Hope and a Cosmo

So I've been babbling a lot about how I'm worried about my US visa and all the blah blah blah that's involved with going away to another country. The last time I applied for an important visa it got declined so I was pretty nervous about this one.

I couldn't imagine anything worse than having my student visa declined. Everyone told me it would be fine but I was still worried. So I decided to power dress. I always do this when I'm nervous. Rely on clothes or some kind of accessory to make me feel better. I have had so many lucky dresses/shoes/bags it's not funny.

I decided I wanted to project Audrey Hepburn. Grown up but still fun. I woke up anxious but hopeful. I even managed to smile!


I have a problem smiling for the camera when told to smile on cue. My visa photo is pretty awful I look PISSED OFF. Lol. This is the closest I can get to friendly and approachable in a posed picture.

I bought this dress specially for the occasion. I figured it was elegant and still comfortable. Also it made me look more grown up. I look about fifteen normally. Recently this aunty asked me if I was in Form 1!!!!

The other kids applying for visas at the American Embassy were a lot more casually dressed. Either in a simple collared shirt and jeans, or a kid version of formal. You know what I mean. Boys who are trying to look more grown up but don't have the formal clothes to pull it off.

A striped dress shirt with a tie, pants that are not slacks. Girls who don't have a nicely cut shirt that looks awkward or an ill fitting skirt.

Anyways it took forever and at one point I wanted to pee soooo badly but I didn't dare go to the bathroom in case they called my number. The interview went pretty well.

Except for the guy implying I've been a slacker for the last 3 years of my life.

Visa dude: So is this a graduate program?
Me: No, it's an undergraduate program.
VD (hahahaha VD): But you're like 21/22. What have you been doing since you left school?
Me: Well I did A levels and then I took a year off.
VD: So you've just been relaxing?

Kurang ajar betul!! Lol. He was kinda friendly though. And when I told him I wanted to be a writer he said he hoped to see my work in ten years. Then he said,

"Congratulations! Your visa has been approved."

He was actually quite cute. Chinese American. Or at least a Chinese guy with a very convincing American accent. But I don't think you can fake that accent.

So it's done!!!!! There's only one way to celebrate a momentous occasion like this. With.....



ALCOHOL! Hehehe. *Hic*

I took my ladylike ass and had me a cocktail and a burger. Mmmmmm.

My mouth is still watering at the thought of that Downtown Tokyo burger. Deep fried softshell crab. Wasabi mayo. Rocket. Heaven. Mmmmmm.

Must I paint you a picture?

Lately I've really had to plan my life around taking meds and being really careful about what I eat and don't eat. All part of the process of recovering from anemia. It's also a gradual start to rethinking how I live to deal with an underlying condition I've been diagnosed for a while.

It gets depressing as hell sometimes. And I will be very glad if I never have to walk into a hospital/drs office in the next year or so.

I was getting my medical for the states sorted and my mum said she had lost my baby immunization book. So we had no proof of my shots. The doctor said I would have to get quite a few shots again. Including the polio one I think.

Geez man...if I'm 21 and have no signs of developing polio thus far what are the odds right? I was really pissed at my mum...specially since she had my brother's baby book.

Maybe a bit unfair since she probably wasn't expecting that to come in handy 20 years later. But I didn't really want to get anything more jabbed into me.

Things are looking up though! She found the baby book. Due to my guilt tripping about her being a negligent mother who loved my brother more (I know, I'm going to hell) she went through her records a third time.

She finally found it. So I can skip the unnecessary shots. Yay!

So even though it feels like I'm swimming upstream sometimes I have to remember it's not all bad. It could be worse.

And something I didn't know I wanted is just around the corner waiting to make me happy. I just know it.

Now I just have to believe that for a while.

I'm dreaming of a different horizon

I woke up this morning smiling and so happy. I haven't done that in a long time. Which is a shame...life's too short to be sad all the time. Not that I'm sad all the time. Just bored a lot of the time.

I'd had the most amazing dream. Sam was in it! I was just so happy to be with one of my oldest friends, even if it was just a dream. Sappy huh?

But I really miss all my friends. There's a long list of people who are not here anymore and may never come back to Malaysia.

Sam, Ming, Son, Galvin, Marsha, Marcus.

Not that long. But out of that list I've known some of those people since I was seven...been friends with them since I was nine or ten. And now I only get to see them once a year and who knows what will happen when we all start work in different corners of the world.

I must have been having a major nostalgia trip last night because I started thinking about my trip to Sabah. It was one of the best holidays I've had in a long time. I got to hang out with Son in her hometown and see a part of Malaysia that I've never really seen.

Everyone's moving away and I can't wait to as well.

I'm a little nervous about my visa after my British visa fiasco last year. I hope that all goes well with my US visa. I'm waiting for my I-20 form from Sarah Lawrence and hoping it won't mess up my travel plans to NZ. Sigh...I hate bureaucracy.

There's nothing to do but wait.

Changing Perspective

Sometimes the things you've always known change. The truth, once immutable, becomes laughably false.

Maybe because you've changed your position. Instead of standing with your nose to the painting you're standing across the room and can see the vulgarity of the whole picture.

Or you have a vital piece of information that makes everything else you've ever known turn hollow and devoid of meaning.

But it's nice to know that some things never change.

Like the fact that my mum's banana pancakes are the best.

:)

Bring Forth the Flux Capacitator!

Dunno what my title means? Shame on you if you were a kid from the 90's. Now go watch Back to the Future.

I watched all the movies from that franchise endlessly as a kid. But the original is the one that I remember best.

Because I like writing and literature I tend to end up analyzing things too much. When you have spent a lot of time extracting the different connotations of a word used in a sentence or a poem it's probably not too far fetched to say you're like that in real life.

I'm not anal retentive. I swear, though I think that I might have an oral fixation.

This habit gets worse (the analyzing, not putting things in my mouth) when I have too much time on my hands. Lately, whether due to nostalgia or not I'm not sure, I've been reading my old journals.

It's funny to look back at what I was thinking and doing two or three years ago. Some of it is painfully naive and some of it surprisingly informed. Some parts of my journals seem to have this sense of terrible foreshadowing...reading it now it's all filled with dramatic irony. Seeing as how things turned out.

So would I do things differently if I could go back in time? Some things, but not everything. Some things were meant to be and some things were just mistakes.

I used to be obsessed with the idea of erasing some of my memories, courtesy of watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. But you know what I think now? There's nothing freeing about divorcing yourself from the past.

Your past is there for a reason. You have the choice to learn from it. Without it you could make all the same mistakes again.

So I guess...no regrets.

But I'd still say, "Meet me in Montauk."

I got my mojo back.

Yessssssss.

XD

Alone Time

Part of what drives me crazy about being at home all day is not having alone time. Sure I could lock myself in my room...but it's not the same.

So I went out under my father's slightly disapproving eye (omg I feel 16 again!) to go look for second hand books.

I've decided to read all the Jane Austen there is...and actually just catch up on my reading in general. I feel like I've missed out on all the really great classics due to school, general laziness, and other things.

It was so nice to go look at books and wonder at all the potential of a good story in the pages. To thumb through, look at the recommended books, think of what I could read next. I always end up buying books...not always reading them. I have a lot of unread books waiting for me.

Right now I'm reading Pride and Prejudice (Marsha said we can't be friends unless I read this...and I see why). Still labouring through the last 100 or so pages of The Golden Notebook...and itching to read something new already.

It's kind of the middle of the year but I feel like making some resolutions:

• Read more
• Get into a writing schedule
• Tidy my room (this btw has been on my to do list forever and will always be something I need to do...sigh)

I'm looking at least another month of enforced rest to recover. Grr.