happy chinese nooo yarrhh!

hey!!
sorry i haven't been updating much. i've been rather busy rushing a deadline for my thesis, and i had one of the awesomest and fun-filled weekends in a very, very long time.

it all started with a birthday dinner at home for my dad, followed by a pre-chinese new year party at butter on friday night. then i headed over to awesome, sun-soaked, beach- beckoning, bintan with my entire chinese family, packed into 4 villas altogether, to celebrate chinese new year! it was a fantastic getaway!

i guess the tough week i had made it so much more worth it! i finished a full-day assessment centre at mfa for my job selection process, round 2...hopefully they call me up for round 3..pleeeaaase! hopefully. fingers crossed. sitting tight.

i also had a crazy time trying to get my thesis in order, at least i now know what i really want to focus on and i've finally managed to get something going. i just have to put it down on paper!

at the beach!

in butter factory!

now it's back to the grinder and back to my thesis. i will embrace it. i will love it and i will make it happen. that's what i will do.
i realised i only have around 7 weeks of school left, so it's time to cherish it all and make it worth the while. knowing me, i may never, never, never go back to studying again...well, not anytime in the near future, so i'm going to make sure my final weeks of formal education are the best i've had so far!

looking back on things today, i realised why, despite having the best of weekends this chinese new year (and i really mean this), why i feel somewhat down and a little melancholy...maybe even nostalgic.

one year ago, you told me you wanted us to 'take a break'. you didn't say for how long, you didn't want to tell me if it was a permanent or a temporary one, or if we'd get back together again. you told me you loved me less than before, and you told me that things weren't the same.
and i remember how it made me felt.
when you told me this, i felt like it was surreal, like i was in a dream (or a nightmare) and that all of it couldn't have been happening. i felt like i had lost you and that you had become someone else.
if only i had known then, what i knew now. if only you were completely honest with me, and if you had told me you had cheated, fallen for someone else, and that you were intending to leave me for her.
if you had told me that, much much much earlier, instead of letting me find out only later, i could've found the means to get angry at you, and the courage to walk away with my head held up, without turning around.

if i had known right at the beginning, i wouldn't have begged you to stay. and i would've washed it all off at that very point in time.

sometimes i look at it, and i realise we both could've handled it in ways that were much better. and i realise, looking back, that i completely and utterly disrespected myself with you. or for you. for that matter. you know what i'm talking about.
and if there was one thing i'd change, if i could go back in time to those 3 months, it'd be the way i treated myself when you treated me that way.

i'd make sure i never fault myself, i'd make sure i never disrespect myself, my body, my mind and my feelings.

and then if i think about it some more (yes, i know i think too much), i realise that i couldn't have seen all of this happening at that point in time, and that i'm speaking from a position of retrospect. i tend to do this alot these days. i should stop. bringing the past up brings only pain, and i know it.
it doesn't hurt anymore, it's just a fragment of my past, of a life i lived when i wasn't really me, when i wasn't really who i am.

and the life i live now, i love.
because it's me, and i realise i could never have this life if i were with you. and i guess, it has taken me long, but it's true then, that we're not compatible in this respect. like you said, i'm meant for better things, bigger things. things above and beyond you.

watch me go, guys, watch me go.