precious three months

It's been almost two months, and I still haven't quite figured out whether I'm cut out for this. But the one thing that keeps me happy, keeps me coming back to this place are definitely the kids. There's something amazing about the kids I've met, I can't put my finger on it yet, but talking to these kids (yes, just talking and getting to know them as people) leaves me with this warm glow inside. Each day I learn a little more about what it means to be a teacher, and I've begun to realise I have power over the littlest things, the power to make kids feel a little more loved, appreciated, understood and cared for. It's this power that I don't quite trust myself with, because who knows what may happen when I screw up. Teaching is something that doesn't tolerate screw-ups, and I'll admit that I screw up a lot, and for all the right things that you do, students tend to remember you for your screw-ups more than anything else. But I'm nowhere near ready to leave this place and its people behind, currently bursting with love for this school and all the amazing students I've met, and I swear it's these newfound friends that make me want to stay on, even if it's just for a few more months.

Also, the past three months have been mad awesome, and I can't believe it's already been three months since we graduated. The past months have changed me in so many unexpected ways, subtle, but still there. Results come out friday, and the thought of getting 'em back on that flimsy piece of paper really terrifies me. Mixed feelings of dread and anticipation (can't tell the difference), coupled with fear of what comes after - uni/college, scholarship apps, the future. Had my heart set on going to the us years ago, just hope my grades get me where I want to be. Or rather, where I'm meant to be.

At times like these, I feel small. These precious kids take on bigger problems than themselves, and here I am wallowing in self-doubt. I admire these kids so much more than they'll ever know. : )

the language of impossible dreams

Thing is, we don't stop wanting the things we can't have. And we may never will.

The mind is a savage beast tamed only by the heart.

those who remember & those who forget

Half the world hates what half the world does every day
Half the world waits while half gets on with it anyway
Half the world lives, half the world makes
Half the world gives while the other half takes

I came to the realisation that there are two kinds of people: those who forget and those who remember. And maybe I've been holding on to the wrong group of people all along. 

Annnnnd I just had to add this in... becky's gonna be an artist in new york after college!!! Coolest thing ever though I think I might need to magically teleport myself there so that I can actually show up for her shows.

I gotta sleep earlier, surviving on three hours of sleep is not cool.

2013.

i never believed in angels…

because i had never felt their wings.

i never believed in paradise…

because i had never held the key.

i never believed in mirrors…

because i hated what i’d see.

i never believed in love…

because it never believed in me.

until you.

-alexander michael deleon

Beautiful words above from alex deleon of The Cab! Words just come so naturally to him I get wowed every time I read his blog. And...... this is a 2013 post : ) Okay a little late, I know, but then again, when am I never late? Ha ha one more new year resolution for me.

2012 was a pretty good year (I actually survived the big As GASP) and the toughest year of my life's now over and done with. Thank God for that. Not sure if it was my best though, but I sincerely hope it was. And now that I actually survived As, I'm feeling pretty invincible (not gonna last when the rejections start coming in ughhh). My last week of 2012 was spent with lovely people in a lovely bungalow along east coast. Love the feeling when you wake up every morning in a new (and very beautiful) place. It's almost paradise. Almost.

Uni apps are thankfully completed, just waiting for all the decisions now and hopefully everything turns out according to plan. Secretly wasting all my 11:11 wishes on this whole college business ha ha ha. Becky has been way too busy at hahvahd to help so this last lap I'm conquering on my own. And I'm glad too. Because this time, it's all me.

Big day tomorrow so going to bed now. Can't visualise myself as a teacher as of now but I've gotta give it a try, haven't I? May 2013 be amazing for everyone : )

dawn

It's been quite a long while since I last posted, and well, as always, lots of things have happened and are happening (I can't say for sure). Yes anyway, I thought it would be good to start off the new term with a post because, call me old-fashioned, but there's nothing a good bit a reflection can't cure. So, CT2s just ended, by just I mean like 4 days, which is a pretty short time, if you ask me. BUT (and there always is a but) school's starting up again tomorrow, and after a month and a half of studying at home, school just doesn't feel right. I've been doing so many things I love the past four days, and I feel pretty well-rested, although rest is relative and something I never ever get enough of. :)

I've been reading so many amazing books, books that make me feel like ripping my heart out after I finish them. But what I realised is that I get disillusioned very easily by books, and very, very overwhelmed. Somehow, I end up staying in that world that words create and it becomes very difficult to get my heart back in the right place. Which means that I kinda need to stop reading that much and pick it up after As, which makes me sad, really, but I seriously need some self-restraint.

Okay I just packed my file for tomorrow and happened to glance at this schedule thing that my teacher gave us at the start of this year, and it says prelims start 27th august. HELLO WHERE DID ALL MY TIME GO.   That's like in 2 months and I haven't even recovered from the shock of CTs yet. Okay time to study real hard, and dream even harder, because that's gonna be where my motivation stems from. Kkk smile on my face, spring in my step, I can do thisssssssss :)))

I'll paint your skies if you'll paint mine

"There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” - C.S. Lewis

But what if the things we're leaving behind are far greater than what lies ahead? What then?

  

I'm so afraid of what lies ahead and although telling myself this won't change a thing, I still tell myself anyway. I've experienced first hand how paralyzing fear is, it leaves you stuck in the middle, unable to return to the comforts of the past yet unwilling to face the future. I remember repeatedly telling myself last year that "I'll cross that bridge when I actually get to it" and it was comforting at that point in time, but now, it just feels we're moving closer and closer towards that bridge with no possibility of retreat. AHH I'M SO NEGATIVE IT KILLS ): And people tell me I'm little miss sunshine when I'm secretly a closet pessimist. 

Anyway. Aside from this great fear that I really have to get over soon, which I will (yay optimism!), so many wonderful things have been happening. Things have been falling into place, people have been amazing and I've been getting more sleep, more than the 4 hours a day thing that I used to survive on. Today was a happy happy day, other than it being the last day of term, which is a pretty sad thing if you ask me. I realise I have lovely classmates, I just never bothered to figure them out more, and regretfully, maaaybe one of my greatest regrets would be how I let opportunities like these slip past. Me stepping back, and expecting others to step forward when they actually step back even further. That's the thing about me: I never ever take the first step, and I really admire those who do. Lack of initiative and pure blindness on my part, I guess. Somehow, though, I really love these people even if I don't know them that well. I've always wondered how it worked yknow, how it's possible to not know someone well and yet love that person still. Now I get it. :)

Hehe today I remembered some of the stuff we talked about in vietnam and (this is such a girly thing to do but) I remembered we made lists of traits we wanted in our ideal guys. And I realised that my list has expanded since then hahahahahaha just goes to show how critical I'm getting. Ahhhh I want someone who would sing I See The Light (from Tangled) to me everyday I keep listening to it over and over again recently and it's the sweetest song ever!! Remind me to play it at my wedding k. And and someone who's a dreamer. And whom I can share silence with and still enjoy it. Haha you get the point. 

Sigh I miss vietnam ): what happened to the good old days when the kids in go vap meant the world to us and studies were pushed to the back of our minds. And Forever and Always (parachute!) and One Boy, One Girl (collin raye!) were playing on repeat in our heads :)

magical things

"In college, I used to underline sentences that struck me, that made me look up from the page. They were not necessarily the same sentences the professors pointed out, which would turn up for further explication on an exam. I noted them for their clarity, their rhythm, their beauty and their enchantment. For surely it is a magical thing for a handful of words, artfully arranged, to stop time. To conjure a place, a person, a situation, in all its specificity and dimensions. To affect us and alter us, as profoundly as real people and things do. 

I remember reading a sentence by Joyce, in the short story “Araby.” It appears toward the beginning. “The cold air stung us and we played till our bodies glowed.” I have never forgotten it. This seems to me as perfect as a sentence can be. It is measured, unguarded, direct and transcendent, all at once. It is full of movement, of imagery. It distills a precise mood. It radiates with meaning and yet its sensibility is discreet. 

When I am experiencing a complex story or novel, the broader planes, and also details, tend to fall away. Rereading them, certain sentences are what greet me as familiars. You have visited before, they say when I recognize them. We encounter books at different times in life, often appreciating them, apprehending them, in different ways. But their language is constant. The best sentences orient us, like stars in the sky, like landmarks on a trail." 

- My Life's Opinions, Jhumpa Lahiri

Sometimes, I wish I could write better, drown myself in pools and pools of beautifully crafted words. But unfortunately, I lack this ability and so my words never seem to hit the right note. I wonder what it feels like though, to write something that people read and go 'that's exactly what I thought', to be able to stir up such deep amazing emotions in people, yet so effortlessly. It must be a gift. And one that should be shared with everyone. Because the one thing we humans need most is to know that we're not alone.

Anyhow, I'm pretty glad this week's over, been breaking down so much I really don't quite know what's got into me. I think it's mainly because I put so much at stake for h3 that I really feel quite the idiot. There's so much of this thing called Life that I missed while cooped up in this wormhole called Biodiversity. And it's kind of ironic, isn't it? That after a whole term and a half of biodiversity, I should be greatly enlightened about the living world. Yet here I am, thoroughly confused about Life and feeling like the most shallow person ever. Or so my narcissistic self says. Ah really need to get a grip on myself; my problems are teeny they don't even deserve to be problems at all, not when there are millions out there with much bigger problems than mine.

It's crazy really how much we sympathize yet how little we empathize.
And there are the people who make things happen, without much of both at all.
Desperately need to empathize more, only through empathy can the things we make happen actually impact people. And impact them in the right way.

Okay off to sleep now, I have this humongous pile of math that I have accumulated from the days of studying for h3 and if there is any hope of it diminishing any time soon, my sleep needs have to be met first.