Looking Back at the Stretch

In the final weeks before leaving Penang, I have had a tight schedule of Scrabble competitions, sudden boom in social life, and of course, pointless report-writing as I plough through them mindlessly.

In the final weeks too, you tend to look back at December and ponder. Yes, yes, invariably, there would be the experience. And yes, yes, I would be reminded that I had racked 138.5 overtime hours. And again, yes, yes, “at least” I have a lot of experience. And yes, to the uninitiated: speak not and advise not what you do not understand.

Period. I almost fell into the realm of ranting. *Phew*

Looking back, plenty of things have happened. Not all was a walk in the park butterfly farm.

There was the assault and battery. 3 months into the new year, I got assaulted. And batted. Bah! They were no match for me. *Slaps miniatures of them off the table*

There were triumphs humble beginnings at the novice Scrabble tourney.

There were losses new experiences as I succumbed to better players at the masters Scrabble tourney.

There were drive-around-Penang trips around here.

Up there at the Penang Hill.

And here at the Butterfly Farm.

And there at the Kek Lok Si Temple.

Those were the good times.

There were also the times when-something-will-go-wrong-it-so-damn-will. Like two hours before my final presentation, the network drive is down. And miraculously back to full swing when my presentation ended.

I have met many people – new acquaintances, Scrabble and tennis buddies, professional contacts.

Of course, also sneaky people. My parcel never arrived Kuching. Chances are that it did not even leave Penang. Screw those people.

And you get to look at things two ways: rose-tinted lenses or realistically.

And I choose realistically. Theft is theft. There are no two ways to look at it.

_______

And invariably, a question I get, quite a number of times, is: Will I come back to Penang?

I’ve always thought I’m just driving through.

But yes, I will. I have a good reason to.

The 8-Month Stretch

The 8-month training is drawing to a close. Bittersweet. I can taste it.

Some 8 months ago, I drove all the way to the north to an unknown is(land) while All The Way To The North – 一路向北 – played in loops in the background.

I stayed at a condo I had found in the classifieds on the Internet. Too many people registered astonished looks at the idea. It’s a great place. I can never give myself enough pats for that decision.

I self-taught myself backstroke swimming. The sweetest taste of success was when I swum half the width of the swimming pool. Short, indeed it was. But the success was indeed sweet.

Bitter days laid ahead. Weekends were my best friend. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday blues were common.

I learn one thing from the Thank-God-It’s-Friday attitude: if you have it, the job is probably not-so right for you. My biological clock re-adjusted to a new schedule. Weekday mornings are spent with a bumper-to-bumper morning jam.

The jam basking in the orange hues of the morning sun, peeking from the mountains ahead, accompanied by The Big Bang Breakfast Show with Fly Guy and Natalie on 89.95 on Fly FM.

The older trainees left. Work was passed down. New work was assigned. Work which was going to cost a lot of my time and my sleep and my time.

It was the new year. The start of 2006. The start of January. The start of a new year resolution.

The start of the year didn’t take off too well. I was overworked. My overtime hours peaked to an unprecedented all-time high. Literally.

It even surpassed the preset upper control limit. It was a time when I had to go to work before dawn, and leave work when dusk fell. It was a time you ask “Why me?”

It was a time when bad things happen to good people.

One friend said,

Dude, too much overtime. Seriously.

My answer is: “You think I want ah??” But of course, I didn’t answer. It is during this time, you feel like reminding people: “I’m sorry. But I only have one body, two arms and two legs.”

Your new year resolution put to the test. Better days were still ahead.

Good News, Bad News

Good news I went to the Scrabble Open Tournament for masters anyway, despite having a tight schedule (hence the long blog hiatus) and being ill-prepared.
Bad news I was thrashed like no body’s business – including one by a 75-year-old lady and one by a 10-year-old boy (He has a 1400+ rating, mind you; mine’s 1200+).

Good news I achieved my targeted number of wins out of 20 rounds.
Bad news My target was a miserly humble 1 after I made a fantastic four straight losses met better players in the first four rounds.

Good news At the end, I still managed to win 7 out of 20 rounds. I’m truly happy. Could’ve gotten a lot worse.
Bad news I keep being somewhere at the bottom of the league as plenty of people have won more than 7 rounds.

Good news Looking back, I could (or maybe not) have won at least (or at most) 2 more rounds if I hadn’t been so unlucky to have 7 vowels at one time, lose my turn to exchange tiles, and still come out with 6 vowels. I also have an uncanny knack to take ‘U’s and ‘I’s. There’s only 4 ‘U’s in a bag, and I manage to have 3 on my rack. What are the chances that I can’t get better letters like ‘H’ or ‘W’? The high-scoring letters like ‘J’, ‘K’, ‘Q’, ‘X’ and ‘Z’, most of the times, remained as elusive as ever from my fingers.
Bad news It’s utterly no point that you could, or you were close; you didn’t. Period.

Good Bad news There’s something called Scrabble betting too! I was told it ran into hundred plus ringgit.
Bad Good news I wasn’t good enough for anyone to bet on =( because they did not think I was going to win, which, sadly is true.

Good news I met quite a lot of people, played with opponents from different countries. Lisa here flew in all the way from Korea, and we had 3 very interesting games. I think my game with Ng Chee Eng was the best of all the 20. I lost, but somehow it felt great to have a “proper” game not bothered by a string of vowels and consonants when you need them the least.
Bad news I didn’t get to play with so many opponents. I wish I did. I wish I could.

Good news I have put my best foot forward in all the games.
Bad news I keep wondering if I had better tiles, would things have changed. It is entirely wrong to say that I would win if I had better tiles. I mean, I know fully well that that depends on your arsenal of vocabulary. Seriously speaking, I don’t mind losing if I had better tiles. But to lose due to poor luck, I don’t know what to think.

Good news I have learned plenty of new 3-letter words, make bingoes, look for anagrams and memorise hooks.
Bad news What I knew before the tourney wasn’t enough. Someone even played the word AMARANTH for bingo. Can you believe it? AMARANTH? Who in their right mind knows the word AMARANTH?

I shall end this with a quote, when I blurted out, literally, at the sight of the stupefying word.

“AMA – what?”