To the Temple..to the temple..

I saw this little poem some where some time ago written by someone and I thought it so appropriate to share..

"Go not to the temple to put flowers upon the feet of God,
First fill your own house with the fragrance of Love.

Go not to the temple to light candles before the altar of God,
First remove the darkness of sin from your heart.

Go not to the temple to bow down your head in prayer,
First learn to bow in humility before your fellowmen.

Go not to the temple to pray on bended knees,
First bend down to lift someone who is down trodden.

Go not to the temple to ask for forgiveness for your sins,
First forgive from your heart those who have sinned against you."

To that person who wrote this..thank you..

Aiyoh..you not scared meh..?

My friend would ask me, as she put her arms lovingly round her boyfriend while we chomped down a late afternoon lunch, in a rather trendy cafe located in one of the classier parts of town. "You not scared meh?", she kept asking..."when you are old and gray and all alone, then you know", as I rolled and stared at her blandly with the white of my eyes for a good 5 seconds, before I resumed slurping up strands of my spaghetti vongolie. "Aiyah...you think both of you will be together forever meh..?", I retorted. "You see, you see...he's already looking at that sweet young thing over there while you are wrapping him so tightly over here with your tentacles"..which disrupted Brian's (not his real name) brief misadventure only to face the octopus in front of him, with the most defensive look on his face, and spurting excuses that any three year old could outdo. "Seriously Sally (not her real name either)", I reasoned with her, "you guys are going to be old too and if you two still happen to be together, you think both of you can go at the same time meh? One of you will sure kick the bucket first one..if he goes first, you will also be left alone, not scared ah?!!"..That stumped her for a while and she went back to twirling her fettuccine while absentmindedly stabbing at the pieces of ham, twirling and stabbing, and Brian throwing out furtive glances at the more attractive side of the wall now and then, and kicking me under the table as a warning not to blow his cover again.

"And besides", I said to her as a matter of fact, "I like my freedom. I like the fact that I can splurge on myself as often as I like. I get to stay out as late as I want, go anywhere I want, do anything I want and I am always available to any sweet young thing...hahaha...right Brian?"

And of course, Sally must always have the last word on any topic that we argue about ..."Well, at least I got someone here to bury me when I die...!!" as she stuck her tongue out at me and placed a big peck on Brian's cheek, leaving tiny pieces of ham on his face...

Wah..If looks could kill...

or a smile should maim, I would have been seriously injured or died many times over by now. But I'm still alive...

Why is it that people nowadays are so paranoid of a smile, a nod, a hello from strangers? Why do people give off that "do I know you?" kind of look or worse still return a friendly hi with a killer stare. A smile should be returned with a smile and likewise an acknowledgment given for any courtesy so rendered. But I guess that would just make everything too hunky dory and perfect and we insists on believing that we don't live in a perfect world anyway.

I remember a time when my friends and I used to make friday rounds at one of the more notoriously seedy parts of the city, bringing with us nothing but packets and packets of nasi- lemak (coconut-milk rice) and smiling our way through. Just so we could distribute our measly hand-outs to the not so fortunate late night workers doing over-time straddling the corridors of red-lighted shop-lots, or those self-taught "medical school interns" perfecting their already perfect injection skills, that despite the environment and the behavioral norm expected in that kind of vicinity, people there were generally more spontaneous and genuine in their appreciation, despite our intrusion into their world. People nowadays would have thought us obnoxiously presumptous then or worse, just plain silly to be making our presence felt in that special enclave. But if truth be told, I think we generally felt a lot safer and more welcomed there then.

And I must say that the warmth that emanated from those people, who were abandoned to stay and survive in that cold cold place, was definitely more real than even some of our closest friends or neighbors...

Oh Lord...it's so hard to be humble..

2 minutes and 38 seconds left..yes..

That's me staring at the stop-clock on the thread-mill machine going at 6km/hr. Started doing like 30 minute routines in the very beginning but that somehow got reduced to 5 minute runs lately. The excuse? Well, I am spending more time nowadays on the weight machines plus doing 200+ crunches every other day. This has been my everyday activity after work since December last and I am so surprised that I have managed to maintain the momentum even though it has been getting somewhat shorter and shorter times being spent at the gym lately. Still, I am quite pleased with the results I am seeing so far.

As I stare at myself in the full-length mirror each time after a work-out session, I just cannot erase that melody out of my head..without fail, each time as I look in the mirror.."...oh Lord, it's so hard to be humble...when you're perfect in every way.." at other times, it's another tune that creeps in.."I'm too sexy for my body, too sexy for my...." It's weird but I swear, I just cannot shut them out..or refrain from typical locker-room jibes at my buddies.."hey, look at these pecs..." as I strike a pose..."Ya ya ya",...my buddy would say out loud..."they look like they are turning into very nice cleavage..."

And of course, there had been rather futile attempts too to make the sculpturing process go faster by ingesting wonderful pills and doing crash diets only to give them up a week or so later. Just yesterday, I popped a yellow looking capsule that supposedly helps to keep one from eating or have thoughts about food only to have the feeling of a walking zombie for the rest of the day with the appearance of a botoxed look on my face until today. Hmm..guess that one just went out the window. Today, there's this new white oblongish-looking pill..and I am having second thoughts about popping that one into my mouth.

But I guess at the end of the day, when all else fails, I can always rely on this image of a good friend of mine who could blindly roll down a bowling alley and still make a strike each time. And to keep me arduously fixed to my gym routine, I should also maintain that image of him emerging out of the sea like some greek god ala ursula andress, in a period of 6 months or so, and back again to the bowling ball physique in just as short a time..

Hmm..vanity..

Sawaddee krraap..khob khun krraap..

Did I get that right?

Such wonderful, melodious sounding language, one could almost sing a tune out of that simple sentence, with the graceful coming together of the palms and the slight bowing of the head as those words are uttered in the most gentlest of manner, just makes the song complete. Yeah...the Land of Smiles. And I have not even started on the food. Just the thought of that makes me want to have dinner a few more times.

But I am not just talking about the language or food today. It is something in me, a seed of curiosity that perhaps some where in the line of my ancestry, I do have a higher percentage of Siam in me than what is physically obvious. Then again, I also feel an affinity towards things Indonesian, like their songs for one, that makes me wonder where I actually belong. On the other hand, those Korean movies that I find myself so engrossed with at times...."sarangheiyo" could just make me go weak in the knees. I get warmly excited too by the ringer tone on my mobile that goes..."konichiwa...konichiwa..." in excruciatingly increasing crescendo with an in-coming call and if I do not very quickly press the answer button, people near me might just start thinking that there's a "Ju-On" spirit lurking around me, waiting to gobble them up. Not very unlike my occasionally humongous appetite in a Japanese restaurant when I gobble up the sashimi or swallow the tempura, as much as I like multiple helpings of Irish stew or the typical English fish & chips at any other time.


So where does all these lead me? It can be so confusing at times. Could it be that I really was one of these many peoples in my previous incarnations and therefore somehow never quite cut off completely those silvery chords in this lifetime? Or maybe it's just wishful fascination with some things that are not quite your everyday ordinariness. But whatever it is, I like the feeling that perhaps I am actually a bit part of this great humanity and even though I may just be a number, I represent the whole in some small way..

Wah liao eh..die die also beh tahan leh..

What is it about that laugh of hers that really brightens up my day or the strange lingo among us that we are so familiar with when we speak, that a simple telephone call conjures up an image of an animated video-call instead? Nah...she's not my special special half or anything of that sort, you know what I mean. In fact, she's much better than that. She's a wonderfully great friend. One who you would not hesitate for a minute to reach out for that familiar booming laughter now and then. One who could literally turn all your miseries into a full feature cartoon.

Oh my, and her husband..he's fun too. In fact, he completes her in every way, in areas that she lacks, he more than covers up for her or rather some times leaves her even more exposed, like when she had at one time accidentally dropped her scuba mask into the sea and he standing on the hull happily posing and pointing to where the mask was drifting and before she could holler out with a thunderous commandment..."what are you doing still standing...." he was already at the bottom of the sea frantically searching, and the ashen look on his face thereafter for having failed his wife miserably for losing the mask that she had dropped, and she having to sit out her next dive.

And those days when we used to organize an extended holiday within a holiday within another holiday trip somewhere, it was as good as breathing nitrous oxide 24/7 and every meal, or rather that would be like 8 meals a day, became a gastronomic buffet competition. Amazing people really. The sight of grazing cows or the occasional stray dog would literally bring a cacophony of excitement as we drove by the countryside. God certainly knows how to create humor and innocence in a perfect combination.

Just the thought of us in a karaoke joint eons ago brings back "haunting" memories of the many many uncontrolled and unabashed, roll-on-the-floor kind of laughter. Haunting? why? because those episodes literally went into my dreams on nights after the fact. If you have heard a flattened version of a jazz classic sung with a rock rhythm, you would understand what I mean. And he truly rocked in every sense of the word. Yeah...those were the days before American Idol appeared on our TV screens. Nightmares were never the same after that. I sure hope their kids turn out better in the vocal department.

Yeah...Those were the good old days..and right now, I just need to make that telephone call..

Ah...sorry hor, should have explained earlier..

I just thought I should have at least listed down the reasons why I am getting into this blogging craze like everybody else on this planet, at least before my very first write-up. Never mind, it is still a good after-thought.

Well, I had first thought about putting down in words the so many many things that come into my head every minute of the day but just never got around to it. Plus a lot of those things would have been severely censored anyway..haha. But I've decided that it should be stories that affects me sufficiently enough for me to want to write about them and not any of those nonsensical thoughts that have a way of creeping into my head and would probably destroy every sensible neural connection that's left in my brain. Anyway, I have not decided on any particular schedule for this blog or any specific topics that i should focus on, so it'll just have to be on an ad-hoc basis. Will probably stay away from anything too heavy. Light and easy would be the general idea here.

But of course, if there is any particular issue that I come across and feel so so strongly about, I just might break the norm and lash out. So keep those helmets on standby and take cover when necessary.

If you happen to be a friend of mine, an acquaintance or known me in any way, and find that I may have described you in any of my articles or felt that you had been used as a template, please note that I was not really referring to you, it was probably someone like you but rest assured not you. And if you still feel insecure about it, do note that I will not use any recognizable name just so you can sleep peacefully at night.

In any case, if you just happen to come across my blog and enjoy what you read, by all means, do drop by again and again. But if you hate my writing, please feel free to skip along. No need to leave any comment. Thank you.