Oh my God, I haven't blogged in more than half a month. In the lead-up to the exams and during the exam period itself, it seems that I was either studying or watching stuff whenever I'm at home. Actually, this would be true of the whole of term 3, simply because there were so many tests and so much to write (essays, essays, stories, essays...) that I didn't want to write any more than necessary. This theory is supported by the fact that I definitely blog more when I'm on holidays.

The exams are over now, along with term three and - oh my goodness! - YEAR 11! You know what this means? There's nothing but a week and a bit separating now and the beginning of year 12! Eep.

So, since I last blogged, I've crammed muchly and probably procrastinated just as much. After all, the amount of procrastination I do is in direct proportion to the a) the amount of study/work I have to do, and b) the urgency with which this work must be done by. I certainly failed to make use of the Friday night before the exams. I succumbed and got out HZGG1 and watched my personal favourite bits again. Basically, all the mush. I find the mush in HZGG1 is much better done in HZGG2. I watched the end of HZGG2 last weekend and found many parts of the dialogue cringe-worthily revolting and hilarious at the same time. I completely cracked up at the sheer and utter brainlessness of it all. I mean, what kind of bride says to her husband in the bridal chamber "I am your bride now". Um, obvious much? And she says it with so much gravity and her eyes so widely innocent... Ugh.

I also spent Sunday night texting Anne which served the double purpose of wasting my potential study time and wasting my credit (I now only have 6 cents, which isn't even enough to make a call in which anything can be communicated). I had a hideous exam timetable in which I had exams every morning in the first week and two days with two exams. Not that I suppose it could have been much better, or else I would have had to continue to stress beyond the first week.

Both English exams were reasonably doable, in that at least I didn't have to stare at the question with no idea what the hell to write. I could pretty much get straight into it. However, don't take that to mean I succeeded in the subject at all. Most people write one page every ten minutes and I write one every twenty. So, in the two-hour long English Extension exam, everyone seems to have written at least eleven pages while I only managed six. I seriously can't see how people can sit in the room for so long just churning out essays and stories! It's absolutely against human nature! People aren't made for sitting and writing in silence with no reference materials!

Chemistry was... long. And tiring. I kept not reading the question properly and mixing up things like ionisation energy and electronegativity, reliability and validity... Consequently I kept having to white entire 5-line responses out. Man that was a tiring exam.

Maths! Argh! Usually Maths isn't the most 'argh' of subjects, but this time it was hideously and unexpectedly evil! I ran out of time for both of them, there were questions in both 2U and 3U where I just just like "what?!" and had no idea how to go about them. Compared to the half-yearlies, where I had like 30min left over at the end of the exam, this was scarily hectic and I couldn't think straight at all! It was mortifying! And in both exams, I got to one of the last questions, didn't see how to do it, and then as there were like two minutes left I finally saw through it except I don't finish answering it in time and so I'll only get like half of the four marks or six marks or whatever. How annoying. I'm so disappointed in myself.

Modern History... all right. A bit uncertain about some things, but at least I got down on paper everything I wanted to get down. Even if my two source-based essays had no intro or conclusion. Whatever. I think I predicted the Japan question reasonably well - since Mrs Young had already tested us on internal changes in class, I suspected the exam question would be about foreign policy and expansion. Good on me.

And French. Didn't really study for that. Watched A Very Long Engagement on Thursday afternoon, which I thought would be good listening practice (even though I still set English subtitles. I would have used French subs, but there weren't any). Again, like Maths, a bit more pushed for time than the previous exam. I didn't manage to check over my comprehension, though I did read my writing again. Meh.

Omg, I absolutely must mention the epic dust storm that we had last last Wednesday, in the first week of the exams. Most of Sydney woke up to a pink sky. I woke up to an orange sky because by 7:30 when I got out of bed, I think some of the storm had already subsided. It was like nothing I'd ever seen before! It was extremely windy and I believe the dust came from inner NSW. When I left the house, I could hardly close the front door because the wind was blowing so strongly. And walking to the bus stop there waws dust flying everywhere. In the sky, there was this fluorescent blue-white orb that I believe was the moon but some people say it was the sun (I'm still a bit sceptical). The sun can't possibly be that bluish! I may have considered staying home due to the weird and frankly quite apocalyptic-looking conditions, were it not for the fact that I had two exams that day. I certainly wouldn't want to have to approach Kenway for a substitute English exam. I sat through the whole two hours of Eng Ext sniffing loudly because there was dust in my nose. 'Twas hideous.

After all the stress and dust and strong wind, then, it may not be surprising that I started feeling woozy on Sunday afternoon and came down with a fever. I had just bought new shoes from DJ's Bondi Junction - yes! new shoes! They were reduced from $160-ish to $60-ish and they were exactly the sort of flat-heeled, open shoes I was looking for. They are black strappy sandals with like gold highlights but they are totally more classic than those gladiator things. By my calculations, I buy a new pair of shoes roughly every 3-4 months. Isn't that interesting?

Anyway, I had a fever so I spent the evening sitting in bed instead of doing my orals. I had hoped that if I took it easy on Sunday night, i could go to school on Monday to practise orals with Nicole and Ama - but that was not so, as the next morning I still had a fever. I would say that that was a bad day to get sick, but actually, is there ever a good day to get sick?

Our oral group put in some good hours on Tuesday and Wednesday and I guess our orals on Wednesday afternoon went alright. Firstly, we got a decent question and despite the two awfully awkward silences that occurred, we kept the discussion going... Don't trust me on this, though - I'm never a good judge of what English marks I deserve.
So after I did my oral, Bei and I went to Dymocks in the city to get Anne and Cindy's birthday presents (those two had the misfortune of having their birthdays during exam week). We got Anne Wicked, the book, and Cindy this self-help book called Happy For No Reason. Oh, the irony.

Today, after my flute lesson, I met Anne, Bei, Cindy, Jojo and Svenja in the city for our celebratory outing. First we went to a sushi train, which was surprisingly good value, I think, and then we went to watch Mao's Last Dancer. A decent film. I have no qualms about it, though I suppose nothing stuck out to me or particularly moved me or entertained me. I suppose I am always a bit sceptical about books or films that deal with American foreign policy, in particular when it concerns Communist China. There is certainly no way that any film can portray the issue neutrally - someone has to be painted as the bad guy. In this case it was China, and while I should be angry at that for obvious reasons, I'm also against China in that it is true that they place a lot of restrictions. They are not very open minded and, like the US, so anything they can to uphold and promote their "strength", their "righteousness" etc. Just look at today's celebrations of the 60th anniversary of Communist China! Is there no other way or celebrating it but by an enormous military display? Like America, they say one thing (hope of peace) and do something else (stockpile weapons and maintain a gigantic army).
And they quash languages by imposing Mandarin at school and in the media. I can never overlook that. I've considered doing Chinese Studies at Cambridge (it's probably easier to get into that Sociology, at least), but how can I lock myself into learning only Mandarin for the duration of the degree. They won't even acknowledge the other dialects - mention them in passing, maybe, but certainly not let them rival the absoluteness of Mandarin.

It does seem as though the Chinese are more patriotic now, particularly the young Chinese. Are they still emigrating to Australia in droves like in the 80s? The topic of patriotism in education is intriguing to me. To what extent should we educate children (and people, for that matter) to love their country. On one hand, we must ensure the population are citizens that wish their country well and are willing to develop it - in short, be productive members of society. But on the other hand, if we indoctrinate them with the idea that their country is great and that they owe their country everything, is that not a lie? It's like how in Othello, even Othello has been made to believe that he himself is inferior because he is black, causing him to cave in at the end. Isn't it wrong to teach them that their country is worth loving? Regardless of whether they are treated like slaves or if everyone wants for nothing, I think that this decision should be up to the people themselves to make, not to be told what to believe. But this could be at the expense of economic, political and social stability. How can a society raise a generation or many generations of people who subsequently decide they have nothing to be grateful for and run off?

And then we went karaoke.

Hmm, it seems that every blog entry I've written lately has been about what I've been watching. But since I watched Pretty Woman last night, I just couldn't stop thinking about what a nice movie it was. It just touched me with its simplicity - prostitute meets billionaire, billionaire for some reason can't go without her, and prostitute stays by his side for love rather than money.

I know I watch historical things more than anything - I'd say that out of every fictional thing I've ever watched or read, mabe 60-70% of it would be set in the past. A lot of the time I find that modern stories are cheaper than old-time ones. Maybe because people don't die. In anything set pre-1800s, say, people die in wars, get beheaded for treason or whatever, make faraway journeys where they have to leave behind their loved ones... there are plots to gain power. In other words, there is ample opportunity for drama, for real life-or-death situations and the emotion that accompanies it. Whereas, say, today if you go far away you can see each other over the internet, or hear each others' voice over the phone. You might not even be able to go anywhere if you can't afford the flight or are denied a visa.
Everything is tame nowadays.

So, exams are in a week. After finishing Wan ju gak gak 2(Huan2 zhu1 ge2ge), I dutifully got down to work with my history essay. By staring at it for about six hours a day for three days, I was pretty well on track by Thursday, with only the annotated bibliography to finish off. But dammit did that essay nearly kill me. I had a stack of books around my computer, pages everywhere, trying to juggle all these bits of information from all these different sources...
So, being confident that all was well for the due date the next day, I cracked out the box of VCDs for Seh diu ying hong juen (She4 diao1 ying1xiong2 zhuan4)/ The Legend of the Condor Heroes. And I've been watching that since Thursday. Yes, I know. So much for me being so distraught about having nothing else to watch. Thirty episodes, each episode longer than one of WJGG/HZGG. So, effectively, with each series I watch, I've been increasing the rate at which I watch them. It's terrible. Thank God I mean it when I say I actually have nothing more to watch, because I really have to start studying for Prelim Final Exams. That's right! Once these are over, I'll really have to bunker down for year 12.
So, good thing I have no more VCDs. Unless I'm so desperate I'll even go for the cartoons of Wong Fei Hong and animal fables.

I don't suppose I have much to say about LOCH, because I've watched it a year and a half ago, so it's still in blogging memory, No doubt if you go back to February 2008, you'll find some nice long rants about it. It's such a classic for me, I've watched it three times now. To be honest, it wasn't really necessary for me to watch it again, not like it was necesary to watch WJGG. I can remember flawlessly what happens in what order. I know how each plan will turn out, sometimes I can even predict what the characters will say next, because the rhythm of the dialogue is so familiar to me. Not like WJGG, where I couldn't even guess what was going to happen next.

Oh yeah, and in the past week I also had two Maths tests (both of which went suitably disastrously) and an essay on Emma/Clueless. I managed to write that one in one day! Not that I'm convinced I gave it 100%. I'd say the first half was pretty through, and the second part was a sorry excuse for two paragraphs and a conclusion.

Anyway, maybe I'll just surf the net for a bit more, and then crack out my Modern History notes on the Meiji Restoration to type up.

One week. Forty-eight episodes. And now, finally, I can let out the breath I've been holding all that time. The characters are married and happy, people have made peace and I like to think that my Mando has improved through intensive listening, never mind if I understand what's being said or not (I'd say I understand about 30% of the dialogue, mainly when they're talking about their feelings and not so much when they're talking about poetry).

Once again, please don't let it end. I'll beg on my kneeeees. Let there be another episode, let us see more of that final wedding, let me see what happens after the wedding, introduce another side story... just don't make me awake from the week-long dream.

You remember my hysteria in my last entry, exactly a week ago. I cried and threw a tantrum because I thought I was unable to watch anything in Mando. It turns out I understimated the extent of my determination to have something to watch, because I decided I couldn't live without it. So, Canto or not, I went for it. It wasn't even as bad as I thought, even though it took a while to get used to the characters with their new voices (I swear the characters are more attractive or loveable when they speak Canto). I understood more than I thought, and I certainly understood the plot for the most part. I understood why people were arguing, I could keep track of the characters and I understood the reasons why people were doing what they were doing eg. being tortured, loving each other etc..

But now... I zow tow moh loh (zou3 tou2 wu2 lu4) - I have nowhere to run. Canto, Mando, English, French, Afrikaans, Mongolian... there's no more for me, no matter which language. The past week was like a dream. I'd come home and lock myself in my room, watching at least four episodes a day, and as many eight. My mum thinks I'm hard at work and keeps saying how sorry she feels for me. Perhaps, on one level, I'm grateful that I've finished the series because now I won't have to feel so guilty. With my history essay due on Friday and only an introduction, I really can't afford to be spirited away again. I've been feeling so continuously scared about that essay, I'm starting to get used to it. I'm thinking, if I write 400 words a day for the next three days, I'll finish in time. I must not panic.

Since... err... Wednesday, I think... or perhaps Tuesday... I have been secretly rewatching another of my favourite childhood series, Wan ju gak gak (huan2 zhu1 ge2ge). Twenty-five sweet episodes, ever so entertaining, and also so tear-inducing...

It's not supposed to end yet! There are another forty-eight or so episodes to go! I am unspeakably pissed at my computer, or at the disks, or at fate, that just when I had found something to ease my boredom and also improve my Chinese, it is cut short. The rage bubbles inside me. It must work, there's no way -

Let me explain from the beginning. My computer only has a CD player, so I can't watch anything on it that's on DVD, it can only read CDs and USBs. I would dearly like to watch DVDs on my computer, but if I ask my dad to install a DVD player, he'd totally get suspicious about why I'm watching DVDs all the time. So imagine my ecstacy when I found some well-beloved VCDs of my childhood that I could watch in the privacy of my own room! Yes, 'twas a leisurely few days when I watched the first part of the series, watching up to ten 45-minute episodes in one day (that was Friday night, so I decided to milk it for all it was worth). And now that it's over, I've smuggled the second part into my room too, and it plays fine on my computer, but no matter what I do, I can't get it to play Canto!

You see, the thing with bilingual VCDs is that you have to turn off either the left or right speaker/earphone, or else you get a jumble of both languages. Let me tell you, it was worth me deafening one ear at a time to listen to Canto without the noise being detected my my family. But with the second series, I've tried turning off both headphones one at a time, but each time, it's still only Mando that comes out. Argh!!! What do I do? Why me? I don't understand!!! When I first watched the series, I was in like year two and hardly knew any Mando at all except for my Chinese name (maybe not even that). My Canto, however, was very fair. I must have watched it in Canto. But why doesn't the canto work now??

I think that we bought the first part for real, while the second part was fake. But that doesn't mean anything, because no matter what tv shows my dad buys or downloads, he would definitely get them in Canto unless there exists no Canto version. In all honesty though, I have no idea. The storyline seems completely new to me. Rewatching it after nearly ten years, I seriously don't remember anything at all about the storyline. I remember brief flashes, but most of the times it's unreal to me that I've ever watched this. I have no idea what's going to happen next, and I cry as if it's the saddest thing I've ever seen, not the saddest thing I've ever seen twice.
Like today, I watched the last four episodes in a row and I cried during each one of them, 'cause people were being whipped and nearly dying and things. and I used up like eight tissues blowing my nose.

Here is one line that I quite liked:
Guy: Did you miss me?
Girl: No.
Guy: Well... do you have anything else to say to me?
Girl: ... that "no" was a lie.
Expected knowledge would be that the guy and the girl met before the girl went into the palace to become a servant, so the guy can only see her once in a while, which why he's all like "do you have anything to say to me" and yeah.

Anyway. So unbelieveably pissed that I can no longer continue watching through to the end!! *throws tantrum*

God, and my major Modern History essay is due in two weeks, and I have no idea what I'm going to do... *scared*

Time to procratinate some more.

I can't believe it's only week three. I know what the teachers mean now when they told us that we would be piled with work all throughout term three. I've had a bit of a blitzed week, though in hindsight I seem to have come out of it relatively unscathed. That modernism essay was a success, and I can't really believe I actually got a 19+ out of 20 for something that wrote itself with relative ease.
Coal research assignment was done and dusted, and given back with no comment but many ticks. French speech was well written (in my opinion, and they only gave us like a week to do it), but the delivery could certainly have gone more smoothly, with me talking too fast and getting all tongue tied. At least it's over. As is the Calculus test, in which there was this freakily hard question that hardly anyone got. That went better than expected too, because I somehow managed to get 91% whilst the average was 87%. Is that not cause for celebration?

So now, I have basically no work except for the customary Maths exercises. And, of course, my essay on Margaret Thatcher, for which I must plough through the reading. I actually have no idea at all where my essay is going. There's three weeks left, but deep down I know that this is not enough at all at the rate that I'm going.

Last Friday was this completely retarded Music Day thing. It was obviously a pathetic attempt to get people to go to Music Camp. Because of the financial crisis or something, the music people (in actual fact, probably just Henshaw) had decided not to take people to a conference centre and just hold it at school, with people sleeping on the floor in the MPH. I'm sure, then, why they couldn't raise enough numbers to actually hold the camp, so they watered the already watered-down music camp experience into a single day, compulsory for all music ensembles except choir.

That's right, compulsory. Tu fous ma gueule!! Compulsory?? If that isn't the lowest, most pathetic thing the music faculty has ever done...! How dare they make it compulsory, and dictate to us people who just want to take part in an activity that hopefully won't ever impact on their daily lessons! And I actually wanted to go to class! My Chem assingment was finished to my satisfaction and due that day, so I wanted to damn well hand it in. I did not stop being outraged until the whole day was over. Look, I'm older now. For some things, such as music, I don't get as enthusiastic over I once did. The day served to do nothing but make me slightly sick of SWE.

The strange thing about SWE and the school musical institution, is that I don't see tham as in such an exalted position as I used to. When I was a junior, I used to look at the more selective ensembles like SWE and orchestra, and the Musicale/Christmas orchestra with awe. They were so polished, so elite, they always sounded fantastic and took your breath away. How I aspired to be in them, to flit from performance to performance at the Musicale. But now, orchestra doesn't sound as perfect as they used to, and SWE is definitely not perfect. In fact, SWE's performances are never perfect, I can't help but notice our flaws.
I have no idea whether this is because I have gained more experience, thereby allowing me to notice what I previously could notice, or whether the school's top ensembles have indeed deteriorated in quality. Surely my musical ear has not advanced to much, until nothing is sacred. I remain unable to tune.

I am truly tiring of everything, after five years. Last night was the Musicale, for which I stayed only until after my single item was finished. Luckily SWE was first up, so hardly had the night begun when I called my dad and was driven home. I wasn't even interested so much in the night as in the afternoon, which I spent in the city with Amanda getting Bei's birthday present. We spent a lot of time walking around looking for Converses, and it seemed as though each time we looked in a different shop, the deals kept getting better. At the first place, they were full price, the second place had them two pairs for one but with a hideous selection of colours, the third had them for a reasonable price in reasonable colours, but the fourth place had them half price, in the right size, in a colour that was very acceptable. How awesome was that? It was like following a trail that would lead us to the Holy Grail! So, since we found such a bargain, we had like half our money left over and could afford to buy the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice, as well as some chocolates with the remainder.
Altogether, an excellent run of shopping.
Had Turkish bread for dinner, then rushed back to school just in time.

Hmm, gtg dinner. I've just about finished anyway.

Yes, it is, but now that I've been tapping away in my sanctum for three nights in a row, I'm rather getting used to it. Not that it still isn't awesome to have my computer here. Not only do I feel a lot more comfortable, it's also heaps convenient to have all my study things around me so that I don't have to go back and forth between my room and the attic. And I swear it's showing in my work habits: I started my Modernism essay on Sunday, right after I finished sorting out the new layout of my room, and finished it last night. It's not even due until tomorrow! I can't remember the last time (if ever) I finished an essay before the night before the due date.

My room looks much bigger now, too. My bed has been pushed against the wall, partly in a little enclave thing that feels very cosy when only my bedside light is on. Having everything against the walls means that there is a huge open area on my floor, which I hope will come in handy for having sleepovers and the like. I think that it will now fit a good four people side by side, or six if we are space efficient.

In order to rearrange my room so well, I had to do a massive clean-out of all my stuff, which almost took up my whole weekend 'cause I decided to get rid of a rather ugly bookshelf that just happened to house the majority of my books. The old schoolbooks dating back to year 7 went into the attic, and the stacks of paperbacks that I never read went into the guest room (all I need now are guests to inhabit that room and enjoy some Austen, Blyton, etc.). I can't quite believe that I'm only 16 (therefore, relatively young in human terms) and I've already collected so much junk. What a regular young capitalist I am. I had to take half the clothes out of my wardrobe so that we could move it, and it made a pile half a metre high on my bed! And that's only the stuff I've gotten over the last three years.

Teachers are really piling on the work now. I've finished my English essay but I still have to do my Chem research assignment, study for my calculus test (which still sort of mystifies me), write a French speech from the point of view of an immigrant (due next Wed! Argh! And it's worth 10% of our report mark) and do my Modern History essay. The essay is actually really freaking me out. I may still have four weeks to do it, but it's got to be edited and done in true academic style with heaps and heaps of research involved. I'm starting to get sick of my topic. I wish I hadn't chosen to do Margaret Thatcher. I wonder how the other Mod Hist kids are feeling. Though I imagine by now I'd be sick of my topic no matter what I'd chosen.
Today I went to the library to get another stash of books on Thatcher, and one of them weighs more than my Maths textbook. And I'm going to have to read all of it, because it's a recount of everything that happened in her eleven years at number 10. *sigh*

Plus I had to get books on coal (for Chem) and the Arab-Israeli conflict, which I sort of get, but all this Middle Eastern territory stuff isn't really my thing anyway. Since I don't have anything due 'til Friday, I think I'll chill for now... Hello, youtube.

Okay. Here I am again, back in front of my familiar screen, at my usual post-dinner hours.

It's been a long week and a half, yet so very short. Long in that I neglected going online in favour of watching all thirty episodes of Chor Lau Heung (Chu Liu Xiang - screw the pinyin, it was a TVB series and therefore in Canto). Short in that I watched it as if addicted, never wanting to stop yet painfully unable to divert my mind from it whenever that suave bastard was not in front of my eyes. Freaking...

But it's over now. Depressingly so (of course the usual nagging question comes to mind: What am I going to base my existence on, now that I've made my way through that whole saga?). But I think I'm getting over it now. I don't feel as lost as before, when I spent ages watching something or reading something. It's a relief, almost. And that grown-up voice in me says "good, just in time for school to start again". That's true. I could really use some "getting down to work", especially since, I'm sorry to say, I didn't actually get much done these holidays. Sure, I've made some notes on Maths, I've read the two chapters on water in my Chem textbook and I wrote my response to Coco Avant Chanel, but that's nothing. I haven't even touched those two essays, and I'm pretty sure my Modernism one is due when we get back! And of course the one on Margaret Thatcher takes heaps of work - there are so many sources and things to put together to make an argument! Argh. I don't even feel as relieved about having finished Emma than I thought I would!

But oh my God that was a surreal experience, watching CLH. I can't believe how much it consumed me. You have no idea. It's like being cut loose from the world and hearing your blood sing in your veins. Actually it's probably not advisable to take that word for word. Perhaps I'm still experiencing the aftereffects of watching it. It's more like exhilarating yet sombre at the same time. I imagine this is what it must feel like to stand in front of the Mirror of Erised (if it indeed existed beyong the world of Harry Potter). You can't drag your eyes away, you want to sit there and be drawn into it, and when you walk out of the room your mind continues to mull feverishly over it.

Now I shall go over the end of the story and hopefully get it out of my system:
Can you believe the other girl... no wait, there are too many girls involved here, let me just clarify them for you from the beginning.
Okay, so the main dude, CLH, is like this perfect guy (as I mentioned in my previous entry - you should probably read that first because I'm writing now as if you've already read it) and he lives on a boat and seemingly just does nothing all day apart from occasional saving-the-day. On this boat also live three girls, who he picked up before the story opens because they had lost their family or something like that. (Of course, it would seem to me as though life on that boat would be orgy-tastic, but no, he just treats them as sisters and they're all one happy family).
Early on, it's sort of hinted at that one of the girls (she probably is the most prominent out of the three) is sort of in love with him, but she's sweet and keeps quiet and just sighs once in a while.

As I've already said in the last entry, CLH meets this other girl and gets close to her as they try to solve the mystery of who's killing heaps of people and framing him. And she gets herself killed in her final (successful) attempt to clear his name and find the real murderer. And that was sad and all, as I've definitely already ranted about.
I was thinking about her death, and the idea that entered my head that I felt really epitomised it was that after her death, the guy would never be completely happy again. Except once I touched on that, I couldn't shake off the feeling that I'd recently used that idea to describe another couple in a different story, so I kept scratching my head about which one. Then I remembered that that's what I'd said about Boy's death in Coco Avant Chanel, 'cause once he died poor Chanel lost her lover and it also seemed as though she was doomed to live the rest of her life with a hole in her heart (though I won't deny that one of the reasons I wrote it in my response was 'cause I had nothing else to say).
But seriously, they were so good together and it was almost as if him, the one who always left girls swooning after him, would settle down. They were joking about getting married and everything! If only she didn't have to die. Or if only there was an alternate ending.

Anyway, back when CLH and that girl were together, I preferred her to the other girl who was in love with him from the boat. Except then she died, and he had a hard time for a while before he got back to his boat and found a note saying that so-and-so had kidnapped two of the girls from his boat. So he and the third boat girl who is still in love with him (but respects that he's still mourning his dead girlfriend) run off to try and save them... and after staying a while in the king's palace, finds and kills the kidnapper (who is cruel and scheming etc.), but not before the king's daughter falls in love with him, which sort of speeds up his departure.

So then, as I said, the guy who killed his girlfriend is still alive and scheming how to get CLH killed, so he goes and tricks the dead girlfriend's sister and after they got over their misunderstandings they were getting close too... At this point I was on the side of the poor boat girl, as in love as ever but silently bearing watching them holding and hands and taking walks together. That sister is seriously useless at times and can't protect herself or anything, despite supposedly having practised martial arts for ten years in seclusion! And because of this seclusion, she has poor social skills and doesn't get along with anyone on the boat, just sticking to CLH at all hours.

Finally, there's another scheme to frame CLH and to cut a long story short, boat girl gets slashed by a sword saving CLH in a fight where he was obviously going to lose (it was just a matter of time), and I'm left feeling rather annoyed because every girl that I want CLH to be with dies, and now the only romantic option left is for him to go with the dead girlfriend's sister, who is the worst of the three. Perhaps it's a good thing that the story closes with him wanting a bit of solitude after defeating his final enemy so I won't have to see them two together. Then again, it could be a bad thing because then I'm left with the impression that them two will find each other whereas if the story continued he might find someone that I approved of. Oh well. I don't suppose the author actually intended for his saga to be a romance.
However, as a last thought, I'm disappointed that she never got to hear him talk about them together, not even jokingly. He never really acknowledged that they were, after all, anything more than brother and sister (by default of living on the same boat). He even sort of kissed both of the sisters - the first one properly and the second one sort of subconsciously, murmuring the name of her dead sister afterwards (something I rejoiced in; I don't want him to forget her).

So! I hope you followed all that, with the mutlitude of girls who fell in love with him who I didn't bother naming, instead referring to them as things like "boat girl", "girlfriend" and "girlfriend's sister". XD Or perhaps you just skipped that whole section. I wouldn't blame you if you did.

Um... what do I say now? Well, firstly, I've discovered that there is ultimately no way of fighting something that consumes your thoughts as this did. You just have to ride it through. Also, as much as it feels like it's "the real thing" and you're never going live after it... well, that's just nonsense. It's just infatuation. I've always had a thing for fictional characters. None of them is the real thing. I think that when I finally encounter it I'll know.

What-the-fuck that was the most vague thing I've ever said. I have no idea what I mean. At first I was sort of talking about being unable to get out of the well of thoughts, and then I sort of moved onto being in love... (which I am not so whatever).

Oh my God I can't believe there are only two more days of holidays. I want people to talk to, but I don't want to leave behind this glorious interlude of nothingness!

Ahhh, my beloved attic. So good to be up here again. So good to blog, after not having done so for a week and a half. So good to get away from my desk. So good to have someone to hypothetically vent to, if faceless and through the medium of computer monitor. Ahhhhhhhhhhh.

My vocal chords are probably being used about 80% less than during the school term. I have nothing much to talk about with my parents, and I'm as sick as hell of Briahna. I stopped talking to her on Monday. Ugh she is so infuriatingly stupid. Every time she talks to me my brain goes into overdrive yelling "fuck you, you stupid bitch/brat" etc. etc..
I'm not being melodramatic. My sanity may be disintegrating, but under no circumstances am I exaggerating or whatever. She... her voice, her presence, her existence just chafes me like sandpaper.

Well, as I've said I haven't been online and really talking to people since last Wednesday. I'm not really a phone person, either. Actually, I'm sort of a phone person provided I'm in an empty house because otherwise I feel like I can't talk freely, that if I talk to loud then my family (especially my sister, but also my parents) will hear me and no doubt judge what I say. Besides, the things that I like to talk about most are probably better off being talked about where my family can't hear me talking about them. Yes?
Another troublesome issue with phones is the suspense of having them picked up. I dislike it when a family member picks up on the other end. Why can't the person I'm calling just know when I'm calling and pick up the phone? 'Cause then I wouldn't have to go through an intermediary, a third party... in some cases, one who doesn't speak English...

Anyway. The reason I haven't been up in my attic for the past week is because my dad began downloading something. Don't get me wrong, it's not the downloading that's the problem. It's what he's been downloading - something that fits my taste so much that I enslave myself every evening after dinner to watch two episodes or three of it. Or four, even. As many as I can get away with before my parents insist that it's too late.

Okay, okay. If you think I had it bad with Merlin, this is the real thing. Lame as it sounds, I literally feel like I want to sob and beg on my knees for it to be real. For it to whisk me away so I can live in their world. Especially since I've been moping around at home like this. Oooh, it's so enchanting. Who needs drugs when you've got TV? Especially since I'm half in love with the main character and am on the brink of no return. (Hell, if I saw him on the streets dressed in that costume walking his civilised walk, I'd probably run up and kiss him.)

Pity that the actor is apparently about sixty now. I should probably mention that the series was made in 1979? If you haven't figured it out already, it is a wuxia series. Even so, I'd say that it was one of the earlier ones, seeing as TVB only really got into it in the 80s. Some of the backgrounds are clearly fake, the effects are well, relatively primitive and the picture quality is ghastly! So I guess it must be saying something that the show manages to capture my heart when I'm used to seeing people's faces more sharply.
Still, the actor was thirty-two at the time, which was surprising to me nonetheless because I really thought he must have only been in his twenties (probably mid-).

My mother says that the author of the novel (which the series was based on) must have been a fantasist and/or unrealistic because he made his central character unbelievably perfect. Good-looking, smart, resourceful, good at kung fu, a "good guy", never kills people, girls dropping like flies (that might not be a good expression to use) for him...
I tell you, there more of these "perfect", sensitive guys I watch in movies or on tv, the more I won't settle for anything less. I'm without hope.

Teehee you know what's going on now? Right, so the main guy was being framed by a mysterious person so that he would be killed, so this girl that he met and befriended and fell in love with had to go out and find the true murderer of all the, well, victims while the dude was held prisoner by the angry clans that had members killed. In the end the girl figured out that the only way the real killer would appear was if she came back to the angry clans and announce that she'd found out the real culprit. So that's what she does, and just before she is about to announce the name, a black, masked person jumps behind her, slashes her with a sword and kills her. That was because he thought that she had actually found out his identity and did it so that she wouldn't say. After she dies, the clans agree that the good guy was obviously not the murderer 'cause it was sort of common knowledge that he was with the girl, so they let him go (still, the girl dying was really sad 'cause now it's as if he'll never be happy again. After all these girls throwing themselves at him, he'd finally found someone who he loved back).

Anyway, the guy who wanted to kill him still wants to kill him, so he goes and finds the dead girl's younger sister, who lives in seclusion with her master and practises kung-fu and so doesn't know anything about the outside world. The evil guy goes and kills her master so that she'll come out into the world, pretends to befriend her and tells her that this "cold-blooded" person who murders people left, right and centre (in reality, the good guy) named so and so killed both her sister and her master. And he helps her make a plan to get revenge which involves finding the good guy. So she does that and after a few fights and getting trapped, she realises that he's actually the good guy and didn't kill her sister (on the contrary, he clearly had feelings for her) and at the moment they seem to be getting closer to each other.
This is where I have severe doubts. This is his dead girlfriend (who died for him, remember?)'s younger sister!!! Oh my God, that poor girl must be turning in her grave. I sort of liked that girl - she was witty like another of my favourite wuxia characters, Wong Yung. Never mind that the younger sister has the same name as me (well, sort of like the same first name), which it may seem would justify me wanting to put myself in her shoes and revel in the main dude's affection. But no, I object. Look here again, is this not the younger sister ruining the older sister's chance at love, interefering for the worst? Like in Atonement? Over my freaking dead body!!

So yes, that's what's going on. As you can probably tell even without me having to tell you, I'm in this pretty deep. I can't lie in bed and go to sleep without my mind playing it over an over again in my head. It's pure anguish. I can't sit at my desk and make Maths notes without having my mind wander off and then swearing emphatically in an attempt to get myself back on track. Muse comes to mind: You... will suck the life out of me.

Also, on Friday I went to see Harry Potter. Pretty good movie, visually very good although it must be said that Daniel Radcliffe is not at all a looker (if he ever was). Tom Felton (Draco Malfoy) rather is, though. He spent much of his time dressed in a silky, completely black suit and cuts a striking, upright, haughty man-on-a-mission figure (unlike Harry, who tends to go for baggy jeans and old tracksuit jacket). I'm disappointed, however, that they did cut out so many scenes, such as the end one where there was supposed to be a huge fight. I mean, Death Eaters broke into the Hogwarts castle, yet in the next scene all's calm again! What, did they show themselves out, then?

Well, that was a good rant. I feel better now.

My flats are comfortable. I swear they are. The strange (not altogether pleasant) feeling that I am getting in my toe probably has more to do with walking for about four hours than the shoes themselves.

Basically, on this first day of the holidays, I was woken up by my mother at about 11:30 to go to yum cha. We went to my grandparents' apartment in Redfern, where we dropped off the car and walked for about forty minutes to Chinatown. I haven't actually had yum cha for a while, so even though apparently since we arrived at the restaurant so late there was less variety, I still stuffed myself full of har gow and nor mai gai and fu pei guen...
After lunch/brunch my mother, my sister and I went walkabout in the city, seeing some pretty things (but, disappointingly, not as much as I'd hoped) but buying nothing of note (fine, a headband for my sister but it was just plain black plastic).

Perhaps I wasn't in much of a buying mood today, but even though I went to a fair few sections of the city, there was nothing I was really willing to spend money on. Not even at David Jones or Myer. No shoes that were awesome and some of the bags there were frankly awful. In fact, perhaps the shops in market city are more my thing - a bit more wearable, less expensive and more my age. Time to redefine my perspective.

Anyway, we walked around for until it got dark, then hurried back to my grandparents' apartment to get the car. Unfortunately, this was about the time of the infamous "rush hour" and the footpaths were crazy, with people shoving and some people walking infuriatingly slowly. God I hate people who walk slowly, It's so annoying. Is it a Sydney thing? Surely if I went to New York or something the pace of the pedestrians would be faster?

Somewhere in the midst of this wide range of walking speeds, the satin rose that was on my right shoe came off and since I was crossing a road in the middle of a human mass at night I could hardly go back and find it. Damn, those shoes cost fifty bucks and I only wore them like five times. They were a good five times - party, camp, Chinese test, yum cha - but who doesn't regret it when they lose something they'll never regain? Would I have preferred it if the flower from my left shoe came off too? Then I wouldn't have to take it off to make both shoes identical again. Yet, if I lost the other one, then I'd have no sign that I had ever had flowers on my shoes...
Ah the philosophy associated with shoes.

One thing I forgot to include in my last blog entry was going to see Coco Avant Chanel for French. It was a really pretty movie, with that melancholy feel that is so characteristic of French cinema (have you noticed?). Once again there was Audrey Tautou in this one, not that I'm sick of her yet. However, the main thing that stuck with me from the film was the large number of sex scenes. I think I counted five or six. The disturbing thing is that the movie was only rated PG. God, I swear MA is only slightly worse than that movie.