Don't Celebrate Valentine's Day!

Valentine's Day is coming up soon. Just so you know, I don't celebrate nor do I believe the significance of February 14.

Saint Valentine, the matyr (mati syahid kalau dalam Islam) patron of lovers was in fact either a bishop or a priest. Just in case you're ill-informed of the celibate life of Christian monks, bishops, priests, there were not allowed to have sex or even spend more than necessary time with women. So how does a death of a priest that were later made a saint be the epitome of love?

Love for God, yes. But love for your girlfriends and boyfriends?

I rest my case. Like any other popular christian celebration like Chrismas or Easter Day, Valentine's Day is another holy day tainted by the likes of commercialism. And yes, it's a christian celebration. I'm a muslim. So I don't see why muslims should get caught up with the hype. Muslims are human beings too, I know. Some monumental sinners like Anwar Ibrahim are devout muslims, I know. Islam acknowledges individuality and freedom of choice as long as it doesn't conflict with its basic belief system.

Like you, I hate listening to Ustazs and Ustazahs telling me how to act or talk or react. Who the hell are you to tell me how I should think? Since when my opinions can be regulated by the likes of you? I know how you feel about people who to tells you that in Islam, you can't do this, you can't do that, haram! haram! nanti masuk neraka! with an outdated holier-than-thou approach.

But I'm old enough to distinct the unadulterated logic behind magma molten insults and ill-delivered advice. In the end God Almighty will judge my deeds and sins and not judgemental fart-wards who tainted the holy guidance of Islam. Fuck them and their attitude towards modern day youths. They attributed to muslim teenagers' reluctance to learn about Islam. It's not our faults that our parents are incompetent when it comes to the holy teaching of Islam. Now that we want to learn, you fuckers turn us away with your index fingers and intimating glares.

Where was I?

Oh yeah, Valentine's Day is lame. People who celebrate Valentine's Day are lame, old-fashion and do their cloth shopping at Giant and Carrefour. Only cool people avoid celebrating Valentine's Day. Cool people who reads Twilight while listening to Lisa Loeb's Fools Like Me at Starbucks stay away from Valentine's Day because they're busy talking to their friends about the extended DVD of the movie KAMI.

Who am I kidding? You're too cool to listen to people like me. I read Allan Hollinghurst's Line of Beauty while listening to Scarlatti's Porgolesi at a deserted gerai Nasi Lemak. I'm not cool. By your standards, I'm a self indulgent weirdo. So go, go and spread the words and celebrate my birthday instead.

*ehem* June the 19th *ehem*

Good Afiq Bad Afiq

When I was 9 years old, I was considered a goody two-shoes in my school. I was mocked by some of the more rugged classmates for being a skema malay. Back in the days, budak melayu skema is a rare phenomenon. In Sabah, only chinese students were entitled to be nerds and be cool with it. Malays in the other hand were somewhat expected to be nakal.

Back then, I was under tight supervision of my mother. Even though she hinted that she would like me to be more manly, adventurous and confident, she contradicted her wishes with her strict rules.

When my grades dropped, my parents would point out ridiculous faults like "Itulah suka sangat Ziana Zain ha! Situ Nurhaliza! Mariah Carey!"

"Apalah Bapak merepek ni, sejak bila Afiq suka dorang?" I would thought to myself while imagining all the mentioned celebrities to do the macarena dance to distract myself from talking back. Rule of thumb: do not refute any allegations by parents. Kalau tidak mampuih~ kena rotan!

I purposely did badly in my midterms so I could be 'cool' and join the melayu gang. Who could blame me? I don't speak chinese so automatically it was impossible to become friends with them. I had no one to talk to about my problems and the conflicts I had in school. Mind you, parents those days don't talk empathetically to their children.

So at the risk of becoming a victim to the almighty rotan, I repented and did well in my exams. I befriended Jason Ng and officially established myself as a budak melayu skema. Along the process, I developed a rather strange habit. Every night I sat in front of the mirror and talked to the 'evil Afiq'. I would ask how my day went, switch off the drawing table light and answer the question with a coarse voice (like Gollum in LOTR) The moment I switch on the drawing table light, I'll turn back into the good Afiq and so on and so forth.

Why am I telling you this? I'm writing a short script about me communicating with my evil twin. I'm honing my script writing skill. I was told that I suck at it.

I haven't figure out what we'll talk about (between good Afiq and evil Afiq) but it is likely that our personalities will be of stark contrast. I think it's good practice and I can start tonight!

I think I'm referring my evil twin as Madba!

(I took and edit this photo 3 years ago)

The Mystery of Time Travelling

Like most of you guys, I grew up hoping that the future me would invent a Doraemon robot to help me out with my homework. And for a time, I always imagined that my study table drawer is a time travelling gateway. Unlike the movie Back to the Future, Fujiko F. Fujio had a more sensible theory of time travel: it works as a loop. The event where time travelling takes place will simply repeat itself infinitely and people only realize this because the intervention of the loop can be seen or understood.

My theory of time travel differs because if I hypothetically travel back in time, I will not see myself in the past, I would just rewind the physical events that had taken place, leaving my mind perceptible of both the future and the past and would therefore affect a ripple of change with my choice of decisions in the future like the butterfly effect.

We live in a continuous loop with no definite end. Even when we die, we will still be in existence. Religions pointed this out in various details: reincarnation, karma, heaven and hell, etc. but what comes around goes around and this continuous loop is what made our actions trigger equal reactions. And you know what? We can all experience the existence of this loop when we get Deja Vus.

If time travelling is possible, in my opinion, we could do so only by activating a deeper level of consciousness. I haven't seen or experience such a thing yet, and even if I had, proofs of such undertakings would be perceived as forecasting and not time travelling. I think mediums who could communicate with people of the future or the past have the ability to bend their sense of time and relativity with their minds.

I'm applying this theory for Rewind, a short film about a guy who could control his deeper level of consciousness and rewind time with a typical dvd option paved on anywhere he wants it to be. It'll be super cool. Einstein-Hawking-Ringo Starr cool! Ice cube cool!

You're Asking Moi?

"What do you think of your..."

"Well since you asked... I think I'm slightly overweight, I've a tendency to..."

"Not you lah Budak Perasan! I'm asking you about 4PA."

"You want me to comment on my own work????"

"Why the hell not?"

"You're asking moi?"

"Yes, I'm asking vous!"

"Okay then, read my blog tonight!"

Ok well, if you ask me now I've to tell you that I'm quite dissapointed with the film. I'm not falling prey to false modesty but I feel that way to all my previous works. So in a way I'm never completely happy with anything I did. I'm the happiest human being on earth when I'm doing it but the outcome will usually make me strive even harder to get things right and even then, when it is all done, I will still be unhappy. It's really like courting an impossibly angelic being. I know she's too good for me and when I do approach her I will make mistakes and give her a bad impression, but she's the love of my life and I made it a mission in my life to marry her.

It's the first script I'd ever written and I didn't know what to expect from the the delivery. And now I do. Now I know how to approach people's attention and make good use of visual motion and sound to make my story felt. Like anything else worth doing, I felt that I learnt a lot from this experience and this will pave a way for more effective jongleur-ing.

I'm not exactly commenting on my own work am I? Don't get me wrong, I'm the first person who realized the abundance of incompetence in 4PA but I don't regret the process of making it. I learnt a lot. I learnt about editing, writing, acting, mood control and flow. But most of all, I learnt that this is the one thing I want to do in life and I'm grateful to God that He made me realize this.

Did I answer your question Razak?

"Woi Afiq!"

"Ye"

"Meja ko bersepah giler!"

"Pedulik pulak aku.."

"Meja ko menunjukkan keperibadian ko tau!"

"Oh ye ke? Sila explain saudara.."

"Okay"

Amin told me that I am a priority freak, caring and temperamental. I would like to think that I'm..

Forgetful

Sentimental

and childish

But then again, who am I to judge myself! If the state of my study table can tell me the type of person I am then this could apply to any of my domestic necessities. If this is so, my CD shack tells me that I'm indulgent, my food cupboad tells me that I'm fat and my drawer where I keep all my underwear tells me that I'm empty?

Rewind

Yesterday I felt the pang of losing my kitten Manja. Somebody took her away. I didn't cry or even show any emotions that might give away my state of grieving. My silence wasn't decided. It just happened. In split seconds I knew this was coming: Yes, I have to make a 'silent' short film.

I'm thinking to make another short about a guy who just found out he has the power to rewind time. There will be no conversation in this short though. Just visual apprehension of the possibility of time manipulation and the excitements and experimentations that comes with it.

Just thinking about this new venture is making me jittery inside out.