The year of 2010 started as do most desires – mundane.
The 2010 Australian Open started with a bang on Jan 18. And suddenly the tennis courts were flooded. The number of tennis posers were sky-high. Federer won it and Nadal went out from injury due to running so much. A sense of normalcy seemed to descend.
My PM turned to me in Jan 2010 and said, “This will be the final push to finish the project.”
By the time it was April, he realized how wrong he was. The clients who were breathing down our necks had started to spit and drool as well. The number of reworks and additional installations had us tearing our hair out at the cuticles.
MBS opened for the first time at the end of April, and the office folk took turns taking 2-day breaks. I spent mine on the tennis court.
February was uneventful – maybe almost deliberately uneventful. Being single in February means that you suddenly have to justify not being attached – and you do so by loading your timetable full, with tennis, trips to JB, groceries and you even begin to love the overtime, even when there’s no pay attached.
But for us, we brave few, we band of brothers – there is always FRIED NIGHT. It culminated on February 14th, I think. Hashbrowns, breaded fish, potato wedges and tons of mayonnaise.
I honestly don’t remember what happened in March. It was all work work work work work tennis tennis. Nothing eventful happened. Federer lost in Indian Wells and Miami. Nadal was still apparently injured and all. Murray was all the hype.
May was the wrap-up. The shit-cleaning. All the crap from the soft-opening had left the office thoroughly drained. The breathing down our necks finally stopped. In fact, many of the people who had hounded us, had started packing their bags. It was deceiving, but in all sincerity, there was still much work to do. The hard part now was convincing ourselves to start working again. It sucked.
A brand new trio of new guys were called in – my new team – my maintenance technicians were brought in. Younger than me and with attitudes similar to sec sch kids, it was a role-reversal. Usually I was the one in the young man post, but now I was the old guy, giving them the advice and teaching them the steps. Jack, Kok Boon, Joseph and Jose, are today the guys who plough thru MBS behind the scenes, making sure EM locks don’t fall on pple’s heads.
June – ah, twas summer indeed. Runxuan and Eugene got married. It was a first real event that made me realize that, holy shit, I’m getting a tad old, aren’t I? Lots of stuff happened in June. Personal stuff too =)
And then the worst of it – I lost an uncle and aunt. Everything that I had been complaining abt up to that moment suddenly seemed like child’s play, trivial and altogether, unimportant. And it was in the most tragic of circumstances too.
I remember when dad touched down in Changi for the ceremony – we’d always made it a happy occasion, smiling and waving through the glass. From when I was old enough to wave to the present, I’ve done that. This time, I had no idea what to do.
Dad was calm and still very much the same during the long drive to Simpang Renggam. Mom was talking about it like she had read about it in the paper. For a brief moment, it seemed like something we would just shrug off. Mom and dad had always been pillars to the family – not just us, but to the rest of our relatives too. And they stayed that way all through the trip, until we arrived and even then, they were still calm. They approached the coffins silently and only there, did they clasp their hands over the mouths and faces and wept long and hard like I’d never seen them do.
And Nadal won Wimbledon again, with Federer not even making it to the semis. My life was at an all time low.
In July, the funeral was still fresh in our minds, but life had to go on. Amidst all the sorrow and depression, I’d decided that I’d had enough. There was no better time to buy a new PC. And I did so, almost with reckless abandon and an almost forced sense of joy. Zs and I scoured Sim Lim Square and we did lug back all the stuff we needed.
The objective was simple – find it, buy it and build it. And build it we did. SGD$2.6k++ of the gaming ownage. It would set in motion a gaming spree that hasn’t stopped til today. And it got Zs’s hands itching to the point that he HAD to upgrade his shit later this year.
And then, an “invasion”. Sarah moved in. To the room just beside me. It was refreshing, sharing a place with someone. Even if, you have to help her hang out the bedsheets.
And I have no idea what happened in August. Ask my new PC – it probably knows. I pillaged all of Tamriel, saved the Citadel from the reapers, did it again against the Collectors, assassinated my way from Acre to Venice, trudged through the darkest realms of F.E.A.R and waged war in graphic like never before in Crysis.
Other than that, I have no idea what else I did in August.
September was the trip to Phuket!! The trip was great. It was also a wakeup call. When you go to the beach, you make sure that you are at least in good shape. A month before, I made sure to cut no corners and went strict clean on my diet. As futile and vain as it sounds – it was an opportunity to get at least get used to the idea of a more controlled diet, with an objective in mind. When the trip was over – the routine continued, bcos I had gotten used to it. Win-win.
In October it was official. The boss called me into the office and said, “Yeap, you’re DEFINITELY the site manager for MBS.” I was like, “Fuck you, what the hell did you think I was doing???”
By November, I had attended 2 Life Liberation outings – gatherings where we’d get together and release fish/crabs/whatever, any potential seafood back into the sea. It was something like a good karma thing, which I feel is a good thing to start on, even if im a little late at doing so.
December was the slowest month ever. Pple started singing Christmas carols like it was already snowing. And then once again, tragedy – my eldest uncle passed away in bed. Not as bad as what happened in July, but still, yeah.
We buried him on Friday. Christmas was on Saturday. At least it came after and my family still had a reason to smile somewhat.
Federer won the World Tour Finals, beating Nadal almost decisively. Maybe there was a LITTLE hope out there still.
And now, even as im typing this, Sarah is preparing to move out. It seems to be an appropriate bookend to a certainly eventful year.
Here’s to 2010 – what a year.
