"You ask Wati to cook the food for you to bring out for what?"

"To eat lah."

"After your tuition you are not coming back? What are you going to do?"

"I'll go buy the memory card for korkor, then i'll go early to airport."

"How much time you need to buy the card? What time is his flight?"

"Eleven plus."

----------------- silence for a while ----------------------------------

"the person who has a car doesnt go out and buy the card, the one who doesnt have the car goes to buy it instead. i ask you, worth it a not?! waste so much time travelling! "

"i think its worth it. i can travel 4 rides on mrt every day "
(thinks to myself. i dont mind buying it at all what. maybe papa's tired so he doesnt wanna go out? or he has other things to do? in any case, i volunteered to buy it. he didnt ask me to. what's the probem?)

---------------------- silence again for a while ---------------------

"After your tuition you should come home and rest! then after that go to the airport earlier. i find that you dont know how to plan your time!"

silence from me. i continue eating and reading my book.
(thinks to myself. what makes you think that i can't rest outside? you dont even know that i'm planning to go early to airport and study first. and there's no point trying to explain that to you cos i think you'll just reply something about studying at home also can/is best/whatever. as you always do. and. coming home wont be restful if you are always on the war path, so confrontational about everything...)

hais. this exchange took place after i caused my mum to tear. we were having some heated discussion (i admit i was in the wrong for replying her in a raised voice and so agitatedly.it always gets liddat with my mum. i have to try very hard to put my point across to her, and in doing so i get all heated up. upon seeing the tears in her eyes as she exclaimed,"You dont talk like this to me ok!" i subsided, and felt bad. its definitely not that i wanna make her angry or be disrespecful... i was just trying to bring my point across. home is a miserable place to be in if there are people going around picking faults and all. and though there's reason a plenty in the things she says, the way she brings it across is very... SIGH. after a while went up to her and started saying. "mum, i'm angry with myself for making you angry but..." b4 i could finish whatever i wanted to say she turned away and went to her room. ok yes i can understand that i hurt her. wanted to write her a note... but after that exchange.. i think never mind la... anyway things are always like this at times. it was so much worse in the past, so much so that i frustratedly scrawled in my diary that i understood how my parents NEEDED to scold me cos they're sadistic and so they'll only be happy when they scold me. i'm serious. it was so bad in sec school. and now, learning about early childhood education... i wonder that if my mum had employed all those right methods of educating me in the past, whether i would fall so far from her expectations now. then again, i dont think its in her character to know how to bring up children that way, even if she was taught. i really feel that because of the way she herself was brought up, she feels that authority is authority, and cannot accept it when we kinda dont accept her authority over some issues, in the sense that we have different views fomr her and we try to tell her. she doesnt understand how times now are different in that these days, more people subscribe to the belief that respect must be earned. so saying, it doesnt mean we dont honour our parents of course... but it does lead to tricky situations cos children these days wont just sit back and let their parents dictate their lives for them. right? hais. ah wells.)

do i sound very un-christian-like here? hais.

for what it's worth, i'm sorry, mom. not that you'll ever see this la but still.

anyway, in the midst of this entry, my dad came to speak to me. he understood totally where i was coming from, but he reiterated this point to me, that we cant change another's person behaviour, but we can change how we respond to that person. ah wells.

after that earlier heated exchange i had with my mum, i wondered, how would my bro have reacted to us if he was here? would he scold me for talking like this to my mum, or would he keep quiet, or would he try to explain to my mum my point of view? then again, if he was here, he would be scolded too... kor, um was scolding me about the toilet. how it was so dirty. and how we (u, me , papa) still happily used it. this, amongst other cleanliness related issues. like the everlasting hooha about my room, which i resent today because i just tidied up my room a week back and it looks fine to me! sheesh.

am i gonna be liddat when i become a mother as well?

HAIS.