My great #throwback with a twist

2001. The recess bell has sounded but Mrs. Tan is still going on and on, scribbling on the chalkboard. I hate it when the teacher ignores the recess bell. We’ve only got half an hour, and I need to get my Pokemon eraser today! It takes about 10 minutes to get to the start of the queue. At this rate, I’m not going to have any time left to eat! Ugh.

2002. It feels great to no longer be a Primary 1 student. Mom has also finally come to her senses. She agreed to let me go to my best friend’s home after school! I can’t wait to see her kittens, watch the whole series of Hamataro and buy my favourite Roller Coaster Potato Rings from the snack van. She said that it would come by her home at 4p.m. every day without fail. I saved up 70 cents from lunch, just so that I could buy it!

2003. I am so relieved that I’m in the same class as my best friend! They said that they would assign us to different classes according to our grades. I was so afraid that I wouldn’t be with her anymore! We met another 5 amazing girls. Every recess break is like an amazing race. The 7 of us would split up into the 7 different queues to buy food and drinks from different stalls. I’m always queuing for the fish ball noodles. They told us not to share our food with one another because of the SARS outbreak. But who cares. Best friends do things together!!

2004. Our clique is drifting apart. Who should I stick with? Anyway, our form teacher said that she would be assigning us with a new sitting arrangement next week! I can’t wait to find out whom I’ll be sitting beside. Oh, how I wish I’d get to sit beside my eye candy. That would absolutely be a dream come true!

2005. All of us were split up. I’m in a new class with almost no one that I know. Thank God for this guy who has been in the same class as me since Primary 1. It’s getting difficult to hang out with my girl friends especially when our recess breaks are at different timings. Oh well, I’ll try my best to find them whenever I can, and we can watch the boys play football as usual!

2006. Being a senior of the school feels absolutely liberating. My form teacher made me walk bare-footed as I disobeyed her and wore ankle socks to school, again. She thought I would feel humiliated but guess what, I’m loving it! I can’t believe this is my last year in Primary school. I loved every bit of it and I’m so reluctant to graduate. Oh yes, that reminds me, I should start adding everyone on Friendster so that we can keep in contact.

2007. THANK GOD I managed to appeal into my dream secondary school. It feels slightly odd to be in an all-girls school but I guess it would be fun. Should I try out for the fencing team, netball team, choir, dance club, or cheerleading squad? Ah, I don’t know. I made a new friend and she introduced me to a Taiwanese boy band. Absolutely. In. Love. Right. Now.

2008. Being in an all-girls school is SO MUCH FUN. I’ve gotten used to changing into our P.E. shirts in class and shouting across the room for sanitary pads. I haven’t gotten used to the prefects, though. They need to stop asking me to lengthen my skirt, pull up my socks, pin up my hair, blah blah blah. Macs and Island Creamery are also our new favourite hangouts. My (new) best friend and I would go there almost every day after school to “study”. 

2009. Physics class is the most boring thing ever. What on earth was I thinking when I chose to do Physics?! The old couple exercising at the playground outside seems even more entertaining than my Physics teacher. I can’t wait for classes to end. Sports Day is in 2 weeks and the cheerleading team is gearing up its training. In my school, no one really cares about the track events. It’s all about the cheerleading showdown! I wonder how I can enjoy 5 hours of cheer training every day but I can’t even stand a single hour in Physics class.

2010. "A" Math class seems to be taking forever to end. 10 more agonising minutes and we will be rushing out of class to catch SHINEE’s comeback stage on Music Bank! Pfft. I need to stop my infatuation with Korean boy bands and start getting down to studying for my O Levels. The principal actually threatened to make me drop "A" Math if I were to fail one more time – can you believe it?!

2011. I made it. I never thought I would make it in life – by life, I mean “do well in your studies”. I made it to the scholarship programme!!! I heard that Junior College really isn’t a joke. No more time for fooling around. I’m here to study. I’m here to study.

2012. So much for studying. I AM ATTACHED. I know, I know, worst year, period, ever, period, to get attached, period. A Levels. Is screwing up my A Levels worth it? Wait, who says I can’t have both. Yeah, we can study hard, together.

2013. Damn. I should’ve studied harder for my A Levels. But at least I’m loving the army life right now. I fired a machine gun today. How cool is that?!?!

2014. I am finally achieving my dream of studying abroad! MANCHESTER. With the love of my life. What more can I ask for? I can’t believe I got to watch Ronaldo play live. And we’ve travelled to London, Lake District, Barcelona, Brussels, Amsterdam and Berlin. What’s next on the bucket list?!

2015. Santorini. Santorini. Santorini. Ever since my birthday trip, I haven’t been able to take my mind off the beautiful Greek island. It was so surreal. I wanna go back. I wanna go back.

Tuesday, 1 December 2015, 11:20p.m.

A significant proportion of my time is spent reminiscing and living in the past. It starts from as early as I can remember (when I was a little kid, chasing sheep in Switzerland) to just a month ago (Santorini, oh, beautiful Santorini). I think about how wonderful it would be to relive those moments. To once again cross paths with the people I (still) think about. Am I the only one like this? I look across at my partner, embracing the moment, embracing now – holding the X-box controller in his hand, punching his fist in the air as he celebrates his Fifa goal with our flat mates. Here I am, stuck in my own reverie, as always. Writing about the past, about my experiences, writing this. People have said that I’m anti-social. I try to avoid socials to the best of my ability, and I would rather walk home alone than have to engage in small talks with a random schoolmate on the bus. I tell them that I’m introverted. I tell them that it’s not a bad thing – introverts think before they speak, appreciate alone time and prioritise quality over quantity. I tell them that it grows with age. I convinced myself of that.

Yet, now and then, I feel like I’m missing the point. Am I? I keep dreaming about the past, and about how great it is, that I end up not living in the present. I keep thinking of the people whom I no longer talk to, and how it would be nice to be friends again, but have I even crossed their minds? Why, oh why, am I regressing into my own social circle, which consists of me, my cup of tea and the computer screen, journaling about the past when this moment, too, will become a figment of the past? A past that would eventually, if sustained at this rate, consist of no one but myself?

I don’t know.

Let me just shut the computer and watch Big Bang Theory with the rest of them.