Two words

Customers, indiscriminately, should friggin understand that they stand in the position of a guest. But that doesn’t make whosoever’s serving them their fkin servant. Having that much self righteous self-respect should reflect equally with how you respect others. It doesn’t matter what color you are, or what language you speak but if you have problems with the frequency that we are working in, you’re just a ticket away from where you flew from. two words. fuck off. (:

x+1 (the endless possibility of a bad day)

On some days when it can be so potent, you can almost feel it coming swirling in your system. It could be how your morning had dissolved leaving you blind to your own intuition and impulses. It’s like walking on wet floors with slippery soles, shouldering an innate sense of insecurity that hits you right at the back of your head like you’re gonna slip and fall at every single step. It doesn’t matter what you preconceive, the deal is usually signed, sealed, delivered and almost if not always, inevitable. Surely, every bad thought can fester into a bad day. And it doesn’t take much but a tiny catalyst that will paint your face yellow insulted and sallow. On days like these, you feel almost inadvertedly like a living neuron layered with receptors at every end and the trajections that the world impose is so hard to miss that the truth on several accounts do not emancipate, it simply thickens and amplifies, weighing down on every single logic possible. Yes, if ever my own philosophy over my bleakest day could ever triumph biology, tommorrow I will be a mimosa plant and maybe I will be stepped on even when I shy myself defenseless.

I admit. I am not the rainbow of every optimist.

But like every dark cloud, there’s a silver lining. Me, you, we could all be blind to it and perceive the billowing darkness like a looming storm but if we look hard enough, we’d be impress on how such beauty can outline something indefinitely mortifying.

On days like these, when I’d needed my friends the most to lift my spirits, you guys were there. And I’d hug you the same like how I had hug my beloved sister goodbye at the airport for being my silver lining.

Thanks Mel. Thanks Nisha.

the love that can’t be bought

You are the watchtower that never sleeps,

The moon on a cloudless night,

The blueness of ocean’s deep,

A newborn starling’s flight,

You are the whisper in the wind,

The soft pastel gray in the skies,

The sophisticated hand on prints

The glint of hope in an orphan’s eyes

You are the light from a candle’s wick

The horizon that catches the sun

The rosiness on a cherub’s cheek

To a cat, its ball of yarn

You are the summer and the spring,

And the warmth that autumn sought,

The chime of a bell that rings,

The love that can’t be bought

The great blue marble (students were writing this)

I sat at the same shady spot at the back of the school. The olive colored fence stood before me like the Great Wall of China and it stretched right out into the soccer field. I could hear the water flowing in the canal from the other side. This is where I like to be everyday during recess, alone and undisturbed. Searching my side pockets, I pulled out a blue marble. This was what remained of my belated grandfather. He was a master at the game of marbles and this particular blue one was his prized possession. I received it on my birthday, before he died a few weeks later. I’d learnt to isolate myself since. Build walls where no one could reach. It seemed safer that way. I stared into the glass marble. Getting lost in it is like being suspended in the ocean. It’s just you and the deep blue.

“Wuss!” Bob jumped out of nowhere and snatched the blue marble from my hands. Blindsided, I was completely taken aback by his sudden appearance. It was purely disgusting how someone as burly and annoying as Bob could maneuver sneakily like a docile cat. I struggled up to my feet but before I could, he pushed me back to the ground. “What do we have here…” he squeezed the marble between his thumb and his index finger and held it up to his eye, examining it as though it was a jewel. “Can I please have it back, fat ass? It belongs to my grandfather.” I hissed vehemently.

He turned his gaze at me and clenched the marble tightly in his fist. “You’re so stupid no wonder your parents left you and your grandfather died on you.” He snarled proudly. His smirk revealed all the evil that was brewing in his thick fat skull. Surging with anger, I had wanted to pounce on him, rip his guts out and let ravens feast on his soul. Suddenly, he raised his arm as though he had a javelin in his hands to throw and instantly, I cowered back. I shielded my face with my hands out of reflex and just when I’d thought that he would care more to bruise my face, he spun around unexpectedly and hurled the blue marble across the school fence.

I gasped. My eyes widened in disbelief as I witnessed my marble diminish into a blue dot as it flew over the fence. It glinted momentarily in the sun and disappeared to the other side of the world, where it clicked on the ground and plopped audibly into the waters of the canal. For a moment the air turned still, the raucous laughter in the school yard died and the birds just stopped chirping. I was paralyzed in time, lost like my blue marble and all I could hear was my own heart, beating, drumming wildly in my ears. I wanted to breathe but the stirring turmoil in my throat stopped me. Before I knew it, I was squirming on the ground confused and breathless from an asthma attack.

Asphyxiation, I thought.

This is how it feels when you’re drowning. And the world blacked out.

In my dream, I was on the pinnacle of a vast green hill lying on a blanket of soft grass. The sky was azure blue with white billowy clouds scattered in the horizon. I stroked the grass blades and breathed the summer breeze. There was a calming effect in the wind. I peered at the sun, it shone brightly but the light didn’t hurt my eyes. I was just soaking the rays of the sun when I noticed something glistening at the corner of my eye. I directed my gaze towards the distracting glimmer and saw my blue marble right next to me. I picked it up and put it over the sun and marveled at how the light danced and swirled in the vast blue. I would picture a diver looking up from underwater and gazing at the same spectacle.

The great blue marble, it felt divine like I had the world in my hands. “You do have the world in your hands.” A familiar voice whispered. I looked up and I saw my grandfather smiling down on me. A tear streamed down my cheek as I sat up facing him. How I’d missed him. “However difficult the world is, I’ll always be there to walk it through with you.” He pressed his hand onto my chest and I felt a ripple in my heart.

I woke up at that point.

“Oh thank god you’re alive! We thought we’d almost lost you.” Mrs Lee hugged me at the hint of my revival. “What happened?” I gasped. “It was just an asthma attack but you’re okay now, that’s all that matters” the school doctor continued. Apparently my short episode gathered an entire crusade of the school staff. “I’m okay…I just need some air” I staggered on my feet and took a deep breath, came to my senses and realized that I was clutching something in my hands. I peered down and loosened my fingers and to my astonishment, it was my blue marble. It was inexplicable but I never came to explore how it got there.

It took a cruel boy, a cruel deed and a near death experience to propel me into recovery from the bereavement of my late grandfather. The loss of my only family was a misfortune but it was not in complete lack of virtue. Although it was incredulous to believe that a dream could change the entire course of one’s life it happened to me. Ever since that incident, I’ve never looked back to regret my past and stopped fearing the future because I know, just like the blue marble lying in the grasp of my fingertips. I had the world in my hands.

content with loneliness

It seems like yesterday, when I’d walked away

Deserted into the blue

I rather not stay; I’d roam the streets all day

And linger in solitude

It feels like I could cry, but fail each time I try,

So I’ll just brood along,

And I’ll count the tiles, on the pavement and isles,

And think of you in my song,

I’d sing to the trees, blow kisses on leaves

My heart’s pricked but not by splinters or thorns

Years in a dozen but time just seems frozen,

And life just has to move on

I’d pray to the stars, wherever you are,

That you’d still think of me

And I’d give up my days, to see you today,

And tomorrow I’d be free

From this inception and preconceived notions

That stabs my brain, till I die,

And I resurrect, in the hallway years back

My memory is still intact

For you I’d perceived and had strongly believed,

That we’ll never be apart,

Now that you’re gone and I’m walking all alone,

And it’s so hard not to look back.

side note: some things cigarettes can solve and i’d have one right now.

you want me to what?

Recently I was recruited as a mentor at AMP and it tore me up when the executive manager introduced me and two others as models of success. Coupled with his rehearsed voice, I was very convinced that every child in the room had an epiphany of this program being a complete joke. Success…yes… gray, like prison walls and I looked around the room examining the morning faces of these kids for traces of diminished hope.

Like every other clichéd team building exercise, we were made to introduce ourselves. I was a nervous wreck spouting rubbish about being a platoon commander and all I could do was flex that meagre meat on my chest to reel them into believing that I was some fucking hero. I may have fooled everyone in the room but anyone who had been a part of my organization would know that I was no more than a face for ex-offenders and potential convicts.

I did not have a good piece unlike Mahathir. This man was born to inspire. Yes, pardon the crooked tooth and you could see angels sitting, swinging, pole dancing, on the tendrils of his beard. Mahathir was a martyr in his own right. Having been incarcerated for drug abuse at an early age, he was thrown into rehab and there he had learned of Islam and embraced the religion. That killed me. How many people could go around and say,” drugs brought me closer to god”.

As the morning progressed I was indubitably turning hysterical in my head. As it turned out, unsurprisingly, in light of the world cup and the impending youth Olympics, our class discussions and activities would centre on the theme a healthy lifestyle. My thought bubble exploded, “you want me to what?! hahaha. alfian, tell me you’re fuckin kiddin.” But he wasn’t. If it wasn’t for the abundant amount of self control that I’ve attained under the tutelage of that fat ugly fuck called subra and admiring his bald black head, I would have burst uncontrollably in laughter and got myself fired.

What baffled me was that it never occurred to him to ask me if I smoke or eat healthy or live a healthy lifestyle during the interview. I would have laid down the entire truth. The future that I envisioned is one where I’d be able to go to starbucks and order an apple strudel cheesecake with a sprinkle of tobacco or celebrate my 25th birthday with 25 chocolate scented cigarettes on my birthday cake. Yes, I do go to gym on a regular basis but I do not thrive on tofu, gargle green tea and break my fucking back doing yoga. I looked across the room; the other two mentors didn’t look like sportsmen either. She was a beautifully wrapped up moth and he, suffering from the virtue of his charm and size was a gentle giant. And I was on the brink of being a bad influence.

Being the optimist I’ve learned to acknowledge myself as the right person for the job. Yes, I may not be a profoundly healthy boy. But I grew up in a household of fat cousins and I know more about the irresistible diet than anyone else. With the amount of laxatives in the cupboard my mom could have easily been the queen of Africa and with my life story as a stricken fat caterpillar that metamorphosed into a smoking athlete, no one else is more qualified of an opinion on the subject than I was. I have a few chubs in my class and I certainly know what to say to give them a head start in life. All you need is a square chest, a good set of brains and every god damn person whom you will encounter in life will think you’re a healthy stud and if that doesn’t work don’t fret, because as a fat kid you always have the thickest middle finger to rely on.

-nadzim