just minishorts.

Here's a thought, actually. A part of me really tingles at all the articles, blog posts and radio commentaries I've heard so far (and I've only been awake for about 3 hours), and I really appreciate the fact that these people are all dedicating their attentions to the iconic women in our world both past and present.Yet another part of me also wants to consider this. It's probably me just being sensitive over nothing in particular, but I quite wonder whether International Women's Day also has us women acknowledging that we're rather weak in confidence, so weak we are that we have to have a Day dedicated to us. Because it is true, every single day of our lives, Int'l Women's Day included, we're submitting to the men, this world being the patriarchal society it is.

Now I'm not saying that submitting to men is a bad thing; after all, it IS Biblically sound and most religious cultures uphold the male figure anyway. Neither am I discounting the contributions of women, not just iconic ones, to this fallen society. What I am pondering is the necessity of being heard and seen via the existence of this one single day.

You see despite International Women's Day, all our lives we are taught to groom ourselves and learn the ropes of being a woman, and we grow up having our mothers more intent on having us married away compared to our fathers. We have bolder women crying foul over sexist remarks from the men, and yet everyday battered wives still hide themselves behind veiled corridors in order to protect the families they love and the husbands who abuse them. We still have Beauty Pageants that include the swimsuit section, and women still sit behind television scenes watching these pageants and comment on the lacking figures that the beauty contestants of these day boast. We still have an image problem, and slimming centres turn around our worldviews of what beauty is. Men still hunt for the prettier, slimmer creatures, and when we praise iconic women, we still have to inject the two or three adjectives that describes the physical attributes, or the clothes they wear, or the accessories they prefer.

This year I wonder why we're celebrating Women's Day actually. For some reason I feel Women's Day has become an acknowledgement of our subordination. Because we're weaker, therefore we require a day of recognition. We require the men to look and realize our strengths. And even after so many years of being in the limelight, we still require the existence of one single day where the media hypes up this whole condition of being female. The long articles and interviews written the weeks ahead of gearing up towards this one day just reflects our admission to this state of subservience. Who are we after one day? It's back to normal again, back to our insecurities with looks, our emotional baggages, wiping the tears off our cheeks, we're back to being quiet, and being subservient. Most of us, we just shut up and remain like all how good girls should, not to be heard, but just to be seen.

Pardon me but I'm not a feminist. While I like being weak and strong, and I relish in being more weak than strong most of the times. It means I enjoy it when the men pay for my meals, when the men open my doors, when the men wait for me to stand first, when the men allow me to walk with them, not have me tag behind them which always seem to happen because I'm not as tall as they are, heels slow me down and therefore I walk a little slower. I enjoy chivalry in action and it is rather disappointing to know that not many guys are gentlemen these days.

And it's not that our thoughts have progressed with societal development. Rape cases are still rising. Date rape cases are not diminishing… and each time you hear a story of molestation, there are still two sides to the story. The discouraging one remains when women from the pasar pagi still say aiyah itu pompuan pakai macam tu, serve her right also lah. We celebrate iconic women and yet married men can still find to send suggestive smses to younger, unassuming women in the work place. Sexual harassment is far from being a thing of a past.

Sometimes I think that International Women's Day should also go towards acknowledging the men who really appreciate us as the fairer sex. I want to read of the men who fight for us women, the ones who do not wait till March 8 to say 'Today we celebrate all women.' The ones who respect and acknowledge the uncredited women in their own lives, not rattle off a dozen and one important female figures to show off their general knowledge.

Where are these men? I wonder. Ironically, I can't quite think of any prominent person, any prominent man whose lives are dedicated towards ensuring women, the types that are satisfied to stay behind in their homes and quiet workplaces , get the due recognition they deserve.

Then again, maybe, I am feminist after all.

Not too long ago I was intrigued by how the recycling battle of the sexes that had woven its way into my life. Living life as one half of a learning relationship seemed to allowed me the 'upper hand' of being 'in the know'. Admittedly the was an overt display of narcissistic feminism in those angst exclamations, ranted in an all-too-daily basis here, on public domain.

In real life I'm pock-marked. Plain. I suffer from the perils of a shining-T zone. I exhibit with glee, this obvious insecurity, but if you're really the genius you say you are, then you must have been blind to realize that I've exhibited all of this disability to come to terms with myself in this blog. Except for the part where I scarf on my food and indulge in gratuitous facial tics. Such needless verbosity, but heh, here I oblige.

A self-professed inner geek residing within an outer jock would have generously labelled me a feminazi,thanks to the lack of a marvel-girl performance that I've neglected to complement with the swordful verbiage such as displayed on this blog.

It just so happens that some people like to build up expectations about a person's character. Oh any idiot (except self-professing geek-jocks) ought to have realized this, When you build towers of expectations, they're more than likely to come crashing down on you.

So that marvel-girl dream went crash, boom, bang during a single makan-meeting, eh?

Ouch, too bad.

Here I have to confess. Having witnessed (far too late) that little squawking outburst, the most of me feels humoured at the fact that letting down someone could lead to so much ranting heart ache, in a specimen of the male species nonetheless. I'm also tickled because the post sounds suspiciously as if written by a 16-year-old girl with reasonable English that had possessed the dear boy's soul.

Or maybe, he IS a girl after all, notable from the bitching that's apparently overflowing in his verbal vomit.

Oh I must admit I'm actually hurt, because there is this pinching thought that a good friend of mine was approached in order to discuss this sudden 'shock-of-the-century'. At least, according to the dickhead's squawk, this great pal of mine seemed to have contributed to the affirmation that the geek-jock was geniusly correct in his observations all along. Woohoo, congratulations, nothing feeds your ego better than to be given an applauding affirmation by mutual friends hoh?

Anyway I wasn't a part of that conversation and it would be far too presuming and suspicious of me to piece threes together. Already this jungle of life is such a troublesome place to me. Besides, I prefer to blame it all on a self-proclaimed geek-jocks who has to seek girly support to be assured that his inch-wide world-view has its validity. For heaven's sake, have more faith in yourself, would ya?

I must mention though that I've never expected my friends to always dish out flattering comments about my character (which has its holey segments). And since I'm so apparently still, itching to be proposed to, all close friends get your invites when the time comes. If it comes, that is.
Yet this experience just approves of self-professed geek-jocks as problematic creatures simply for the fact that they've got their heads growing out of where the dicks ought to be. I'm tried to imagine what the world must look like to these pitiful creatures, alas it's impossible because I do not have a dick!

Read this. Yes I have my issues in my life and I have my problems with the people I care about (or even the people I don't care about). But doesn't everyone live through their days (it's not as if we have another choice anyway… suicide is not an option) good and bad? So on bad days, towers of expectations have to come falling down, and that was exactly what happened.

I asked a more reliable MAN, no, not another Superman/Clark Kent wannabe, what would a stranger expect of me, and he said simply this, 'You write very well.' And added on to that, 'It's not nice to build expectations of people you don't know'.

These days I'm happy to be mediocre, whilst admitting that my career allows to be a weak writer with a less than amicable appearance and manners, hooray. Oh if you haven't noticed this already, I'm still the girl who will cry when a mosquito drowns in her Milo.

BTW, I'm attending the Bloggers Together Gather function this Friday. See you there!

That was so obviously a feeble attempt in constructing a pun.

Actually there are several things which I'm afraid to admit. Where personal dreams are concerned, I've always been a shape-shifter, but the core has thankfully remained the same.

Since a young girl I have fascinated by the written word, and plodding along in life, circumstances has made it easy for me to somehow, find myself doing and learning what I loved to do. So in the midst of more 'glamourous' and 'outspoken' involvements such as the debate club (and perhaps, later on in life an engagement in AIESEC where event-management was rather core), I was still surrounded by the written word.

Oh yes, me, the boring librarian. The boring editor. The boring writer. The boring language teacher.
March announces its arrival promptly. Two weeks ago the CEO, my boss, had his tenure renewed for another three years. A week ago the country's stock market started a dive in sync with the rest of the world's, yesterday it plunged some more. Today my boyfriend's driving home from his business trip. And I've got another planning meet south of the city happening next week.

For some reason I'm a mixed bag of emotions over the kind of work I'm doing here. A part of me loves the travelling, the meetings, the socialising. Yet another part of me, the core, is strangely distracted. But first I have to say this, it's not that I'm not allowed to write. I do it every week, and it's more focused than anything I've ever done previously. I'm included in the media circle, even if I'm on the other end of it. But this genre, this stiff limitation of what I'm allowed to express, and how I'm supposed to compose the expression, somehow, all of this is taking a toil on the kind of compositions I now write.

I have to admit that in the past, I was susceptible to producing a series of needless verbiage, and often I tried miserably to control that excessive need to say what was rattling in my mind. Now, having gained control, I'm surprised that I'm not as happy as I hoped I'd be. Instead, because of this control I'm left voiceless, not knowing what I can say or what I should say.

Still, I realize this. Unlike before, I'm not frustrated by the silence. Unlike before, when the thoughts flow in, I'm not eager to rant them. I like to imagine that up inside my head there's a sieve that's learning to function well, and the filtration system is just but starting to function in a better way. Knowing that I have control over what I say is one thing, understanding and practising that control is but another. I'm probably still a newbie at this, and it's interesting that being 27 (yes I'm that old this year), I still have to say all of this in-my-brain conversations out loud (much to the annoyance of people who seem to suspect I'm a kiddo pretending to be a mature Auntie). Realize I'm recording it not because I can, but rather because I want to and I feel I have to.

Having said that I probably should have inserted the other cliché line: Oh this is my space and I can say anything I want. Add on with this: And I'm saying all of this because I feel I need to. And another: Since so, I will.
There's a breathy tremor wafting its way through me because I feel the connection, and it excites me.

I spent my weekend in a surprisingly different way yesterday. Interestingly I signed myself up for the Friends in Conversation event at CLGC, my decision to attend being one of those on-the-spur things I always do ever so often.

I suppose reading Peter Rollin's book on 'How Not to Speak of God' has sparked a curious light in me, and I've been scouring the Net reading up on the Emergent movement for weeks and months already. So imagine my excitement when I found out that Brian McLaren would be coming to town, but this of course I've much to thank Sivin for.

Perhaps it is rather timely to mention in passing here that I live in what you may call a family of mixed-religions. I grew up being aware of my dad's conversion to Charismatic Christianity, and church had been an on-going affair until some point in my time when my parent's marriage fell apart. Eventually my mother went back to her old Taoist-Buddhist-Ancestral worship ways, and I tagged along. It took me several years of experimenting with almost every other religion (except the monotheistic religions) and months of nit-picking on the Christian religion that I finally realized that God just won't leave me alone. And Amen to that, I have to say.

A part of me wants to admit outloud that I have my peeves with the church where I grew up in. There are times when I feel like saying 'you guys are mad' to my fellow brethren, people who I used to think were obsessed with the spirit filled life. Oh and I haven't been a very adventurous person either, so my entire life I spent going to church, I went only to ONE CHURCH, unless of course I went overseas, where any church would do and I'd gladly call myself a visitor and be grateful to be welcome there.

So the Friends in Conversation event, you have to understand, was a difficult and risky step for me. One it meant me making a choice for myself to step aside from 'family' decisions, and two, it meant me coming out in the open and admit it, so yes, I've had some issues with 'church', and for far too long I've been sweeping it under the carpet.

So rather than vacuuming out the dust, or throwing it away, I spoke to my aunt this morning about the possibility of exploring churches, and shared with her the totally refreshing views I've gained from the event. I'm just glad, because as I've grown to be radically different in my thinking so has the church matured, and when I mentioned that I would like to explore this strange emotional calling (I can't say it's from God yet), the reaction that I presumed would have thrown me aback did not come at all.

'Just as long as the church you go to is a bible-focused church, it is okay to seek God there,' she said.

This is when I pause and thank God for the little wonders He's made possible, and especially how great He is in timing everything so perfectly.

Pardon me, but I do believe that this is the first time I've been so explicit in this blog about my personal faith journey. Surely it must be a good thing!

I'm happy.

I'm just going to mention this about what it was like to visit Penang while on a working trip. As you would probably have guessed, most of the ppl in my company are Muslims, hence my Penang visit would have been devoid of the yummy yummy non-halal selection they have there.See the last time we went to Penang I had hotel food three days in a row, no thanks to being stuck on Jerejak Island during the entire period. So, yeah, while we did go for Mee Udang just before our plane left for KL, I felt sorely deprived.I MEAN WHAT IS A TRIP TO PENANG WITHOUT A GOOD OLE' DISH OF CHAR KUEY TEOW RIGHT?? RIGHT??

…

So this time around, I literally ate like a pig. And I must thank thank thank my BRAT/Varsity/Journo mate AC for being my official chauffeur… Looking back I still can't believe I ate so much yeah? The dear girl came at 8.30 (oh yes media line peeps have weird let-go hours), and still I managed to gorge myself on Cendol, Assam Laksa, Char Kuey Teow, Leng Chee Kang, and OMG OMG … so-unhealthy deep-fried chicken skin.

My cravings for makan were SOOOOOOOO bad that even when my boss said he'd treat us to 1/2 hour foot reflexology sessions, I declined the offer! HAH. So on day-two after the operations, while my colleagues went to enjoy the free massage, I sneaked away to Swatow Lane's New World Food Court. Hah.

Ok the Chinese really, really love their food. I'm greedy I know, but I'll just say that if there's any one who's trying convert me to Islam or Judaism for that matter, better not try lah. I love my pork too much to even think about it. Kosher and Halal is far too restrictive for me, and I don't think I'll even survive a month of going without pork.
Erm… I hope that last para wasn't too offensive.

I MISS YOU CHAR KUEY TEOW!!

oh oh… btw, I personally feel that the char kuey teow you can get at Kuchai Lama Food Court is very authentic. MUST TRY YEAH!

…

Oh oh. Please visit Leon's post on what mothers want in their future daughter-in-laws. Nabeh, so picky one?