goodbye 2k16

with every year i find a tune that characterises me - last year oh my muu's expression was the tune that made me feel like i could rebuild myself over & over again. as 2k16 draws to a close odesza's always this late will forever remind me of new york & everything that came with it - the feeling of losing myself in a spirit of sheer aliveness that brims, brims & overflows, the inexplicable feeling of solitary night walks down the streets of manhattan spaciously flanked by two majestic buildings - ceaseless bc of its grid-like structure, or losing myself in the sea of people at 14th street union square with sheryl sandberg's 'lean in' clutched close to me - feeling like i can be anything i want to be as long as i put my mind to it & grit my way through - in spite of being a woman, in spite of all these sickening gender stereotypes, or wandering lost in the poetic drizzle on my last night till' i found the brooklyn heights promenade overlooking the gorgeous skyline of 'the concrete jungle where dreams are made of'.

the platitude 'new year new me' sounds cliché af but i think it perfectly encapsulates what 2k16 has been for me. sitting on the steps outside ngee ann city civic plaza on the 2nd of january 2016 with bun j talking about our lives & futures ahead i could never have envisaged the adventures i had this year -

the lows were excruciating all time lows: dealing with one of my best college friend leaving college / dealing with feeling at a complete loss wrt my summer plans (by mid feb everyone had their summer nailed down & i still had no clue) / almost missing my flight to nyc bc of an insane visa problem / getting stranded for three days alone in a foreign country / toxic people / emotional exhaustion from feeling played to varying degrees by so many boys & having to pick myself up after every single one of them / dealing with the death of a classmate / dealing with feeling inadequate in almost everything i put my hand to / nights sleeping at 4am & running on caffeine all day bc i was just so overwhelmed with work etc. those nights that i could only sit on my bed & cry for want of someone to hold me, or to help me pull myself together, those nights that i could only sit at utown green suffused with a choking bout of numbness that i couldn't snap out of regardless of how hard i tried - those nights were so tough i sometimes wanted to just efface into the walls forever,

but the highs were also off the charts: the friendships strengthened & restrengthened, the invincible feeling of assimilating into new york city & being there not as a tourist but almost like a local - living, cooking, working, gymming etc., the kickass feeling of making the best out of a curveball thrown my way & feeling in control i.e. when i got stranded in hk on my solitary flight back, experiencing the high of being suffused with so much affection in my heart with cuddles & kisses - albeit temporal, of waking up somedays feeling so beautiful in my own skin, of finally stepping up to something that had scared the crap out of me & realising it really wasn't as scary as i had imagined in my head/surpassing my personal expectations by nearly hitting the 20k mark, of discovering that i can always find my inspiration in the gym, of conquering my first GA module even as i had felt so little at the beginning as the only soph - all these little & big victories culminating into the rollercoaster highs i experienced running throughout 2k16 -

2k16 was an insane year swinging on two ends of the spectrum & leaving no middle ground, but i wouldn't have had it the easy way either. personal growth is so important to me, & i aspire to keep growing, to keep improving, to keep experiencing. i have never forgotten that the good things in life are all from You, even though sometimes i act otherwise, so thank You

& here's to an enriching 2k17.