FOOD
i think chinese and indian food taste pretty good together at times. i cooked some vegetables and mushrooms and my indian neighbour also had some of her stuffs on the table and we ended up mixing two kinds of food together. i think we should have other people in the suite do their specific ethnic cooking and have a multicultural food party one day, since we have people coming from nigeria, india, taiwan, singapore, china, US and france. food offers a great way for different people to connect with one another!

FILM, THORSTON, THE OTHER.
tonight i will be watching LA confidential. never heard much about the show, but thorston, my german friend thinks it's really really good. i envy him because he gets to watch a couple of movies a week for the history class he is taking in UM, including the trilogy the GODFATHER. we just had an interesting discussion about "the other" over dinner. brought me good memories of the literature and art history classes i used to take as a college student. indeed, marginalized characters continue to hold a fascination for me, including the insane, homosexuals, women,
beggars, the homeless, ....and don't ask me why.

TIME
ever since i started working and taking classes, the sense and feel of time had become so drastically different. i wonder if this is in the right direction. i don't want to feel that i am bound by the minutes and seconds to the point of suffocation. that is how i feel like at times, especially the moments before i head for eight straight hours of cafe work.

the nocturnal habits are slowly fading away in my life. i am now seeing less of late nights, and more of the early hours in the day. while mourning for the loss of a cherished lifestyle, it's good to return to a life of normalcy, at least, for now.

i used to look at him watching the TV. i like to watch him lose himself, in the fascination with the images appearing in front of him. it was as if he had completely transported himself...to another realm. the sight of him....just doing that was inspiring. never had the act of watching tv been so exciting and interesting to me. even though he is now away, the memory of it stays.....

today, while i was working at the cafe, i experienced sporadic moments of laughing fits. one funny incident sparked off many others, and i thought it was rude to laugh too much in front of customers. the dillemma of laughing is that while you feel really guily and bad about laughing too much, you just can't stop doing it. you only think about the consequence later. it's like getting drunk. how can i curb this behaviour? for years and years, i tried coping with this, but these fits always happen at the most inappropriate moments in my life.i suppose i just have to accept it as part of my psychological makeup? but still, it's fun for others to watch me suffer in my uncontrollable state of giggling.

a few minutes ago, i was thinking of this mysterious russian guy in the coops. he's almost like a myth that never really exists. we used to play chess during those nocturnal hours and sometimes watch tv and have bizzare conversations. then one day, he said goodbye without revealing his plans . the others in the coops who used to hang out with him were also clueless about where he was going and were caught by surprise by his departure. to his roomate, he only left a note saying that they might meet "sometime, somewhere." why did i mention him? i guess because i do miss his presence and am continuously intrigued by his odd and erratic behavior. i have not met anyone whose identity remains so elusive all the time. to many of us here, he is an interesting question mark. i am glad i had those encounters with him at least in this lifetime. hopefully, i will run into him again "sometime , somewhere".

coops life is great, except for the neverending house work that keeps coming your way. two days ago, after eight hours of work at the cafe, i rushed back home to do another three hours of cleaning in the kitchen. today, i spent another three hours doing the same thing.everything is mandatory. this weekend, on top of the weekly kitchen cooking duties, we have "work holiday" assigned to us, where every one is supposed to contribute four hours of work. i mean, i really don't mind doing these things. However, an intense combination of cafe job duties and coop work shifts is not the most ideal lifestyle. I must find a better way to react to these continuos chores . otherwise,the routine will only take its toll on my happiness and
mental well being.

i think i am in dire need of some effective sleeping pills. my class and work schedules are turning my nocturnal lifestyle upside down and i feel that i am TRAPPED, in between day and night and i don't feel completely awake any of those times. Help!

ah, ping pong was great today.......and for now, it's time to sleep. May you, my friends , be blessed every single moment, whether you are happy or sad, or feeling just neutral.

i lost the book "madness and civilization" i was reading........can someone please tell me where it is??!!!???....feeling very mad with myself.

"Lolita" i wonder what this book is all about. people around me have been talking so much about it that i can't wait to read the story. i got the book at a used bookstore at $5.50. they said it's about an older man and a much younger girl. at least, that is the simplest summary it can get.i read the first line :
" Lolita;light of my life, fire of my loins.My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta :....."
That got me really curious, especially about what it means to fall helplessly in love in a socially unacceptable relationship. What further destruction can our passions do to us?

it's time to sleep, but there's this sense of restlessness within me that disturbs me a little. i wonder where that comes from? does it signal that certain changes have to be made? does it mean that maybe i should look at or approach certain things a little differently?i am dying to know....the antidote to these sporadic moments of restlessness.

Or should i ignore it and pretend that it is not there? Will it come back to haunt my quiet moments? We shall see. But i am rest assured that God knows.

Katie Beth and I are planning to have a fight club soon...anyone wants to join us?

For further information -especially about rules and regulations, please visit

jinganlin.blogspot.com

work finished at 11 pm last night. when i returned to the coops, it felt so deserted and abandoned...and suddenly, i chanced upon three other girls wandering around and we played some pool. it was good because that jolted me out of a state of mental inertia since work for the last few hours had been kind of dull with too few customers walking in.

looking forward to watching Big Fish tomorrow afternoon with a neighbour. NO WORK tomorrow! Hooray!

strangely, everytime i run into him in the coops, my heart still misses a beat. i wish i won't see him again, but at the same time, i wish i do.

i think insomnia will remain a companion for a very long time. to me, the night is really not the time to sleep.i mean....doesn't the stillness of the night....entice you to remain wakeful? and doesn't the nausea of early mornings
force you to stay in bed as long as possible? well, not for many people, but for me, it is a reality.


i think i should go to bed, but i really don't want to .

always, in love with the night.

written on 2nd January 2004.


1.
"the despairing saint became an old man
who knew the secret delights of the past,
where romance, beauty and warmth
existed and where wars were prevalent.
the passing of age offered him a way
to rest in the comfort of silence and peace,
where the world became a different place,
a place far away from the touch. "
----------------------------------------------------------------
2.
" the desire to fly and fade away, into a
world unknown,
into a place, where our identiy becomes this
elusive entity, is strong and unyielding. the
desire to cease existing in this part of the
world transports me to new realms of emotions
and thoughts that help me gain new sights and
visions, and where a new kind of beauty
surprises me. "

i have been listening a lot to this particular chinese cd by David Tao.there is a certain emotional richness and free spiritedness in his music that i am very much drawn to. he is so cool :)


oh, i notice my work schedule and realize that i will be working every evening mon - friday! i mean, i like night shifts, but i will miss dinnertimes with fellow coopers very much :(



thanks to sarah konrath, i chanced upon foucault....and i am now reading his book" madness and civilization". i am looking forward to the next chapter...."passion and delirium". i think pascal was right when he said that "men are so necessarily mad that not to be mad would amount to another kind of madness."

"SURELY God is my salvation,
I will trust and not be afraid,
for the Lord God is my strength
and my might;
He has become my salvation."
Isaiah 12:2

IN SPITE of the human tendency within me to wander in my emotions and
thoughts, there is the miraculous grace of God....that is sufficient for our
weaknesses! Amen!
"his power is made perfect in weaknesses!!" - Corinthians

these were poems written during the period when i fell into the emotion of love.......one month ago before the breakup.

1. " the night has become an opportunity
to create that dream with you
and when the daytime arrives,
the pain starts to evaporate and
your shadows blind my vision,
rendering me dazed."
30/11/03


2. " All the words shared between us
transport us to a world where
we gain new sights and visions
and where we learn more about
the beauty and darkness of love.
When we return to the outside world,
reality seems to have become
a little different and a little more
soothing."
11/30/03


3 when a person is in love
he is puzzled by how love can
move him
and how love and make him weep
in such a beautiful way.



4 " we are all imperfect people
dealing with games in this life
always playing and always
learning.
the colors of our existence
bring us forth,
into a world unknown,
where we are required to know
how to love better."
11/25/03

i was working nightime in eastern accent today. i guess because of the cold weather today, we had very few customers and that left me with some idle moments. and therefore, this poem came to being.
...and it's titled WAITING.

" the game of waiting,
has become a time,
where inanimate objects around us,
come alive,
and when our reality fades
into a distant dream."

followed by another poem, "inspired" by the recent breakup with somebody...

" Last night when I talked to you,
I felt the pain, emerging
within my heart, and my soul
screaming out to yours.
All the time, I was hiding
beneath a face of indifference
and happiness,
so that you would think me
strong and mighty in my God.
The truth, I am telling you,
is that every night on my bed,
your imaginary presence
creeps back into my sleep,
uttering, " I love you."