Life Of A Typical Malay - August 2000

Monday 7/8

Could the guy who webpaged me (over and over again) yesterday please email me so that we could talk via email.

This is so disturbing, I mean, I don't know who you are and yet you are asking me questions upon questions I have no idea what else do you want to know. Mind you, I'm not a celebrity (...heh...), go ask Ning Baizura, she has lots of juicy stuff to tell.

And speaking about Ning Baizura (she's a flirt *famous* singer here in Malaysia, famous for all the wrong reasons). She recently gave a lengthy interview about her sexual fantasies, I don't know how wild her fantasies were, I didn't read the article (I don't intend to read it, I have *better* things to do, thank you very much) but it caused such a big stir here and everybody's talking about that article.

Ok, I was at the site office this morning doing some works and my C-o-Ws were talking about Ning.

C'mon En Zainal, we know you don't like Malay singers/songs but just look at this. Ning Baizura dreams of having 5 guys at one go. Blah blah blah...

Well, I'm not at all surprised, you see, her mouth is big and her lips are thick. I think she can "accomodate"...hahaha..

Hahahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

I don't know what I was thinking at that time though.

Oh, where was I? Right, I hate to repeat this but here goes... whether or not I choose to share the details [on this journal, it's a journal for god sake, a j-o-u-r-n-a-l, so what do you expect?] eventually is MY business. In the meantime, if this page is SUCH a source of irritation and pain for you ... why do you keep coming back? Just for the *FUN* of harrassing me? Get a life! Get a bloody life!

This does bring up some interesting questions about online journals, and about what motivates people to post their deepest/darkest stuff (as for this journal, nothing is that deep/dark or even juicy, you have to wait until I gt married then I might "drop" a few juicy stuff stories in here..heh...) in such a visible forum, and about what is or isn't "too" personal to post.

He/She (this visitor) very dourly compares me to those men/women on the Internet who mount a webcam on top of their computers and broadcast their every movement to a panting cyber universe. ("Look! Now I'm swabbing my ear with a Q-Tip!") I don't see it that way at all. (For one thing ... I don't have a webcam. For another ... I don't have a Q-Tip. I use paper clips instead..heh...) The way I see it ... you either understand this sorta stuff, or you don't. You either think it's cool, or you don't. It's like those people who write to me, asking me to "explain" my ICQ profile for example. I want to say this about my journal, "If you don't get it ... there's no explaining it." Instead, I tell them I'm really a grumpy sex-starved old man and most of them hurriedly go away.

So, I'm sorry (in advance) that this journal entry is gonna add more fuel to the flame, probably.

But I've decided finally, that I'm going to quit tip-toeing around trying to make the someones of the world happy. Selfish? Probably. Narcissistic? Hell, I don't know. Ask any of the bazillions of other people who keep online journals if they feel they're narcissistic ... then we'll talk.

For right now I'm simply going to concentrate on doing the things that make me want to stay alive.

And this journal is one of 'em.

Tuesday 8/8

You say it best, when you say nothing at all... - Ronan Keating

Yep, that's it, I don't feel like writing today, one of those days I guess. But I have to be here to let you know that there will be no entry tonight. Because I'm a nice guy...heh....

..see you later alligator(s)...

Wednesday 9/8

I just realised that I've been swearing /using foul language quite a lot since working on this project. But I can't help it, I don't really feel bad sometimes because almost everyone here swears. It's a construction site, what do you expect? Boys will be boys, right?

And we swear in Chinese dialects, since most of the Contractors here are Chinese, and that includes 2 of my C-o-Ws. Words like *i**i, l*n***, c***o*, m**a**i, s***i, s**a**i*a* etc can be heard almost every minute, I don't really *know* what those words mean but I know they are swear/curse words. I don't swear in languages I understand though. I mean I don't swear in Malay/English.

And sometimes we use "vulgar/curse" words to get our message across, especially when dealing with Indonesian and Bangladeshi workers. Today for example, seeing he was working without a plumb-bob, I asked one of the bricklayers, mana awak punya c*n**i? (where's your c*n**i?) {c*n**i = plumb-bob, and since there's no Malay word for "plumb-bob", we use c*n**i instead) - knowing exactly his real c*n**i is safely tucked in his pants..*LOL*...

Later on when supervising concreting works at Block B I said this, hey, pakai **nc*u kecik punya, jangan *on*** kuat-kuat nanti pecah. Hey, use smaller vibrators/pokers and please vibrate slowly otherwise it will give way.

Yeah, we have lots of vibrators here....heh..

Thursday 10/8

2-00 pm : and it's raining outside. Good, now I have a very good reason not to be at the site. Hope it doesn't pour until after 5-00 pm, I need to be at Subang Jaya office by Maghrib.

I seriously think that I'm such a lazy or maybe a tired/worn out person. Or perhaps combination of both. I was having a small chat with Simon this morning when I said, Heck, what's wrong with me? I'm not in a good mood. What's bothering me? I think I'm bored. This site is not that lively, I mean, the Contractors are not communicating with us much. My previous project was totally different, the site was always busy. Unlike here.

It's like that, mah? Sometimes we are busy and sometimes we are bored, that's normal. I don't want to be busy all the time but I do get bored when there's not much activities, I will feel trapped here at the site with nothing to look forward to.

Yeah, I feel that too, too bad we have no internet connections here.

Ah, you with your internet world. Get real!

*ac**ai ! So, right now I'm trying to gather all the things that's bothering me....my life is like CSCE Coffee Market, or cotton, or orange juice, or silver etc...*LOL*...With lots of fundamental news flying around it's hard to dictate the direction of the market.

And since I'm a fundamentalist, I'm going to list all the potential "bullish" and "bearish" factors. No, I'm not analysing markets direction but things that's making my mood a bit bearish today.

Ok, on the negative side (bearish factors):

1. I'm tired and sleepy (oh, that's very bearish...*LOL***)
2. I have tons of paperworks to do, there are 2 important meetings next week, Site Meeting and Progress Meeting (with KDN) and I have yet to do any of the reports.
3. The Contractors are a bit slow, they need me to push them I guess.
4. I have an appointment with En Roslan (the MD) next Monday, he wants to have a discussion and he's going to authorize me to sign all the documents pertaining to the project. In other words he wants me to handle the project full monty. That's a potential bullish factor but my sentiment is still bearish
[Note: When analysing, you have to read between the lines, not just the headlines...]

because:

---------a) I don't want to get too involved in this company. Too involved in this project, yes, but not the company. I'm a Resident Engineer, not a Project Manager. Besides, my contract is for this Pantai Hillpark Project alone, so I see no point of having my name on that Exco list (for example) or bragging about their next project (another example). Let me complete this project first, then we will talk. As simple as that.
----------b) I don't see the professionalism in this company, true they have multi-millions projects all over the country but something is not quite right somewhere. I mean, they have yet to issue me the appointment letter (and I've been here for more than a month). And my salary too. I know, the letter is there, somewhere there on someone's table. I'm not worried though, I have no reason to be (and I'm not complaining though, I'm just telling), someone's not doing his/her job, that's it.
5. Coffee tanked again making new contract low last night. It closed at 79.50 a pound, lowest in 6 years. Looks like coffee has no bottom, with frost season ending soon I won't be surprised to see the prices go to 6o. Frost season has had its moment of glory and now we are back to reality with mounting stocks at various US warehouses. I'm quite ok with this price level but everyone is talking about opening new accounts just to catch the next wave up, (wish I had lots of money to open new accounts) sometimes during harvest season (September - December). Last year coffee rallied by about 60 points within 2 weeks. I haven't been doing any transactions for the last few weeks and now that winter season almost over I have to restructure my plan.
6. With no internet connection here at this site office I feel isolated, really.

Now, on the positive side (bullish factor):
1. I (at least) have an entry today.

So, with so many bearish factors weighing on my mood today no wonder I feel like I'm going to "plunge".
Friday 11/8
First I lost a picture. I meant to keep it forever. It showed what I was, what I believed myself and the world to be. But I must have gone on a wild cleaning spree and thrown it away without thinking. Maybe I was feeling angry and destroyed it because it was a lie. I don't know what happened to it, but it's gone. It's not in any of the places I keep special, important things.

Then I lost the camera that was used to take the picture. I thought I'd cry, but I've lost too many things from the old life in the new life I've made for myself to feel much more than a keen sense of regret.

I tried to see her face in my head the other day and I find it's being erased. This makes me more sad than the loss of the picture and the camera.

Heck, I have nothing else to lose. But my pride.

......And for the very first time I want to be wanted, and she's the only one who wants me. The only one who'll ever want me, the only one who could want me.

Absolutely I feel like shit. I haven't been able to whine enough. That's strange for me, I usually whine so much.

Saturday 12/8
No, there's not a goddamn thing anyone can do about it. My best is just not good enough, my worst is far behind me. I have outlived, or outrun, all my own worst traumas. That's what happens when you're in your early thirties: whatever can be done to me has been surpassed before. When I hoped for better.

As it is, these days I'm barely capable of paying attention. And I'll be disappointed with myself for farting online for hours on end instead of making the dental appointment I actually need -- for putting killing time ahead of taking care of myself. And yes, that is hard to face, being nothing but a pathetic loser, as anyone can see.

As anyone else can see. But you know how that is, I see it differently: to me I'm not a loser, but a sad and bloated corpse. Those like me have trouble holding on to hope, or love, or even pride; such qualities seem posthumous, or perhaps eternal. The problem is, I just can't relax: I'm too stubborn, or too stupid, to say "Enough, already."

Sooner or later, sooner in any case than some of you would wish, I will stop struggling and desist. Sooner or later I'll tire of this pointless obstinance, fed up with playing the broken hero, and get it over with. Before worse can be done to me, I'll let go then, as I should have long ago -- when there would have been a point to it, when I cared enough for that.

The bleakness within me now makes all I see look bad enough -- already.

Sunday 13/8
I've been feeling trapped, tonight. There's a ghost here. It's the ghost of the person that I have to become. Someone who forgets, and compromizes ... above all, a ghost who forgets. I have to become this person, whom I don't like, and it scares me. I can see no way around it at the moment.

I don't have friends, really. I don't appear to want them. I'm surrounded by people I do not understand. I treat people like exotic dishes at a buffet. I carve little bits out of them, and nibble at them, but the novelty wears off, and I drop them on my plate for the servers to take care of, and move on to the next taste. I'm wonderfully open-minded: I get along with just about everyone for a little while, then mistreat them all equally.

I don't know why I'm like this.

A few particularly tenacious people have somehow managed to stay in touch with me fairly regularly. These are the people who deserve to be called my friends, I suppose.

I think that people might mean more to me if they could manage to alleviate my loneliness. They don't, though. I don't know why that is either.

Well whatever, right?

It's a choice really. I choose not to have people in my life. I like that people don't come over to my apartment, call me on the phone, intrude on my time. I'm rarely lonely, though. Rarely...this implies that I am sometimes, and I guess I am. But only sometimes.

I find that I enjoy the quiet and order that my life now holds. I enjoy not having to worry about other people until I go to work, where I'm paid to worry and care for them. It seems perfect this way.

Well, it doesn't sound as if I'm happy with my choice. Perhaps I'm wrong. I would hope so.

Why not try to alleviate someone else's loneliness then? Who knows, maybe my loneliness will get lost in the process. I am of the opinion that I have to give a little to get a little just like the old song says.


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