It’s been slightly over a year now, since Nil and I got together and closer to the day that he’ll make it back to his home country, the big F. Honestly, I’ve been dreading that day. (Well, I just realized that he isn’t exactly gung-ho about the idea too. Just that me? I’m more vocal about it.)

And that’s when my stupid past begins to rear its ugly head at me.

I worry.

Worry that it will never last. Worry that he’ll find someone new. Worry that I’ll have to start all over again.

I love Nil. I want to be married to him and have his babies. But I’m also aware that people DO change and that distance (plus time) does have an impact on a long distance relationship. I’m hardly prepared for the idea of him leaving, let alone the fact that he is to leave and in six months’ time. Many people tell me that it’ll be fine but I can’t help but wonder if they are true and that I’m just being overly paranoid or that I’m right and that they are just in denial.

Two nights ago, I dreamt that Nil got down on his knees, and popped the question. (Does and will it mean more than what it seems to be?) Two days later, I wondered to myself if that will ever happen.

I still think about it sometimes.

Will we ever get married? Will we ever grow old together? Will it ever lead to something more than what it is already?

One of my secondary school mates is tying the knot end of this year after a three year courtship. Blame me for starting off late…actually, finding Nil this late in my life. I had to go through some shitty relationships before finding The One. Or at least I seem to think of him as The One. I feel the age, pressure and pinch catching up with me. I dread being asked “when is your turn ar?” next year during CNY and dread giving the same ole’ excuse over and over again.

I mean, I know my worth but it sure is a lonely battle out there. (I might just skip CNY and run away to another country.)

*sighs*

This is, honestly, shitty. End of the year blues, coupled with that whole new year resolutions thingie and not to mention the whole parents going “are you guys serious about each other?” bit.

ARGH.

This is so frustrating…yet scary.

Just when I thought I didn’t need to know more, this came along into the picture.

And then I found myself questioning my own thoughts, emotions and actions about the past.

Have I really forgiven? Do I want to forgive in the first place? Myself, him, her…all of them.

This needs more thought.

It had been a while since I last visited Anita Roddick’s site. The dame, bless her soul, once left a message on my first blog and till today, she remains an inspiration to my sometimes cynical yet ever hopeful soul.

On Friday, during one of my more melancholy periods (upon reading awfully depressing stuff on Amnesty.org), I surfed around her site and chanced upon this spam mail that she got. It touched me…and reminded me about how blessed I was.

Perhaps it’ll do the same for you too.

If we could shrink the earth’s population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same, there would be:

57 Asians
21 Europeans
14 from the Western Hemisphere, both north and south
8 Africans
52 would be female
48 would be male
70 would be non-white
30 would be white
70 would be non-Christian
30 would be Christian
6 people would possess 59% of the entire world’s wealth and all
6 would be from the United States.
80 would live in substandard housing
70 would be unable to read
50 would suffer from malnutrition
1 would have a college education
1 would own a computer

And also consider:

If you woke up this morning with more health than illness… you are more blessed than the million who will not survive this week.

If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of starvation … you are ahead of 500 million people in the world.

If you can attend a church meeting without fear of harassment, arrest, torture, or death … you are more blessed than three billion people in the world.

If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep … you are richer than 75% of this world.

If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish someplace … you are among the top 8% of the world’s wealthy.

(First up, apologies for the three-blog-posts-a-day sort of thing. I’m just bursting with ideas and stuff to talk about.)

A comment made by the ever lovely and brilliant expecting first-time mummy, Naj-naj (sorry la) prompted me to revisit the topic of capital punishment. She brought up a very good point in her comment to my post about the Oz-S’pore-drug-smuggler issue here:

I agree with you that the law of any country should be respected, but since Singapore shares the same mandatory death penalty as Malaysia, I believe it’s about time that Malaysians join in the debate.

Which is not about sovereignity of a nation but the principles of our laws. Laws are imperfect and should reflect the values of the society which it is supposed to protect. I’m not sure where the roots of the mandatory death penalty originated in Malaysian and Singaporean law, but shouldn’t we as citizens and good neighbours explore this first? Then shouldn’t we question the rationale behind any death penalty - whether it should be applied in this day and age?

The law is not unquestionable. Its effectiveness of a law should be periodically assessed - for example, Singapore’s drug rates are as low as other nations that do not have mandatory death sentences for traffickers. In Malaysia, it’s obvious that this sentence does nothing to curb this vice. Looking at the numbers, can’t we conclude that there are other factors at work than this singular irreversible punishment?

While I believe that Singapore’s arm shouldn’t be twisted to change its law for this one case, I do believe that its government (and any government that inherited any form of law that involves capital punishment, Malaysia included) should reassess the need for such measures, and whether it is a true reflection of the soul of its society.

This was one aspect that I neglected to examine in my hurry to throw out my thoughts about the whole incident. Heh. I need more gingko.

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Don’t know how many of you have been following world news, after having been caught up in the scandal that is currently shaking (or has it crumbled?) the foundations of our beloved PDRM but I’m been following the story of the Vietnamese-Australian who was caught three years ago, in Singapore, for smuggling 400gms of heroin.

The Oz government have been battling to save the boy from the gallows (he is scheduled for a hanging come next Friday) and they have gone even to the International Court of Justice in hopes to sway the Singaporean government. However, S’pore is adamant. There is a price to pay for every crime and they have a ‘good’ reason to stick to their guns, so to speak.

For the Ozzies, the question posed to them would be this: If S’pore were to release this boy and puts him to jail instead when the law clearly states that drug smuggling would result in the death penalty, what would that tell you of the government and the country? Wouldn’t it set precendence for future would-be drug smugglers? Just wave your passport and say “I’m from so-and-so” and you get a one way ticket out of the death zone and into jail. And if you do change your mind then, you also allow people to say “Why him and not me? What so special about him?”

*sighs*

In a country that is synonymous with authoritarian rule and strict enforcement of those rules, bending to the whims and fancies of a American partner would only undermine the authority of the S’pore government in their own country. Like was mentioned in news reports and the letter that was sent to the Australian Parliment by his S’pore counterpart, the S’pore government owes a responsibility to its citizens - to protect and safeguard them from any possible harm, even drugs.

For me, I had to reluctantly say that this time, S’pore wins mainly because of this:

The law is the law.

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Suddenly I’m being reminded all over again of how and why I once was ashamed to be a Malaysian.

Everywhere, in the papers, on national TV, over the Net, explosions of how the police force had been conducting themselves has been shocking, to say the least. So much for Pak Lah’s ambitions of wiping the slate clean from a force that is notorious for taking bribes.

I’ll be fair.

Not all cops are like that. It is the bad apples that give the entire force a bloody bad and tarnished reputation. I never had any negative impressions of the police force…up till recently. They have always been prompted, I’ve never been asked for a bribe and well, I’ve never been treated rudely (or discriminatorily) whenever I had to make a police report.

In fact, it was the opposite.

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Did you ever stopped and wondered about how things would be if you had done stuff differently? Simple stuff. Like blogging.

I feel like taking a break.

Better still, I feel like password-ing every single entry.

I’d love to go back to the time when I could write about anything and everything and not worry about how small the world was.

I think my entries have changed in tone and mood. I think I’d be bored to death just reading about the same old stuff over and over again.

Hm.

I think I’ll take that break.

Besides, it’s going to be December soon and I need to prepare tonnes of X’mas pressies.

We’ll see how it goes.

Don’t be too surprise if I password stuff. You can always email me about it though.