One Sunny Sports Day

Watching all the kids lined up in a row, getting ready for their sports day was indeed a sight to remember. All parents were anxious to see some action. They danced, they sang and they bounced on balls and crawled through tents and cardboard tunnels. Ultimately, they are just kids, getting together and having fun. When I saw Ryan with his other friends that bright Sunday morning, it reminded me of my good old school days. Back then, what matters to me the most was not how much A's I got on my report card or how much hustling I needed to do to get my lunch in the canteen, but my friends who stuck by me through thick and thin, friends whom I looked forward to meeting every morning I arrived at school. I am glad Ryan has his friends at school whom he can play with. I had a blast during my school days, have you?

Don't Love You No More (I'm Sorry)

When is the very moment that you know and you just know, from your gut feeling (or we women quite instinctively called instinct) that the person is the ONE, the one that you would fall head over heels with, the one you would pour your heart and soul out with, no matter what happens? When is that moment? Could it be the moment that would change your life forever? For most people, I think it would be. The moment in point where things will definitely change, the course of your life could be altered all together. But what constitute that particular decisive moment? Only you know. What if that very moment passes you by, like it passes Julia Roberts by in My Best Friend's Wedding, while she was talking to her long-time-old pal who was going to marry Cameran Diaz but not her? The moment the merciless afternoon sun hit right on her face, the moment when the boat came out of the shade underneath a bridge above, she was no longer in the shadow...that was the moment she had missed, and she knew, he was out of her life - forever. That was one of the most significant scenes I remembered of that film. It is amazing how at times, film is so much like life itself, it is the small little moments that we could (or could not) capture through the film lenses and, the chemistry between the two characters (we so often called actors). Aren't we all actors in this great huge STAGE called LIFE? What if you don't love the person whom you promised to love for the rest of your life anymore? What will that moment be then, to make you decide that love should end? It is ironic how catchy and nonchalantly the way Craig David sang the song called Don't Love You No More (I'm Sorry), yet to most people, the lost of love, or the void of it, simply shreds one into thousand pieces. Surprisingly, I liked the sound of the tune...

Cinderella Man

We carry the burden of the world
the minute we commit to turn ourselves
into parents
parents that would have to provide
the very basics in life for them
food, shelter, home, comfort and above all
love to make them a better person in life
it does not really matter
if our tummy rumbles like Russell Crowe
right before his fight in the ring
it does not matter
if we shed silent tears like Renee Zellweger
in the midst of a cold winter snow
seeing your children suffer from the chill
without a warm blanket
over their frail small bodies
but it does matter
if we stop to try our very best
to give them the best we could in life
for it is our sole responsibilities
to bear what is hard to bear
to endure what is difficult to endure
and to do what is the most challenging thing
to do
that is to be parents
A simply beautiful and remarkably
truthful film about life
indeed wonderful for me
to shed tears and to feel
for this is the essentials of
being parents
and you could only feel how I feel
if you are one yourself

Happiness Z Chen

hApPinEsS is the time put aside
to listen to the music that moves me
to let those little melodic shapes of musical notes
filled up the cup of emptiness in my head
to have words written and scribbled all over
on the body of a completely off-white piece of blank paper
so that all the alphabets could dance the waltz of a-b-c
with one another, to fiest my eyes and enrich my soul
Happiness is the time spent
with those whom I care the most and
could not have ignored and get rid off
for they are the ones that define who I really am
Happiness is
listening to Z Chen's latest album
on a sunny saturday morning like this one
Life can be complicated but at times,
happiness is just a simple thought of the notion of us
arriving at the state of happiness
on a subconscious level
and it is simply that
no more
no less
Happiness is nOw

House of Flying Daggers

One of my favourite films of this Chinese director, Zhang Yimou. I have seen some of his other films like Ju Dou, Not One Less, To Live, The Road Home and Hero. His style is so versatile yet always captivating and refreshing, always putting women at the centre piece of his storytelling. He is indeed, a film director I admire and hope one day to meet in person. Watching Hero and House of Flying Daggers on big screen truly makes a difference. One could actually admire the richness of texture and colours, the depth of field and details put into each and every piece of shots to lull you into the ancient Chinese world of martial arts. I believe Zhang took the form of traditional storytelling of kungfu fighting into greater heights and created a deeper meaning with his version of Hero, which reminded me so much of the film Rashomon by Japanese master, Akira Kurosawa, in terms of the similarities in their story structure and how the ambiguity and many facets of truth prevail in so many different layers based on individual perceptions and interpretations. A poster with a different title, Lovers.

Boys in Action

What are they up to lately? Well, Ryan goes to school in the morning, the house is usually more quiet, with only Aidan busy watching his TV. This is what they do at home...

I kind of love this shot coz we took it at the passage way from Aquaria to KLCC or vise versa. It is quite a long tunnel with loads of eye-catchy advertisements on both sides of the wall.

Iron Jawed Angels

Women in the spirit of strength and courage. I have just watched an outstanding and truly moving piece of film by a HBO production on ASTRO. Iron Jawed Angels, based on real events in the US in the 1920s, during the World War I, is a film about a group of women coming together (suffragists) to fight for the right to vote for women in the States back then. Hilary Swank plays the lead and real life woman called Alice Paul, together with her close friend, Lucy Burns (played by Frances O'Connor) took centre stage when they and the rest of the women were jailed and force-fed in prison and this created a massive response from the media as well as the public (especially women), hence brought forward the realization of the 19th Amendment.

A beautiful piece of film by Katja von Garnier, top-norch acting and excellent cinematography but most surprisingly is the intriguing use of modern contemporary music and songs to accompany a period film. It is sometimes delightful to discover how visuals and sound can be cleverly manipulated to collide in order to create an opposite attraction to one another.

Co-incidentally, I was also able to catch Mona Lisa's Smile early this afternoon, starring Julia Roberts. Another inspirational film, empowering women in so many ways. It makes you open your mind and wonder, what true potentials women have, possessed in us and how it would make a difference in this world if we had only begin to fully utilize them, in any way we can, to truly define the meaning of our existence, our contribution in this life time and the realization of this SELF that are alive within each and every one of us - woman. I love being a woman, despite of all the hardships we have to ensure...how about you?

Labour of Love

Would like to congratulate my three friends who just had babies recently. They are Marina, Jee Me and Pui Yee. Hope that their bundles of joy will enrich their lives to come and deepen their love of being mothers to their own child. Though it is only the very beginning of a long journey (which I have personally started embarking more than four years ago, and still is), it is definitely a surprising one as you will never know how much it changes your life until you start walking it yourself. May we fill their little lives with loads of tender love and care and the rest will fall into its own place, at the end of the day.

Picture courtesy of Anne Geddes. Please visit www.annegeddes.com or click on the title link above for more lovely baby inspirations.

Love Letters

Those WoRds sealed with lOvE and pAsSioN. I honestly think that it is the most romantic thing of all if you ever received a love letter from someone. It does not have to be perfectly written, or even sent in one of those perfumed envelopes with colourful designs, all you need is words that could melt your heart when you read it, and sets off a beam on your face while going through those you obviously know are ridiculously cliche and extremely cheezy lines yet you can't help but feel all ticklish inside. My fondest memories are not these days of writing in front of the computer but actually those nights of extensive scribbling under the soft light illuminated by the small table lamp, in the midst of the darkness and tranquility of the nights, seeing words come alive on those blank white innocent papers and at times, pour your heart out with words only you could identify with. There is a strange magic when you see the blank ink develops against the grainy sandy papers as you write, as if they keep staring right back at you and tell you thousands of untold stories. Too crazy, at times, too heavy to even let them go. If you have not received a love letter from someone in your life, I think you should start writing one already...with your pen in hand and good thoughts in mind and send it off immediately. I am sure it will come back with a post box of letters filled with life's wonders and surprises. For who knows, the very person that you may be dreaming of might just be someone who has always been around you all these while...waiting for your love letter.

Aquaria

An underwater world adventure. Last weekend was a fun one for my two boys. They had a chance to go Aquaria at KLCC convention centre, after a long one week wait as we had promised to bring them two weekends ago but work just caught up with everything else. As usual, Sunday is always packed with people. It is not cheap to get into the place. The set-up is quite interesting. The highlight of the whole aquarium is definitely the rotating walkway, surrounded by an underwater enclosed water aquarium, filled with all sorts of fishes, stingrays and SHARKS too. The fact that the audience could catch a glimpse of the divers feeding the fishes make the whole experience more lively. Ryan and Aidan were completely amazed by the whole scenario. Nonetheless, I personally find the Vancouver Aquarium we visited last year in Canada was a better experience as it housed more types of sea animals and more interesting things to feast your eyes on. It includes those overwhelmingly huge all-white beluga whales. I heard they even have new additions to their family now like dolphins! All in all, they really did enjoy themselves. I guess that's what matters after all.

Love = Marriage?

Came across some really nice wedding photos, so, I have decided to begin a series of writings on marriage or love itself.

Love strikes when you least expect it to come your way. Some find love in the blink of an eye, some just can't seize love no matter how hard they try. When love hits you, some say it's all about chemistry, some say it is fated and destined. Some believe there can only be one true love in their entire lifetime, some understand that love can present itself more than once in life and some may even be pretty sure that they can love more than one at the same time. Love is strange and you can only believe in what you believe, the rest are in the eyes of the beholder and in the heart of those who are in love.

Is love negotiable in marriage or is marriage negotiable when love needs to be lifted into a whole new level? Is it true when love transcends into the state of a marriage, love seems to gradually evaporates into thin air and what is left is the nitty gritty details that we fail to see when we fell madly in love with the other person? They say all you need is love to make things work in any marriages, and I say we definitely need a little humour in any love that is meant to sustain more than a second in a lifetime of gruesome tests in...

ultimate love.