Chapter : Brisbane vs Malaysia

I have been in Brisbane for more than a month now and I can’t wait to go back to my own country now and I think I don’t even want to come back to “Sunny” Brisbane anymore. Why do you ask you may wonder? Why do I say this? You might be thinking, how could you prefer Malaysia compared to Brisbane? I know, compared to Malaysia, Brisbane does have some redeeming qualities that are way better. For instance, the air is fresher here, the place is cleaner and the people are well damn polite from what I have seen. I mean, over here the people actually patiently waits for you while you cross the god damn road! Sorry to say but in Malaysia, you don’t see that often. People would just blast their horns at you and scream at you to get the fuck off the road. You know what I mean and pardon my language. People here in Brisbane would greet you politely and ask you how’s your day and heck, they are just people who works at the cashier! At Malaysia, people don’t give a damn to know how your day is and just give you a cold stare and waiting for you to pay up. That’s how life in Malaysia is.

But the thing is I guess Malaysia has some good redeeming qualities too. I mean, it looks as though I’m dissing about Malaysia but heck no, I’m just explaining the difference that I have experienced here. Malaysia of course has the food; you can’t deny that for a fact. You can literally find all sorts of food there if you know where to look of course. Not only that, there are always shops open till 4am! If you are feeling hungry and want to grab something to eat but feel too lazy to even cook and well, it would literally bother your parents in the house clanking those entire saucepans just to cook something up, but anyway getting back to the point here is that you could just hop into your car and take a drive to the nearest shop and it would still be open! Even all the McDonald’s here are 24 hours, not forgetting KFC. Here in Brisbane, everything closes at 6pm or maybe during their so called late nights, 9pm. Well, the movies would still be running but heck, there is no such thing as late night shows here. Well, I don’t think so that’s for sure. How do people survive here? I know I’m struggling surviving here without my late night hang outs with my friends. Everything here in Brisbane is so dead. Literally.

At Malaysia, you have unlimited usage of water and internet which is a good thing because heck, you can bathe as long as you want and use the internet to the maximum to your liking. Over here in Brisbane, you have water restrictions and bandwith limitations. For an example, you are only allowed to bathe up to maximum 4 minutes and further than that is a big no-no. Also, you have to watch how much water you use because each house is giving a certain amount of water to use and if you used up the water that was given to you; you will have to pay the extra charges. In Brisbane, you are not allowed to water your plants as much as you want nor wash your car to keep it all shiny and clean. Why if you may asked? Simple, the answer is water restrictions. To speak on the bandwith limitations they have here, you are given certain about of usage to use for a month and if you have used up the usage, you will be facing dial-up internets. So technically if you want to download some things and it is taking up so long, I’m afraid that you will have to do some rethinking whether that particular “thing” you are downloading is important or not. Like in my case, since I was facing without the internet for almost a month and I could barely talk to anyone because heck, I JUST GOT HERE and I have really no friends at all so you know.

So my boyfriend was nice enough to spend all his money just to call me and even though we only lasted for 10 minutes each call, it was worth a lot to me. So from that day onwards, each night I look forward for his call before I go to bed because I know that he would definitely call me. But I felt really guilty because he is spending so much money on me in a day. Then luck was on my side because the internet was finally up! The next thing I know I was sharing video calls with my boyfriend each day for hours just talking or stoning literally but just because I really wanted to see the face of someone I love. Every day without fail I would go to my classes in university really happy because I know when I reach home I would be seeing my boyfriend online. Then I guess I was basking in my luck way too much because now I can’t share any more video calls with my boyfriend which hit me really hard. The only happiness I look forward each day is taken away from me. I kept asking God why he does this to me.

I mean I have to endure all those restrictions with water and all and I can take that. Bandwith limitations okay, fine since I won’t be able to download the things I want or go online as often. Now with that particular rule, I’m forced to give up my one and only gateway to communicate with my loved one and not being to see his face each day causes me such pain. I’m trying my best to survive in this strange world with new surroundings. I have turned myself into a loner and I don’t like that. I shut myself in my room, talking to no one except to my friends back home and yet some of my friends are not online because they are busy with their own things.

The only socializing I do is talking to my boyfriend each day sharing our laughter and jokes through our video calls and it makes me smile and live through another day just to see his face smiling back at me. Now, since it has been taken away from me, I will have to struggle surviving again alone in this cruel world. At times like this I’m on the verge of breaking down into pieces and I’m afraid that I wouldn’t be able to patch myself again. I really don’t know how much longer I can take. I don’t want to go into the path of depression just because of this. I really don’t want too. I’m beginning to regret my choice of furthering my studies here. I wished I have found a job instead. At least I would have a social life and I would be so much happier.