The Times We Had and the Time We Have Left

In our youth, we used to laugh at each other's idiosycracies. I used to laugh at how Shima would ask us for permission to wear a particular combination of clothes, how she would refuse to eat her vegetables, till we introduced her to the vegetable that makes non-vegie people start eating vegetables ... french beans! Or the time when she picked Sarina's nose in her sleep. I remember how I used to quietly protest whenever she walked into our rooms and (without asking for permission), turn down the volume of our blaring sound systems.

I remember laughing hard at the time when Wan mistook the green colouring for a pandan leaf substitute - and turned our dinner (nasi lemak) green. We used to cringe when we heard her cries of pain, the first couple of weeks she started wearing her braces. That's when I learned about Neurofen and Ponstan.

I remember wondering whether I should laugh or cry when Sarina told us she passed out from extreme period cramps (that's when I learned about Naprogesic) in the toilet and didn't realise it. We all ended up laughing about it. And the times when her kitten, Chi-poom, was found 1) with her whole body covered in whipped cream after she licked the bowl we were using to make trifle and 2) covered in soot as she decided to explore the fireplace in my room.

I remember the mornings when Bad used to busy himself in the kitchen, making 5 mugs of coffee as the rest of us gathered in Sarina's room to watch Rage (or Teletubbies). And the times when we used to wait eagerly as he experimented with tiramisu.

I remember the Christmas I spent at Belina's house, sipping coffee and picking on fruitcake while listening to Shirley Horn by the fireplace, going over a shopping list for a Tuscan salad. I remembered that summer, when I walked barefoot outside her house, when we hunted down an open cafe on Christmas eve after we snuck into a Midnight Mass to watch the choir.

I remembered Melbourne fondly, not just for the city that seems to have no limits to its offerings, but because of great memories with great friends. We were all young then, and the world was our oyster. We never thought our lives can ever get more complicated than a faculty pass or a broken heart. Life, then, was endless adventures up and down Chapel Street, living next door to a club and then a weird old lady.

We've all come a long way, and life did get very complicated. We all have something, but not everything. We've had love, and saw love lost. We've had our dreams fulfilled to the ends of the earth, but only after we've had it snatched from us over and over again. We were given joy, but in unexpected ways. We are offered happiness over the horizon, but on the condition that we let go of the comfort of our shores.

A lot of things happened to us in the last 6 years. But someone once told me, God never burdens us with more than He knows we can bear.

On an upbeat note:

A BEEEG Bon Voyage to Belina on her new adventures. May Singapore and New York treat you 'better' than KL ever did! ;-)

Posted by Najah Nasseri at 2004年05月13日 12:31 | TrackBack