A little bit about my past

As I slid my final essay into the essay box at the Arts Centre, I realised that tertiary education has come to an end. These days, I find myself working two jobs to cover the cost of hiring an expensive migration agent, preparing the last bits of an event that I am helping out with as well as juggling my social life on top of all of these...

I am working at this place where my supervisor is super cool and he does not mind the employees talking to each other as long as we do our job right. These past few days, I have been sitting next to a good friend of mine who had been with me through my ups and downs. Anyways, my job is super boring as it mainly involves pressing ones and zeros. One for correct and zero for wrong. My friend's love life is kind of in a "turmoil". Because of this particular situation of hers, we can't help but we started discussing about our past relationships...

I was suddenly reminded of my past relationships... all of the ups and downs... the good times and the bad times... the boys I have dated in the past. It's really weird when I thought about the boys I have dated in the past... I just realised how each and every one of them differs to each other... especially in terms of character. I once read a Cosmopolitan article and the article said that men tend to date similar type of women in their life but women usually goes for different types of guys because they don't want to repeat the same mistake.

I see some truth in that article. Last year when I went back to my home country for holidays, I bumped into my ex. This ex of mine was the guy that at some point in my life, I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with. When I bumped into this ex of mine, I was shocked. He has not changed much but I think I have. I no longer looked at him the way I did. Long ago, I looked up to him with lots of admiration. Now, I look at him and I just could not understand how I once fell for this guy. I finally see why my parents were so against my relationship with him back then.

Fast forward to the future, I was ringing some friends that I have not seen in ages to persuade them to attend a friend's farewell party. Althought it seems that the people that I ring already have some other plans (which comes as no surprise as I ring them the night before the event), it was good to speak to them and see how they are doing. I realised that it is not only my life that had changed a lot within these past four years but my friends had changed a lot too. And then, in the spirit of memorabillia, I logged into my friendster account and visited profiles that I have not visited in a while.

And then I stumbled upon that profile... a profile that i had not visited for a very2 long time... a profile that I once avoided because I was too upset to see. Things have changed, I can now look at that profile and realise that I have done the right thing. I was bitter back then. I was bitter when I found out that he cheated on me with a girl (who not only according to me but according to many people) is shorter and uglier than me and not to mention her command of grammar is far worse than mine. I stayed bitter until I learnt something from my friend. I realised that I never really looked up to my ex... I just can't... despite of his good qualities, he brags about non-existent things in his life making it impossible to appreciate such person. He needed someone who would constantly flatter him and look up to him not someone who outshines him. I was no longer bitter from that point on.

I remembered his final words "You will find someone but I can't promise you that it will be someone better than me". Oh My, still the same arrogant person up until the end. Seriously dude, get over yourself. There's a reason why arrogance is one of the seven deadly sins. And as for me, I dated several guys after that failed relationship. I am currently seeing a guy right now and at the moment, he is the best for me.

Been wanting to write about this for a long time. I know that the ending of this blog sounds really mean and vengeful. But hey, freedom of expression is one of the basic rights of internet users and hey, i do keep his identity a secret. Fortunately, most of the people in my current life are either unaware or no longer aware of this person. There is a reason why my blog is titled no saints nor sinners... I am a flawed human being... As committed as I am to doing more good deeds in life, I can't help my occassional b*tchings. My previous posts have been way too nice and I do feel I need to write something... mean... once in a while.

Growing up

Last year, I was on MSN when I saw one of my friend from Korea wrote "Graduation: The Unbearable Heaviness of Growing up". The sentence struck me back then. I realised that the next semester could be my final semester at the university and perhaps my last six months in Melbourne.

Right now, I am writing the last few hundred words of my assignment. Suddenly I got a flash back of three years ago when I went for my first day at Melbourne University. I was super excited in embracing uni life. I remember sitting down at the union house with some other former Trinity College students who are planning to study Arts as well. 96,000 words, 16 oral presentations and 500 references later... this is my final step towards graduation.

I have asked this question before over and over again to some of my friends and now I could not believe that I actually have to answer this question "What will you do after graduation ?". A while ago, I was distressed because I felt that I was not ready yet in leaving this country. I did a translator test that I thought I was going to fail. In the end, I passed the test and this means I can obtain my residency in Australia.

Although things are currently looking good on the surface for me, I am facing a major dilemma. I am working two jobs at the moment and soon, I will be working three jobs. Two of these three jobs are contract and as soon as the project concludes, I will have to seek other jobs. The last job is a casual job with good pay but really little hours. For one of the projects that I am undertaking, I feel like I am not doing a good job and I secretly despise both of my project works.

I did a shift today and I felt like I was the worst performer of the day. But then, I recall my first shifts back at Hungry Jack's two years ago. I remembered I was not the best performer back then but I worked hard and in the end, I was a valuable staff member to the company. I realise:

" I know for sure that I will suck for the first few shifts... But, if I don't do this job and work hard, I will never learn. I will work hard and learn until I get it right and I will do a good job in the end"

Anyways, hopefully I will do better for my next shifts. And hopefully, I will know what I want to do and I will choose my career path wisely. My biggest fear right now is not being able to find a job or even worse, doing a job that I am not meant to do. There is nothing worse than coming to work everyday, knowing that This is not what I want to do in life.

Also, there is always the option for further studies... And there is one question that like or not, I will have to answer one day. Should I stay in Australia forever or should I go one day? When I came to this country four years ago, I missed my home country and my childhood friends badly. I did not want to leave my home country and back then, I wished I had never left. Months later, I discovered that I had fallen in love with Australia. I love the feeling of being able to walk around and take public transport without the fear of getting nabbed. The people, the food, the education system and the working conditions that are generally fairer than in Indonesia had won my heart. Above everything else, I had fallen in love with some of the people here. I just could not imagine leaving the country at the moment.

However, I am also quite reluctant to stay here. I have met many people who are struggling for jobs here and in the end, these people had to go back to their home countries. Despite of receiving the accrediation as a translator, English is still my second language and I am still far behind in comparison to native speakers of the language. I also miss my friends and family back in Indonesia. No matter how many new people I have fallen in love with, the people I grew up with will always have a special place in my heart.

"I wish that everything will be allrite for me and I wish you all the best with your future endeavours..."

To friends and family back in my hometown: I am not sure whether you will be reading this or not but I will not be able to come back home for a short while. All of you will always be in my heart no matter what and I hope I am in yours too...

David Tao

Of all the subject that I am planning to write on, I can not think of anything else to write other than David Tao. This perhaps, has mark my decline in writing quality blogs -_-

When I was in high school, I was somewhat against all Mandarin songs... the reason why was because I DID NOT UNDERSTAND A SINGLE WORD!!! Anyways, I went overseas to study four years ago and then, something happened to me. I WAS CONVERTED. My first housemate here is an Asian song freak... in fact she refuses to listen to anything English. And then, my other housemates are all Asian song freaks -_- As a result, I started to listen to Mandarin songs (it was not voluntarily, it was more because they are playing the music when I was there and of course I could not ask them to turn it off).

One day, my former housemate played this song called "Pu Tong Peng You" by Mr. David Tao. As soon as I heard the song, I was... CONVERTED. I just could not get the song out of my head eventhough I did not understand a single word. It was so funny, I thought the song was about a guy who just wanted to be a friend with this girl. Turned out, it was the other way around. The dude want to be with the girl but the girl just want him as a "normal friend".

Anyways, I liked some of his other songs (not all of them). Weirdy enough, most of his songs are apparently about broken hearts (my friends told me of course). The weird things is that having heard some of his songs, I never actually know how he looked like... until a few minutes ago. Driven by curiosity, I decided to find his picture using Google Image Search. My ex once told me that David Tao is a great singer but he lacks in term of looks. And I found some pictures of him..

The picture above is probably... one of the very few pictures of him where he looked... eh normal somewhat... the other ones are him with super tight shirts and sleveless tops. Maybe I am weird, but I am anti guys who wears super tight shirts and sleveless tops... and for this thing, I SHALL NEVER BE CONVERTED.

Mr. David Tao is not my type of good looking but he does have a good voice and he sings some good songs. Eventhough I will probably never watch his video clips especially video clips where he wear sleveless tops and tight shirts, I will listen to his songs. I'll be doing a certificate in mandarin next year but on the mean time, if he sings a good song no matter what it is about... I will listen to it. He can sing about poo and I will still listen to it. Beside, it's not like I will understand anything :p