The Beginning
Well, it's one more day till 2019 and a lot has happened in the past year. For Jaime, she'd say that there has been pretty good events and experiences that she had gained this year, outside of work that is. For one, she've been to the most beautiful and breathtaking country in the world, Bhutan with her bestest friend Melisa last May and it was certainly one of the most unique and heartwarming travelling that she've done in her life. Two, she kick-stared 2018 by joining the Singapore Red Cross as a nurse volunteer and honestly though, that was one of the best moves she'd ever made in 2018. Never did Jaime imagine that she would be able to fly to a foreign land and render medical aid to the ones in need. Taking part in her first ever Medical Mission to set up mobile medical clinics in aid to the Rohingya Refugee Crisis in Cox's Bazar Bangladesh with a bunch of awesome humans alongside is sorta of a dream come true or like Jaime would say, a true blessing in disguise. She literally learned immeasurable amount of knowledge, gained invaluable experience and most importantly made new friendships with people from all around the world. Thank God for social media for keeping her new found friends together. Thirdly, Jaime found love. Meeting him was perhaps the icing on the cake for 2018, for it has been extraordinarily the perfect timing that they met as if the stars were aligned for them. As cliché as it may sound, he's been the naughtiest yet awesome boyfriend anyone could ever have.
Moving on, besides listing out the vey three things that made the year 2018 an exciting one, work has always been there, yeah, always creeping up back at her. To Jaime, theatre nursing is love. In fact, being an operating theatre nurse is one adventurous and challenging role to take in yet a fullfilling one in a way. That was possibly one of the many reasons why Jaime even chose this career field. Coming from a family where her mother was an operating theatre staff nurse herself, Jaime grew up with stories in the hospital. Jaime and her brother, José used to love listening to their mom's stories that happened during her shifts over dinner.Raised with stories from her mom's everyday work encounters during mealtimes, her mom used to feed Jaime and José. The best part of growing up was something she she remembers so vividly. It was the countless time when they use to accompany Appa (dad in South Indian culture) in his car as he drove to fetch Amma (mom in South Indian culture) after her shifts at the hospital which was located so very conveniently an hour away from where they stayed.
Jaime and José used to love going with Appa in his old raggidy Proton Saga (BEG 215*) which then slowly evolved to Proton Waja (WNG 511*) and finally the strongest lasting car in their family so far, Perodua Myvi. Jaime never will forget the rides with their first car, though many at times it has failed them in providing cool air conditioning service, failed manual window shields and weak radio signals, it created a whole lot of memories and was a crucial player in their childhood. They, or lets just say, Jaime was definitely happy that Amma had erratic shifts most of the time as it was the perfect oppurtunity to step out of the house and savour the delicious Nasi Lemak Kukus at Haslam's or the savoury Nasi Kandar Pelita right after fetching her from work. It was very rare for them to be out when they were kids. It was just them, and Mark and Shane and sometimes Sammy, Nathan and Sarah, their cousins who basically grew up in the same house. So, going out means it's either everyone follows or no one goes. Life was a little hard back then. Appa was a technician at the local University and didn't earn as much as Ma', neither did any of her aunties or uncles at that point of time. They were all just barely getting through with their contenful salaries and mkinf do with what they have. Therefore, whenever there was an outing planned, the adults would chip in a little, but most of the time it's all homecooked food that they packed to be eaten out or the RM1 ice creams (they are still the bomb though!).
The time right after high school SPM results were out were the confusing times of Jaime's life. It was as if it's a life or death situation for her to choose the right career path that she would want to take in life. Coming from an Indian family means the choices you make must be blessed by the rest of your family. Jaime wanted to be a writer at first, for writing was her very first love. See, Jaime used to hate writing so much that she never did scored well for it during primary school. In fact, she didn't really learn to write well enough till she met Mr Hamidi, her Bahasa Melayu tuition teacher. Meeting him changed her perspective of writing and instead showed her the beauty of the world of literature and all that it encompasses within. He motivated his students to always read as much as they can to gain knowledge and master the words and the different styles of writings used, to be more proficient in their essays. As she slowly learned under Mr Hamidi's guidance, Jaime began to appreciate the beauty of writing. She went to the extent of subscribing to the monthly school magazine called Kuntum and used to turn to the students essay submission section just to read their point of view about things and the style they used to write their piece. The very one word that she could use to describe how she felt for writing was mesmerizing. It still is. From writing the worst essays in school to being the best writer in class all through high school, it was surreal when her Malay Language teacher at that time sent a copy of her essays to the Malay writing competition without her knowing about it only to find out when the mail man sent a certificate from the Malaysian Malay Language Council. Although it was a consolation prize, it's somewhat a rewarding experience to be actually considered by her teacher, who's known for her strict views of literature. Jaime could never express the level of gratitude she have for having Mr Hamidi in her life and for all that he has taught her. Jaime miss being his pet student and following him around during school holiday breaks attending his after-school and intensive classes everday, with her litle brother tagging along. She strongly thinks that she had to thank her periamma (aunt in South Indian culture) Josephine Mary, for introducing her to his classes.
Nevertheless, being a writer was a choice that wasn't much blessed by Appa and Amma. It was always "are you sure you can make money out of it" or "will it be easy for you to get a job" dilemma's that would occur in their worrying minds. That's when Jaime voiced out to major in music. It was her second love to be honest. As far as Jaime remembers, if it wasn't for her little brother José, she wouldn't have learnt how to sing. He used to be the "star" of singing in her family where Amma used to praise him for singing beautifully and then singing-along with him. Well, simply put, it was sort of like a sibling rivalry. It wasn't until high school did we get our very first computer. No, not the enormous chunky ones you seein the 90's but it was actually a modern version of the latest flat screened computers at that time. Excited as we can ever be, Internet was something very alien to José and Jaime. Figuring how to use the computer was epic with all those trial and error moments that isn't complete without a Virus attacking. Yup, those were the days. It wasn't long before they finally figured out emails and discovered social media. It was so lucid that very day when José created his very own email, stilindj@yahoo.com. Jaime thought he was a computer genius at that time, being able to work out the technological world until she realised her email address was more hillarious than his was, dancinvj@yahoo.com. Good Lord, how did their brains squeeze that poor soul out. As embarrasing as the email addresses were, it's still alive till now, going strong in the midst of their adulthood Jaime must say. That innocent jealousy of her now ever-so-loving little brother (love ya little bro!), she used to sing with him and her small cute singing performances used to be nothing but a sort of entertainment to Jaime's huge big extended family (they were just bored I guess). Instead of receiving stalks of roses being thrown at her after her small short performances for the family, it was always a huge warm hug or a painful pinch on her cheeks from her loving aunties and uncles, also, from her Tata (grandfather in South Indian culture) and Amachi (grandmother in South Indian culture)They didn't learn much about the existence of songs and lyrics at that particular moment in life. All Jaime and José had was a folder of about 100 songs that were already installed in the computer and it was their first 100 songs which established their interest in Western music and its culture. They basically had the songs at the back of their hands as they had memorized all the best songs from the 80's till the late 90's that list ever offered. From Celine Dion to Westlife, they yearned to know more about the world of Western music. It was a proud moment to finally buy a song CD from their own hard earned money, well, mostly earned by scrubbing toilets at home, sweeping, mopping and basically just cleaning around the house. BIG. That was their very first album and boy did they ever felt so good to finally have it! After that phase, they grew up to Avril Lavigne and Linking Park. Mark and Shane bought the Under my Skin and Meteora of their albums and Jaime remembered how they wouldn't stop playing the songs from those albums over and over again until they got sick of it hearing it, only to play it again later. The most crsystal clear memories Jaime had with those albums was when she used to write down the lyrics of all the songs in a piece of paper by pause and playing it word by word. As agonizing as it may sound, it was before her genius brother found out you could get the lyrics from the Internet directly. So yes, no judgements here people! Anyways, Jaime used to bring those handwritten lyrics to school and sing it along with her best girlfriends, Cammy, Darlene and Shreena, during their extra-curricular activities every Wednesday afternoon. They would sit on the field and sing along to those lyrics as if they were a famous pop girl band while watching all the other kids playing. Speaking of girlbands, they literally came up with their very own band name, Spice Girls. Again, no judgement guys. To the eyes of the adults, they were just kids with wild dreams but Jaime really believed they could be one someday. In class, they used to sing to Simple Plan and Disney songs when the teacher wasn't around. Once, Cammy and Jaime sang to their English Language teacher who was leaving to another school. She couldnt find a more appropriate song than Toy Story's When Somebody Loved Me. Of course they were scared to our pants to sing in front of her and so they waited till all the other kids left and Cammy being as nervous as she was, elbowed Jaime to start singing first. So Jaime remembered singing the song and looking at the teacher's expression was priceless. Bittersweet as the moment was, Mrs Noraisyah had the widest smile and thanked Cammy and Jaime with a pat on their backs. They walked out of the class feeling proud as they could ever be. Till now, Cammy and Jaime would laugh just talking about it.
Besides learning how to sing, musical instruments wasn't new to Jaime and José either. Since young, Amma sent them for piano lessons and that's when Jaime fell in love with the sound of the piano. Ironically, they didn't have a piano during the whole of their piano lessons. Though they scored well in theory all through Grade 1 till 5, they have never sat for a practical one before. Moreover, with both of Appa and Amma's salary combined, Jaime's parents still didn't have enough to buy a piano. But years went by, and that day arrived when they eventually got a piano of their own. It was a picturesque scene to see a piano laying so grandly at the dining area of their house. However, the joy lasted for about a year till Amma got a job in Singapore and Roseline periamma got a job in Ireland that Jaime and her family had to move out to their Amachi's place. It was indeed a short-lived moment in their lives and also was their first time living away from Amma. Jaime thought to herslf that maybe Amma was meant to leave her and the rest of the family in order to provide a better life for Jaime and José, or at least that's what they say. They tried their best to stick together as family, they really did. Appa didn't want the family to be separated and so Jaime and José followed Amma to Singapore with a hope of getting a place in the local school. Teban Gardens was their very first home in Singapore. Although it wan't that fancy and the pipings were infested with cockroaches, they finally lived alone. It was weird not having Amachi or Mark or Shane or their periamma's around. In other words, they were so used to living in a massive extended family that it was silent and somewhat quiet without them. On the other hand, they were blessed to have experienced living as a nuclear family after all those years. Never thought they would be able to. From having her mom chasing her around around the house to taste her bland curries to finishing all the Ferero Rochers in the fridge since she didn't have to share it with her cousins, those were awesome times until the end of the year and before school began. They couldn't get into the local school. Jaime and José worked their asses off reading and learning all about the local syllabus. They even had to take up IQ tests to pass the enrollment. As hard as they tried, they weren't able to fix a spot. Filled with much guilt for not planning it thoroughly before leaving everything and coming to Singapore, Appa took them back to their hometown in Malaysia and enrolled them back into their high school. He was afraid Jaime and José would be left behind in their studies and their future would be compromised.
Comments
Post a Comment