The Current Situation

A couple of months ago, I noticed how clear the air was. It was unusual. I mentioned this observation to people, I believe I wrote about it in my journal, I know I included some words about it in my mood tracker.

I think I realized what it was today. China had shut down and the lack of emissions from there had had an effect all the way here.

Now we're shut down, too. Tomorrow is the inflection point, I think. Seventeen days after shutdown. The skies have been remarkably clear almost every day.

For the past few weeks I've been thinking it would be Wrong, somehow, to let this situation pass without making some sort of Post in this Blog about it. It's Historic; there should be a Record.

Anyway, this is that post. Perhaps there'll be more but there probably won't.

I'll leave this one untagged also, future Shaun is welcome to come through and add tags whenever he's got the free time and energy for it. But dude, go change all the "jealous"es to "envy"ies first. It's still bothering me.

Anyway to conclude, here's a poem that I didn't write:

The Second Coming
BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

Turning and turning in the widening gyre 
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere 
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst 
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand. 
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out 
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert 
A shape with lion body and the head of a man, 
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, 
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it 
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. 
The darkness drops again; but now I know 
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, 
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, 
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

First of February, Twenty Twenty

Dang, so today was a pretty great day. Saturdays usually are. Work from home, really chill. No need to commute to or from the office so that's an extra 40-ish minutes each day, and it means that 3pm (yeah sorry 25-year-old Shaun, I decided that using the 24-hour-clock all the time was not really conducive to clear communication so I've walked back on it a bit. A lot.) rolls around I can go right from work to a bunch of YouTube videos that have accumulated in my tabs and have been sitting there since before the shift.

Had a tweet go kinda big, there was a funny tweet about some new PETA nonsense, so gave the tweet a like then wrote a reply calling out the organization for killing animals, which linked to this article in The Atlantic.

Ate a tasty homemade lunch.

Really the only kinda not-great things about life is that I don't have a lot of money at the moment (I mean, I have an okay or almost okay amount in my savings and I've got some crypto investments doing fairly well, enough for a plane ticket to anywhere if I book far enough in advance), my glasses frame broke (but the tape holding them together is working fairly well and I've already got replacements ordered), and another Fairly Big Thing possibly looming as the result of a Very Big Thing that happened a few months ago. 17-year-old Shaun would've just outright said what those things were, but I guess I've learned some discretion in the intervening decade. Well, perhaps not enough. The Very Big Thing is that my dad died, but I don't want to write about it here since this is (was?) supposed to be a post about the good day I had.

Would've put this on my Tumblr, but I've just left and so according to the pattern of past behaviour it'll be another two years before I'm back. Could've put this in r/vent but, uh, meh. I wanted to update this blog outta nowhere anyway. I think it's kinda funny.

I have a website, I've owned the domain for a while but it doesn't work and hasn't for a while. Used to point to my Steam profile, not sure why it stopped working.

But yeah, good day. It's nice to stay home and just watch a lot of videos and read a lot of stuff and possibly check out a podcast after this. Just kinda wish I had more money. Perhaps I should get a more difficult job, or move to someplace where the currency is a lot stronger.

Am I gonna tag this post? Nah. Perhaps I'll come back to it and tag it someday instead of making a new post. Yeah, if I ever wanna interact with this blog again, that's how I'll do it.

20th of November 2015

Friends. Food. Music. History. Crocodiles. Hunger Games. Luxury.

Friday was one of the best days I've experienced so far.

That's noteworthy, so here's a note. I intend to tag this in future; wanna head to bed now.

=D

I have a girlfriend and she's really rad. I should write more but I'm really [not? - edit from the far future] feeling like a blog post right now.

Diary Entry for Today (If I Had a Diary)

From here.

Woke up at 5am so I would have time to get breakfast and give my old boss a ride to work before the shift starts at 7am. Had a magnificent breakfast at McDonald’s. It was extremely filling, which was good because I hadn’t eaten at all yesterday.

Drove to the station to wait for my old boss. Listened to music while walking up and down a divider practising my balance. Despite the sun not yet even having begun to rise, it was still pretty damn hot, so I returned to the car. Took a ghetto shower by applying hand sanitizer to the underarms. Continued listening to music and reclined the chair. 7 minutes before he was supposed to show, I texted asking for a bottle of water. Got no reply. At 6:30am, I gave him a call. No answer. Sent a text. No reply. At 6:43am I gave another call, no answer. Got a text saying he missed his alarm and that I should go ahead. Replied “Ok” and went ahead. Didn’t really mind; earned me some brownie points.

Arrived at work just in time. Arrived still listening and singing to music ‘cause it was Sunday and none of the other departments work Sundays so I wouldn’t’ve been disturbing anyone. Set up my desk and started calling. Got assigned a buddy to train. This is excellent because it means that for one hour he’ll do all the typing, and then for another hour after that he’ll do the calling, too, and all I have to do is listen and tell him how to do stuff better. He was a good learner with a bit of an accent and only a wee bit of BO, so it definitely could’ve been worse. Could’ve been better, too, though. He could’ve been a girl with no accent. Would’ve been better for me and the respondents.

Anyway, we got a very good amount of completes and I was able to teach him quite a bit. Had a good idea for an ask on Tumblr and an even better idea for work. Also went through my old texts to pass the time and realized that I suck at texting. Being half-Asian does not prevent the straight white boy curse, I guess.

Approached my old boss and temporary boss to see if I could speak to the guy in charge of the department tomorrow about coming in as an assistant team leader for my internship. Old boss says forget temporary, just come in as assistant team leader, and don’t mention the internship. Previous internship offers were RM500 from another company and RM1200 from my dad. Old boss says I can easily get RM2000. That’s slightly more than the average wage in Mexico. It’s more than my older brother is earning. It also means I’ll be my younger brother’s boss.

Take a break and sing some more in the smoking area. Again, it’s Sunday so nobody’s there and I’m free to belt out My Way and Your Love Is My Drug (it was on shuffle) before returning to work. Got a few more completes and then called up my brother and some friends to see if I could convince them to come in tomorrow to boost attendance and thus make a good impression.

Realize I need new clothes now. Realize I should probably talk to my dad about what’s gonna happen to my allowance. Plan a dinner; I’ll pay.

Come home. Meet younger brother. Ask him if he’s seen the new boss around the office. “What, the brown guy?” he says. I tell him no, this new guy is more Chinese. Kinda white, too. Really handsome. Very intelligent. Enormous penis. Plays a lot of DayZ. Has a younger brother who’s on DotA all the time, always yelling. He only figured it out on the last line.

Went to get a haircut and a shave with my brother. Found a newspaper at the barbershop reminding me that Obama is in town. Obama has aged significantly since he was inaugurated around six years ago. He got the white hair and wrinkles and stuff.

Exit the barbershop and realize it is flooding outside. It’s monsoon season; the papers said it’ll be raining like this every afternoon at around this time for the next three weeks or so. And yet we still have a water shortage. Weird world.

Brother runs in the rain to get the car, I wait for him. The perks of being a boss.

Get in the car relatively dry, come home, try to buy “Like a Boss” .mp3 from Amazon. “This service is only available in the US”. Fuck you, then. Torrent the song. Test it out, too quiet. Download from YouTube. Too quiet. Realize my iTunes volume slider was just really low. Turn it back up. Torrent song again. Realize it is the exact same as the YouTube rip except double the bitrate and read-only. Finagle with the file until it is editable. Rename it to fit my file system. Create 64kb/s version for phone. Put on phone.

Go to Tumblr. 5 nice asks from 2 rad people. Ask Bailey the thing I thought of in work. Save a copy of the text in case I wanna ask anyone else. Begin answering ask. Write diary entry for today. Move on to next question.

Edit from 2020: I ended up not getting the promotion and also wow, apparently I was quite an asshole about it. Yikes.

21 and some of 2013

The night before the day of my 21st birthday was quite nice. I invited a bunch of people for dinner but 80% of them couldn't make it so in the end it was just Joanna and Amanda and me at Jake's. We ate a lot of good food and listened to a lot of good music. Well, I ate a lot of good food. The girls weren't as hungry. But yeah, the music was good.

I then drove us up to Genting and we arrived at the resort right as it turned midnight, so fortunately I did not have to turn 21 inside a car park. We had hot chocolate and I got a sexy card from Jo and some delicious repurposed Valentine's Day cupcakes from Geraldine via Amanda. I also got cookies and candy. It was a very edible batch of presents.

We went to the casino and I gave Jo my wallet so I wouldn't overspend. I went in with RM100 and won RM35, so that was nice, but I also lost RM135 so that was less nice. It was still really fun, though, and I was expecting to lose it all from the start so it all went according to plan.

We were supposed to go clubbing or for karaoke afterwards, but Jo and Amanda were tired so I just dropped them off at their houses and spent some time on the computer at home.

I didn't sleep so well because Jan kept opening the curtains to let the light and heat into the room. I woke up at 4pm and Papa gave me a lecture about expectations and dinner or something and he made it pretty clear that he didn't want to go out for dinner and that he'd rather eat in, so I decided to go get some McD's with Jan. Jan was busy with DotA 2 so I went to swim first. While I was downstairs, Papa sent me a text but he received no reply and got upset. When I came back he gave me a long talking-to because everyone was upset that we weren't going out to eat. After that we went for pizza. While everyone else was eating, I went out to get a Pepsi. When I came back, my classified chicken pizza was not there. Apparently the order was mixed up. I wanted to go out and get my own pizza but Papa demanded that I eat the pizza we had gotten so I stormed into the kitchen because I was upset at having to eat pizza that I didn't even want on my birthday. Mama tried to calm me down but she did so by invading my personal space with a pat on the shoulder. When I tried to swat her hand away, Jan came into the kitchen and told me not to "fucking hit mum" and attacked me. After things calmed down I left because I didn't want to be at home. Ian was there, too, and he kinda stank. I don't think he showers very much now that he's moved out.

I went to get ice cream with Jo and Amanda. Along the way they implied that I need to shower more. That was kinda tough to hear but I'm glad they were honest about it. Now I can take steps to improve. I'm still pissed that this country's so hot and humid that we need two showers a day here, though.

At Baskin-Robbins, the cashier lady tried to give me sass so Jo and Amanda resolved to get her fired. It wasn't really necessary, but it's nice to know that they care and I guess it's better for the world if ice-cream people in general are nicer so I suppose I support the firing of cretinous cashiers to make ice-cream eating a more pleasant experience for everyone. Joanna wrote a post about it.

Anyway we went to McDonald's 'cause I hadn't eaten anything all day aside from the ice-cream. I had maybe my last Prosperity Burger of this prosperity period, but I couldn't finish it. I only had about half, but it was a double, though, so I guess I had the equivalent of one burger so that's fine. Anyway Amanda saw someone she hadn't seen in a long time so she went off to talk to him while Jo and I talked.

Afterwards Amanda needed to get back home and Papa wanted me back so I drove the girls back. Amanda told us about how dangerous her neighbourhood was becoming, with a burglary down the road and an attempted burglary on her house when Geraldine and she were home.

Anyway the fourth was a lot better and the fifth so far has been okay. It's also Jan's birthday today so we'll be eating out. Papa is keen not to repeat the mistakes he made on my birthday.

Also unrelated to all that, I've made new friends at work. It's nice to have someone to talk to in between calls.

Also also, the Tans came over to visit near the end of December and start of January. We watched Les Misérables and it was very good. They also came over for dinner and karaoke. Aunty Rosie made some very nice dessert. We sang karaoke. Well, I sang karaoke and other people listened. Elselyn asked a few times why I kept choosing sad songs. Sad songs are easier to sing; the machine scores you higher for crooning compared to regular singing. Anyway hopefully that's the last time I ever see her; I prefer to deal with my problems by ignoring them. For example, there's a girl at work that I haven't spoken with since sometime in 2011. I don't think I have feelings for her anymore but I don't really care to find out.

Jan got drunk near the start of the new year and he kept wanting to fight me. His friends had to restrain him. Jan is an angry person. He yells in his sleep, mostly about DotA and football.

Angela 2013

I met Angela again today. The last time we hung out was quite a while ago. We bought some books and walked around KLCC and got stuck in traffic and talked a lot. When I dropped her back off at her hotel, she gave me some chocolates. So yeah, it was fun. I got to leave work early, too, so that was nice.

The only unfortunate thing is that she's a Redditor and she thinks Tumblr sucks. Tumblr's never given awards to paedophiles, though, so it's still the better site in my opinion. I'm just weird like that.

A Pretty Good Day

Shortly after Obama was re-elected, I met my Calculus and EMA lecturer, Joel Charles, in college during lunchtime. He's got two children now that he didn't have when I was in my first semester. They are adorable. He's also no longer doing the whole lecturer thing; he's a pastor instead but he swings by HELP every once in a while for one-on-one math tutoring.

Anyway after that I managed to complete and submit an assignment with just three hours left. I've only got one piece of work left to submit this week, then I'm off to Genting with Hannah and her friends. The whole of next week is a big holiday for Diwali, so it should be way less hectic.

I also got paid today and I celebrated by eating a big sandwich at Subway. It was delicious. I'm going back to work next week to earn more money for more sandwiches and stuff.

I'm happy.

Twenty-Something Eventful Hours

By her pool reading a big book of zombie stories, I first met Angelina on Sunday night. I like her and that feeling was mutual until she met me and found out we were the same height. There were other reasons, too, but that was the most immediate one. Anyway we talked and it was nice.

In class on Monday afternoon, I found out that Elselyn was engaged. She's a month older than me and probably the one person I'd been infatuated with longest. Since I was seven to around when I was thirteen and then I never really saw her much after that. Ruben and Stefanie still visit pretty regularly, and Aron shows up every now and again, but I don't recall seeing their sister in a long time. So yeah, she's figured out who she wants to marry; meanwhile, I only just had my first date ever earlier this evening.

But yeah that first date ever was pretty nice. It was only a date in the sense that there were just two of us and I paid for the whole thing, but I enjoyed it and I got some good advice for future dates and later on in the evening there was hand-holding so I'm happy.

I need more money. I wonder how much more work I can do without compromising my studies.

Things I Will and Won't Miss about Malaysia

At some point after I get my degree, I plan to leave Malaysia and either live somewhere else in the Commonwealth or in the Netherlands. Here's what I will and won't miss about living in Malaysia.

Things I won't miss:
1) The weather. Malaysia has three seasons, and all of them are terrible.

You've got the default season, Hot, where the humidity and equatorial sunlight conspire together to make you start sweating from the second after you finish your morning shower all the way until you get back home, shut all the curtains, turn on both air-conditioners and your fan to prevent everything from melting. You can also look forward to baking inside of your car if you leave it outside for more than five minutes. More than once I've been unable to even leave the parking lot because my steering while is so hot that driving is impossible without oven mitts.

Next you've got Haze, which is what happens every year when Indonesia sets itself on fire to get rid off all the excess wood they end up with from their deforestation and everyone upwind of them gets to enjoy a post-apocalyptic version of their cities where schools close, streets empty, visibility is reduced to almost nothing, and anyone brave enough to venture outdoors does so with surgical masks and bandannas around their faces like they're in a zombie movie. Actually, Haze might be my favourite of the three seasons just because of how awesome everything looks.

Finally you've got Wet, where it rains everyday and flash floods pop up everywhere, ruining your floors if you happen to let the rainwater seep into your house, and causing insane traffic jams on all the roads. One time I was driving to pick my sister up from something or other and I had to drive through what used to be a highway but had temporarily become an urban river. When we got home I noticed that my license plate had been ripped from its screws and swept clean off. Floods are hardcore, man.

2) The traffic. Rain isn't the only thing the causes jams. Cars will also slow to a crawl if there's an accident up ahead, or some particularly exotic roadkill (think python or monitor lizard or giant rat), or if the police have decided to send an inept traffic warden to direct traffic at a busy junction, or if it's between six to nine on a weekday morning, or if it's five to nine on a weekday evening, or if it's anytime on a Friday, or for seemingly no reason at all. It's one of the reasons owning a motorcycle is so great.

3) The hotness. Not to be confused with item #1 on this list, the hotness here refers to the ratio of beautiful people to normal-looking people to ugly people in the country. While we seem to have proportionally as many ugly people as any other country, everyone else seems to be exceedingly plain-looking. Good-looking people are few and far between. It's probably part of the reason that modelling and acting for commercials pays so well around here.

My beliefs about how hot the populations of other countries come from what I've seen personally (for Holland, Australia, and the States), or from documentaries (Australia), the sounds of their voices while I'm at work (Australia, New Zealand), and pictures of my Tumblr followers. That last one might just be because everyone on Tumblr is attractive. It's weird but I challenge you to find an exception to that rule.

4) The food. Every local and tourist you ask will disagree with this point, but however much I wish I did, I do not share their tastes. A lot of the local food here is pretty okay, but everything else is either too spicy or looks like vomit. I don't care how good of an acquired taste it can be, if it looks like someone barfed on my plate and it has the texture of regurgitated toilet paper, I won't be that interested in eating it, no matter how cheap and readily available it is.

Also western food is amazing and freshly-baked bread is amazing and the candy overseas is amazing and those are all things that are nowhere near as common here as they are in, say, the Netherlands or Australia or  New Zealand. Also also, bacon. Malaysia is a predominantly Muslim country, and as such most places do not serve pork. This means no bacon burgers, no bacon pizzas, no bacon anything. It's the worst, you guys.

5) The accents. Malaysian accents tend to be more of the comedy variety, which is part of the reason why killing dudes is so fun in Just Cause 2 ("HE CUT ME WITH HIS WIRE THING") and the Petronas Twin Towers levels in Hitman: Silent Assassin ("You wanna boom-boom with Charlie?"). I'd much rather listen to accents of the sexy (Australia, West Coast USA, New Zealand, parts of the UK), super-chillaxed (Netherlands), badass, or unclassifiable (South Africa) variety.

6) The cockroaches. They fly, they aren't afraid of the light, they're huge, they seem to crawl onto my body way more than random chance would allow for. Also they are everywhere.

Apparently Corinna had never even seen a cockroach before she visited Malaysia. I don't seem to remember ever seeing one in any of my visits to Holland, either. There were some massive mosquitoes that one time, but that actually turned out to be a good thing because it made them so much easier to swat.

7) The ridiculous censorship. Some examples: "I ****ed a Girl"/"I kissed a ****" (actually acknowledged by Katy Perry when she performed here), "Inglourious ********", "Super Sapiens" (Hellboy), Snakes on a Plane (Which was censored for the first fifteen minutes before the board eventually gave up and let everything through except for the "Enough is enough" scene, which is arguably the best one in the movie), District 9 (Where the censorship board was confounded by the speed at which everyone was talking, which resulted in them censoring the words immediately after "Fuck"), Hancock (Where the use of the word "Asshole" was actually a plot point, but every scene with it was cut), Kick-Ass (Where nobody was censored except for Hit-Girl and anyone swearing at Hit-Girl), and The Grey (Where almost a quarter of the movie was cut because Liam Neeson yells at God).

8) The grass. Not cannabis; the actual grass beneath your feet. It's all crabgrass, which is itchy as hell and grows super-fast and doesn't even look that good. It also sucks at collecting morning dew and the ground underneath it is always waterlogged like mad for days after rain.

Things I will miss:
1) My friends and family. Once I leave the country I won't be seeing them again except on Christmases and weddings and maybe the occasional Chinese New Year. If I go to Holland, though, I will have a whole other side of my family to get to know, which could be fun. I'll finally meet my female cousins. Except for my sisters, it's all boys in this generation of Cheahs.

2) The internet. Australia's internet regulations are ridiculously backwards, and the censorship is almost worse than Malaysia's. Also laws against piracy are actually enforced in Europe, which means that I'll have to deal with being months behind American TV shows and I'll actually have to deal with EA and Ubisoft's backwards DRM which causes an endless supply of headaches for legitimate customers but does nothing against pirates.

3) Cheap stuff. Movie tickets are cheap, petrol is subsidized, electronics are cheap, food is cheap, and alcohol is cheap unless it's beer or you actually care about the quality, in which case it is crazy expensive. If I'm overseas, though, I'll probably be using a stronger currency, which will at least make buying things online relatively cheaper.

4) The malls. Like the cockroaches, our malls are huge and everywhere. If you've got the cash, you're never too far from someplace where you can get a good meal, watch a movie, get your groceries, buy a book, buy some clothes, or rush-buy a gift for someone whose birthday Facebook just reminded you it was.

So yeah, the fact that the former list is twice as long as the latter should be a good indication of my feelings about this country. It's nowhere near the worst place in the world, but there are so many places that are so much better so I see little reason to stay once I have the money and skills to survive on my own.

Staccato Roller-coaster

Friday certainly had its ups and downs. I woke up and was on the computer for a bit, and I enjoyed myself because of Tumblr and the Sims Social and also because T-Kun was online so I could talk to her for a very brief while.

I was doing my sit-ups when Hannah and Mama went out to take Ringo to the vet. I decided to stop before I was done so I could go say goodbye to him for the same reason I like to make sure I hug my parents and let them know I love them before I head out for a drive: there's always a chance, no matter how small, that that might be my last moment with them and I want to make sure it's a good one.

After the stairs and a shower, I rushed off to work. I had a stress-free day at work because I stopped worrying about the amount of completes I was going to get and just focused on the calls at hand. I also had some tea, which was nice. In between calls, I browsed Wikipedia. I went from MyKad, to Eddies, to Billabongs, to Waltzing Matilda, to the All-Black's Haka, and then back to Waltzing Matilda. I also ended up reading about the Mechanical Turk and a bit of the bombing of Dresden in between all that. I learn quite a lot in-between calls at work.

Near the end of the day, I lost a complete because the fire alarm went off. I followed the instructions pinned to my desk, but apparently we're not supposed to do that. Next time the alarm goes off and we're almost done, we're supposed to finish up unless the manager gets a call from the alarm company confirming that there's a real fire. That seems quite absurd to me, but I'll roll with it.

I asked Kelly a few questions after work and learned things. I like it when Kelly's around because then I can actually "Refer to [my] supervisor IMMEDIATELY on ANY issues" like the whiteboard near my desk says.

On Saturday, Lutfi will be in, so I won't be able to do that any more because when I ask questions from him it reflects badly on his position as a trainer, so I'll just keep schtum. As Uncle Shark(Shak? Chak? I need to ask him how to spell his name sometime) says, the boss is always right.

Anyway, I stayed back for an extra hour to finish my tabs and to memorize Waltzing Matilda. It is an incredibly catchy song. It ends in hobo-suicide, though, so make of that what you will.

The whole ride home I had the radio off while I sang the unofficial anthem of Australia. When I got home my happiness was promptly murdered when my mother told me that Ringo had died while he was undergoing an operation at the vet to remove a fluid build-up in his lungs. He had been misdiagnosed earlier in the week and so the medicine that I was forcing down his throat to try and make him better weren't actually helping. I'm glad that at least my last memory with him was giving him a goodbye stroke before he went off to the vet instead of fighting with him to get him to swallow pointless pills.

Despite all that, I still had a craving for karaoke that I had let build up all throughout the time I was at work, so I took the set and plugged it in Susanna's TV and we sang together for a while until it was time for dinner and mature grown-up conversation with Uncle Shark, Papa, and Mama.

I left at one point to check my computer, and I found the Secret Recipe website, so I gave the local branch a call to make sure they were still open. I then drove down to pick up some chocolate indulgence for Hannah, because chocolate cake is my default response to sadness among women. When I got home, I put it on a plate with a tiny spoon and then I brought Mercy and a glass of cold water over to Hannah's room. Mercy ran off and Hannah told me that she didn't like cake. She ate half of it anyway, though, and I got to have the other half. I gave her Faith to replace Mercy as role of comforter-in-chief for the next week. Until the ninth of September, 2011, he is her cat.

I then went and had a wee bit of wine and some conversation with my parents and their friend. I have learned from past experience that nobody tells me anything if I blog about everything they say, so this paragraph will be intentionally left vague.

Anyway after that I went on my computer for way too long. I was on Tumblr for a long while and then I read this and then I made a long blog post. I guess after that I'll take a shower and go to bed for a short while before waking up early for the weekend shift, where I will earn a lot of money for a lot of work, and after that it will be Geraldine's birthday party and I will be bringing the karaoke. It looks like it will be a difficult, then very fun day for me.

But yeah, rest in peace, Ringo. Even though you couldn't possibly find a better owner than Hannah in your next eight lives, hopefully you'll at least last a bit longer on your next few times around. Go make some friends your age who will actually want to play with you, and never ever lose your questioning meows. Those are adorable.

Another Good Day

Work was good. Ian and I logged out early because completes had ceased coming in for about half an hour, so we were quitting while we were ahead. I spent some time researching the Virgin Mary. It says in the Bible that Jesus had four brothers (Simon, James, Joseph Jr, and Jude), but apparently according to Catholic and Lutheran doctrine (or dogma, I forget), Mary never lost her virginity to Joseph so these "brothers" were either children from Joseph's dead wife who was never mentioned (the Catholic explanation) or actually his cousins or close relatives (the Protestant explanation).

I went to dinner at Joanna's house. Kuberan, Milan, Amanda, and Geraldine were there, too. I asked them about it. Amanda said that she had been taught in some Catholic class that Mary had lost her virginity after she married Joseph, which I found weird because that is a progressive Protestant concept, not a Roman Catholic one. Kubes called his priest who confirmed that I was right and Catholics believe she was always a virgin. We never found out whether his priest subscribed to the dead wife or actually cousins explanation.

Anyway we had a delicious dinner and I found out that I have a lot in common with Joanna's dad. Next time I want to watch a movie and Jan and Hannah are too busy or poor to tag along, I'll go with him instead.

After that we did some karaoke for a few hours. Joanna's family has the exact same system as we do (Singstar). I was thus familiar with all the songs and managed to score perfectly on just slightly less songs than Joanna's mum, who was at one point an actual singing coach. That felt good. We had fun. I got to sing Tell Laura I Love Her and My Own Prison and Creep. Everyone seemed to enjoy watching me sing Creep for some reason. I scored 91 with that one, because I can identify with the lyrics.

As we left, Joanna's mum said to one of my friends that he should be more like me during karaoke, because apparently, whether I can or cannot sing, I always do it with gusto. That was the nicest backhanded compliment I've received in a while.

So yeah, even though we didn't get to swim or practice Salsa, I still had a good time.

Anyway I got back home and went on the Sims Social and Tumblr for far too long. I will need a long nap after work. Also I bought a new soundcard and headset for my computer, which means that I can finally use Skype, which is excellent for my social life.

This post is probably a one-off thing.

The End of This Blog (Probably)

I should've stopped blogging ages ago. People let me in on so much more gossip now.

Anyway this'll be the last post in a long time (or ever), so I might as well sum up what's happening in my life now: First semester at SEGi for my Bachelor's Degree in Civil Engineering is almost over (finals at the end of the month), I'll be going for an interview at Datacom for the Roy Morgan position when my semester break starts (and I'll be shaving my rather pathetic attempt at facial hair right before that), all the shows I watch have begun airing their season finales so I will have to find something new to watch in the meanwhile, and I have not made (m)any new friends but that's okay because my old ones are still awesome.

Yeah, that's about it.

So this is my life now

New Year's Eve was fun. Amanda and Joanna came over. Geraldine showed up with her friends and we all played taboo.

Chinese New Year was good. I got a lot of money since it was also my birthday. Ian got me a slice of cake. Jan bought me McDonald's. I gave him RM20 for his birthday. Hannah got me No Country for Old Men.

I read Hannah's present at SEGi, which is where I'm doing my Bachelor's in Civil Engineering. It's a four-year course, so I'll be there for a while. Most of my classmates are from the middle East, which is interesting. One of the subjects I'm doing is Engineering Mathematics, which should go smoothly because I already did that at HELP.

Aron visited. Hannah forgot to return Ruben's hat to him.

We got a package full of licorice from Corinna. When I thanked her on Facebook, she replied that it had been sent on Christmas, which meant that it took more than a month to get to us. Anyway, the licorice was pretty great.

I've been playing Minecraft a lot. It's a very good game. Recently I made a giant mob trap in the sky and a big pit in the ground and a very large staircase into that pit. Also, Ian found some 3D glasses that came with his graphics card, so I can play the game in 3D anaglyph mode and that is pretty great.

My dad's letting me get a car and he's given me a budget. I plan on getting something small and cheap. Jan's learning to drive now, so I guess he'll be sharing it with me.

That's about it, I guess.

Oh, I also went with Amanda to drop Walker off at a shelter. After all her puppies died she started barking all the time and the neighbours started complaining. It was quite sad to let her go.

Also, Hannah got a kitten from her friend, Rebecca. His name is Ringo and he is extremely cute. The other cats don't get along with him so well, but most of the time they keep their distance. The only downside to the kitten is that sometimes he really stinks. Hopefully that'll stop when we castrate him.

Almost 2011

So it's almost a new year. Christmas was nice. I visited Amanda and Carmeni. Amanda had a nicer tree and tastier food but Carmeni's family served a really tasty drink.

Amanda's dog, Walker, had eight puppies. Six of them died, I buried one.

I've been sleeping a lot. It's been nice.

I finished watching all the Community episodes yesterday. It's a good show.

Hannah had me drive her around a lot to visit kittens and such.

For Christmas, I got The Road from Hannah (dang good book; I read it in a day) and a bunch of Coca-Cola contour glasses from Amanda (so cool!) and I got some jeans, a belt, and a polo shirt from my mum. I also got a flashlight from my dad, I think. I drew Hannah in the Secret Santa, so I got her a "How To Take Care of Your Kitten" book and a Buzz Lightyear watch and some other stuff.

Tonight there is going to be a New Year's Eve party at my house but not many people are coming. Amanda and Joanna will be there, which is good. We'll probably order pizza. I got the keys to the roof so we'll have an awesome view of the fireworks, which will be nice. I also got, like, a buttload of snacks so that should be good, too.

Aside from that not much has happened.

Summary (18/11/10 - 10/12/10)

A few weekends ago we were in 1U and Corinna was sick. We ate Carl's Junior and it was pretty gross.

I applied for another job at Datacom and met some other people but then I changed my mind because my dad didn't want me working after my contract expired anyway. While waiting for my aptitude test, I met some people from HELP.

I got a new chair from Ikea. It's the same as the old chair, but not broken.

Angela was in Malaysia and she was bored. She came over to KL and her family was cool with me showing her around so I went and drove her and her cousin around KL. Well, basically I took them from some very-difficult-to-find house in Cheras to a place in town near Petaling Street, then we walked and took the LRT and walked around KLCC and took pictures and drove back to my house. I showed Angela the view and she said "hi" to Hannah but nothing else because Hannah was shy. Angela's cousin and Corinna could talk because they were both from Germany and new to Malaysia. Angela's cousin didn't speak much English anyway; just Chinese and German. I don't know her name. The four of us went for dinner with Angela's family. It was surprisingly good for Chinese food.

Also, I got a very bad haircut. I criticized the barber too much.

I lost RM200 from my savings so I left work early and I found it again. My boss got me to work eleven and a half hours on my last day to make up for it. It took him almost two weeks to pay me after the job was over.

I drove to see Rebecca and David's cat's kittens with Hannah. We're adopting one of them in January, but we don't know which yet.

I watched Tangled (actually, since we're in Malaysia, I watched "Rapunzel: A Tangled Tale") in 3D with Ian and Jan the day after my work finished. Later on that night I went back to the mall to watch The Social Network with Hannah. They were both excellent movies. I teared up a little during Tangled. I am very easily moved by movies. Hannah has a crush on the leads from The Social Network.

The next day I visited Amanda and Milan and Kaminie at Devi's and then I went to watch Tangled in 3D with Kaminie and Amanda and her four nieces and one nephew. I wanted to see the movie in 3D so I paid for the difference between the 2D and 3D pricing. We all enjoyed the movie except for one niece who fell asleep. It was totally worth it. Also, another niece kept accusing me of lying. Children are strange.

The day after that I went to get my new passport with Jan and my dad, and then I went to PetroSains with Corinna. We walked a lot and my feet hurt. I bought Joanna's birthday presents last-minute from the same bookstore where I found The Zombie Survival Guide and The Company. We also dined at Chili's for two hours and bought some polo shirts. The polo shirts were very expensive. The black one looks nice on me. PetroSains was fun until the last hour, which was a bit draggy.

Joanna's birthday was the next day, and it was nice. The theme was black and white and I think I looked okay, except for the haircut. It was Chinese food and I had a lot of peanuts. There was a dude there who was studying in Germany. He was attending the second-best university in the country and he was living above a peepshow in the red light district. I talked to him for a while. Also there was a video made by Amanda and Kaminie and there was a bit near the end where I embarrassed myself and it went on much longer than it should've. It was all in good fun, though, so that was all right. Joanna liked her presents, so that was good.

After the party we went to Joanna's house and I stepped in dog shit. I managed to get most of it off my shoes. We were supposed to go clubbing, but Milan had to go home early and I was kinda tired so I decided to go home, too.

The next day was Sunday, and that was okay.

After that I went to Singapore with Corinna and Jan and Hannah. We were helped out when we got there by Uncle Danny. He's a guy who knows my dad. We had some trouble at the hotel, but he paid for it. My dad paid him back later, presumably. The hotel was okay. I was in a room with Jan and directly under us were Corinna and Hannah. Jan is a surprisingly tolerable roommate.

We spent the first evening on Orchid Road, which was okay. I had some McDonald's. It's basically the same as the one we have here, except with McWings (which are good) and the McCafe (which is everywhere except Malaysia, apparently). The fries were only very subtly different, but in a good way. Also it was more expensive.

The day after that we went to the zoo, and we saw a lot of animals. The white tigers were great; one of them reminded Hannah and me of Faith. The baboons were fun, too. Jan loved them. During feeding time they were all riled up and they kept having crazy baboon sex. One of them was doing backflips. I thought that was pretty cool so I threw bananas at him and he caught most of them.

We went to the night safari and that was good, too. Hannah and Corinna really liked the otters. Corinna also liked the bats; Hannah was kinda terrified of them. She didn't get as scared as she does when frogs are around, though. I still don't know why she's scared of frogs.

On our last day we went to the Singapore Flyer, which is basically a really big ferris wheel. It was okay. They had a Subway there; that was really good. It had real bacon and ranch sauce but I only noticed that after I ordered my sandwich. It is my biggest regret of the trip.

We went back home and we were picked up by Ian, who had had a bad day. He was stuck in traffic for three hours. Later on that night I had to pick my dad up from the LRT station with Hannah. My dad bought us Twister Fries from McDonald's, though, so it was worth it.

The next day I drove my dad to the airport so he could go to Penang. Hannah also went to Penang, with Ebony. In the evening I had Outback Steakhouse with my mum and Corinna. There was a nice symmetry to that, since Corinna had gone to Outback Steakhouse with Ian and Jan and my dad when she first arrived here. I ate a little too much and ended up throwing up outside. It was probably my most expensive puke so far.

I woke up early the next morning to drive Corinna to the airport. Our goodbye was pretty pathetic. I said "bye" and she said "what?" and I said "I said bye" and she said "oh" and that was it. I listened to the Beatles on the way back. The drive seems to get shorter each time I make it. I must've driven to the airport at least a dozen times this year.

And now we're at today, I think. I went to town with Ian and my mum briefly, and then I had McDonald's for lunch. I'm thinking of maybe having McDonald's again for dinner. I want to try the Prosperity Burger. Amanda says it's really good. I know it isn't; it wasn't good the past five years when I tried it and it isn't going to be good this year, but I want to try it again just in case it is. Also the Twister Fries are really good.

Condoms

Jan, Hannah, and I walked into a 7-Eleven and bought a pack of condoms last night. It was the funniest thing I've done all week.

I would write a detailed post but I think this is one of those things that's best left up to the imagination.

Possibly the Second-Last Wednesday I'll Have with this Job

Today I woke up, like normal, and I slept through my first two alarms, like normal, and I read my Bible, like normal, and then Hannah and my mum arrived home from the Netherlands, which isn't normal because it doesn't happen very often at all.

I said hi and I hugged my mum and I went to the kitchen to get some water. My mum had brought home loads of candy and biscuits and licorice in many bags of luggage. It was delightful. Hannah had brought back stories of the speed of the internet in the Netherlands. 800kb/s, she'd said. Five minutes to download an episode of How I Met Your Mother. Lucky Dutch.

I opened the least-best candy first (saving the best for last has always been kinda my thing). It was the Engelse Drop. I had some of that and it was nice. I can't wait to get to the other stuff.

My mum showed me pictures of the funeral, and also a picture of Oma a week before she died. Oma looked healthier than you'd expect from someone who was a week from death. She looked quite grey afterwards, though. I think it's a bit morbid to take pictures of the body at a funeral.

I'm glad that my grandmother had a good life and that she raised a good family. She's with her husband now and I guess that means she's glad, too.

Corinna was at home, which was unusual. I asked her why she wasn't at BLTC and she said that it was a public holiday. My mum said that BLTC was over for the year except for a party on Friday. Corinna would be around a lot more now. Today, she was meeting up with Grace from BLTC to go shopping for dresses or something in Mid Valley at 11. I told her I could drive her there on my way to work.

I went to do my exercises while Jan took a shower. He was going to Mid Valley to meet Cherie and her sister and Adriel and Gabriel. I told him that I could drive him there but he said it was at ten, which was a bit inconvenient.

I took a shower and went on the computer for a bit, but Tumblr kept dying. I asked Hannah if she knew what was up but she didn't. She wasn't on Tumblr in Holland; she was too busy hanging out with Stefanie. Anyway, Tumblr started working again and I answered a question and asked some questions and then I turned off my computer and got ready to go.

Corinna was on the phone with one of her friends from Germany or something. She didn't mind the bill, either because her parents were paying or because she had loads of money; I forget which.

We went to McDonald's for breakfast first. I had a lot to eat. Corinna had a milo. After we entered the restaurant we talked about Pepsi and Coke. Pepsi is cheaper in Germany, apparently, but everyone thinks Coke tastes better, even without the labels. We left the restaurant while talking about dreams. Corinna said she had a dream about me but she couldn't remember anything from it except that it involved Megamind somehow. I told Corinna that nobody is really interested in anyone's dreams unless they predicted the future somehow or they involved the person that the dreamer is talking to or they were about sex. Corinna said that everyone dreams about sex. I told her I don't. It's odd; I think about it all the time but even in my dreams I can't get laid.

I dropped Corinna off at Mid Valley and drove to work. I was late again. Yesterday I was late because I had spent too long on Skype talking to Sara. This time I was late because of the extra time it took me to eat a Sausage McMuffin I wasn't expecting to order.

I worked for a while and now it's late. After I'm done blogging about this I'm going to read another Machine of Death story and then I'm going to leave before the system locks me in again .

Driving, Gua Tempurung, Kuala Woh, and Cameron Highlands with Corinna

As of Tuesday the 16th of November, 2010, this post is incomplete. That's what happens when I procrastinate. It's not my fault that this is such a good, free book. Anyway:

My alarm went off at eight-ish on Sunday. I didn't wake up; I wanted to sleep more.

My dad came in at nine and told me that Corinna was waiting for me, so I woke up.

I showered and I think I may have read the Bible, but I definitely skipped my exercises. I do so little that it doesn't matter, anyway.

I packed some extra clothes and a couple of towels. I decided to put my laser in a bag, too, because why not? Also, I packed some sandals because I didn't want to ruin my shoes

I called Corinna. She had thought we would be leaving a lot earlier because I had told her at one point that I would be waking up at six. I had changed my mind the day before and I thought I told her that, but apparently I hadn't.

Before we got in the elevator I asked Corinna why she hadn't packed extra clothes. She said that she didn't mind getting wet in those clothes because they were old then Malaysian sun would dry them out pretty quick anyway.

We got in the car and I drove. We'd agreed beforehand that I would drive there and Corinna would drive back. I got to the toll for the North-South highway in less them then I thought it would take. After that we just drove and talked.

I spent a while the night before putting songs on my phone to listen to on the way there, but Corinna preferred the radio so we listened to that instead. Some good stuff came on, so I didn't mind.

We talked a bit about Mormons and Rastafarians and Jesus and the Catholic church and abortion and teen pregnancy and palm oil and contraceptives and sexual education. There was other stuff, but I forget.

We pulled into the Tapah rest stop for brunch at KFC. Corinna had never eaten KFC before. We each had a snack plate and large wedges and a box of popcorn chicken. Corinna was too full to finish the popcorn chicken, and she couldn't even look at the chicken leftovers so she just covered them with a cloth instead.

We talked about stuff. I asked Corinna when she wanted to have kids and her answer was a very specific 28, but she had no reasons behind it. I thought that was interesting.

We went to the rest of the rest stop so I could get some drinks and candy and so Corinna could try to find a toilet that wasn't a dirty hole in the ground. When we walked to the food court she almost recoiled from the smell. She said it was the worst smell she had ever smelled. It was just dried fish.

I bought a Red Bull and a Coke and some packets of Nano Nano and some Strepsils and a bunch of lollipops. I also got a razor and some glue. Corinna was gone, so I called her and told her to meet me at the car. Apparently the smell had been too much for her and she left.

I gave Corinna a Nano Nano in the car and her reaction was priceless. She reacted exactly the same way that most Malaysians do when I let them try licorice. She said it tasted like vegetables and vanilla. I didn't think it tasted like that at all. She declared it the most disgusting thing she had ever tasted. She still hasn't tried durian. Anyway, when we got back home I gave her a pack to share with her friends in Germany so she could enjoy their reactions like I enjoyed hers.

Gua Tempurung was easy to find. It's fortunate that I had a leadership camp in that area for college earlier this year.

The entrance for wet tours had ended at twelve and it was already twelve-forty, so unfortunately we couldn't go in. Well, Corinna felt pretty fortunate. She has a fear of confined spaces like submarines and space shuttles and tight crawlspaces in caves, so she was glad she wouldn't have to crawl through a subterranean river. I was a bit bummed. I had packed my boardshorts and everything.

We couldn't even go on the longest dry tour because we needed to have five people. I tried to convince three other people to come with us, but they didn't have enough time, so we ended up buying tickets for the 45 minute tour.

My dad called me right before we were supposed to go in at 1pm. I told him where we were and what we were about to do. He told me to drive safe.

The cave was pretty fun. It was quite cave-like, and I was really glad I had brought my laser. The best place for a laser is a cave, really. There were a lot of stairs and it was very humid and there were a lot of people, so we got pretty sweaty.

When we reached the end of the tour, I asked the guide if he could take us further. He said it was fine, but we'd of course have to pay the extra price as if we had gotten the ticket for the "Top of the World" dry tour. I was very pleased with this, because it meant we could stay for another hour and it would only cost three ringgit more each. A small group of other people decided to come with us, too.

The rest of the tour group started going back, but before they did I let a kid play with my laser. I figured I'd've wanted to play with a laser if I was a kid in a cave, so there was no reason to deprive him. Oh yeah, earlier on in the tour some chick asked if Corinna was my wife. I thought that was pretty funny. Corinna's exact reaction when I told her had been "What?".

Anyway, we continued to the tour to the "Top of the World". There was more walking and more stairs, but it got cooler deeper in the cave so it was alright. There was even a breeze at one point.

Eventually we came to this huge cavern that was the end point. It was, indeed, pretty high up. Previously when I had been there they turned off the lights, but the guide told me that they didn't do that any more. He could turn them off at the place with the breeze, though, so that was nice. In the meanwhile I sat with Corinna and tried to find Top of the World on my phone so I could play it and have everything be all appropriate and stuff, but I had deleted the song. I was pretty upset with myself for that.

We turned around and went to the tunnel with the breeze. I tried to talk to Corinna but she told me to be quiet because the total silence in the cave was really nice. I told her that we couldn't hear the silence even if I wasn't talking because the guys behind us always were. She pointed out that they stopped sometimes, but I didn't. She had a point, because after she said that they did for a few minutes and there was silence and it was nice.

The guide turned off the lights. My laser looked really cool in total darkness. I told Corinna to come check it out, but she didn't come.

Someone walked out of the rails to take a picture. I walked out of the rails because I wanted to walk out of the rails. Also, there was a big rock and I wanted to see if I could lift it. I couldn't. I smelled the dirt, but it smelt like the kind of dirt you get on the side of the walls in condominium basement car parks, so it was a bit disappointing.

We left the cave and we were very sweaty. Corinna still smelled nice, though. I asked her why and she said it was because of her Nivea body lotion or something. I asked her how much it was and if they made one for guys. She said yes to both, so now I know what I'm going to buy with my next pay (aside from polo shirts).

We got in the car. Our drinks were warm. We decided to go to a gas station and buy colder ones because we were still thirsty and also because we needed to refill a Touch 'N Go card so we could pay for the tolls. It cost more than RM20 to get from KL to where we were.

After we bought the stuff and I topped up my card, we got back in the car and drove to Cameron highlands. It was further down the highway than we remembered it being.

Okay, it's almost nine o'clock here at the office. I'll continue this post tomorrow.

Okay, it's tomorrow.

While driving up to Cameron Highlands, I spotted the Sufes campground, which brought back some memories of Writer's Camp many years ago and a BB camp less many years ago. A little ahead of that, I saw a sign for Kuala Woh, and I knew that that was where we had to go.

I missed the turning at first because it was on the wrong side of the road, but I found a place to turn around a little ways down. The road to Kuala Woh was not as well-maintained as the main road up to the Highlands, which made sense.

I sounded the horn as I approached a big turn in the road and explained to Corinna why. It was so that people on the other side would know I was coming so they'd slow down and stick to their side and there wouldn't be an accident.

We parked at Kuala Woh and I'm not sure how I got in my swimming pants. I think I asked Corinna to go wait by the river first.

Anyway, I went down and met her. She thought the water was dirty. I walked around in it for a bit until I found what I was looking for, and I called her over.

Hot springs are cool, especially ones along rivers because then you get the contrast of the cool river water rushing by but the hot spring water bubbling through the sand at your feet. I forgot what Corinna's reaction was but I think she was at least slightly impressed.

I put my shirt with my bag and tried to walk through the river to the other side, but I underestimated the current and was pushed a short way downstream. I hit a lot of rocks, but I didn't get seriously injured. When the water got deeper and calmer I found my footing and walked up to shore and started digging on the hot sand.

The spring water is hotter if you just dig for it because then it doesn't mix with the water from the river and get cooled down. I put a rock in the hole that I dug to heat it up. It got pretty hot pretty fast.

I talked to some Indian guys who asked where I was from and where Corinna was from. They were okay.

I waded across to the other side of the river and started digging again. I called Corinna over and got her to hold a hot rock that I had put in a hole. I think she dropped it and swore. That was funny.

I told her that I didn't want to leave until she had at least gotten her calves wet, because it was silly to come all the way out to the river and not swim in it. It took me a while to realize that she wasn't reluctant to get wet, she was reluctant to get dirty. I have to admit, the water did look kinda nasty.

I noticed a bridge over the river and how wobbly it was and I said we could leave if she went on that with me, but she didn't want to do that, either. Eventually she caved and went in the water. I took another refreshing dip and then told her that we could go, but first I wanted to shake the bridge. I ran up and shook the bridge. It was not as wobbly as it looked. It was hardly exciting.

I went back to Corinna and told her to wait by the bank for a bit while I got changed in the car. I said I'd miscall her when I was done.

She walked to the car before I miscalled her, but I already had my pants on. I asked her why she hadn't waited and she said that nobody takes that long to change. I told her the car was cramped and asked what if she saw me changing. She just did that thing where she blows air through her lips in exasperation. I dropped the subject.

We got back on the road and started driving again. Corinna told me about the dead fish she saw, and also about the dead cat she saw. Kuala Woh had quite a few dead things. Hannah and Jan and my mum went there once and there was a dead snake. Well, it was alive when they got there, but it crawled in the engine and so that's why the car makes a funny noise when it goes too fast.

And that is all I'll write about for today. I like this, pacing my blogging. I'm afraid that, by the time I get around to writing about the long conversation about sex that we had on the way back, I will have forgotten most of the details. The fact is, though, that I already have, and besides I told her that I wouldn't tell anyone until she left the country. If I do tell someone before she goes, she gets to tell everyone something that I'd rather not have everyone hear about that she knows.

I'll continue this after work tomorrow. Shit, after tomorrow there'll only be Friday. That's only two days to write about the next... five hours? Dang.

And it's after tomorrow again. Here we go.

So we were back on the road going up Cameron Highlands, and we were talking about stuff. It was a long road. It was very curvy. There were a lot of dogs on it. It was difficult to overtake people. On two occasions there were fallen branches blocking the road and I had to drive on the wrong lane to get past them. On one of the occasions I scratched the car against it pretty badly.

I can't remember what we talked about. I guess it's for the best. I've lost the inspiration to write this post. It was perhaps not the best idea to spread it over so many days. Oh well, might as well finish it for the sake of finishing it.

Um, at one point on the way to Batu Caves we talked about Corinna's friends and why her friend who slept with basically anyone would not sleep with Asians. I don't know why I remembered that or why I'm putting that here and up the story a few dozen paragraphs where it belongs, but there you go. Anyway, back to the part in the story where we're going up the curvy road.

We passed the cloudbank and kept going. It was quite high up. We rolled down the windows and the air was cool. That was nice. Eventually we saw a really big strawberry and we were in Cameron Highlands.

There was a town and we followed the road and we came across a big brownish-orange lake. Next to it was the Lakeview Hotel. It looked like Europe. We parked and got out and took pictures, then we went in to get a map from reception. Corinna went to use the toilet and I sat down in a very comfortable chair in front of a fire place and wished that I lived there. On our way out we saw someone taking scones and tea to a room. That hotel is now one of my favourite places in Malaysia. It even had a typewriter.

We checked the map and drove down the road to a tea house which overlooked a tea plantation. The tea plantation was vast and cool and beautiful. I ate some scones and had some strawberry tea while Corinna ate a slice of carrot cake and drank some plain tea. I thought it was a bit pointless to go all the way there to drink normal tea, but oh well.

I washed my hands and even the water felt like Europe. It was so cold and nice. I really like Cameron Highlands.

We went for a walk in the tea plantation. On our way in, two Dutch tourists passed us, so in addition to the trees, the smell, the temperature, and the air, for a brief moment it sounded like Holland, too. That was nice.

There was a sign that forbade people from plucking the tea leaves, so I plucked a sprig of pine or something instead. It was from I tree that I didn't see much elsewhere but it smelled very nice. I dropped it halfway through our walk and I was sad because it really did smell nice.

We talked about how I had told the girls I liked that I liked them. I think Corinna said that I shouldn't do that any more. I can't remember, though.

We took some pictures in the tea. I tried to climb up a hill but I didn't get very far. I got quite wet from all the dew and such on the leaves. It was quite drizzly.

After we got out of the tea plantation we drove back down to try and find a strawberry place, but they were closed. I pulled over across from the Lakeview Hotel and let Corinna drive.

On the way down we talked about sex. Midway through the conversation, Corinna told me that if I told anyone anything she'd said, she'd kill me. I told her that I wouldn't say anything until she left the country. She said that was alright. I told her something embarrassing about myself so if I betrayed her trust then she could betray mine.

I learned a lot about sex during that drive. I really wish I lived in Germany. Malaysia seems so boring. And the women are pretty sexually repressed here; Corinna was shocked to find that none of my friends had ever masturbated or experienced an orgasm and they all thought oral sex was gross. (I'm going to go ahead and assume that I'm allowed to talk about Corinna's reactions to what I said. That could lead to trouble. I should probably cut this short.)

The rain got worse and the sky got dark and our windows started to fog up. It was difficult to see out of them due to all the condensation, and we struggled with that for the rest of the drive. Corinna got pretty upset with the windshield for being so crap.

On the way down, I took out my laser and shined it out the window of the car and that was fun. I couldn't hit any of the nearby mountains with the beam, but I didn't mind.

We talked about vibrators and pornography and (loss of) virginity and Corinna's "type" and herpes and contraceptives and many many other things that nobody else would talk to me about so that was nice. I'd list more but I'm probably already to close to saying something I shouldn't, so I'll stop. Also I can't really remember much of the conversation.

We got back home and I said goodnight to Corinna and think I went on the computer for a bit and then I went to bed. I'm not sure. I know I felt quite depressed and lonely for some reason that night. That tends to happen after I spend a lot of time with people and then I suddenly stop being around them. The transition usually isn't so quick and it usually isn't after spending only one day with a person.

Oh well.

Hey, I'm done.

Actually, I'm not. We also went to Pizza Hut after we got back to the city but before we got home. Corinna was happy because she had been craving pizza all day. She'd never eaten in Pizza Hut before. We ordered too much food and I had a slice of pizza and it was good. I liked it. We didn't finish everything we ordered and Corinna wanted to pay for me, but I didn't want to let a girl pay for my meal so we split the bill. She ended up paying more but then again I did eat a lot less.

Okay now I think I'm done.

Friday Night Clubbing in Fragmented Thoughts (Also the Evening After)

Well I had thought this was going to be in fragmented thoughts, but that didn't really work out so well. It's still fragmented, but the style of this is still conventional enough that I didn't save much time at all. Oh well.

I have been procrastinating this post for too long. It's almost eight now, so I'll only have an hour to write this.

Clubbing on Friday was fun. Well, for the first four hours, anyway.

After I got home from work I took a quick shower and got changed and then I went with Corinna to Amanda's house. We waited and watched a National Geographic show about large crocodiles for a while.

Joanna, Amanda, and Kaminie showed up eventually with two of Amanda's cousins. One of them was named Jose. I don't know who the other guy was.

Everyone went in another car except Corinna and me, who stayed in our car as we went to pick up Milan. I drove over a bump too fast because the other car was in a big rush and we were following them.

The drive to the club was uneventful.

When I parked the car, we were approached by a jaga kereta fellow, so we paid him five bucks not to scratch our car. Corinna said that would never happen in Germany.

When we got to the club we got in for free because it was lady's night or we were on the guest list or something. The girls went to get free drinks and I decided I wasn't going to drink anything because everyone else was drinking and I didn't want Corinna to be the designated driver because I wanted to see her drunk.

I spent RM80 on drinks somehow anyway. The guys bought a beer tower and I pitched in, even though I didn't drink any. It was a Carlsberg anyway, so whatever. I also went up to the bar to get Corinna a refill but they made me pay for it because I was not a girl. I also bought a coke.

I encouraged Corinna to take advantage of the free drinks, so she ended up having fourteen of them. She had thirteen whiskeys-and-coke and a single vodka-and-lime, which she thought was disgusting. She let me have a sip of the latter and I liked it.

The whole club was pretty empty when we arrived. The dance floor was empty for quite a while. After a while two girls from the VIP section went up to dance. They had nice bodies but crap faces. That theme continued with the next group of people up on the dance floor. They went back down after a while. Something happened that made a whole big group go up, and then soon other people were going up, and then things started to get fun.

We danced. The first time the whole group of us except Corinna went up because she didn't feel like being watched by everyone or something, so after a while I went down to convince her to join us, but it took me a while to find her and when I finally did locate her everyone else had gotten off the floor. I told her that next time we went up she'd have to go, so she agreed.

Throughout the night Corinna told me how shit the club was compared to the ones she'd been to in Europe. I heard a lot about Ibiza. Later on she also gave me tips for when I was out with ladies, three of which I remember. The first was to get a polo shirt and pop the collar, because girls dig that for some reason. I know polo shirts are great. I told her I'd buy some with my next pay cheque. The second tip was to keep my hands out of my pockets because when girls see a guy with his hands in his pockets they think he's playing with himself. The third tip (actually, she said it was the "first rule") was to never ever do anything with an unconscious girl. I thought that last tip was a bit unnecessary since that's actually rape and I'm pretty sure I would never rape someone, but she stated it anyway. On Sunday I'd figure out why she was so insistent on that last tip.

Anyway, eventually we went up dancing a second time and that was fun. At one point we danced back-to-back and I thought she enjoyed that because we did it for quite a while, but every time after that for the rest of the night when I wanted to ask her if she liked it or not, I was always interrupted. In the end she asked me if I really liked it, and I said I was only doing it because I thought she really liked it, and then on the car drive back home when it was just the two of us she said that it was fun. I really actually did like it, though; dancing back-to-back with Corinna was the best part of my night. It might have been the best part of my week but then I had such a good time on Sunday. Actually, Sunday is the start of another week so I guess dancing back-to-back with Corinna really was the best part of my week.

I met my colleagues, Reena and someone else, at the club. They came in at one-something and when I asked them why they had come with only an hour or two before closing time, they informed me that the club was open until five in the morning that day, so I learned something there. Reena had been buddied up with me at work when she was nearing the end of her training. She still uses my computer in the mornings, I think. Anyway, her and her friend looked very very sexy on the dance floor. I enjoyed their dancing very much. They kept offering me drinks for a while but after I refused a few times they stopped. Well, actually, I had a few sips, but I didn't finish a glass of anything. I feel proud of myself for that.

Anyway the pattern of the night seemed to be that I would talk (yell, actually, since it was quite loud in there) to Corinna or Amanda for a bit, then the girls would go to the toilet or go off to get drinks and I'd stand in the alcove near the store room and rub two coins together while thinking, then when the girls came back I'd talk a bit more and then a nice song would come on and we'd go dance and then we'd come back when lousy songs came on and so it would repeat.

I asked Corinna which guy she'd want to dance with most in the whole club, and after the obligatory "Of course I'd want to dance with you, Shaun" line, she told me that there really wasn't anyone that handsome there. I told her to just pick the least ugly guy, but she couldn't find him either. Apparently Asians weren't her type. Too short for her.

At one point we went up to dance for a while with my colleagues instead of my friends from college, but they only seemed interested in each other so we let them be and moved down a bit, and then I turned around and noticed that Corinna was dancing with someone else, which I thought was odd, and when she didn't turn around I moved off to join my college friends and when I glanced over and saw that she was still dancing with the same guy, I got off the dance floor and went to sit down for a while and rub coins together.

Corinna came down after a while and I congratulated her on finding the least ugly guy in the club, but she told me that she wasn't dancing with him because he was the least ugly; she just thought he was a good dancer. She thought he was a weirdo, though, because he kept asking her to go low or something.

Anyway once I knew that he was a weirdo I felt pretty okay and I went back to talking and waiting and then going off to dance, but when we were back on the dance floor she was dancing with him again and then they were swapping numbers and I thought screw it and got off the floor again so I could go sulk in a corner or whatever.

Corinna and I talked at some point, probably earlier on, about how annoying it was that the emcees kept talking over the music. They didn't let the music play uninterrupted, someone always had to chip in and say something or other. At least they let Sweet Child O' Mine play to the chorus, though; last time we were there they ended it before the verse. Also, they played the theme from Outsourced. I'm not sure what the theme of this paragraph is.

Jose told me to go dance with Corinna because everyone could see how down I had gotten. I told him that I would and I did, but after that I kinda just sat around and waited for the night to end. I got pretty tired. At four fifteen-ish I decided that we could go, so I told everyone that we were going. Joanna wanted to do one last thing with someone. Milan was practically asleep for the last two hours or whatever so he had no problems with going, and the rest of them... I forget what happened with the rest of them but at four twenty-ish everyone seemed good to go, so I left. I said goodbye to Reena and her friend and I got a hug and was told to drive safe. That was nice.

When I exited the club I noticed that nobody was behind me, so I sat by the stairs and waited for them to come out. I texted them and said I was outside.

Amanda's other cousin had gone home in his own car so everyone (Joanna, Amanda, Jose, Kaminie) was going back in the car with Milan and Corinna and I. Also, we met Roshaan and Joshua at the club. That was earlier on but they left with us.

Everyone was out except for Jose, but then he went back in to say goodbye to someone. Everyone was quite drunk except for me (because I hadn't drank anything) and Kaminie (I don't know why) and Corinna (she's German; even after fourteen drinks she was barely buzzed). Milan walked down the stairs so I had to follow him to make sure he didn't hurt himself. Either Joshua or Kaminie came down as well, and then the rest joined us from the elevator eventually. I was quite annoyed to notice that the guy Corinna had been dancing with was there, too.

I could tell right away that he was going to be annoying. He kept asked me where I was from, so I told him Bangsar, and then he asked me where I was from "originally", so I told him Bangsar because my dad was Chinese and my mum was from the Netherlands, and then he asked me where I was from "originally" again, and then when I told him Bangsar the third time he gave up on trying to understand and just went back to bugging Corinna. Except she wasn't bothered, as I later found out. She just kinda tuned out of everything he said and she ended the night under the impression that he was a "nice guy". Ha!

I thought we were all headed to the car to go back the same, but Joanna and Kaminie broke off to go back somehow else. We were all meeting in Devi's, though, because Amanda wanted cheese naan. Amanda always wants cheese naan when she's drunk.

It was a bit tricky to get Milan and Jose to the car as they were both pretty well out from all the drinking, but Joshua helped us so we were grateful for that. Amanda sat between them and Corinna was up in shotgun, and I don't know why I'm mentioning seating arrangements but there you go.

Anyway, we got to Devi's and Amanda and Jose hobbled off to go order. Corinna and I stayed by the car while we watched Milan puke. Corinna pointed out how she could tell that he hadn't eaten anything because his vomit was entirely liquid. It meant that there wasn't any smell, though, so that was alright.

We got to Devi's and I sat down and then Kaminie and Joanna arrived with the dumbass that Corinna was dancing with and two other guys. The dumbass kept saying "trust me" after everything and he kept insisting that Corinna should try nasi lemak because she'd love it even though she'd already told him that she'd tried it and she hated it. He asked us what our favourite countries were and Corinna replied that she didn't have a favourite country, and then he said his favourite country was America and I knew he was full of it. I asked him how many states there were and his reply was "forty plus". Gah, I hate him. The worst bit was that he wasn't mean-spirited or anything, just so freaking oblivious and idiotic and obvious in his intentions.

I asked Joanna if she knew who the dumbass was, but she didn't. She didn't know the other two guys, either. I asked her why she decided to ride back with them if she didn't know who they were, and she said something about Kaminie.

Meanwhile Jose was threatening the dumbass' friend with a fork and the dumbass' friend was also being an obnoxious annoying dumbass. Kaminie looked miserable. Earlier on he had been leaning in near her and it was pretty obvious that he was trying to flirt with her or something but she was having none of it. Oh yeah, when Corinna had mentioned that she as from Germany, this guy's first reaction was to yell "Nazi!". Not as an accusation or anything, it's just that that was the only word in his thick empty skull that he associated with Germany, so he felt that blurting it out was an acceptable reaction. Idiot. Fortunately, Corinna was tuned out because of the other dumbass (Mr Trust Me) so she didn't hear it.

I finished my second limau ice and decided to go have McDonald's instead since they were serving the breakfast menu and the hash browns would be very fresh. I jogged over and there was a group of four girls talking about college or Form 5 or something, but they were the only other people on my side of the counter. Behind the counter it took the staff a minute to find someone to take my order. I didn't mind though, because it only cost RM10 and I got to eat from the breakfast menu for dinner.

After I finished my McMuffin and hash, I took my orange juice and walked back to Devi's. Along the way I was contemplating whether I should tell the dumbass about Corinna telling me on the way to the car from the club that she wasn't going to sleep with him or even text him back. I don't know why I decided against it, but I guess he wouldn't've understood no matter how clear I made it anyway.

When I got back, the dumbass was still talking to Corinna and she was still semi-ignoring him. She was responding to what he was saying, but I'm pretty sure her mind was elsewhere because there is no other explanation for her conclusion that he was a "nice guy". At one point he leaned over and whispered something in her ear and her response was "Okay, A) he's not my boyfriend, and B) he's not my best friend" so that was a thing.

I asked Amanda why she was eating nasi lemak instead of cheese naan and she said something but I didn't hear what. It sounded sad, though. Everyone was in a lousy mood except the two dumbasses, because they were the ones ruining everything, and Corinna, because she had zoned out or whatever. Even the dumbasses' cousin (or friend) looked like he was feeling lousy, probably because he realized at what shitty company he was keeping.

Finally everyone finished their food, so we got to leave two dumbasses and their cousin behind and go back. I asked why Joanna and Kaminie had even decided to ride with them anyway, and apparently it was because the dumbass that liked Kaminie had been so persistently annoying that they decided to ride with him just to shut him up. I thought that was phenomenally stupid because, I dunno, they might have just driven off someplace and raped them or whatever, but Joanna said that Kaminie apparently knew them from somewhere so it was okay.

Milan threw up a second time while I was waiting in the car. It was very convenient of him to only spew immediately before and after journeys. It kept the car nice and clean. Milan is a considerate dude, even when he's drunk.

In the car, Amanda got pissed at Kaminie for bringing them to Devi's, Joanna got pissed at Amanda when Amanda told her to stop defending the dumbasses (Joanna wasn't defending them, she just didn't want everyone yelling), and I was pissed at Corinna for giving that dumbass her number and not recognizing how stupid they were.

Apparently the dumbass that liked Kaminie had been punching her all night in some retarded form of flirting, and so Amanda said that she'd punch him if he hit her one more time, so he dared her to, so she slapped him, so he said that that wasn't a punch, so she said it was a "preview to a punch", and then he said if she could hit him then he could hit her, then Jose said not to touch his cousin, and then he said something to Amanda, and then the dumbass thought he was talking to him or something, and then Jose raised his fork and started threatening him, and then Mr Trust Me kept chiming in to try and impress Corinna who had stopped caring a long time ago, and then I left and went to McDonald's. So that's what was happening on that side of the table.

Anyway eventually everyone in the car agreed that the dumbasses were dumbasses, and then I dropped Milan off at his house and everyone else off at Amanda's. Joanna told me that we could maybe do it again on her birthday, which I wrongly guessed as being on the 31st of December. It was actually on the 30th of November.

On the way back home with Corinna, I told her about the "nazi!" dumbass and tried to convince her that it was stupid to give the other dumbass her phone number, and although she agreed that the other guy was really stupid she still stuck by her decision to trade numbers with the guy. I told her she'd regret it. I was wrong, though; the next day she hadn't received anything from him so I conceded that she was right and maybe it was okay to give out contact details to dumbasses.

We got home at six in the morning and the sky looked very nice. We said goodnight and I took a shower. Jan knocked on the door right when I started, because he had just woken up and needed to get ready for BB. I told him to just wait and then I brushed my teeth and told him and Ian about Corinna not being drunk after 14 drinks and about the dumbass she had danced with and then they left for BB and I went on Tumblr for a very short while and I went to sleep at seven.

I woke up at six and had pasta. Corinna joined me in the kitchen and we talked until my dad came home with Uncle Shark. The four of us talked about Aquaria for a while, then Corinna and I went out to the dining room to play checkers. The board I had bought was too big. It was 10X10 instead of 8X8. Corinna had never played before so it was doubly awkward. We didn't finish the game because it got too boring and we forgot whose turn it was.

Corinna told me about the headache she had when she woke up in the morning. Susanna had walked in twice just to stare at her and that didn't help. Anyway she said she eventually woke up to take a shower and go back to bed, and then a little later she went to the pool for a while but went to sleep afterwards anyway. So I had eleven hours of lovely sleep in my bed and she had ten and a half hours of sleep in her bed and also by the pool and such.

Jan stopped by and I told him that Corinna had complained to me the night before that I was the only one that talked to her. Jan felt pretty bad but Corinna said she wasn't complaining, she was just saying. Jan defended himself anyway by pointing out that I talk so much that it just seems like Hannah and Ian and he don't say much, but really they're talking a normal amount and my excessive talking is making them seem quiet by comparison. Then he left.

Corinna and I went through all the pictures on her camera and I took a bunch of them to upload later. They were the ones from Batu Caves with snakes and the big lizard and such, like these two:

After that, Corinna went on Facebook and she showed me a picture of the stripper clown from Ibiza with cock ring and the gigantic penis. After that she showed me pictures that her dad sent from the Middle East of the gun store and the lavish golden bathroom and the gold ATM and such. She also showed me pictures from some parties and her friends' profiles and her ex-boyfriend's car crash and her castle school. She told me loads of stuff about Germany and by the end of it all I was very jealous of where she lived.

We watched some videos from the Midnight Beast on YouTube and then we watched some of Tenacious D and some of my favourite music and her favourite music and soon enough four hours had passed and it was eleven o'clock, so Corinna went back to bed and I went to my computer.

I wanted to blog but I didn't. I think I just got kinda depressed for some reason and I didn't do much except e-mail Sara and delete a bunch of photos from my phone and put some more Taylor Swift on it while trying to figure out how to compress songs. I went to bed at five.

I woke up at nine and then Sunday began, but I'll write about that tomorrow.

On Sunday night I was also sitting at my computer for a while feeling depressed even though I had a really nice time. It's weird. I think it's because I start missing the fun times the moment they end, and that's not good for me.