Dance, dance, dance!

I am so glowingly happy after having sat through at least four hours of GREAT back-to-back dance performance. Project Dance was a blast.

I'm hoping they'll edit the Sydney performances into a video too, but here's the official video of Project Dance New York to give you an idea of how good today was.

Goooooooood morning, sunshine!

I am not a morning person.

My childhood was marked by almost daily "episodes" (to put it gently) with either or both of my parents, in which I literally kicked (hard) and screamed my way to getting washed up, dressed and out the door to my nanny's. When I was in primary school, I grudgingly learned the art of getting up early, but not of waking up early. They are two very different things. Getting up involves climbing out of bed, brushing teeth, showering, eating, and so on. Waking up involves actual conscious cognition and function... something which didn't set in until at least an hour after I'd got out of bed.

My mum was either a classic Morning Person, or had become one through a lifetime of discipline. (Could that be me one day?) By 5.45 each morning, she'd be out of bed hanging laundry out, making breakfast, and having a coffee and talk with her favourite cat. There was never a school morning when I didn't have kaya toast, or similarly toothsome breakfast, and a hot drink in my own mug waiting for me at the table. By the time I was in upper secondary school, the hot drink had evolved into a chilled combination of Milo and coffee, which she'd make first thing in the morning and stash in the fridge so that by the time I woke up, it would be refreshingly cold. (And this was at least two years before the brilliance of Neslo Ais hit Malaysian stall-goers in a flash of genius.)

Up to now, I haven't been able to get just the right mixture of coffee, Milo, sugar and milk that will give me that taste.

Where was I? Oh. Yeah. I am not a morning person. (This is a VERY RARE morning post!) Although years in the working world have turned me into someone who will both get up and wake up early if required, I still haven't taken to it naturally. Coming from West Malaysia where the sun rises late, by the time I left the house for work the sun would already be well on its way. And since moving to Sydney, I have to say I haven't adapted my internal clock very well to local time.

Which is why it's so amazing that this morning, I was wide awake before 6, watching the sunrise over the city.

Image by Rachel Grandinetti, Stock.Xchng

I didn't take any pictures, but I picked this one for an illustration because it's probably closest to the view I had, complete with the buildings in the foreground and the horizontal strip of orange light spreading over the darkness... the significance of which I hope to realise in the months to come.

I think the last time I was woken to watch the sunrise this deliberately was in 2006... I can't imagine how much beauty I miss by being true to my non-morning-person nature every day. I hope it won't take another two years for me to catch my next sunrise.

I wonder where the world's most glorious sunrises are...

Life, she's like a chocolate marble cheesecake

Sung to the cheesiest country 'n western tune you can call to mind:

Life, why d'you gotta be
Sweet and bitter all together?
I know, I know,
The sweet's for enjoyin' and givin' us the grins
And the bitter makes the sweet parts sweeter
But why oh why, I still wanna know,
Do you gotta be
Sweet and bitter all together?

Awwww yeahhh... (repeat several times. Banjo accompaniment optional.)





Ask me to tell you the story behind the "song".

Proof that there is hope

I knew there was, but this is for the sceptics among you.

Another one of those surprise things

And then there was the time, two weeks ago, when I was walking home from the station and I ran into my childhood.

I had cut through Belmore Park, because I'd observed the previous week that it was a much shorter route and well-lit enough not to be a stupid shortcut. And as I emerged from the park not more than 500m from my building entrance, I heard it. Handel's Arrival of the Queen of Sheba, floating across the park and over the sounds of honking, shouting, general city-ing, tapping me gently on the shoulder like a friend I hadn't met in 20 years. Or 13, maybe.

I walked until I found where the music came from: a lone busker, playing to recorded accompaniment. He was good, good enough to make me remember how much I loved listening to classical music when I was younger, starting in primary school up to my late teens. I wondered what had made me stop, and thought of getting a library membership so I could borrow some recordings.

But before I could get round to doing that, in another of those pink champagne moments, I found myself listening to the Sydney Symphony live at the Opera House on Monday night.

It was enough to make a childhood memory smile and scamper away back where it came from.

Why I just won't quit

How can one not be bubbly? Image from Stock.Xchng

Note: I have tried more times than I can count to make the typeface and text size of the following paragraphs consistent. Blogger simply will not obey. Still, better to have an imperfect published post than an unpublished one.

Because life is an experience of the sort where, one cold winter's night in Sydney, you might find yourself walking down Castlereagh St in a hurry, not because you are late but because it is cold and the sooner you reach warmth and shelter, the better. It being a Friday night, you are wondering where you can bring the ex-colleague you are about to meet, because this is Sydney and late-night establishments are few. At least, the type of establishment that offers a safe, warm place for non-alcoholic drinks and quiet conversation. So you wonder, as you bluster along Elizabeth St now, together with the chill wind that appears to be racing with you, where shall we go? And perhaps, you are also wondering if any of the places that are open will also be kind to your wallet, because you have yet to find a job and would like to Save Money while still Enjoying Life. All these things you wonder, and meanwhile, your toes are telling you that canvas slip-ons are not the warmest footwear, and your torso and arms would like you to know that the ensemble of Moschino tee with the sequinned-strawberry-juggling monkey in a tutu and the scribbled words "Multi Talented Girl" on it worn under a denim blazer might be more stylish than a windbreaker but it is also not very warm. But finally you decide that what will be, will be, and what establishment is open (and safe) at this time, will be. And so you reach your ex-colleague's hotel, and you don't wait very long, and she appears. But what's this? Suddenly you realise that you are having drinks with not one but two ex-colleagues, and their international hosts, and instead of buying her a $5 coffee in some little hole in a Sydney wall, you soon find yourself upstairs at the lounge, having a glass of Moët & Chandon Brut Impérial Rosé, and you walk home with two slightly intoxicated but still very chummy ex-colleagues feeling considerably warmer than you did on the walk out.

So, although life has in the past sometimes given me very sour lemons when I would have liked mango (mmmmm... mango), I have not given up on it and will not, because it sometimes gives you pink champagne when you expected to have to buy it a $5 coffee.

Mine!

One of the things that irks me is seeing reading matter that isn't attributed to its real author.

A lot of bloggers are guilty of this, and most are unrepentant. "What? I got this story in my mailbox, I like so I post, lah. Free, what."

Indiscriminate e-mail forwarding is another thing that irks me, but let's stick to one at a time. Is it too much to ask that, if you have no original thoughts of your own and yet feel the compulsion to post, you say where the text was from or, at the very least, that it's not yours?

One thing I am thankful for today: that I no longer have to edit the work of a national editor who gets her "facts" from Wikipedia. (Not a Malaysian editor. At least there's that much consolation!)

BTW, everything on this blog so far is original. Aaaaaaall mine. Mine. Mine. Mineminemineminemineminemine... this video illustrates what happens when multiple Tohs encounter seagulls and have too much time on their hands. Thanks to the folks at Disney/Pixar for the possibly brainless, solely food-minded gulls in Finding Nemo. Five years on and still inspiring.

Today, I woke up 35 minutes after I'd planned to.

Today, I finished half as much of my assignment as I'd planned to.

Today, I cooked a smaller amount of curry than I'd originally shopped for.

The other night, I broke down while talking to cell group members and told them that maybe this is just my time to be mediocre, because I don't feel like the record-breaking Ren I used to be. Not mediocre, one corrected me, but it certainly is time to let go of my own ability and see what God will do instead.

My life over the past few years has been a constant, all-out fight to carve out a life larger than the present one. Job-hopping to a position that was more prestigious, and then to one that I hoped would be more fulfilling; upgrading from a single mattress on the floor to a queen-sized four-poster; overcoming my room's chronic untidiness by adding an extra desk; taking dance classes and participating in a youth conference, stage musical and film project simultaneously while working full-time; quitting work altogether in order to go back to school. I am not unhappy with the result, and my life has been enhanced by the many, many people I've met along the way. But I am, without a doubt, exhausted from the effort.

What, I wonder, what if for once I stopped fighting the current and let it take me where it would?

Would I be able to enjoy the ride, the cushioning waves beneath and the blue sky above?

Can I learn to enjoy the present instead of reaching out a grabby hand for something better?

I'm rich!

I'm a bit slow, so it took a while to hit me. But I am. I really am! Evidence as pictured.

One Saturday night, on a crowded Sydney street...

... some people might have overheard the following conversation, if they were attentive enough.

A: Excuse me...
B, stopping in her tracks: Hi?
A: I'm just wondering...
B, clearly wishing she hadn't stopped because A was so obviously going to ask for money: Yeah?
A: Do you think you could give me some spare change?
B: What do you need it for?
A: I just want to buy some food.
B: How much do you need?
A: Oh, just... oh, two dollars.
B: Are you hungry? Would you like some food?
A: Yeah, that's what I just said, I'm on my way now, I'm going to buy some. I'm just a little short.
B: I'm sorry, I don't have any change. But I do have food and I can let you have some.
A: I just want two dollars and I'll buy my own food.
B: No, I'm sorry. I don't have much money, myself. But you're welcome to some of the food I've got if you're really hungry.
A, agitated and annoyed: No. I'm going to buy some.
B: OK. (Walks off)

Image: Stock.Xchng

Does a genuinely hungry person turn down an offer of free food?

Is a person, apparently able-bodied and sound in mind, with the capacity to carry on a lucid conversation in fluent, proper English, entitled to demand $2 of somebody else's money in exchange for nothing?

I wondered if A would get her $2 and the dinner she was so set upon buying. I wondered if B would share her food with someone else.

I still wonder.