When I’m hurt, my typical initial reaction will be to call a friend avoid people. I would even leave my habitat and start over, meeting new people until I’m hurt again. There is a reason for this, at least. There is something about pain that makes you crave for it. You see, for me, like love, pain is a life’s gift. you get hurt, you want to feel the pain, to celebrate it. Sometimes you do it by hurting yourself. But, unlike love, pain is not limited substance – it grows. Sometimes it’s not enough to hurt yourself, you hurt another person because you cannot contain the over-growing pain within yourself. I seemed to understand this mechanism hence i kept running away. Continue reading
relationship
PLATH: THIS IS NOT I
Seven years ago, I was invited to perform my poetry in Jakarta on one of the two nights of a literary venue.
I just finished, at that time, a poetry performance project with some young musician and artist friends and had successfully performed in two cities. However, the committee of the venue in Jakarta wanted me to perform alone, just me and my poetry, or in the man-in-charge’s own words: “could you just come without your boyfriend?” He sounded bitter, and he was wrong – my then boyfriend had nothing to do with art except that of making me cry. Love, love, love. Continue reading
CHICKEN AND FREUD: IS ROASTING MENTAL?
A friend of mine warned me recently: “beware, baking is addictive.” I looked blankly at the roast chicken a la Jamie Oliver I’d prepared for us and replied, “but I roasted.” She just smirked. “Roasting, baking, grilling — whatever you call it. Just as long as you use your oven.”
I wasn’t sure where she was going with the oven metaphor and I didn’t ask. Continue reading
FRIENDS
What are friends? It’s an idea that excites my spontaneity and shakes my deeper layer of being at the same time. I don’t know where to start or why I am talking about something I don’t quite understand.
Where do you start when you talk about friends – do you start from regular hangouts, endless supports or traumatising betrayals? Continue reading