I'm back at home in London now! and feeling nervous for uni -_-; I've finally found the energy and time to work on this website... I had everything saved on my computer for most of the year and i want to get it out FINALLY!!!!!! Though over the summer I barely found the time to code and it seems I need to relearn a lot of things. sigh (◞‸◟；)
I never understood people who don't have a diary of some sorts. Then where do you put all these thoughts? Where do you hide all the pain? Do you carry it within you? Is the burden not heavy? Do you look for yourself in art? Are you moved to tears by the sight of the sky? How do you live? How do you live?
Why does everyone around me seem normal? Why are they able to lie in bed at night without their thoughts consuming them inside out? Where are the people who seem to think exactly like me? Who feel as deeply as I do? Is everyone hiding it, just like me? Will I ever truly understand someone? Will someone ever truly understand me? Will the loneliness end? It ends, eventually?
Will these fragments finally piece together? Will I bloom? I'll feel like I'm living my own life? I'll be whole?
I used to think I had a good understanding of myself - or rather, as I read through my writing from two years ago, I used have a better understanding of myself than I currently do - but now, I'm so lost. I don't know where to start. On one hand, I feel like I'm too complex to understand. I've dug too deep and realised it was an impossible task from the start, like trying to unravel a tangled wire only to realise it was a dead knot. And then there are moments when I feel like I'm making it all up, that all of this is just in my head and I should stop trying to make sense of nothing and stop caring for these meaningless things and for god's sake just get a grip and stop wasting time and live a normal life like everyone else is but... there is too much proof that it is possible. Reading The Book of Disquiet and seeing his wild fluctuations that feel all too familiar, the way he seems to have himself in the palm of his hand, examining himself with scientific precision, proves to me that I was never alone in this attempt. And then there is another quiet, haunting, terrifying voice, telling me the map of my soul is not complex enough to be worth exploring; only a truly creative and poetic soul is worth the attempt and I'm just a fraud. Not creative nor eloquent enough for art, not logical nor resilient nor interested enough for science. I don't know what I'm doing. I keep going in circles, and I'm running out of time.
And it's already 2025 and I've finished my A-Levels! And I've finished secondary education! And I'm 18! And I'm going to university next year! And so much has happened...yet I read back at these entries and I'm still the same confused soul as I was a year ago. To be honest, this "diary" feels redundant as I've written constantly in my journals all this time, where I am much more personal, and the entries here are usually duplicates. But I think I'd like to keep this going - even if it means typing up existing text, as it'll be a good way to reflect on previous thoughts.
I might copy some of my journal entries during the time I was gone to fill the gap, when I feel like it.
I'm typing this at a desk in a library in Tianjin, China, where I'll be spending the summer. I got here three days ago, and I'm already overstimulated and my brain feels constantly foggy. It's clearer here in the library but out on the streets, online, in the shopping malls - everything is loud and bright and fast and oversaturated. It's sensory overload. I hope I get used to it soon.
this is why i hate working in teams!!!! i'm already doing all the work, and noone seems to be bothered to just respond to my messages!!! i seem to be the only one who cares about this project?!! uagaggagggg!!!!!
Went Xmas shopping with my dad this morning - Can you believe how cheap everything was at Tesco?!! Broccoli, parsnips, potatoes... all under 20p. Veggie heaven!! (ﾉ ˃ˋᗜˊ˂ )ﾉ
I'm battling with my thoughts today again, and I'm trying my best not to relapse. That would be a betrayal. That would be the opposite of what he would want.
Lately I've been feeling disconnected from my physical body. There's me which other people see which does all the talking, smiling, and other necessary social interactions. Then there's the me inside my head, processing, thinking, feeling. But I've been thinking and feeling so much these days that I have no energy for anything else and my outside self is on autopilot.
My music teacher lent me his score of the Berio Sinfonia(with the Mahler recomposition) and ... its GIANT!!! It looks so intimidating too, though I love the cover design.
I think other people in my class think I'm shooting myself in the foot for picking such a strange and niche composition brief, to do it on Berio. But this is part of a wider need to expand my concept of beauty. Does that make sense? I've been thinking about it a lot, how my sense of beauty is too narrow. I'd like to consume and interact with new types of art and beauty. And though Berio and this post-WW2 avant-garde world scares and confuses me a lot, I think that's more of a reason to explore it! I'll try my best ^_^!!
I decided to get up an hour early today, though I couldn't see the sunrise. My window is west-facing, so I get to see dusk at the expense of dawn. Mornings have been so foggy recently, and combined with the blood-red trees, it's strangely beautiful.
Speaking of red, I felt like the only one wearing a poppy today ! I remember how much we did for Remembrance Day back in primary school, I guess it's just become a habit.
It's been a relief to finally talk to him again, after avoiding him for so long. I was just scared I hadn't sorted through my thoughts properly that I would just collapse into a broken mess. But my head was strangely calm. Maybe it will all hit me soon.
On another note, look at the bracelet I made for my friend! Isn't it cute?! ^_^ I learnt how to do the snake/Jigang knot (蛇结) and the peace knot (平结).
I read a poem on the Underground today, "But the purest memory is the storybook moment when we stood there...and for once we became the characters we pencilled to paper." I want to live in these moments, I want to live in these pictures... I want to live. Do you understand what I mean? I'm not quite sure I do myself. All I know is that there somewhere, out there, there is a world where I am free to care about nothing but my art, the pure, terrifying intensity of emotion. I want a world where I am destroyed by my own feelings, not by the supression of them. I'm not sure... I don't think I belong here.
I was reading ZAMM on the train back, and I feel like something's finally clicking. It has been a hard read (I started it all the way in the summer!) but, unlike all the negative reviews I see of it online, Pirsig's writing speaks to me a lot. I think I understand why people don't like his fragmented, random sequence of writing, but I like the spontaneity and the free flow of thought. Maybe I'm reading it at a correct time in my life, especially as I'm examining and reflecting on the divides between the scientific and artistic in my own life right now. Though I have close to zero background knowledge in philosophy so most of the philosophical interjections go right over my head. I'm kind of inspired to get into philosophy these days. It might help a bit with everything that's going on inside my head.
today in my music lesson we talked about Hegel and dialectics - thesis and antithesis in terms of thought systems in society, and how he believed a perfect society is one which achieves a synthesis (in it's truest sense !) of the two. My teacher related this to sonata form in that the 1st subject serves as some sort of a"thesis", the second subject its "antithesis", and the development section a synthesis between the previous two materials.
I find that really interesting, how such philosophical concepts that make comments on society as a whole manifest in the most unexpected of places, such as in a traditional form of classical piano music.
on another note. that picture isn't just of some random church, it's a cool pic i took inside the Free Church next to our school where we held the school House Singing event earlier today.
i used to play in the symphony orchestra of my school, and i hated it, because i don't enjoy large gatherings of people in general. they would be so energy-draining, and, as a 2nd violin, i often felt irrelevant and unneeded. i quit two or three years ago. but today was the school house singing event which us Year 13s (are forced to) organise. it was quite a difficult process, but here we were, me on the piano, accompanying the children sing. and, now, back at home, i am feeling very happy. a warmth in my stomach that is deep and humming. there's a certain joy that social interaction can give you that nothing else can match. of course, i get most joy from solitude, but i've missed this feeling... standing at the back of the church, seeing everyone enjoying themselves, i thought to myself, this is the beauty of community - that each and every insignificant person among us can come together to create something beautiful.
Boo!!!
it's Halloween night... and time for all the cute favicons!!! 
there is a gentle buzz in the air, of tension and magic, sparkling fireworks, soft glow of pumpkins, colourful baskets of candies and excited little children. i hope everyone has a spook-tacular Halloween!
I'm finally free from school＼(^o^)／ for a week... I had a friend over yesterday and we took a walk in the park and the autumn leaves were falling in the wind like it was a shoujo anime :3c the trees have all become red and orange and it reminds me of one passage from The Secret History, something like "trees are schizophrenic now and beginning to lose control, enraged with the shock of their fiery new colours.. someone-was in Van Gogh - said that orange is the colour of insanity."
i'm starting to see pumpkins and little ghost decorations in front of peoples' houses now, and it's so exciting! i wish I could go trick-or-treating again...am I too old to?!
i've had a super productive weekend! i've been wanting to reorganise my closet sometime, as well as do a big clean up of my room - i got some of that accomplished recently, as well as catching up with missed schoolwork! i spent this evening working on my homepage and i didn't even notice the hours passing :0 i think i finally get the hang of html... and i want to make my halloween-themed homepage soon!! anyways i am pretty tired right now so i'll head to bed ~ don't want to be late for school tomorrow, do we? ^^ goodnight♡
i made it out alive. it wasn't at all dramatic like I'd been imagining. walking out of the exam hall, i felt kind of numb like all my purpose had been drained. but i'll find that purpose again. and i think i did the best i could for the time that i chose to dedicate to it.
i returned to school today, after skipping for almost a week to study X<. i was finally able to work on my music composition after school without the constant voice in my head telling me to revise. it's such a relief to be able to create again.
Hello(^^)/" today is one of those afternoons, when the warm sunlight is seeping into my room and there is soft piano in my ears...i am feeling very comfortable and sleepy right now, yet a little bittersweet that moments like these are so fleeting. I thought I'd capture it here.
It's been so long since we had guests over, it kind of reminds me of a summer weekend when I was 6 or 7, and me, Mum, Dad, and my brother were cleaning the kitchen for guests coming over. I have a lot of good memories in that old house. Anyways, we had hotpot today! I haven't had hotpot in so long!! Mum also bought watermelon today. Eating it today reminds me of this summer. I want to go back... TwT
The weather was so peaceful today. Considering there's only been rain, rain, rain for the past week. The sunlight was too beautiful for me to miss it. The light shimmering off the surfaces of my MDZS couple badges was so pretty, I had to take a photo! one day I want to do a photoshoot of all my badges like I see on 小红书 hehe >///<
I want to keep writing this as a memoir for future me. One who hates oneself for not doing enough. I want to say, this is enough. The daylight is beautiful and there is something worth waking up to and and I am slowly healing.
On another note, it's finally October! (I'm a bit late aren't I?) I've been wanting to make a Halloween-themed homepage like I see on some super cute websites here. Interview and exam preparation might take up my time, though. we'll see. I'm excited for halloween ~~
the weather was so strange today! I haven't seen rain with sun in a long time. I even saw a rainbow! ⋒ ( > 〰 < )♡ Here's a picture I took when I was walking under grey rainclouds with an opening in the sky of blinding white sun ahead of me. It felt very otherworldly.
I was walking from school to the train station this afternoon (because I only have lessons in the morning on Wednesdays wooho^3^!) and for some reason... I felt strangely sad that this was my last year here. I have always felt my experience at my school has not been great - I was always waiting, waiting for something, a moment where I would finally feel that I had accomplished something, that I had reached the finish line... until I eventually lost myself in the race.
I guess that's why I'm trying to write about me and my life more. So I can find myself in the process.
I'm going off topic again, aren't I? Somehow I felt a little sad that I would be leaving soon. Mainly because I left just in time to see the Year 6 girls walking home with their parents after their entrance exam today. It reminded me of 7 years ago, how I had walked with Mum along the very same path, under the very same canopy, to the same train station. I thought about how these little children will, one day, leave, too.
The passage of students, a school which remains. The movement of time, the stillness of space.
It has been very painful as of lately. I am struggling to keep the pieces of my life from falling apart. what's worse is that I feel like I'm overreacting, just for some university admission exam. Everyone is handling the academic stress just fine, so why aren't you? I don't want to admit it, but I am someone who is so afraid of failiure that I'll freeze up and stand still just to avoid it. But I can't stop. I have to stand up again. I have to keep running. Because everyone else is, and I'll fall behind.
This weekend started well. I am proud that I was able to eat a proper meal on Saturday for the start of the day. I managed to get some work done that afternoon. But the next day got worse. I felt I had lost all meaning or sight of the goal. It's terrifying to not be able to do anything as the time passes by and the end gets near. As I'm writing this now, the panic is starting to rise again and I feel the need to do more.
I know this is just one small challenge in the life ahead of me, but right now, it feels like everything depends on this moment. I know I'll look back at this and laugh at how unecessarily worried I was. I guess that's why I'm writing this. I have to keep reminding myself. I will be fine. I am smart enough. I deserve a good education. I'll keep focused and not let the thoughts get to me too much. I'll try my best.
At least the sunflowers in the bathroom are beautiful. Mum must have replaced the flowers last night.
i hope it will be okay in the end.
Who in their right mind would invent wasabi flavoured white rabbit milk candy?
???
I often feel sad that my friends don't view the world the way that I do. I often feel that I am not surrounded by the right people. Today's dinner reunion in Chinatown for a friend's 18th was, as usual, tiring, but I found it strangely....comforting. There is a part of me that belongs with them too. I am reminded of how I became friends with them in the first place. Although they may not share my values, my view, my interests, they are still people I hold dear to me, in a different way. And it's nice to catch up and see that they are doing well, and to laugh with them once again.
September's here and the days are getting shorter and I am forced to say goodbye to the last of a carefree blue sky. Autumn is always a hard season for me to come to terms with, the painful evidence of a fading season ... but this year, I will try and see it in its own beauty and not in the shadow of Summer.
"My life felt empty and unreal and I was embarrassed about its thinness, the way one might be embarrassed about wearing a stained or threadbare piece of clothing I felt like I was in danger of vanishing, though at the same time the feelings I had were so raw and overwhelming that I often wished I could find a way of losing myself altogether, perhaps for a few months, until the intensity diminished."
I am scared of vanishing. My life is so thin and shallow and someday I could just disappear and nothing would change. Every day I am living for rules that do not matter, smiling for expectations don't mean anything in the end. I drop out of a weekly commitment, but what does anyone have to care? I stop hanging out with my friends, but what do they know about everything that is going on in my head? I hang onto all these material items, keep them so dearly in my cabinet, associate with them pretty childhood memories that never existed, but what will happen to them when I die? Who will know of any of the worlds which mean so much to me? Everything will perish with me. Because what makes the brain superior to, say, that of my heart, my lungs, my intestines? I am as simple as the organs inside my body. I am saddened by just how little I really have. You say "Don't care about what others think" , but if I don't force society's rules onto me. I will find that all the meaning I found in art, in nature, in other human beings, in their eyes, in their words, in all those fake universes, I found them in the strangest places, but if I take that fatal look in the mirror, I will see that it was just ...me all along. It was just me and these empty eyes and my empty head filled with horrible thoughts all along. I was alone this whole time. I am so scared to be left alone with my own mind because I will fall into that unappeasable abyss of a black hole and then I will truly, truly, truly just disappear.
When someone ask me "So tell me about yourself" or something of the sort and offer me a rare chance to open up a little bit of my mind to them, I find myself at a loss of what to say, because there is just so much to say. It takes a lot of time to sift through what version of myself I should present, what I need to filter out, what I need to make more interesting. How much is truly my own thoughts and not just me agreeing to the general opinion of the conversation. And by then, someone else has probably joined the conversation, or it's moved on, or it's over.
it's really hard.
this sense of Self, that only seems to emerge when I'm alone.
i grew up classically trained.
there was always this mindset of... the "real" music.
Real harmony. Serious harmony. Complex harmony. Four-point counterpoint. Harmonic progression. Structure. Development.
and I love classical music, but I also love so much more.
Compared to the soundworld I grew up in, my music, on the other hand, ... was shallow. incomplete. spontaneous. pretentious. i couldn't write real music. Not well, at least. So I didn't. Or if I did, I hid it, or laughed it off jokingly. Because only if I was writing "real" music would I be working hard. I used the cover of unseriousness to hide how much I cared about this music I was making.
Does all music have to be "real" music?
What even is "real" music?
Can't I stay here and enjoy the strange creations in my pocket, instead of catching up to the crowd following the open path? Can I walk down that half-formed, unacknowledged path? I hope i can at least open up another perspective to my view of this beautiful and simple landscape.
that's a start.
that's why I'll continue to work hard to write my shallow, spontaneous music.
The sky at night is clear enough for me to see the stars.
In the house down the road she plays the piano.
I'm reminded of the special days by their fireworks.
On sunny days I can see the clouds from my window
and the light glints off the cars and the rooftops.
Such is my quiet life.
this morning, i looked up from my desk and saw that my suncatcher, for the first time in several months, was diffracting light.
seeing the kaleidoscope of colours against the bedroom walls felt like a glimpse of the warmer days ahead.
spring, please come quickly this year ^_^
There's a beauty to figure sketching in public.
To think that somewhere out there, someone has recorded a fleeting moment of an existence, frozen in space, frozen in time, the eternal memory of a stranger.
...aaand you've reached the end! Thanks for making it this far ^3^