peeps. i need help. please, the next time i go out with any of you guys. please please please don’t let me into popular, borders, pageone or kinokuniya atau apa sahaja yang sewaktu dengannya. please don’t let me see them, don’t even let me smell them. (trust me, i could smell a bookstore just like zaimah can smell an adidas store;) *zaimah, gurau aje*)

seriously. i’ve been spending on books! and i’ve been borrowing books like there’s no tomorrow, and now i can’t choose which book to read first!!! (tu lah, orang kata jangan tamak…. ada ker tamak buku??)

books i’ve been buying just this month:

and i’m not even a jodi picoult’s fan!! i have yet to finish reading dina zaman’s book even at the moment!

so please people, DO NOT let me inside a bookstore!! well, until next payday.

today is romo’s birthday. we bought him some new shirts, and what matters most was his silent smile and happiness.

Little Nuri left for India last Saturday, i am truly proud of her for being chosen to participate in this some sort of student exchange programme. and we miss her already~ Nuri, kakak miss you soooo muuccchhh! takde orang nak kacau malam2!!! takde orang nak hug kakak! 😦

and oh yeah peeps, i am now officially a student of comfort delgro driving school or whatever it is named, i am so going to learn driving!!! but hey, firstly have to take Final theory test (apparently, basic test result is still valid after like what, 4 years??) which is waaayyy in december.

see? 7th and 6th on the list done. i really should have put them ascendingly, descendingly, whateverlah, so upside down seh!

counting the days to the date……with my petals.

i apologise for feeling rather melancholic this fine morning. While most people would be wearing nice baju kurungs and kebayas visiting family and friends. i have a class to teach this afternoon. but that’s not the reason for this temperament.

but the sudden remembrance to those faithful departed. especially my nenek and atok, yayi and nyayi. always. always. when its syawal, our memories to the beloveds, never fail to greet me and family. and the whole of ramadan, our conversations would always include memories with them. it could be nenek today, atok the next day and then yayi. there’s always some memories to reminisce! me and family truly missed them alot. we lost our pillar of strength when we lost them, and losing my late uncle was the last straw. the only uncle, despite his flaws, the only uncle who truly cared about my family, my mom being his little sister. i just missed them. raya had never been the same happy days as when they were here. never.

in the past, there’s always a destination every morning. there’s always the two places that we must go without fail. there’s always something to look forward to. now, even years after they’re gone, we had not gotten over the fact that we seem to have no place to go. no one to turn to. the first days of syawal, usually spent at my grandparents houses, are replaced with great nyayi and grand aunt, and my father’s eldest brother and sister’s house. they could never replace the same sincere happiness. they just don’t. seeing other people with their grandparents, i always had this pulling effect, like something pulling my heart, squeezing it deep into the core. i wish my grandparents and uncle are still here. i wish. because they are the ones who truly care.

silently torn, deteriorating, communication breakdown, i grew up witnessing these. it hurts. it frustrates. it’s mental anger. but who am i to say.

i miss sleeping beside nenek, and her lifestory as my bedtime stories. her happy days, her sadness, her disappointments, her strength and independence, taking the bus alone to come to our house. her eagerness to see her grandchildren. her frail thin frame showing no signs of elderly exhaustion. accompanying her to the market or to religious class at a nearby house. and her last days, her high fever, my father bearing her on his back walking all the way to the clinic. and losing her.

i miss sitting beside my atok, watching the news from his small tv in his room, a cup of coffee a must, his thick specs. visiting him at his workplace at the old plaza singapura, celebrating his last birthday there, with a cake at mcdonalds. his eyes shining behind those specs, his true happiness being with us. and you know what, going to plaza singapura now hurts alot, because the place has changed, totally, there’s no more that small corner, where my atok usually sat, guarding the jewellery store, that one chair he sat, i could imagine now, him sitting there, but now, none of that. his stays at our house in his last years. and losing him.

nek, atok, your dreams and prayers of seeing me complete my studies. i did it nek, i did it atok. but you are not here to see me now. but i did it. for you.

i miss listening to the conversations of my nyayi and father. listening to him talking in javanese, and losing the chance of learning mother tongue from him. a respected man he is, i was so grateful and proud that he is my nyayi, that i’m his granddaughter. my mother sometimes reminded me how he used to hold me in his hands, when i was still a toddler, cradling me to sleep and reciting prayers to my ears and eventually falling asleep himself. i miss his silence. and losing him.

i miss my uncle. the only uncle who showed care and concern towards me and my brother. he had his flaws definitely, but he is still the uncle who fetched me from school, and as soon as i called him, when i was feeling sick, he would come driving his taxi, fetched and brought me home. i always argued with him because of his smoking. his last days. sadly alone. and losing him.

i’ll remember days with them. we will always remember days with them. and nothing can change the fact that they are not here. yet, they are still here with us. our silent tears every 1st day of syawal. always on our minds. always will. i never stop missing them. never will.

al-fatihah to my faithful departed.