The red light district.

Laptop is at Toshiba service center. Hard disk error of some sort. I brought it to the center atop the highest floor of Plaza Low Yat. I was cradling the metal child in my arms, its limp cords swinging back and forth as I ascend escalator after escalator. The multitude of vendors along the way that call out to me, whoring their services to me, offering to repair my baby for a small fee. I hated that it was so obvious. I ignored them, and pushed my way forward. What the hell does UG stand for? I ascend.

I got to the fourth floor, and on to the Toshiba service center. It was like an oasis of quieted whiteness amidst the hustle-bustle downstairs. The walls and floor were immaculately shiny. No gaudy, flourescent signs that said "UNLOCKING/JAILBREAK". Just serenity. I was in heaven. I was told to take a number. I sat and waited, as the person in front of me fills up some paperwork. I knew I was next. I knew what had to happen. I handed her over. Was made to put my signature on paper. It wasn't even to fix her. Just a diagnosis. A fucking diagnosis. I signed.

Yeah so basically I have no laptop. Until some unspecificied time next week. They got back to me pretty fast on the diagnosis, so I have hope in the time it'll take them to fix my hard disk. Or was it my hard drive. What's the difference. I don't care.

The unwinnable battle.

For the past few days I have been in turmoil. It was over a decision that would change my life, the things I believed in and the way people would view me. Yes, it was regarding my religion. Literature.

More precisely, the topic of reading and books, and my love for one versus my love for the other. You didn't know there existed a difference between the two loves? Me neither, until the creation of ebooks.

To be more comprehensive, it also includes switching over from paper to electronic, because I was thinking of ditching my big and bulky organizer for the Calendar app in iPad, which I can also utilize to download books and read. God, just saying the words "download books" makes me cringe in old-fashioned disgust.

Also might I remind you I am a big, big Apple HATER and to make this purchase would be selling out.

But on to matters of the heart. Books. Paperbacks are my favorite kind. I've always hated hardcovers - I never got the point. I always thought it was purely pretentious, with no economical or convenience sense whatsoever for the avid reader. And those hardcover books with some sort of detachable paper sheath over it? Da fuck? Those were the most annoying, pain-in-the-ass things I've ever had to deal with. Read Nabokov's memoir in a book like that, had to transport it trans-atlantic, and then trans-pacific, cover edges were properly damaged by the time I had the sense to remove them.

So I am anal about my books, yes. I like them the way I like them, and anything more (like large-sized paperbacks won't do too. They can't fit in my purse, or even if they do, I would rather them not) is a sin. So imagine my horror when I found out ebooks were gaining popularity, and Borders was closing down. Does this portend the death of paperback goodness? And more importantly, where was I going to stand on this?

You say, you can easily do both.

No, I say back. You can't. Do you think the Darth Vader calls you over to the dark side, and then say oh maybe you can dabble a little in the Jedi Council, and then come back to the dark side? Oh maybe you can be both?

No. No you can't be. Once you cross over, that's it. You've contributed to the loss of a culture, a way of life, a period of time.

I'm being dramatic, but whatever.

My love for books is real. The way they fit in your hand, so lovingly, waiting to be read; the recycled paper that makes up the pages, the grainy, pulpy feel, so coarse, yellow and imperfect; the matte finish of the cover, feeling the ridges of the book title, running your fingers along it; the spine of the book, so steady and reliable, the thickness of it both a challenge and a delight; how you fall asleep with it splayed open on your chest, or resting on your lap as you check your text messages on a phone, which should remain a phone, and only a phone, and not a device for reading; how sometimes you make a grab for any random object to serve as a bookmark (I am using a bus ticket from my Moscow trip for Miguel Syjuco's Ilustrado); and of course, turning the pages of a real-life book, the sounds of the novel's plot flipping ahead, the smell of a thrill you will soon absorb, the font text so tangible.

All of that replaced by a machine that programs the sounds and actions of pages flipping  to make it seem like you're not living a total lie.

I'm afraid I might be writing an obituary more than anything though, because they have gotten me. These soul-sucking corporate giants have struck right at the heart of book-lovers, at the only thing they could possibly cherish more than books: reading.

The promise of convenience, of having 3,500 books at your fingertips, of having it delivered to you wherever and whenever you want, as opposed to going out to a bookstore or waiting for your Amazon package in the mail, the promise of a much easier device to carry around in our little girl purses, as opposed to War and Peace, the promise of cheaper books, the promise of increased reading due to the convenience of it ... all of this tempts us.

Especially when my body is not exactly built for carrying War and Peace, or any other epic novels, for a long period of time. Or for the transferring of any heavy objects, such as the many, many books that would have piled up by the end of my college years in America. It's a pain in the ass already having so many things to store during the summer, and books are just stacking up by the year. My Dad suggests bringing some books home everytime I made the trans-Pacific journey home, but Daddy! Overweight luggage!

As an English slash Russian Studies slash History student, I have a heavy reading list for each class. I can easily get 5 to 8 books ... per class. I have four, five classes a semester. That makes for 40 books per year, the very minimum, and a whopping 160 in four years. Holy hell.

I am also a sucker for convenience, and if the iPad proves to be a one-stop center for my organizing, reading and Facetime (I am so mad that I'm getting this whole Apple jargon) needs, I might very well get it. It'd be nice to only have to carry one thing, instead of five.

What's annoying is that I didn't think I'd need an iPad until I started creating all these problems for myself. I like my organizer, I like books (as you can see). But now that I know I have the option to not have to carry as many things, I start to want them, and for a brief moment, my life becomes hell as I think about how I don't have them, and how I could have them. Consumerism sucks.

But I don't know. I don't know if I wanna give in to this sick need for convenience and portability. Maybe humans are meant to not have everything in one place, and to think for ourselves what we need, and how we wanna carry our things around. And the more I think about it, the more I can't live with ebooks. The idea of not being able to flip physical pages to get to what I want is a horror ... maybe I will have to ship home my someday, or carry less things in my luggage to make way for these books, to bring them back to my real home. After all, if they're real to me, I can do that for them.

Or I could use ebooks for these years of my life, and switch back once I finally settle down somewhere? But what do I do with all the books that are in my iPad then? Good God, what if my iPad breaks and all my books just disappear forever? But no, God, no! I can't! eBooks are disgusting!

I need to stop.

People and their bullshit nowadays.

There was a time when criticisms and insults bothered me. This blog might even have witnessed this, way back then. And then I stepped over that bump. Major. I remember clearly when I was no longer bothered by what people said about me, when I could face the worst criticisms, laugh and move on - sometimes even taking a sick pleasure in it. I told myself I will never again be unnecessarily judged and derogated, even if it means secluding myself from a sizable section of society. I just didn't care anymore. I was way too comfortable with myself for that shit.

And I cannot believe this is happening again. All this belittling, telling me how to lead my life, pre-empting problems for me that I cannot even begin to see (yes because I'm going to spend all this time I have trying to solve problems that I don't even know are going to happen, instead of focusing on what is good for me now. Yes), telling me I'm despicable, a hypocrite, a disgrace to all things wonderful (this one's true), that I'm a fucking cunt.

And I have no real response to all that. The situation is just too implicated by emotions. Mine, and his. Minds have been made up. It was tragic.

In other news, I've also been called a "semi-functional autistic immigrant who will be lucky to touch shit with my hands" by an American. But I laughed off that one, and called the guy "cute". Stupid kids trying to fuck with me.

"What is the necessity for this show of might against right? No matter what, right will always prevail," - Ambiga Sreenevasan

IGP: Police provoked, Anwar injured

Inspector-general of police Ismail Omar today defended the police's use of tear gas and water cannons against Bersih 2.0 protesters, claiming that they were provoked into action and used only “minimal” force to disperse them.




0:12 doesn't look very provoked to me...

On claims that riot police fired tear gas into the premises of the Tung Sin Hospital along Jalan Pudu – where protesters had sought refuge – he dismissed them as mere “berita angin” (rumours).









Ismail also downplayed the turnout of the protesters in support of Bersih 2.0, saying that the crowd only assembled at no more than two locations. He insisted that the crowd had only assembled at Jalan Pudu and outside Stadium Merdeka along Jalan Loke Yew.




Chinatown.


From Jalan Sultan to Jalan Hebat.


From KTM to Pasar Seni.

And of course, let's not forget Ottawa, Hong Kong, Australia (Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Perth, Canberra), Taipei, Osaka, Geneva, Paris, London and various places in America - New York, San Francisco, Portland, Washington DC, LA. I've also seen pictures of people congregating in Nepal and Egypt. On any other day these people probably won't even admit they are Malaysian.

Can everything that comes out of the police force's mouth not just be PLAIN LIES? Who the fuck are you defending anyway? A government that severely underpays you that you have to resort to the lowest order of corruption practices? Who can we trust, if not our police?

Another question: Where the fuck is our journalistic integrity? Are we really no worse than the slimy, underhanded dumbfucks behind Fox News? I am ashamed by how our mainstream media has reacted against the Bersih rally. If there's one thing this rally has shown me, it's the disparity between what I am reading and what is actually happening. I knew of this before, but I now know the appalling severity of how much the Malaysian people are being lied to. I literally could not sit still in my living-room as I watch the newscasters on TV3 speak about the rally like they haven't got their brains screwed in for them that night. Followed by of course dumb and less-than-mediocre reports about how the rally is affecting the businesses of the people, shots of empty stores and bus stations, interviews with people who all surprisingly oppose the rally because it is an "inconvenience" ... and nothing for the voices of people who support the rally.

In what universe is this objective news? And in what universe is this okay? Wake up, Malaysian people. News with purely propaganda purposes should be viewed with suspicion, not blindly accepted. When the TV3 newscasters had their "professional" faces on and proceeded to shat on the rally like their life depended on it, I think I puked a little in my mouth.

It is disgusting. And I can't say I've been proud of the angles that The Star has been taking on the rally, which is so obviously government-bias. Not only have we lost in every other respect to the other countries, we have also lost in our integrity. Safe to say I will not be applying for jobs at any of these news publications in the near future. I rather work for a small, unknown publication and keep my integrity, rather than bullshit my way to the top at the expense of the Malaysian people.

Someone should also really fucking teach our pea-brained Prime Minister the meaning of pro-reform. Has he had not has his history lessons? If he has, then he should know what happens when the government ignores moderate calls for reform.

I still don't know who I should be voting for in my next - and first ever - election. But I know who I am not going to vote for.

PS - I hope people everywhere - journalists, newscasters, politicians, police force - see what is obviously going on. Compare raw facts (photos, videos, testimony from people) with show of raw power by the government. If we, the common people, refuse to lie for the ruling elites, and refuse to accept their lies, that's when change happens.

I love this space.

More than my Facebook, Twitter and Google. I blog so far and few nowadays, the point isn't pictures anymore, this is not a social networking site, so anyone who's still here must be here for a reason.

I guess I kinda like where I am in life right now. The impossible has been done, the bad kind of crazy has been minimized. I like him a lot, but sometimes I wonder just how much of me he can take. I'm impulsive, capricious, bipolar, messy, indignant ... and he is not the most tolerant of people. If opposites attract, I'm interested to see how this is going to work. The sex is great though.

Location-wise, it's just been really strange. This is my first real "summer", and it sucks ass. I'm more bored than I usually would be if this was not a "summer". I did my share of traveling already, and now I'm just bored. It's all too weird for me because summer to me doesn't mean what summer has meant to the other people all this while. I lived in summer for 20 years. My school year started in January. The sun sets at 7pm everyday.

I should go out and work, but I'm afraid if I do then I'm gonna miss sitting around on my ass, doing nothing. Maybe that's what I need. Lose it to miss it. Really wish life didn't work that way.