Looking Back

By Ng Hui Qi

Photo: By Jaslin Chua

All that has happened in my life can be traced back to that one incident. Yes, whenever someone says, “Sum up your life thus far in one sentence,” I think of an image instead. Of course, it’s no use trying to describe that image to anyone. Who can truly look into the mind of another? I’m not even sure we see the same sky. So words are the closest you can get to my thoughts, I guess, and perhaps the closest, even, for me to get to my own thoughts, to articulate for myself the consciousness of possessing a thought. But I digress. Yes, yes, you were asking what kind of an image sums up my life. I won’t try to describe it in a sentence, for I can never do justice to it. But I’ll give it in two words, which through these years have become the symbol for my picture, the crystallised shorthand for the image to sum up my life. Looking back.

Looking back at what, you say? Well, when I was a kid, I looked back over my shoulder whenever I left home, and there she’d be, my mother at the door. When I took the bus, I would go for a seat facing the back, and it was like walking backwards to move forward, if you get what I mean. It’s a matter of perspective. Of course, I missed some stops this way, because I saw them only when the bus passed them by. But isn’t life often like this? We missed some things just because we weren’t looking when they came.

So why do I insist on looking back?

Because if I hadn’t looked back, I wouldn’t be who I am today.

That day, I sat backwards on the rocking (sea)horse at the playground, simply because I thought it’d be amusing. Imagine the skills required for a horseman to ride his horse backwards. Not merely a matter of skills, I’d say, but trust. Well, these thoughts didn’t occur to me at that time, but I’ve thought over them so often now they seem to have sprung from that moment.

I see you’re nodding, you agree with me, don’t you? Thank you.

Yes? You’ve a question? Oh, what did I see that day, that made me who I am today?

Well now, is that really important?

Coffee Talks – Soulmates

What if everyone had only one soulmate in the world?

 

What if we only had a soulmate chosen at birth and we couldn’t be happy with everyone else? But, you do not know anything about who or where they are but as soon as your eyes meet, you fall deeply in love with each other.

 

Firstly, if we were paired up at random, 90% of our soulmates would probably be dead. I know that sounds pretty morbid, but there is still an unknown number of future humans as well. Who knows, maybe your soulmate is in the distant past, and by then, will you really still be alive?

 

But hypothetically speaking, the odds of running into your soulmate is incredibly small. The number of strangers we make eye contact with on a daily basis can vary from none to a thousand. Let’s assume that you lock eyes with 50 strangers in a day and if 10% of them are close to your age, it shows that you have 500 million potential soulmates. Hence this means that the chances of finding true love is 1/10,000. So, what you should take away from this is: look up from your phones and make more eye contact!

 

Quite contrary to most Hollywood films, true love don’t just fall into your laps, or happen just because your sister sends out a bunch of letters (if you know what I mean). It is so rare to be in close proximity to your soulmate and it would probably take you more years than you have to walk the whole world trying to find the one that you are destined to be with.

 

Therefore, given all the stress and pressure, some people may fake finding true love. They decide to get together with another lonely person, the get married, hide their relationship problems and struggle to be happy.

 

Living in a world of random soulmates, we would all be lonely. So: work for fate.

What’s in my bag

With promos and prelims drawing near we all need some inspiration for us to get our life together and through this tough time. What better way than by feasting our eyes on the study aesthetics around us? Inspired by various studygrams and studyblrs around us, the Origin has selected several talented Eunoians to share with us their personal aesthetics in keeping motivated to stay organized for school.

 

What’s in her bag:

Pencil case – MINISO, POPULAR, highlighters – Mildliner, pens – Muji

Earphones – MINISO

Portable charger

Phone, phone case – Toy Outpost, popsocket – POPULAR

Water bottle – Thermos

Files, notes

Black umbrella – Japan

Bag – Adidas

Favourite place to get school supplies: Muji

 

What’s in her bag:

Pencil case POPULAR– , highlighters – STABILO, pens – SARASA, Muji
Water bottle – Starbucks, coffee thermos – Korea
Phone, phone case – Taobao, earphones, wallet
File, notes

Hand sanitizer – Dettol , Plastic bag for sweaty clothes

Sports jacket

Bag – Fjallraven Kanken

She learnt how to do calligraphy from a friend when she broke her leg and had nothing to do. She also has 18 pens (of which 3 are lucky pens),10 highlighters and has recently started to put her pens in the right order every time. She drinks black coffee with no sugar everyday. Gotta enhance that dopamine for motivation to go to school.

 

Water bottle – Tupperware

Pencil case – , pens – Muji, highlighters – Mildliner, calculator

Notebooks – Muji

Wallet – Tommy Hilfiger, glasses

File, notes

Pencil case-Muji

Bag – Adidas