Now and then I always have my friends asking me how long have I not been home or don't I miss home? Well, sometimes I do, when I feel lonely or when I can feel that my mom is lonely back at home. I tried to tell myself that I don't feel it or rather I don't know how to miss a person or a home at all. That, I know, is a big lie. I mean who doesn't miss their family?
I started making myself believe that I don't have that feeling when I was in Form 1. Right after the results for UPSR were out, I was offered a place in a very prestigious English girls' high school in Penang Island-St. George's Girls' School. 6 girls were offered from my school but in the end I was the only one who went while the others transfered back to a nearer school. I went to have a look that school before I registered myself. The school was very very old and it looked full of experience and I could see the classiness of it, a very big obvious difference between it and the hometown high school. Two different worlds apart from my home. And yes, the distance between the school and my house is more than 50km as I need 45mins by car using the highway and Penang Bridge.
When I was looking around the school, my dad suggested I should try to have a change of environment and feel how the Penangites there studied. I was reluctant at first, thinking that I would be all alone and making friends wasn't easy for me especially in an English-based school. Back then, I could hardly utter a 3-syllable English word properly. My dad even offered to transfer me back if I couldn't cope. In the end, I agreed because I didn't want to give my parents so much trouble to transfer me back to my brother's school and also, I wanted to see how hard was the challenge. I could see my friends' parents traveled few times a week to and fro Penang Island just to transfer them back to a nearer school and the paperwork was troublesome. To save my parents energy and time and also they didn't know how to deal with all the paperwork, I'd rather accept the challenge.
So, I moved out of the house at the age of 13 to Penang. I stayed with a family's friend. I could still remember myself crying everyday for one full week because I was so lonely at the house during the day, everyone was out of the house to work and school leaving me all alone. I could taste loneliness back then. The first three days of school were the orientation. My parents were so kind to sacrifice their time, energy and money to drive all the 45minutes to see me at school the first three days, afraid that I couldn't get used to the environment. They stayed for few hours everyday standing outside the hall, watching me. I couldn't make friends that time as I was very timid that time, thanks to my so broken English.
Two weeks later, I moved back home to Nibong Tebal. It was not because I couldn't cope with the loneliness (as I had stopped crying after a week) or the school but because of some untoward incident that made me run away. I believe, that incident would degrade me if I have stayed longer. I moved back and from that day onward, I started traveling by buses and ferry. At first, I traveled by a teacher's car who drove from Butterworth but after a few month, she moved to Penang.
Then, my dad sacrificed his time to fetch me all the way to Butterworth jetty. From there I would take the ferry to the island and then bus to school with a few seniors for a year. After fetching me back and forth between the jetty and NT for a few months, he started teaching me how to ride the bus from NT all the way to the jetty. At first, I was not used to it and I was mad at my dad's decision, as well, for 'dumping' me. Right then and there, a hint of regret seeped into me. A regret for choosing that school. But I got used to it fast. Though it was tiring to travel 4 hours a day just to get to school and back home, I enjoyed that experience and the friends. Yes, I left home at around 10am and reached home at 8pm. From then also, I started to eat dinner alone and I talked lesser and lesser at home.
After a year of traveling, the seniors advised me to follow the other juniors from Butterworth. They were from the same batch as me. It was easier if I traveled with them as I didn't need to take the bus to school but car instead. But I still need to take the ferry to the island.
After two years of traveling, I moved to the Island again for Form 3. I couldn't travel anymore due to the morning classes and it was impossible for me to board the bus at 5am. Again, I was left all alone there in the apartment rented in Penang. I was stranded there with two strangers, working ladies. And again, I tasted loneliness in the house as I was all alone during the day as they were off working. This time, I cried for two weeks non-stop but I didn't move back. I got used to it.
During the weekends, I would go back home for the tuitions lined up a few hours a day from Friday till Sunday. Then, I would travel back to the island on Sunday night. The apartment life was merrier when Sze Lin and Khai Chuen transfered to my school for Form4 and Form5.
I could still remember how my dad would put down his job on Saturday morning to fetch me all the way to school for my co-curriculum activities though I had tried to minimize them. He would then roamed Penang for a few hours before fetching me back home. And all the time, he pampered me by letting me indulge in McD fries on the way home. He never once complained about the trouble, the money and the time wasted on me. And all the time, I threw tantrums on him for being late to fetch me home from the jetty late in the evening or just being late or even when I was irritated about nothing. He just endured it. I never thought about him having to work in the evening preparing the vege for the next morning which made him late to fetch me. That was very inconsiderate of me.
From the time I knew how to travel by myself, I started shaping a new me. I laughed and smiled lesser as all the while I thought by keeping cool, I could protect myself. I saw a lot of disgusting homo sapiens while standing at the jetty waiting for buses enough to last me a lifetime. Ok, maybe a lifetime is a bit over, but the people there were just...ewww..disgusting, with the smoking and the eyes eyeing you up and down. Ewwww...Ok, I am discriminating here and a bit over. I don't know, I just didn't feel secured with so many strangers around me. Suffocating.
After 5 years in Penang, I was offered a place at Kedah Matriculation College, Changlun, 8km away from Thailand and about 150km away from home. This time, I didn't miss home that much anymore, I even spent my mid-term holidays of 10-day in KL, not even bother to go home after 1 month away. That was the time, I started not to believe in the word 'miss'. I just made myself believe the word was not in my dictionary. After matriculation, I moved to KL for my tertiary education which was more than 350km away from home. And from that time on, I seldom go home, the longest was 3 months, I believe.
Oh well, I am not condemning my Life and never will, as I have got so much experience from it. I love the way I live, like a nomad, traveling around, gaining experience, learning new things, acknowledging new feelings. It just feels so good. Next stop should be Sabah or Sarawak, I wish..
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