Life!

You see, mobile phones/ pagers are just very minor things in our life. Just an something extra. Its amazing how things change for the past 12 years. A simple phone can have so much changes, let alone life. Imagine how much have changed since 12 years ago.

Years ago, we were cheerful and naive. We trusted friends with our lives, we quarrelled with our families over our friends, we gave up travel trips just to stay behind for our school camps, we did things for our friends without thinking of advantages/money, we spent time together simply just chatting, talking nonsense, without any motives. We were young then.

Now, years passed. Everyone grows up. We give up trusting some friends, we avoid quarrelling with our most beloved families over our friends, we fight hard, earn hard to go on a trip, we do not do things without thinking of making money, we spend time together for networking purposes. Is that not true for the most of us? Is it a bad thing that is happening? Are friends not important anymore? No! It is not true. Friends are still important, so as families and career. Sometimes you just have to make a balance between them.
But as your friend list grows, your work load grows, your time is not growing. It is the only thing that will never change. You will only have 24hrs a day. So, can you still spend so much time to maintain your ever-growing friend list, ever-growing workload? Can you keep up to beat with your ever-changing friends? Some friends come and stay. Some friends come and go. Old friends are precious but you have to accept the fact that friends, however perfect, are humans too. Everyone will change, some better some worse. Of course, some good friends will remain good friends forever.

Some friends disappointed us, some friends betrayed us, some friends left us. What can we do but to live on? You are not going to die or become really depressed simply because of that. Life changes, people changes. The one whom you thought for so many years you can rely on, the one whom you had thought is really your good friend might not be so anymore. Expectations arise. Not only within you, but them too.

Something must have happened lately that make me write all these right?

I am not sure if i should write this down but i think it is a nice entry to write on as it will reflect on our life when I read through this entry again many years later.

“Once upon a time, there lived two good friends Lychee and Durian. They met each other in school and grew to become close friends. Although each had graduated from their school, university, got a job, live different lives. They managed to keep in touch all these while, maintaining a very close relationship. Lychee excelled in school and got a high paying job, earning about 9000cups of rice a month. Durian also excelled in school but luck wasn’t with her. Her job was not lousy, however it was not fantastic as well. Durian strived toward a better live for her and her family. She started thinking of her career, her life. She wanted something different. She wanted to start out something of her own. She decided to do some business related to dogs, due to her love for her own dog.
One day, Lychee mentioned to Durian that she needed to travel overseas to Ululu Island for a couple of weeks for her job. She started asking around for dog boarding for her dog, Cotton as she could not bring Cotton to Ululu Island with her. Durian then told her that she could help her with Cotton for a fee of 20cups of rice per day. Lychee decided to patronise Durian. As planned, Lychee went on her trip to Ululu Island and left Cotton with Durian for 23 days.
23 days passed, Cotton was well taken care by Durian. However, when Durian returned Cotton to Lychee, Lychee did not pay Durian 460cups of rice as agreed. Durian was diappointed, yet she did not know how to bring it across to Lychee. As days gone by, Lychee pretended nothing had happened. One day, Durian could not bear with it anymore. She decided to write Lychee an email about the payment. Lychee claimed that she never knew there was a charge for leaving Cotton there. Durian was aghast!
Was Lychee faking ignorance? Was there a misunderstanding? As she wanted to start a doggie business, she knew she had to keep by her business principle, so she replied Lychee and tried to jog Lychee’s memory by quoting some messages and emails. This time, Lychee replied with a few statements saying that she remembered, however did not know that Durian will charge her full rate of 20cups of rice per day since there were some shops that charged only 15cups.
Lychee even got Mother Lychee to send an email to Durian, stating her displeasure, since they all thought that Durian was not going to charge them. When Durian replied Mother Lychee an email of facts and conversation between herself and Lychee. Lychee called Durian and reprimmanded her for being rude to her mother! Are they monsters? ”

Did Lychee “forget” about the price purposely before? Did she think that since Durian was a very nice person, she would probably not ask her for the rice? Was Lychee trying to bargain for lower price now that Durian had requested for payment?

This is based on a true story. Durian was upset and heart broken. Their years of friendship had broken. Just because of this. Relationships are fragile, isn’t it? Had Durian not asked Lychee for payment, will this still happen in future? Had Lychee paid up without questions, it will not end up like that too. However, on saying this, how can you not pay for a service you had bought? Especially when you claimed that that person is your good friend? Especially when you had known that that little amount of money may have mean a great deal to someone not earning as much as you? Plus, she did not beg for it, she earned it by hardship, by rendering a service.

What has the world come to??

Anyway, to Durian, I know you might still be upset over this. Time, although long, will heal a wound slowly. It is not such a bad idea to realise that Lychee is such a person now. Had you not do anything about it, continue to be her friend for another 10 years, perhaps something might happen that hurt you 10 times deeper. You know that there are friends around you and will never let people take advantage of your kindness. (yes..that is me! wahhahah) Anyway, I might have jog your memory by this entry when you are trying to forget. But you know me, I will never “try-not-to-mention” just because it will trigger your sad memories. In fact, i will always mention it so that we are constantly reminding ourselves that a lesson is learnt.