Loving Is Easy

It's the last day of March and... It was a pretty chill day! Although it kinda ended hectically heh. Today we did the Qing Ming prayers for my grandparents and great grandparents. So my aunts and uncle gathered as usual. Since it was a Saturday, it was pretty chill! Although well, my late aunt isn't here so the house felt kinda empty. But anyway it's a good Saturday nevertheless!

As today's the last day of the month, I went to do stock checks at the shop as usual. We had an unexpected guest in the evening so yeah the schedule got pushed forward a little bit. We had a satay session at night but then I hadn't finished with the stocks so I couldn't make it :(

Alright before March comes to an end, here are some great music I discovered!

Great Music of March:

 - Loving is Easy by Rex Orange County ft Benny Sings

- Happiness by Rex Orange County

- More I see by S. Carey

- True North by S. Carey

- Yellowstone by S. Carey

Song of the month: Loving is Easy by Rex Orange County and More I see by S. Carey

I discovered Rex Orange County (ROC) music through the BBC sound of 2018 list! I actually heard of him before last year, it was kinda fleeting around the internet and YouTube heh. But I only gave him a proper listen after knowing more about him through the BBC sound of 2018! I think he deserved the runner up. Sigrid deserves the top spot! And I'm happy that Pale Waves made it to top 5 :D

I really love his music, which I like to describe as effortless. I fell in love straight away with his song Loving is Easy which I found in YouTube. It's truly such an effortless song that one can fall in love with easily. And after listening to his other songs, effortless is still the word that comes to my mind!

Sean Carey (S. Carey) is the drummer of Bon Iver and I discovered him through Favela who shared the video for "More I See" on Twitter. I listened to his album on Spotify and just fell in love with every song from it! So I bought the vinyl haha. Well his 3rd album "Hundred Acres" is such a beautiful album. And I think the title fits the music pretty well. It's the kind of music you want to listen to while driving long distances. And I think More I See is a masterpiece.

Right that's all for this month of discovery! I'm kinda excited for the next few months because we'll have new releases from PREP (April!), Chvrches (May) and hmm who else, there are a couple but I kinda forget haha. Also I just saw that Florence and The Machine is playing in some music festival so does this mean... New Music?! Yes yes yes. Oh and I'm looking forward to her new book heh.

Alright, the year is Marching on. And so will we! To a better and brighter rest of 2018 ahead :)

The Chase

Right as promised, I'm going to talk more about Vancouver Sleep Clinic's new song "Ayahuasca" and why I love it so much! Well although the song, I think, is about a failed relationship because the two parties share different views, I really love one line from the song that caught my attention a lot!

It says "I don't know what I'm chasing. Maybe I'll never know"

That question has been on my mind for probably forever. I often wonder what are we really chasing in life actually? I know for me it's definitely not wealth, because I know one day I'll leave everything behind. It's not fame, because it's just too troublesome. It's not happiness because the more you chase it the more it'll fly away (and also we create happiness, not chase after it!). So what is it then?

In the recent years, I kinda decided to search one thing - and it is inner peace. Or should I say mindfulness? Like I once said I want to be the most mindful person in the world, not the happiest. Because by being mindful, you'll be able to see everything. See the situation and also decided how and what you want to feel. Thus avoiding unnecessary unhappiness, which is something we love.

Also thus by being mindful, you can also strive for inner peace! Ever since I started my meditation journey, I truly felt how important inner peace is. The ability to be calm in every situation and see through your thoughts, words, feelings, and everything else. Instead of letting them just bombard your mind like hailstones falling on metal roofs. Noisy, and... Annoying haha.

Anyway one of my favourite quotes is one from Mark Twain that says There are two important days in your life. The day you're born and the day you find out why. I've been on earth for just 25 years and obviously I haven't found the answer to the second question. Sometimes I think to myself that the only time we can answer this question is when we're lying on our deathbeds. 

But after listening to VSC new song, I changed my mind. Maybe we won't even know! That line from the song made me think that perhaps, even if we were to know that we're going to die in the next 15 minutes, we still won't know what we are chasing in life. And ultimately, we'll never know.

So yeah. What are we chasing in life really? Are we just weird creatures destined to live on this planet, being caught in a rat race, that we don't know what the race is all about?

Pressence of Emptiness

So today we did the Qing Ming prayers at home for my aunt. Well traditionally we're supposed to bring food etc to the tomb to pray there. But to make things easier and more convenient, we prepare the food at home first (at the altar) before we go to the tomb for Qing Ming haha. And because my aunt just recently passed away, we have to do the prayers for her first, before my grandparents.

I think it's quite funny how my nephew wasn't really in a good mood during the prayers. Like he just wanted to go home. My dad thinks that maybe he's sort of confused because we are doing prayers for my aunt. With her photograph on the table and her favourite food on top of it. Usually during the other prayers, my nephew would be with my aunt, asking her to eat together etc. 

So I think it isn't stranger for him to act such way today. He's probably confused.

I think emptiness will be a part of us after someone's passing. All the things that the person usually does will feel incomplete and different. When you're an adult you'll understand things. But as a kid I'm pretty sure things felt very weird right. So yeah. It's part of life I guess.

It's quite hmm... Sad? Funny? How one day after we buried my aunt, we had a satay session together at home (cause it was a public holiday). And my nephew asked my sis to go to my aunt's house to ask her to come and eat. And how one of our drivers came on a Sunday and he asked my driver "Oh you're here to fetch aunty right?". All these innocent things but... It's quite saddening to see.

Oh well, life has to go on. I guess we'll just have to get used to this emptiness,

until it has become part of us.

Ayahuasca

I am currently obsessed with this song by Vancouver Sleep Clinic (VSC) ever since they released it back in February. I think the words fit so well to the thoughts that I've been having in life these days. I've been a fan of VSC ever since I discovered them a few years back. The lyrics, the music and everything else just fit so well. Dreamy, ethereal and melancholic. They just released a new EP last Friday with this inside, and a couple of new songs and I love it!

Anyway I'm going to talk about this song more. Gotta go to bed early tonight cause I have a guest coming over tomorrow so... Yesh. I'll see you soon!

A Thousand Words

I realise my blog posts are getting shorter and shorter these days. Well maybe I'm still grieving or something, but I just don't have much mood to talk and blog nowadays. Which is weird, given that I had a lot of free time last week. I went to bed straightaway after finishing work/watching my daily dose of YouTube videos. Although ironically, still, I have difficulty sleeping hah.

Well I'm not going to deny the fact that it's getting harder for me to blog. To be honest, I'm not sure about the future of this blog. I suppose I'm giving in to the temptation of not blogging. Yes, I do have more free time to do things I enjoy (albeit not productive). I'm not sure if I can still blog as often as I've been doing in the past few years or so, when the future arrives. But we'll see I guess.

Not sure if I should list down the things I wanna post and talk about, because most of the time I feel kinda "forced" when I do this. Although I actually have a list of things I want to talk about!

Well I'm determined to write at least 10 posts a month, as usual.

Anyway, just a quick update on life. I think March has been going on well, although losing my aunt was a pretty shocking thing for all of us. There are some exciting things happening for us in the next coming weeks, hope all goes well! I swear time just keeps on moving faster and faster as each year goes by. I can't believe March is coming to an end next week. Well, lots of things happened too.

I always find that the first three months of the year will go by rather quickly. Things kinda settle down until June, and things will quicken up once we reach September. And before you know it, we'll be in December! What is time really, what is time.

Alright that's all for a quick update. Anyway I think I should do more of this life update thingy. As I read back on the older posts on my blog, I realise most of them are just thoughts. Not much about what's going on in life. And I think it's more fun to write such posts! Okay I'll see you soon :)

I Started A Joke

Generally speaking, I'm not a humorous person. In fact my jokes are pretty lame. Yes I can get pretty funny when I'm writing on social media, and also that's more towards the sarcastic and punny side heh. But in real life, I rarely joke with people. Not just because I suck at it, I see no reason why I should. Which is also why people always take me too seriously, and vice versa. Such is life.

I find it really hard to just try to "lighten up" the situation. When I have to "joke" with people to make them sort of go inside my flow. I'd rather be straight forward and tell the truth to the other party. Sounds crude but I think it gets the job done. Although I'm always being told that I need to see the situation, and try to inject humour so that things flow easily.

As I grow older I become more straightforward I guess. I used to dislike this kind of people. People who can't stand small talks and just want me to go straight to the point. Oh the irony, I have become one of them in the future haha. But it's true, nowadays I can't stand small talks. I think lets just get to the point and talk to me about what you need. Time is precious my friends.

Oh well. I remember someone once told me I'm "the boy who never smiles". Well I try to be very friendly with others. Like well, don't joke with me but if you need anything, come and find me!

I started the joke, which started the whole world crying.

Eternity

A week ago, my aunt passed away. And I was there together with my aunt, uncle, sister and brother witnessing her taking her last breath. It was quite a traumatising experience for me, but at the same time I felt a bit of relief because she's finally free from pain and suffering. And she left this world without experiencing pain, because she has lost consciousness prior to this.

So on last Sunday, just as I was about to fall asleep at 7:15 AM-ish, I was woken up by my maid, who told me that my aunt had lost consciousness and was just "snoring". This is a term we used here when people lost consciousness. I came to check her condition and was pretty shocked to see her condition. She was having high fever, and her heart rate was beating really fast. Checked her blood pressure and it was normal. But the fever and super fast heart rate was worrying me a lot.

We called for an ambulance and brought her to the emergency room. Doctor did a CT scan and X-ray on her because we thought her throat was filled with mucus. We suspected an infection (the fever) and thought it was in her lungs. X-ray turned out clean, and we even tried to suck her mucus out but there was no mucus. The CT scan came out bad, because there was bleeding throughout her brain.

Her blood test came out normal with no high cholesterol/triglyceride level. She didn't have any fall prior to this either. She was put inside the ICU for more monitoring, it was 9:30 AM then. While in the ICU, the doctor (who's also my dad's friend) called me up to deliver a bad news. The bleeding in her brain was pretty severe and she had a slim chance to go back to normal. We had another option and it was surgery, but it was also too late because the damage is quite bad.

The doctor eventually told us that she might be suffering from aneurysm. Or that she might have an abnormality of the blood vessel in her brain that caused it to rupture and bleed out.

At 10 AM the doctor and nurses at the ICU called us out to tell us that the condition wasn't doing well. Her consciousness level was also at 3 (out of 15). And the doctor told us that at this level, it is rather impossible for the person to make it out alive. This is when my heart sank. And what's worst is I am the person-in-contact between the doctor and my father. It feels tough to be a bringer of bad news.

11 AM, her blood pressure went haywire. It was at 170/120. Doctor and nurse called us in again to just pray for the best, and we waited again. 12 PM - her blood pressure started to decrease at 70/40, together along with her heart rate. Her breathing slowed down significantly as well. We were all just preparing for the worst, and it was so much more tougher than I thought it's going to be.

1 PM - doctor and nurses called us in for one last time. They offered us if we want to resuscitate and  put her on life support, if she were to reach terminal state. I consulted the doctor but he said it's not going to help, because the bleeding has reached her brain stem. We also noticed that she started to bleed internally from the feeding tube. The capillaries on her legs became more visible too.

I called my dad and the rest of my aunts (who were on their way to the hospital) to ask about their decision. We decided not to resuscitate her and to also not put her on life support. With a heavy heart, we said no to the doctor. 1:30 PM, her breathing rate, blood pressure and heart rate went down really really low. We all started crying at this point but there's nothing we could do really. Doctor and nurse asked us to say our last words to her while we still can, and while she's still here.

1:45 PM, we witnessed her taking in her last breath, and breathing it out. Her chest slowed down its movement and eventually came to a stop. Her heart rate monitor jumbled up, and eventually went to a flat line. My dad, aunts and uncle lost their eldest sister. We lost an aunt then.

It was definitely one of the most heart-breaking moments of my life.

My aunts came, followed by my cousins. We brought her body home to prepare for the funeral. She was buried yesterday near my grandparents. The last 6 days have been nothing else but an emotional roller coaster for me. It was my first time, experiencing first-hand, losing someone who is part of my daily life. Someone I meet almost every day. It was heart wrenching.

What saddens me the most is the fact that we lost her in such a short time. Just on Saturday evening, I was still talking to her and she was doing alright. My dad was still talking to her. My aunt came for a visit on Thursday and she was still doing normal. And in 6 hours, we lost her forever.

As I witnessed her taking her last breath on Sunday, it felt like the 66 years of her life has culminated into that gush of air her lungs pushed for the very last time. At that moment, a lifetime suddenly felt very short, and yet that moment felt like an eternity for me.

My aunt had quite an arduous life. She suffered from meningitis when she was 3, and because of this she was left mentally disabled. So can you just imagine being an 8 year old trapped in a 66 year old body? Your body grows old with time but your brain doesn't. That's what my aunt and other special people on this planet have to go through. And from the deepest floor of my heart, I wish no one else would have to experience this anymore.

Whenever I talked to my aunt, I can see this person just wishing to be liberated away. 

And now she is free I guess.

Rest in Peace, Oucun.

Missed - Part II

Continuing from my previous post, which kinda happened co-incidentally today. I found out that Oh Wonder is coming to Indonesia today, to perform at Lalala fest in Bandung. Which is near my hometown and I was kind of planning to go. However I'll be off to Jakarta on Monday to send my brother-in-law's mum off as she's going back. So I thought it wouldn't be a good idea to go today.

So I didn't. Do I feel regret? Kind of. Oh Wonder is a band that I've been wanting to catch live. I almost flew to Singapore to see them last year! But well as the day came to an end today, I understood why I didn't, and what I shouldn't. Well put it in short, things happened and I have to be here. Once again I'm reminded of a quote by Robin Esrock: where you are is where you're supposed to be.

Well again and again, I'm a firm believer that things happened for a reason.

I tend to remind myself that if things don't go to plan, there must be a reason why it doesn't. Like it just doesn't happen "that way". One fine day you will learn about things. About life, how everything intertwines and how everything is linked from one thing to another. To paint a beautiful picture.

Just a random, short post. Been a pleasant Saturday night so far, chilling and blogging with my new essential oil burner. I'm currently obsessed with the smell of sandalwood! I'll see you soon.

Missed

Today is the 22nd of the first lunar month, and at the temple of my hometown, we celebrate ji-it meh (22nd). Usually it's the 15th (cap go meh) but the tradition dates back to the days where lion dance troupes would tour around the surrounding towns, so that they can perform for cap go meh. My hometown got the 22nd, thus the name, and the date that it is being celebrated on.

Sadly this year I didn't go for it. Work caught up on me and there's things going on that we need to settle. I feel kinda sad? I've been meaning to go since last week but well, I couldn't. Like I once said I always feel annoyed when things don't go to plan. But then I am reminded how everything in life is insubstantial. So there's no point being annoyed I guess. Things happened.

Sometimes I feel sad how I have given a lot of things a miss just because of work. Or just because some things cropped out in the middle and my whole plan has been ruined. I kinda realised that this is just life as an adult. As you grow older life becomes more unpredictable? Also maybe because you have more things to do. So your days go by unpredictably. Parts and parcel of life I guess.

Also to be honest I don't know if I should feel sad. I've gotten used to this cropped up situations that when it happened, I just take things naturally. I guess this is the biggest teaching of Buddhism's Anatta. That nothing has a self on its own and everything is sort of interconnected.

Life.

Life In Two Sentences

Two days ago, I woke up to the news of someone's passing.

Last night I went to bed with the news of the arrival of a new human being.

I suppose this is one way we can sum life in two sentences. That... It just goes on I guess. At this age of 25, I have lost a few people. Some who are very dear to me. I've grown to accept death because... After all, we'll all have to die anyway. There's no way we can escape that yes.

It's just very funny somehow, how these two events happened in two consecutive days. There's a sense of solace and serendipity as I went to bed last night. The feeling how life just goes on, but at the same time I also feel how we'll all reach the end one day. It's a pretty weird feeling.

Yet at the same time we go to bed each night believing that we'll wake up tomorrow.

What if we don't?