"When are you getting married ah?"

Top Ten answers to that annoying relative's interrogation efforts during Chinese New Year gathering.

Drumroll please......

10. "I did. And you didn't even have the courtesy to show up at my wedding! Hummph!" and then walk away.

9. "I cannot, aunty, I just joined Opus Dei and if I get married, I will have to flog myself everyday to rid myself of the lust I have for my wife."

8. "I am saving myself for your daughter in six years time...." and pointing to her twelve year old princess.

7. "I'm saving myself for you.... I have been secretly in love with you since I first saw you at cousin Jen's full moon ceremony.... I heard uncle is dying of cancer right?"

6."You talking to me?...... Are you talking to me?......"

5."Aiyoh aunty, I am only eighteen years old* leh.... not yet legally an adult how to get married?"

4. Three words:"I AM GAY".**

3. "But, I am married.... And this is my wife, SO-and-so...." and points to a non-existant person beside you, smiling proudly.

2. "Sob... Sob..... We recently broke up..... The love of my life left me for another man/woman!" and then cry inconsolably.

And the #1 answer to the question: "When are you getting married ah?" is....

"When are you going to die ah?"***


*regardless of your actual age. And must only be said when one's Botox treatment is still in effect.

**whether it's true or not, this always shuts them up. For good.

*** Oh come on! This thought has come across your mind too. Admit it!

Morning Drive

"You drive an hour to work?" went my friend when I told him of my daily commute. "Everyday?" he went on, apparently in disbelief. Sometimes I find it rather ludicrous too, that I would choose to live in one city and work in another, forty-five minutes away.

But you know what, I find that I kinda like the early morning drive, with the sun just waking up from its slumber, peaking through the coconut fronds, while children in their blue and white uniforms gleefully cycle their way to school and the housewives greet each other on their way to the wet market to buy the day's groceries.

And in that hour of solitude, as I sit in my car, slowly snaking my way down the country roads, I often find myself in a very serene environment, regardless of the traffic conditions outside. This is my time. Away from all the cares and troubles of yesterday, protected from the anxieties of tomorrow. Just basking in the glory of Now.

This is the time when I would often have my mini epiphanies. When all that has happened converge to fit into the Big Picture, and it would all make sense. When all the troubling emotions that has bothered me previously, I can now step outside of, and view it for what they were. And to really appreciate that Life is truly where I am, what I am and how I will be.

Sometimes, I think I almost get it.

You are what you eat....???

This flyer comes courtesy of my good friend TK. Item no. 6 sounds intriguing........

Hmmmm.......

Speechless

Locked up tight but holding the key
Clock keeps ticking like it's laughing at me
I wonder
What spell I'm under.

Days go by in a pulseless haze
Who's that person that's wearing my face
Denying
What he's hiding?

I can't go on like this
I won't let myself miss the rest of my life

When something's come and gone
What good is holding on?
Why waste tomorrow chasing yesterday?
I part my lips to speak
But the words are out of reach
I guess that really means
There's nothing left to say

I guess we could carry on living asleep
Who is the fool who could choose to just keep pretending
That this ain't ending?
I wish you all that I wish for myself
To have that ache of emptiness behind us
And not still inside us

We did the best we could
Just like we thought we should
But sometimes you've got to just let go

When something's come and gone
What good is holding on?
Why waste tomorrow chasing yesterday?
I part my lips to speak
But the words are out of reach
I guess that really means
There's nothing left to say

It's time to take that dare
There's still a world out there
Waiting for me

Adapted from "Nothing Left To Say" by Richard Marx