November 2006 Archives

there's so much i've been meaning to write about in the past few days, but now that i finally find myself in my room, during the day, with nothing much to do (or, at least, nothing i can feel too guilty about not doing) i just feel so incredibly tired that i want to cuddle up in bed with a good book and a cup of tea and then sleep for a bit.
but soon there will be lyrics, and fantastic m and how happy he makes me, and bitching about stats, and the winter ball, and... oh i'm so glad it's basically the end of term.
soon i'll re-emerge from this stupor, i promise.

i'm walking around my parents' flat in paris wearing:
- a tshirt and jumper;
- pants (as in, panties);
- knee high socks;
- gray four inch heels i've bought to go with my ball dress.
and i'm finding all this extremely amusing. what i find less amusing is that i am completely and utterly unable to walk in these heels and am therefore quite likely to die during the ball next saturday.
next week is the last week of term. i cannot wait. shame i have to do some stats before then... sigh. it'll be fine.
in more or less a day i should be back in oxford and back with m, and that makes me very happy. i've actually missed him. how silly of me... it's just that it's hard to be on my own when i've spent every single evening (or almost) of the last month with him. i can't believe how i'm still not annoyed about having to share my single bed. i think something might be going on...
(i'm going to stop lying: something IS going on, and it's wonderful)
and now it's time for me to make use of my parents' lovely bathtub. and get rid of these damn shoes.

so now it's become official between us that we're going out - which is kind of silly considering everybody has assumed we were going out anyway, but you know. it took us a bit longer to get there... that's what happens when you really like someone and you don't want to make mistakes.
i still find this quite scary, but i'm getting used to the idea. i enjoy the fact that we can take the piss out of ourselves, and come on... 'our room' and the 'storage room' is quite funny. :)
i find it quite amazing how un-annoyed i am by (effectively) living with someone.
instead, i wake up in the morning and smile.
it's beautiful.

what a night, oh what a night. it all went pretty crazy - the wine was definitely flowing slightly too freely! i know i paid the consequences of that by spending an hour or so by the toilet. ah ah. throwing up - always a sign of a good night, or is it a bad night?
it was lots and lots of fun, everyone was dressed up very nicely, pennies were thrown into people's glasses (ah, pennies, what a classic oxbridge game - it's very simple: someone drops a penny in your drink, you have to drink the entire content of your glass as quickly as possible), there was lots of inappropriate touching due to drunkness, the food wasn't even that bad (i beg to differ with a lot of other wolfson people on this!)... i wish we had these more often, actually. once a term isn't a lot! and i do love dressing up.
i finally managed to wear the dress my aunt bought for me and that made me very happy. i looked kind of hot - see, when i make the effort it does really work... i find myself having a very 80s style lately. mmh. i can't wait to pick up my last paycheck from indonesia and go shopping. i'm loving layers right now, and many colours as always.
anyway, if you're wondering, it is m & i in the photo. we got a lot of comments last night - about how cute we looked - and that made me very happy, because i feel cute when i'm with him. teenagers eh.
and now he's coming over and we're watching house. yay!
on a sidenote: my tailbone is swollen. what the hell?!? how does that happen? is it normal? maybe i should go see a doctor...

why do i always have to be so scared that my mind (or my heart) are lying to me?
was i really not sincere in the past or is that just something i convinced myself of so that i didn't have to feel stupid? i think the latter is without a doubt the right answer, but admitting to that makes me feel like a coward for not facing up to the fact that i've lost some good things in my life. so i'd rather be scared? it makes no sense, does it.
i am messed up in many ways and it's starting to show. that worries me.
opening up is never easy and right now, i feel there is a lot of stuff going on in my head, on so many different fronts, i am not sure anyone could really like me if they knew it all.
being scared of so much is getting tiring. i cannot spend my time being afraid i am not enough, not clever enough, not studious enough, not passionate enough, not sincere enough, when really, i am trying my best.
maybe i have to accept the fact that i am not perfect and never will be; that my best is never going to be good enough, or maybe that i don't need to be perfect to be good enough (depending on whether i want to be positive about it or not).
it is all a big mess in my head and i need to sort it out. i'll get there.
i guess i can start by doing my stats assignment for next week... oh joy.
this is turning out to be a lot more challenging than what i thought. all of it. my mental sanity feels very shaky right now...

stats are killing me. assignment due on tuesday - but of course, it needs to be done long before then because i also have an anthropology presentation and an economics essay due next week. and i'm going home on the weekend of the 24th... this was all very badly planned. sigh.
i do find a strange sense of satisfaction in having some form of understading of stats. despite hating the subject. i'm not doing too badly in following up on my courses (more or less) but i do find it stressful how i can't seem to be able to find a structure to any of my subjects. i guess this sort of problem goes with covering a lot of ground in subjects i've never studied before in very little time. still, it makes me feel kind of stupid and that of course annoys me - because if there is one thing i've never felt before was being stupid. oxford does that to you (everybody i've spoken to here feels pretty much the same way though, so again, i guess it's alright!).
i'll have a lot of catch up to do over christmas - and also a lot of preparation to do for next term. i need to get started on a few assignments so that i won't be too stressed out over hilary. most of all, i need to learn to manage my time properly.
enough ranting about uni; m is about to come over and we shall watch a house episode or two. i'm loving house actually, it's pretty good (and has some wicked characters). i haven't watched good tv series in far too long!
maybe it's time i bought that spaced dvd...
ah. for once i feel relaxed - i've done lots of work today! yay.
plan for the rest of the week: lectures and work tomorrow and friday, and then friday formal hall followed by cocktail night in the bar! it shall be fun.
the one thing keeping me sane is waking up next to m every morning. i can't help it. it makes every single day better.
how silly of me.

sitting in my economics lecture, almost falling asleep (9 o'clock class when i've gone to bed at 3 is not a good idea), something my lecturer said made things click in my head. i never thought talking about the market of umbrellas in an economic sense could remind me of south east asia, but indeed it did (it really is becoming a love story between me and asia - the number of times i've thought about it this week! oh. i want the beach...), so i had to quickly grab a blank piece of paper (in this case, the back of my economics handout on market failure) and write things down.
running through the streets of KL
water pouring over the pavements
wet feet in flip flops
buying an umbrella in a market
little fat kid selling it to me
i remember the price being not quite right
but what was i going to do?
there's nothing like tropical rain
the sky opening up
and rivers of water coming down
with that weird dim light
and the city lights and cars and people
all over this huge city...
once more i realise how unable i am to put down in words such a simple, passing image in my head - how can i describe, the heat, the humidity, the rain, the people, the shape of the tiles, the big buildings, and all of those tiny details that are stored in my head? i miss travelling a lot. i love that continuous discovering new things, new places, new scenery. my eyes always open wide in amazement, my head trying to take it all in.
i can't wait to go back.
anyway, my essay was handed in this morning, finally. i am not entirely satisfied with it but i'm going to live with it - at the end of the day, it was the first essay i've ever written for an anthropology course and i was kind of left to my own devices in terms of choosing a topic, so i don't think i did too badly.
of course i'd planned to do more work today, but my brain just shut down and instead i found myself walking around town buying all of these things i've been meaning to buy for weeks (but haven't had time to buy). so i now have new jumpers, new socks, new tights, new pants, new shower gel (well, it's always the same one, but i was running out - i smell of roses!), tissues, cereal, bread... i really want new shoes but i might wait until next week. vans slip-ons are a huge temptation but i might go for some cute, girlier trainers instead.
after that i came home and was doing this and that, and the temptation was too strong and i had a nap. i was good and put the alarm on so i only slept one hour and didn't become a total wreck; after which m came over and we spent some time together. he's gone to london for the night and it feels very, very weird. even though we haven't had spent all of our time together for the past week, we have slept next to each other every single night and now my bed is going to feel kind of empty. i guess i need to be a bit more pragmatic about this, but it's all instincts, you know. i was sitting in the bar with my friends and kept expecting him to appear at the door.
the silliness of it all, it's lovely.
the plan for the weekend is to do lots and lots of work tomorrow and then chill out as much as i can sunday - possibly watching dvds and being cute with m. yes, yes, it's disgusting. i know.
i'm quite worried that i hear of more and more 'spies' from the wolfson world reading this, but i have no desire to censor myself. so people, if you know me, read the disclaimer up there, please. be good. :)

so far 56 pictures of me have been tagged on facebook. they're all from the last six weeks and (i'm afraid) i'm drunk in most of them. maybe i should stop going out so much...
in fact, i have been going out a bit less. that's all to do with the insane amount of work i need to do; but tonight i feel much, much better about it. my anthro essay is worked out and only needs to be written (around 2,000 words since the introduction is done), which can be done tomorrow in a couple of hours. i have a lot of assignments in the next three weeks but i'm confident i'll be ok - book for anthro presentation has been read, stats assignment will be worked out collectively, economics presentation shouldn't be too hard and at least it's interesting, economics essay is only 1,500 words and group assignment should definitely be ok. it's weird how 'not doing a lot' here would really mean 'i'm working so fuckin' hard' somewhere else. i'm enjoying it on some masochistic level though. of course, i still hate half of my courses, but i'll survive. i should be clever enough for that - or otherwise i wouldn't be here right?!?
from a psychological point of view i also feel better - i've come to the conclusion that right now there are two issues i really want to work out in my head: 1. i need to stop whingeing so much (it's in my genes, i swear!) and 2. i need to be a lot less insecure, or maybe, i need to stop unloading my insecurities on people. in a lot of ways i've become much better, but it does annoy me when i get these weird paranoias in my head about how people don't like me. discussing things with m made me realise that the problem simply is that the image i have of myself in my head is completely misleading - in my brain i still feel like the girl i was at 17, with almost no social life, few friends and a lot of inferiority complexes. i haven't quite realised how much i've changed yet. i want to accept this incredibly social, hyperactive, bubbly me that i've been for the past six weeks.
i think this place will make me grow in a variety of ways i could never even have imagined.
and now i'm waiting for m to come back. is it very silly that i haven't slept on my own for... five? six days? i don't even know anymore, i've lost count. waking up next to someone still is the best though (as is kissing).
all this is making me very stressed out, very happy, very fulfilled, very... relaxed. strangely.

here's a photo of me, in my sub-fusc, posing like an idiot in some part of wolfson that i didn't even know existed. this was a couple of weeks ago and in the meantime the trees have gone yellow and the fog has risen from the ground; today as i was walking back from my department through university parks i sang along to lily allen, looked at the sky and grasped the absurdity of this place, if even for just a second. it was an experience to be had... i've never seen so much fog in my life and it does feel like i live in transylvania. i am slowly starting to love this place though, in all of its smallness and pretentiousness, it's actually beautiful (and its people are beautiful too).
what is less beautiful is that i have to write an anthropology essay for friday and am incredibly confused as to what my topic is going to be; constructions of identity, imagined communities, nationalism and indonesia are my main themes, but the ideas end there. hopefully my lecturer will give me some idea of readings i can do... or i'm screwed. i guess that since it doesn't actually count for my final mark i can make a bit of a mess of it - to be honest, i have no idea of how an anthropology essay should be structured, so it seems fair enough. oh, the beauty and weirdness of the oxford system.
now onto other, far more exciting things (edge the spy, i know you're there - you'll like this!) i've realised once again how much of an addicitve personality i have. a weekend spent symbiotically with someone is good for the soul, oh yes it is, but now i have withdrawal symptoms and it's very silly. i guess i've always been one for taking risks and i haven't changed - it seems so worth it that i don't even need to assess whether it's a big risk or not. as i said to m today, i can sleep at some other point in my life.
it is good for the soul. even more than good music or a good novel... more addictive than 'girl with a one-track mind', more fascinating than human trafficking literature. oh yes, i am a weirdo.
that's why you love me. :)

i'm painting my nails bright pink because the halloween bop starts in an hour or so and i'm going as... a wacky witch? probably more like sabrina the teenage witch but well. my costume basically involves wearing as many colours as possible, big earrings, pointy shoes, crazy hair, and that's it. not very creative, i know, but i did decide on it about five minutes ago. :)
today has been a lovely day for a lot of reasons; two which must remain unnamed, and a cd from indonesia from n. peterpan! and the version i was looking for. oh yeah. and some amazing pictures. i really miss asia sometimes (and even sigli) but looking at those pictures just gave me that wonderful feeling of melancholy you get when you look at something you once had but you know you're going to have it again. i can't wait to go to thailand for my fieldwork next summer.
and i'm still grinning like an idiot because of one of the two unnamed things which have happened; and who knew you could feel so comfortable around someone so quickly?
i think this is going to be the conclusion to every single one of my posts for the next two years: i'm stressed out but happy. :)

about to go meet the others to go into town to see borat... i am wearing:
- woollen tights
- one top with no sleeves, one with long sleeves
- jumper, jeans and trainers
- wool jacket
- big cashmere scarf
- long wool gloves
- big wool hat
that's what -1 degrees does to you after you haven't seen winter for a year and a half.
why did i leave south east asia again?

i've just woken up (for the second time) and even though this time (unlike the first time) i am on my own, i have a silly, silly grin on my face.
i'm not even ask if it's right to feel comfortable with someone this quickly. because it's lovely.
i don't have a temperature anymore, which is good news. still have a cold but hopefully that'll go pretty quickly (i'm not drinking nor smoking and that helps!).
off to the library to get some books... i need to do some work and catch up dammit.

so i am ill again; yesterday i left a lecture halfway through because i was tired, and by the time i got home, i had a temperature and felt pretty horrible. the whole of last night was spent being delirious, taking paracetamol every four hours and sleeping. today i feel better, but still pretty faint. have been doing some stats homework, finally. missing all of my classes today though, because there's no way i can walk all the way into town. it's bad, bad. last night i had a moment of panic and started crying because - what if i can't make it? i don't need to be ill on top of everything else and it really scares me how weak my body is. i guess it doesn't help that i haven't actually felt winter in a year and a half (had indonesian tropical weather instead), and also that i haven't had a lot of sleep lately. i need to sort myself out. i really am scared for my mental sanity though. i am losing hope i will make it through even though i know i can...
i need to learn to ask for help, however silly it might be, when i need to. friends are friends, doesn't matter for how long they've been there. right?
and then there's all sorts of other things happening in my life as well; deciding how much to reveal of yourself is always hard, even when you definitely want to. opening up has never been a problem for me (ultimately i am a very trusting person), but now i start having all of these doubts on whether i should be the way i am or not. can i even change? do i even want to change? it's confusing.
which is why i was a bit startled when he asked me inbetween hugs and kisses: 'what do you miss about him?' i had no idea what to say. it's something i've refused to think about for such a long time, mostly to preserve my emotional balance, that it now seems like a violation of my peace of my mind for someone to ask me something like that. but when he did ask i realised that maybe it is something i still need to work out. there has to be a way i can overcome all the bitterness and cynism and finally get to a point where i have some sort of real peace of mind. how can i even involve myself with someone else when i haven't worked these things out? the problem also is that i've accumulated more and more of these open-ended feelings in the last year, just because i couldn't deal with accepting them for what they were. so there's these names going around my head of people i don't really want to be with anymore but that just don't want to leave and they confuse me to no end.
am i even making sense? i still have a temperature so probably not...!
i guess i should go have some lunch. haven't cooked in so long i'm not sure i still know how.
in the end, it all goes back to lily allen (because she is my obsession of the moment):
whenever you see me
you say that you want me back
and I tell you it don't mean jack
no it don't mean jack
i couldn't stop laughing
no I just couldn't help myself
see you messed up my mental health
i was quite unwell
i was so lost back then
but with a little help from my friends
i found the light in the tunnel at the end...
(have i posted these already? probably. oh, it doesn't matter)