Simple

Right now, the only thing that will make life perfect would be to get the job. I think life has been pretty smooth sailing since graduating... and I am so thankful, so so so thankful.

It'll keep getting better eh?

Can't believe I graduated in June. Feels like forever. Feels like I never left.

"So, this is my life. And I want you to know that I am both happy and sad and I'm still trying to figure out how that could be."

"It's just that I don't want to be somebody's crush. If somebody likes me, I want them to like the real me, not what they think I am. And I don't want them to carry it around inside. I want them to show me, so I can feel it too. I want them to be able to do whatever they want around me. And if they do something I don't like, I'll tell them."

The idea of love, of falling for someone, of holding hands and kissing in the rain, of warmth and comfort... romance is sweet. I love romance. I fall head over heels in love with romance. But when romance dies out... and the rose colored glasses are taken off, how do you live with what's left?

And yet the thought of being alone for who knows how long.
That's equally as terrifying.

To love or not to?
To try or not to?

But the world works in mysterious ways.
Universe, I have faith in you.
Good things will come to those who wait. 

Teenage Woes

AMAGAD GUYS

WHAT KIND OF HAIR IS THIS HAHAH

I was uploading some photos from a buncha CDs containing old photos..... and omfg, I WAS SO UGLY PLEASE. Not that I didn't know how unattractive I looked then la... but looking at the photos now, wha fuck. Even though this is super thick-skinned of me, I JUST WANT TO SAY I BECAME SO MUCH MORE ATTRACTIVE HAHAHAH.

And man, even though i still get pimples, it's not as bad as when i was in JC.
OMG. I was so ugly in JC.
Like WTF happened to my eyes!!!!

old school selca yo. see my eyes...... omfggggg....

All ODAC's fault.... and my own for not protecting my skin. I had a lot of confidence issues when I was in JC because of my horrible skin. I couldn't even look at myself in the mirror and every time I went to the toilet, I'd always avert my eyes while washing up at the sink. It was horrible. I remember feeling so horrible that I hid my face even from W. I really felt ugly then. And I knew people were talking about my bad skin, like some times I overheard people saying it right in front of me.. wow, that hurt like a bitch. Once, my ODAC teacher said it to my face and I went right to the toilet to cry.

And the thing was, I was actually trying to make it better. I went for facials, did some peeling shit, I even decided to go to New York Skin solutions but backed out at the last minute because of the bad reviews online. I tried to do simple home facials with egg whites.. tried the aspirin scrub Michelle Phan recommended...  I was really desperate. Eventually I got my mum to take me to the dermatologist to get some oinments and creams and finally, it got slightly better. And wow, being a teenager with no resources or ways to help yourself despite all your efforts, that sucked. It also didn't help that my mum wasn't one too concerned with superficial things. In that aspect, i really could have used her help.. but all i got were comments instead of much more active assistance.. until I insisted on going to the doctor's.

Oh well, those dark days continued even when I went to uni... and UK.... but i think they are more or less over now....
My skin is obviously faaaarrrrrrrrr from perfect and I still get major breakouts. But it's way way way way way better than before and at least now I have the courage to look at myself in public toilets. You must be like 'then you must take better care of your skin mah!!' whalau, you think I never meh? when i have skin that is so sensitive and with a mind of its own, even with my best efforts it can still go cray cray.

All the horrible feelings are coming back to me now.... wow, I must have put all these bad thoughts in the back of my mind. Thinking about it now... man, it still stings.

Anyhow, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
Younger Jiggy, it's been hard on you.

On the bright side, I WAS SO FUCKING SKINNY IN JC LEH WHALAU.

Thank god for braces as well.

Okay, i know my hairstyle now is still shit hahaha.
I guess I'll always be an awkward teen.

Hoarders

I don't know if I should say le Zhang fam are hoarders.... but man, I'm so frustrated with all the hidden junk. My auntie does such a good job of keeping our house tidy that you never would know how much shit we have. My mum wants to keep EVERYTHING. Whatever we want to throw out, she says she'll find a use for them... or should donate them to the needy... or it's such a waste, it's still functional..... and then what happens? It ends up where it is for another 5 years.

So now that I'm back and feel like I have more weight around the house (not my mass/weight ok hahaha), I've been slowly chucking stuff out. Those that can be recycled, are recycled, those that I'm not sure of just goes right into the bin. I'm so unsure about what can and cannot be recycled though since Singapore still isn't too invested in going green (which sucks considering how developed a nation we are). And electronics! The garang guni man doesn't even want our stuff man. He told me to call up those recycling companies that collect e-waste but I've been on their websites, and they seem to do more corporate collections than domestic. The only convenient collection point i've found still requires my mum to drive me there.... and she's already made it very clear that she's not gonna waste her precious weekend doing it. Boo. So i've just been leaving them near the rubbish point downstairs and I FEEL SO GUILTY DOING IT!! Because it seems like we're just off-loading our problem onto someone else =________=

Anyway, I'm hoping to get our home properly spring cleaned as soon as my internship ends :D Quite excited for that. Oh and I just took off the swivelly thing that my old monitor was on and disconnected all the old wires from my desktop.... everything does in the trash tomorrow.Now my table seems so spacious. Wowza.

To a better and cleaner tomorrow!

Y'know, in the past I would have at least tried to convince myself to get back to blogging... but I've completely fallen off the bandwagon, which is to say, I'm a lazy bitch. Anyhow, I've given myself the day off of work (hehe i blame monday blues and uhm, indigestion) and weirdly, did not sleep in. It's just ten past nine now and I think I should do my little space a bit of justice with some ramblings.

I have 3 more weeks left on my internship. It's been a very insightful journey and at the same time, has once again destroyed the romanticized view I had of this job. Other than getting to wear a spiffy white lab coat and feeling like an important agent with an access card-key to various labs, the job is surprisingly... technical. I know, I'm an idiot hahaha. Obviously it's going to be technical!! I just didn't expect so much sweeping and swabbing and strain on my eyes.That's not all I do okay! I've used several mechanical tools I never even knew existed and all the vocational training has made me realize how much of a hands-on person I am.

Back to the topic - not to say I'm not enjoying work, I honestly am. Every time I walk into a store, I feel very alive and captivated by all the artefacts and it's a pity hardly anyone knows about our huge collections. And looking at them, I do want to continue my long-established goal of safeguarding and conserving them. Just that work has been pretty slow for me, since I am still an intern, and having a not-very-expressive supervisor makes time go by so slowly... so much so that I've fallen asleep while working quite a few times, sneaked off to do mindless things and taken lunch breaks longer than i should. Yes, guilty as charged!

(The Mother just asked me if there isn't any other jobs I'm interested in. No doubt my chao geng antic today has made her think this isn't what I want to do....)
(I've always been chao geng. Not just on this job hehe. Not proud.)

Anyhow, I'm both looking forward and dreading embarking on an official job - perks: financial stability, a job i enjoy, getting to work with artefacts, getting to finally start on my career in the heritage industry.. boo: no more alone time (mega-sob), morning rush (ew), being a civil servant, alone time (worth mentioning again)..


Now I just need to get the job.

*

I actually have more to ramble on, but I shan't make this entry too wordy since I know how short my (and my few readers') attention span is. Toodles!

It's scary knowing that somehow, change has become the only thing that makes me feel alive.
Now i feel like a part of me is slowly slipping into the abyss.

Sometimes when I'm working, I wonder why i keep counting off the minutes till the end of the day. Don't I like what I'm doing? If i do... then shouldn't I just lose myself in it and not care about time? And then I wonder about the people around me. The auntie that comes in around 10am every morning to collect the trash from all the labs... what runs through her mind everyday? When I was having dinner at a fast food chain, I wondered what the auntie clearing the table was thinking. The auntie who gives out flyers everyday at Causeway Point while plugged into her earphones.. the elderly and handicapped selling tissue packets.. the people working at the weekly roadshows... all these people. So many of them.

Maybe for me, I measure how well I've lived my life by how much I've seen and learned. But if I hadn't been as privileged and lucky.. how will I judge how fulfilling my life is?

I need to be more grateful.
Be thankful.
Be kind.  

Moved On

A lot of times i still gripe and feel bitter.
But I know i've moved on, it's just some times it feels nice to vent.
I never forget even after forgiving.
That's bad for me.

Only problem is... I'm possessive.
I don't want my own friends to get hurt, that's why I say things like that.
My friends are mine. Mine to love, mine to protect.
You didn't love with sincerity... so you don't deserve to love them.
They are amazing people.

So this week marks a month since I've started my internship at the Heritage Conservation Center. It's been a really enriching experience and I'm looking forward to the next month and a half. Hopefully I'll get to work on other types of materials. But as of now, I can say that I'm basically a cleaner (for artefacts) lol. The good thing is that you'll always get different things to work on... but right now, I'm bored shitless vacuuming and checking the conditions of boxes and boxes of wayang kulit puppets.

I've probably looked at at least thirty puppets. The workmanship is amazing but i end up not remembering any puppet, except the one of the goat lol. Another thing I'm struggling with is identifying mould. When it's obvious, it's not a problem. But most of the time, I don't know how it looks like macroscopically and even under the microscope, I'm straining my eyes so much that.... I just scribble mould on my condition check list anyway (yes, lazy, irresponsible.).

Hopefully by the end of October, I'll have a job offer and then I can slowly gather experience in this little, yet discreetly, expensive industry. I've applied for positions in NMS, ACM, HCC and NAGA. Curator positions... I'm not that confident in since it seems like you have to really be into symbolism.... and I'm not lol. That's why conservation is good for me. See it as it is, treat it as it is.

Fingers crossed!