My Journey

I was listening to the music from the ending scene of "The King's Speech" because I have to write an essay about it (I'm serious). Looking through the comments, this one caught my eye (and my mind, too):

"You are absolutely right immutabledude. What a piece of music to combine with the speech. The overcoming of a man's fears mixed with Beethoven. Just wonderful." -syedaamirmsd

It reminded me of how my fears were overcome with "I Still Call Australia Home" in a Boeing 737 toilet.

I found this email to my friend, dated 5th of March, 2007, detailing my plane flights to and from Singapore. Here's some of it- you can see how much I've changed.

I was busting to go pee. I really was. You see, when you're EXCITED, you really needa go! So, when I went to my seat, I asked the stewardess where the toilet was. "Yes, just here," she said, gesturing to the toilet door. I walked over and tried to push the door open. I pressed everywhere except for the middle. So I asked the stewardess how to open the door. She said: "Yes, these doors are really hard to open. Push in the middle." So, I pushed in the middle.

The smell hit me like a pang. And the size. It was awful. I went inside and locked the door. I lifted the lid and sat on the toilet. I did you-know-what, and then I got up. Instead of being smart enough to close the lid, I just pressed the flush button. I freaked out immensly. I was half screaming, half gasping, washing my hands at the same time. I was leaning towards the door. Leaning away from the evil Thing that was making the horrible, dreaded noise.

I didn't know how to turn the water off. I pressed every button I could see (other than the flush button). So, I unlocked and opened the door only to find the stewardess standing about 10cm away from the door (she might have heard me making "oh! oh!" noises). "That was FREAKY!" I said. And do you know what the stewardess said? Well, do you? She said, "Well, next time you know not to!" She giggled. Then I said, "How do you turn the water off?" Leaning forward, she said, "You just..." and then I noticed the water was no longer running and replied, "It's off now."

I sat down on my seat next to the Thing for about 5 minutes. I must have been shaking like hell. I was so scared, I needed to pee again. Yes, again. I tried to put it off and watch the seats filling up. But I kept on thinking the Thing was flushing! In the end I got really scared. I remembered what the stewardess had said: "I'm going to return to my cabin now. If you need us, just step there," gesturing to the section where the stewardesses are. I tentatively stepped round to the back and said, "I feel... queasy." I didn't exactly mean that, but it just came out. The two stewardesses there offered me a plastic bag. I said, "No, it's not that... I just feel..."

"Scared?" the stewardesses asked.

"Yes," I replied.

The two stewardesses told me to sit down on one of the crew's chairs and they started talking to me. They gave me a glass of water and they noticed the book I had in my hand (The Da Vinci Code). They both said they've read it, but didn't understand it! I told them that the thing that was freaking me out was the toilet flush. That's when one of the stewardesses (who had long, blonde hair tied up into a ponytail) said, "That's alright! I hate it too. Just tell us when you need to go and we'll flush it for you!" The other stewardess (with short red hair) tactfully kept quiet. I don't think she particularly wanted to flush the Thing for me. They also said I should close the lid. I had never closed a toilet lid in my whole entire life!

(the flight on the way home)

I settled down to eat my meal of spaghetti and meatballs. (I ate only the meatballs- I don't like spaghetti.) I ate the salad and of course, the passionfruit yoghurt dessert. After that, I found I needed to pee.

No escape, of course. Five hours without doing a pee? Uh... I don't think so.

So I knew that whether I liked it or not, I would have to use that Thing! It was occupied, so I stood up to make a 1-person queue. A lady got out of the cubicle and held the door open for me. I must have looked scared, because she asked me, "Are you alright?"

Me, being truthful, replied, "Yes... but... a little scared..."

I went inside and took great care not to look down the Thing. It freaks me out, to see just a hole and no water. Of course I locked the door as well.

I made plans to make three deep breaths before flushing the Thing. But, after I got up from the Thing I closed the lid, but I could only get past one deep breath when I said to myself, "I'm not gonna be able to take this." So, I washed my hands and unlocked the door. I held it open and pressed the flush button with my free hand. I got out before it flushed- got lucky!

Hehe. End of story.

In case you're interested, my friend's reply included these words:

Hey, guess what, Mum says we'll be going on holiday soon

and we'll have to fly there! So, should we have to "go"........

The toilet of doom awaits!!!!!!

You know, aeroplane toilets aren't so bad, I mean without them.! Can you imagine a plane full of busting people on a long flight!

Wow. I am printing out that email and taking it on the plane with me to Europe.

46 days!!!

The Journey: Live Another Day with additions

This is a video that combines all of what I've written of The Journey: Live Another Day.

In order, the excerpts that appear are:

1. The Awakening
2. Walking down the 737 aisle
3. Carolyn and Lucy
4. The Aeroplane Song

Google and Aeroplane Toilets

I randomly googled "aeroplane toilets" and on the first page alone these headings came up:

"POLL: do aeroplane toilets scare you? - Yahoo!7 Answers"
"Fear of aeroplane toilets - how to overcome? - TheSite.org boards"
"Aeroplane toilets scare the hell out of me!! - Local Business ... "

The last one is actually a Facebook group, so I'm not sure why "local business" came up in the title on Google.

What siblings are for

According to Hienari Stellart of Xiniyan Academy, Mimaiya, siblings are there to make sure your ego doesn't grow too large.

The way insults work

Today, in English, we were watching clips on Youtube etc. One clip took so long to buffer that we gave up.

Person 1: I hate buffering!
Person 2: You're buffering!
Person 1: Your mum's buffering! Ooh!
Teacher: YOUR FACE'S BUFFERING!

Words to "Walking down the 737 aisle"

I've finally written some lyrics!

Harsh it is, the path you travel lonely,
Fear awaits, but forward you must journey.
On you march, your face it shows so little,
Hiding fast behind the mask you've crafted.
Sadness is that no-one understands
The turmoil within.
But you must learn to accept the troubles you are given.
There are things you must accept before you hope to change them.

Numeracy Question for Politicians

If you have 1.1 to 1.2 million children who have to sit the NAPLAN test, with four booklets (numeracy, language conventions/spelling, writing, reading comprehension), a reading magazine and a writing stimulus for each, how many trees do you need to kill?

A) Only B
B) Only A and C
C) Only A and B
D) All of the above

Stupidest multiple-choice question ever

Apart from finding my old essay on how my choices influence my future, I also found the worst multiple-choice question ever:

A leprechaun is:

a) a small man
b) a tiny old man
c) a small old man

WHAT THE...?!?

"How My Choices Will Influence My Future"

I found this old "essay" in one of my exercise books from primary school. Be warned that it is pretty long and repetitive (we were required to write 10 or so paragraphs of 10 lines (handwritten) each, not including the introduction and conclusion, and we hadn't been given much instruction on essay-writing).

A lot of things, such as friends, money, jobs and luck will influence my future. Some of these will have a positive effect and some will have a negative effect. Some I have no control over but some I do have control over. I believe that it is my choices that will influence my future most.

It will be easier to make decisions if I know exactly what I want to do when I am older. For example, if I want to live a happy life with a good job without becoming a drug addict or an alcoholic, then I would be far more inclined to work hard at school to get a good job and avoid drugs or alcohol than if I did not have a goal. Even if a goal is vague it can still have an influence on my life.

How I behave can have a large influence on my life. If I got a criminal record then I would not be able to do a lot of nice things and my life would be very different and possibly a lot more unhappy. I might be treated differently and maybe be avoided which would not be very pleasant at all. On the other hand, if I was nice to other people, people would be nice to me and possibly know me of the good things I had done.

Friends can also influence the way I behave, depending on which friends I make. Some friends might be very nice while others might try and force me to do things that I do not want to do. I believe that people who try and force you to do things against your will are not your true friends. I think that true friends respect and appreciate you for who you are and do not make you do things that you may not want to do.

My education will influence my future too. If I work hard and study well, I will have a better chance of getting a better job. On the other hand, if I slack off I probably will not get a good job and earn a lot less money. Usually it is not easy to stop procrastinating and study instead but it may be easier if you think about how it will help you enormously in the long run. It may be even easier if you have a goal in mind.

The job I get later on may have an impact on my life. If I get a good job, I could earn a lot of money, which in turn could be used to go on holidays, get a nice house and have a lot of nice things. If I don’t have a good job, then I will probably earn less money so I would not be able to go on as many holidays or get as many things. In addition to that, I would do more with my time if I worked rather than stayed at home.

If I had a boyfriend he would probably have an influence on my life too. I may have to be careful not to concentrate on him and to make sure that I still study and make the right choices in my life because he might just dump me later on anyway. I do not think that it is a good idea to let other people distract you from other things. After all, other people can be extremely unpredictable and occasionally they may disappoint you.

Money will probably have a large influence on my life. For a start, the more money I have the more things I can buy. The amount of money I have isn’t the only thing that matters thought. I believe that how you spend your money matters more. For example, there might be a person who is very rich but spends more than she or he earns and becomes poor, while there may also be a poorer person who saves their money and slowly and steadily becomes richer.

Alcohol may influence my future. If I become an alcoholic that will probably change my life forever. If I was an alcoholic I may feel that I need to have alcohol. That would be quite terrible. It is not good to have your life “ruled” by drinking or other unhealthy things. It is your choice whether to be an alcoholic or not, so it is probably a very wise idea to choose to avoid it so that alcohol does not consume your life.

Drugs may also have an influence on my life. Some drugs, for medicine, may be alright as long as you only take them when you really need to take them. Other drugs, such as marijuana and cocaine can be very bad for your health and only one is needed to start the vicious cycle of addiction. An addiction is often extremely hard to overcome and may consume your life for far longer than you think.

If I chose to sniff things I shouldn’t then that may have a negative impact on my life forever. Some odours affect the brain and I think that if you sniff these things too much the end result may be brain damage or even death (some of that may not be correct). Sniffing is mainly your choice. Sniffing is pointless and can have negative effects so I believe that one of the best things that you can do about it is to just avoid it.

Owning a car may have an influence on my life. If I am not careful on the road and get into a lot of crashes then I may lose limbs and my life would have changed because I would not be able to do all of the things that I am able to do now. Life would be far more unpleasant. On the other hand, if I am careful I will get into far fewer crashes but then again, I may not be lucky and crash into someone who isn’t being careful.

Luck will also have an impact on my life. Unfortunately it is not something that I can control. One day I can win millions of dollars from Lotto, while another day I could lose both legs in a car crash. But as my imaginary friend Xikun points out, “It is not the fall that matters- it’s the getting up again that does.” I believe that he is correct, mainly because luck is not something that anyone has control over.

I hope that my essay was enjoyable and enlightened you about how choices influence your future.

NOTES:

1. Seems to me that I was very materialistic. I would be lying to say that I'm not at all materialistic now, but I think I might be at least slightly less materialistic now, after having all of those experiences of being sick with diarrhoea over panicking about aeroplane toilets so much.
2. It also seems to me that I used commas quite sparingly. So, to ma,ke, up, for it,, here, are, a, lot, of co,,mm,as. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
3. I mentioned hard work and studying well in the paragraph about education. Like I even knew what the words meant back then. (I still don't know, but at least now I have a vague idea.)
4. In the paragraph about alcohol, I said, "That would be quite terrible." Reading over this essay, I laughed inside. It reminded me of an Uncyclopedia article about Qantas that said, "Qantas airplanes (also known as the exploding bomb) are impervious to all anti-aircraft missiles, rocks, birds or acts of God because it is made of metal, which is very strong."
5. I QUOTED XIKUN!!!'
6. "I hoped you enjoyed my essay." Seriously?! It wasn't even that well written!

Fear and Courage

I found this article on Psychology Today titled "The F Word (and the C Word)." No, it's not about the F word and C word that people generally think of immediately. The F Word is "Fear" and the C Word "Courage."

One line that caught my eye was:

According to these researchers, the difference between courage and fearlessness is the aspect of feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

I guess that's like that time on the 737 when every muscle in my body was screaming at me to run when I was at the front of the queue, but I just told the toilet door to "stop looking at me like that" (yes, I actually did mutter that under my breath), went into the dreaded toilet cubicle once it was vacant, locked the door, did my business and FLUSHED THE DAMN THING.

Random dream last night

I had a random dream that I was flushing a vacuum toilet loads of times and I was thinking, "This isn't scary at all." It felt like indifference, though if I was seriously that indifferent to vacuum toilets then I wouldn't have flushed it as many times as I did in my dream.

Anyway that was a very good dream. Sorta makes me feel like I can do anything- even go on a plane for an 11 hour flight.

Walking down the 737 aisle revisited

I put in a poco accel. (short for poco accelerando- get faster little by little) starting at about 30 seconds in. I think this might help me put in a climax later. What do you think?

猜谜语

Today, while waiting in the car for Mum to get some stuff at IGA, I read a riddle in my Chinese textbook so many times that I remember it off by heart now.

有个好朋友，
跟你不分手。
你停他也停，
你走他也走。

Roughly translated, this means:

"A good friend,
follows you and never leaves you.
When you stop, it stops,
When you go, it goes."

The answer is a shadow.