I hate not hearing you laugh

It feels as if a friend leaves the country every month. Sometimes, a few in the same month. I'm not good in saying goodbyes and doing that to a friend dear to my heart is deeply painful. Instead of joining the bunch in the airport hugging and waving goodbyes, I (most of the time) choose to hide at home for the fear of seeing them leave my sight. I unashamedly admit that I sometimes weep seeing a certain friend leave.

May we meet some day years from now.

I was driving hopefully back to my secondary school SMK Seri Bintang Selatan this afternoon, thinking of all the changes that my school would have gone through. I remember vividly the days my friends and I went through in that school and the school days we sometimes skip. It feels good to go back to where I started as a student,dreaming the dreams of which some I have already achieved. Upon arriving, the guardhouse looked the same, the gate looked the same, the drink seller in front of the guardhouse looked the same, the guards still nap in their chairs and the visiting form looked the same 4 years later.

The office however, looked more barren than the last time I was there, 2 years ago. I was there today to get a copy of my leaving certificate after loosing my original copy. Thinking the 'kerani pejabat' would be hospitable enough to help through my application, boy, was I so wrong. Attitudes in the office haven't changed a bit. They are as ineffective as the days when I was still a student. After gossiping amongst each other (in front of me) that it was 'impossible' to find a leaving cert for an alumni who left school 4 years ago, a clerk shoved me a form resembling the leaving cert and told me to fill in as many particulars as I could remember. I stood there for a good 10 minutes filling it in while hearing all the grumblings from other clerks saying that it's my fault for loosing it, with a they-couldn't-care-less-attitude. After handing over my filled form, I asked how long will it take for the certificate to be ready in my broken BM. She said that I can't rush her, it'll take some time and that she wants to charge 10 ringgit as a fine. I insisted when can I get it, to which she said 1 week. I wonder if it will take just 1 week. If I can't get that piece of paper in 1 week, there will be no US.

I thought to myself, "Sekolah bestari kononnya". I looked around and saw facilities and buildings and that enormous sports stadium that only a handful of govenment schools could afford to have in the whole country. Yet, why such attitude? Truly, the scenario was an exact epitomy of "First class facilities managed by third class minds" Shallow minds which couldn't see beyond what they're doing at the present.