Is It Better To Have Loved & Lost?

Posted on 24 August 2008 by Mimi

broken heart

Image from www.irishhealth.com

A very good friend of mine is experiencing major heartbreak right now, which got me to thinking about the oft-repeated quotation: “It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”

But is it better really???

If you have loved and lost…

  1. You’ll have first-hand knowledge of how wonderful it is to love and be loved. But the moment you lose that love, you’ll spend the rest of your life looking for the same euphoric high. If you get a second chance, well and good. If you don’t, you could end up wishing you never knew what it was like in the first place.
  2. Things will never be the same again. It’s just like finally having known the freedom, ease and convenience of having your own car, then suddenly having to take public transportation again. Sucks, huh?
  3. You might spend the rest of your life pining for your lost love.
  4. You’ll forever be haunted by the “what-if’s”.
  5. You could end up a cynic.

If you’ve never loved at all…

  1. Ignorance is bliss. When you don’t know what you’re missing, it won’t matter to you if you never find it at all.
  2. But then again, you’ll forever be wondering what the hype in all those movies, paperbacks, telenovelas and love stories is all about.
  3. No man is an island. And things can get pretty lonely when you’re solo far too long, especially when friends start living their happily-ever-after’s one by one and you start feeling like an extra finger on a glove everytime you go out with them couples.

Share with me your thoughts on the subject, people!

Categories: Thoughts | Tags: | 7 Comments

Why Me?

Posted on 22 August 2008 by Mimi

I chanced upon this little guy this morning, right after a quick run on the treadmill.

He looked so miserable, with a smudge of blood beneath his right eye and his tail no longer attached to his body. He was staring at the sky, motionless and pitiful, not even twitching a muscle when I moved in close with my Nokia N82 to snap his pic.

If lizards can talk, I swear I could almost hear him say, “Why me?”!lizard

Categories: Rojak | 7 Comments

Maman At The Louvre/Tuileries

Posted on 22 August 2008 by Mimi

The Tuileries Gardens in Paris make for an interesting stroll. It’s a sprawling park with trees, mallard ducks playing hide and seek amidst the tulips, and ancient statues. But stay away when it’s a windy day lest you find yourself in a virtual dust storm because a huge portion of the area is comprised of bare earth.

Between now and the 2nd of June, 2008, if you do visit the Tuileries, be prepared to come face to face with a gargantuan black spider, about as tall as a tree. Or to be more precise, 30 feet (9.1 m) tall.

Maman

It’s actually a sculpture by artist Louise Bourgeois, one of the seven bronze casts, with a stainless steel version on long-term loan to the Tate Modern, London. The six other bronze casts are located at:

* National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
* State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg
* Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
* Mori Art Museum, Roppongi, Tokyo
* Samsung Museum of Modern Art (Leeum), Seoul
* Havana, Cuba

I hadn’t planned on posting this pic because I find it quite creepy (I hate creepy crawlies!) but then I saw a photograph of the same spider in Kayni’s Corner Cafe, although I didn’t know yet at that time that there are several casts of the same sculpture. That’s why there’s no oomph in this photo. I just snapped away without thinking of composition or angles, just focusing on showing its size relative to the trees.

The sculpture is, interestingly, called “Maman“, which is French for “Mama”. I found the choice of name bizarre, at the very least, for a spider. Curious, I immediately googled it up and found out from Guggenheim Museum’s website that the sculpture is actually associated with the artist’s own mother (seriously!). According to the site: “The spider, who protects her precious eggs in a steel cage-like body, provokes awe and fear, but her massive height, improbably balanced on slender legs, conveys an almost poignant vulnerability.”

Categories: Travel | Tags: , , | 5 Comments

Rodeo In Malaysia

Posted on 21 August 2008 by Mimi

cowboy

Yes, yes, you’ve come to the right place. This is Sleepless In KL, not The Pioneer Woman. And yes, those are genuine cowboys and cowboy clowns you see in the photo.The rodeo has come to town, complete with bronco-busting cowboys. They were flown in all the way from Australia by corporate sponsors, in conjuction with MAHA 2008 (Malaysia Agriculture, Horticulture and Agrotourism Exhibition 2008) which is being held at the 100-hectare Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang (MAEPS), Selangor, Malaysia from 11th to 23rd August. The exhibition is open to the public from 10am to 9pm. Entrance is free and trams are provided at a very minimal fee of RM1 per person per day.

MAHA 2008 tram

Free shuttle buses — huge and airconditioned, with seats that recline — are also provided to from Kajang to MAEPS and from Bukit Jalil to MAEPS. We took the shuttle bus from Bukit Jalil, which also stopped at Bandar Tasik Selatan LRT station and at Serdang KTM Station. I strongly advise you to take the bus because, if you go by car, the parking lot at MAEPS is crowded and is quite far from the entrance. Buses depart every 30 minutes.

MAHA 2008 is the region’s largest exhibition showcasing the latest Technologies and Innovations in the Agriculture, Agro-Based, Horticulture and Agrotourism Industry, with over 950 local and international exhibitors. Here’s the map of the place (click on the photo to see a larger version):

MAHA 2008

The Livestock Pavilion (Laman Ternakan) is probably the best place to take the kids. Aside from the rodeo, there are carriage rides, pony rides, elephant rides, camel rides, horseshoe-making demos, rabbit petting and feeding, to name a few of the activities available.

Tree saplings, seedlings, seeds, fertilizers, gardening paraphernalia and farming equipment are for sale at very good prices. There was also an agro bazaar, which we didn’t have time to visit, owing to the fact that we were herding a group of small kids (pun fully intended) hence I didn’t have the chance to see if any farmhouse sinks were available for sale. Other places of interest are the ornamental fish display, a greenhouse for vegetables and an orchid park.

Food and drinks are available everywhere, all at very reasonable prices. Drinks like air kelapa muda (young coconut drink) and air sirap (rose cordial) are only RM1 per cup, while nasi ayam (chicken rice) can be had for RM4. At tram stop no. 6, you can also find Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken.

So to all residents of KL and Selangor, make the most of the remaining mid-term school holiday and take your kids to MAHA 2008 today! And make sure you go early, so that you don’t miss the rodeo at the Livestock Pavilion.

Categories: Malaysia | Tags: | 2 Comments

If I Could Turn Back Time…

Posted on 20 August 2008 by Mimi

Wells Fargo watchThe twins are so much better today, thanks be to God! They seem to be responding well to the expensive new medication prescribed to them by their paediatrician. As proof of that, for the first time in days, they slept through the night last night. I was shocked to wake up before 7 am and realise that I, too, had some 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep :D

Feeling totally energised by my 7-hour recharge session and the fact that the twins were still sleeping at 7 am, I immediately grabbed the opportunity to have a short run on the treadmill while listening to the radio. As I scanned stations, the deejays in Mix.FM caught my attention with their topic for the day: if you could turn back time or go back in time, at what point in time would you like to go back to?

Now that really got me thinking. But it didn’t take long for me to come up with an answer. If I could go back in time, I’d definitely like to go back to the time when I was in university. The reason is simple: I made many life-altering decisions and choices — both direct and indirectly — at that time. My choice of major (a.k.a. concentration), for instance, eventually determined my career choices.

I’d also want to go back to that point in time just so I could change my relationships with people, to be nicer and kinder to anyone and everyone. I’d force myself not to feel so shy just because I was a probinsiyana (budak kampung) so that when people reached out to me in friendship, I could and should have reciprocated their gesture. Yes, I was shy, mahinhin, di makabasag pinggan (Tagalog, literally: ‘can’t break a plate’), pijak semut tak mati (Malay, literally: ‘an ant wouldn’t die if I stepped on it’) and all that. But I’ll save that for another post sometime :P

So…what about you? If you could go back in time, at what point in time would you like to go back to?

Categories: Rojak, Thoughts | Tags: | 6 Comments