Saturday, March 18, 2006 @8:21 AM
Department of Medical Science Freak’s Tabloid
CITY S, COUNTRY D - - Friday (17th March 2006) is a memorable day for Dr. ZM. ZM, a recent PhD graduate from Saving Lives Medical University tied the knot with her fiancé after a three-year long distance relationship.
Three years ago, ZM met her husband in this campus. ZM’s husband was on an exchange program to this country for a short period of time. But that didn’t cease the immediate attraction between them. They fell in love shortly despite of him going back to his country to continuing his studies there.
And finally the loving couple was announced as husband and wife at the wedding registrar office of City S today. Everyone at ZM’s workplace was truly happy for the couple. ZM and husband are now all set to welcoming a new phase in life hand in hand together. – Pseudo-Reuters
***
Yesterday was a slack day because it’s Friday. However there’s something really unusual; everyone was talking about ZM. ZM got married yesterday!
JH: Do you know how ZM met her husband?
Me: Yeah, she told me before.
JH: Do you know he’s from another country across the ocean?
Me: She mentioned that too.
JH: It’s so amazing that they worked it out. Awww, it’s such a sweet story!
Me: Definitely, what’s more awe-inspiring is they were on long distance for THREE years!!
Do you have faith in long distance relationship?
“Long distance will not work!” This is how many of us will respond and think. I don’t know and I was like one of them, and just assumed it would not work. Yet, when I open up my ears to hear more, there are numerous stories I’ve heard throughout all these years that proof this assumption wrong. They are real life stories heard from a distance and stories I’ve seen myself.
My college mate was on a 4-year long distance with her fiancé then and now husband. He was doing his specialization in paediatric medicine in another country while she was finishing off her degree in Country B. A year later they didn’t reunite because she had to go back to her home country to help her dad’s business.
I met this lady who’s staying in the next building on a bus. She told me that she was married two years ago but her husband is in another country. They started the long distance relationship before the marriage. Out of curiosity, I asked her thoughts about this.
Me: Don’t you find it difficult?
Her: Of course it is very tough for my husband and me.
Me: Why don’t you go to the country your husband is working now or he comes to you?
Her: We’d considered that. But after discussion, we thought that it is better for me to get this job here for a few years and he stays there for his. Then we’ll be together later after this. This is just a transition period.
Me: It’s great to hear that both of you can be so understanding and are so willing to work it out.
Her: Sometimes he’ll fly over to see me and I’ll take vacation to go and see him. It’ll work as long as we put the effort.
While I was working in Country C, there’s this Vietnamese lady who was working there. When I first came to the laboratory, I was told that she just returned from her wedding back at home (Vietnam). I was like, “Whoa?!” During my 2 years of work there, I’ve constantly seeing the couple putting the effort in maintaining the marriage and relationship. He’d chatted with her and she’d called him. Each time after talking to her husband, she’d this glory happiness look. Even till after I quit the job, she was still there. A year later after I left, I received an email from her telling me that she’s now back with the husband and an addition to the family was on his/her way. I was so happy for her.
There are many more successful cases I’ve heard. Yet all these case studies have shown the magical trick there. Long distance is really tough! But if the couple puts in the effort and works it out together hand in hand, it can be as sweet if not better. It is possible.
I know a couple who’s working together. This is something I really don’t understand. I am someone who doesn’t like to work (career wise) at the same place/unit/team/room in an organization with my spouse. I do think some space is needed. I mean I don’t like my husband or my boyfriend is my work mate as well. Anyway, this is not what I intend to discuss in this entry. So back to this couple who are doing postdocs in my lab. They work together in a project. So that means they are 24 hours together with each other. So one day, again out of my curiosity, I told them my doubts.
Me: Don’t you guys find it strange to work together and then see each other at home again? I mean don’t you feel suffocated a little?
Wife: So far we haven’t felt that yet. We cherish every moment we are together now.
Me: Yeah, but…
Wife: We were on long distance for a while before we got married. And this postdoctoral position here is not forever. After we return to our country, we are not likely to work together. We’ll be working in different hospitals.
Sitting back and giving some thoughts about it. I think the words from these people who’ve been through or going through the long distance relationship themselves do make sense. What makes you think a non-long distance relationship will work perfectly fine? The risk of a “normal” distance relationship will not work is equally the same as long distance. It is just like two arrows moving towards a direction. Now it doesn’t matter so much of where these two arrows coming from as long as they share the same direction/purpose/vision. Even if the two arrows come from the same point, if they’re heading towards a different direction, they’ll still not meet. Sometimes this long distance thing does make the couple cherish each other more. Because you know it is difficult to be with this person, you’ll extremely appreciate every single moment to be with him/her. Even if you and your sweetheart are together in a “normal” distance relationship, it also doesn’t mean you’re really spending quality time together. This is what the Vietnamese lady used to joke about. She joked, “Quality is better than quantity.”
After hearing all these real life cases, I do have faith in long distance relationship. But as they all emphasized, “Effort has to be made from both sides.” I think it’ll all work out if both are willing. It takes two to get going. One thing though, there should be a duration (I would say not more than 3 years) for long distance. You won’t want to not to be together with your love for years and years. Geez how can you stand not seeing and being together with him/her in a long period of time?
Can long distance work? Well, anything is possible.
Friday, March 17, 2006 @6:42 AM
There’s something my dad did to me when I was about 2 years old that I will never ever forget. I have been telling myself that I would never want to do that to my children or other people.
My dad is the most wonderful dad on earth. I can’t ask for more. Yet as we all know, no one is perfect, including my dad. He’s a responsible and caring man. He’s my hero! But my dad has his flaws too. He doesn’t keep his promises, especially to his children. I am not saying my dad likes to break promises. He does try to make everyone in the family in particular us, his treasures and source of happiness, happy. If he could get us the star in the sky, he really would get it for us. But probably he’s a busy man and forgetful too, he tends to “forget” what he has promised. Or probably he doesn’t think keeping all his promises that big deal if the promises are on small things of no significance to him?
I remember one fine morning around 25 years ago, dad was at home. I hadn’t seen him for a while because I stayed with my grandmother while my parents were staying with my paternal grandparents. Plus my dad’s always on business trip. So that morning the 2 year old was elated to see her dad. That was a special day because my dad, maternal grandma and I were going to the hospital to welcome my mother and my new baby sister home. My dad and I were waiting at the living room for my grandmother. I saw the ice-cream van passing by the neighborhood. How could a 2yo kiddo resist ice-creams? Straightaway the kid rushed to her dad and asked him to buy her one. Her dad made a deal with her. If she made a short performance, he would buy her one. The ice-cream enthusiast instantly came up with one. At the end of the performance, she went to her dad and waited anxiously for the ice-cream. Man, she’s just asking for an ice-cream, not a moon! No, my dad didn’t buy me one. He didn’t want to buy me one at all at that time for no reason.
“But dad, you said if I perform, you’d buy me one.”
“…….”
“Dad, you are not keeping your promise.”
A quarter of a century has passed, I could still remember this childhood story. Few years ago when I was home, my dad, grandmother and I were chatting. I brought this up. My dad was stunned for a moment. He didn’t expect I would remember such small incident for so long. My grandmother said she could remember. Yeah, my grandmother has perfect memory for the past but not the recent ones.
My dad explained, “I didn’t know you would really take my words so seriously. I didn’t expect you to perform immediately. And I wasn’t planning to buy you the ice-cream anyway.”
If you have already known you would not buy it, then why made a promise in the beginning?
My dad was once invited to attend my High School’s Teachers and Parents’ Association meeting. The school wanted to nominate my dad to be one of the committee members. The Principal called me out one day. She expressed her will and asked me to pass the message to my dad and if he’s willing to take up the responsibility, he needed to come for the election and they’d arrange the rest. So I went home obediently passing my dad the message.
“Sure, tell your Principal that I’ll go for the meeting.”
“Are you sure you’ll be going? You’re so busy. And please don’t simply make promises to my Principal. She’s not us who are so used to your “invalid” checks.” [note: invalid checks is a Cantonese saying referring to checks issued without a signature that you can’t bank in or cash out. It is not valid!]
“Of course I’m going. Just tell her that I’ll be there.”
I didn’t completely believe that my dad would turn up. I’ve known him too well. But still I was hoping that maybe he’d go.
“Didn’t your father say he’d come for the meeting?”
“……”
“We waited for him but he didn’t come.”
“I’m sorry. Perhaps he’s busy at work and couldn’t come.”
This time I didn’t make a big fuss to my dad because we were so used to it. Yet, I'm more determined that I don’t want to be like my dad.
I don’t want to promise somebody the earth. Even for small things that I know it is not tough in achieving, I still don’t like to simply make a promise. Usually, I’ll tell the person, “I’m not sure. I can’t promise/guarantee but I’ll try.” This line is close to a promise from me. In this case, you more or less know I’ll be really trying. But still it is not a promise from me because of some uncertainty that I’m aware of. At least for sure you know, I'll keep my promise for trying my best since I said "I'll try". Of course I don’t mean that I don’t make promise. I do make promises, not always but quite often to things that I know I’ll certainly make it. Once I’ve made that promise, I do keep it regardless of some unexpected hurdles. If I can’t make it all the way, I’ll definitely inform the person whom I made the promise to soonest possible.
Promises don’t come easy from me. But when I make one, I’ll really keep it; otherwise the other party will feel the disappointment. Trust me, I know how it feels. It is not something I like others to experience.
♥ every page of my imagination
Thursday, March 16, 2006 @6:41 AM
What took me so long to find this out? I ought to know it by now! Why it took me all these years to understand this. There is no success but failures. Life is nothing without failures.
I was supposed to get a table constructed for a pending to be written manuscript a year and a half ago. It will not be a fancy table with complex numerical figure. It was supposed to be the first thing done and checked before I pursued that study further. Yet being a great procrastinator, I’ve put off till this last minute when the study has come close to an end. It’s no big deal; I just need to spend 30 minutes in front of the computer and clicking some buttons to analyze the experiment done during summer 2004. What happened? I ended up going back and forth of the analysis for almost 2 days! Not a single line or word was constructed! At first I thought I’ve had the analysis done after fiddling around the program for few hours. I went away happily with the “raw” (turned out to be wrong data) data. I referred to a previous data and found out that I’ve left out a crucial part in the analysis that made the “raw” data in hand WRONG. So I went back to the program trying to redo and fix those left outs. It was another few hours spent excluding another wrong step done during the process. Till this entry, I’m still not quite sure whether I have it analyzed correctly.
When I first stepped into research field, I was hit badly with failures in experiments. I was greatly disappointed with myself. I complained. I cried. My first step of my project for my final year (entire duration for that research project was about 10 months), it took me 3 good months to get it worked. Needless to say there were many steps before reaching the final stage so that I have some results to writing up the thesis. I didn’t get anywhere close to Step 3 unfortunately. But that was really ok; everyone in that field understands that. While complaining and venting what a failure I was, someone sarcastically said, “Hey, research just basically means, re-search. That is to search what will NOT working again and again.” This guy who told me this must be as nutty as fruitcake? I thought so.
Looking around of what I’ve been doing, other than RESEARCH at work, I’ve been RESEARCHING a lot in other things in life too. I hardly get things work on the first few times. There were a few times I did make it work on the first occasion. That was really like hitting the jackpot! Just when I thought luck was on my side, the magic didn’t work for the second and subsequent time.
One thing I really love about my work now, I mean medical science research is I’ve been constantly hit by failures and by now I’m so darn used to it. The moment I get a new stuff work on the first trial, I’d become very sceptical and start to wait for the failure that is bound expected next time. And most of the time I was correct. How lucky can you be every time? I mean come on, let’s be realistic a bit; you can’t be an expert in something new. How would you get it work perfectly well without more practices? The more practice you get, the higher chance you’ll screw things up, and therefore we get more failures.
The constant failures from work has really trained me well and prepared me to facing more failures in life. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in many matters thus far. The way you deal with certain things. How you should perceive a problem? How to get along with someone? How can you be a better *insert your role* to others? Being a freshman and inexperienced explain this all. As you get more experience (note that experience actually means more failures encountered), you’ll gradually find your way. I personally find myself learn much better each time after a failure. The amazing bit is I can also see other sides of myself during each encounter.
But let’s not be disheartened by failures. Success is really nothing if there is no failure. The great inventor and believer of failure, Thomas Alva Edison always stressed, “Every failure a success.”.
I can foresee I’ll make more mistakes in future. But hey, as what Mr. Edison said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work…” So who cares about success? Life is nothing without failures!
♥ every page of my imagination
Wednesday, March 15, 2006 @6:03 AM
I loved my landladies. Am I being sarcastic here? Let’s see… Since I moved out, I’ve been renting places everywhere I stayed in all these countries. Thus far, I’ve had three landlords. I’ve heard heaps of stories about fussy landlords. It is rather difficult to maintain a good relationship between landlord and tenant. You’d be glad if you don’t end up badly with your landlord.
I was having real problem in finding a place to stay after my immediate move out due to the incident I mentioned in my previous entry (Good Old Days Part 2). In the end, I shared a three room townhouse with two new people I just met during the house hunting. To be precise, I was their subtenant. No, I am not referring them as my landlord(s) at all. So this townhouse belonged to a Greek family, who was staying next door. There was a bit of a drama later on in my stay there. I am not going to elaborate much about that because I believe that encountere have made me learned about some sides of human nature. To cut the long story short, the students weren’t honest about the actual rent of the whole house and thus incurred me with a much higher pay rather than a fair share period. Anyway, back to my Greek landlord and family. So that was my freshman college year. And the Greek family was my first landlord ever. I was staying at a student hostel the year before after stepping into the soil of Country B. Thus the thought of having a landlord is somewhat strange to me. The thought of seeing your landlord almost everyday when you walk pass their house is bizarre.
In the beginning I was struggling to settle down. I was beginning a new life there despite that was my second year of stay there. Almost all my pre-college mates known from previous year disappeared to different colleges. And I was having trouble in coping with my studies. To start with, I wasn’t even familiar with the new neighborhood. During this time, my landlord’s mother, an old Greek lady approached me. She asked me to join her for weekly grocery shopping every Saturday morning. I thought she was just being nice seeing I was all on my own in the first few weeks. She also invited me to her house for some yummy Greek delicacies for tea. There was once that I hurt my eyes and was panicked of getting help. Without much hesitation, I knocked on her door and she immediately dropped her housework and brought me to the medical center. Seriously I’m still very touched about her kind gesture. I don’t know why. I really like her a lot. Looking at her, she reminded me of my maternal grandmother, though they are two distinct individuals. I didn’t know how we communicated. She speaks very little English and I don’t understand any Greek word. Yet we always chatted while walking to and from the supermarkets. That was when she introduced some Greek culture to me. After a year, I decided to share an apartment with a pre-college friend and my younger sister who was coming to join me the following year. It was so hard for me to say good bye to her and her family. Her eyes were watery when I finally had to leave. I really like her. 9 years has passed, I still appreciate and can remember her and her family for being a wonderful landlord to a young girl struggling to survive on her own alone by herself.
I have my third landlady when I was working in Country C. (This is the last landlord in my record thus far. I am currently staying at a student apartment owned by an organization/company.) This was once again an unplanned move. Initially I was staying with some relative. After a month, the sudden news of her wanting to sell off the condo prompted me to move. Thank goodness with my dad’s friend’s help, I found this apartment nearby my workplace. But the only thing was I had to stay with my landlady, who’s an old widow. She looked a bit unfriendly when I first met her. But very soon, that impression was erased completely. My landlady is a wonderful cook. She always fed me with different yummy food. Since she’s retired, she has a lot of time participating voluntary jobs and spending time cooking with her friends. Every now and then, she would bring me food. Geez, did that explain why I couldn’t lose weight while I was so stressed and burnt from my previous job?! There were a few times I was sick, she even made me some porridge and traditional medicine! She said she treated me like her daughter. My landlady is illiterate of English. I was her translator for all her letters and stuff at that time. We missed each other on the day I left Country C back to my home country before I left for Country D (where I am now). She held my hands and wished me luck. As much as I was eager to leave Country B for Country D to start a new life, I was worried for leaving her. I hope she would manage to find some tenants to take over my room and the other room. I didn’t mention during my stay there I managed to meet two friends, a Korean and Japanese. My landlady had two rooms to rent out. But she always had problem in getting tenants to stay long. I guess I was the exception.
I haven’t had the chance to go back to Countries B and C for a visit. Anyway, no matter where I go, I’d never forget these two landladies. It is already fortunate enough to have just one sweet encounter. And I have had two! What makes it more lucky is, come to think of it, there were some bitter encounters/events that led me to these two sweet encounters. If you know what I am trying to say. I think I’m really lucky and blessed.Thank you so much. =)
♥ every page of my imagination
Tuesday, March 14, 2006 @5:47 AM
“Have you eaten?” You must find it awkward if this is the first line you hear upon meeting/bumping into someone. What? Can’t they say something else? This line just sounds a little too peculiar.
Well, actually, this is a way of saying hello for the Chinese. They don’t really want to know whether you have really eaten. You see, food is immensely emphasized in the over three thousand years of Chinese culture. It has become the first and foremost concern whether you have enough food to eat. Food resembles the amount of wealth you own. The better food (not necessary healthier in this case), somehow speaks how well you live (meaning how wealthy you are). So naturally this culture has passed down from centuries to centuries and has become a casual habit way of saying "Hello".
If you go and ask your Chinese friends about this, most of them may not realize this. I presume your Chinese friends are around our age here. That’s right; it seems that the younger generation is not keeping this “Have you eaten?” trend. Things are changing including certain aspects and values of any culture. That could be one of the explanations. Another possible reason could be because we’re now living in the year 2006, technology has improved our lifestyle tremendously, many of us are well-fed and food is not seen as the only essential, especially in developed countries. I am, like many young Chinese out there, wasn’t aware of this “Have you eaten?” line until my dad brought it up once. No wonder I found it strange to hear my parents’ friends asked this “Have you eaten?” question to my folks or vice versa when I was young. Yet I wasn’t really paying attention to this. Many years gone by, I still didn’t get this correct. I just assumed someone was inviting my grandmother for some food when I heard someone asking my grandmother, “Have you eaten?”. Deep down my heart I was thinking, "Wow, this person's really nice to my grandmother. But she's just eaten, how hungry can she be?" Argh, how silly I am to just always think about food!! Now I finally know the true meaning of this line. A little too late huh? Speaking of this, I’m the type of Chinese who just says “Hello” (pronounced as “Ni Hao”) [你好] in mandarin or Cantonese. That’s the more conventional way for a lot of younger generation to say "Hello" to people now.
My exposure from residing several countries in different continents has further opened my eyes about some parts of other nations’ cultures. You’ll hear the line “How are you?” or “Good day!” if you’re at the check out counters wherever you go in certain nations by default. I wasn’t too used to it at the beginning. The cashiers sounded like some machine to me when they asked “How are you?”. Sometimes they said it too quickly and went immediately checking out all your items. I don’t think they bothered to wait for a second to see or hear your response.
If you go around and you’ll amazingly find that certain nations articulate on the way of saying “Hello”. Certain words are meant for the elderly or people of higher status than us. Some “Hellos” are more casual than the other. Some even has gender difference. For example, in Thai, if you’re saying “Hello” to a guy, you have to pronounce it as “Sa-wa Dee Krab” and to a girl, it should be pronounced as “Sa-wa Dee Kah”.
Which type do you prefer in saying “Hello”. “Hi”, “Howdie?”, “How are you?”, “What’s up?”, “How are you doing?” …I tend to just say “Hello” to people whoever I meet. I was once swamped in the trend of “How are you?” during my few years of stay in Country B where everyone just say this line by default. Sometimes it’s so natural for me to ask this and answer “I’m good, thanks.”, without giving much thought of my answer or others’. Did I mean what I ask? If not, why would I bother to ask? This thought just provoked me and since then, I’ve been really making an effort of putting more sincerity when asking “How are you?” to anyone. I am ready to give it a minute or at least a few seconds to patiently listen to others’ response. If I’m in hurry or I think it’s kind of awkward in talking to someone who is more of a stranger to me, I just say, “Hi”. Probably I’m a little weird in this. But I do realize if I can spend some time listening to others’ well being of the day or that moment, it really brings some meaning to me for that moment. This is the best time of showing our care to our friends or however this person’s related to us. I come to realize that we are always too oblivious of our own things. I’m not saying we don’t spend time caring for others. We do and many of us are doing that. That’s great; yet we are not aware that it really doesn’t take a lot of time and effort in caring for others. It just takes a few seconds or minutes of slowing down and putting some sincerity when asking how the person’s doing or feeling, will make a whole lot of difference. We may not be able to help, but at least being there to listen for a few minutes can be of vast help.
“¿Cómo estás?”
“Comment ça va ?”
“Come stai?”
“Como estás?”
“Wie geht's?”
“Wie geht's?”
“Apa khabar?”
“Conas tá tú?”
“Conas tá tú?”
“Ngò gàttò?”
“Anh có khoe không?” or “Chi có khoe không?”
Can you figure out what I was asking? What about the following?
“Konichiwa”
“Ola”
“Hei”
“Zdravo”
“Bok”
“Salut”
“Han-gul”
Whichever I use, I just want to ask you, “How are you?” and I really mean it. So please do let me know how you are doing. : )
♥ every page of my imagination
Monday, March 13, 2006 @8:38 AM
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, I’m proud to announce to you that I have a tidy Jade-style writing desk at work now!! Yay!
Did I move or relocate at work? Nope.
You won’t believe this if I tell you I’ve taken over a nice corner desk sharing a big room (the biggest room of the floor) with a few others, yet I had never bothered to clean up whatever “leftovers” from the previous owner 1.5 years ago! Yep, that’s just me, lazy girl! How did I survive all this while? Well, fortunately my desk is big enough for me to pile stacks and stacks of papers. I was telling NK, “I’m the messiest person in the lab!” He laughed and noted that it was funny to hear this coming out from me and he couldn’t believe it. It is so true and I even further added, “The worse part is, I’m even more untidy than a lot of guys out there, at least in our lab.”
I have always had the urge of doing something for this. It’s not like I’m really a messy person in general. Most of the time, I’m quite presentably tidy. Yet I have always let the laziness rules me. Recently I’ve been going through some gluey phases. No, no drama or chaos. It was just one of those moments that you felt something’s not quite right and thus affecting you in certain ways. What I usually do is to pause, examine the root of the problem(s) and then deal with whatever I can.
While pausing there, I realized that I’ve already stayed here for almost two years! In other words, almost half of my stay here has gone, I haven’t really made myself as comfortable as I should. I mean, look at my work place and my apartment; I have stuff unpacked for 2 years. I have stuff stacked at aside that I am likely to forget about. Perhaps subconsciously I knew my stay here won’t be forever, and hence I couldn’t be bothered to unpack and pack later. That’s a lame excuse. It’s not like I’m going to leave tomorrow. I should, however, really take the advantage to make it my little place for me to enjoy the rest of my stay here. AA said in actuality, my laziness was to blame. That could be true too.
I’ve been putting off to doing anything about this, until I came to this gluey phase. Due to a combination of things, I just realized I wasn’t enjoying what I was doing each day. I was de-motivated. I knew I’ve got to do something about it.
So after contemplating my navel (yeah, I do that a lot), now it’s about time to put some thoughts into action. First of all, I need to clean up the mess, tidy up the place(s) and make them as MY Place. I spent two days cleaning and rearranging my work desk in my office. I chucked away tons of papers and unwanted stuff to the recycle bin and trash bin. I’ve rearranged the little notes I put up on the wall that my desk’s facing. It’s all done now and I’m so proud of the nice clean desk of my own.
I’m going to do the same for my apartment. I want to make it my comfortable little place. It’ll be MY place. No more unpacked stuff. I’m actually going to open up stuff that I brought and use them. If I’ve brought them with me, there is no reason for me to keep them untouched until the day I leave.
I feel so great to toss unwanted stuff out to the bin. I feel extremely good to see more rooms after emptying the trashes. A good start is halfway to success. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not referring to the success success. The success I’m referring is the plan you’re setting for yourself. No wonder, some people go for a hair cut after a break up. Some people get a job change after some unpleasant encounter. To them, by doing something (although not related to whatever drama they are going through) symbolizes good riddance. “Deep down you know it’s best for yourself…we know that it’s true, let it burn, let it burn, gotta let it burn.” Eh, no, I’m not promoting burning rubbish to generate smoke and dust to the environment. But you know what I mean, don’t you?
I think with a clean tidy Jade’s desk at work and a soon-to-be clean apartment, I shall be all set to revive some aspirations. Wait, I need to clean my lab bench too. : )
♥ every page of my imagination
Friday, March 10, 2006 @5:57 AM
I had never imagined that I would come to this country for a graduate degree. Not even 3-4 years ago. It was a quick chain reaction of incidents that led me here. Where I am now might not be the perfect consequence of that reaction. But it really couldn’t be any better. I am content with where I am now.
My first acquaintance with Miss. D (refer previous post, Someone to call my best friend) close to 20 years ago, is really a marvel to my life. How would one suppose to know the strong long lasting friendship start from just that one brief moment?
I certainly would not have thought about getting to know a very close friend upon my first arrival in this continent. Sure, I was aware that I would know many people here. Yet, I wouldn’t expect that I would find a true close friend, whom I can share, many things outside work. She’s AA (refer post Glad to know you). Even though our getting together was just the few months, our bond isn’t torn apart after her return to her home. We’ve been regularly chatting and emailing each other. She’s very different from my best friend, Miss. D, whom I knew since childhood. You know, there’s always some obvious difference between childhood friends and friends you know when you’re a grown-up. But we both click instantly.
I have another good friend since college. I wrote about her in a Chinese post earlier on (August 2005). I’m not going to translate that entry. But it’s really worth mentioning how we knew each other. We found each other in a computer lab. She’s not my course mate at all. In fact she’s a year senior than me and she’s from a different faculty! It just happened that she was taking that subject as her elective and I was initially enrolled as a double degree (dual degree) student. While I was struggling with my information system assignment, this friend who was apparently occupying the computer next to me, for some strange reason saw my worried expression. She offered me with some help! Since then we've just somehow gotten closer and became really good friends. Now, if you don’t think this is a stupefaction friendship, I don’t know what would you call it. I have another close friend, whom I knew for years. We never shared anything much in common. We didn’t like each other that much, even before knowing each other. Yet, it was just one casual coincidence that brought us together. And then we found that, “Hey, this is a cool girl. I like her!” Years later, we still stay in contact. Isn’t that awesome?
“Hey, I really like you.” This line came out of my senior pal, KL’s mouth while she and I were taking care of the dishes. I wasn’t that close to her because she’s a lot senior than me in terms of age and career (she’s already an Associate Professor). I mean, we are from two distinct social circles, apart from the badminton team I was initially participating. I thought she was just joking. But she assured me she did mean what she said.
“You know, you’re a trustworthy person. I like you.” This was an unexpected compliment from NK, my coworker.
Wow, do I deserve all these compliments and good words from these people? I haven’t done anything particularly nice to them. Yet they still think I’m a nice person. Of course I’m not saying that we should do something nice to get compliments. All I am saying is, I have never expected this. I know all my flaws. But hey, I’m very astoundingly flattered.
All right, I could go on and on to share more about my other amazing surprise stories. But that’s not really the point of this entry. Neither do I want to make this entry to portray myself as a nice person that everyone just likes me. No, seriously, I don’t mean it that way at all. All I am trying to say is; life is full of surprises!
Yes, life is full of surprises. Be they friendship, compliments/flattering remarks, romance, career, family or anything that just happens anywhere, anytime. Just when we are calculating and mourning our losses, just when we are upset of our dramas, just when we are frustrated and disappointed of things that we want or whatever…we have failed to realize that there are plenty of surprises in our lives already, and more to come. While calculating what we don’t have, we’ve missed out a lot of what we already have. We only see the surprises when we have least/no expectation.
Life remains hopeful. Have faith!
♥ every page of my imagination
Thursday, March 09, 2006 @7:10 AM
In one early morning, a car gracefully stopped at a corner of a crowded jam-packed street. Before the car came to a complete stop, one of its doors was opened. A 15yo girl rushed out from the car and ran to the car boot. She grabbed her bag swiftly as if she were some Olympic player. Just as we would expect her to rush to elsewhere, she paused and then turned back to grab another bag from the car boot. She pulled the two shoulder straps to make it easier for the smaller girl carry. When both were all set, both headed to a different direction. The older one was gone in seconds. But no, she didn’t. “Ouuuuch”. The little girl turned around and found the older girl with one leg kneeling on the street and then other leg stretched. The younger girl giggled but she went up to help the older one. She’s got bruises. One of her knees was bleeding too. “I’m all right. I need to run. You better go too.”
Later that night, the two girls met.
“You’re so comical…the way you fell on the street.”
“Hey, aren’t you sorry for me? There were so many people staring at me this morning.”
“Why should I be sorry for you?”
“If only I didn’t have to help you with your bag, I wouldn’t have to rush for my duty session. If only I didn’t have to rush, I would have not fallen on the street with so many pairs of eyes starring at me as if I were some crazy mad girl. Oh heck, I’m so embarrassed!”
“I didn’t ask you to help me. I could carry my own bag. Mind you, who’s always late in the morning?”
Right, so obviously the younger girl didn’t appreciate what her older sis had done for her. Oh well.
I realize sometimes we can do a lot of stupid foolish things for others that they would at least appreciate if not touched by our considerate and warmth gesture. I do this lot, especially to people who are close/important to me. Sometimes I am disappointed by receiving cold responses or no response. Yet the stubborn I still continue repeating being foolish. I think if you just want to do something for somone, you shouldn’t expect something in return, not even an acknowledgement, though honestly speaking, who doesn’t like to be reciprocated? If you do it, then don’t expect something in return. No expectation, no disappointment. Plus if you always want something back, that means probably we aren’t that genuinely nice and care for that person. Of course it is always human nature for us to hold back if we do not receive any response. But for people like my family, especially my cutie siblings, I still do whatever I consider is nice for them, albeit they may not appreciate the effort.
12 years later. The little girl is no longer little but the older girl is still big. They have their usual babbling over a distance. At some point, the topic of taking for granted was brought up in a funny way.
Big Girl: When you have someone cooking for you and have the food ready for you all the time, you won’t appreciate it. Then one day when you come home realizing there's no food readily made for you, and that you have to cook for yourself. You’ll start missing that person, the convenience and stuff.
Small Girl: Oh you must be missing me now. Haha... You took for granted for being able to take my school bag when you were in HS. And now you don’t even have the chance to do that.”
Big Girl: Huh? Oh nooo…why did you have to remind me this embarrassing scene? Yeah, you’re sooo right. I really miss that falling on the street just because I had to take your school bag!”
Small Girl: I just thought that scene is really funny. Hehe…I will remember that for the rest of my life. Geez, I don’t think there’s any sister on earth would help her sister until she fell on the street.
Big Girl: Argh, you’re so awful! You don’t know how fortunate you are to have such sister!
Small Girl: Oh, having a sister falling on the street because of me? Yeah, I’m so fortunate.
Big Girl: That’s it. I’m going to tell your kids in future that their momma is an ungrateful person. She doesn’t appreciate her older sister’s sacrifice.
Small Girl: I’m also going to tell your kids in future this, “Hey, your momma is really so nice to me. She bled for me and had the most hilarious pose attracting crowds at a busy street. You guys should be proud of her.”
Well, I guess maybe the small girl doesn’t seem to be that ungrateful. Maybe many do appreciate our foolish gestures yet they just don’t express it. Nevertheless, I’ll continue to be foolish. Isn’t that what we call unconditional love?
♥ every page of my imagination
Funny. H. (aka NC_State_Gal) commented that procrastination sometimes just provides us with the impetus to focus on things in their due time in response to my second last entry. I happened to have a real life example to illustrate this freshly baked from the oven. Earlier on I mentioned that I was intending to have a major thorough clean up in my apartment (refer previous post, Burn). Well, the great procrastinator as usual hadn’t really put her words into actions. She has very good excuse this time since she’s too caught up at work. The apartment has been in a mess for this long; sure it can remain in such condition longer until more timelines at work are met right? I thought so. Well things sometimes just don’t happen in the way we want. Few days ago I received a note from the apartment maintenance unit that they would be sending some servicemen to my apartment on Monday to do some work. Oh well, I guess I just had to add one more item to my urgent-to-do list. 
“Two persons three feet”, have you ever played this game? I am unsure whether this is just an Asian game. Anyway, this is really common in 
I loved my landladies. Am I being sarcastic here? Let’s see…
