2 years ago, I didn’t know what to expect when I decided to join Big Bad Wolf Books as a purchaser. It turned out to be one of the most memorable experiences of my life. Scratch that – it became my life. Nothing prepared me for the job. I didn’t have any experience purchasing books in the past, and all I knew about books were my limited knowledge of authors in genres I was familiar with and some of the bigger names. I had to learn everything from scratch.

It was a trying time in my life. I ended up sacrificing a lot of personal time in order to finish my work, and while I don’t regret it, I realized that it wasn’t something that I wanted to do anymore. Also, the thought of going through sales data to see whether a book was worth purchasing didn’t exactly pique my interest after the first year. Still, I held on and decided to see if things would get better.

2 months ago, I decided that this was it for me and I didn’t want to continue working in the industry. It’s not that I don’t love books, (fun fact, I love books but haven’t had the time to read much since I started working with books) but I realized that purchasing them wasn’t my thing.

I’m a fiend for creating stuff. Be it random blog posts like these, song lyrics or stories in general. Heck, even writing press releases and speeches were the most interesting part of the job for me when I was working in PR.

I’m going to miss the purchasing trips to the UK and US. Despite not having free time to do any exploration or touristy activities, remainder book suppliers are some of the nicest people you’ll ever meet. I’ll miss the nice dinners and drinks with them. Easily the best part of the job.

Thursday was the last day of my tenure at Big Bad Wolf Books. It was a pleasure to meet and work with you guys. All the best to the you guys and all your events in the future. I’ll definitely be dropping by the KL sale to restock my library that I’ll have time to actually finish the books I’ve bought from the sales over the past 2 years.

Today marks the return of my Lubuntu laptop (farewell office laptop, you were a wonderful machine to use).

Also, this blog post is all over the place, but whatever. Treat this post as a free-writing exercise I’m doing. I haven’t sat down to write in a long time and this post marks my return. I’ll definitely have more time to collate my ideas and write more meaningful posts starting again (at least until I get another job).

After receiving the news tonight of a relative’s passing, I found myself googling what to wear. The last wake I went to was right after work so I didn’t have to change – I was in working clothes and so were the rest of the people in attendance. However, I don’t wear formal clothes to work anymore, and also – it is the weekend, so I wouldn’t be at work anyway.

Anyway based on my search results, I should be wearing something dark and formal. I don’t think I’ll need to bring a blazer. It’s too hot in Malaysia right?

Wakes are not something I enjoy attending – heck, I don’t think anybody enjoys attending them. Maybe the pastor/monk being paid to run the ceremony. I’ve been to a fair share of them, and even though I wasn’t close to most of the people who passed away, I still felt sad. The collective mood of all the miserable people in the room just amplifies and washes over everybody. Nobody walks out happy.

He was a young man and I didn’t know him very well – the kind of relative I’d only see at Chinese New Year reunion parties. I feel sorry for his father who lost his wife to cancer not very long ago. He must be devastated right now. Nobody wants to see their own spouse or child go off before themselves.

Which made me think about dying. Death is inevitable. It causes so much grief – unless you were someone hated, then happiness (and this point wouldn’t matter anyway). Would it be better to run away and be declared missing rather than dead? I’m not sure which one is sadder but at least being missing does give people hope that you’re still alive. Nobody has to bury your body. There’s no need for a funeral.

I guess some issues will rise – like your unpaid debts and so on, but I doubt it’s any harder to settle than if you had passed away. Is that why pets run away before they die? I did some googling on it, turns out it’s not really true (for dogs anyway).

Wherever you may be now, I’m sure you’re in a better place.
Rest in peace, cousin.