what could we have done

We're not the same, dear

And it seems to be

There's nowhere we can go

With nothing underneath

And it saddens me to say

What we both knew was true

That the ice was getting thinner

Under me and you

Death Cab for Cutie - The Ice is Getting Thinner

Life is a bitch. This is one of those moments where I lose faith in justice and to some degree, the existence of a higher divinity. 

Why would you let something like this happen? Why the fuck did you not do anything back then, too? What lesson is to be learnt in all of this? That if your life happens to take a downturn and is heading for the shits, then bad luck cos that's all there is to it? And what the fuck happened to the so called friendship and compassion? I am really starting to lose all hope in humanity.

Why her and not someone else? Or god forbid, why not me instead? What's so different between us?

At the end of the day there's nothing that either of us could do. 

But like what she said, I miss the past but I can't help but to try and look forward to future...

And it saddens me to say

What we both knew was true...

heartbreak world

let’s all pack up and move this year
we’ll slip the liars and disappear

we’ll leave memories for auctioneers
and those just standing still

they’ll miss the taste of wanted you
call out your name, like i still do but
they haven’t said a word that’s true
and they only hold you down

in this heartbreak world of just imagine
with its tired talk of better days
in this heartbreak world, where nothing matters
come on, let’s make this dream that’s barely half awake come true

Matt Nathanson - Heartbreak World

So, my mum might take off tomorrow night. That will leave me on my own again. That will also mean I will be surviving on instant noodles, amongst other random junk, soon.

I feel rather elevated since it's a Friday. But my horoscope said this weekend may be slightly disappointing, despite looking all nice and peachy for now. Let's just ignore that for the time being.

happy knickers day

Just a shout out to wish my dear friend Knickers a happy 23rd Birthday. Stop growing please. If you get taller again when I come and visit next time I’ll make you the official real live mascot of our flagship product, Sausage Pimp.

Soon it will be Mich’s birthday too and I heard there’s a huge party happening this weekend in Singapore. If only I’m rich enough to just go off for the weekend. How awesome would that be! Wish I could be there. Party hard but don’t drink and drive ok. And don’t drink to the point where you end up doing funny things to each other either – that will be ferduckingly bizarre.

I have been applying for a few job vacancies but no luck thus far. I wonder if it’s because of my lack of experience or because my competitors just have far more impressive stuff under their sleeves. Either way it’s not good, as I want to get out of this damned place as soon as I can. I think this place is really starting to get to me.

That aside everything else is stagnant as always. I’d like to move out sometimes in the future…hopefully not too long from now. It’s be pretty blissful to have my own place where I can be in control of everything. Rent rates are not as bad as I thought they would be but I wonder what my likelihood like since I haven’t rented anywhere before?

So many things to think about.

But for now, I’m just looking forward to the end of the day so I can get out of here. Shanghai Dumplings and Chinese lesson lined up for tonight – let’s hope no one will get pushed down the stairs by some idiotic drunktard this time.

Update: I am bitterly aggravated at people who are doing well in their job/career move with multiple offers from big compenies and awesome career progression who also boasts about all of that while masking them behind a 'dilemma' so they don't sound like a show off. Screw you ferducktards.

Jealous? I obviously AM. But mainly bitter about this whole situation.

we can't go back now

As you all can see I've done a bit of tidying up around the blog (at last! you say. yeah, yeah whatever I've been busy! :p) I've finally decided to get off my ass and get started on what I need to get done. Submission for the Desktop cover competition is out of the way, budget for the next few months are pretty much all worked out, all that's left to do is to start revamping my 'brand' again. That is, design, content and portfolio. I've been dreading this because as we all should know - you're really your worst possible clients.

After that, onward to the FutureBrand competition and job hunt. Mr. I've Got Worse Temper Than a 5 Year Old Kid is back in the office now so we're just waiting for another unreasonable outburst to head our way. Hopefully this time around I'll be better prepared for it. Maybe I should premediate smartarse comebacks in the meantime.

Or get back to work. Hehee. Oh well. Life never stays peachy for longer than a few hours anyway but what can you do. The only way to move now is forward...

Yesterday, when you were young,
Everything you needed done was done for you.
Now you do it on your own
But you find you're all alone, What can you do?

You and me walk on
Cause you can't go back now.
You know there will be days when you're so tired that you can't take another step,
The night will have no stars and you'll think you've gone as far as you will ever get

But you and me walk on
Cause you can't go back now
And yeah, yeah, go where you want to go
Be what you want to be,
If you ever turn around, you'll see me.

I can't really say why everybody wishes they were somewhere else
But in the end, the only steps that matter are the ones you take all by yourself

And you and me walk on
Yeah you and me walk on
Cause you can't go back now
Walk on, walk on, walk on
You can't go back now...

The Weepies - Can't Go Back Now

hope and falsity

Yeah, yeah I know this blog’s been collecting dust. I seriously don’t know what to post… there are a lot of things going on at the moment but everything is just all over the place, you know? It’s hard to pick one event or topic and blog about it. You probably don’t even know what I’m on about. I don’t know I’m on about either. Let’s all take a moment to breathe in all this confusion.

All right. Start over.

So, I’m looking for a new job. I’m sure most of you would know that by now – I have bitched about work quite a lot over the past couple of weeks. For those who don’t, it’s basically OH&S and management issues. I’m now officially on the lookout for a junior designer position preferably in a design studio. Here comes paycut…*sob*

Oh that’s right, today is our (Gav and I that is) second year anniversary! And since we’re both flat broke we’ll celebrate it like how we did last year, a simple dinner at the Timeout Café in Federation Square. That’s where we first met up for coffee. Service’s crap as hell as I discussed earlier at lunch with a few colleagues…their Fat Chips is to die for though. I should also mention that I’m not calling them ‘fat’ intentionally, that’s actually the name of them chips. Thought I should put that out there. I don’t judge chips by their thickness and I sure don’t want a row of skinny French Fries hounding me for discriminating against skinny chips.

Anyway, randomness aside I’ve been working on my submission for the Desktop Magazine July Cover Competition. This is the first time I’ve played around and experimented with Photoshop after Shillington so…while what I’ve came up with may seem a bit abstract, I had quite a lot of fun (and stress) working on it. I’m fairly happy with it at this stage. Will be submitting tonight…then onwards to my portfolio for the job-hunt.

…and just like that I ran out of things to say. Well that’s me today, I’ll post again when things change. Hopefully it’ll be good news next time.

a fleeting moment

I am now typing away from my new shiny Blogger Widget for Mac. Let's hope all works well. In response to having actual responses to my posts (which was rather surprising I must say) and nagging and taunts from Nick, I shall post away. Ease up, I'm slowly getting into the habit of this.

And so it's the end to another week. Another Friday night that did not feel like a Friday night. One of Gav's friend asked me today - 'What is a Friday night to you?'. Ironically, I found it hard to narrow down the answer. In the end, I concluded that an ideal Friday night is one where you actually go out and do something. Preferrably with your group of buddies. 

Having said that, I did had a catch up dinner with Natasha. I have not seen her ever since the Hobart trip. In fact, I haven't seen anyone since the Hobart trip (Gav being an exception but that's obvious). We had a great dinner at Malaymas - overdid the food again and felt slightly sick by the end of it. Afterwards we went home and I continued tidying up my iTunes folder.

And that was the extent of it; my Friday night. I'm not complaining nor am I unsatisfied with anything. But I did wondered about whatever happened to long chats and huge enthusiasm over catching up. Rewind back a couple of years ago, we would have spent hours chatting and gossiping over the most ridiculous things, insist that we need to continue over coffee and dessert and end up in each other's place talking all night and asking for each other's advice on personal matters.

Wait, I better clarify that I'm not talking about Natasha in particular there, I'm  referring to people that I used to be close to in general. 

Anyhoo, it's a weird feeling - knowing that people you used to be super close with are now so far away. It's a natural thing to end up with different cliques - but it still feels strange. For me anyway. What makes is strange now is that years back, I would have been upset over the whole situation - now I feel rather ...indifferent. 

I guess that's how it works with most people. You meet friends, you lose touch, you move on. End of story. But I wonder what it was that made me so detached from values that I once held so dearly, and whether it's a good or bad thing. Perhaps it's neither. It's probably something that's just meant to happen. Perhaps this is what it's like to grow up. My theory is that the older you get the more cynical you'll become thanks to the shits that life throws at you. It's a fact - you can either admit it or be in denial and still say that life's all roses and peaches. I could not care less either way (ha!).

I still believe that by the end of the day, you'll still have timeless friends and people that you hold dear. These people are the ones who keep you together during those moments where everything else seems dull and mundane. But what about those people who once were what you call your second family, your partners-in-crime, your best mates but now can't even hold a proper conversation with without using the formalities of small-talks. 

Are these people meant to around only for that fleeting moment, to give you good (or bad) memories or to teach you a lesson about life - and nothing more?

You might not even see some of them again for the rest of your life. 

It's a strange thing to think about.

awake

Alright, alright, alright. I know I went MIA again after my last post. Cut me some slack, I'm still not used to blogging again. After all, it's been a few months now if not years since I last blog regularly. 

What's new? Well, it's the long awaited Easter break. I have done nothing much so far - started on sorting out my iTunes so now they're all neatly organised by albums and all albums have a decent cover art. Also found some awesome Japanese albums here. See, I'm kind enough to share. It's a pretty awesome site with direct download links to full albums. Mainly Japanese, but there are a few English ones too. 

Work has been ho-hum. Great on the financial side but not very creatively stimulating, but hey I have had this discussion so many times before so no surprises there. It pays the bill, that's most of the people in the company (including myself now) say. It's good in a way that it does not affect much of my personal life - I suppose that's a good thing. 

Since I am now totally hyped up for the FutureBrand Future Talent Competition it's definitely a good thing as the lack of challenge at work allow me to focus most (if not all) of my attention to preparing for my entry. Not hyperlinking there as I don't want more competition, but if you're keen google ahead. Please don't be too keen. Keen is not cool. Go and download that latest episode of How I Met Your Mother instead. 

In saying that, I have found myself awake and not able to sleep for a number of nights now. Ideas and questions kept flowing through my mind and at last I got myself to start on the initial brainstorming session an hour ago. There is SO MUCH to do. So much research, so much preparation... it freaked me out in a way. But there's only one way to go about it...ahead fullspeed.

What else? I miss my friends. Yeah, that entails all of you in Malaysia and Singapore. And New York. Tomorrow (or should I say, in the next couple of hours) I will be going to Wilson Promontory with Gav and his friends. Which is cool, they're all great fun people to be with. But it's a different feel when you're with your own group, and I'm sure most of you understand what I mean when I say that.

There's that stupid inside jokes that really makes no sense but can reduce everyone to hysterical fits. There's that gossip about old friends, crushes and bitching on nasty ex-es. There's that deep and thought-provoking conversation about life in general and where we want to be eventually, which line of work and which industry. Or another nostalgic session where we would reminisce about the past, our uni days and how we'd like to turn back to that one particular timeless moment. 

Yeah, I miss you guys. And this becomes particularly obvious when I start to sigh out loud regularly. I've been doing a lot of that lately.

Until our next reunion...until then, I wish you all well. 

a comparison

Most of you should know that I've been suffering from insomnia lately...(ok fine I wouldn't say suffering as it's partially my fault that I can't sleep). My point is, I've been reading bits and pieces of my old blog . And I find it quite appalling, really. Dark, disturbing findings that will probably haunt me for the next couple of days. 

Ok, so here it is...back then I was such a... happy person! 

So bright, so naive, so excited about every single day and every random chatter that took place. So forgiving, so understanding and I dare-say - so compassionate about...er...human beings in general. Give me rain and I'll come back with an overblown rainbow filled with glitter and sparkles with purple leprechauns and pots of gold on both ends, then I'll invite you to come in and shield yourself from the rain and offer you a hot cuppa and home-baked cookies. Ok, you get the idea. And yes this is disturbing.

Heh, I don't even want to imagine (neither would you really) what sort of thoughts will be running through my mind if that were to happen these days. Especially on days when I cannot afford for things to go amok. 

Be-warned idiots; Just because I haven't done anything so far, it doesn't mean I haven't thought about it yet. Ahem. And back to the point...

Right. I've turned into a bitter cynic, no questions there. Why? Well that should be obvious too given the things that you go through in life. You may find better (and more productive) ways to sort out your problems - but this is how I deal with mine. And it works a treat thus far. Still, I guess it's a little sad to look back and find that you've changed so much from the person you used to be. "Whatever happened to that girl?" some would ask. 

My favourite reasoning: Reality ate her.

probably a beginning

Why probably, you ask? Because it's yet another beginning and i can't reassure you of a continuation. Nonetheless, it's a beginning. So welcome, new and old friends - here I am again. What can you expect this same? Same old random posts, more rants and irrelevant rambles on life and all that surrounds. More lyrics that I relate to (though take note that in most cases they do not reflect my current mood or emotion or most importantly, mental state). This time I hope to make my posts more clear and concise and tone the ramblings down.

Before I scare off my newer guests, I suppose I should introduce myself. My name is Christina, most people call me either Chris, Chrissy, Tin and Itin. Mind you, the last two are strictly only to be used by Indonesian friends who are close to me (just because I hate random strangers who act like you're their BFF). Oh and I'm not trying to be racially exclusive there, it's just that 99% of the time it will sound funny if you attempt to pronounce them - especially if you're not erm, phonetically Indonesian. 

Moving on now, I live in Australia in the great city of four seasons, Melbourne. Been here for almost 10 years now so I guess this is home (although lately it has not been very homey due to my good friends being physically far away...but that's another issue altogether) I live by the waters facing the west so it's bloody hot come afternoon (meaning I can't oversleep in peace as I'll end up waking up covered in sweat...ick) 

I am to commence work next week as a Graphic Designer/Marketing Coordinator (yeay I am two in one) at an Engineering consulting company and I so need to brush up on proper business/technical writing skills. Now I hope I haven't given out too much information there, now that you know a little more about me please don't stalk me. Not that I'm implying you have that kind of intentions of course...but er...whatever, you know what I mean.

That being said, I only have less than four days now before work begins. And in the meantime, there is so much to do. Namely business cards and other random design projects I've set for myself. It's the Chinese New Year period now but it doesn't really feel that way... or rather, I'm not really in the spirit of celebrating. For various reasons that I'd rather not disclose right now, maybe later down the future (there you go, incentive for you to keep coming back here). I guess this is it for now, I'll leave you with part of a lyric from a song I'm listening to right now. I'd dedicate this to an old good friend of mine if I could.

Should I decide it's true

That you would leave me given half the chance to go 

And I'd be left here on my own to find myself in bed

Wishing everything that changed would be the same...

William Fitzsimmons - It's Not True