Halo Amedika !

I will be home in less than 12 hours. I don’t know how to feel. For as long as the plane sinks in altitude while the overhead telly flashes random information that brings me nothing but nostalgia, my heart sinks along with it. I reminisce what happened, before and after I flew to the land of real opportunities, trying to take it all in, letting it sink in.

Still trying.

38005 feet, it said. 11518km went by.

I recall musing about my pre-departure some months ago. Relationships were the main theme, particulary the ones I had with my family and the cuntry. What used to feel like motivations to constrict my freedom and individuality now feels like excuses to make amends. The BERSIH rally, something like the vendetta I wish for Malaysia the very moment I watched V for Vendetta, actualized with the kind of media attention I think it deserved better. Not too long ago, over the phone, Mum told me to do whatever that makes me happy, sans our usual altercations. Even if it means sans my formal education too.

My romantic life. Over the month of August, at least six former flames attempted to make peace, some with hopes to rekindle past fires. I think I said something along the lines of “Dream on”.

As for my life in North America, well, let’s just say that nobody who has lived most of their life in the same cuntry would realize how narrow-minded they really are until they’re in frequent contact with someone of foreign culture. Many someone-s for that matter. Try dating a mixed batch at the same time too. For nobody can assume that they’re truly liberal until they’ve met their match. Also, it was interesting to put the American-Malaysian politics and social norms in perspective. Just yesterday, during the last makan session Malaysian gathering, after speaking to some Malaysians who have been around town for at least “half a decade,” I was reminded of the refreshing change practically all of us have undergone ever since we left the Southeast Asian counterpart of this melting pot of international culture.

Though, all in all, to compare the Malaysian drama I’ve endured with its North American counterpart’s worth of bohemia, my stand remains: I was not in the wrong place nor was the United States a better place for me to live in. I was merely in the right places to see what’s wrong with the mindsets many apart from me have been pre-conditioned with.

The best part of returning home? The food I think I got my best friend back; the best friend from high school. Not to mention the newfound realization of the amount of true blue friends I really have, especially in desperate times of need. How I was pleasantly surprised.

And all of this was made possible after my stay in that psychiatric unit, over the break in Spring, the week of my 21st birthday, my coming of the very legal age.

Irony, c’est la vie. Which reminds me: I’m taking French100 this Fall. Wish my procrastination preseverance luck for this summer and beyond.

Of friends and family and overdue spa vacations, no amount of wailing babies can spoil my mood right now. Not even the Korean brat behind my window seat.

Char kuay teow, ayam kambing bek!

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P.S. This Sony VAIO is very nice and white and complementary before my next flight of Seoul Incheon Airport, South Korea!

Residues of unsettled feelings rolled about in my heart and mind, just as I boarded the plane, making the last phone call to the one who has always been there for me when there is a friend in need. I thought of a few others whom I should say goodbye to and tried to SMS with the last bar of my tattered mobile.

It didn’t help with the male flight attendant of Korean Air breathing down my neck for not following taxi and take off procedure. I probably couldn’t tell if he was singing the national anthem or not. Either way, I managed to switch off the blasphemous device after seeing the reassuring ‘Message sent’.

As I sat through more than 23 hours worth of Korean entertainment, I couldn’t help but to wonder why these tadpole-eyed passengers didn’t have the sense of appreciation for the big blue skies of red fluffy clouds against postcard perfect nightfall and romantic sunrise. All of them ungrateful bastards lucky window seaters took care to keep the window covers shut, sans the rare curious traveller or two.

How often do you get to witness the rising and falling of the fiery orange and yellow, first hand, directly from the sky? How often do you get to see how night changes to day?

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How often do you get to see fields of clouds so white and condense that you feel like you’re flying above a sea of iceberg and snow, only to eventually see that it’s almost as if you’re flying above the watery world above,

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and when you see wipsy white cloud floating by the sun, it becomes beautiful smokey red dye?

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How often do you get to see how snow flakes creep up to decorate your window?

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Nobody deserves a window seat more than I do.

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Then again, Korean Air could have redeemed itself with that in-flight entertainment screen in front of my seat.

But only if it didn’t break down as often as Paris Hilton making the headlines for something groundbreaking.

Hello! This is your friendly neighbourhood corpse! Yes, I know I spelled ‘neighborhood’ “WrOnGlY”!!!!!!!!!!111111 <333333333

Okay, maybe it’s a bit too early for that. Am currently only in Seoul and am writing this just in case I forget. I’m currently taking advantage of the Internet service of kickass speed here and there is a Korean TV squealing behind me, nothing less than the Hong Kong and Taiwanese channels of giggling game shows back in NTV7 and 8TV.

Perhaps it’s an Asian thing.

There is a menu right on the corner of this desk and the amount of zeros in the price list reminds me of Indonesia.

Mum has been trying to get me to camwhore in front of every scenic poster possible, even though I suspect Yahoo! Photos might be affiliated with Korean Air. I suppose it’s because the only place in South Korea we can visit is the airport.

All the flight attendants have been instructing me in Korean. I wonder what a New Yorker will say.

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Avid shopper in Seoul Incheon