the diary of a girl named joanne

ouch! it still hurts… it’s still painful… it’s still causing me a lot of problems…

can’t stand up straight… can’t walk properly… it’s all too painful…

and it’s all because of my stupid twisted ankle!

when is it gonna get healed? when is the pain going away? when will i move or walk properly again?

feel so handicapped… i know i shouldn’t complain.

but what am i gonna do when i have a sprained ankle? especially at this critical time… one more day to pre-NLDS and this is freaking me out!

there is little i can do… sit and wait and wonder when the pain is going away.

to my twisted left ankle: pls heal quickly… okay, still not enough…  I BEG YOU, pls heal quickly!!!

*sobbing*

why? why? why?

why did i sprain my ankle? why this time?

pre-NLDS is this sunday! there’s still so much to do. first, there’s square dances to plan, then the african dance, and then the roll calls and then the delegates… i’m so dead. i’m almost practically immobile… limping in my steps… can’t even change the car gear properly, causing the car to jerk every time i switched the gear - almost met with an accident the other day… fortunately. phew! *wipe sweat off forehead*

i still gotta teach and learn dances for NLDS… but how am i gonna dance with limping legs??? guess i have to just make do with whatever energy and strength that’s left in me.

*sigh* there i was, all excited and geared up to attend NLDS. but here i am now, with a sprained ankle. guess i just got to live with the fact that i have a sprained ankle for the entire next week. at least, pls pls pls let it heal quickly so the pain will go away and i won’t remember about the pain anymore and i’ll be a happy girl once again! *fingers crossed*

still here… in utm.

everyone’s gone back home and already celebrating "freedom" with friends and family. as for me, i’m still happily sitting here beside yan (yes, he’s not supposed to be here ’cause he’s not from this faculty but i "smuggled" him in here… *evil*) in my faculty’s computer lab, typing this piece away.

more and more people i know here in utm are going back today. utm is getting emptier… physical evidence: my hostel block! there’s practically no one else on my floor and for the entire block, it’s only me and 3 other girls (whom i don’t really know). yes, it’s creepily unusually silent… ooh please, hate the silence. it’s killing me. shower has never been scarier than this. feel as if there were eyes watching me from every nook and corner. so i tried making my shower as short as possible, wrap the towel around my body, run out of the shower cubicle and immediately head for my room, get inside and lock the damn door!

but during the day, everything turn normal again… it’s warmer and sweeter with no one bustling around or slamming their room doors or talking out loud. the whole place is wonderfully yours… but sadly, i’m not always indoors. i go out. there are much more things to see and enjoy out there… thank god, yan’s still here to accompany me. really appreciate all he’s done for me especially in making my extra few days here in utm much more exciting.

going back home this saturday… "things-to-do" always waiting for me. this time, it’s not a holiday - it’s work! with christmas coming around the corner and NLDS… my hands are full. help… me!

i’m gonna leave penang in a couple of hours…

snap! oh wow… it’s been 2 weeks.

definitely had the time of my life. glad to be back home and all. it was indeed a fun-filled 2 weeks (with a lot of sweet things here and there every day, hmmm…). and also thanks to my-one-and-only-buddy, ms. emily chong, for making my short stay even much more exciting and crazee… we celebrated my 20th birthday together (she helped me to welcome adulthood and eliminate the -teen behind my age… haha!). so sad… and happy to be 20! and we also ate at nando’s and gurney’s food court (yes, it’s a big deal to mention that we ate together ’cause we can hardly always eat together like this), catched up with the latest news about each other and gossips in town and watched movie - Frostbite (i agree with you em. pls ppl dun watch the movie even if you have free tics. it’s lame with a big ‘L’).

so you had it all… really had the time of my life… i know, finals is coming very soon… dun remind me… this is supposed to be my study leave.

i returned home 2 weeks ago with all kinds of feelings inside - happy, excited, sad, heavy etc

and i’ll be returning to JB with the same all-kinds of feelings inside. a part of me wants to stay on here and the other part of me wants to go back as soon as possible… been wanting to meet everyone back in uni (everyone i know is back there except me…) - i so wanna meet up with alish, mich, xl, lem, karteck, simon, doria, khailun, shiuan, ayie, laila and yan: really miss you loads…

hmmm… utm here i come…

"Yesterday,

you entered my life

being my princess

i built up a beautiful garden full with roses

for us to live in.

Today

you cherished my life

you gave all of your life to me

you said the roses are our bridge of love

i’m giving you my pure love

there’s no life for me without you.

Tomorrow,

we don’t know

what would happen to our garden

to our bridge of love.

Hopefully…,

we, together

will keep the garden well

make the roses bloom…

so that

our bridge of love will never break."

p.s. - hey m.i.z.z., thanks for this beautiful piece… really appreciate it.

words just can’t describe how wonderful everything was spelled out for me today…

i really felt i was in cloud 9… for the 1st time.

i know you’re rushing me into details… but this time, unfortunately for you, i’m not spilling that many beans. this is way too confidential to be blogged out here (hehe… some of you know what i mean… yes).

hmmm… the air is sweeter, the day is brighter, the wind is softer, the sky is bluer, everything, everything, everything, yes everything is nicer!

it’s a very nice feeling to have… you can’t sit still, you can’t lie down, you can’t stop for a while… it makes you wanna jump up, run around, scream your lungs out, kick the air, laugh your heads off etc. you can’t seem to contain the feeling. you simply need to let it go and express yourself.

that’s exactly what i felt today…

and the feeling is getting stronger by day… just like what i had predicted today to be.

and i would like to thank *someone* for it.

today: exactly one week in penang…

time flew so quickly in just a twinkling of an eye. can’t believe i’ve been back for a week now.

YES this is study break, after which i’ll sit for my finals. NO i haven’t started studying yet.

what was i doing?

well, let me recap.

i’ve been partying the whole week-long non-stop. even before i came back, i was already partying and all. well of course, it’s october… and it was getting near my birthday. and unfortunately, my birthday falls during the study break so no one in UTM will be celebrating it with me on the real date! but fortunately, i’m blessed with many sensitive frens who realised this. and what they did, they threw me not one but two surprise birthday parties… thanx ppl for making my life in UTM so happening.

and then, when i returned to penang… hmmm. surely-lah makan makan makan like UTM is food-deprived (memang pun!). so every day, for lunch and dinner, my family and i were eating out. mom of course took me shopping (lost count on the number of times i visited gurney plaza)… we also went over to SP and stayed there. long weekend holiday.

and then sherney visited penang with her family. took her, her brother and frens round penang island… went to gurney, tanjung bungah, batu ferringhi, teluk bahang, georgetown, etc makan makan makan again. taa-daa!

not to mention the flu and the cough and the fever i was experiencing… a sick birthday girl! party on 23rd(with family… then with buddy emily), party on 24th and party again on 25th. and today, finally - REST!

though this week was only spent in partying, i did enjoy myself very much. a lot of sweet nice things (can’t tell you what…*mouth zipped*) happened this week. i’m really happy to be home… but at the same time i’m longing to go back to UTM. can’t wait to meet up with frens back there.

hell, just a day more to the day i’ll be leaving for home - penang; and i can’t even manage to get at least a night of full 8-hour sleep! i’m indeed sleep-deprived (dunno how many times i’ve mentioned this in my blog) since last week. tests, assignments, and then AIESEC and then tests, assignments and then AIESEC again. attending classes every day do not seem anymore exciting to me. i’m practically a walking zombie. just going thru the motions - as if my body is around but my soul is somewhere else. my biorhythm is slowly getting used to sleeping at 3am every day.

today for example, decided to skip accounts class for marketing assignment and i was having a bad sore throat, slight fever, cold and stomach upset! dragged myself outta bed to get dress took me 15 minutes. and thankfully, i made it to class today. here i am now, sitting away in this lab, sickly typing away this piece of junk. looking at the watch every now and then, cos i need to attend a L’Oreal meeting after this at 2.30pm. trying to squeeze in time to update this quite-long-forsaken blog.

some of my friends are already packing their stuff home. some already reached home! and i… pathetically am still thinking what to take home cos i have to be careful about what to bring back as i am only limited to 15kg only (via flight). my textbooks alone already weigh more than 15kg i think. dun think i can bring anything else back! hmmm…. moreover, i’m still pathetically thinking where i should keep all my "harta-benda" here during the semester-end-holidays. i seemed to have the most things here. HELP!

time is ticking. gotta go… talk to you next time.

i don’t know what actually led me to have that horrible dream. yes, i dreamt i died. i mean, it’s definitely horrible, i’m sure no one would ever want to dream that kinda dream. it could probably be the workload i’ve been having throughout the week: assignment datelines, tests, aiesec, IK etc. i’m certainly sleep-deprived. what do you expect… 3-5 hours of sleep daily. don’t wanna mention about how i look these days. i barely dare to look myself in the mirror!

just when i thought i had the opportunity to sleep tight and soundly that night, that was when i dreamt it. first, i dreamt i was driving in my car back home in penang when all of a sudden, a 14-wheeled truck (or 16-wheeled? nvm, that’s not the point!) rammed into my side of the car… felt the impact, my blood oozing out, honk flared, windows broken into pieces and then darkness. the next thing i know, i was standing by the side of the damaged car, looking around. i saw "myself" lying still in the car and there were so many ppl around; screaming and shouting, oohs and aahs. and that was when i realised i died.

everything happened so fast… i didn’t even know what was happening. i saw my family members and friends at my funeral. people crying and mourning. the whole world just froze in time. for the first time in my life, i felt so so so sad. so melancholic, so solemn, so alone. i tried speaking to them, no one could listen… i still had lots of things to tell them, how the accident happened and everything… i just wanted to tell them i was sorry and that i had always loved them. i wished i could have said it earlier. time cannot be reversed.

the dream was so vivid that when i actually woke up, i thought i really had died. coming to my senses, only then i realised that it was only a dream. but somehow, deep inside me i felt uncomfortable… i know something’s stirring. although i don’t believe that bad dreams may actually come true (even good ones), that particular dream has truly opened my eyes about to never take for granted the people and the things around you. i’m not afraid to die. i’m just afraid how everyone i know is going to live his or her life after i die. i don’t want ppl to worry or be sad because of my death. i only want to tell them how much i’ll miss them, and am sorry for all that i’ve done them wrong, and how much i really love them.

23rd Sept 2006: told myself the night before, after returning from an AIESEC party, that i must somehow make it a point to wake up at 7am to read my microeconnomics (having a test this friday… and i dun even know what’s going on in class!). another reason for getting so early (7am is considered early… for weekends-lah): a "tong" of more-than-a-week soiled and dirty clothes that was waiting for me to dump into the washing machine. i was already experiencing "clothes shortage"!

but, like usual (i’m sure this happens to many ppl), i woke up later than i was supposed to: 10am… i practically slept thru the night without any disturbances whatsoever till 10! i was like "WHAT???!!!" forced myself outta bed, immediately took my dirty laundry to the washing machine (haven’t even brushed or washed my face - fresh from bed… dun dare to imagine how my hair looked!). to my horror, someone was already there and was about to dump her clothes into the machine. okay gurl, time to "fight" for survival. negotiated with her with the reason that i was rushing for time and blah blah blah… and she let me 1st! so grateful to her. and then there was the weather which started protesting… it wanted to rain. started raining even before my clothes in the machine were done! NO this can’t be happening! so pitifully, i hanged my clothes in the room (my room turned instantly into a laundry shop)…

it was still raining when i wanted to make my way to the FAB bus-stop for an AIESEC gathering, this time it was cats and dogs! made it thru the rain luckily and then the bad news came: no rented cars available for us to get to the gathering which was in JB and all of us would have to take the public bus. but luckily, simon called another company… and then there were cars… taa-daa! but we had to go to pulai to collect them and drive them back to UTM to pick the rest of the members. that meant we had to endure the pouring rain. but if nothing ventured, nothing gained. so we went…

we were already late, very late for the gathering. i had 4 other ppl in the car: fadli, yan, mich and tina. i drove like a mad cow (like how a Penang driver always drives-lah). all of them called it the PDS which was abbreviation for Penang Drivers Syndrome. i switched lane more than many times, i cut queues, and even attempted overtaking a 16-wheeled vehicle! how cool was that? hahaha. all of them in the car got a ride of their life… especially mich who went goo-goo-gaa-gaa, fad called it thrilling, yan was like "be careful this, watch out that!" and tina just slept thru the whole journey. and what’s worse, i dunno the route to get there. relied on yan… so sometime during the journey, i accidentally took a sharp right turn because i didn’t hear yan said "turn!"… reflex action i guess… tyres screeched, other vehicles’ honks flared! but we reached safely. mission accomplished.

and then there was the petrol shortage problem. because it was a rented car, we didnt want to pump too much petrol. what we thought was more than enough for our journey was actually not! the petrol indicator was already showing "a-below-E" signal. we were like "surely can reach UTM… dun worry. kancil only!" it was when we said that, the car suddenly jerked, slowed down and stopped. yes no petrol… what?! we just passed the petrol station. what to do? we detoured(walking) to the petrol station and bought a RM3 petrol. fortunately, someone brought a 1.5litre bottle along. though the bottled was already softening (reaction with petrol), we managed to fill into the car. and we happily made our way back to UTM.

and then there was another problem, mich and I both forgot to bring along our matrix cards (guards will ask for it for identification upon checkpoint). we were delayed… and it was nearing 12am (UTM curfew). but somehow we managed to talked them in and we were "freed". thank GOD!

and all of us reached our final destination at last… what a day!