The blacklist was a time of evil. No one on either side who survived it came through untouched by evil. There was bad faith and good, honesty and dishonesty, courage and cowardice, selflessness and opportunism, wisdom and stupidity, good and bad on both sides. Failure felt very much like success.

Sylvia Plath,Edge

thank you God, whatever u are (Y.Martel changes your outlook:),for letting me get into CAP.thank you all non-bitchy friends whom i bugged with my sub-standard poems.thank you silence for exactly that.thank you, the triumvirate alliance who threatened to trample on my pride.thank you for doing as i requested (pleaded?)--to be gentle.
thank you Plath, for making me moody, because one needs to be screwed to up write.(now, isn't that true?:)

looking very much forward to attending CAP...Can't wait to find out who my mentor is..alfian sa'at, i hope.a screwed gay.does that explain itself?

"what do you tell the woman who believes her happiness lies at the other end of a Toto queue"
-alfian sa'at

anyway, com serve was (unusually)productive today. they were holding a party when i got there, to celebrate someone's birthday or something. something.don't they hate to be reminded of their birthdays?i think i may have spoilt uncle jaya.the nurses warned me abt doing tt, "girl
he'll ask u for thing,even if unecessary one"

strangely,(have been using this word too often for comfort)everyone was strangely hungry today.so that's good, right.the thing was, i kept cogitating if they knew that their time was nearing, so they might as well grab a last, full meal or something. i prefer something.

damn, this piece is good.(http://www.livejournal.com/users/epicyclical/174739.html#cutid1)
i'll never look at harry potter n gang in the sameway again.rowling would have flipped.
disclaimer:be open minded.strictly NOT for coservatives.cassie claire rocks. i posted her LOTR slasher a few months back. well, this is even better.

had com serve at alexandra hosipital(AH) yest.
quite awkward really, cos we were late and past the optimum timing.patients were drab and sullen, but u can't really hold them responsible or blame them.
a few interesting old ladies though, one of them particulary spritely, wonderfully energetic, but darren or whatshisname very rudely interuppted my conversation by tapping me on the shoulder to remind me to go home. Peggy (tt's her name) got...guarded and vulnerable suddenly.
"sorry, for wasting your time.u see, normally, i am at home alone, and only the stray cats come into my house.there's no one.i don't close the door, u see, so if i faint, then someone can help me." almost cried AGAIN (i still remember in sec 2, there was this visit to peace haven, n this lady called Dorothy told me to study hard and tt may God bless me..i started bawling after tt..so embarressing.mushroom had to spend like 1 hr comforting me..damn whatever happened to all my best friends...it's a curse, i tell u, but anyway,gross digression here..)
i didn't want to say tt i would visit her, because i most probably wouldn't, i didn't want to say tt i would see her again, because tt would mean she'ld have to be admitted into the hospital again.damn how do you say goodbye to someone you'll never see again?
the ladies there are .....
An obsure fascination with the serviettes provided by the hospital during mealtimes.they would save the pieces of serviettes, then tenderly fold them, affording the monogrammed wipers with the intricate care that one would bestow upon expensive origami paper(i still have the weird jap origami envelope thingy i forced sher to give me in sec 1)the serviettes would be smoothened, folded, not into any byzantine crane or whatnot, but a simple square. their existence, if you will, though it seems horribly undermining and apathetic to say tt, esp after Peggy's stories (too long, too many to write down here)they would then proceed to place these scraps of rubbish under their pillows or in their sea green pockets. wong fong ching.
i offered to throw away a horribly crumpled piece of tissue, she'd only allow me to do it after she had carressed it and gave it the once over..byebyedearnapkin.i gave her another one and she repeated the moribund cycle. i cldn't speak shanghainese, so i sat there smiling at her, smoothening her blanket.resmoothening them. i tried to get her to read the newspapers, but then it occurred to me tt she couldn't.
well, the next time i go there, i'm bringing along my chess set. or bridge anyone?

Train Ride to Malaysia
Alfian Bin Sa'at
I

Remember us,
on the platform, sitting on luggage
with our Casios and sweaters
playing hand-games, picking flat cigarette butts
and having mother scrub their soot off our fingers
with gruff tissue. Then recall
how we'd grope the bags like birthday gifts,
feeling for snacks, the biscuits you proudly packed.
Then, tugging father's sleeves, you asked:
"Are there cows in Malaysia?". A nod triggered
a glimmer of milk teeth, and you peering at the rails
that stretched into the infinite night. Such moments:
sleepy footsteps, a passing boy's yawn, the water-stained pebbles,
forgave us for what we were,
mistaking the train's hoot for a far-flung moo,
the thresh of its wheels for a clamour of bells.

II

There was a man, in a PVC jacket,
and shades petalled with fingerprints,
vampiring marlboros, oozing
phantoms. Cheekless and cheerless
he clutched a brown PVC bag
with a yellow-nailed hand as mottled
as the bag. The ring on his finger
gawked at us like the eye
of a crocodile.

There was a woman,
green-eyebrowed, self-permed,
who beat her son for peeling
skin off his lips. When he bawled,
the speckled sores stretched open
and cried like little mouths.

We shrank a little,
but never found it in our hearts
to judge.

III

You exchanged your seat with mine
because yours could not recline.

You waved at the station-master, expecting nothing,
but he winked back at you.

Hair cream had misted the windows
as passengers coughed and shoved.

Outside, someone's washing rustled
soft against the huddling trees-

a picnic of ghosts. The train hummed
a restless tune, impatient for the first piston-heave.

But we patted the insides of our pockets,
clutching tickets like fireflies.

Published in One Fierce Hour (1998)

ahhh... i feel better...

Had a horrible time today at VJC funfair. Spent $20 on worthless stuff, plus Miss ZXQ didn't show us ard, didn't pick up her phone, didn't call and generally ignored us. Humph, not to forget tt she maid me wait for 3/2 hrs on thurs....(YES, i STILL remember)

lemme see, the litany of complaints incl sucky food, exaggerated pricing, rude and stingy vj pple : "10 mins lar, water still boiling OK" ARGH. resolve to make hc funfair a more fun place.

too tired and pissed to blog anymore.

Plus, some stuff are best left unsaid.