in memory

just remembered that i used to have a goldfish in high school.
it was a fish won from a kingyo-sukui game (thats goldfish scooping game to you aliens. its a famous game at fairs and stuff)
i was in form 5 and it was during our schools annual foreign language celebration day.
(i manned the french language DJ booth. great fun)

it was a small fella, cute as hell. (actually it looked pretty much like all the other goldfish but being owned by me made the goldfish extra cute by one point)
i named it Chiisana Taiko that means 'small drum'
how cute is that.
i kept it in a altered 1.5L empty coke bottle (it was plenty big for him, trust me)
and fed it urm, stuff.
i made a funky name card to put next to the bottle and brought home water plants from the school ponds.
we talked and laughed and played together.
great times.

then one day (2 weeks later)
chiisana went belly up.
i was shocked and sad and seriously considering of following my goldfish to the other side.
but i overcame my grief and organized a funeral cause i know he would want me to be strong and because i couldnt have a dead fish floating in a bottle on top of my locker now, can i?
the funeral was a solemn yet beautiful affair. just me and fifie, my sister(chiisana's half sister, different mother. and father. and species) was there.
we picked a prime spot for his final resting place. (near the clothes lines, its grassy and breezy and theres some pretty flowers nearby)
we said some prayers, shed some brave tears as i slowly lowered him to the earth, in a beautiful wooden coffin(i took a match box and beautified it).
fifie and i held hands, drawing strength from each other.
and after the funeral we went to the dining hall to have dinner.
we had fried fish.

here's to Chiisana Taiko.
a friend, a brother, a fish.
you would never be forgotten.

IN LOVING MEMORY;
CHIISANA TAIKO SHUHAIME
(2000-2000)

how to kill a baby houseplant

my houseplant, Dhaun is dying.
we are having yellowing, wilted leaves, spots, scorched stalks, the works.
leaves count are down 13% since last week.
i was literally going insane trying to figure out what am i doing wrong.
and Dhaun is supposed to be the no-fuss-leave-it-alone-it'll-just-grow kinda plant.
how hard is it to keep a house plant from dying?
what kind of incompetent idiot would kill a house plant?
i was hoping to prove (to myself) that should i succeed in rearing Dhaun (bountiful green glossy leaves, creeping thick vines) i would upgrade to keeping a pet, maybe a fish.
at this rate the fish would die before you could say 'stanley'.

am thinking it might be the tap water im giving it, so i switched to watering Dhaun with mineral water.
(RM5.30 evian water in fact. shut up)
cant say its working, Dhaun's still shedding leaves.
thinking that maybe it was not getting enough sunlight, eventhough the labels says Dhaun only needs half sunlight.
so now, every morning i would leave Dhaun at the window sill, hoping it would catch some second hand sunshine (what sunshine is after the people in better room locations are done with it)
but Dhaun still persists in dying.

but last night, after snipping away another load of wilted, mutated leaves from Dhaun's anorexic, scrawny body, i wondered if Dhaun is perhaps suicidal.
i wouldnt blame it, i know i wouldnt want to be a houseplant under my care. but as deranged as i am to buy imported water and talk to a potted plant, i am not deranged enough to think a plant would have any common concious sense. yet.
im killing my houseplant and i dont know how.
then, accidently my sleeve snagged the end of the table and almost tipped over Dhaun's funky orange pot.
it didnt fell but the sloshing sound it made me wonder.
in the orange clay pot, under the plastic underwear pot, apparently theres urm, some excess water. by 'some' i mean there's enough water to flood Ghobi desert.
ive been tad overzealous in watering my plant that the roots are dying from water rot.
ahem. dying slowly being pickled in the swampy soil. ugh.
death by evian.
wow.

im still getting a fish soon though. because theres no way i'd overwater a fish.
unless i find some other moronic way to eff that up.
cause of death: excessive caring. overly loved to death.
snort. thats just great.

team building

went to some country resort last week for team building training.
the place is pretty awesome considering we didnt cross state border.
didnt think it was that helpful (the training, not the state border).
but i still had fun.
i won 'Miss Gung-Ho' at the end, but i think they were just giving it to me so i dont feel left out.
there were only three girls and we all won something.
i dont think the facilitator liked me that much. but its okay, the feelings mutual.
the pictures suck but only because we took it with wahidahs nifty camera phone.
my phone cant take pictures, it can toast bread though. can your nokia do that?

with wahidah, she's in operation.

we 'graduated'. snort.

(l-r) miss helpful, miss take, miss congeniality

the resort. pretty trees. pretty cool place