photo by krookroo

-

-

MOM:
Asyraf! Finish your food!

ASY:
Sorry, I can’t.
I’m bloated!

MOM:
Don’t you know that each time you waste your food,
They will cry?!
(An old saying)

-

Asyraf just sighed and looked over to his fried bee hoon.

“Oh dear fried bee hoon,
I beg for your forgiveness!

I can’t finish you,
Because I’m just too full to eat anymore.

I’M VERY SORRY!“

-

Asy clapped his hands together in signs of apology and bowed his head for the fried bee hoon.

My mom just sighed in contentment.
But then she suddenly noticed,

-

“JAZREEN, WHY AREN’T YOU FINISHING YOUR ROTI CANAI?!?!”

-

-

Quietly I whispered to my untouched roti canai,

“I’m very sorry.
I’ve got no more space for you in my stomach.

But I just want to tell you that you’ll always have a place in my heart as the wonderful food that I should have eaten!”

-

-

Back in mid 2007,
I was really into Arashi- a random Japanese group.

Japanese is a language that most international fans could not understand.
So the fandom community would contribute translations and subtitles for the fun of it.

And I had my own subbing activities back then.
I’d pick translations from the other fans, sub it, and post it up on YouTube.

Now that I’m almost out of the Arashi fandom,
(I only feel tied to it by 2%)
I don’t see the need of keeping my YouTube account anymore.

So I deleted it.

At the time of deleting, here are the account stats:

JOINED: August 21, 2006

VIDEOS WATCHED: 504

SUBSCRIPTIONS: 8

FRIENDS: 16

SUBSCRIBER: 79

CHANNEL VIEWS: 7021

And here are the videos’ stats:

Iza Now MC
10 158 views
13 comments

Nino Cam
(this is subbed by Winky, I only hardsubbed it)
34 139 views
37 comments

Sho Cam
18 131 views
9 comments

Sho Cam Bonus- NinoOhno
18 332 views
9 comments

Ohno Cam
59 247 views
40 comments

Ogu-san The Fanboy
203 708 views
22 comments

Suppin Ending Talk - Midnight Train
6 931 views
5 comments

Jun Cam
11 100 views
7 comments

Aside from that, I also had 4 unreleased subbed videos.
Reasons for not releasing,
even I don’t remember why.

In my family, from my father’s side,
each time you’re about to move to a NEW PHASE in life,
You’ll get a lecture from my grandfather, Tok Pa.

Be it when you’re stepping into secondary school,
moving into college, finally being conscious of the opposite sex,
getting married…

Although I said lecture, it’s not in a nagging way.
It’s real- grandfather to grandchild-
talk about life.

Last night,
I got my ‘transitioning into university life’ lecture- Part 2.
(Part 1 got triggered from last week)

After he’s finished with his part,
he asked me what else I’d want to know about.

I mentioned about how scary it is to meet people that you really just can’t agree with in college.

TOK PA:
Ah, about that.
I think it’s better to ask those who have been through this same thing.

As if it was God answering our call,

Mak Su (my aunt) entered the house looking flustered from work.

She paused after sensing the silence and realized that Tok Pa and I were looking at her for a long time.

MAK SU:
What?!

TOK PA:
(smirking)
Why don’t you ask our social butterfly there?

-+-+-+-+-+-

And so this got one person to reminisce back about her old life in college.

How she had a bad reputation,
got kicked out by her dorm mates,
joined the cooler dorm mates…

Feuh, what a way to start her first semester, right?

Then my dad jumped in on the conversation too.
He recalled what a glorified creature he was back in the old days.

DAD:
I was friends with a lot of the seniors back then.
The guys of my batch were extremely jealous of me!

But they can’t do anything to me!
Because they were afraid of the seniors.

Yes, that’s right.
NOBODY had the guts to bother me!
(cackles)

-+-+-+-+-+-

And when you’re in university,
you really can’t avoid getting some weird people in your room.

My dad didn’t describe much about his dorm mates.

But Mak Su had a really dangerous mixture of roommates.

There was one girl who kicked her out of her dorm earlier,
One girl who sleeps naked in her bed with a big knife under her pillow,
and one really emotional girl by the name of Susila Anak Kambing
(An example of the name since I can’t remember it correctly)

MAK SU:
The third girl was the most problematic.

Each time when we’re saying something like,

“Hey, I feel like eating lamb.
Aku rasa aku nak makan kambing la.”

Then she’ll start shouting,

“Oh, so kau nak makan bapak aku la?!
Kurang ajar kau!”

She’ll get so emo about it and locked herself in her room for the longest time.

I mean, we were talking about lamb’s meat! Not her father!

-+-+-+-+-+-

When my dad continued on how he was the envy of his peers,

JAZ:
(whispering)
I think my dad is still living the ’sorority life’.

MAK SU:
Let him be.
He can’t let go of it.

DAD:
Of course I can’t let go of it!
‘Sorority life’ rawks~!

Yeah, believe it,

Your papa rawks!

I tuned in for American Idol Finale 2008,
mainly to watch the Davids.

By the end of the show though,
only one song that was really playing on the loop in my head.

Carrie Underwood’s ‘Last Name‘.

It tells a story about how a girl who got too drunk in Vegas,
hanged out with an unknown guy.
The next morning, she found a ring on her finger.

Yep, she married the guy
whom she doesn’t even know his last name.

So she left Vegas trying to erase the incident from memory.

Then it hit her,
she doesn’t even know HER last name!

Yeah, you can throw out the whole
“This song promotes indecent behavior etc etc.”

But I find this to be a very fun song.
A song telling a story of such irresponsible moments and
has its own comedic effect.

I’ll probably start listening to Carrie more often now.

* Click ‘read more’ for lyrics.

“Last Name“

Last night, I got served a little bit too much of that poison, baby
Last night, I did things I’m not proud of
And I got a little crazy
Last night, I met a guy on the dance floor and I let him call me baby

[Chorus:]
And I don’t even know his last name
My momma would be so ashamed
It started off, “hey cutie where you from”
And then it turned into oh no, what have I done
And I don’t even know his last name

We left, the club, ’bout around 3 o’clock in the morning
His Pinto, sitting there, in the parking lot, well it should have been a warning
I had no clue what I was getting into
So, I’ll blame it on the Cuervo
Oh where did my manners go?

[Chorus:]
I don’t even know his last name
Oh My momma would be so ashamed
It started off, “hey cutie where you from”
And then it turned into “oh no, what have I done”
And I don’t even know his last name

Here we go

Today, I woke up, thinking about Elvis somewhere in Vegas
I’m not sure how I got here
Or how this ring on my left hand just appeared outta nowhere
I gotta go take the chips and the Pinto and hit the road
They say what happens here, stays here, all of this will disappear

There’s just one little problem

[Chorus:]
I don’t even know my last name
Oh My momma would be so ashamed
It started off, “hey cutie where you from”
And then it turned into “oh no, what have I done”
And I don’t even know my last name

What have I done
What have I done
What have I done

Oh, what have I done
I don’t even know my last name

Well it turned into, oh no what have I done
And I don’t even know my last name
Yea, Yeah, Yeah

I don’t even know my last name
It started off “hey cutie where you from”
And then it turned into, oh no what have I done
And I don’t even know my last name
Oh, yeah

[Thanks to Matt for these lyrics]
[Thanks to Jenny, Ashley, Morgan, rapunzelmw@yahoo.com for correcting these lyrics]

SOURCE: azlyrics

“You. MUST. Come. And watch this play.

I’m in it, that’s good enough of a reason.

Your only excuse is either you’re dying

or you absolutely hate laughing!”

Yes, I was indeed threatened by a friend to watch this play.
I was hesitant at first,
but after knowing that ANOTHER friend will be in it too,
I booked myself a ticket for the Sunday, 18th May 2008, 3:30pm show.
(Later on, my sister bought her own ticket)

COMING OUT OF THE CLOSET - The Play
was held at Alliance Francaise, KL.

Before entering the hall, there were two girls behind me talking:

“What is this play about?”

“Oh, it’s just about 2 gays together in a closet.”

That. Sounds. So. Wrong.
If it is so,
then I’m much too naive for this!

* Click ‘read more’ for my take on the play.

“I laughed myself to tears reading the script!”

With that said from my friend,
I went there expecting to laugh a lot.

I didn’t.
Not because it wasn’t funny.
I guess it wasn’t that big of an impact enough.

It was good enough to get me smiling most of the time.
I giggled through half of the jokes presented.
But I remember laughing out loud at ONE particular joke.

The Toyota Joke

SUREN:
(While in the closet)
[Long winded explanation about how he was playing hide-and-seek with his brother.
He hide in a Toyota car's boot, and his uncle drove the car unknowingly.]

(Spooky voice)
It was dark and scary!

Ever since then, I am terrified of dark and small spaces!
… And TOYOTAS!
(with disgust)

ASHLEY:
Wait a sec, was that why you broke up with Neesha?!

SUREN:
(Desperate and terrified)
It was too much!
SHE HAD A TO.YO.TA.!

It may not really be funny to you now,
but you have to see how Lau Wai Keat/ Suren acted it out.

That was the one point that poked my sides to laugh out loud!

Thinking about it back now,
I think I would’ve laughed a lot if I had READ the script
rather than watch the play.

It was wacky and random.
The kind of thing that I’d enjoy reading.

So if there was a problem with the jokes,
I’d probably put it more on the actor’s performance.

Maybe their timing was a little too off.
Maybe they were too fast on things, that I didn’t get to digest the humor.
Or maybe that’s just me (and my sister, who thought of the same thing).

Whatever it is,
I don’t blame the script for it.

As for the second act of the play,
it was more focused on solving the insanity around and reaching a conclusion.

I somehow did feel that it was a bit draggy there.
I think for about 15 minutes,
I was wondering,
“When’s the next big thing coming? When are the drastic changes?”

“GET OUT OF THAT CLOSET ALREADY, YOU GAYS!”

-+-+-+-+-+-

I remember groaning in confusion when a random booming sound came out.
It was between an explosion or a horrible rock guitar played.

I only realized, after the fourth time,
that the sound was to cover up for the swearing by the characters.

I find it messy with that sound effect.
The dialogues were sharp and clear,
then suddenly an occasional Low-Q explosion sound interrupts in between.

If it was really to cover the swearing,
a simple *BEEP* would’ve sufficed for me.

On a random note,
I have no idea how the closet was still standing after 3 days of performance!
It looks so fragile,
Suren and Ashley moved a LOT in the closet.

Just when I thought that the closet would have fallen apart,
Ashley took his chance to get out of character and fixed up the darn closet.

It would have been fun though if the closet did break off in the middle of the show.
They’ll be forced to adapt the storyline to the unprecedented disappearance of the closet,
with Suren and Ashley getting discovered way earlier than they were supposed to.

Fortunately for the show,
no furnitures fell apart.

-+-+-+-+-+-

Was it worth investing RM20 for the show?
Yes.

It wasn’t hilariously funny for me,
but it’s still entertaining.

LINKS:

• Coming Out Of The Closet- Livewire’s Website
• Coming Out Of The Closet’s Facebook Group
• A short review by MinLi

“We are just 2 guys together in a closet.
What is so WRONG with that?!“

Thursday, 1st May 2008.

Mak Su, Unc Azim, and I went for the MPH Stock Clearance Sale.

It was about 8:30am,
Unc Azim was speeding.
Mak Su was encouraging him to go faster.

And I was at the backseat, gripping to anything I can reach for, terrified of the speed.

ME:
What’s with the rush? The sale is going on the whole day, right?

MAK SU:
a) We’ll get good parking spaces.
b) We’ll have the whole place to ourselves.
c) We don’t have to wrestle with other bookworms for our books!

Hold on tight, girl!
Azim, step on it!!!

-+-+-+-+-+-

As we were about to enter the hall,
there was a mountain of old boxes outside of the entrance.

We eyed quickly for the bigger boxes around and snatched it before anybody else sees it.

My jaw fell off upon looking into the hall.
There were countless of books!
At DISCOUNTED price!

Oh the temptations!

After picking back up my jaw, I frantically made my way to search for any interesting books.
(Which isn’t really hard, given that I have at least 20 books on my wishlist)

-+-+-+-+-+-

I was still in the Darren Shan Saga fever,
having just finished reading Book 9.

I was really only looking for either Book 6 or the compilation of Book 10-11-12.
And both books were there!

Now, what would you do when you have both desired books in front of you?

You grab ALL of them.

And one book led to another,
I found myself resisting temptations at the sight of the Demonata series.

Mak Su, after seeing me in terrible pain,
dumped the whole collection into our box.

Yes, the whole freaking collection of Demonata!

-+-+-+-+-+-

I was officially in a pure state of bliss by the end of our shopping spree.

I got a total of 9 books, a huge treat from Mak Su and Unc Azim.
They spent a total of RM 149 on my books alone.

To show my appreciation for this,
I unconsciously said,

“Thank you!!!
These will be my birthday present for
3 years!”

Then I paused to actually analyze what I said
after seeing both of their wicked grins.

“Muahahaha! We don’t need to think for her birthday present until the year 2011.”

“Heck, we don’t even need to REMEMBER her birthday for the next three years!”

Right, erm… should I be regretting now?

]]> http://thewitlessairhead.wordpress.com/2008/05/14/mph-stock-clearance-sale-2008-and-my-3-years-worth-of-birthday-presents/feed/ jaezreen The Darren Shan Saga books I bought The Demonata books I bought http://thewitlessairhead.wordpress.com/2008/05/13/taking-pictures-with-his-schoolmate/ http://thewitlessairhead.wordpress.com/2008/05/13/taking-pictures-with-his-schoolmate/#comments Tue, 13 May 2008 04:24:52 +0000 jaezreen http://thewitlessairhead.wordpress.com/?p=95

Do you know how the world is really small?

After a few years of not meeting someone,
suddenly on that day, fate has brought you to stumble upon them?

This happened to my Uncle Azim.
We were all hanging around at Sunway Pyramid trying to search for keychains.

Then, he stopped walking and was looking at a particular guy.

He asked for me and Mak Su to snap a picture of him with his ex-schoolmate.

He went to the guy,
who was in charge of promoting a toothpaste brand, Sensodyne at the exhibition.

So I was expecting my uncle to strike up a conversation with that guy.
Instead, he only said,

“Excuse me sir, could you please move a bit?
I’d like to take a picture with my fellow ex-schoolmate here.”

Eih?
That guy isn’t his schoolmate?
So who is it?
I don’t see any other people around there.

It only dawned on me after Unc Azim posed beside a guy with his shiny teeth,
telling us to quickly snap the photo of him with his classmate.

Lorh!

His classmate was the Cardboard Cutout Image of the Sensodyne model!

Ceyh, buat suspense je!

With college coming nearer,
I’d avoid going to auditions unless I can gain something from the audition ITSELF.

And THIS is one of the few auditions that I’ll feel accomplished just by going there.

On Saturday & Sunday (3rd - 4th May 2008),
Da Huang Pictures had their Web Shop Launch on those days,
aside from also having auditions for their future films.

So I went there for two reasons:

• Purchase ‘Flower In The Pocket’.
• Go for the audition.

This was held at The Annexe during the Art For Grabs that weekend.
Too bad I didn’t pay much attention to this ‘funfair’ at first.
(Yep, I call these types of events- Funfair)

There was a lot going on there and so many things to do.
It would have been really fun.

* Click ‘read more’ for details of the audition.

I went straight away to Da Huang’s stall and purchased the DVD,
only to give it back after seeing,

“20% concession on DVDs for audition participants!”

Heh, it seems like it’s a sign from God pushing me for the audition.
(God knows that I have a very very soft spot for free and discounted items.)

After filling in the form and taking profile pictures,
I was handed a paper describing three scenarios.

• You called your boyfriend to tell him that you’re leaving him forever.
  (Sounds too mushy and jiwang for me)

• You’re being raped by a stranger. You tell him to be a gentle and use the condom that you have with you.
  (Err…?)

• You wake up from a three-years coma and realized that you’ve lost both of your arms. You are alone and a mosquito landed on your cheek and starts sucking blood.
  (……)

As you can see from my responses above, I’m definitely not familiar with any of the scenes.
Then again, I don’t have much experience to start with in the first place.

And they’re MONOLOGUES!
I’ve learnt from previous auditions that I’ve yet to be able to interact alone,
so monologues are absolute nightmares!

-+-+-+-+-+-

I went up to the audition space and was greeted by Da Huang’s filmmakers.
- Liew Seng Tat & Tan Chui Mui

Alright, so among the scenarios above,
Which one did you think I would choose?

If your answer is the THIRD scenario,
then that’s proof that you indeed know me well.

She woke up confused as to where she is.
Then she realized that she have lost both hands.
She struggled to try and remember what’s the last thing that happened to her.
Then she remembered that there was a man before who kidnapped her and raped her.

And this was the cue for the mosquito to come buzzing over and sucked on her blood.
There was some fidgeting to get it off of her cheek.
Eventually, she got so frustrated that she banged her cheek at the wall for three times.
(Three days have passed. And it still hurts!)

(Because I forgot what I wanted the ending to be, I came up with some drastic changes on the spot to end things)

As the girl was still coming to terms with her current situation,
she was surprised to see a man came in.
She remembered him as the man who raped her before.

She was terrified and screamed as she backed off to the wall until there was no more space left.
The man came nearer and nearer to her with a wicked grin…

Yeeaaahhh, that’s the end of it.
Sorry for the scarce details.

I always find it awkward talking about my own acting.
I can’t evaluate myself.

I know I’m not superbly good.
Somewhat decent for screen,
but terrible for stage.

TAN CHUI MUI:
So you’re doing both scenario 2 and 3…

ME:
Mainly scenario 3. I mixed them up a bit.

TAN CHUI MUI:
(Scribbling on clipboard)
Hmm… Interesting…

She actually called my attempt -interesting-.
That was enough of a reward for me.

-+-+-+-+-+-

Went down to their stall again and purchased ‘Flower In The Pocket’,
grinning like an idiot chanting in a holy manner,
“20% concession! 20 percent cooooonncessiioonn!”

(Me and my infatuation for discounted price)

GOALS COMPLETED:

I’ve always wanted to audition for an Indie Film Company.
Check!

Attempt a monologue audition and at least have 25% of the fear thrown off my shoulders.
Check!

Purchase ‘Flower In The Pocket’ to finally fulfill the desire to watch it after seeing the trailer.
Check!

The only regret I have so far is forgetting to ask for a picture with both of them.
But all in all, it has been a really good day!

UPDATES:

Congrats to the two winners announced!

Based from the e-mail I got,
it seems that there are about 15 participants who came for the audition.
And I was the last one to audition there.

Oh yeah, and here’s Da Huang’s own report of the auditions:
Da Huang’s Audition For Grabs

The proper English for the title:
To Apply For Matriculation or Not To Apply For Matriculation?
(But that title would have been too long)

So here’s a post on some of my takes on matriculation a.k.a. matrics

-+-+-+-+-+-

Matrics is like STPM/ Form 6.
You take them up for your pre-university course before going up for a degree.

The difference is, your chance to apply for matrics comes BEFORE you even sit for the SPM papers.
And it only comes ONCE.
So it’s a now or never chance for us then.

Most smart students went to apply for it,
regardless of what courses they are actually interested in or whether matrics is really relevant for them.

I, on the other hand, wasn’t a smart student.
I was a stubborn twit.
I didn’t apply for it for certain reasons.

Which most would consider stupid since:

• If you get matrics, at least you have a path to continue your studies if you’re rejected by the IPTA.
• You’ll have more options to choose if you get accepted by both matrics and IPTA.
• You have NOTHING to lose in applying.

Really?

Do you REALLY have nothing to lose by applying?

There was a rumor going around:

If I did get accepted by matrics, my IPTA application will be terminated automatically.

Not True!
I have friends who got both matrics and IPTA entries.

So matrics really have no effects on my IPTA applications whatsoever?

Aha! THAT’s the real question here.

There’s no official answer for this.
But sources have said that it DOES affect the IPTA admissions.
It makes them consider less of your application for the IPTA.

If you look at it one way,
it’s unfair as matrics and IPTA are two different institutions.
Why mix them up to have one affecting the other?

But looking at it from another way, it is somewhat sensible.

So let’s look at a very common case here:

Students who are interested in Science courses.
(Regardless whether it’s medic, biotechnology, farmacy etc)

They applied for the Science matrics and the Asasi/Foundation in Science for IPTA.
They got accepted for the Science matrics.

Now, if you are the person in charge of the IPTA intakes,
you will look at this applicant and you see that he/she already has a place in matrics under the same subject.
So would you prioritize so that this person will also get the offer for IPTA?

Despite having hundred thousands other applicants who are also fighting for this same course that have no placings in the matrics?

I’m not saying that it is fair to disregard IPTA applications after seeing their matrics results.
Nor am I saying that it is unfair that some have the luxury of getting accepted by both offers.

But I can see why they had to do that as it is necessary to sacrifice one’s OPTION to
offer another’s CHOICE.

Although you have two options, you can only choose one.
Thus, wasting one chance for those who have none at all.

So now, do you REALLY have nothing to lose for applying to matrics?

Woohoo! Yeah baby!

Unlike most courses, this course actually required an interview.

Which is good:

My paper qualifications are much of a fail.

Having an interview would be another chance of proving myself of my worth. Plus, I’m better at that than answering subjective questions on the structure of chemicals and the formulas of physics.

There’s not much competition.

Eventually, I did pretty well in the interview, Alhamdulillah.

And as you can see from the image above,
I got accepted!

I’ll post more on the interview I went through, and some rumors that got cleared after these results.