Developing my voice in slam

I find that I haven't fully developed my own voice or style when it comes to slam.  I don't want to simply recite my poem. I want to perform it. Both ends of the spectrum differ greatly from the other. However there is a fine line separating reciting poetry and performing it. I struggle to find it.

The first poem I did was about my sister. It was one big apostrophe as I talked about in an earlier post (link here)

With that poem I did loud, anguished, indignant. Now I'm trying to write a poem on the influence my mother's occasionally erratic and frustrating behaviour on my development and attitude.

I could take the path I took with my old poem-loud, indignant, angry. The idea behind of the poem is similar-the actions of another family member and it's effects on my development throughout the years. It wouldn't (performance-wise) be difficult.

You see, I am a very out there with my emotions and thoughts. Talking about either of them isn't hard. Bringing out strong passionate emotions on either end of the scale and threading those emotions into my words is not difficult. I do it all the time.

However I want to challenge myself. I'm going to try taking a step away from a loud and out there approach. I'm going to try for a subtler take. What emotions will be threaded into my words and how that'll be done-I'm going to try soulful and reflective. I also have to be careful not to victimise myself-that's the easy thing to do. I'm going to try showing firmness and control in my performance; not hurt and victimised.

How it'll be done? That's where it gets hard. So far it's been nothing but difficult actually- I find I cannot bring myself to be calm, firm, reflective and soulful-lest not all at once-without turning the performance into a recital, because I soon start losing the 'subtle underlying, yet still incredibly important' emotions. It's personally difficult to maintain. Subtly with my emotions has never been my thing. 

Sheeple Holidaying (pt. 3)

Well, I'm finally up to the part where the name of this/these [originally supposed to be one long] post/s came from.

I initially was incredibly excited about New Zealand. Exploring, discovering, experiencing it's beauty and culture. This was soon to be broken down into mild eagerness as I discovered we were taking a tour.

Sheeple holidaying.

'Sheeple' is a compound word. 'Sheep' and people' combine to make a term describing those who blindly follow with others without questioning or thinking for themselves.

I'm not too happy about the idea of being bundled up in a big bus and being shuttled from place to place. It will not allow for me to explore as far as I want to my satisfaction. What is the point of buying an expensive air ticket to take you to a place which you cannot explore to your satisfaction?

 I protested against the tour, to which my father replied "Well,  how are we going to get around? What if we get lost? "

When I told him that was what the point of public transport was,  and that we spoke fluent English-or at least, I do, he laughed.

"It's not that easy." He replied.

I do not believe him. For the convenience of tourists,  the government surely would've arranged for good public transport to tourist hotspots. I speak fluent English as well- I cannot understand how it can get any easier than that. Extensive planning and research beforehand would've made it so. I am willing to do that.

Yet here I am instead-sheeple travelling in New Zealand.

Sheeple holidaying (pt. 2)

When I was told we were travelling to Cambodia a few months ago,  I was incredibly excited.

Suddenly it was China. I was not excited anymore. China does not interest me from a travelling point of view.  From an economic point of view, yes. Travelling-no. Suddenly those plans got scrapped due to my dad's work change. 

I was fed up with the whole state (or lack) of travelling, and I simply got over my anger in a few hours.

A few days ago,  my parents asked me how I felt about travelling to New Zealand. I have heard New Zealand is a place of great beauty, with its great natural landscape. I eagerly thought of exploring it-trekking in forests,  relaxing in hot springs, walking on its beaches. I asked my friend for travel planning advice. 

Until,  to my horror, I discovered we were going on a tour. I saw the travel tour the dad held was written in Chinese and that did not raise my hopes. At all.

I have only had one travel tour in my life, in 2009. It was a Chinese-speaking tour.  It was in Melbourne. It was terrible.

We were shuttled around from place to place, not given enough time to properly explore. The tour spoke Mandarin, not my dialect. I speak Cantonese and so did a majority of the other passengers. So I did not understand what was going on half the time.

I refuse to believe Melbourne is a boring place. So I believe the tour took us to boring places. For I do not remember a single place or thing I went to or did in Melbourne, except for the Ballarat goldfields. Primarily because their cola was delicious. Add in the language barrier, I was further disconnected with the whole damn tour. Also,  a minor nuance-there were no people my age on the tour. It was all-not even primarily-all middle to old aged Chinese-speaking people.

Due to that tour, I am incredibly afraid this tour will be similar to the Melbourne tour.

Sheeple holidaying (pt. 1)

My family rarely travels. I've been on an aeroplane three times in my sixteen years,  and none of those trips more than a measly three hours to an adjacent state. I haven't gone on a cruise either. I haven't gone overseas at all.

This lack of holidaying has two primary causes: 1. My father is generally always working- we are from the working class- and never chose to take holidays off so he could work more and 2. My mum is very much a homebody. She doesn't like travelling anywhere. Beaches, Blue Mountains,  anywhere- you name it, she'll say she'd rather be home.

In 2010, both of my sisters and my grandmother flew to Cambodia for a month. They attended a wedding and did some sightseeing,  staying with relatives. My mother, the bitch, deemed me too young and irresponsible,  unable to take care of myself without her aid. So there I missed a great travelling opportunity.

We'd have random interstate travelling when the family was younger and no one was intensely preoccupied with exams and education. My father was and is a huge fan of The Blue Mountains,  so we did a lot a trekking there.

Maybe too much. Now I'm sick of the Blue Mountains.  You say Blue Mountains,  I'll think 'not bloody again.'

I'm acutely aware of how selfish this is given the primary circumstance which has made me travel so little-but I'm incredibly angry about it all and wish I could go travelling more. I want to go travelling. See rarely touched places, explore small towns,  wonder in big cities. Expand my thoughts and see how others across the world live. See places. Observe countries.

So excuse me for being selfish, but my youth will only last so long.

It's been about a year and a half with my second lobe piercing

It's near unnoticeable-small and nondescript, usually dwarfed by the flashy gold and ziron earrings I wear my my first set of lobe piercings. Why, I only have a second lobe piercing on my right ear.

I've wanted second lobe piercings since 2010, but only got them early last year.

In the three years that I didn't have one, I remember feeling very distressed- not even jealous- just very distresed if I saw someone with double lobe piercings. I don't know why I felt distresed- wouldn't it make more sense if I just felt a pang of jealousy and want? Yet I felt none of them, but instead distress.

Now that I have it- sometimes I think it's made that much happier as a person. It's not a huge helper in my happiness, but sometimes I look at it, and I recall the struggle I went through to even get it secured- planning months in advance, sneaking out of school to get it treated (I developed a hypertrophic scar about three quarters of a year into it,) panic as my earring fell out and I fumbled, wincing as I fed a restainer one size too big into it. (I know, I did not treat the piercing like royalty during aftercare.)

Cheesy as hell, I know, but I look at it, acknowledge the difficulties I undertook to secure it, and think 'I finally have it. It's stablised. It's mine, and I love it.'

Why do I always achieve perfect and cute eyeliner at midnight when I'm just going to take it off and sleep like whenever I draw it for school it's never this perfect

I bought my formal gown from a brand that sells for a few hundred dollars per gown, unworn with the tags still on for $25 I love thrift shopping

A haiku about insulin resistance

Craving some sweet food

Can't eat that. Besides, there's none.

Well, screw you hormones

It has been about a year since I was disowned as a daughter

I cannot remember the exact date, but I remember it was the holidays between term three and four. I got disowned as a daughter and as far as I'm concerned, that still stands.

I'm fine with it though; growing up, my mum and I weren't close and she didn't really express any feelings of love (or whatever that concept is) to me. So I do not really recognise any love in our relationship.

In the future, I might hold my head in my hands and sigh about how my mother WAS showing me love-I just didn't recognise it (a lot of people tell me this). I don't care. I am in the 'now.' Right now, I don't feel any love, so I will say there is none.

So getting disowned was not, and one year later, is not, a ground-breaking change. The woman I call my 'mother' (for the sheer purpose of convenience) is simply a woman who feeds me, clothes me and pays for my lifestyle, and that is about it. A guardian, if you will say. But not a mother.

I do not turn to her for personal advice. I do not confide in her as a daughter. I do not (never have) tell her I love her- how can I if it might be a lie?

For me, it wasn't much of an emotional change, to know the woman whose vagina I shot out of no longer considered me as one of her own.

As I made my own food and washed my own clothes and packed my own bags, I realised I didn't care.

I did not, and do not feel like anything changed between us when she told me I was not her daughter any more.

Today I found another piece of clothing which I can fit again due to my weight loss and increased fitness levels. I am very happy.

I once asked my mother if she was proud of me

I asked her this about a year ago. The conversation went like this:

---

Hannah: Mum, are you proud of me?

Mum: You haven't done anything good lately. Back in primary school, you were getting good grades, you were fit, everything was going well. I was proud of you.

Now? You're not doing any of those things anymore Hannah. You're not doing moderately well at everything. Look  how short and fat you are now. You have done nothing special at all. There is nothing to be proud of.

---

And I don't know if I should be more upset that my mother isn't proud of me, or because I find myself agreeing with her from time to time.

Today was a rather lousy day

I arrived at school early and was in the canteen for a little less than an hour. I volunteer, helping to make sandwiches which are later sold.

I immediately had my accelerated business exam after, from nine to eleven. Despite the lack of studying I underwent to prepare, I could attempt most questions. I have grown to dislike business studies and will be shortly dropping it; preferably in a few weeks. If not, by the end of the year.

There was some confusion afterwards amongst our class afterwards on whether we had exam leave or not; our teacher, who had left us halfway through the exam did not, untrue to his word, come back.

I left anyways. I had tutoring work to catch up on and presents to buy. I knew from past experience that the time taken to travel to the locations to purchase the presents would take forty-five minutes; at the most, one hour. Afterwards, I would travel home, finishing the work at my local library.

And that's how I wasted two hours, being lost in Sydney's annoying public transport system.

I go to school in the city, and make my own way to excursions, and my own outings using Sydney's public transport. So I'm not completely hopeless, and my own expectations for our transport system are mediocre.

But my god, today was so frustrating.

First, I went to chemist warehouse. The one I went to, however, did not stock Maybelline. No problems. The employee told me there was one in Darlinghurst that did. I looked up directions on my phone, and I was ready to catch a train back to Central.

I waited five minutes. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. Three trains were might to have arrived already. So I sighed and walked to Central instead. That took about fifteen minutes. Five minutes into my walk, what did I see drive past me? A bus. A bus that had came the stop I left. Which went to Central.

Obviously I couldn't do anything about that. So I kept walking to Central, around to Eddy Avenue. My bus arrived after ten minutes of waiting, only a few minutes late. We left. My stop was meant to be the fourth stop, where I would get off and change for a second bus.

The thing was, the bus didn't go where I wanted to go. I asked the bus driver if it was the 374, city to Coogee.

"It is ma'am."

But the bus went in a totally different route to what Sydney transport website said it would.

After the fourth stop, I got off. The bus was heading in a direction where I had absolutely no idea where to go. I found a nearby buststop (the one I got off did not have buses going to Central) and was pleased to see a bus going to Central would arrive in five minutes. I double checked on Sydney transport's website.

Five minutes passed. Ten minutes passed. Fifteen minutes passed. I was on a long road, and walked to another bus stop further down, in case they had different timetables.

A sign attached to the bus stop apologised for any inconvenience as it told me that all bus stops along this road were temporarily unavailable. So I kept waking down the road, back to a bus stop about fifteen minutes away which I knew was not closed. Every bus stop I passed had a sign to announce it was out of service. Except for mine. Just to my luck.

I saw a man taking posters off, and asked if there were any buses that could take me to Central. He pointed out a bus stop right across the road. Much to my surprise, I only had to wait a minute before my bus arrived.

Arriving at Central, I caught a train to Town Hall, and spent about fifteen minutes there getting one part of my present.

By the time I arrived back at Town Hall station, my train was arriving in eighteen minutes. It was already 1pm.

I called Chemist Warehouse I was headed to on the train, to see if they stocked the item I wanted. They bloody didn't.

I had had enough for a day. I got off the train a few stops later to change trains. By the time I arrived at my train station, it was past three o clock. And it was only meant to take, at the most, one hour. And I didn't even get everything in the present.

Life update on my weight

I have a green book which I used to use to keep track of my weight. I used it earlier this year, but lost the motivation to keep updating it. I've recently started using it again.

I weigh myself three times a day- morning, after school and at night time. This way, the moment something go awry, I can swoop in right away before it gets worse.

For instance, in the past week, my weight has been about one and a half kilos heavier than normal. I am also menstruating, and I remember learning in school that water retention (and therefore, weight gain) is normal when menstruating. I have been staying hydrated and moving around more, nothing too intense. Now my weight is back to normal.

In the course of five months, I have steadily lost four kilograms, and I know my fitness has improved.

I couldn't be prouder of myself.

I'm dropping my favorite subject next year

Textiles is not one of my subject choices for year eleven. I am doing English, maths, chemistry, biology and modern history.

My initial preferences would've had textiles take the place of chemistry. However, parental permission and a signature of approval is required for subject choices at my school, and when my mother saw that I had selected textiles, she was not pleased. She refused to sign the note approving my electives, and would not until I removed textiles.

I've been taking textiles as an elective through year nine and ten, and been steadily trying to convince her to allow me to carry on throughout the two years. It has not worked.

What I would've done, if I could've, would been to forge her signature, and entered my own choices. However, textiles does require the purchase of your own materials and notions. I am still financially dependant on my parents; I do not receive an income in any form, and any money I do receive, is saved for outings. I cannot discreetly purchase my textiles requirements, not whilst I am financially dependant.

It's making me very, very sad.

I don't know how I'm going to survive the next two years of school without textiles. I know I'm going to keep sewing at home- I have an industrial sewing machine and a cheap local fabric store- but I do not think I can rely on my home projects to maintain my sanity as well as as textiles as a school subject.

One of my favourite feelings is

When I'm hungry and can control myself to not eat any of the food in my bag

It's like yaaasss, you go girl, avoid those carbs

Work that self-control

Make your body use up that blasted fat as energy instead

Moment of absolute panic when you open your go-to pad  for your heavy flow days and see that the design of the pad has changed

I haven't played Assassin's Creed in more than a month

The yearning is real

I devised a new song+exercise routine last night

The morning after, walking hurts, sitting properly hurts. So it's effective.

TOM honours+self-reflection on my leadership of TOM team

I am so proud of our team. It was a beautiful way to end my final year of doing TOM. (Year ten is the oldest grade a team member can be.)

Honours, whilst not going through to state championships, is basically a title equivalent to highly commended, and is used sparingly.

Given the rushed circumstances of our long-term challenge presentation (finishing props and learning lines the night before,) I am proud that my team still pulled together to present a play, as well as work co-operatively enough, to receive honours.

My team consisted of two year sevens-Rutika and Phoebe, two year eights-Lucy and Angela, one year nine-Cecile, and two year tens- Evelyn and myself.

As team captain, I viewed the performance and cooperation of our team during the six weeks as a reflection of my own ability to pull together the minds of seven talented and creative people with such varying personalities, and make something wonderful happen with what we had to offer.

We had good ideas. But it was very rushed. I will accept full responsibility for that. I made two blunders:

1. I only made half an hour a week for regular meetings.

In retrospect, I should've held the first two or so meetings in person, so everyone could get to know (or re-know) each other. After everyone was comfortable, I should've just used a lot more email communication to aid in our development and exchange of ideas.

You see, I only wanted meetings where everyone was there, so everyone could stay in the loop about everything. The only day where every single one of our team members was avaliable for a meeting was Wednesday lunchtime. Not good for fast progress.

2. I was reluctant to proceed with an idea unless all seven people agreed.

Because our team was so out-and-about, and hard to get to (some didn't check their emails too frequently, and everyone was busy during most lunches,) this made collective team agreement very slow.

If I could do it again, what I would've done is had the majority of people agree- minimum four people- and go forward. If one of the three objected, they could do speak out. Getting four people's confirmation is faster than seven.

What I liked, which I ultimately think had a huge role to play with our honours, was my risk taking.

I rushedly wrote the script over the course of the weekdays before the TOM weekend. Whilst not the most realistic nor my best work, I do not think I could've really have done better given the circumstances I was under.

Then, two days before the TOM Sunday, Evelyn rewrote the script, nearly competely.

I was in a dilemma. Whilst hers was much better quality than mine, it was just so... late. I was afraid it would not be that familiar to our heads, with such a short notice.

I took the risk. I ditched my play. Evelyn wrote half the script and sent it out Friday night. I finished the other half and sent it out late Saturday afternoon. I spent Saturday night finishing off props and attempting to learn my lines, feeling my sanity trickle away. I felt like an iPhone because my sanity-battery was running very quickly.

The fact I stayed up until 3am, and woke up at 6am did not help at all. (As soon as I arrived home later that afternoon, I showered and slept for three hours. Amazing three hours.)

However, I think it was a good risk as it was a much better quality performance.

I thank my team for making my last year so awesome and worthwhile.

Tournament of minds is tomorrow

Excited. It's my last year ever doing it. I love my team this year and working with them has been enjoyable. They have given me a worthwhile experience as their team captain, and I hope they can say the same about me.