melman

:) there is a pleasure in forgetting the crowd around you and staying put in your own little world.

meeting the rascals in november

double chocolate chip

chocolate chip

choco nut

date and nut

Out of this world cookies!! A true treat on my birthday. :D

cookie monster love.

Walking out of Quintessence of Spun Sugar always makes me realize that whatever I ate was different to any other dessert/baked product I've ever indulged in. Be it a mint cookies and cream cupcake or double coloured chocolate brownie, I find the place terribly unique and a lot of passion put into their food. We walked in the other day for cookies for the cookie review we were doing for the column and found ourselves bowled over! In between munches of this cookie and the other handed over to me either by Shabnam or Nisal, I decided to whip out my trusty camera and photograph a few of them cookies.

Jam Window

Biscotti

Chocolate Heart

Rainbows

discovering solace

• Eating rice and curry on a rainy Sunday afternoon. There's nothing that warm basmati rice, dhal, pol sambol and chicken curry can't cure. Besides, nothing and I mean nothing tastes as great and fulfilling as rice and curry.

• Sitting on the beach at Buba on a Sunday evening. Breathing in the salty air and the soft breeze rippling through your hair whilst watching the sea is quite relaxing.

• Curled up on a chair in boxers and a huge tshirt and watching Nigella Express.

• Ditto for Gossip Girl, Bones and Glee. Friends too.

• Walking by myself on the road while on my way to work in the morning. Allows me plenty of time to just think about anything. I love how the voice inside my head sounds at that time of day.

• Catching a whiff of really great perfume. Something that makes you stop in your tracks and look wildly around for the person wearing it.

• Hugs. Warm. Safe. Breathing in the person's perfume and letting it linger in your memories.

• Sitting on the wall at Galleface Green and watching the sunset with your friends' laughter in the background. Always makes me feel happy.

• Curling up on bed with soft pillows at Nanna's place during cousin sleepovers.

• Plus playing childish games with them cousins like Robin Hood, Boys and Girls and Hora Police.

• The warmth and aroma of Mama's brownies baking in the oven.

• Looking out the window during long car rides to Seenigama and listening to the Beatles.

• The first few days of a developing crush. When text messages make you smile unknowingly. When smiles from the 'other' make the butterflies in your tummy seem as though they're on a Red Bull high. When the very innocent flirting takes centre stage in your life. When, all of a sudden, you love how your name sounds when he talks to you or calls you. When eye contact with him keeps you wide awake at night, still thinking about it. When you are aware that the attraction is mutual but silence and exchange of shy smiles is all you need.

• Paying extra close attention to the tortoises and their antics.

• Cream crackers with ice cold strawberry jam. Fresh out of Nanna's fridge.

• Those occasional moments when inspiration hits you hard and you're frantically typing down thoughts into your phone. Almost giddy with excitement and scared that the inspiration will perhaps fade away.

• Suddenly waking up in the middle of the night, hungry and in desperate need of comfort food. Usually taken care of by shifting feet downstairs temporarily for warm soupy noodles or a mug of chocolate icecream sprinkled with Milo powder. Mama always finds this activity of mine rather strange.

• That awesome time of year when your school besties come down for vacation and you can spend hours catching up on school gossip, boys, life and that irresistible piece of chocolate fudge cake you had the last time vacation rolled around.

• Whipping out my camera and getting close-to-perfect shots of food.

just so you know

picture courtesy of Flickr

I hadn't remembered that I don't feel giddy or lightheaded any longer at the sight of you. Or that the word euphoria didn't make itself a constant presence in my mind's vocabulary. I will go through the tagged pictures without any feeling inside me. Cos yeah, that's how I feel about you. I'm guessing you wouldn't even stop to think how much you made me happy but I guess the 'happiness' wasn't really worth it.

The incessant text conversations make me go a little nostalgic and the important dates saved in my phone calendar do make me go a bit more nostalgic but that's it. Constant whiffs of the fragrance you so famously wore makes itself a regular presence in my life. Remember the day we went to the beach with our friends one Sunday evening? How we carelessly kicked back sand and held hands amidst the emotional waves and bright blue sky is still imprinted on my mind.

Just like those picture perfect postcards I used to collect back when I was younger. I'll miss your hugs and that flashing smile. And once how you quickly changed a song on the stereo system in your car just cos I casually mentioned that the song was my current favourite and also my ringtone.

But that's it. I hope you know now that you cease to exist in my not-so-perfect life.

Ward 47

Yesterday we visited Mama's uncle Penny Muda at the General Hospital. As we walked past the various male wards, we finally spotted his family and came to the bed where he sat. He was at the top right bed in Ward 47. Most of his family members had come to visit him during the regulated visiting hours and he appeared to be in high spirits. It was fun for him. Mama's other aunt and uncle came too and everyone joked and spoke to him. I chose to watch the other patients around me and I sort of regretted it almost immediately.

Several patients around us stared at our company and it was then that I realized that some of them were alone during visiting hours. No one had come to visit them. I caught them looking wistfully at where we stood.

There was the lonely man opposite from Penny Muda's bed. He was sitting right up in his bed and was observing everyone and everything around him. Another man languished on bed next to where we were standing. The entire right side of his face was swollen. He stared at the ceiling listlessly and shifted from side to side on bed. I saw the young man on the bed situated in the far bottom left of the room. Earlier, I saw him limping from the washroom and was assisted onto bed by his wife or girlfriend, I couldn't exactly tell. He seemed happy. He was young, sorta attractive and he probably had the best visitor see him. Smiling and holding hands with the girl next to him, he too lay on bed and didn't allow anything to distract him.

It was sweet watching that couple. The girl stroked his face and he truly appreciated her company. It's like they failed to let anyone else into their comfortable world. After watching them, I saw the other elderly man on a bed who had appeared to befriend another patient, most probably his own age. Again, I felt sorry for them because they had no one. No relative or friend to visit them during visiting hours. No one to come and provide them with a meal packed from home. Or help them put on their shirt buttons. Whilst walking away from the ward when visiting hours were over, I saw another elderly person who was talking to himself.

I left the hospital feeling dejected. What happened to those people? Who admitted them to the hospital in the first place? Did they get themselves admitted alone? Didn't a relative or a friend understand that the hospital can get pretty morbid and depressing most of the time? Didn't anyone care about their situation?

Why can't people be a bit more caring? I know this sounds super cliche but certain things do make an impact in this world and in peoples' lives. We may not think it does but it truly does make a huge difference.

Dedicated to all the people who haven't had a visitor at their hospital beds today.

Prams and yellow headbands.

This blog post is a little weird but I can't help it. I've always been recognized as the one person amongst my friends who hated (or disliked) kids of all sorts and sizes. I could never get along with any of them who came strolling my way.

Example #1 They'd always want my food which is something I just can't stand. But since I can't refuse the ogling eyes of the fifteen month old nephew in my cousin's arms, I think again.

Will my doughnut go to waste? Will the little monster actually finish the whole thing or just slather it with saliva?

Anyway, I reluctantly hand over the doughnut to my nephew with my mother sitting behind me, assuring that she'll buy me another chocolate filled one on our way home. And just like that, my fears come alive. The nephew just drools all over my doughnut. Full stop.

Example #2 They always want my phone. Or pull the headphones away from me when I'm busy listening to Queen on Nanna's couch. And when I try to pull it away from her pudgy little fist, the monster screams out so loud, it's as though I stripped her of her 'baby' title.

Example #3 The camera distracts them. Way too much. I can't STAND fingerprints on my beloved camera. So I am forced to show them the picture I just captured. And then roll my eyes when the adults around me go "So darling, who's the baby on the screen? Looks like some child I know but aney I don't know where he went."

GAG MOI. Seriously.

Those are my top three reasons for disliking kids around me. The list could go on. Digging through my handbag when I get up to go to the kitchen. Screwing up my eyeliner wand when I leave it unattended to answer the phone. Screaming their tiny lungs out as soon as they wake up from their deep slumber. But I can't help wondering sometimes. I see babies as fat as fat can be and their smiles do really light up the lives of their parents. I see babies bringing so much happiness into a single household, I wonder how they do it.

When I watch my cousins mothering their kids, I'm (sometimes) inrigued. The way they can't stand a single moment without their mother by their side. I find it rather annoying that my cousin/s can't even spare five minutes for a quick shower without my mom rushing to grab the little boy who's crying and yelling so loud, I am nearly tempted to yank all my hair out.

But it must mean something, right?

For them to have such love and affection for a parent. I wonder how that sort of love feels.

How it must feel to push out a baby and breathe relief that you finally did it. Once when I was very little (maybe nine), I asked my mom when was it that she felt great about herself. She replied saying that she felt as though she conquered the whole world when she gave birth to me. I found that kinda gross back at the time but now I think I understand what she meant.

I want one. A little one of the female variety. Someone I can dress up in little cotton yellow dresses and headbands on bald heads. Or put her in a pram and push her around supermarket aisles while shopping for my favourite foods (icecream, Pringles, Lemon Puff...). Even if I'm not married, I'd still want one. And NO, I'm not going to have one out of wedlock. Not that I'm strongly against the idea of people having children out of wedlock but I don't think I'd want to go against social and religious norms to do that.

I'd rather adopt. Yes, strange. But once when I was thirteen, I was watching this documentary on CNN which showed so MANY babies in orphanages all over China. Those babies looked so helpless and I felt awful. Most of their parents had given them up due to various reasons and so forth. I sorta made a promise to my immature thirteen year old self that someday I would travel to China and adopt one of those babies for myself. Make sure she'd feel loved and cared for. I'd like to do that someday so we'll see.

I'm nineteen-going-on-twenty and I'm still that immature kid. I can't handle simple responsibilities of folding dry clothes and cleaning my room which seems as though a tornado struck it. Let alone making a simple cup of coffee for my mom on a Sunday morning or trying to fry fries in the kitchen without it burning and getting cooking oil all over the cooker and wall. So how in living hell would I be physically capable of waking up every night to put a crying child to sleep. Or heat water for a bottle of milk. Or sterilize milk bottles to ensure the no-germ policy. Or even spend twenty four hours with a little human and devote all my attention to her. I'm very selfish. I like spending a lot of time on my own and making sure I get what I want in life.

But maybe it'll be a matter of time before I am ready to do all of those things. It'll take time. A long, long, LONG time but I'm sure it will happen someday.

Just something invading my comfort thoughts for a while.

This blog post is dedicated to my friend GG Purple whose recent blog post kinda got me thinking. It's like she woke the thoughts inside me. So thanks for that. :')