manage my expenses less and I’m also ashamed of myself when compared to what, my philosophies once were. India only opened my eyes to the reality I was denying.

Most girls I know, since my school years to date, have that one guy who has left that one scar – usually bad – that has impacted them greatly despite having broken up years ago. Most of my guy friends however, do not suffer from this. Maybe I don’t know enough guys well enough to pass this judgement, nonetheless of the ones that I do know, I don’t see it in their faces. The girls on the other hand – no we are not looking for a sympathy vote here – have a scar, in their heart or wherever they say that hurts the most that undoubtedly shows in their face and the times they space out not to the future and how things would be like five years from now but to those moments with what’s-his-name.

In attempting not to be feminist – which I am not by now, at least not an extremist – I can’t help but think to myself, why women? Why is it that our kind end up with all this suffering? Is it because biologically we are emotionally stronger and therefore have the capacity to uphold such trauma or is it because we are supposedly stronger otherwise too as a result of the XX combination.

Maybe it does come down to biology. We have the XX factor. Boys have the XY. Bastards have one less (e)X to worry about.

Freud said that anatomy is destiny. Guess he at least got that theory correct.

The title is not to be misinterpreted as something of deep meaning with nuances that are above the average person’s comprehension. Instead, I try now to encapsulate the promises we give to ourselves and that of which we fail to keep.

I say with much shame that I have been anything but prepared for these exams and I don’t know why. It couldn’t have been the Production as work came to a halt following the funereal. I suppose, it has turn to utter lack of motivation and enthusiasm. I cannot help but draw a correlation to my present state of hopelessness and despair to the Erikssonian theory that applies to those of my age. Since the stages tend to overlap, at present I presume that I belong to the stage that acquires the virtue of fidelity and speaks of the emergence and discovery of an identity or worse, results negatively in an identity confusion. I think I’m inclining towards the latter.

The first exam went not-so-well and I will never forgive myself for the pathetic answers that I never want to sight again. However, I told myself that day that the next paper would be better because I would prepare for it. Clearly, that didn’t turn out too well either.

The trouble with growing old is that we tend to believe less in things that scare us and base our convictions solely on what we assume to be correct. This would also perhaps result in our sense of morality going for a toss.

For once in my life I don’t know what to do. By that, I don’t mean an immediate plan, but what I would do upon graduation. I know what I want to study. However, executing what was learnt becomes problematic. We all need something to blame for out failures in life. I’m just one among the we.

Tagged: 2011, Black, Blogging, Devil #win, First-timers, Ignorance is not always blissful, Individuality, Life in a New Land, Mera Sixty-Deka Duith, Miserable, Oppression, Pressure, Trying Times, Work, Yindiar, Youth ]]> http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/false-promises/feed/ 0 12.971606 77.594376 12.971606 77.594376 jillinthebox90 http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/12/the-journal/ http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/12/the-journal/#comments Tue, 11 Oct 2011 19:36:54 +0000 jillinthebox90 http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/?p=455 ]]> I like writing in my journal. It helps me keep track of my life over the years despite the intervals being utterly irregular. It helps me recollect my memories, learn from my mistakes, pat myself on the back occasionally over a few achievements. It makes me laugh, cry or even crib when reading certain entries. I began maintaining a journal since I was eleven solely based on my passion to write.

***

She liked to write. She thought that she was good at it. Dumb headed twat. Why did she not realise her true potential? Why did she not realise that she cannot write and what people say about her writing is a whole load of horse shit? After all, what became of that seventy odd poems of hers? Flushed down the toilet eh?

***

As a result of my like for writing, which over a period of time grew to love, I decided to make a career out of it. A journalist. Not as prestigious as it may sound: severely underpaid and awfully overworked. But Kitty, life was good. I enjoyed what I  did so much that that the little smoke-filled wooden box became home. Life was indeed good. I had never been happier.

***

She always wanted to write about lifestyle, maybe a little on fashion – despite her minuscule knowledge on the subject and unforgivable fashion faux pas -  as opposed to heavy-weight articles that completely changed her “style” of writing. But then again, who said that she could write? Wasn’t that a self-made, self-believed delusion?

***

Her passion for writing made her a journalist. For a while at least, before she  succumbed once more to the pressures of education and academics. She knew that she is not a “book-person”. She apparently considered herself, “street-smart”. Between you and I Kitty, she was neither. She was just dumb.

***

Kitty, today I am not myself. I feel dyslexic.

***

While in school, I apparently “looked” the many boyfriends type and spoilt. Or so they said. Little does anyone know that I never had a boyfriend while in school! As for spoilt. I won’t say that I am not. But having observed spoilt and unspoilt children, my age I would say that I was average spoilt; spoilt to the basic extent that any parent would spoil their kid – if that made any sense to anyone.

Now in college, I look the type who smokes, smokes up, drinks and parties. For the love of Susan. I like partying only because I love dancing. However, the good side to keeping quiet and bearing all “assumed impressions” the last few years, wisdom has begun to surface? Wink wink.

Mama used to pinch the living lights out of me under the table to keep me from saying the wrong thing at the wrong time or worse, the right thing at the wrong time. As for the faux pas, but that’s getting better. Phew. However, once the backdrop of formality is removed, life only gets better. But that is not what is in question today, is it? Most people are more interested in what lies on the surface as opposed to actually seeing what is beneath that layer of social malfunction. Sigh. FML.

Tagged: 2011, Apathy, Black, Blogging, Devil #win, First-timers, Home&Co., Hypocrisy, Individuality, Mera Sixty-Deka Duith, Miserable, Oppression, Trying Times, Youth ]]> http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/creating-impressions/feed/ 2 12.971606 77.594376 12.971606 77.594376 jillinthebox90 http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/05/of-life-and-its-learnings/ http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/05/of-life-and-its-learnings/#comments Wed, 05 Oct 2011 11:34:35 +0000 jillinthebox90 http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/?p=443 ]]> What made me blog, in such a close-knit interval, especially when exams are literally, “round the corner”? I don’t know. Perhaps, it is like buying shoes for me, an incentive. An incentive to tell myself that I can write and do the things I normally do in the midst of exams and all that jazz.

Ever since India, I’ve become accustomed to spending time with myself. This is neither meant to denote peculiarity nor perverseness. Instead, I look at it in the light of self-discovery and acceptance.

Self-discovery. I would be twenty-one in a few months. While I have been cribbing to all who would hear me out about growing old, it’s fascinating because, at times I laugh to myself when walking down S.G. Palya and think, ‘who knew I’d get this far?’ Looking back, I’m amazed at how soon the years flew by. Looking back, I remember when I wrote my first poem. Looking back, I count the number of career choices that I lay in front of me. Irony is that, none of the choices seem to appeal to me today.

Acceptance; I think begins with appreciation. I have begun to appreciate more, the members of my family, the new members in my family and most importantly God. I also have learnt that while it is only Facebook that gives me some 600 friends, life gives me a few friends who are good, reliable and beautiful no matter how far away they physically may be. I have also learnt that cribbing about being in India would not really get me anywhere. I asked to be here, I made the choice of coming here and therefore, I am indeed responsible for it.

Perhaps due to an overdose of psychology and studying the workings of the mind of a twenty-one year old, I have learnt that this also a period of crossroads in the context of choices whether it be career, relationships and so on. In that light, I also see that while God has indeed written and planned as to how things should work, He also gives us the choice of making the right or wrong decisions.

My tea tastes good and the post seems relatively all right. Let’s hit the books now.

Tagged: 2011, Awareness, Blogging, Faith, First-timers, Home&Co., Individuality, Life in a New Land, Mera Sixty-Deka Duith, Pink!, Trying Times, Yindiar, Youth ]]> http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/05/of-life-and-its-learnings/feed/ 0 12.971606 77.594376 12.971606 77.594376 jillinthebox90 http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/02/one-of-those-days/ http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/2011/10/02/one-of-those-days/#comments Sun, 02 Oct 2011 11:17:58 +0000 jillinthebox90 http://jillinthebox90.wordpress.com/?p=438 ]]> It’s rare. Those days that make you feel as though there is absolutely no care in the world – in a good way – and feel as though, yes I’m going to say it, “Top of the world!” These days are ones that are of absolute happiness.

My Literature teacher told me that happiness is brought about by the awareness of the consequences of that particular circumstance – if that made sense to anyone who is reading Not that all is going brilliantly for me: I have my exams in a week, the Production is well, – those of you know the story I needn’t say more – I am losing weight at an unfathomable rate, I leave to Goa in twenty-days and Dubai in a few months and I love my family and my best friends too much and the list goes on.

However, it all comes down to the fact that regardless of me knowing that all this is happening, both good and bad, I am still thankful to God – regardless of as to where my faith stands as at now – for what He has given me thus far and for all that He continues to bless me with.

So while the day lasts, it’s time to work – if you feel like it – listen to Katy Perry, dance till your ass refuses to move no more and be grateful for everything and everyone around you.