day twelve - whatever tickles your fancy

this topic seems to be appearing quite a lot...
anyway, so i was thinking today of what i was going to write about, and it dawned on me.

VCE

i get so frustrated with the whole concept sometimes!!

i'm not someone who hates school either, ever since i can remember i have loved it. yes, of course, there have been off days, and fights with friends, or just days when you can't be bothered because you haven't finished that assignment, but in general i love it.
i love the people, i love the music, i love the feeling of being 'home' when i'm there.

my music teacher always tells us:
"i'm teaching you music for life, not for the exam"
and i totally agree with her. the things on the exam are so simple, that being extended keeps us interested and wants us to learn more.
but what about other subjects?

like english for example. we've learnt our basic english skills, but we are studying a certain context. we are studying certain books, certain techniques, certain authors and films.

maths. we learn formulas, do specific topics, learn equations... and unless we study maths at uni, are we really going to remember all these formulas in 2 years time...?

i have friends who do history, and yes they love the stuff that they learn about, but sometimes there might be something off-topic, not in the coursework that you want to learn about. but because the course is so jam-packed of things you need to learn to pass the exam, there's no time to cover other things.

i guess what i am trying to say is that my one huge frustration with the whole concept of VCE is that all year we study hard and work our butts off just to pass the exam. all we are learning is so we can pass the exam. to get a number. to get into the course we want.

but then again, there is so much that happens in year 12 that i guess VCE is a little price to pay for all the enjoyment i have had over not only the past 12 years of schooling, but the enjoyment i hopefully will have in the coming year.

keep learning, even if it's not in the course.
oh, and 33 weeks until exams... thanks VCAA.
xx

day eleven - a photo of you taken recently

for starters, i am posting two blogs today because my best friend came over last night and we were jamming for 5 hours. hence no time for blogging.
all good though :-)

so back on track, todays blog is
a photo of me taken recently
i don't exactly have many photos of me that are NOT in costume, so i have chosen this photo from the Easter holidays last year :-)



it was one day on the holidays, and with some friends, we ventured to central gardens in glenferrie for a picnic. fully set with picnic rugs, food, drinks, and of course a guitar.

the afternoon was beautiful, sunny, warm - perfect!

one of my friends bought her camera, and this photo seems to keep recurring in my profile pictures, it's a bit of a favourite.

so there you go, i haven't changed much in a year - dyed my hair black, then mahogany, so that's the only real difference.
the music geek part hasn't changed !

"today's the day the teddy bears have their picnic!"
xx

day ten - a photo of you taken over ten years ago

it was actually quite surprisingly easy to pick
a photo of me taken over ten years ago...



i have chosen this photo not only because i am quite fond of it, but because it reminds me of how much i used to love playing dress-ups when i was a kid.

the costume box is a childhood memories that i keep quite close to my heart. there are a ridiculous amount of photos of me playing dressups - with my sister, with my teddy bear, with my barbies, with my entire toy collection. in places all over the house... (you see, when i was little, i refused to take afternoon naps... instead, mum would find me asleep in the middle of the hallway...)

mum has told me stories of how i used to get all dressed up (including the occasional raid of the makeup drawer), take afternoon tea (quite early in the afternoon), take all my toys, my tea set, and sit in the cubby playing for hours.
i would make sure that everyone get dressed up for the grand tea party, and off i would go, until mum came to get me.

my favourite book as a kid was "A Proper Little Lady" - a book which tells of a little girl who just loved to get dressed up in her beautiful dress, her pearly necklace, her best shoes, and her best white frilly socks, but then loved to play.
each piece of clothing has a sound, and by the end of the book, everything has fallen apart, is completely covered in dirt, or is clunking along behind her.
this books pretty much sums up my entire childhood.

and on special occasions, like in this photo, i got to dress up real special, put red lipstick around my mouth, let mum do my hair, and off i went:
the clown of the party...

so yeah, ten years ago, i was a pretty cool kid.
xx

day nine - a photo you took

i'm just going to put it out there that i am not much of a photographer. of course, i love taking photos and experimenting with different things, but it's definitely nothing special.

the only place where i ever took real care in the taking of my photos, for a whole two weeks, was on my school trip to Japan last year.
however, instead of choosing one of the photos that i took of the landscape, or the beautiful gardens, or the shrines, or any time when the photo clearly demonstrates the culture and sophistication of this beautiful country, i have chosen this photo:



Lisa and Sayaka.
these two girls were my host sisters for 1 week while i stayed in Japan.

seeing this photo, i cannot even begin to describe how the memories come flooding back.
for starters, i took this photo myself, on the evening that we ventured up to see the Kobe lights at sunset; and what a beautiful night that was. completely exhausting, yes, but it was truly the end to a perfect day.

Lisa, my host sister who was the same age as me, spoke a little bit of English. she learns it at school, and knew enough to get by, similarly to how much Japanese i knew.
in fact, our usual conversation of the morning was: "you're crazy!!" "no... you're crazy!" "hahaha no... you're crazy" (we would giggle as we ran out the door to begin the 90 minute monorail/train/subway trip to school...)

meanwhile, Sayaka, my older host sister, didn't speak any English, but somehow i still managed to connect with her as though she was my real sister.

these two girls, as well as my host mum and dad, made me feel so welcome into their home, teaching me so much about the way that they live, and laughing both at me and with me at some of the most ridiculous things.

we only stayed with our host families for just under 1 week, and although there were times of frustration due to a language barrier or home sickness, when it was time to leave for Tokyo, i definitely wasn't ready to go... it was as though i had just settled in with my second family, and now my teachers were telling me that i had to leave them?

tears were shed, hugs were given, and we waved until we could no longer see them. but it's okay, because i know that i will see them again one day. and hopefully my sisters can come and stay here in Australia, and i can welcome them into my home, into my life, just as they did for me.

ありがとう
thankyou
xx

day eight - a photo that makes you sad

second post in one day - so i'm up-to-date now.
todays actual post is supposed to be a photo that makes you angry or sad; and i have chosen...

a photo that makes me sad:



alright, this photo is actually a photo that was part of my friends folio for studio art, her theme being: "3 masks of me - my past and my flowing future."

i'm not going to lie, the first time i saw this photo, it really upset me.
you see, my friend suffers, as too many people do, with depression.

what so many people don't realise is how serious mental illness can be. an illness like depression can take a hold on your entire body, not just your mind, until the things that you are thinking and doing, seem normal to you. this is your reality, and despite all the positive things going on around you, you just seem to take the negative out of every situation.

i have quite a few friends with depression, and it breaks my heart to see them so sad, so self-loathing, so depressed.
however, i have learnt over the past 6 months or so that i personally cannot save them - yes i can support them and tell them every day that i love them so so much, but i don't need to be feeling it myself.

i have had a few friends tell me that i just don't understand, and i used to get really angry about the fact that i couldn't understand what they were going through. but i have come to realise that i don't need to understand. all i need to do is to be a good friend, even if that means being the friend who has no idea what is going on, but instead is there just to distract their friend, have a jam session, go to the movies, go on a picnic, anything that means that the friend can be as happy possible.

i have learnt that although i want to take their pain away, no matter how much i try, i just can't - they're going to need to get help themselves. but sometimes this is a lot easier said than done. which brings me to my next point...

earlier this year i heard from a speaker, Ingi Barr - the author of "Walking the Black Dog."
she spoke about her experience with bipolar disorder and her depressive episodes. it was something that i really took on board, because the whole point of her speech was not only to inform us about the effects of depression/bipolar/mental illness, or how we can help someone with this disease, but to reduce the stigma that comes with speaking about mental illness.

WHY is mental illness not spoken about? it can be just as life-threatening as a physical disease, and if the stigma was reduced then maybe people wouldn't be so afraid to ask for help.

as for some of my friends who suffer with depression, i will admit, i cannot handle their issues all the time. sometimes i just need to take some time for myself, and refocus what's important, so that i am in a better place myself to help them.
but even if i do ask them to back off, that doesn't mean i won't text them to tell them i love them, or that i care any less.

reduce the stigma of mental illness.
so perhaps, peoples "3 masks of me" won't have to involve depression, or covering up how they are really feeling.

i love you.
xx

day seven - a photo that makes you happy

alright, to begin with, yes i did miss doing this yesterday, but to make up for it i am going to do day seven and day eight today. yeah. :-)

so, a photo that makes me happy...



this photo was taken last year, at Tokyo Disneyland.
it was our last day of the trip, and although we were all exhausted, the rain came down half way through the day, and we were all emotional about the fact that we were leaving the next day, we had an absolute ball.

this photo makes me happy because it pretty much sums up my entire day at Disneyland - I spent most of the day with the two girls in the photo (plus myself): we went to countless shops, waited in line for hours to go on rides, got photos together, had inside jokes about way too many things, and just the mixture of their personalities and mine made it a truly hilarious and unforgettable day.

it reminds me so much of the beautiful country that is Japan, and just as a side note my thoughts are with anyone in Japan effected by the earthquake: my heart goes out to you all.

things to do before you die: go to Tokyo Disneyland.
you won't regret it.

xx

day six - whatever tickles your fancy

for starters, the awkward moment when you realise it's 5 minutes until tomorrow, therefore this blog is totally going to be on the wrong day... oops, my bad.

alright, back on track.
todays topic is: whatever tickles your fancy.
i looked at this title and i literally do not know to write about.

but instead of boring you with the ramblings of an almost-eighteen-year-old, i am going to decide on a topic, and write. about something that is really close to home. something that matters a lot to me. and that is; my best friend.

i don't know about other people, but the term "best friend" is so loosely used these days. wikipedia says:
Best friend, someone (singular) with whom one shares the strongest possible kind of friendship

but it's so much more than that. i know i wrote a blog about this in july last year, but since then my feelings on the matter have only intensified.
and if it accounts for anything, that one person that i called my best friend in July last year is my best friend to this day.

she is beautiful (although denies it), she is kind and honest, she knows when to be my best friend and when to be my big sister, she's a good listener but still knows when she needs to intervene, she knows when to sit back and watch me make my own mistakes, and learn from them, and she is someone who i hope i will be telling jokes to and having little sing-a-longs with when we are sitting in our little grandma chairs reminiscing about the 'olden days'.

since last year i have made new friends, and yes i have been very close to them, and hope that i will be for a long time, but there is nobody else that i trust more than my best friend, and nobody else that i can sit down with after 3 months of not seeing her and just pick up exactly where we left off; everything around us has changed, but somehow we haven't.

so say what you like, call everyone around you your best friend just because it seems like the cool thing to do, because you don't want to upset anyone, or because you want to fit into "that" group, but when you're sitting alone in your room crying over something miniscule, think of the person who would come over, give you a hug, and then tell you to get back up again, and that you are the most amazing person in the world. that, to me, is my best friend.

i hope she knows i'm always there for her, even if we don't talk every day, and i wouldn't change the way we are for anything.

Stay Beautiful,
xx