It Is What It Is

After all these years, after all the dates and the girls (not that I'm proud or bragging of) I've met or communicated with, I still found myself in no man’s land about how they think or what really attracts them. Still clueless, about the DOs and the DON’Ts, how to react smartly or manly if things go sideways, and the list goes on and on.

As you probably know by now, I’m single and back in the dating game. I used to keep doing the wrong things, saying the wrong things, to say them inappropriately or ill-timely kind of things. Or acting needy, insecure, totally no self-control, blurting everything on the table, or being too nice like a therapist, or an emotional tampon to the girls, or projecting too much affection, over pursuing, talking my way towards liking her. Becoming the “mangina” or the male girlfriends. Weak, rushing and boyish.

You see, all these beta male behaviours really didn’t get me anywhere with girls.

Well, they said repetition is the mother of all skills. Rinse, cycle, and repeat. Doing something over and over again until we really be good at it, and get good things out of it. And they also said, you need to get to the noses in order to get to the asses. LOL. I just made that up. The truth is, we need to get the NOs before we get the YESes.

So, am I saying that I finally get it by now? Well, not entirely. But slowly bit by bit I’m getting on it. It is much better now. That's for sure. 

And somehow, my daughter Insyirah and having her in my life really helps. It “accelerates” the learning process and absorption speed to the next level.

Oh wait, how is this have anything to do with courtship? Why the 4 years old girl got anything to do with THE game? Well, allow me to cuddle you with the elaboration, like I always do. Like the way I always do best :-P

Believe me dear reader(s), buckle up as this might take a while. Somos listos? Vamos!

Having a daughter and raising her teach me about the dynamic relationship between a girl and her father, or whoever the father figure during her growing up years. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a biological father. But in my case, I’m the biological father and ALSO the only parent she has most of the times. Her mother is living 300 plus kilometers away, and our daughter spends bulk of her growing days and hours with me and my parents. I can see that I’m her hero, the mountain, the sun, that unmovable roots and for her I am the alpha male, the centred male figure, someone she can look up to, someone she adores most, her core, her everything. It’s natural, in a sense, it’s effortless, and I didn’t have to crack my head to be those and she doesn’t have to think or to learn those. It is what it is. Es destino que no nos puede separar. It is destined like that, and things are flowing and she will continue to grow under my guidance, and nurturing (since I have to take up her mother’s role to be the motherly figure) while I will continue to grow old learning new things everyday bout parenting, just by having her around in my life, which the best thing that can happen to any dad.

Insyirah is a very smart girl, an independent sassy and mature girl way ahead of her age. She knows bout her parents, she knows bout what’s going on, and she did well to understand the situation, and she adapts well, juggling her schedules between me and going back to visit her mother and brother. She knows where she is standing, she knows what her roles are as a daughter, and I can see that she just knows what to say and what to do in those complicated moments. And my god, we are talking about a 4 and a half year old kid, mind you.

Every day she knows what to do, her routine, she knows how to keep herself occupied, being the only child in the house. She likes to color, and to draw. She acts like she doesn’t really need me to be around twenty four seven, but when I got back from work, she will greet me at the door and runs towards me, asking for the self-validation, the love, the assurance, the manly presence. We usually continue chit chat about what she learned on that particular day at school, what did she had for lunch, did she had an ice cream after school, whether Johan (a boy at school, and yes, I know! They are supposed to be in a kindergarten and remain four years old!) teased her at school, or did Arissa (probably one of her best friends at school since she keeps mentioning her) gave her the new Frozen stickers again and so forth. I just keep asking the questions, and let her babbling about the details and those too much info or TMI stories over and over. I literally did nothing. I keep asking questions from what she answered. And repeat. Rinse, cycle, and repeat, remember? When she had all she wanted to say heard, or she feels heard, she will stop and jump down and run away.

Same goes when she plays with her second cousins, Danish and Qaisara. She usually will be the one being teased and she bursts into tears every time this happens. Guess what? When it happens, she will run towards me, and ask me all those questions, the typical why and why those two kids said such things and bla bla bla. When I comforted her and she feels better, she will jump down from my arms, and run back to the siblings and continue playing. She will say, “Okay, I want to continue playing with Abam Nish and Kak Omei” or continue to finish her colouring or continue whatever she was doing before. She will hop off from my lap and run away and resume her things. 

Sometimes, I even had to beg her to give a kiss. Imagine that, I am her father, her core, her mountain, what not, and yet I had to ask for a little act of love from my own 4 year old girl?? Sometimes, she does it, sometimes she just shrugs me off and ignores me. I was like, seriously?? But I never take it personally. That really hit me hard. Every time. Without fail. But somehow, it teaches me something, every time.

And WOW! And there and then, that was when the magic moment kicks in. And now, I know. Like really really understand this shit. Girls are like that! Nothing personal, but they are just born like that.

It is scientifically proven that the dynamic is the same when a girl gets into a romantic relationship with a boy. She will act and react towards him exactly how she grows up with her father. She tends to look for the same qualities. She tends to dislike or at least be able to see the things that are lacking in that boy’s core, his values, and etc. And it is not her fault if she expects or having a set of expectations of how the boy to treat her. Because she is so accustomed to this. She is used to this. Same goes to my daughter. Any girl for that matter. Insyirah will come to me at her will. Whenever she feels like, wherever she wants to. At her own PACE, SPACE and TIME. She doesn’t need me to say the magic three little words or the famous four letter word all the time. She will ask for it whenever she wants it, when she feels like the need to hear it from me. Other than that, she will continue to be her space, doing things she likes. Without me or me pestering her. I love it when I pretend to be a nosy little boy, tickling her, distracting her, just trying to get into her way especially when she is watching her cartoons in YouTube. She hates me when I do that. And I’ll usually stop when she about to cry or when my mom yells at me to stop! LOL.

Now, you see, a girl doesn’t want us boys to say nice things to her all the time. Let alone saying that we like them, right away in the first date. They know it. It is like a common sense to them. But not to us. They do not need us to say that we like them to know it. They are trained to read the signs, our body languages, both our verbal and non-verbal signs, the glow in our eyes, the tone when we talk on the phone, how we text, the frequency of our text, the speed of our reply, simply EVERYTHING. The fact that we ask them out, they know straight away that we are into them.

Girls or women, go on dates to see what it is about the guy, what is he made of. Not to be in a relationship straight away. Guys go on dates to lock the girl into labels and commitment. It takes more than that to get them in love, to have them emotionally engaged. We got to balance it all. Between too much and not enough.

This is actually unavoidable since men are meant to break barriers, achieving goals in life, to provide, etc. It comes together with the ego as a package. Oh well. Hehe. Meanwhile women are meant to receive, to bond, to nurture, to love and to trust. I'm not being sexist here but just stating my observations and what I've learned over the years. 

They said, women are like cats and men are like dogs. Dogs are loyal, they like it when people show affection to them, and they run after the bone people throw for them to chase. They go nuts when people pet them, or have them pampered. They show it straight away that they like it and love their master who smothered them with affections. And dogs are loyal to their masters. But women on the other hand, are like cats, a curious creature. How many times when we chase a cat and they stop and let us hold them like dogs? Yeah, exactly, ZERO! Si, nunca!

They usually walk in circle, lurking, stalking, analysing, and don’t be surprised if you see a cat comes and rubs her fur at someone’s feet and that person is the one in the whole room who paid least attention to it. Basically a girl, needs to feel safe, and sure that they guy is good enough for her in order to help her to grow more, and be better. She doesn’t need another younger brother, for her to babysit. She doesn’t have time to wait for the guy to grow into the man she hopes him to be. She definitely doesn’t want to teach him about life or how to be a man.

Yes, she wants another sun, to shine and to light her paths. The same mountain like how her dad treats her. The man, who is centred at his core and values, that man who she can always feel safe and assure of herself. She needs a substitute to her dad. A similiar father-esque figure, whom she can rely upon, but in a romantic manner. She looks for another alpha male. Not a boy.

How many times we hear that girls talk about that confidence in men is the sexiest thing that attracts them most above other things? Not money, and definitely not looks. But men, on the other hand are visual creatures. Well, I hate to admit this but it is true. When a guy sees a girl, he knows already whether he likes her or not. If he likes her, he will let the clouds smother him, only to find him day dreaming, wondering on how great the sex will be, how many kids he will have with her, how great the wedding ceremony will be, how adventurous the life growing old will be, simply everything. LOL! For some reason, blame the movies, the chick flicks that we see day in day out for years. In the movie, a boy meets a girl, the boy likes the girl, pursues her, says the typical you-are-the-last-beautiful-girl-on-earth poetic kind of words right away and the girl smiles, he dines her, wines her, buys her flowers, they fall in love, and the boy does more and the girl can’t help herself to fall in love more and more, says to herself "oh well, MAYBE I do like this guy" and they got married and live happily ever after. Oh yes, plain daylight robbery kinda lie. In real life, this doesn’t happen all the time. Seldom there is a maybe case. Probably 90 percent of the times, not the case. Not by chance, not at all. Big bull shit billboard there. Lo siento!

In real life, the only way for a girl to fall for a boy is, the boy to be her mountain. He takes his time, slowly she feels comfortable and more comfortable with him until she knows that she feels safe to be around him. How she felt safe to be around her father. She doesn’t need the wine dine and flower yet. Not just yet. Those vain efforts are usually perceived as bribery for sex. And act of neediness. And over pursuing will definitely turns her off. She only wants him to get to know her. She wants to see whether he is compatible with her for her to open up. To be emotionally engaged. She wants to see what the boy is made of. His values. His aspiration about life. Is he having his shits in life all together? Can he provide? Can he remain composed and unmoved in hard times? If the boy continues to do everything right and timely right, she will continue to feel comfortable with him and feels that she wants more and more. Too much until she is all over him. She will starts to pursue and do all the pursuing. When all these assurance creep in little by little, then only she will brings out the exclusivity topic, the “now what are we” talks. And this probably takes months. Hence, only then, the dines, wines and flowers are permitted. Really, it is what it is. This is how attraction works. The law of attraction.

So for those guys out there reading this, do take your time and do not over pursue. RELAX. Take a thing, one step at a time. Just go out and have fun. This is also scientifically proven that couples who play and do fun physical activities together will naturally bond better. Laughs and jokes around. Nothing serious. Banter, tease and banter. No politics, religions, or ideologies. Save those for your best male buddies during teh tarik session after futsal. Just be yourself. Nothing fancy. Let it flow, naturally, like the streams down the waterfall. It works like a gravity. Over pursuing will only leads to rejection. She will back off, fearing for many things. Over pursuing or rushing things out only shows the lack of manhood in the guy, that he fears that she will not like him and dumps him. Well, what we fear most, will eventually gets the better of us. Careful there. What if things don't work out? Easy, lick up the wounds, and move on. Continue searching. Remember, it is nothing personal, it is just that she wasn't really into you. Do not be bitter or butt hurt bout it, be a man and continue be nice, and slowly walk away. It is just a numbers game. Purely statistic. Some girls like you, and probably, more do not. 

The objective in any relationship is, for us to give. Without having any expectation, or expecting anything in return. We all should be in any form of relationship with the “to offer” mentality, simply not in “what to get from this” kinda mentality. We all should be in a relationship to grow each other. Or in other words,  we should look for a relationship with someone who wants to share their completeness with us, not to complete each other. And do not get complacent, the courtship never ends! 10 months dating or 30 years marriage? It doesn't matter. The effort is still the same. It doesn't matter what you did good in the past. Always you got to be the gentleman for them to put on their make ups. It is as simple like that.

After all, love is all about giving. The unconditional love. I don’t expect my daughter to say she loves me back every time I say that to her. Or say thank you for all what I’ve done for her. I’m here to give. To give my all, and never expect anything in return. The respect, the love, the appreciation will all come naturally. And a partner who is equally matured and having the same principles will reciprocate accordingly. There's no need to be fearful about that. And hopefully, my daughter and her brother will adopt the same principle. Give from the heart, and know the value of love.

But do not mistaken this giving it all as a weakness. It is not a sign of inadequacy or insecurity. Not even a slight hint.

This is the true strength. A noble sign of self-loving, self-belief, pure sign of honesty, and a great sign of completeness. This is an abundance mentality, not scarcity mentality.

But before we give it all, we need to know how to filter. How to remain composed during the selection process, what to look for, what to avoid and when to stop caring, who, how much and when to invest emotionally etc. I didn’t learn all these overnight. It took me years to finally realize this. It took me countless of heartache, countless of dates, and even a marriage to learn all these. I've been there done that, bought a T-shirt, took a picture and wrote a blog bout it! Kahkahkah. But I live with no regret. I never regret myself marrying my ex wife. She taught me many things in this life. The marriage and the divorce definitely taught me to be a better man. It is just that it didn’t work out, and it was not meant to last longer than it is written to be. Again, it is what it is. Es lo que es. We need to go through the NOs first before we got to the YESes. Go for No because Yes is the inevitable destination, but it is the No is how we get there. Los NOs antes los SIs.

The key is to find someone is equally excited to get know you. Someone who is interesting enough to be interested to invest her time and emotions for you and to learn more about you. It is whether she is interested in you or not.

Oh yes, it is. It's either she likes you or not. Whether you are in or you’re out. She can't choose whether she wants to like you or not. This is not a classic MAYBE or PERHAPS tragedy like in the movies. It doesn’t work that way. Attraction is not an option, guys. Do take note of that. This is not a B rated chick flick movie. This is real life. And in real life experience, we all got to play our cards right, keep them close to our chests in order to keep ourselves in the game, or else, we are out of the game. It is either to out-wait or to be outwitted. Good luck! Buena suerte! Adios.

Mas Vale Tarde Que Nunca

We all should pick up an additional language or two. It is never too late to learn one. No matter what age are you, what state of being you are, it doesn't matter how busy at work or how caught up you are in the traffic everyday, it is really never too late to learn. I've always believe in the long life learning concept and picking up foreign language has many benefits, more than you know, believe it or not. Of course they are never the short term kind of perks or privileges but be patience, the good things will come, eventually. Did you know that it is scientifically proven that people who are multilingual has far more less chance to get Alzheimer than those who speak single language? 

I've been asked few times by friends and colleagues why do I chose Spanish. Why not French instead, for example. Well, many reasons actually. One of them is, apart from my perpetual quest to be a sophisticated global survivor who is capable to dress well all the time and converse deeply in multi languages (kihkih), Spanish is the third most spoken language in terms of world population, after Mandarin and English. It's actually a close call between Spanish & English. 20 countries in Central & South America have had the language as their official or national language, or most utilised language in business at the very least. Therefore, if I can master it, it means that I've unlocked more than half of the world population. I can travel to almost any country on this earth. 

I've also been asked frequently how do I learn Spanish. I went to class for two months. But it didn't work out that well for me. Why? One, it was once in a week class, on weekend only, and it was only 2 hours class. It was so short to have me etched and immersed in the language. Two, I have a classmate who is always "not synchronized" with my pace, and that resulted my teacher to keep repeating what was covered over and over. So that bored me. To death. Despite her (my classmate was a Russian girl) good looks, I decided not to continue the class. Futhermore, it was quite expensive to me, not justifiable, especially with that kind of pace. Not that I was being too economical bout it, it's just that I wished I could gain more than that.

So now how do I continue? Myriads of way to be honest. But here are the main ones. Here are merely just my own preference. You can mixed them up with yours or scrap them totally. It's a free world where freedom is so expensive. La libertad es cara. Ehem.

First, Duolingo. Si todos de mundo, es Duolingo. Duolingo has been my best friend for the past year or two. It is an application, available in all markets, IOS and Android and even windows shop. And the best part, it's totally free. It's very easy to use, it's fun and it offers many languages. You can choose and learn multiple languages at one particular of time. As long as you have the time and passion for it. They even offer Arabic and Turkish!

The way Duolingo is structured makes it fun and helpful. It is colourful and the lessons are arranged step by step, you need to finish the incumbent layer then you unlock the next layer and so forth. It's like playing games. But in a very foreign and intellectual way of playing. It starts with the very basic until the more complicated grammar lessons such as past participle, subjuntive etc. It also has idioms and romance lessons, just in case you might get sidetracked and your interest gets thinner. And who knows, it might come handy in future. LOL. It also encourages you to repeat the course over and over because that's the only way to train our brain to memorize. Through repetition and endless repetition. To prevent brain decay it says. Since it is available in mobile form, it helps me to learn Spanish whenever and wherever I have the time. Oh and by the way, it also links up your achievement to your LinkedIn account, another feature that might help you in future, career wise.

Two, we all need a dictionary. The basis of a good dictionary is of course, free, unlimited vocabulary or at least almost unlimited, easy to access, mobile, and if possible, offers some example sentences using the word that we looked up. For me, ¡SpanishDict! is by far one of the best interlingo or inter idioma dictionary available in the market. Again, ¡SpanishDict! is also available in all stores for free! Times are hard now, got to be cheap and as thrifty as possible! Lol. I've tried all of them the English-Spanish dictionaries available, but I personally like this one better. It also offers la conjugacion or the conjugation table for every each verb that you search. Learning Spanish is all about mastering the verb conjugations. That's the hardest part. It also has a function where it can give you a daily reminder with word of the day that can be set at any point of time in a day. How's that work any better for you? Una palabra del dia casi a diario, cada mañana!

Three, you need to practice. A lot. It is unfortunate that I've been living in a very orthodox English speaking country where, a foreign language is very foreign to everybody I stumbled upon, generally. So, where can I practice my Spanish? Easy. Es muy facil. Through deep immersion. La inmersión profunda. Spanish songs, Spanish articles, Spanish television series, everything in Spanish. I even had my phone and laptop set in Spanish. What else can I do? If those are not enough, try to read the news in Spanish. My Flipboard are set in Spanish. Watch live stream football with Spanish commentary. Any other possible manner that I can think of. A falta de pan buenas son las tortas. Beggars can't be choosers. We have to make do with whatever presented to us.

Four, get passionate about the cultures. As I already said above, Spanish are the third most spoken language in the world. Those in Central and South America speak Spanish. Except for Brazil where Portuguese is preferred. From Spain to Venezuela, to Cuba el Caribe (the Carribeans), to Guadalajara, Mexico and Argentina! So many things to learn and to see! Even Spain itself is so diverse from north in the Basque Country to south in the Andalucia. Learn to love the songs, the dance, the food. Their telenovela. There are so many things to learn and so many ways to love the cultures, hence so many reasons not to learn the language.

I even have had my own Spanish playlist in my Spotify, full of Spanish songs and my Musixmatch linked to it so that I can listen to my favourite Spanish songs and learn their lyrics there on the go. Reggaeton is fun. Flamenco fusion songs are also fun to start with! 

Five, what happened when you get stuck and your motivation grows weary? Easy, learn another language! Pick something harder. Life is always like that, we tend to appreciate what we had and be in more appreciative mode when we get into troubles. Face it, whether you like it or not. Estas son nuestra realidades! In my case, I simply went for Russian and French. Just to make me feel that Spanish is a lot more easier. Which is the very true case for me. It worked. I somehow regained my motivation to continue.

Six, look for others like you. Other people who are around you and also learning the same language. In my case, I used an app called Meetup. Yes, it is a FREE social media app. I found a group in there for French and Spanish Speakers in Kuala Lumpur. Que interesante! How interesting is that?! To meet people of your "kind". From there, we meet up once in every fortnight, for coffee and chit chat in the two languages. People from various backgrounds and professions. All with one purpose, to practice speaking. Learning a new language is all about communicating. To be able to speak or converse. And hopefully to be fluent. We even have our own Whatsapp groups, one for French speakers, and one for Spanish speakers. In there we shared a lot of information, from Youtube links to articles to the very daily basic conversations of getting to know each other. We have native speakers from Mexico, my friend from Granada, Spain, some ex students who used to study in Spain or France, some got married to native speaker and live in Malaysia, we have Japanese expat but wants to learn Spanish, we got engineers, embassy staffs (from Spanish speaking countries), physiotherapist, language teachers, business man and it is all mixed up. Jumbled but fun! Somos como una ensalada!

Who ever thought learning a new language can be so fun and colourful!

The link shared some insights why Spanish is not so foreign anymore and why it should be first choice when it comes to be second mother tongue. After almost two years of learning Spanish, and few others "foreign languages" like Russian and French, it is safe to say that Spanish is by far, the easiest to master. What you read is what you pronounce. It is like a brother to English. I would say 50 percent of the nouns and verbs are almost the same, if not totally the same. It's just the pronunciation is a bit different since Spanish tongue don't work the same. But you can guess what it is when you read it. At least it is not written in Cyrillic like the Russian! And it offers more cultural benefits than the others. From Barcelona to Chile to Puerto Rico to Panama. That's just my personal tendency to be bias. Or it might just be me being bias. Lol. But whatever it is, it is never too late. Better late than never. Mas vale tarde, que nunca. Hasta la proxima amigos, ciao!

Keeping It Platonic

Platonic.

If appealing is the definition to give to the word just by the spelling and the pronunciation, it is indeed a good association. Isn't it catchy and intriguing? The word itself , is already non ideal, non parochial. It's melodic and can work as a "tonic" to make it as memorable as it gets.

Well, that works out very well isn't it? At least by it's definition. At least for me, it is.

What is it all bout being platonic? Some says that it is kinda relationship between a boy and girl, so weird that the vibes are all positives but there's no real string attached whatsoever. It's like, I-like-being-friends-and-talking-with-you-but-I-don't-want-you kinda relationship.

Keeping it platonic. As catchy and intriguing as it sounds, having or trying to maintain a platonic relationship is equally never an easy task. It is not a religiously straight forward concept to uphold. Well, conceptually it is already a mess.

Some says it's a eccentric kinda close relationship, close enough to say " I don't want you, FYI".

But then, all the mushy elements in that particular friendship do exist only to lack the sexual perspective of it. Can this be possible?  I sense this will devour me, subconsciously, without me realizing it.

However, as oxymoron as it sounds, as deeply confusing as it sounds, I am still intrigued to meet her. I do. Meeting this girl is the "primera objectivo" for me for the time being, this very much particular period of time.

I do want to meet this girl, personally. Period.

I want her to get to know me. Vice versa. I want to unlock, unfold this "travesura", I'm interested to learn more bout her. Very. I crave to lean myself towards learning on what it is that makes this girl. Who is this girl who makes me want to be bad. I want to do this so bad, in a very bad boy kinda way. Sometimes I feel I want to get bad, for her I am nasty. Me pones como loco, por ti me pongo mal. That sounds crazy, right?

Coming back to being platonic. I don't know whether it is a good idea. Whether to keep it that way. Well, honestly I don't know what I want. LOL.

But one thing for sure this what I want. Learning bout each other. Stepping out from the existing boundary of these annoying restrictive textings zone. It's suffocating.

I want her to understand me, my complications, how complicated I am, my difficulties, how difficult to be me, how it is not easy to be with me, with all the history, my circumstances, my status quo, my children. I want her to know that it is okay, to be associated with someone like me. And in my deepest sincerity, I feel like pouring her with all the love within my possession. Which I doubt such exists.

At the same time I don't want her to know that there's a possibility of us liking each other. I don't want to impress her, not intentionally, not when I'm in my full conscious. Which is totally crap, I think. For some unknown ambiguous reasons, I'm beating around the bushes, in my own self created maze, between reality and dream, whether to sweep this girl off her feet or to continue to be in my shitty platonic zones. Estoy perdido. Damn right, I'm lost.

I can't stop thinking about her. I certainly don't want to this to stop.  No quiero dejar de pensar en su. Whatever it is. Sometimes  I feel out of synchronization, lost in my own translations, between my self definition of platonic, and what I really feel. It's like I'm trying to fool her in this "casino royale"-esque poker game of love, that I'm up for the challenge, with all the cards on the table. It's a perfect picturesque of how 007 got bewildered by Vesper Lynd. Whether it's working or not? I don't know. I got not a single clue. Maybe I'm just fooling around, or I am a fool to set myself for another epic series of self cremation.

There are times I do ask myself why am I putting myself in this cyber torture? Unnecessarily. Is it worth the time, the headache, the heartache. Why? Why do I keep getting myself into silly indescribable trouble, unrelenting, consuming, overwhelming and undoing all the hard work I've put into. Is this going to make me better? A better person, a better man? Will this condemn me into another self inflicting wounds, for wanting someone is not available?

Who is this unfortunate girl? :-P

Well, she is an irresistible soul. A non text book kinda girl, intangible in many ways. Disparate. She got this weird style of describing things, which I find it funny. She makes me unconsciously smile when I read her texts. Fundamentally, she's different. Different enough to get my attentions, distinct enough to get me caught. She keeps getting me in a confusion state of mind, so divergent, far away from what I think it is the "ideal" me and the old unfamiliar wild me. She is contrastive, so in congruent to make me to lose control over myself. Silly things become not silly anymore. She makes me forget many things, suddenly wrong things can be re-positioned, suddenly crazy things are not so crazy anymore. Makes me want to let go. Well, I hold back many things in my life, stacking up to become an unwanted deposition on my shoulders, dragging me backwards. She makes me want to be unstuck. If there's such word. She makes me want to want her. She's my Vesper now. Mi chica ideal.

Ah, crazy. I think I'm going crazy. Y no me puedo contener. And, I can not help myself.

What about her? I wonder how is she doing. Juggling between her "routines" and having me pestering her in daily frequency. I wonder what is she feeling now. Deep inside, I feel bad for putting her in this entangling situation. Maybe she doesn't have to be in this mess. For all what she is having now. All these nuisances and deceiving signals I'm sending are not what she's looking for, certainly not even par to what she's experiencing now.

Why am I putting her into this? Getting her to think hard, between what she already has and what I can possibly offer. Should I continue or shall I embrace the idea of retreating-is-not-so-bad kinda idea? Well, whatever it is, I hope we both will not regret it. Whatever the outcomes, the end. Hmmm. Exhale, deep purging kinda exhales.

Okay, before I go on and on, pointless, senseless, and hopelessly relentlessly effortlessly making myself more stupid than I already am, I better stop this. Let me continue to sink myself, down in my own platonic cyber relationship. Some things in this life you don't get it twice. And this is one of them. Tu amigo, loco kukubal.

Endless Malarkey

Salam all. I know. It's been ages since I last wrote here. I even forgot that I had a blog. Seriously. And more surprisingly even to myself is, this blog for some ambiguous reasons contains 157 posts already?! My god, was I that vocal? Or was I just being myself? Flooding rants in this very humble page that has a very limited number of readers. I am pretty positive about the statistical analysis of that. Or maybe I was just too self criticised and self analyzing, so rampant in my individualistic notions that I simply had too much to write. And that I can attest too :)

It's been a year plus since my last post. I've been busy. With many things, among all, getting to know myself. I have come to a very delicate state of mind that there is nobody worth knowing unless you know yourself. God and the prophet excluded, of course. To really know what are we really capable of, our limits and to learn to master ourselves. Age is catching up with me, to be honest with you. I've learn recently to tactfully decline to any future endeavours that might put my well being in jeopardy. Be it a strong temptation to buy unnecessary pair of new shoes or an invitation from a friend, unscheduled, for coffee hangout kinda thing, so late that I know I am so going to have a problem adhering to my morning routine the very next day. Unless, it's weekend eve's night, of course. That's different. 

Being routinely disciplined is good for me, and it is exactly what I need to manage myself. And my time. I simply just can't afford to live like that anymore. Going to bed late for example. And being so immersed in my perpetual desire to be a full time professional golfer competing in the European Tour which outside my liking, completely turned me into a complete mad golf scientist, if such thing exists. I spent too much time at the range, countless of hours practising, inviting for a party of bodily malfunctions. And I know my body is not in the agreeable state anymore, with my lower back being the most vocal about it. Too much of anything is never a good thing.

I need to be in control. In a sense that being early, on top of things, being proactive not just in work but it is so extensive that all this being religiously timely applies to my personal life. From paying the bills, the groceries, my grooming, getting my haircut, servicing my car, my financial management etc.

But what is it about good practices without consistency? I'm totally passed that period of identification and self/soul searching, whatever you might want to label it. I'm bloody thirty two and not getting any younger, apparently. Divorced for almost two years, with two kids. It is just not befitting for me to be and act in slack and sluggish. I can't. Can't afford and in my conscience, I won't. 

I think we've already came to the conclusion (in the previous post, at the very least) that divorce is not a good thing and there's indeed no need to dwell on it. But managing the "post-divorced" era is even tougher than I ever imagined. And to a large extent it does, and it does taking its toll on me and my family. Especially the children.

I am not putting any sugar coat on this. I think the children is the most affected ones. I do however, in my usual best, sprightly appear to be well managed, somehow, emotionally and extravagantly extrovert. But the fear is always going to be there. Well, I am recovered. I go out, I golf, I work, I meet people, I talk, a lot, business as usual. But it is that fear, of my children imbalanced and unconventional upbringing that worry me most.

The narrative that's been laid in front of us in recent decades is that money does rule, and unfortunately to a certain extent it does. But money shall not solely define any human being self sustainability and certainly not at the expense of integrity. 2014 was tough year for me. Financially. And institutionally. I was out of job twice. In job transitions I called it. I had to endure a torrid period of time of my life with no savings, fully depending on my parents' pension money (yes, I know, I should have not burden them anymore, but how I wish it was avoidable) and to my deepest shame, I had to borrow some money from my close friends I met at the range (guess, golf buddies are cool after all, isn't?) for legal fees etc since my ex-wife filed summons for custody of our daughter in court. Twice. Which in my rarely issued humble opinion, a true indication of greed and relationship damaging manifesto. 

She is burning bridges. That's all. A self centered move, fully disguised in the name of syariah law, taking advantage of their self proclaimed slight upper hand, only and limited to only in terms of financially. There's no rights or wrongs about the divorce decision, which in my understanding, was mutually agreed and its repercussions are to be embraced. Don't slam on the repercussions now. It's expected and of all people you should have known this since you were the one who asked for it. You can't just dragged the other party to court every time, simply just because you think things should be in certain way, or in certain manners, which are always for me, one sided, to your self benefiting only. Just because you think it is good, good for you or the children, it does not necessarily mean it is going to be good for me. And to my parents. And surprisingly, to our daughter herself. I personally don't think that she would agree with all these so called fights for rights thingy. Too bad she is too young to understand.

Enough with all the bad tones. It is just not me. You know what I've discovered recently too? You can only love yourself much and that much, above all. And self loving is the very basic love principle and loving attitude before any of us has any idea to love any other human being. Love yourself first, then talk bout loving others. Bad tones is "self-love" damaging for me.

Let's talk bout the beautiful things that happened. Oh yes, the travels. First, Melbourne, then London. I am lucky, very lucky to be honest to have such wonderful parents who see travelling as a good thing, and I am very grateful to be given such opportunity to travel with my parents despite all the setbacks. I guess, there's no doubt whatsoever now that their love for my daughter (their one and only granddaughter by the way, for the time being) stand above all. Even higher than all my blunderbusses to date, and I was very well positioned to take advantage of that :-P Yeah, free tickets etc. Who wouldn't want those? Lol.

Melbourne trip was in August last year. It was a cold eye opening trip down south. Melbourne is such well organized especially in their CBD that it is so easy for you to get your way around. Then London was early May this year. We even went to Paris too. We celebrated Insyirah's birthday that day under the Eiffel Tower. She turned 3 that day. Took the train for a quick visit to France. I finally set foot in Europe and even though it was kinda sad that Madrid wasn't included within the itinerary but I was satisfied with the whole trip, as a whole. I learned a lot from the trip. The culture, the vast western civilization, the facilities, how they manage and juggle to balance between preserving nature within the metropolitan compound and infrastructure mega conglomerate. 

I just love walking in the Hyde Park with Insyirah in the morning, with a hot latte in my hands and my mom home cooked sandwich for breakfast, spent time walking from one end to the other, sit by the lake, watching the swans and how my daughter gave them bread crumbs and chasing the squirrels and rabbits around, and passers-by talking to each others at the cafe and above all what I love most, exchanging words with any strangers that I can possibly have the opportunity to utter words with. It was just, self revealing. Talking about just about anything and to be honest, nothing in particular to some British old ladies and tourists in the bus, out of the blue in a foreign country was just fun! Some spontaneity in travel is always fun. Learned that life doesn't have to be stressful and that hard, you know. There's always a good side of anything even after such a bad thing. Yes, we all already know that life is hard, but being gloomy and living in the past just won't take you nowhere. Certainly not to Spain I guess :-P

The only thing that didn't go well with the trips is, Furqan's absence. I have made it clear to myself that the next journey shall have him with us. That's a promise. Here are some pictures from both trip.

Okay, I think it is enough of these endless malarkey. I am going to excuse myself with these wise words from Bil Keane saying that, “Yesterday’s the past, tomorrow’s the future, but today is a gift. That’s why it’s called the present.” Till then, appreciate today and the present, be good folks. Cheers.

Living It Best

Salam. I know. It's been ages since I last posted in here. It's been almost a year now. So many things happened in a year, even I lost track on the changes myself.

Firstly, Insyirah is going to be a year older by the end of this month. She will be two years old then. Time flies, and watching her grows everyday is the best thing to do after having her in this world was one of the best things that happened in my life. And she has a younger brother now named Furqan. Furqan was born last year, end of June to be precise. And having another breathing human being with my name as his last name is another blessing that I am so grateful for. My son, the heir of my throne.



Secondly, I just got divorced. I know, that just spoiled it all. After all the good things in the previous two paragraphs. Well, I've been wanting to write bout this much much sooner, a lot sooner than this. To express what I felt during the process, over a period of time. It when on for few months until we finally settled in court and reached sort of a mutual agreement, on the children custodies and many other things. Well, divorce is never a good thing. Never easy. And mutual was hardly in it. It was a fair and mutual kind of setlement, I think. For me, at least. Each of us get a custody for one of the children. Insyirah stays with me in the capital. Furqan stays with his mother in JB. I gave her the  visitation right, unlimited, unsupervised and vice versa. She can come and visit or take Insyirah overnight. I'm planning to do the same with Furqan but decided to postpone it until he is slightly older. He needs his mother most. Too young to stay overnight without his mother.

It is not that I don't want it, god knows how bad I want to have my son sleeping over, but the timing is not just right. Not yet. I love my son and daughter equally. Not more not less.

Both of them are not the same, in my observations, limited but sure enough I know that my children have different set of being. The way they sleep, the way they look at me, the way they were born, the behaviour, the way they cried for any reason, everything. Same blood running in their veins, but different in many ways. But I love them the same. Irony.

I tried to be as fair as I can. For her, the children, my parents in law, my parents, everybody but never to myself. All my life I tried to be fair and work my best to please most people, if not everybody. Well, self sacrificing has become my repertoire lately. I guess having children changed me as a person. In a good way, of course. That I always put them infont of anything, and I will do anything that I can think of, everything in my might and within my knowledge to give them the best. Best kind of living. Anything. Even if I have to starve or die.

Okay, what really happened? What were the causes? Personally, I think let's just put it this way. Two adults just can not be together anymore, under one roof, as husband and wife. Maybe it's our fate that it only lasted for three years. That it is already written this way. Knowing me, always strive for positiveness, that I look it as a process to make me as a better person. Do not get me wrong, like I said, divorce is not a good thing, never will be, and shall not be an alternative in the first place, but I always believe that this is all within His plans. Everything happens for a reason. Anything. And my divorce is no stranger to it. It is true, that divorce is allowed in our religion but never a good thing. He hates it most. And so do I.

Why do I hate it? Because it's a failure. My failure. And god, I hate it so bad that I know, this will affect my children. If not mentally, emotionally. Sooner or later. Eventually. Or maybe it is happening. I don't know. I can not tell. It's too early. But it affected me.

Everynight when I put Insyirah to bed, it gets me to think, like, f***, what have I done?! Always ask myself that is this the right thing to do? Could I've done any better? Save the marriage. For the children? The two people that I claimed so bad to be my utmost priority in my whole entire universe. Is this a good thing, having two siblings living and growing separately? Am I greedy to take Insyirah away from her mother? Am I cruel to leave Furqan unattended? What about his unbalanced upbinging?!

Thousand and one questions keep bugging me. Every night. Without miss. Speaking of miss, god! I miss my son. It's been over a month since I held him in arms.

Well, life. This is life. My life. My fate. My challenges. To raise a kid, without her mother. To miss another one, every single day. To live and to sleep with all these burdens, not knowing what will happen tomorrow, breathing remorses and doubts, worrying bout the two people that I love the most.

I hope this all will pass. Albeit I knew that the guilt will always be there. For the rest of my life. Yet, somehow I'm living it best.

An Eternal Student

I went to my old office in the twin towers yesterday. It was a good reminiscence of the good old days. It is always good to see old friends and bosses at old work place. Now I'm serving my old colleagues to supply their shortage in case there's any in the hydrocarbon finished products.

I left my previous job earlier this month to join the current one. I'm doing petroleum trading now. It was a tough decision to make, probably one of the hardest one, if there's such one. I really like what I was doing in the previous company. I like the culture, the job descriptions given, I love the liberty of control given, I was free to roam, the trust to make decisions in both commercial deals and market developments. It was fun yet full of life learning. It was the first time I'm doing sales and marketing. I took the giant leap of faith to do something I never done before, something alien to me, some tasks I never trained before, not by design or in formal educational background. But I took the challenge, to leave my comfort zones, believe in my capability and natural talents, which is, being with people.

But love affair don't last. As I was getting good in what I did, learning fast, came offers knocking on my door.   I got two offers. One to be a downstream operational consultant and another one to be a petroleum trader. Both were handsome offers. Double from what I was getting.  So there was I, in dilemma. Between my passion and my responsibility to my loved ones. My soon to be born son is due in July. So this has to be his, meant for my boy. My heir to my throne :) My family deserves a better life. Not to say that what we are having now is bad, but certainly an improved life and house earning will help. Well, money is not everything towards good life balance and happiness but money plays a big role in everything in life nowadays.

It took me sometime to come out with the decision. But good offers usually don't come knocking twice. It was sad to part ways with things that you like to do, especially when you were just about to get started to get better in it. I learned a lot. Tonnes of knowledge gathered. Finally I found something I like. After almost 7 years of professional career in the industry, after years of disappointments and "try and error" downfalls, I found it, the one dream job. And it is safe to say, I was happy, finally. But as we grow older there will come to a point where we have to make a decision against our own willing and put our loved ones first. I've reached to that point where I become less selfish and think more others under my care. Well, that's life.

Here I am now at G Tower, one of the famous stylish office and hotel building occupied by mostly oil and gas companies in the middle of the city. Starting all over again. Learning and learn and learn. I never seem to stop learning. For me, the learning process has no end. The curve is always going to be left open. And I feel like I am an eternal student in this life. I am still yet to seal my very first trade deal. Looking forward to that. I kind of like the culture here. Similar to what I had before but slightly different in some ways. The bosses are nice and ambitious. It is a new company with big aspirations. And I'm going to be a vital part in growing this company to be big. Hopefully.

This morning, as I was in the train to the office, scrolling down through my old music playlists, I stumbled to this song which I first listened 7 years ago. I downloaded it when I about to graduate from the university and I listened to it everyday during my days in the factory. The first job. Time really flies. Seems like it was forever. I've changed so much since then. Physically. I'm fat now. LOL.

So I want to share this song. It's a good song by a band called Nevertheless. About love and lover. It is saying that life must be spent like we are living and dying. Let us live like we are alive, nevertheless we are  dying, soon. Deep :P

Being an emo band star is probably the only thing remains unfulfilled yet. I've been an engineer, an executive, been in aviation operations, did governance for a while, hated it and left for sales, still a graphic artist, in love with photography, then an avid golfer and now trading. But never been a star. Not just quite be able to continue with the band thingy when we left the university.

 I now define myself as a seasoned aviator turned trader. Was a lousy engineer, a retired lover and now venture as a father and trader. But my love to my family will never cease. Enjoy the song and till then, I'm out.

Effortless In Forgiveness

I just don't understand why people still wants to justify when they are saying sorry.

We don't justify why we are sorry. Guilt is never to be reasoned. Forgiveness is a product of common civic value, a by product of humility. Apologies are never to be followed by proud excuses.

We are humans, we are bound to make mistakes. Error prone. When we do make mistakes, we feel sorry about them, and the guilt creeps in. And we seek for forgiveness. That is part of humanity and that is all about being a mortal. We have feelings.

We don't say "I'm so sorry for what I've done, but really, I want you to know that I did it because of I don't respect you bla bla bla.."...

Seriously, that was horrible. I doubt the sincerity of the plead for forgiveness.

And when people tries to do that, that derivation of why they are sorry, they tend to talk a lot. Tonnes of unnecessary things. Too much of a thing really will not help to ease up things.

Too much info doesn't mend, it is deteriorating instead. Bores the patch, pokes the wound.

We say sorry. Full stop. That's it. That is how it should be. And somehow it reflects true honesty.

And for that, sorry is always seems to be the hardest word. Because it is not easy. Only the strong can say sorry. Sincerely.

But it is never meant to be so expensive, let alone being cheap. Forgiveness is just priceless. And for me, it should be effortless.