Okay…it’s story time!

In 2003, I was in my second semester of the first year of university. A few days before Valentine’s Day, I received messages from Rob asking me if I was going to be home on Friday. Valentine’s Day fell on a Friday that year and I didn’t have class on Fridays for that semester so I always went home on Thursday nights. 

We were “friends” at the time, albeit we were already flirting with each other a bit. ;))

Okay, “a bit” may be an understatement.

I enjoyed chatting with him online. I found him to be funny and sweet. I’m pretty sure at the time sparks were flying all over cyberspace between the two of us. So Rob and I made plans to spend some time chatting on Valentine’s Day. He told me he had planned something for me involving a series of ecards so I should be sitting in front of the computer to receive them right away. I found that interesting so I promised him I would be home all day.

I was never prepared for the events that were to happen on that fateful day.

At about 8.30am the Friday of Valentine’s Day, I was awaken from deep slumber by a phone call from the courier services. Apparently they were going to deliver something to the house. I was confused, who would send me a package? Fifteen or so minutes later, I hear a honk outside the house.

There was a van and a man stepped out of the van with a bouquet of roses. Wait a minute, I thought. That’s the courier man? Holy crap, those are a lot of roses! I sign for the flowers, trying to figure out who they were from and at the same time a series of “OHMYGOD!” went through my head.

There was a card. It said:

 ”Shin, you are a wonderful girl, with beautiful eyes and a lovely voice. You are a blessing to this world and a miracle in my life. I adore you sunshine.”

My heart melted for a split second but excitement overtook me. Never in my life have I received flowers of that magnitude! I rushed up to my room, to the laptop and started messaging Rob like crazy. My messages consisted of mostly “OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG! OMG!”

On the other side of the world (I was later told), Rob was talking with his friend over dinner when his phone started to beep and vibrate like crazy. He flipped open his phone to find messages from me going absolutely insane and he smiled with pure satisfaction. His friend was laughing at the rate of messages that were coming in to his phone. After we exchanged messages back and forth for a bit (I was the one sending most of the messages) I calmed down a little bit.

Less than an hour after the roses arrived, I hear another honk outside. I rushed to see who it was and again there was van! A man stepped out of the car with a package in hand asking for me. Shocked, I sign for the package and went into the house. The sender; Rob! I opened the package to find two toy ladybugs facing each other, touching at the lips. My first instinct was to pull both apart with my hands. A string formed between them as I pull them further apart.

I let go and suddenly, smooching sounds! The ladybugs started moving towards each other, all the while making smooching sounds, and saying “I love you”. It went like this; “*kiss*kiss*kiss* I love you *kiss*kiss*kiss* I love you” over and over again until their lips touched. I was laughing so hard at this point because it was just the cutest thing ever.

I rushed back upstairs once more and messaged Rob like crazy, again. At this rate his phone would’ve exploded from the heat of the vibrations, if that gives you some indication of how many messages I sent him. The messages included, ”How did you do it???”, “When did you plan all this???”, “You are a sneaky monkey!”, “OMG!!!! You are sneaky!!!”, “How the heck did you plan all this???” etc. I’m sure you get the picture.

He then messaged me back, saying that’s about it and I believed him!

Little did I know.

At about 3pm, while we were already chatting online, someone was honking outside. Another van! Delivery man handed me another package and I rushed back to my laptop so fast, even I was amazed. I haven’t even opened the package at this point and I was excitedly screaming to Rob, calling him a sneaky monkey. He asked me to open the package first. Lo and behold, looking up at me from the box was a stuffed monkey. I laughed.

Then I noticed a card. I opened it up and read it.

“Thank you for being a part of my life. No one has touched my life as you have. Your kindness inspired me to believe in wonderful things. My spirit cherishes you in all ways. Monkey loves you.”

He loves me.

My heart melted.

No guy has ever said that to me (Well, there was a guy who said “I love you” to me in high school but I think he said it just to impress me or something so it doesn’t count) and meant it. Somehow I knew he meant it and I believed him with all my heart.

Valentine’s Day 2003 was one of the best days of my life.

Thank you for being the best part of my life Robbie.

I’ve never been happier.

I love you

As many of you already know, I graduated last month. The ceremony was LONGGGGGGG. I got to the university about 7am and the ceremony didn’t start til like 8.30 or so because we were waiting for VIPs. Speech after speech later, the ceremony ended at 12.30pm! It was a crazy hot day and I was sweating like pig underneath the pink(!) gown.

I’ve been asked how it feels to be graduated a couple times and I seriously don’t know how to answer that question. I’m at a loss for words to describe the feeling but it’s not because of happiness. I suppose the journey of reaching the finish line wasn’t what I expected it to be and so it took away from the excitement and happiness, I think? I don’t know. I haven’t quite figured it all out yet. If you follow my blog, you would have somewhat of an idea.

Anyway, I shall let the pictures complete the post.

Yours truly on the big screen

My mom took this pictures as I walked out of the hall

With the parents

Soupy my good friend and hubby came by bearing gifts!

With my favourite Soupy

Somewhere in campus

Library behind us

The picture above is dedicated to Soupy. (Hi!!!! *waves*) I’m actually holding a pink stuffed toy octopus, a gift from Soupy. She gave  it to me simply because it’s PINK. I’ve named the pink octopus Rosie because, well it’s pink, AND the name of the person who gave it to me is Rose.

With dirty Leo

This was taken after getting dolled up for studio pictures

For now, I’m not going to post up the pictures I had taken at the studio. I personally think that they Photoshop the pictures too much to the extent that I look plastic but it’s not that bad I suppose because it was pretty cheap. Hehe

Gifts

The one person I had wished to be there is Rob, because he has helped me so much with my Postgraduate debacle but I guess we can’t always get what we want in life. Either way, I couldn’t have done it without out you baby.

And now, I continue my job hunt!

I’m sure you’re wondering now that if I so miss and enjoy writing why am I not updating my blog more often? Frankly, I have nothing interesting to blog about. My life now is mundane. The most exciting thing that happens to me each day is talking with Rob during the afternoons.

I am not a great writer. It takes a lot of talent to write something that everyone can understand and relate to. I have much to learn. The reason for writing this memoir is simple. Everyone has a story and I want to tell mine, since I have the time now anyway. I hope to write something that can touch lives, even if it’s just one.

A lot of this memoir will come from this blog since I have shared many experiences of my life on here. I’m not sure if I will ever finish it but then again how can anyone ever finish writing the story of their life? I have a few ideas on how to start and I just need to bounce those ideas around before I officially start.

I don’t expect to get it published or anything like that. It’s just something I want to do for myself.  I can’t promise I will finish it but I keep having this intense desire to start writing one lately. I’m not too sure whether I will share it with the world (as in, in this blog) though. I suppose I need to be very confident with what I write to feel comfortable enough to publish it on the blog. We shall see.

Happy Merdeka everyone!