This is going to be one of the longest posts on my blog. Ever. I’m writing this from KLCC while waiting for an event to start and couldn’t think of anything else better to do than blog! Time waits for no man (or fairy).

Birthdays. Yes, i wanted to say this – Just recently my friends and i have been agreeing that the older we get, the better life gets. You learn more about yourself and what you like and don’t like. Along with that, you start earning more money to DO all these things you like even MORE. You start filtering friends who feed positivity into your life, and surround yourself with them more and more. You start feeling that you miss your family more and thus start spending more time and being more patient with them than our terrible teenage selves were (well, i was definitely a terrible teenage self).

On my side, i have started feeling that i’m not as invincible as i used to be. I get scared hearing of people my age getting sicknesses and diseases that we never had to worry about before. I make sure my insurance plan gets paid so *touch wood* if anything happens, all is taken care of.

I have started looking at life as a much longer journey than my short sightedness previously did. I used to think i would die young (don’t ask me why, maybe it’s a writer thing), and i used to feel that i would be okay with it.

Now i’m not so okay with it.

I would like to live long and healthy. And do lots of happy things. I see a lot of things in front of me that i can’t wait to get started on, but i know i’ll get to do it all in time.

So for me, i don’t relate to those quips of “Oh, i’m getting a year older, this sucks”. I LOVE getting older. (This is not the same meaning as ‘i LOVE getting old’ but i’m nowhere near old yet so i can give myself a few more decades.)

Another thing that made me appreciate my birthday this year is a recent incident that happened to a friend’s friend. A few weeks ago i tweeted about an 11-year-old girl who urgently needed blood donations. Lots of people retweeted it and i heard that lots of volunteers went to the hospital to help her (THANK YOU very much). Tragically, she passed away a few days later. My friend told me about the funeral in a bar when we met up for Guinness and we cried.

On the day before my birthday, i thought about that little girl who had passed away. It seemed so terribly unfair for a CHILD to die. I wouldn’t know how i would be able to handle it if my child died. And as i thought about how life is given and taken, i gave thanks to the Universe that i am alive. I am alive at 29 and i am GRATEFUL for it. I could not even have existed or BE here, but HERE i am. And it’s a damn well good reason to celebrate.

Okay i’m finished with my spiel, so on to my actual birthday. The night before, my mom cooked my favourite dish one of my favourite dishes (too many of hers to say it’s my fave!) – fish head curry. Being so considerate, she even cooked extra non-spicy dishes for Clem in case he didn’t fancy the fish head curry so much. In the end he whacked them all.

After family dinner, Clem and i went home where i prepped burgers to take for my birthday BBQ the next day.

OK OK to update you – my birthday plan this year was to book the whole of Awanmulan and invite 23 friends to drink, BBQ, chill, dance, and swim. I just wanted to get out of the city, and bring a whole bunch of people along for the ride. I said that i’d prepare as much food as i could, while everyone paid for their own bed/room. I think i was a bit mad to want to prep food for so many people… it was exciting to prep and pack it there, but oh… to clean and pack stuff up home was a nightmare. And i was so hungover i’m glad to say that i have a very loving boyfriend and friends who did all the cleaning and packing the day after the party 😀 😀 😀

Some of us convoyed at 12pm so we could be there around 1pm. But you know la, Malaysian timing, someone (not me!!) was late and we finally took off 40 minutes later. It was okay, no rush anyway.

I was so happy Yishyene happened to be in KL when my birthday was going on! She made me this card/picture frame thing above which is currently placed in my mini zoo at home. I almost thought she wasn’t coming when she whatsapped me: “Joyce… don’t kill me…”
And i was thinking, OH MAN SHE’S GONNA CANCEL ON ME! and considering how to react in a mature and adult manner.
Then she wrote: “I made brownies for you but…”
PHEW. Turns out the brownies were hard tho i never got to try one…

Yishyene had this idea where everyone who attended could paint something on me. I told someone about her stupid idea and they said, “It’s a GREAT IDEA!” Yeah. Cos you’re not the one being painted! I was already envisioning someone painting a giant cock on me. No thanks. Let’s keep the paint for another time…

Meesh & Clouds

Clouds & Kevin brought Wallis. And that blue shirt. Is still in my car, KEVIN. So many people hungoverly left their things at Awanmulan the day after, and we had to bring it back to KL for them. Someone even thought he lost something there, but turns out he just found it yesterday…………. in his own house. Cos he never even brought it. -_- What a champ.

Oh Rudy, such a man of style.

Which straight man you know goes to a forest looking like that? I had to grab a picture.

I didn’t think of asking Rudy at first cos he always has to spin at Daikanyama on Sat nights. But i tried anyway and AM SO GLAD you came! You definitely needed to get out of the city 😉

My birthday dress! From Topshop <3 Oh BTW there are MANY pictures in this post which are all STOLEN from Tania, Steph, Meesh, Sa, Ming, Deep, etc. Sorry i’m not crediting you for every individual picture cos……… i fed you that night? Heh.

Mah trusty kaleidoscope

You can see Rudy! Just try a bit harder than you think you are right now.

Me and my beloved spinner; Cammy with the new GIANT CIRCLE OF PEACE Yishyene gave me; and Steph with a lilac feather boa Clouds gave me. After this party i realise not only do i need a massive house to keep all my clothes, but a huge room JUST for TOYS as well.

When people started eating junk food in the afternoon, i decided it was time to start cooking burgers instead of filling their stomachs up with snacks. Above is Cammy helping me, and Kenny pretending to help us.

Tania, me, and… OH MING you just had to play with food in THAT way

Ming helping to shred the duck confit.

The menu that night was:
Pork and Beef Burgers with chives, spinach, sundried tomatoes and too much salt
Duck Confit & Potatoes in duck fat and dill
5-day marinated Lamb in vodka, garlic, & herbs
Greek Salad
Hotdogs

Tania brought spicy chicken wings to BBQ
And there were more veggies and salads

These hotdogs that i casually mentioned above… were the bane of my supermarket trip. First of all, it was CLEM’S desire to have hotdogs. I think hotdogs are boring. And he was like, ‘Why? I’ll do the hotdogs, i’ll go buy everything, you don’t worry about the hotdogs.”

3 days before the BBQ, Clem goes: “Baby… can yoo google what good hotdog recipes there are?”

-_-

2 days before the BBQ: “Baby… can yoo pick up good sausages since you’re going to the soopermarket? Oh, and hotdog buns! Not the shitty ones, the good ones, they make it with good bread, you know? And mustard, good mustard you know? The spicy one. And mayo! Ahh the mayo in Malayshia sucks, try to peeck one that is ohkay.”

-_-
I KNEW THIS WOULD HAPPEN.

But it’s okay. Cos Clem redeemed himself by managing the BBQ all night with Tania. THANKS GUYS!!!!

Clem ala Charlie Chaplin. Tania werqinggggg it

A lotta team work going on! And a big fat growl.

Hmm my memory started going fuzzy once it got dark. Not surprised cos we started drinking from the moment we arrived. All i have to make sense of the night are these PICTURES in my camera. THANKS VERY MUCH to whoever took all these….

Cammy Kenny got me a beautifully-made fairy birthday cake…

BOOBIES

And someone brought sparklers (yishyene? i forgot!)

The cake had these cute cartoons on it like a fairy, and red mushrooms.

And then i KILLED the fairy… which i don’t COMPLETELY remember doing hahaaaaa

Like Tania quipped: BECAUSE THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE FAIRY.

Die you fake marzipan fairy DIEEE

Yishyene brought these clown wigs which the boys put on.

Clem played us three quarters of a song (Bob Marley’s Redemption), which is the only song he can play.

[fill in the blanks]

Somewhere along the night, i freaking PASSED OUT -_-
It was quite early too.
I was just soooo sleepyyy and tiredddd and drunkkkkk

When i woke up, Mei and Brenda came to take a picture with me and i thought, awww they must have missed me…

My ass they missed me.

Picture of the culprit at work. Thanks to the photographer. Actually, thanks to everyone who helped snap with my cam ALL NIGHT!!!

I may be mixing up the entire order of things but hey, it’s all mixed up in my head anyway.

At one point when i was really drunk, someone handed me a box (a present!) and i opened it SO eagerly i blatantly threw aside the card (according to Sarah). Thanks to Meesh, Sarch, Fuad, Didi, Clouds, Kevin, Li Mei, Brenda, Mei and Sa for these shoes!!! And thanks to Claudia for making the card. I NOTICED there are exactly 29 candles on the drawing! Good job Clouds! You make me proud as chocolate pudding filled with alcohol and sparkles on it!

I was so touched i started sobbing with the shoes in my lap.

-_-

Drama or WHAT. I think everyone was a bit er shocked. Now you know beautiful shoes can make me cry!

Midnight meal

I couldn’t believe SOMEONE was READING A BOOK at my party. I guess it was REALLY BORINGGGGGG

Rudy was playing music upstairs, and Deep & Danny had another party going on downstairs so i was just going back and forth

The next day i told Clem: Aww i had so much fun dancing with you!
Him: We danced? *scrunches up face in thought*
Me: We danced, you idiot. We danced for quite long.
Him: ….
Me: UGH

Steph and i did her ‘legs up’ thing. The others joined us on the deck. Why is Wallis eating my hair? I don’t remember if i saw stars. Steph said she saw two shooting stars. My vision must’ve been really blurry.

Steph, Cammy and i. HUG!

I’m wearing the sarong, meaning this was after we went to the pool. Well i BARELY remember this but i REMEMBER Deep and Danny bugging us to go to the pool. We drank and danced somemore in their room. Then a bunch of us went to the pool around, i dunno, 3am? Mei and Brenda told me i jumped in, swam a lap and was shivering like crazy while muttering under my breath, “Shouldn’t have listened to those guys!”

Didn’t your mother ever tell you? NEVER LISTEN TO DRUNK INDIAN MEN.

Then, apparently, we played with sparklers again

WHO HELD MY CAMERA SO CLOSE TO THE SPARKLERS!!!  👿

And then a whole bunch of photos turned out like the one below.

All blurry, grey. Artsy-looking. Whoever took it sure tried hard and i appreciate it. That was the last batch of photos for the night!

The next morning, i found myself on *a* bed in *a* room with Clem.

I felt SO thirsty so i ventured out of this room… and couldn’t find how to GET myself to the long house (where everyone was) across the road. I bumped into Uncle Teng (the owner) who asked me, “What are you looking for?”
Me: “…I’m looking for the WAY OUT.”
He kindly pointed the right direction in which to walk to, which i stumbled towards.

I grabbed some water. A few ppl were tanning in the sunshine. I tried it and almost fainted slash threw up. Forget it. I saw Sa and asked whether she may have a Panadol.
Her: “Ooh! I might have one!”
Me: “Oh…please…… ”
Her: “But i just gotta record this song first! I just thought of it and i tried doing it here but it’s not working, i gotta go down and just RECORD this first, then i’ll get the panadol.”

My first thought: i’m never seeing that Panadol.

So i went back the long journey to bed, slept some more and woke up around 10am((?). Went across the road again and saw it was quite obvious who the ones were that stayed up the latest…

And who the ones were that didn’t…

Cammy’s such a great wife – like, i don’t know if i could be a wife like that. She got up as hungover as all of us, and made a cup of coffee for Kenny. At the time, the only people STILL IN BED were Clem and Kenny
-_-

Shit man, if my man was still in bed, i’d be like waving my hands in the air going “If you not getting up, i’m going on WITHOUT YOU BITCH.” (This kinda talk is a result of hanging out with all my gay friends right now. But i would choose them any day.)

Anyway back to Cammy and this coffee. I watched her make the first one. And it took SO long i got bored and diverted my attention elsewhere. 10 minutes later, we found out that she hungoverly put salt in the coffee and i laughed and laughed.

So she started making a second coffee. And… agessssss later…… she put salt in the coffee. Again.
Cammy: “How would i know! I don’t know ‘garam’ is salt!”
She shook the jar with ‘garam’ written on it, in the air. I don’t know man, if you’re living in Malaysia, you better learn a minimum of some Malay words!

I think she successfully made him a third cup after that. I’m not sure.

Finally Clem decides to prove he’s alive.



Clouds. Dinosaurs are amazing!!!

Such a great couple picture.

My pink bandeau from Bangkok,
silver wishbone necklace from Comyns @ Royal Selangor,
silver headband from thirtyfour,
bunny ears from Disneyland Tokyo,
and Brenda, from my office.

Cassie my cat stayed on the rafters till it was afternoon

We had SO MUCH leftover alcohol (cos i must say this: i have such generous friends!!! whom i didn’t expect to bring much alcohol but THEY DID so we just had… a LOT ALTOGETHER..!) that Deep tried getting rid of some… how do you think he did it? Hint: He wouldn’t let me get a picture/proof cos he was afraid he’d get BEAT UP by his friends back in the city.

I found the giant can of foie gras and went, “Oh mannnnn i forgot to open the foie gras -_-“. I think noone minded cos we ate most of it the moment we discovered its existence.

ANTM vs MMF (Malaysia’s Model Foreva)

Ming ‘decorated’ me while i lay on his bed watching Fuad play his guitar and sing songs. Fufu’s pretty damn good at playing the guitar!!! Even Clem admitted ‘Fuad is really good at the guitar’ when we got home. Yay Fuad! Next time we invite you over for dinner you gotta sing for it!

No caption

Hungover LIKE SHIT

The only thing i regret that day is… not taking pictures with the owners Teng and Anne. So stupid. I don’t know why i didn’t think of it. Kept on blah-ing myself when we got home.

When i went to Awanmulan for NYE, i queried about this miniature cleaver that i used in the guest kitchen downstairs. Instead of revealing to me where i could buy it, Anne bought it for me and wrapped it up for my birthday (in red paper, pantang to give knives on birthday, she said) underneath gold wrapping paper. SO SWEET. GAHHHHH.

I had such a brilliant birthday… I didn’t expect much out of it. Just wanted a get-together with a lot of time on our hands, nature and good food. And it surpassed my expectations. Also because of the people who came. I specifically said ‘no presents’ since everyone was paying for their bed, helping bring mixers, side dishes etc. And some of them STILL brought presents! Just thinking about that weekend makes me want to weep in joy cos it really made me happy and it was SUCH A HAPPY WEEKEND i couldn’t have asked for better.

Lastly, i FOUND this video that Yishyene took with my cam which kinda shows what my face was like most of the night.

How can this party not be proof that GETTING OLDER JUST GETS BETTER