back.

it has been a long weekend.
i look different now.
i think i am a shade darker now.
doesn't matter, really.
i'm supposed to be dark.

train journeys excite me.
my mum and i are still those li'l stupid kids who jump at the sight of a train.
even if it is another train passing by the one we are in.
and also, the upper berth on two-tiered compartments is one of the best places to read a book.

but i am deviating from what i wanted to say.
again.
no, i realised that no matter how much i try escaping labels, i actually do fit a stereotype.
this is where train journeys again prove to be immensely educating.
propped up against my pillow, book in hand, i kept laughing to myself and rolling my eyes every time i heard my co-passengers from the next berth.
the brat of a babushona kept messing something up and babushona's mother kept cajoling him.
and it continued.
and then it dawned upon me.
i have never been a mamoni.
my mum was too busy doing everything else to bother wasting time over mamoni's-mother behaviour.
and that is why, i grew up to become what i am now.
bongo mayer ingo shontan.
i sit there, frowning at them for making such a hue and cry out of everything.
i stand there, frowning at the coolie spitting on the platform.
i walk by, frowning at the kid who comes up to me with a leaking nose.
that is what i am.
i realise that things will be like this.
things are supposed to be like this.
i just keep wishing that things were not like this.
thus, to the anonymous observer, i am this proud and vain little thing who keeps frowning at the world around her and keeps "ewww"ing in her head.

i wish it was different.
or, maybe not.
i think i prefer it this way.
at least, this way, i have a choice.
to choose for myself a better world.
and i think i am going to take it.

i missed a lot this weekend.
and i wished i hadn't.

but then again, i got to see dolphins.

i am not running.
the ground below my feet is zipping past.