It was Friday, Jasmine, Jeanna and I had an early gym session, and after some quick lunch at the mamak, we went over to Suriamas to help Jeanna move. Basically she was moving from one block to another, sharing a unit with a few classmates, rather than anonymous housemates.
When we got to her new unit, the air-cond guys had arrived, and immediately started to do all the wiring and drilling and whatnot. The guy in charge was brutal: "Kamu semua bodoh tak ada otak punya" (all of you are stupid and brainless). Those were what we heard him constantly scolding towards his foreign-worker staff.
We started the move when the guys had finished installing the air-conditioner in the master bedroom, which was the room that belonged to Jeanna. Back at her old unit, one of her housemates was having a bath.
At a glance you would think - "oh, this will be easy", because there wasn't much stuff ... or so I thought. It took us three rounds to get everything out. Getting the stuff from point A to point B wasn't much of the problem - the problem was that we were laughing like mad women, and couldn't stop.
Laughing uses up energy and oxygen, as well as increases blood circulation which in turn makes your body temperature go up, which was why we were all sweaty and panting by the time we finished moving everything. My arms ache now, and so do my shoulders.
I also discovered a super-addictive iPhone/iPad game - Temple Run. iPhone users know what it is, I don't need to explain. For those who don't, it's an adventure/race game in which you must jump over or slide below obstacles and turn corners with the right timing, while collecting coins and running away from monkey-sounding, hollow (from Bleach)-looking things.
The next day I had a date with my primary school friend, Yu Ning, a.k.a. Jo (inspired by Little Women). I was awake at 8am, and halfway through preparation Jo called and said that her mum could drive us there at around 10am.
Being the late-to-sleep-and-late-to-rise person that I am I went back to bed. My mum came in at 9am and I told her that my friend's mum could drive us there, and that she'd be here at around 10am. You know what she heard? "Could you drive my friend and I there at 10am?"
Later I got it from her: "you said bla bla bla, I had something for you to help me cash in and why didn't you tell me that you left already? Next time could you talk more clearly so that I can bla bla bla". Hello? I was drowsy. I seldom see people who just wake up and can speak clearly like a sir.
Anyway we were pretty early, collected the tickets first, then she watched me have my breakfast while chatting about various stuff. Ate at Shihlin again, ordered the Happy! Lunchbox again. And basically didn't take water the entire day.
I kinda felt that the things I talked about made the entire atmosphere a bit awkward. Since we graduated from primary school, we went our separate ways and rarely met. I felt that she essentially stayed the same - down-to-earth, logical, and completely in love with literature and classic books.
Me? I got superficial - boys, make-up, fashion. I had biases against some of her interests (such as Glee, and a tad bit on Twilight. I blame 9Gag for this), and somehow I felt like a biatch. I usually judge people by how they look, their self-presentation, but no amount of make-up and clothes can mask an ugly heart (a quote from Wayne's Youtube channel).
I've known her for almost 10 years already. Compared with my high school friends, they suck. They never contact me unless they have something to ask of me, and when they have what they need they continue ignoring.
Maybe it's also my fault that I don't take the initiative to contact them. However, every time I try to strike up a conversation, they seem busy and annoyed that I had interrupted something.
Oh, well. By the time I finished by chicken rice, we went up to the cinema, and I completely regretted not bringing my jacket - it was freezing.
Here are the two trailers of the movie.
WARNING. SPOILER ALERT.
The Lorax stars the voices of Danny DeVito (as the Lorax), Zac Efron (as Ted), Taylor Swift (as Audrey) and Ed Helms (as the Once-ler). The main theme of the movie is to love nature as it is, and as important as it is for profit to survive in the modern world, you have to take care of the source of your income - once it's gone, it's gone for good.
The movie starts as Ted purposely flies a toy remote control plane into Audrey's backyard. Audrey is a high school girl whom Ted has a crush on, and her wish to see a real tree. They live in Thneedville, where everything is plastic and selling fresh air has made Aloysius O'Hare a zillionaire (oh god, I just realized that this rhymed).
Ted asks his mother about trees at mealtime, but his grandmother (voiced by the ever-lovely Betty White) diverted her attention and told Ted about the Once-ler, who lived outside of town where the grass never grows.
He sneaks out at night, sighted by O'Hare's many hidden cameras. He finds the Once-ler and convinces him to tell the story of the trees, and how they came to non-existence.
The young Once-ler was an aspiring inventor, which was creating a multifunctional cloth-item called a Thneed. To make a Thneed, he needed Truffula tree fur. He made a mistake of chopping down one Truffula tree, and summoned "the legendary, slightly annoying, guardian of the forest - the Lorax".
Upon failing his attempts to sell the prototype Thneed in a town, he randomly throws it away and immediately everyone is fascinated by it.
Thinking he failed, he went back to the Truffula valley, where all the people in the town came to him wanting a Thneed. He called his superficial mother and dimwitted family to help him manufacture the Thneeds. His mother came up with a suggestion to chop down the trees instead of slowly picking out the fur, which he agreed to despite his promise to the Lorax that he would not chop another tree.
The Once-ler became successful, selling over a thousand Thneeds per minute. However, the wealth was not to last - the last Truffula tree was cut down, and his source of income was exhausted. His mother left saying that he was a disappointment, and the Lorax left him with a stone tablet with the word "unless".
The Once-ler then gives Ted the last Truffula seed and tells him to plant it in the middle of town, where everyone can see it.
O'Hare, his business being threatened, tried to convince all the residents of Thneedville that the last thing that they would need are trees. However, after convincing from Ted's grandmother and Audrey, the agree to let the tree grow.
The movie ends with the Lorax returning to meet the now-very-old Once-ler, and compliments his mustache.
I love that this movie was so meaningful. Like all other Dr Seuss stories, there's an important lesson to be learnt - we must remain open minded, and not listen to everything that economic moguls sell to us. We should also be careful and appreciative of our source of profit.
After the movie we took a walk to MPH, then to Borders. I still have my RM200 1Malaysia book vouchers, and I'm wondering what to buy with it. It took me a while to realize that I have not touched J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books.
I saw the gift set at MPH, which included The Fellowship of the Rings, The Two Towers, The Return of the King and The Hobbit. For four books, this was pretty good. However I don't know whether there is an abridged version of these books - I'd love to read every single detail of this magical world.
At Borders I couldn't find it - it wasn't even in the database. However I did have some fun browsing through the rows and rows of books.
Finally started home via KTM. Almost never in my life had I taken the KTM back from Mid Valley - the people are crazy. And thank you, the ladies' coach rules are now being enforced - some time back it was common to see men in the ladies' coach.
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