i can't choose, or think. i'm afraid.

BCMB, BC, BPC, CMM...

Or P,MS? D:

principle of nostalgia

The most important thing you should know before you learn the principle of nostalgia from me is that I am not a good memory sorter and I do not remember every single turn my emotions make.

They just lead my life through the twists and turns of the labyrinth of life and sometimes, we just meet this dead end together. We turn on the gooey water fountain, then we realize there was another way. We proceed. We go on. It's the only way we were getting out of this misery, or joy. I... don't really know. But one thing I definitely know is: on the way out, we were always lucky to have picked up companions, wonderful ones, and repressive ones. We, relish both kinds, because all we wanted was to get out of here.

Or not?

Sometimes (define sometimes?) we pick up companions who are covered with fire, we can't touch them, we just smile at them. We want to hug them and help them with every single twist and turn this labyrinth has to offer but we never had water. Or a fire extinguisher. No one gave us those. No one gave me those. No one wanted to give me those. Some just intended to, but they were disallowed.

Sometimes, you faintly hear the walls of the labyrinth, the weeds growing on it, and the sky: they yell a faint "Well done!". We hear it, but we don't. We believed it, but we don't. We wanted more. Moar. More. I; we, we needed a flaming companion. We needed it to burn through the walls, to light up the paths, to burn our souls. We had nothing to fear. We had nothing to enjoy. We were, banal. We tried so hard to be either fatalists, or hedonists. But failed every time.

It consumes us, the fact that we eventually reach the end of the labyrinth: success, and the fact that we will, in the end, be just us. Just this group, this duo - me and Pain. Our physical attributes will be consumed by the omnipotent Thanatos, and Pain will grow stronger with Eros beside me. But I, I've got to save myself. How? I never knew, and will probably never know. Guess I've got to cope. We are, after all, reaching there together, alone. Alone & Together. The world will spin without us.

Yesterday was technically the last day of class. Cutting all the nostalgia out, it was just another plain day, perhaps with a few hints of excitements (with friends, and celebrating a birthday) and a few hints of sorrow (with friends, and celebrating a birthday, from sensitivity and imagination). Looking back the semester, this is probably the point on my life graph curve where the slope of the tangent was the most steep. Growth was as eminent as Pain, Nostalgia as eminent as Indifference, Longing as eminent as Abstention. Perhaps the Marxist interpretation of dialectics would best describe this long, content-filled semester. Need was also as eminent as Want. But the most painful of all competition for eminence was between the party of Rationale, Cynicism, Disbelief and the party of Emotions, Humanity, Lust. Pain comes and goes in between.

I will miss this, as rational as I try to be, because Rationale grew out of this intense cycle of Emotions and Thirst for Explanations. I will miss my wonderfully brilliant friends, my companions, my indifferent acquaintances, the acquaintances who I'm indifferent towards, the amazing and heartbreakingly ambivalent lecturers (the regret for not knowing them personally sucks), the prevalent hatred, the prominent lust and longing, the pressies - the Comfort, basically. Define Comfort? Most possibly everything. Define Extra Comfort? Maybe the sight of that Flame. That red Flame. Ah forget it. I would just conclude by defining Extreme Comfort as books and Total Comfort? My best friends (you know who you are and I, know why you are), my pen, my body, my...family. My goal now, is just to really, really live up thanking the people who pragmatically filled my life with hope, and I want to do it the right way: with love. Yes, thank you for criticizing, cliche much, I know. But I know at least I'm not as cliche as you: I know that Flame will never realize it and I will never want to add gasoline (or water) to the flame and I know all I can do is just to not look. Not think. Just do, what everyone does. Denial, they call it, but I call it Camouflage.

To conclude this messy post, I shall use no metaphor. I just want to really thank the people who have really been through this with me. This hard time, with Myself, with the Beast, with the Labyrinth, and with Pain. I want to shout out to the best companions I have *at college* (alphabetical order, or random order? oh where are my narcotics! I won't rank, ever! And length doesn't mean anything!):

COMM 105 classmates: Thank you so much for making the class so lively! Special thanks to Emily, Sheng, Azrina and Druvi for making the class very, very fascinating with either your crazy barks or sarcastic remarks and fantastic ideas. And thank you most Ms Anna for such a wonderful course!

Doraisingam Tamilwanan: The best friend anyone can have! Thank you for being such sport in our friendship shaken by sloppy dirtiness *hinthint* and ambivalent sarcasm. It was really fun to have your company at times and thank you so much for making our WREL project such a major success. Loved your speeches and its great to see you grow so well in SPCH class. Thank you so much for sharing the only Wall Street Journal which barely appeared in the library. Even though it was so hard to comprehend, I know you were able to savor all of it; I just really loved the quality of the paper and the graphics *LOL*. And I apologize for whenever I was a tough nut to handle and for the wrong things I may have said. I really hope to see you in Wisconsin! And continue landscape drawing! One thing I really wanna see is you wearing your glasses! ZOMG Kitteh! =3

Fione Lim: Though I may not know you for a long time, hanging out with you and Ikhsan when you were here was probably the best thing I could ask for. It was very nice to have you around and I bet everyone here misses you! We all miss you! Hoping you are doing great and all awesome over there in Milwaukee! And I heard you aced Microeconomics. Congratulations! Hope to see you real soon!

Geraldine Evone Ho: HALO! The best friend anyone can have! Monkeh! Haye, how come you've never drawn a bunneh on my book! Thank you, Gelatin, for being such fun company and fun to tease (don't kill meh pliz)! Thank you so much for the awesome possum and all wonderful language that I have never mastered! LOL. And thanks for being such a great conversationist (No pun intended, Justine, I know you are pfft-ing now). I'm so sad (in both a true way and a sarcastic way) to say that I will surely miss you when I leave college. Who's gonna draw on my books?! NOHHHHHHH! I will visit the future building you will build in Michigan! And draw monkehs! "Do not tempt me!"

Justine Yeo Jian Ju: Requesting permission to poke. *pokepoke* *flashteeth* The best friend anyone can have! You know, this part of the blogpost will not be enough for me to say everything I wanna say, 'cause there is just too much to thank you for. I shall practice my summarizing skills to the maximum. Firstly, thank you so, so much for being an amazing friend (I was awarded Ikhsan's Understatement of the Year Award for this). Do I even have to say this? It is just too taken for granted that you are such a wonderful soul, always assisting people, running up and down the 12th floor corridor saying hi, greeting people with your soothing smile (regardless of mood, or pain *hinthint*) and doing stuff for people, without taking credit (I'm not criticizing anything this time! Just stating the facts!). We all love you and thank you for everything you've done, Justine! You've made my breathing in college (especially during the sociology research) possible. And keep it up with the awesome sarcasm, 'cause we know there is a lot moar in store! Keep loving what you do and keep doing what you love! And I support your "Special" someone! I'm also glad to say I'm proud of you for being so strong and I'm grateful for having you as my closest friend! I couldn't ask for more tolerance and acceptance(you know what I mean). Please, let me do my part too. May the Man Upstairs bless you always!

Kar Yan & Marcus: Sifu! The best friend anyone can have! I will definitely miss you and your laughs! Thank you for being so cool and sporting! And you're probably the person I can be so awesomely vulgar with LOL. Continue being such an amazing person and good luck in your future undertakings! Love you! And Marcus! Love you too! Thank you for such fun company you've been and I'm really glad you're a fan of John Mayer and Jamie Cullum! High 5! All the best to you too!

MATH 161 PASS Students: You guys are awesome, man. PASS has been one of the best things that happened to me in college. I really enjoyed teaching because of you guys. I really feel all passionate about teaching again, which had been lost for so long since I was told I couldn't do so when I was young. I had a really bad experience trying to teach my peers when I was seven (pathetic, I know). I hope I really helped you all! I'd like to thank Yee Sheng and Natali for making my first few PASS sessions easy, Kyoko for asking the toughest questions of all as it really made me learn, and thank you all who asked questions (especially Mercy, Indra, Adrian and Su Lin)! Thanks for participating ever so actively! Love you guys! All the best and I hope you all get what you worked for!

Mohammad Faiz: The best friend anyone can have. Hey Asian! Okay, I'm getting sick of that joke, but you know what I'm not sick of? Being called Cina, and I somehow felt for the first time, you're actually teasing me. It's a great thing! LOL. And I wish I could call you Cina but everytime I use it against you I must add it 'One-Twelfth'. Not very convenient! Anyways,thank you so much for being such an amazing friend! Thank you so, so much for saying thank you, and for being such a straightforward person! I'm also very grateful having you as a classmate in COMM and ECON. I have no idea how the heck I've forgotten to pass you the quiz paper by the way. And trust my, your presentations were great in COMM so quit being self-destructive! We all love you and your teasing, Faiz. Just keep it clean. (Look who's talking?) Okay I will try to stop snorting at your seemingly banal sentences! (emphasis on 'try')

Muhammad Ikhsan: *hinthint* FALE. *rolls eyes* HAHA. The best friend anyone can have! I know this is all understood but since it's a shoutout... Thank you, dearest Pukitron, for being such great sport when we all tease you so much, especially me, I really feel so ungrateful for poking fun at you all the time (okay it can be sarcastic but no, it's not). Thank you so much for being a great friend, for tolerating my being a nuisance all the time, and thank you for being such an understanding friend. I will always hope the best for you and I hope you do your best in life. You have no idea how much it means to me how well you handle whatever you know about me and really, a million thanks. The rest is either already understood, or you know, yeah... I must be really lucky to have you as a friend. Keep your heart open and never let anyone take you down. You know you can do it, and if you need anything, I will always be here.

Natalie Tan & Alvin Teh: Thank you both - if I'm allowed - daddy teh and momma nat! Haha. Thank you, Natalie, for all the nice things you've said about me. I've heard them. And thank you Alvin, for being such sport in helping Flipside achieve (probably) its best issue evah! Love your photography, keep snapping! All the best to you both and good luck in whatever you do! Hope to see you guys in the distant future, uh, no offense at all but hopefully married. Haha. You can adopt me if you want!

Olivia, Yi Min, Abhishek & Nicole: Thank you guys for being such amazing company either in the library, the corridor, or in Subway. I'm really grateful to come to know you guys and I really hope the best for you guys. Olivia, thanks for being so cool! Yi Min, thanks now I know what a blue waffle and lemon party is; I really hope you figure out your aims. AB, thanks for being such sport! You're cool and we all know that! And heard you're transferring to Segi, so all the best! And Nicole, thank you for being awesome possum and for asking "where's Ikhsan" every time you see me LOL. And all the best in studying, I wish the best for you! I know you can be an awesome businesswoman!

Rebecca Wong Yoke Ying: Salmon! The best friend anyone can have! Thank you so, so much Reb, especially for driving me around (oh and Iki, Justine and Faiz and Sam too) and for tolerating my nonsense! We shall get drunk on tea as much as we can! Thank you for being such an amazing friend and for the fun you have brought. And thanks for being a ghost lately because it's really fun to have you around after college! I really hope the best for you in whatever you do and whatever I can do to help, let me know!

Samantha & Faisal: Thank you so much for being fun company! Thank you both, for everything you've done in college and with the gang. Sam, I will not tolerate any more eyebrow raising for anything I didn't mean by the way! I will really miss you both too! All the best in whatever you pursue and promise you'll visit Banting!

Shanggar Ganesh: The Dewd with the VidCam and mad Beatboxing skillz! The best friend anyone can have! You know, when I first met you, you reminded me of my high school best friend, big time. And I thought it would be really nice to know you and you know what, it turned out to be moar than true! Thank you so much for being such sport and great company! Continue doing what you love and I will be there for you so long as it's green! We shall save Mother Earth! Good luck in your future undertakings, study hard, and study smart! P/s: Deactivate your facebook account!

Soon Kiat, Adelina & the Flipside team: Thank you all for being such cooperative people and especially Soon Kiat, for the passion for publishing this issue of Flipside. Thank you, Adelina, for being so supportive and such a cool editor, and for being there for Soon Kiat and I during the design-rush! Thank you, Soon Kiat, for being such amazing assistance and company for designing. It was really fun working with you! And thank you again, Dre, for being there for us when we were really stressing out! I really appreciate the success of this issue of Flipside!

The Classroom Colonizers: Thanks for letting me join the studying-in-the-empty-classroom club! Thank you Soh Imm, Wei Ling, Evone, Piong and the rest! It was really fun studying with you guys! And more productive! I wish all the best to you guys in whatever you're doing!

And I guess that concludes my shoutout. I really can't remember if I left out anyone so I'm sorry, and thankful too, to anyone who's not in the list but deserved my gratitude! And I apologize to everyone, for everything I might have done to hurt you all, or maybe infuriate you. Thank you so, so very much. I love you guys!

I will miss you!