random things i've done in the name of procrastination:

Now Playing: Death Will Never Conquer (Live) by Coldplay (one day death is going to conquer me, I'll be down where the waters flow)

1. Facial! (my face is green and tingly at the moment...The Body Shop Tea Tree Face Mask is Uh-May-Zing)

2. Blog. Way, way too much.

3. I've never been so religious about coconut oil until exam week

4. Email...(I'm old school like that)

5. Dance to Death Will Never Conquer. Or You Belong With Me. Or Kiss With a Fist. Or Warrior. You get the picture.

6. One Directioning! Is very addictive!

7. Watching comedy. I love standup. My favourites are Adam Hills, Jeff Green, Wil Anderson, Jack Whitehall, Russell Howard and Ed Byrne.

8. I actually have a notebook I carry around everywhere. I write down random thoughts, funny ideas, the beginnings of poems I hardly ever finish. I do it really quickly and discreetly, people don't notice. I've become a crazy person.

9. I can't sing because I'm still sick (sore throat...waahh...) so I've just been miming really dramatically. Is quite disturbing when people see me and don't understand that when I sing/lip sync, I am LOST IN DA MUSIC.

yeah...about that.

Now Playing: Never Let Me Go by Florence + the Machine (though the pressure's hard to take, it's the only way I can escape, seems a heavy choice to make, and now I am under)

Apparently this story is making the rounds of Facebook...

Okay. I missed my Politics exam. Happy?

And it was my fault, I'll admit it. The long, boring story cut short (but still boring) is that I changed my exam timetable whilst it was still being drafted, and so the deputy principal wrote on my draft exam timetable. When I got the final copy it looked exactly the same as the draft, so I kept the draft with me because the changes were written on. I don't know, it made sense in my head.

But apparently, the two copies were different. You know I don't do numbers and the layout of the timetable doesn't make it easy to pick out the times. The politics exam was swapped from afternoon to morning. And so of course I showed up in the afternoon. I sat the exam that afternoon, no big deal.

Yeah, I'm a muppet.

There. Really not that interesting.

A Thousand Thousand Fearless Things #37

Now Playing: Cameo Lover (Live at Sing Sing Studios) by Kimbra (every day's like talking in your sleep, love feels like a silhouette in dreams)

#299: I can dance on the verge in the middle of the city if I want to. 

#300: You know you're stressed when the first thing someone says to you is 'Are you high?'

#301: Soul destroying. Lol. My sympathies are with the maths spec students. I'm looking pretty intelligent now, huh?

#302: Love and other animals

#303: Curiosity killed the cat. But I'm not a freaking cat. 

#304: Sleeping Beauty ;P

#305: Coconut oil. Muchos love.

#306: This lack of routine is seriously screwing with my head.

#307: Pfft. Learn to multitask, woman. 

#308: At last! I have a second opinion! ALL YOU FREAKING TALK ABOUT IS BASKETBALL.

#309: Epsom salt + raw sugar + coconut oil + honey = heaven (don't eat it! find something else to do with it...)

#310: Arguing with a teapot is scarier than it sounds...

#311: Now is beautiful. 

love and other animals.

Now Playing: Someone Like You by Adele (never mind, I'll find someone like you, I wish nothing but the best for you.)

I must tell you that I'm not in love. But sometimes I feel like I'll never be in love again.

I have spent a great deal of my teenage years being angry. Being jealous. High school is the one place where each and every day you're confronted with every boy you have ever loved, ever girl you have ever fought with, every missed opportunity, every time you've tried and failed. I made a list of things to do, to conquer, and one by one I could tick them off. They were all personal goals, doable goals, things that only failed because I didn't try hard enough.

Love isn't like that.

I'm not one of those girls who makes their lives revolve around love. I'm not one of those girls who judges herself how other people, how boys judge me. High school has been reckless and exhilarating and I've achieved so much, I've done so much, I've learned so much. I've become someone people can talk to, learn from, have fun with, appreciate and respect as a person with something intelligent to say. I wouldn't throw that all away for a little high school romance but, you know...it couldn't hurt to have it all...

I loved someone for a very long time. I don't really know when I fell out of love, but it happened, at some point. This person has hurt me beyond belief and I've cried myself to sleep too many times over him, and I've walked away from it more than once.

But then, almost entirely separate from all of that, this person is a wonderful friend. It is wonderful to have someone who is your equal; someone you can talk to, argue with, say anything to. Someone who smiles when you smiles. I've never been able to talk to someone about all the things we talk about, not so candidly and honestly; I've never in my life had someone willing to chat about the most randomest crap in the world. Nobody's ever said that I was wrong, or that I have bad taste or that something could be done this way and not that way; nobody's ever said that I'm pretty, and made me feel like I deserve the world. I love being myself, and I love it when people are just being themselves. Sometimes he lets me down, it's true. But it is nice to have one person you know won't judge you in a world that is so very judgemental. 

Girls are brought up with the firm idea that attraction is for the sole purpose of finding The One and then getting to all that happily ever after business. We do things with so much calculation, so much careful architecture, so many expectations and hopes and prayers, and then we either buckle under the pressure or cry when things come undone. Why do we see attraction as a means to an end? It's quite tragic, really, but that's certainly how it was for me, for a long time. Let's just say that I've unlearned a few lessons, and I've done a few things for the hell of it. And it's very...liberating. I'm all for living in the now; now is beautiful. 

I know many people think that I give out too many chances, that I'm blinded by love and all of that. The first part of that is probably true; the second part is definitely not. I've been in love before, but just because you're in love doesn't mean that there aren't any dealbreakers. Friends, lovers, mortal enemies...there are always dealbreakers, no matter how deep you let yourself fall. If that weren't the case, I'd still be friends with a certain person, and ask anyone, K and I are not exactly best buddies at the moment. I said I'm reckless, not stupid.

It's strange when you become friends with someone you realize that, maybe, that's enough, as far as you and he and we are concerned. I look back and I realize that I was never really attracted to most of the boys I 'liked', back in the day; I just wanted someone to talk to, someone to be close to. When you have that, it dampens the blow a little. Friendship makes you fall out of love, sometimes, in a good way, for all the right reasons.

It's very very defeating, you know. I've lost faith. I realized, last year, at the ripe old age of fifteen, that I fall in love knowing that nothing will come of it. Tragic, isn't it? All I've known is disappointment, of having to swallow my pride and watch whilst I get passed over for other people and, as cruel as it sounds, this time is no different; the only difference is that this time someone bothered to be nice about it - which is a big difference, and something that I'm thankful for. Seriously.

I wouldn't say that nothing came out of it. I won't lie; I was all for a relationship, but that's not going to happen and that's okay. I have no regrets. I have a friend who I love dearly, and even though now I feel so defeated by the prospect of love and other animals, one day...I'll find someone like you.

So don't worry about me. Go chase the girl of your dreams, and I'll be here to talk about Coldplay and economics and anything else you want to talk about. You're not the guy of my dreams, but you were pretty damn close. I'll watch but I won't be waiting.

I'm okay. I'll be okay.

offensive? really?

Now Playing: You Belong With Me by Taylor Swift (I know your favourite songs and you tell me about your dreams, think I know where you belong, think I know it's with me...)

I'm sure you've all read my mother's opinions of Coldplay's Princess of China. ;P

Which I love, by the way, because I love Coldplay and I love Rihanna and I think that it all works really well. That being said, I have been told by numerous people that I have rather...interesting taste in music. I've been waiting for this music video for ages.

I've always found it fascinating how people can genuinely take umbrage at...pretty much anything. I for one thought that the music video was really cool; I love the Oriental influence, the kung fu geisha elements that are, true, anachronistic, but make for a wicked visual experience. It's not a history documentary, people! I really don't see the music video as offensive at all. Yes, the random arm thingy is not Chinese, Rihanna's not Chinese, Chris Martin's not Chinese, and it is Princess of China...but I'm an artist. It all makes sense in my head.

I remember it got to a point when you genuinely couldn't say anything - like, please pass the black shirt - without being accused of being racist. I'm Asian! I know about racism! Trust me! But sometimes we take things to the point of ridiculous. 

A PC world would be boring. Now is not the time to make a Mac joke. 

living without regrets.

Now Playing: Shake It Out by Florence + The Machine (it's always darkest before the dawn...and I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't...)

One of the hardest things I've had to balance in my life is my desire to live without regrets and an intrinsic recklessness, somewhat exacerbated by, ya'know...being a teenager...

Being reckless is freedom. It's the bliss of freefall, without knowing or caring about the consequences. I live in the moment, now is beautiful. I am so addicted to the rush I'd do it all again in a heartbeat, come what may.

It's hard to not have regrets when you're constantly doing things against the status quo; every single day, it seems, I break some kind of taboo. But that's okay, you know? Because I have this miraculous thing called a conscience, as tenuous and irreligious as it is, and I've never done anything that went entirely against it. I believe in things, like feminine intuition and gut instinct. They haven't really failed me, not yet. Touch wood.

If you're afraid to live you're never truly alive. You'll never be loved, or be happy, if you're afraid to get hurt. I don't want to miss out on anything; I want those experiences, those feelings, those thoughts, but I also want to look back at them and smile, without a twinge of guilt or regret. I want people to teach me things, tell me things, without fear that I'll run screaming. The best experiences of my life have been done in a moment of bravado, a rush of headstrong fearlessness. I've missed out on so much by being shy, insecure, scared.

Granted, this might be the exact same thinking that sent Catherine Howard to the block, but it's human nature! It's beautiful. When I was little I would spin round and around and around until I nearly threw up my guts. But it didn't matter how vile I felt afterwards, I'd be back up as soon as the vertigo was over and spinning again. Then, I figured that if I just kept spinning and never stopped, I'd never be sick. So I'm still spinning, folks, I'm still spinning. 

When I was thirteen I felt so cheated, so taken advantage of. Nothing even happened, not really, but I had walked into traps and blindly given more than any little girl should ever give emotionally; I was so emotionally drained by what happened it took me so long to crawl away. I'll never let myself get into that position ever again. Everything I do is tempered with the bitterness of reality; everything I try or say, I have to have the upper hand. I think I've finally worked out how to be vulnerable without getting burned. 

That being said, I've never really been very good at stepping back, saying no, refusing something on principle. I am ruled almost entirely by emotion, by irrationality, by desire, and I've gotten into a lot of scrapes. You'd think that people would be less inclined to take advantage of a little girl like me, but even little girls have to wear armour it seems, these days. 

But I regret nothing. Even the things that have cut deep and left a scar, if I could go back I would do it all again. I wouldn't change a thing, I wouldn't treat anyone differently. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, and, in the end, I have faith that I'll get what I want. Somehow.

the lies we tell little girls.

Now Playing: I Look To You by Miami Horror ft. Kimbra (see her world lit so bright, see her bird take flight, see her face wild and charged, see her quickened heart...)

I was all of eleven when I first started shaving my legs. For the other girls I grew up with, hair removal was a weird coming of age ritual - your mother would, at some point, buy you a razor or some wax strips, and it would be some kind of feminine bonding time.

Not for me.

I learned the mechanics of it at school, as you do. I remember sitting with a long line of girls in PE and realizing I was one of the very few girls who didn't shave their legs. Before then it never occurred to me that people had hair on their legs, much less people who actively got rid of it. This was just after I had chicken pox, too, and so I started having scars on my legs (which I still have, hence my penchant for tights and leggings), and unlike most of the white girls I grew up with, I have black hair. I'd never felt less attractive in my entire life, and I've been in a hospital bed covered in blood with cracked, white lips and purple shadows under my eyes.

One of my teachers, a very sophisticated lady who always dressed nicely and wore Chanel No.5, talked to the other girls about shaving, and I nodded as if I knew what they were talking about. I learned a lot that day; never dry shave (I did that once...ouch...), hair conditioner is obviously the best shaving cream and, my teacher gleefully said, when we were married we could steal our husband's shaving gel, which apparently feels wonderful.

That night, I put a razor to my legs, and I've been doing it ever since.

My mother didn't approve; she still doesn't approve, probably, but one of the beautiful things about my mother is that she accepts that now I'm all grown up and I have full responsibility over my body. I always laugh that a sign of my fundamental laziness is that now I buy razors with shaving cream built into them, because it's quicker and easier; and now I'm a dirty hippy who doesn't use hair conditioner anymore. Another sign of my incredible laziness/phobia of pain is that I don't actually have the courage to pluck my eyebrows; now I genuinely don't give a shit, because the only people who actually get close enough to me to see my eyebrows would have to be pretty...close...but back when it did bother me I had a little eyebrow trimmer, powered by a few tiny AAA batteries. The stupid thing died, and I don't understand where the hell the batteries must have gone in, so the eyebrows are probably going to stay fuzzy for now. 

I started shaving my legs for other people. I wanted to fit in, I wanted to be pretty. To be honest, it didn't really work, not back then. Now? In summer I can go days without shaving. Last year I went an entire winter without doing anything to my legs at all. It's just something I do when I feel like, to make myself feel good. I like the look of shaved legs just like I like the look of red Converses or distressed jeans or 50s retro pinup dresses. Shaved legs feel kind of amazing; kind of numb but really ticklish at the same time; sometimes I just do it for that. I know it's not exactly true when women say they do these things 'for themselves', but for me, for the most part, it's true.

Why do we teach little girls to obsess so much about physical appearance? Why are boys seemingly immune to that? I mean, I'm not the most petty or pedantic person in the world, but I know for a fact that boys get teased for being hairy just as much as girls do, and yet it's the girls who have to buckle to social pressure. I couldn't even get my date to shave his *face* for the ball!

 I was eleven. It's only now, now at sixteen, that I realize just how little I was - I was a child! Just a child! I'm sure in my twenties I'll bash my head against a wall, questioning why I was so stupid and naive at sixteen.

If there wasn't the social pressure, would I have shaved my legs? Probably not. If I were older than eleven, would I have had the strength to never shave my legs? Probably not. Am I going to stop shaving my legs? Probably not. But at least now, I have the strength to hold my head high. Everyone is beautiful in their own way. Including me.

A Thousand Thousand Fearless Things #36

Now Playing: Fearless by Taylor Swift (and I don't know how it gets better than this, you take my hand and drag me head first, fearless)

#287: Just...living in the moment

#288: Whoever doesn't lick peanut butter off their fingers doesn't know how to live.  

#289: I am so done with exam week. Seriously.

#290:  Ed Byrne <3

#291: Girl talk. Thank you muchos, Belephant. 

#292: Time Traveller's Wife + Florence & The Machine + bubble bath = girly heaven ;P

#293: Brie cheese!

#294: I'm not one to judge myself on how other people see me, but...I'm not entirely immune to flattery...

#295: Only exercise of the day: dancing to You Belong With Me

#296: Trying to acclimatise my hair to every other day washing, daily tea rinses and weekly bicarb detoxes. Read: lots of cornstarch!

#297: Love my fuzzy eyebrows XD 

#298: It's not that I like the 'hacked off with a chainsaw' look...but my nails kept breaking and it was seriously annoying. Please forgive my dodgy manicure. 

OMG COLDPLAY PREMIERE!!!!!

Now Playing: Princess of China by Coldplay ft. Rihanna (I could have been a princess, you'd be a king, could have had a castle and worn a ring, but no, you let me go...)

To my fellow Coldplay lover (lovers?)...this is for you:

A Thousand Thousand Fearless Things #35

Now Playing: Breath of Life by Florence + The Machine (I was looking for a breath of life, a little touch of heavenly light, but all the choirs in my head sang 'no'...)

#280: When you're good at multitasking you're also very good at getting very bored very easily

#281: You know you're short when you put on a 'jumper' and it falls to your knees

#282: Heels make everything okay

#283: Somebody. Stole. My. Swing.

#284: Am I the only person in the whole world who likes drinking plain hot water?

#285: I love all the people who have somehow contributed to the 385 songs on my playlist. Muchos love.

#286: I've had to live without singing for three days now. People don't realize that I sing a *lot* - just not really in public, because I kinda suck, unlike this guy. But I am actually going insane.