Little Stories 288 : June's Social Events & Please Look After Mom

 

The Weekend Events : KL Collectors Market & CAFKL

I didn't plan on this, just decided I would need a day out on a weekend. So I went to KL Gateway for supposedly CAFKL but I was at the wrong venue! Like I said, I didn't plan for it properly, but luckily KL Collector's Market was there. So, powered with caffeine, I explored the event 'almost' calmly - the crowd wasn't that bad because I was early. I didn't find anything interesting worth buying. 

I found Cassian Andor:

Then I went to the next intended event: CAFKL at Fahrenheit 88. 

The crowd was overwhelming, there was a long queue to buy the ticket. I decided to explore Uniqlo first to avoid the crowd (3 levels of Uniqlo). I also bought Totoro's Nekobasu kids' t-shirt and I did embroidery on my sling bag just for fun. I had to wait 1 hour for the customization ❀, so then I went to CAFKL.

The inspiration, the creative side of everything, the booths, and the visual marketing part, were all a bit underwhelming compared to the KL Illustration Fair. I explored the place twice, bought 2 stickers then went out from the event. Got my bag back, and decided to eat at Kagura Bukit Bintang. I went back home afterward because it was raining - missed a chance to stop by at Eslite.

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The Birthday Brunch

It was my dad's 69th birthday. 

So, we got together and cooked something for all of us. 

Been a while since we did this. The whole meal was colourful and beautiful, and it felt so effortless in the kitchen, passing the baton whenever needed between us siblings. I'm still curious about whether we really need a leadership role between us when something as peaceful as this could be achieved when we all know and understand our roles in the family. 

My dad was so happy ‪‪❤︎‬

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Potential for Growth:

Just as one must suffer physical pain to build stronger bones and muscles, one must suffer emotional pain to develop greater resilience. And it's only when we feel intense pain that we're willing to look at our values and question why they seem to be failing us. We need some sort of existential crisis to take an objective look at how we've been deriving meaning in life, and how we can change course. - Mark Manson

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Please Look After Mom by Shin Kyung-Sook:

I finished reading it on the train yesterday. Almost cried in public - it was so heartbreaking. It has been a while since I read a good book (did I also say this when I read The White Castle last April? Hihi). Should give all old books a chance, you might find valuable ones.

It is an old book, published in 2008 - found it at the library and thought why not. I didn't like the writing style, the writer used "you" throughout the whole book and I felt uncomfortable while reading it. Every chapter came from a different character, using the Rashomon effect, to give different perspectives of the same event: from the daughter, the son, the husband, and the missing mom herself, and ended with an epilogue.

Short synopsis: Please Look After Mom is a stunning, deeply moving story of a family's search for their missing mother - and their discovery of the desires, heartaches, and secrets they never realized she harbored within.

It makes me question the silent sacrifices all mothers make for their families. Yes, you, your sacrifices for the well-being of your children - we all know about it, it is something expected from us, as a mother. I lie awake at night thinking whether I do enough. 

Random: You know, lately, Sofi has been having leg pain at night so I massage her legs before going to sleep while reading ayat2 pendinding with her. I'm assuming she is in another stage of her growth spurt, so she's eating a lot, started having growing pain and nighttime is a bit hard since these past few weeks. I explained to her last night that she is turning 5 soon, her body is changing and growing, so the leg pain is because her bones are getting longer and stronger. She became chatty and excited, instead of whiny, re-explaining to me that she is getting taller now and turning 5 soon, in 5 weeks ‪‪❤︎ ‬

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Little Stories 287 : I Don't Have Anything Else Other Than Books

I was again, at the library.

Last weekend, I went there with Ms Chin, thinking that I finally show her the library where I borrowed books - but it was closed (the first Saturday of the month, a rookie mistake). So, we had brunch, spent some time at the CM, got my bracelets fixed and we just walked around window shopping. Then we went to Kino, I bought some books because I wanted something tangible and she bought books because well, she could.

4 days later, I took another ride to KL to return the books that I borrowed weeks ago and made another small promise of not borrowing anything before Raya. But, apparently, I don't follow my own rules and brought back another 3 books after the library visit :F

Books that I bought :

• Novelist As Vocation by Haruki Murakami (paperback version, I need to have a copy even though I listened to the audiobook already)
• Must I Go by Yiyun Li (beautiful cover, beautiful writing) 

Books that I borrowed:

• Gratitude by Oliver Sacks (finished reading in one sitting at a cafe after the library trip) - 4 essays from a dying man
• Please Look After Mom by Kyong Sook-Shin 
• The History of Love by Nicole Krauss

Gratitude:

I've never read any of his other books, borrowed this one because I love reading writer's essays compilations (or journals) - something true to themselves, instead of fiction. In Gratitude, he wrote 4 essays before his final day, and there is something beautiful about saying goodbye to the world:

“There will be no one like us when we are gone, but then there is no one like anyone else, ever. When people die, they cannot be replaced. They leave holes that cannot be filled, for it is the fate—the genetic and neural fate—of every human being to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death. I cannot pretend I am without fear. But my predominant feeling is one of gratitude. I have loved and been loved; I have been given much and I have given something in return; I have read and traveled and thought and written. I have had intercourse with the world, the special intercourse of writers and readers. Above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal, on this beautiful planet, and that in itself has been an enormous privilege and adventure.” - Oliver Sacks

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Funny Not Funny Thing:

I've been fooled twice by this "company" that wanted to hire me full-time. I almost worked with them for a full year now, thinking every month that I would finally get a proper contract from them. But I didn't receive any, my salary (or "freelancer's payment) was really hard to get, and nothing was protecting me from anything because I didn't sign anything. 

I was left hoping and waiting every month, and I had to beg to get my payment. So this week, after 3 whole weeks of begging him to pay for my 2 months' salary, I decided to just be honest to my "boss" and say the real truth as I would if he were not my boss. 

The thing is, fooled once is a mistake, but if fooled twice, it is totally on me.

If misery can be visibly stacked, the tower would probably reach the Merdeka 118.

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Song of the week: