Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Oh damn. Where do I start?
I haven't blogged in over a year. Two years if you count regular posting. Damn. Two years of undocumented days. Haha... and what an eventful two years it has been. Well, first and foremost, Sharon and I broke up. That explains my free time and freedom to blog, lol. Naturally I'll be posting about it, but not yet. I guess I'll chronicle everything I can and post it, but I'm not going to make it available for public viewing. There's a lot of sensitive information out there and it's not information I can freely let anyone read, because it concerns the deepest, darkest parts of two people. Like I've said before, I don't mind revealing things I've done, but when it comes to the heart of another person, I'm not privy to release that to public knowledge.
Anyway, I guess I should recap a bit? There's a lot I didn't record down. I guess when I feel like it I'll type down the details, but for now, a summary should do. Really, long summaries of so much that's happened.
Well, job-wise I joined, and later, quit Canvas Art Creative, the job I was working with Fei Yan; her dad and mom's company. It was a photo-restoration company, so people would bring in really old photos that needed to be touched up and the designers would do that. It was very satisfying to see how happy people were when they could see their old memories clear and printed. I also helped dictate letters on behalf of my boss to Sultans and royalty because we did a lot of work for very prominent and powerful people. The photo restoration helped keep my Photoshop skills sharp and I learned quite a bit too. I really liked the environment, but the pay was really, really low. So I went to work for my old college, The One Academy. It was funny as hell working in my college, because as much as it tortured me and I had so many lecturers I didn't like, I learned a lot from it. It taught me a lot of skills and the college is highly regarded. I was a graphic designer there but I helped extensively in copywriting and photography, even though they weren't under my job title. Lotsa drama there, especially in regards to the manger Teresa, who really pissed me off a lot, and Chin Wee, basically the vice-principal, who also was a major dweeb. Learnt a lot about the drama of my former lecturers who were now officially my colleagues. On equal footing now! Heh. Work there was very tiring and they gave a lot of assignments. I left the office very late on most nights but there were perks from guest speakers I could watch and listen to. I managed to make back half of my school fees before resigning due to another issue with Teresa. I had a freelance copywriting job with JobsCentral, a rival job portal to JobStreet, who I eventually joined full time as a writer cum designer. And that's where I've stayed till now. I've made a lot of close friends from my colleagues and it's been a pretty fun environment so far, challenging but rarely ridiculous workload. I write articles and mailers and design visuals for said articles and any other things I'm given.
Band-wise, I totally forgot if I mentioned this, but Forsake Me Not disbanded because of issues with Joseph Stanley, and we are no longer friends. The rest of the band reformed as Ataraxia, which was eventually modified to be Ataraxique, due to us sharing the name with a metal band in New Jersey, as well as a neo-classical band from Italy. Ataraxique was also a much more unique name easier to find, so we stuck with it. We recruited Gerard, Pip's brother's childhood friend as our guitarist. Later on due to a conflict of interest and direction with Harish, we decided to kick him out and recruited Johan, Maosun's ex-guitarist. So yeah, it's become a full-fledged band that's become such a joy. No arguments, perfect example of democracy in a band setting and great music being made. As Forsake Me Not we were playing metalcore but we decided to play progressive metal as Ataraxique. And as the bassist (oh, I became the bassist, did I mention?) , I need to follow Chris' insane odd time signatures and complicated as hell beats. It's a band full of talented individuals, minus me, lol. We've got Chris as the drummer, who loves Symphony X and odd time signatures and complicated beats. He's played drums for 10 years. Then we have Sharon, who's the keyboardist who was classically trained since like, 4 or something. Damn young age to start. Then Gerard, who's a fantastic guitarist influenced by Lamb of God and has been played for almost 10 years. Then Johan, the best guitarist I've seen in my life who plays insane solos and harmonies; he's learned theory and played for 20 years. Then Pip is the all rounder who can play bass, drums and is learning guitar and he's the vocalist, with a big passion for music. And I"m the ex-keyboardist who took lessons for like, 8 months or something at a pop music school, and became the bassist because there wasn't anyone else. Lol. So as you can see, they play at a level far beyond what I'm capable of and I need to constantly catch up. I learn advanced and basic stuff at the same time because I was never trained musically. But the band is doing very well with the current formation. We have become quite well known and played many gigs, and so far people really enjoy what we play. We also launched our self-titled EP which is doing very well in sales, and we had a EP launch in Penang, courtesy of Nonserviam's Leon helping us organize it. We've got more shows upcoming in Singapore and Johor Bahru, thanks to Harris, boss of TFHM. Oh, we got signed by TFHM, so they're our label now.
In regards to friends I still hang out with Symposium regularly. Less frequently compared to last time but the hours spent are much longer. We've slowly moved away from having symposiums at our houses and instead buy bottles and drink and Ming Tien. We've also severely slowed down our dare games like The King and I and the such, although they come in once in a while. I mean, technically, most of the group has already made out with each other. Lol. Maxi, Nissa, Sharon, Izhak (Redzuan's brother) and Jeremy (Justin's brother) have all joined Symposium officially, while we are no longer friends with Aaron, Michelle and Masayo. Details on that for another time. Essenism meets up once every few months now to catch up for the entire day, although there's meet ups here and there in between the individuals. Henry and Ivan still aren't friends after 5 years. Fei Yan is no longer friends with Shana, and her friendship with Ai Li is just formality. I still catch up with her here and there. My colleagues at work have become more or less friends as we play badminton weekly, have company trips, go to the gym, and hang out a lot more than I ever with with my previous colleagues. A lot of social activity which really helps to bond the colleagues, and I enjoy a lot of it. I meet up with my Singapore friends much less due to working. I don't have the benefits of holidays to go down 3 times a year, so it's shortened down to once a year, although I'll try to make it a long trip to make the most of it.
Family-wise, it's stable, I guess? My dad broke up with his girlfriend, and my mom broke up with Uncle Ben, so after having two moms and two dads, I'm back to one each, lol. Zoe went back to Canada to study journalism, but her attitude hasn't improved (in fact it's gotten worse), although her vocabulary has. She has driven everyone in Canada nuts, and my relatives there regret asking her to come back, and so desperately ask me to come back instead. Lmao. I'm not ready to leave everything behind to go back there yet. I visit my dad on some holidays when I go back down to JB. While I was with Sharon I didn't get a chance to visit my grandaunt weekly, like I used to, but now we've broken up, I'm making the effort to catch up on lost time. Oh, my relatives from Canada came to Seremban for two weeks, where I got to meet my paternaol aunt, grandmother (my paternal grandfather passed away last year), aunt from Australia and her husband. It's been 10 years since I've seen them. It was a wonderful catch up. It's also where I got most of my information on Zoe, who's become perhaps one of the most despicable people in the world I've ever known.
And lastly, me. I've learned a lot in the last two years. I've been reading novels a lot less, but I've made up for it in reading scientific journals and debates, atheistic, Christian, Satanic, Islamic and so many more. I've learned so much more on religions and philosophy and my Christian faith has matured. It's also been changed a lot more compared to my faith when I first converted. I've long abandoned creationism, and after looking at the evidence it's clear evolution by natural selection is the method we arose. I support theistic evolution, influenced by Francis Collins book The Language of God. Also, I'm no longer agnostic in regards to homosexuality. I believe it's fine, and not a sin. I had long been troubled because my friend Gordon was gay and believed that Christianity condemned homosexuality and because of that he left church. At the time I never knew what to say because in a blanket sense its what I thought was true, until I saw his struggle. I personally believed it was okay but I thought the Bible disagreed. And so I began researching and reading up on to so much material that you'd probably think I was gay because of how much I read into it. And I've come to the conclusion that it's not a sin. I'm outright open and affirming. My views on the Bible have also changed. I still see it as the Word of God, yes, but it was oral tradition long before being written and canonized. So anachronisms exist and copying errors exist because man wrote it, however under divine inspiration, not dictation. A lot of the general rules and traditions are important, but not always biblical, but can be good to follow. My knowledge of Christian history has also vastly improved with what I've read and learned. The horrors, the good, and how it changed the world in its various ways. I no longer see smoking as sinful, but don't like it because it smells and tastes bad. A lot of things I would've seen as black and white 10 years ago have become grey. I still don't swear because I think its inappropriate, and even the Bible contains curse words. However it's a part of human nature to swear and I understand it. However I myself won't, and I won't encourage it but neither do I condemn it.
I've become a lot more knowledgeable about many topics as well, mainly in regards to science, religion, philosophy and history. It's funny that I've become to go-to source for a lot of people in regards to these topics, because I don't see myself as an expert on these topics because I learned from other sources, people who would seem to be much more knowledgeable than me. However I've become fascinated with these topics and sometimes I go overboard, heh. Like I'm asked about the kiss of Judas and I end up explaining how it was difficult to identify Jesus because he looked like his disciples, Jewish men, and not the blonde, white guy. This also applies to fictional examples. When I was asked about the T-Virus in Resident Evil I ended up explaining into the Progenitor Virus, Alexander Ashford and Veronica Ashford. I've become much more intellectual, and as a result I get pissed off when people don't know basic science or history (I know way too many people who didn't know who Hitler was). I've also become very egoistical, though not to the point of obnoxiousness. As in, I'm very clear on what I know, what I can do and the capability if I'm confident. But I also know my limits and still keep my humbleness. Pretty contradictory, I know. I suppose because I know a lot more now I'm aware of fallacies and logic and stuff that most people may not know. And I get annoyed when people can't grasp a concept, although my reaction depends on their attitude. I'm nice to nice retards, and very, very mean to snide retards. I've become very addicted to learning as much as I can and remembering facts, dates, and events. It's what drives me to read so much more, at the cost of stories and novels, which I still try to keep a healthy dose of.
So yeah. That's me and my life in a short summary. Not really short, but eh. A lot happened. I haven't changed so much, but more like... gone the extreme end of intellectual thought. Emotionally? I've learned a lot, but that comes later, when I go into detail with Sharon. Let's keep my blogging regular again, shall we?
Chronicled
9:51 AM
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