"You see, you closed your eyes. That was the difference. Sometimes you cannot believe what you see, you have to believe what you feel. And if you are ever going to have other people trust you, you must feel that you can trust them, too - even when you're in the dark. Even when you're falling."

Morrie, in Tuesdays with Morrie, p61
by Mitch Albom

annie's baby - diary of annie, 14, infatuated with this guy danny, 16, who raped her, hit her, made her pregnant and shirked off responsibility. sounds like a total jerk? but during the process, she kept making excuses and defending him, blaming his wrong-doings on herself and alienates her friends. in hindsight, she realises that whatever he said/did wasn't right, though he tried to convince her with the fallacy that "everyone's doing it". how terrible.

imagine the burden of a kid having a kid? scary...makes you wonder, in the past, ppl got married at a young age, around teenage years. and ppl were smaller in size, had poorer nutrition. was it like that too? kids having kids? and in the past, ppl tended to hv many kids too *shudders*

the thing that really struck me, was the way the diary was written. it's just like the way i used to write, perhaps still do. in a manner filled with certain degrees of self-doubt, deliberating over courses of actions and sharing the joys and anger with the diary. she's so normal, like duno what hit her.

luckily, she had a very supportive mother to help her along the way. still, it seems that she couldn't quite cope with being a mother and perhaps had post-natal blues? eventually, i think she gave the baby up for adoption, for the baby to have a complete family and better future.

found a forgotten long lost love recently - reading

trying to read books that i've always wanted to, but never got round to

crows - overhyped, i feel..or perhaps expressions were lost in translation. the story wasn't all that fascinating. just about a Chinese woman, trying to making a living and stay in Singapore, flitting from one man to another, depending on which seemed like a most probable option. seriously seems as if she only really wanted their money. cheated by many people, even those who were supposedly her friends, seems like all the rest of the characters are in cahoots with one another. as if singapore is so small that all the Chinese ppl know each other.

girl, illustrated - book by fann wong, she drew all the illustrations inside. and i must say they are very nice, with a distinctive style of her own. never imagined she might be able to draw so well. and the illustrations were painted with water colours. whimsical, simple pictures. i wish i could draw like her. i always wished i could draw. even though, i don't really like her a lot. but her looks and perhaps what is called the x-factor, were evident, even from a young age.

ham, draw more! mayb one day, you can publish your own book too :)

Extra Ordinary: An Amusing Guide for Unleashing your Creativity
by Hisako Ichiki and Takao Umehara
(picture from amazon.com)
A book about how you can put common items to more creative or weird uses. Nice pictures, interesting ideas, but not all are very feasible. Can check out some pages of the book from amazon. I think the idea I like most is using disposable chopsticks to hold letters and photographs up :)

i've been lost in a world of books, books and more books :) time to do a review

Adrian Mole: the Cappuccino Years by Sue Townsend
(picture from amazon.com)
I've seen this book in the library all the time when I was an avid reader with frequent trips to the library but never got around to reading it. It is humorous in a grown-up kind of way, the diary of an apparently 30 1/4 old guy who's being upstaged by everyone in his life. But he's a good man, trying to make everything work and be responsible.

His mother has fallen in love with his ex-girlfriend's father and (to simplify the matters, or complicate it, depending on how you see it, like is the glass half-empty or half-full?), his depressed father moves in with his ex-girlfriend's mother. And to further simplify what I've just said, they basically, exchanged partners. How crazy can that get? Those parents are like 50 or 60 plus already.

It is obvious that it's a British book, you have to know your Tory, Labour, Tony Blair, Margaret Thatcher and all that, otherwise you'll be kind of lost. Yup, I'm glad I read it now, might not have appreciated it when I was younger. (My younger brother doesn't like it.)

Oh there's a tv show too.

that's adrian and his mum (i guess, cos she's supposed to have red hair.) picture from comedy zone

Happy Birthday and All That by Rebecca Smith
(picture from bloomsbury.com)
Another distinctly British book, with the use of words that I do not understand, such as Asda, what's that? Apparently it's part of the Walmart family, but in UK. The second largest supermarket chain in UK after Tesco, according to Wikipedia.

Yet another story of a 30 or so adult, who wondered what happened to her life, to have turned out as such. With 4 kids, a husband who doesn't care and a name like Posy Parouselli. Again, she tries to be responsible and make things work out.

I wonder why the writer hints at the lesbian orientation of Posy's sister, Flora? To make her sound more exciting? That there's more to Flora than just the perfect, efficient person she is? To explain why she puts off the advances of another man?

She organises birthday parties, deals with Frank's, her husband, infidelity. Finds out about the new baby, survives with some pampering and support from Flora. And, good for her, she eventually junks the mummy shoes she wears at a fair. Signifying that she's not going to endure it any more after her husband takes off for a hot-air balloon ride, alone, without the 4 kids and her!

Somehow, I think it was the magician, of whom she has a good impression, who let the balloon fly off. Again that was only hinted at and not said in exact words. i like :)

Book Review:

House Husband by Ad Hudler

when i first picked up the book, i wondered that if the author was a man. he was.

a man intruding into the secret world of housewives and he's not too welcomed. viewed with suspicion, chastised and interrogated by strangers and neighbours alike, he manages to do everything and better than the women. in a literal no man's land, sandwiched between corporate men and housewife women, he finds friends in a few women.

Hungry for adult attention, the book show the insecurities, temptations and vulnerabilities of a stay-home parent. Somehow, he manages to remain sane and find meaning in his job.

when i put down the book, i wondered if he was a house husband. he is. something just sorta shines thru, he's gotta hv the relevant experience, if not how could he have written all that?

anyway, i think it's a very admirable job

strange, both these books have men as lead characters, who have been taught to respect women. interesting..

btw, the other book was "Just Like Heaven" aka "If only it were True" by Marc Levy..

light cheery reading :)

Bumper Book of Un-useless Japanese Inventions
By Kenji Kawakami
Translated by Dan Papia
from Cheng San Library

Chindogu means weird tool in Japanese or an invention that is not particularly useful, yet is not useless either. Confused? You can find out more at www.chindogu.com. The first time I ever came across such a book was at PL library. My friends, xuan and weiie, and I were very amused. *Haha..imagine a school library having such a book? It was very funny because a lot of the inventions were really quite dumb. The funniest thing was how the people in the photos had this serious, deadpan look, as if what they were doing is as normal as taking a walk down the street. Actually, I don't think that this book is very great because a lot of the chindogu were repeated from the previous book - 101 Japanese Un-useless Japanese Inventions. It would be interesting if it's your first time. Frankly speaking, I've seen some of the inventions being sold in shops. Like the umbrella one can wear on the head. And some of the ideas actually seem quite feasible and useful, few though.

The book definitely leaves a deep impression on those who have read it. This morning, I was asking Xuan if she remembered that book, which we'd read about 5 years ago. She promptly replied that I needed the Hay Fever Hat (because my nose was giving problems again). *Haha..

Together Apart
By Dianne E. Gray

I like the title - so oxymoronic yet hints of so much. I like the illustration on the book jacket and even the blue paper in the book. I like the big fonts that are easy on my eyes and most of all, I love that story that's so sweet. A simple story written with a simple language, yet the descriptions are sharp and convey the meaning behind the actions.

The story is based on a blizzard in 1888, in which a lot of school children perished tragically. That particular snow storm became known infamously as "The School Children's Blizzard". Hannah and Isaac were together when the storm struck. Miraculously, they managed to live through the storm, by hiding behind a stack of hay. However, Hannah's 2 brothers died in the storm. She feels very guilty as she should have been at school with them, but was not, and hence, escaped death. The book traces how she eventually manages to come to terms with the deaths and the blossoming love between the two.

I guess one reason why it appeals to me is how they managed to find their way out of their predicaments and yet, along the way, helped many other people too. Helped her family to come to terms with the deaths, tried to improve working conditions of the girls, gave the women a place to rest and socialise, helped Isacc's mum escape from his abusive step-father.

I need to read more of such books! :)