over the past few weeks or so, there were so many times when i just wished i could go "home". hours and hours on end spent in school, a place where you can practically call home, with all sorts of people. you have no choice (although you actually do) but really, you have no choice. i know i have to be here and i know i have to do what i have to do but all the time, the temptation of running away, running home, just gets stronger and stronger.

it's like, being thrown out into a jungle or into the deep blue sea or onto a safari. maybe you're too busy at first. too busy dealing with the thrill, fear, anxiety and excitement of such chaos. but after a while, you know you just want to go back to what you know. you just want to go back home.

i was telling janice. i don't why i was but i was telling janice. that i feel like a missionary who's been away from home for so long and just needs to go back home to something familiar. a lonely missionary. i did tell her that perhaps, missionary was too honourable an analogy. haha. but seriously, imagine what it must be like for foreign workers. like those who come to singapore to be construction workers. the moment they touch down, they're immediately thrown into chaos. the living conditions they put up with, the measly salary they worked hours on end under the sun for, the lack of freedom, the sudden immense distance between them and their loved ones, the few minutes of calling home from public homes to shout a few words that don't say alot but mean so much because of the mere connection to something familiar, the ill treatments, the way the public looks at them. and they thought they had finally reached paradise. imagine what they go through and my gosh, shireen, what were you saying?

don't be mistaken though. there's so much i am thankful for! so many things were accomplished over the week, taking away some of the weight, but i'm just missing something so much. i wish i knew what i was missing. friends seem so far away even though i see them all around everyday. it's not that i don't appreciate them. i don't even know who or what i am in their eyes sometimes anyway. there are all these circles around me but i feel like i'm in my own even though i talk to a gazillion people each day. maybe i'm missing a real kind of connection. there's really nothing at the surface. i just feel, in the words of a famous cliche, so near and yet...so far...

like a little girl sitting in the backseat of the car on a long journey home, persistently asking her father, "are we home yet?" even when it's not going to change a thing.

maybe it's because i'm moody and sleepy and tired and restless and it's 3.36am in the morning... i don't want to turn into a bitter, selfish and grumpy brat. i'm almost reaching the finish line. please don't let me stall now...