Guys in Suits and Girls in Dresses

You know, funny things happen when you wake up from bed one day, crave for a sandwich, look around the kitchen and realise there's no bread, then remember you're supposed to feed the cats because it's half past noon, do a head count for your cats and make sure they don't run off to some neighbour's lawn and get hit by a 4WD--

I'm getting ahead of myself here.

Anyway, back to the bread. After all the chores (that I remembered by far) were done, I went to the 7-11 to get some bread.

For my sandwich.

And because I was to stock up on bread that week. Actually, last week.

So. I entered 7-11, gave the store cashier a hearty wink, and strode around doing business (collect the bread). After carefully reviewing the contents of a chocolate bar and a fizzy drink, with the loaf of bread in my hand, I walked to the counter...

...when this happened.



Yes. Yes. It was like that and more!


And more! (I couldn't remember the third one's face)


Why are all these smokin' hot, ''gun'' (note the inverted commas)-wielding, sexy scorchers inside a small little 7-11in a suburban neighbourhood and I'm just standing there with a ''I'm a Virgin'' t-shirt and banana shorts??

Even the dumb cashier dropped his jaw (I bet his pants too, but I couldn't see because he was behind the counter) and stopped playing his PSP.

I did not know what was happening. Probably a teen gang heading for a friends' wedding? Lost and stopped for a can of soda? I looked outside, expecting to see a Lexus Rexton with a sandy-haired guy and a roguish grin behind the wheel, calling out, ''Come on, girls, we're gonna be late for the wedding!''

Instead I saw a roughly-eight-year-old boy, in the passenger seat, poking his head out the window and half-shouting, ''Kakak, hurry up! Aunty Cei Cei's (I think it was Cei Cei) birthday laaaa!''

And it was a Toyota Wish.

Girl Number Two, which I'd like to nickname the Black Mamba of the East was at the magazine rack. What a fine rack it was. I always picked up my issue of Gempak! there, so I proceeded as so.

She was reading a magazine with a close up of a man in a suit on the cover. My thoughts went to the legendary Barney Stinson of How I Met Your Mother.


I sniggered unconsciously. And the Black Mamba of the East caught me!

''What's so funny?'' she asked, her voice striking the still air and interrupting the God of War sound effects in the cashier's PSP (obviously three un-Earthly beauties did not seem to bother him for long as Kratos's, the front man of God of War, bare chest and abs splattered in monster blood were far more interesting for him).

She talked. To me! I choked. Regained myself. And spoke with careful care.

''Eh... guy in a suit. Funny.''

*loud groan from audience*

What did you expect me to do?

''Hey, dollface, my house just a couple blocks away. What say you and your friends?''

The Black Mamba of the East laughed, and put the magazine away.

''I like guys in suits.'' and she winked. She winked. The Black Mamba of the East winked at me.

And she left. With Girl Number One aka Vienna Jackpot and Girl Number Three aka Faceless Rack and that lucky, lucky, lucky eight-year-old boy, off to Aunt Cei Cei's birthday party, in that white Toyota Wish.

I think she gave a glance at my banana shorts.

I paid for my stuff and left.

Black Mamba of the East... I will find you. One day.

And wink back at you!

Thanks, folks.

This is not a dream sequence. Some elements were obviously exaggerated ( Girl in a bikini walk in a suburban 7-11) but the core of the story is true. There were three hot girls. One of them said ''I like men in suits'' to me. And the wink. And the glance. Well, maybe not the glance. Do not judge me.

Break Free! *RENGEKI!*

I will feel better when I post this up. I am so stressed right now. My results weren't bad, but I'm not happy with them. And that's just Trials. Teachers were sympathetic, and passed me on a couple of subjects.

I so do not need pity. What I need is bloody strength. And the guts to be truthful to myself. To her. To everyone I know.

I will kill SPM ( meaning, just pass it with flying colours ), go to college. Finish studies, and start anew.

I do not want to be grounded. Lemme go free. Gimme my WINGS! Ever heard of the Wings of Liberty? That's what I want!

That's what I need.

And I want love.

And since I'm at it, I won't mind world peace, too.

I'm gonna break free of this, and no, I'm not breaking into a High School Musical number!

No, no, no!

Can I go ''Na, na, na'' instead? Gerard Way kicks ass, and that ass is Zac Efron's.

EFF YOU, STRESS-MITES, IMMA GONNA COUNTERATTACK YOUR MENTAL ATTACKS ON MY BROKEN SOUL!

I need my guitar, so, ciao, folks.

I'm gonna start a comic soon. Check my FB page in a couple of weeks. What's it about? Imagine Scott Pilgrim feat. Green Day in a Malaysian high school setting.

Story of a Hoodie Girl

A quick one before I scoot off to a film festival at the PKNS Tower in PJ with my photographer bud Daniel...

I was on the way home from tuition today. Bloody tiring it was, and it was blistering hot. I've always had the LRT as my mode of transportation. I passed through the terminal with my Touch 'N' Go card, waited, got on, got off and walked home. Never paid attention in the in-betweens, especially in the coach.

But heck, today was different.

A girl with a striped hoodie walked by and took the opposite seat of mine. The caption on her hoodie shirt caught my eye, ''Forget it. Yesterday is history. Tomorrow's a mystery.'' Yeah, cliched, but it got me thinking of my own problems with girls lately. And I stared.

Hair tied back with a bang, just a allowing a strand of hair falling over her face. Lovely brown eyes behind a square-rimmed thin spectacles, and the cutest nose you've ever seen. She was texting a friend at that time, probably, because she had her phone out, and smiled the tiniest of smiles.

It was... just too distracting, that smile.

And she caught me staring. I quickly looked down and pulled out my own phone.

The whole way to my stop we kept stealing glances at each other, always avoiding direct contact. I'm probably imagining the exchange of glances. She did catch me staring at her.

I wanted to say hi. I really did. I wanted to comment on her hoodie shirt.

But I didn't. Got scared. Just got off my stop without a word.

I'm gonna ride the same LRT line next Saturday. See if I can catch her again.

That lil thing you do -- lying -- I can bloody well see it!

I woke up late today. Usually my time's at 5.00am but I got around at 6.15am. Of course, after a quick shower and that treasure hunt for my under-- I mean neck tie, I started the walk from home to school carrying around 15 SPBT textbooks which I was supposed to return (yes, I'm missing two textbooks; don't blame me, I'm only human!).

Then this happened.

''Dude, your class (5C) has its book-returning session tomorrow. Today is 5B's turn.''

See, no one actually told me that.

Well, that out of the way, it turned out to be quite an interesting day. No class, some noobs had their Accounts exams, free period all day. Class-hopping joy, what fun.

''Uh can we borrow Bob for a moment?''

''Sure,'' *raises eyebrow in a very suggestive way* ''what for?''

Ah, and there was that little fight in which I got roped into; some relationship crisis. I didn't ask to be a part of it, I never wanted to, but fate's just mean sometimes, and before you know it, the boyfriend wants to pull my guts out through my nostrils and the girlfriend wants me to be her output for tears.
I was nice, too nice, like someone pointed out, and went along with it.
And this is the part where it got cool. I mean, really cool. Really cool. Let me try that in Italic and Bold. Really cool. Well, in my opinion anyway.

''Is he mad?''

''No, he's not!'' *eyes looking down, nodding while saying otherwise, raised voice pitch*

''You're lying.''

''Look, he is not mad and I am not lying!'' *repitition of statement* ''Look, I thought you wanted to help me!'' *changes subject, classic deflection*

''If you're lying to me, I can't do squat. I need to know what exactly happened.''

*sighs* ''Okay... this--''

Whoa, spoilers there, and there's that confidentiality agreement. I helped the girl out, but she was trying to cheat me by trying to cut me from the whole truth. I got everything out in the end, using that simple technique of just looking into the face. Face-reading, a deception expert would call it.

Deception expert is a real occupation. The science of FACS (Facial Action Coding System) is applied here. Discovered by Dr. Paul Ekman in 1970s, the good doctor theorised that every face that showed emotion, any particular emotion, joy, hate, contempt, surprise; all of these emotions had their own specific features formed by the facial muscles, and it's the same for all humans. Yes, it's universal. If Obama and Clinton had something to hide, they'd have the same look on their faces, eyebrows joined together, upper eyelids raised while lower eyelids tensioned and the muscles around the mouth tightened. The look of fear of that secret to be found out.

Spawned a TV-series too. Season 3 up this October.


I'm not saying I'm as good as that bloke up there, or any of those scientists. But I love learning the technique. True scientist say this is BS, since psychology plays a large part in FACS and psychology has been acknowledged as ''soft science''.

I'd like to think I saved someone's relationship today. But since I did play a part in destabilising that relationship somewhere in the past, I'm too ashamed to say it out loud.

There's another technique in detecting a lie, that is by body movement. The scientists call it ''gestural emblems''. A gestural emblem is something the body does involuntarily because of the loss of synch between mind and body when the person lies. This lost synchronisation however can be overcome if the person is a pathological liar, someone who has full control over his muscles, thus disallowing any involuntary movement.

An example of a gestural emblem is the defensive posture. When a person lies, and the lie is opposed by the listener, the liar will go into a stance called the defensive posture, crossed arms, chest in and usually followed by a few steps back. These movements show the need to reinforce the lie, withdraw and defend. We have President Obama for a demonstration.

Though we can say Obama is just being defensive in this picture; I mean, it is a talk with the opposition.

The involuntary muscle movement on the face is harder to catch, according to deception expert Dr. Ekman since usually the liars are betrayed by their emotions within a 1/5 of a second. A hidden smile, a look of contempt, a flash of fear, or the dilation of the pupils. A quick and sharp eye can catch these looks.

FACS is a lovely thing, don't you think? We really should appreciate Dr. Ekman's work. A deception expert is on my list of careers now.

In the end, emotions betray lies. Philosophic, eh?

The Post-trials One

Ey. This should've been done by Friday, but I was busy. Or lazy. Whichever you prefer, really.

First thing, though. Hui Jan, this won't be about FACS (Facial Action Coding System) no, but something else.

Not really a good start there, isn't it? Well, I'm not sure myself, so let's just call this post the Post-trials One, since everyone seems to be happy about the ''post-'' in the word ''Post-trials''.

Now this blog... I set it up a year or so ago, so I could write about stuff. Type, sorry. Express myself, you know? Being a teenager and all, and expressing yourself verbally in your house doesn't actually help a lot. I mean, your 9-year-old sister can't help you if you're suffering from internal conflict of which even you can't describe specifically yourself, can she?

Thus, the purpose of this blog. Well, it's helped me. I can just bloody well post anything I want here, and no one would care. Well, some people care, but I don't really care about them not caring, or caring otherwise.

I'm on a rant here, I have no idea what I'm saying.

I'm relieved, as most people are, because SPM trials just went through. Can't wait for the results *nervous flinch*.

Lots of stuff happened this past few months. Time as a carefree teenager runs out while that looming 12-gauge pump-action shotgun of responsibility just smirks at you from that corner turn; the same corner turn in which someday you're gonna turn around. You get older, wiser. Well, some, dumber.

Experience adds up over the years, but things never change. That's what they say. But really now?

Never?

Well, I'd say never say never, mate.

I just did say never in that sentence which proposes to avoid usage of the word ''never''. A big loophole in that philosophy, eh? I wonder which idiot came up with that.

I bet you're totally confused now. What the hell am I talking about here exactly?

Well, that's your answer. I'm confused. Emotionally, my mentality and my sense of the future is very, very, screwed up right now. I know what to do. Yes, I know what steps I'll be taking once everything is done during this high-school time. Afterwards and forward, yes, I have the vague outlook of what choices I'll be making.

But I am confused. Because, really, nothing's ever clear is it? Well, no worries, though. I'm gonna find out.

Care to join me?

What Happens Next?

Hey, folks. This is probably the last post before I stay off the Net for two weeks for SPM trials. Need to get this do-hickey off my chest.

Everyone, and I mean everyone has been thinking of what to do after SPM. College, work, and so on. I haven't been thinking much, thanks to my immaturity, and really have been living in the moment. Too much, I would say.

It was these couple of last months that I began to grind on my thoughts of what to do when SPM wraps up and I have the results in my hands.

Before this, I've wanted to take Law. Law sounded good, works good, and pays good as well. It was really all talk with lawyers, because these blood-sucking leeches knew how to play around with words and facts, manipulating people's mind. The truth's still the truth, but if one really mastered Law, he can change the way people look at the truth.

KDU offered a good course. Bachelor's Degree of Law, 2 years in Malaysia and one more in UK, an example of one of the programs.

But there's been a definite increase in people majoring in Law. And because of that, most of them are unemployed. Sure, I'd like a Bachelor's Degree of Law, but if I can't work and earn, what was the frickin' point?

My cousin, who had a degree in Pharmacy and recently returned from Bali in Indonesia, suggested that I take Radiography. Radiography was in the medical field, but it didn't require the course-takers to be excellent in Biology or Chemistry, and it was all memory work. Memorise how the X-ray, CAT scan and MRI machines work and learn to read the results through the medical images.

But I wasn't actually a fan of working in hospitals. Sitting behind a machine and checking a man's insides were a bit lame for me, even if you can boast that you know how to operate an X-ray machine.

So, for now, I've decided on the two-year-six-months Creative Media Design course at KDU. Creative Media Design offers the same basics like Illustration in One Academy, though more computer-software oriented than hand-made. Plus, I can concentrate on improving my skills in photography since it's a subject. I'm still considering for Law, and I even might continue for Law after I have my Creative Media Design diploma. Which probably meant that I'll be done studying in 6-8 years.

My Dad wants me to continue the cycle of the family tradition and take Mass Communications and become a journalist. ''You can become anything if you major in journalism-- it's the jack of all trades!'' says my Dad.

But no. Journalism is something both my parents have done. I want to make a new path for myself. And let's face it. Journalism is the freedom to express through literature. I'd be joining politics in a few years. And that's the last thing I want to do.

Even my class teacher says I'm destined to become a politician.

Well, no. A lawyer-photographer I will become (either one) and a hard-boiled one at that.

See ya folks. Wish me luck for them dreaded test papers.

Dedicated to the late Bunny, Madeleine's Pet Rabbit.

Hi, folks. Sorry for the very late update. I've been sick, then busy, then sick again, and busy yet again, then Raya celebrations were around the corner and I just didn't have enough time.

But I think I have enough time for this.

I was at the train station today. On my way home to KL. When I boarded the train, I got an SMS.

The day turned slightly bleak when I read that message.

Madeleine's pet rabbit, Bunny, died today.

I met Bunny for the first time, at Madeleine's Chinese New Year open house, last year. Cute lil rabbit she was, and I regret that I didn't have my DSLR that time to take a picture of her. She hurt her leg at that time, so she was limping. But Bunny was an adorable little fluffy... well, bunny.

I met her a few more times over this year, and even petted her a bit. If she didn't have that limp, she would've been jumping a lot around Madeleine's house. But she was determined, one night, when she hopped delicately into Madeleine's lowered hands.

Madeleine loved Bunny. She still does. Bunny's been around for eight years, and the photos of her with that rabbit really could move a heartless guy's heart like mine.

It's never easy losing a pet. My cat Lilo died in a car accident a year back. I didn't cry; I even made measly jokes about it at school. But I really did mourn her loss when I'm alone, knowing she'll never brush past my ankles anymore.

Miss ya, Lilo.

The bond between a pet and its owner, something like Madeleine and Bunny, it's not something to be lightly taken of. ''So what, she could get another one,'' Sure. But not all rabbits are the same. Not all pets are the same. One's just special for that one person, and that's what makes the love even... stronger; unique.

I'm sorry for your loss, Madeleine. I really am. Bunny was a great rabbit. She's gone now, but she'll remain as a wonderful memory for us all.

Bunny knows you loved her, Madeleine. She wouldn't blame you because you weren't there when she passed. And knowing you cared and loved her for eight years made it easy for her to pass on. You love her, and she knows that, even though she's gone now. As much as you love her, that's how much she loves you back. That's the most important thing right now.

Bunny, I'm sorry I couldn't get to know you closer. I would've love to have you pose for my DSLR. And for you to meet my cat, Shiro. You would've been the best of friends.

We all miss you. Madeleine the most. Rest in peace, Bunny.