my sister's keeper

oh my gosh, this book is amazing.

i cried reading this book i promise. it's so moving. you can't decide who's in the wrong cos no one is actually in the wrong. we'll at least form everyone's point of view. the book is full of unexpected turns and full of questions that we ask everyday. what is isolation? why do we feel lonely even with all the people around us? when is it time to let go? when does loving someone too much turn to selfishness? is life ever fair? we all have our secrets. this book is just AMAZING. i love it. Jodi picoult is just so brilliant in crafting this novel. my mind is swarmed with thoughts. the book is overwhelming and it's gonna need soemtime for it to be fully digested.

other than that i've got an offer to buy a macbook pro. its a really good offer and reallly tempting one too. but do i jsut want this or do i really need this? i dunno. damn it. and my iBook will only be back sometime in the coming week. there's only 5 more days left to the end of IAP and about 8 more days before my final report is due. the thing is, what am i even going to write in that report? UGH.

oh wells, i guess i really got nothing much to say except that something really awkward happened today. but i shall not recount it. and for the record, it involves someone's reallly huge ego.

quote of the day?
dark matter has a gravitational effect on other objects. you cant's see it, you can't feel it, but you can watching something being pulled in its direction. --brian to julia in my sister's keeper.

untitled

AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! i've watched episode 14 of season 2 of PRISON BREAK!!!! YESHHHH!!! FINALLY!!! you have no idea how long i've been waiting for this. and damn jsut when you think this is as good as the show get the producers just proves you wrong. so wrong. kudos.

anyway i've liked this song all along but i suddenly decided to googel the lyrics and look what came up... i love the first two lines of the chorus.

Step one you say we need to talk
He walks you say sit down it's just a talk
He smiles politely back at you
You stare politely right on through
Some sort of window to your right
As he goes left and you stay right
Between the lines of fear and blame
And you begin to wonder why you came

Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

Let him know that you know best
Cause after all you do know best
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you've told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And pray to God he hears you

Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

As he begins to raise his voice
You lower yours and grant him one last choice
Drive until you lose the road
Or break with the ones you've followed
He will do one of two things
He will admit to everything
Or he'll say he's just not the same
And you'll begin to wonder why you came

oh wells. if you have been wondering where i've been, whihc i highly doubt so, my ibook decided to go swimming last week. yes i know. its gonna cost me about a thousand bucks. WTH right? so veron has offered me a very attractive price for her macbook pro. should i? she even said i could pay her by installment. i promise i've known so many nice people through this project superstar 2 stint. hahaha lousy friend, his royal highness hahaha. oh man his face was classic yesterday. hahahah CLASSIC.

oh wells, so its only a week more to the end of internship. rather 6 days after today. i'm contemplating how to tell boss that i dun wanna make up the 4 days to just deduct it from my pay. i mean i'm so tired already and final report is due 5th feb. nightmares. anyway, twins' birthday the coming monday! so fast they're already 3. gosh. its really quick REALLY REALLY quick. i sound like their mom. SHEESH.

BIG YAWNS, i'm so tired. oh yes i bought a jodi picoult book "my sisters keeper".

quote of the day?
Under this mask there is more than flesh and blood; there is an idea, and ideas are bulletproof. -- V

Plain Truth

I finished my second Jodi Picoult book IN A DAY. infact less than a day. the book is just so well written it draws you into the story. and somehow this book is so relatable to me. This book deals with choices and consequences. it deals with acceptance and forgiveness. it deals with the fine line between the truth and what we believe to be the truth. it deals with being different, being selfless. it's a fantastic story. is the truth really the truth or just what we want to believe? how often have we told a lie just because it was easier and it would hurt less? how often have we let our own selfishness hurt others? just for that moment just because we feel like it, just because we want it, just because. we make excuses for ourselves to be selfish in that moment. and like Jodi Picoult wrote in the book, "it all adds up".

off cos i have grace to thank for lending me this book. its fantastic. gripping and its reflective. you don't just read it and go like "OMG, this character is so pitiful... blah blah blah...." its more than that. you read this book and you actually think. And the book is so fun, it has these questions at the back of the book that are for like book club discussions that are kinda very literature lesson kinda questions. let me show you...

1. What character has the most to learn during the course of this novel? Why?


2. In what ways does immersing herself in Amish culture alter Ellie's perception of the case? Of Katie?


3. Does the American legal system have the right to govern a group that lives separate from American society?


4. To what extent is Katie responsible for what happens to the infant?


5. What role does Hannah's ghost play in forming Katie's actions? Sarah's?


6. Jacob Fisher and Leda are two characters who bridge diverse worlds in this novel. Are they successful? Explain.


7. Do the actions of the men in this book aid or detract from the growth of the female characters? Explain.


8. Was Aaron Fisher justified in cutting Jacob out of the family?


9. The Amish base much on the concept of Gelassenheit, or humility, and putting others before yourself. What examples support this? In what places in the book does this not happen, and how does it affect the society?


10. Forgiveness is a basic tenet in the Amish faith. Which Amish character in this book forgives the most? Who is the most unyielding?


11. What about the Amish culture is similar to “English” culture? What is the most different?


12. Is the verdict a fair one, in your opinion?


13. Why would an Amish person accept a punishment without having committed a crime?


14. What do you think would have happened if the baby had lived?


15. In your opinion, what occurs after the last page is turned-- to the Fishers, to Katie, to Ellie?


16. What do you think Ellie will do with the information she learns from Sarah at the end of the book?


17. Why do we care so much about Katie Fisher? How does her specific situation come to touch upon universal issues like community estrangement and forbidden love?


18. What kind of a man is Aaron Fisher? As you were reading, what were your reactions to his choices? If you had to, could you make a case for defending his code of life, his propensity to put the community above the individual?


19. "You know how a mother would do anything, if it meant saving her child,"Sarah tells Ellie. And earlier on, referring to her ability to butcher chickens with remorse, Sarah says to Ellie, "I do what I have to do. You of all people should understand."What is Picoult up to here? Why should Ellie in particular understand this?


20. "We all have things that come back to haunt us,"Adam Sinclair tells Katie at one point. "Some of us just see them more clearly than others."Discuss the ways in which the ghosts of the past come to haunt the present action in PLAIN TRUTH. Of all the book's characters, who comes to "see"things most clearly? Ellie? Jacob? Sarah? Explain.


21. What kind of future do you see for Ellie and Coop? For Katie and Samuel? Jacob and his Plain heritage?


22. Discuss the significance behind the title. Is "Plain Truth"a different sort of truth than "plain truth"?

okay enough bout the book. i was so in need of a miracle oday and i got one. yes, hanyuen thank you for lending us your DSLR. couldn't be more grateful. oh project superstar tmr will be so fun cos grace will be there tooo!!!! HEHS! and damn there's officially only 14 MORE DAYS to the end of IAP! oooh oooh. HOLIDAYS! HOLIDAYS!!!!! can't wait. oh wells. so there. i'm gonna watch my shows!

quote of the day?
We all have things that come back to haunt us, some of us just see it more clearly than others --Jodi Picoult from Plain Truth

Fear

Dr. Tancredi: Here's what I think. I think you are scared and you wouldn't be human if you weren't scared in a place like this.

Michael: When I was young, I couldn't sleep at night because I thought there was a monster in the closet. But my brother told me there wasn't anything in the closet but fear. And fear wasn't real. He said it wasn't made of anything just...air. Not even that. He said you just have to face it. You just have to open that closet and the monster would disappear.

Dr. Tancredi: Brother sounds like a smart man.

Michael: He is. In here though, you face your fear, you open that door and there's a hundred more doors behind it. And the monsters that are hiding behind them are all real.

this is a quote i love from prison break. i can't figure out what episode its from though. that's all i guess. haha!

she lies with angels

okay you may be thinking "what the hell abigail" but before you even continue thinking along those lines. this is because i just read a x-men comic where they introduce the character icarus. so he has the powers of flight, the ability to mimick any sound he hears and he has vocals of a human choir and of course with any angel like mutant - healing powers. but that's not the point. the point is that this comic was written as a tribute to the all time classic shakespear playwright romeo and juliet. so you can pretty much figure the story but what i love about this comic is more of the last few frames....

she lies with angels
and loved them more
than heaven's heart could hold
she lies with child
then left his care
and both would weep from cold
child to youth
remembrance dims
but passion still must hold
two angels lie too bold
two angels lie so bold
she returns to the heaven
that missed her love
her memory spun to gold
may she ever lie with angels
may you ever lie with angels

and that's all for today's post cos there's really not much to tell. except that every monday when i come back from prooject superstar i'll have a new fav chinese song. hahah! so lame i know. hahah!

the moment in time

when we were all little we all had dreams. some girls dream of being in white wedding dresses with their prince charming waiting for them at the altar and their dad walking them down the red carpet with flowers daintily scattered over it. mine was very much the opposite. i've dreamt of travelling the world. i've dreamt of being some big shot photographer/designer. but my most abandoned and still dearest dream is the one to be a neurosurgeon. no, it's not about the show grey's anatomy. it's not about mcdreamy. its about what i want to do. i want to be the person who can tell someone after he/she believes their life is over that "hey, you've got a second chance". i want to be able to go inside someone's head and right a wrong. but don't we all, when reality is shed upon us, abandon these dreams we as children have hoped upon. we settle for less. we walk away because we are afraid that we would fail. but because the child in us never dies... one day, your dreams will come back and all you feel then is a sense of lost that washes over you.

that is how i felt when joanne told me that tracy is studying neuroscience. suddenly i felt unaccomplished. i think to myself. what if i had went to jc and then tried for medicine. then i tell myself, i'm not smart enough. but this is all but an excuse. but after all, this is something i have to live with. the WHAT IFs of life.

today, i saw another person's quest to a dream being put to a halt. even though i expected lesheng to beingg given the "golden handshake" it was still not a pleasant sight. it only occured to me that he has no family here as he is from china. it's quite trying and it takes alot of courage to go through something like that without your family supporting you. and for the record, he has a really nice voice. the guys started crying after they got off air and it was a really awkward position to be in. do i intrude that moment of weakness and take the photo that will be a good journalistic shot or do i lean on the side of compassion. i was at the recieving end of an uncompasionate jounralist once. when i was in sec 3 and had just finished 3 last on a race that we were supposed to be the top 8 at least. i had pushed myself so far i couldn't stand because of all the acid. i was crying from the pain and all that journalist want to do was snap a picture. fortunately i had teammates who were kind enough to ask her/him to leave. is that how they felt when i was taking those photos? bare and helpless. did they feel like the prey?

maybe i am thinking too much tonight or rather tthis chilly morning. oh wells. i had finished Vanishing Acts already. the book is very good and i recommend it to anyone who is finding for good reading material.

well i'm finally heading to bed.

quote of the day:
Memory is the only way home. --Terry Tempest Williams, as quoted in Listen to Their Voices

all good things

well 2007 is finally here. time flies huh. its strange how time passes quicker as you get older.

anyway, my new year's night was passed at my aunt's place. was quite a night although not everyone was there. the michelle, melissa, lance and michael were not there. pearl, my bro and anna were not there too. but nevertheless still had quite a fun time. it was so funny when aunt sally was more excited than anyone else when the ships put up their flares at 12 midnight. but she was so nice about it "i'm so excited cos you all are here to celebrate new year with me". hahhaha how nice of her.

sigh back to work tmr. i'm dreading it. sheesh. i know abigail. i know it's all part of life. well, i got a job offer at a design firm and i don't really know if its what i wanna do. i know i shouldn't rush to make a decision but i don't want them to hold the place for me until march and me to tell them only then i do not wanna work there. it isn't very nice. wells. what i;m thinking is working at believers music as a guitar or keyboard teacher. and freelancing on design. i don't know. this way, i get to spend more time on doing something that i feel is more useful. but then i heard that the pay at believers isn't very good and i do not believe i am a good teacher. imagine me... hahah i can't totally. but i guess it would probably be a challenge. it's really something to think about because what if i don't get freelance jobs? would i be able to earn enough to help put my sister through school and live independantly?

anyway, i am halfway through a book by Jodi Picoult called Vanishing Acts. this book is INCREDIBLE. the method of storytelling is not the traditional through one persons eyes. but the story is told through the 5 main characters. the stories of these five people are seamlessly woven. the book deals alot with the fragility of what we already know and what's lost and what happens when you find it. what if its not what you think you've been looking for. what happens then? you can't just throw everything away. what now. its exceptional. i'm saving the book. cos, i can't find more of her books. anyone with more of Jodi Picoult? or Cecelia Auren.

quote of the day?
Sometimes it is necessary to reteach a thing its loveliness --Galway Kinnell, "St. Francis and the Sow"