My Dear Ahma

My dear ahma,
It's been a month or so since you are gone,
I have missed you so much and I hope you're reading my mind,
As tears stream down my face with all these messages I'm writing of you.

I was never taken care by you like others who were,
Sometimes I wonder what do you think of me,
Even though you were very fond of all your grandchildren.

At the balcony you pointed at the forest,
Do you see that dinosaur?
It protects us at night,
At the balcony you would light up firecrackers,
To shoo those bloody monkeys that partied in the house.

From the very first memory you were a hunched lady,
And so Ma said if you don't stand straight you will end up like Ahma,
It was during puberty, and those words are always true.

Your face was already wrinkly when I started remembering you,
She held two passion fruit and said to Ma
This is you and this is me,
One of the hilarious moments ever.

I knew it will be the last time seeing you last summer,
There wasn't much I could do,
I just hope I made you happy and bring you less pain,
You would wave to me in the morning,
And then I set off to work.

It was dawn and I had to leave abroad,
I bid you farewell and yet you thought I was just going somewhere near,
Holding back the fear and feelings, I left.
Unwanting, unwillingly, but that's what I have to do.

19th - Full of Surprises

Hi everyone and welcome to my first birthday blog post,

I turned ninteen on Friday 16th August 2013. On the day before my birthday, I was thinking about what to do and my friends at university asked,

"Hey Shu, what are you doing for your birthday?"

"Err.. Nothing much," 

"Let's go for a movie for your birthday! The movie 'Now You See Me' looks good from the trailer," 

I was like yeah, why not a movie? I love movies and popcorn. So I set a birthday plan in my mind, a normal, quiet birthday with my friends. Just a good movie and nothing big. 

I went home in the evening that day. As soon as I step on the porch, I smelled something so fresh and mouth-watering from the house. I entered and found everyone in the kitchen and dining area. 

"What are you guys making? It smells so good!" I asked.

"Oh Joy made a tuna sandwich," Nicy explained. 

"Ahh I see, I'm gonna go up and put my bag." I headed upstairs without further questions or curiosity. 

The whole evening was just normal afterwards I thought. Christal was in her room doing her ab circle pro workout. It was to cover talking noises cause she and Joy were actually discussing about my later birthday surprise. After a while, me the ruiner knocked on the door wanting to join them. They stopped immediately and switched topic. I made Joy workout for real instead of pretending. Haha. 

After dinner, all of us including Nicy were in Christal's room. Nicy insisted on straightening my hair (which got wavy soon after). Before the hot iron touched me someone knocked on our door. 

"Joyyyyyy! I think it's Ben at the door to get his book back, can you please help me pass the book to him? Its on my desk." I requested. 

"Okay, I got it." Joy replied and went down downstairs with the book. 

After a few seconds I heard murmuring noises downstairs and thought there's a problem. I quickly got up and walked out of Christal's room to go check what was wrong. Guess who I saw? My dear sister from Wellington! I was so stunned for a moment, I thought it was someone else, anyone else but my sister. I had no idea, no expectation she would come! And for the next 5 minutes I was just shrieking and hugging her, asking how why what she doing here. And there goes the first surprise.

We all settled down. Sister and I had our baths and stayed in my room. She wanted to paint her nails so that I was kept in my room and not walking around. I said "okay, let's paint your nails!"

And so we sat on the floor, picking what colour to put on my sister's nails. Then outside my room, Nicy, Joy, Christal and Emily were running around, whispering, laughing and rushing to set up my birthday celebration at 12am.

"What are they doing now??" I got up and opened the door to see what's happening. I regretted. I opened my door and found purple balloons all the way downstairs. I turned to look at my sister and she hustled me, "Come here and sit down! They are giving you a surprise you idiot." OOPS!

After one minute Nicy slipped a piece of paper with words 'Follow the balloon trail!' written on it. I actually didn't know what and how to feel. I already knew they were going to surprise me. I thought I knew how the surprise was going to be. But not at all. I followed the balloon trail. At half way Nicy came up and wore a birthday hat and a furry butterfly hair band on me. Funny combination. I couldn't see anything yet until everyone was ready and Nicy announced,

"Here comes the birthday girl!!!!!"
This happened and there goes the second surprise.

Remember that I said something so good and tasty when I reached home? They were baking the cake! They tried so hard to hide it from me. Poor cake came out from the oven and started a whole journey. It was taken out, put on the counter, on toilet bowl, in Joy's wardrobe, in another house, on the washing machine and finally on the table ready for celebration. See, it travelled the 'world'. It was hilarious.

So they say, the first piece of cake is for me and it has to be fed by family.
More like stuffing the cake into my mouth hahah.

And then, I feed my family!

"Hold on there, something else has to be done...", Nicy walked to the pantry, grabbed the chocolate sauce and did this to me.

Joy: "We are now the same colour!"

Yeap. Thank you very much.

You want asian peace? I give you asian peace. Peace!

Hey there Madonna.

Peeps who own house 5.  'Fivers', we call ourselves. 

We love each other cause we CRAY CRAY. 

Emily with us. Thank you so much for coming!
The cake was hidden in her house. Haha.

Me and sister! 

Oh oh UNICORNS!

"Joy.. stop laughing. Seriously."

Kinda failed Maori faces.

Balloons make me happy. 

Cutting the cake for everyone.
Lemon passion fruit syrup cake, so yum. 

Joy and Christal.

PRESENT TIME!!!!! Hehehe..

My right hand was holding this sweet pea flavoured hand lotion from sister. Didn't know sweet pea can be a flavour for lotions. Smells nice! 

And my left hand was holding nail art stamps and rhinestones from Joy and Christal.
"Nails can you please grow faster? I want to paint and decorate you,"
Girl excitement!

Body shop 30 dollars gift card from Christal and family. Shopping time!

Ooh something green!

A bag from sister. Love the design. 

"Beanie?? But winter's almost over!" 

It's actually a head band! Handy for me in tennis. I hate the wind blowing on my ears and made them so cold. This will keep my ears warm. Yay.

The Cadbury Roses chocolates on the table are from Nicy and Ishan. They are yummm.
And another present.. 

A white dress! Really pretty. 

See how gorgeous it is!
Short front long back.

Detail at the top. Love it.

I also received cards. Thank you so much guys.
They are all nicely pinned on my notice board now.

Now remember that my uni friends and I were going to watch a movie? WE DIDN'T. This is what happened:

On my birthday itself I had a finance test. So I went to uni and spent a whole day there with my friends preparing for it. Cjantra my very first friend made in uni and also my course mate, gave me cute little red velvet cupcake. I don't have a picture cause I ate it already. Lol. Anyway after our test which is around 8pm, I quickly gathered up with my friends and told them we have to grab something to eat and rush for the 8.40pm movie. So there was me, Cjantra, Taylor and Morre going from uni and we were to meet my house mates and sister at the cinema.

We reached the mall and parked the car. Cjantra and Taylor told me we all should find something to eat. We started walking pass fancy bars and restaurants, then we reached this Mexican bar called 'Mama Loco'.

"Are you guys sure you wanna eat here? We don't have time to wait for the food.." I said anxiously.

"Yeah yeah eat here. We'll have time don't worry!" Taylor replied relaxedly.

"Err.. okay then. " I said.

In my mind I was like "Oh damn we are definitely missing the movie", I mean how can you eat in a bar or restaurant in less than 20 mins? We haven't even bought our tickets! I followed them into the bar. At the biggest table on the left corner, was everybody!

"SURPRISE!!!" They all yelled.

I was laughing so hard and feeling dumb at that time. I worried about the movie for nothing. We were not even going to watch it in the first place. Apparently when I reached home Thursday evening and told Nicy and Joy about the movie, Nicy messaged Cjantra immediately.

"No don't go to the movie! We have booked this Mexican bar on Friday night to surprise Shu! Don't go please!" Haha.

Food was okay and considered cheap. Had a good time.

Mexican hat for the birthday girl!

The food took so long. I just simply had to eat someone else's food. Look at Nicy, we were so hungry.

Cheese!

Izzy! 

Here's sis. She didn't want to go back to Wellington haha. Come again!

Why you so shy la Christal? 

Hahaha. You go girl!

Group photo. It feels kinda cool to have a 'Reserved' plate on your table.
The waitress who took this for us got annoyed.. 

My BABES.

We all went back home. I was exhausted. Yet they gave me a task before the day ends: 19 shots for being 19 years old. And I did it!

Izzy got us her skull-shape shot glasses, really cool.

Shot by shot. My tummy felt so cold.

These are the homemade strawberry vodka jelly shots. Didn't get me drunk.
One skull glass was counted as two shots.
So I had 7 skull glass shots and 5 smaller ones.
It was fun.

Finally my birthday ended and we all went to bed. Thought everything was over but it wasn't. Next day in the morning I woke up to this:

A handmade birthday card from buddies in hometown!
Thank you so much guys, I feel so loved and touched.

To all my friends, see you all end of the year!

And that's all for my 19th birthday. For those who wished me, thank you. I love you all, you all made me one of the luckiest girl in this world. I couldn't wish for more. Life has been great so far and I'm truly grateful for that. Okay bye! Hope to see you all next time.