Illusion of Words

A Strange Thing Or Two

Spring is here, definitely. The trees are budding. The grass is greener. And of course, the temperature is much higher, although a far cry from the heat of the tropics. This tree, with white flowers, smells very like fried or baked crabs.

The first time I stood near those trees, I wondered who on earth would cook such deliciously smelling food. It was kind of disappointing when it turned out that it was the flowers that emitted the smell, but it was all pretty cool anyway.

On a routine trip to Walmart, I saw this at the vegetables section. Starfruit, proudly named as “Unique Fruit.” It is terribly uncreative and funny. The instructions to select it: Choose firm and plump unique fruit. Oh please. Unique fruit?? The starfruit did look unappetizing, being all somewhat shrunken and battered, and of course, expensive, so no, I was not willing to try this unique fruit. I doubt anyone would, given the name. It just has a sinister ring to it.

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Snow Again

This time, in a different place, with much more snow. Perhaps 8 inches of it or so. It snowed all the evening, pretty heavily. I watched as the afternoon rain turned into mush, then into snow. Within a few hours, everything was blanketed in snow. It was beautiful - I only wished it wasn’t night, because then it was hard to see.

Still, night doesn’t mean you can’t go out to have fun in the snow, so that was what I did. I crunched through the snow - an awesome feeling. Made a huge snowman. Of course, I nearly froze my fingers off in the process. Fumbling for keys with numbed fingers is definitely not fun - made me think about how people die in cold places (after falling in water or the like) not because they don’t have the necessary fire-making stuff, but because their fingers were too numbed to strike a match/flint/whatever. And how do I know that? Watching too much “Man vs Wild” and “Survivorman”, that’s why.

The snow all over the land. Wait. Who is that talking to some ghostly snowman-ish apparition?

It was snowing hard. Proof? This picture.

Me and Mr Snowman. He’s a nice guy, although too fat and heavy.

Snow is just so pretty. But ice is treacherous. On a sunny day after a snowy day, the snow begins to melt. But the water doesn’t melt fast enough for the night to come. At which point, they all freeze up on the ground due to the low temperatures. And school is delayed an hour, and every class is cut back 10 minutes - the best part of it all. But it’s not exactly easy maneuvering my way through the ice and snow - the trick is to either pick the clear, obviously non-iced/snowed parts to walk, or to pick the pure white snow place to walk. Walking on ice? Not a good idea - unless you have spiked boots or the like.

The snow was thick, as you can see in comparison to the thin brown needle under all the white stuff.

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More on the Weather

So today was the wind-blowing day. And boy, does the wind blow! Occasional bursts of strong wind made it somewhat difficult to walk in a straight line. The weather forecast said thunderstorms in the morning, but there weren’t actually any, just relatively heavy rain. Thank God my 9 o’clock class had been canceled due to other reasons beforehand, or else I would have probably been caught in the rain halfway there. And of course, because of the wind you couldn’t quite use an umbrella, because 1. either the umbrella will be flipped inside out, or 2. the wind will blow the rain right into you anyway. By the time I was going to class, the rains had stopped and the sun had come out, but still as windy as ever.

They say tornado season is here. And this place - yet another gripe about - it’s right in the infamous tornado alley. A little apprehension when people talk about it. It would probably occur, at least a tornado warning or two. And many hours spent in the bathroom waiting for 1. the all-clear signal, or 2. in worst-case scenario, the building collapsing on top of you.

Malaysia is blessed, in some ways. The worst ‘natural disaster’ (if it could be called that) is probably floods, which are usually mostly caused by human beings, e.g. bad drainage system, who-asked-them-to-build-right-next-to-river.

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The Weather

I never quite understood the obsession with weather forecasts and reports until I came here. Back home, you didn’t need to look at the weather forecasts. It was either sunny, cloudy, or rainy. And the temperature never changed all year long. But here it’s a different story. I find myself somewhat ‘obsessed’ with checking the weather forecast especially before leaving the house. It’s very vital to know how much to put on - something that you never thought of in the tropics, where jackets and anything remotely warmer was hardly needed except in air-con rooms.

Also, it seems that there are quite a bit of ‘weather advisories’ all the time. Ice storm/ winter storms are the common ones in winter. Schools close then, which is the good part. Tornado warnings are supposed to occur sometime too, although I have not seen one, and hope not to, because they are far more deadly than the other storms. Today, there was a windy weather advisory, which I found kind of weird. Although truth be told, it was very windy and occasional gusts made you feel like you were going to get blown away. Of course, in this flat, barren land, the winds wouldn’t have anything to stop them. Have I mentioned the ugliness of this place? No hills or mountains as far as the eye can see, just a flat piece of land and trees. So I suppose the wind could literally blow its way through without any problems.

Just something which has nothing to do with the weather: it is obvious that Americans like to use pencils in school. I remember in primary 6, teachers were gradually weaning us out of using pencils - which was a tool for little kids. We were growing up, going into secondary school; therefore we needed to learn to use pens - the grown-up writing tool. I think there was a certain sense of pride back then: I could use pens and feel more adult-ish. Now, I feel cheated. Almost everyone uses pencils, as can be seen on the roll that is passed around. Me? I still use pens, a habit formed out of a different culture. And never using any correction liquid when mistakes are made, opting instead to strike out the mistake messily - another habit formed out of a school that forbade the use of correction liquid (in anticipation of the vandalism that would have otherwise occured).

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SNOW

Yes, this great topic deserves all caps. I was not expecting any snow during my stay here, but God brought along a pleasant surprise in the form of a winter storm. It wasn’t a big storm, but we had at least a good 4 inches of snow accumulated on the ground. Which was quite a lot for the southern areas.

And of course the thing is it’s the first time experiencing real snow. The first impression was the dazzling whiteness of the scenery. Cars, houses with a layer of snow on the roof. It was just beautiful. And because words, at this point, is quite useless without pictures, I give you: pictures.

1. Make an obese, ugly mini snowman.

2. Snowball fight. This picture was posed, actually, but yeah, a real, albeit lame fight did occur.

3. Make a snow angel. Not very clear, but you get the idea.

Tree covered with snow. Beautiful sight.

That’s me. And I’m not even in long pants. Really. Because my uncle was like “just take a picture”. Weird. And I look kinda weird.

Me and the Obese Snowman.

Oh. and the pictures with me are significantly smaller just because.

Today, besides snow, was also Obama’s inauguration, obviously. I watched this historic moment along with the rest of the world. But I can’t fathom the obsession with the new president.

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The Cold Weather and More Movies

The temperature plummeted over the last few days - well, actually just yesterday and today. Today, the temperatures pretty much remained sub-zero, which is quite abnormally cold. However, real snow continues to elude me (I don’t want no “flurries”).

I used to wonder why weather channels and widgets and applications were important. But ever since fall came about and then winter, I understood. The temperatures were vital to knowing what sort of clothes to wear when going out. They could vary, no matter the season. Back home, you only checked the weather for rain or sun. The temperature was always 33 high, 26 low, give or take 1 or 2 degrees Celsius.

More Movies. Yes.
Cinema Paradiso (no picture, sadly. I’m lazy)
Italian movie. Josh Groban sang the theme song in his first cd. Today I got around to watching it. It was a little different from my expectations. I thought it would be another full-blown love story which will have me switching it off halfway through. But no. It follows the life of Toto, or Salvatore, and his friendship with Alfredo, who works with the projector in the cinema. And of course, there is a love story between Toto and a girl.

All in all, kind of charming, as we watch how the movies influenced the rural Italian society and bring together a little boy and old man. The way the people cry and laugh watching the black-and-whites is quite amazing. As a rule, I usually dislike little kids in movies who enjoy torturing adults, but thankfully the cute little Toto did not turn out to be that way, which made the movie much more bearable. Be cautioned, though, the movie contains perhaps a scene or two which are not family-appropriate. Other than that, great movie to laugh and cry with. And for the older folks, perhaps a time to reminisce about the first black-and-white movies in cinemas that changed the world (in a way).

Oh, and the soundtrack features the same theme over and over again, and after listening to it all throughout the movie, and then Josh Groban’s version, it’s stuck in my head. Melancholy tune, definitely.

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