Books read in 2015

A tremendous feeling of pride will truly taken over our body after finishing a phenomenal book! I've learned that it does not only widen our aspect, but it broadens our mind on the philosophical questions that revolve around the novel and its writer as well. Furthermore, I've also realized how greatly beneficial for us to list down the books that we have read in order to remind ourselves of the poignant, beautiful and wild feelings they gave us while we walk down the memory lane through the long (or short) list. Henceforth, this is my humble list of novels and poetries that I have read in 2015. Enjoy!

1. The Nutcracker and The Mouse King by E.T.A. Hoffmann (1816)
2. 'My Last Duchess' by Robert Browning (1842)
3. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (1862)
4. 'Goblin Market' by Christina Rossetti (1862)
5. The Golden Key by George MacDonald (1867)
6. 'Jenny' by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1870)
7. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson (1886)
8. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (1890)
9. The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells (1898)
10. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1900)
11. The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1904)
12. Ozma of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1907)
13. Dorothy and The Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum (1908)
14. The Road to Oz by L. Frank Baum (1909)
15. The Emerald City of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1910)
16. The Patchwork Girl of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1913)
17. Tik-Tok of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1914)
18. The Scarecrow of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1915)
19. Rinkitink in Oz by L. Frank Baum (1916)
20. The Lost Princess of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1917)
21. The Tin Woodman of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1918)
22. The Magic of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1919)
23. Glinda of Oz  by L. Frank Baum (1920)
24. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)
25. 'Burnt Norton' by T. S. Eliot (1936)
26. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1943)
27. A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams (1947)
28. The Neverending Story by Micheal Ende (1979)
29. The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell by Chris Colfer (2012)
30. The Land of Stories: The Enchantress Returns by Chris Colfer (2013)
31. The Land of Stories: A Grimm Warning by Chris Colfer (2014)
32. The Land of Stories: Beyond The Kingdoms by Chris Colfer (2015)
33. The Sleeper and The Spindle by Neil Gaiman (2014)
34. Grey by E. L. James (2015)

Bird of Prey

Little bird of prey,

Flying high in her pastel paper plane,

Are you searching through the woods?

Or soft cotton clouds in mere wonder?

Come, hither! Come, hither!

The moon is singing to his sons and daughters,

On a broken piano of one thousand years' lullaby,

Let us soar through the fluorescent sky of starlight,

Where blue flamingos and pink ocean vomits love,

Together in this earthly paradise of Adam and Eve.

Little bird of prey,

Did you see the shooting star last night?

A golden dust rocketed through our cosmic space,

Marking its presence on our humble doorstep,

What a memorable sight!

Trees, rivers, ghosts and wild creatures all hailed,

This mysterious entity whose seducing my sister on cold blood,

Who feeds her poisonous fruits and candy canes of dusts,
Look! There she dances through the silver moonlight,
Up, up, up into the night; consuming the black stars.

Little bird of prey,

You've blossomed into an immortal pale swan,
Gliding your tiny feet in the magical lake of the forest,
With a stone crown on your head to kill the men,
And protect your chastity from the merciless hunters,
What once was an innocent youth turns upon darkness,
Biting and gnawing on the unicorn's metal juice,
Their rust and salt are your midnight's precious meal,
Satiated, you conceived on the venomous wine and cake,
While they devour hungrily at the stone of your feet.

Father Sagittarius now cries upon his phantom children,
His operatic lyre soothes the spirit of the victimized sopranos,
Thus, she floats on the unseen pathway for eternal elation,
To revive her timeless demise unto the little bird of prey.

- a.i.a.

Georgetown

It has long since I last wrote or updated anything. In the past few months, I was literally drowned in multiple assignments to be submitted for my previous semester. Now that has been completed and sent, I can now focus on a more clear retrospect on what to write about and reminisce on the good memories that I experienced with my dear fellow classmates which took place about 3 months ago.

To begin with, a few of my classmates and myself participated in joining on a road trip for Georgetown, Penang where the town would hold annual literary festival. The Georgetown Literary Festival is an event which brings together all writers and major figures in the literary industry from every corner of the world to discuss and debate on some of the most critical issues in literature in terms of politic, economy, or social views. The event is open to the public and each workshop brings interesting and eye-opening topics and lessons to everyone. This would actually be my second time in attending the Georgetown Literary Festival and considering that the event only takes place in my father's hometown annually, I am pretty determined to make it my goal and attend this occasion every year. And on the happier note, my father himself wishes to attend the literary festival with me next year! Being a huge reader of literature himself ever since he was a boy, I find that this would make a great beneficial addition for both of our sakes.

Now, let me begin by recalling on what happened during our first day upon arriving in Georgetown. We got to our hotel which was only a walking distance away to the festival, went to our rooms to freshen up, then went down to the lobby to regroup with the rest of my classmates. As much as our main priority and reason on coming to Georgetown was to actually attend the festival, we may have strain from our main purpose for quite a bit hehe. Jon became our tour guide and had led us the way to find the best cendol in town! The walk was pretty tiresome considering that the day was blazing hot and we had to wait for the public bus with what seemed for hours and hours. (Note: We did wait for almost one hour for the bus to actually arrive. But we had fun while waiting hehe) We then continued to walk for some time until we finally arrived at the cendol stall but before that, we just couldn't restrain ourselves from not having to take a few memorable photos of the beautiful old buildings in the historical Penang. Most of us who went on this trip are from Penang or at least our parents are (like myself!), but we would still act as if we were tourists and some of us even took silly and laughable poses. Recalling it now makes me miss that day already.

The following day, we attended the festival and got an incredible opportunity to watch Marina Mahathir gave an incredible talk on who are we as a Malaysian nation, in both literal and political sense. I especially liked the part where she links on the subject of how would our countries' mentalities will progressively develop if all Malaysian novels ever writes about are having women as a domestic and submissive roles in a patriarchal society. What with their ridiculous titles and it's always the same plot over and over and over again. The repetition of the genre is completely nonsensical and gives no moral values to the younger or elder readers at all. And to that, I completely agree! Honestly, I am not trying to be a feminist or to discriminate our own writers but in all God's sense, how would we ever develop from this narrow-minded domestic thinking if all the novels that are ever published in this country only centres on the docile workforce of women? Times have changed and we do not need to abide ourselves to the rules of men, thank you very much! Nevertheless, it was definitely a great speech by one of the amazing female figures in our country and I felt so blessed to be attending it.

After the event had concluded for the day,  Jon, Yasmin and myself decided to visit Armenian Street and had a little silly photographs taken of ourselves with the street arts. We would walked and made hearty jokes, it was so fun! I always had a good laugh with them. It is so very nice to have friends whom are your classmates that you could always talk about almost anything in the whole wide world with, especially books!! Endless conversations of books, literature, movies, and more books hehehe. Which reminds me, we stumbled into this great mini bookstore which sold classic vintage hardcover books! And I am not just talking about those second-hand classic books, I'm talking about those really old yellowy-papers with old fragrant smell which predated back to 100 years ago! These books had been imported straight from England and all of them had been owned before by people from the late 19th and early 20th century. How can you not be in love with that! I think I spent almost two hours in there with Yasmin and that is only because our minds were not properly fixated on the reality of all these wonderful books that had laid before our very bulging eyes. With each book that I took, I couldn't help infusing the heavenly smell of those 100-year old papers which literally belonged to those poor dead Victorian souls now. May God rest your kind souls, Good Sirs and Ladies for handing down these books to us a century later hehe. Now, let me list down the books that I purchased from this God-sent paradise mini bookstore:

1. To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf (1927)
2. Black Beauty by Anna Sewell (1877)
3. Nicholas Nickelby by Charles Dickens (1838)
4. The Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (1859)

The very latter contained notes from the previous dead owner which he/she writes the date of their purchase in the year 1916! Gobsmacking, isn't it? Ugh, I was in Seventh Heaven and just felt so lucky to be purchasing these rare books! I only wish I could've bought more but I'm sure my parents will scold me for buying too many. But no matter, I was completely over the moon!

As our educational and fun road trip was coming to an end, I then realised that this year would mark the third and final time I would be coming to this literary festival with my dear classmates. How soon will we part! I could not bring myself to think about this dreadful moment yet. To cheer myself from this unwelcome thought, I would always remember and recite the beautiful message that T. S. Eliot had written in his phenomenal piece of "Burnt Norton":

"Time present and time past,

 Are both perhaps present in time future,

 And time future contained in time past.

 What might have been, and what has been,

 Point to one end, which is always present."

 (T. S. Eliot, 1936)

This brilliant masterpiece would bring solace every time as it reminds me that the past and future are not what matters in our lives, but it is the present which we should enjoy and engross ourselves within it. For it teaches us that time present is crucial and we should appreciate the existing day of our lives while we are at it before the present-day fades into nothing but a memory. Right, I am getting too deep now. I did not mean that. But God, this poetry is absolutely beautiful. I would love to end this entry then by reminding everyone that do not fret about the past and your upcoming time ahead. Value the moment of your present-days and acknowledge the beauty of every thing with families and friends. Time waits for no man and we must be aware of our surroundings before nature devours us.