Blk 1 'The Conversion' More essays ...

'The Conversion' by Md Khairul Hazwan bin Hj Maidin

Being in the young adulthood stage, I have grown up to become a very complex human being. Often intense, my mood ranges from uncontrollably jubilant and blithe to easily aggravated and agitated. It is in this stage of life that young adults like me either feel full of joy or utterly depressed as if life has been sucked right out of us. It is often the latter that dominates my life. I had gotten used to being fragile and intense to the extent that I became quite ignorant in life.

This was the case, until one day I was enlightened. An incident woke me up from my ignorance that until today, it bears as a reminder which cannot be erased from my mind.

It was a lazy Friday afternoon as I arrived at the bank. I waited as my brother opened the door for me and he quickly went to take a number. My number was 912 and the current number being entertained was 903. I pursed my lips as I waited impatiently. All the seats were full so I was forced to stand, which upset me even more.

I had been furious for days as I had found out my allowance of $100 had not been increased. I was promised a raise two months ago yet when I checked my account a few weeks ago I found out that my brother had not applied for my raise. I had been unkind to him ever since and so today he made an effort to meet my demands.

As I had nothing more to do than wait, I observed the many faces of the people in the bank. People from all walks of life were there, waiting patiently for their turn to manage their personal financial matters.
Suddenly the bell rang and the next number was 906. A middle aged couple stood up and went to the counter. My eyes were suddenly transfixed onto a young little girl in a yellow dress, smiling nonchalantly as she walked side by side her mother towards the counter. Her mother then picked her up and sat her down on the counter whilst her father managed their accounts.

I couldn’t help but notice the young girl’s ignorance of the fact that her parents probably saved money for her. Hugging her mother tight, she touched her mother’s delicately embroidered head scarf and expressed innocently how beautiful her mother looked. With a wide smile, her mother gave her an audible peck on the cheek which made them both laugh gleefully.

I suddenly saw myself in the cheerful little girl. I remembered that I had been much like her, not caring for monetary wealth, only for being happy and seeing others happy too. Her innocence reminded me of what I used to be and how happy I once was.

I suddenly remembered the cute child I was: guileless, timid, yet over-enthusiastic. I didn’t have the slightest care for any troubles at all, although I was always in trouble for being quite a menace. My mother’s smile and my father’s laugh were the only things I regarded as priceless. Yet now, it is the amount of money for me to spend which I hold dear most.

It suddenly dawned on me that I had been quite selfish and uptight over money. I had grown up to become self-centered and I felt stunned as I sat there thinking about it. I had regarded money as important, pushing away the more important aspects of my life. I had changed from being just like the little girl to enslaving the people around me, including my brother.

Until today, that incident at the post office is a reminder not to be self-indulgent with material wealth and to take into account other people’s feelings, especially the ones I love and care for the most. (648 words) [grade: B]





'The Conversion' by Angelyn Choo Tze Hui (B5).

My mother worked hard all her life so that I could have everything I ever wanted. I have become almost everything my mother had always hoped I would be: successful, wealthy and healthy, all at the same time. But she is not here to spend this time of my life with me, she left awhile back; she left me.

As my chauffeur drives along Richmond Road, I cannot help but glance out my window from the back seat of the car. I watch as the palm trees and grass fields roll away from me; I pretend that they are leaving me. Finally, the car pulls into the airport’s departure gate, and I step out of the car and on the dim platform. I linger around the hall so I can soak in the entire image, the entire sensation, the entire awareness of people leaving. I close my eyes and take it all in. Right at this very moment, I am thinking of my mother. In the very midst of crowded airport, I feel lonely. My hands start shaking and I clasp them tightly together, trying to calm myself down. I feel beads of sweat forming on my forehead, but I swear that the airport is cold; the air-conditioning is working just fine, so I guess it is just me.

All the sudden, as if the thin piece of thread holding my sutured heart together was snapped, memories of my mother and I come rushing back to me. I shut my eyes even more tightly; as if to keep the memories from invading my mind so maybe that would stop the tears that are now slowly making their way down my cheeks. But I know these memories too well; they always come back when I think about her. They replay over and over again, and I get angry because most of them are of her leaving me for some business trip or another one of her urgent meetings. But there is one memory that I remember more vividly than all the other memories combined - it was of my mother and I when I was fifteen years old, and I was terribly sick and even more stubborn.

“Alright!” my mother said, “if you won’t go to the doctor, at least come and sleep in my room with me. Don’t sleep alone; I’ll take care of you.” She then tried to carry me, but I kicked and screamed and refused to move, because I was so angry. Angry at her and angry at the fact that she could be so caught up with her own busy working life all the time, rather than be there for me.

“Just leave me alone!” I yelled, “Go back to your own room, your own life. I hate you!”

She said nothing and went back to her room. I really thought that this was her finally leaving me alone, she was not going to fight for me anymore –my heart sank. The darkness in my room suddenly became so obvious to me, I felt alone. The she came back with a blanket, covered me with it and placed her pillow beside mine. She lay down and slept in my room, on my bed, with me; holding my hand the entire time. And each time as the stomach pangs came back and I started crying again, she clasped my hand with her hands and hugged me even more tightly; she knew it would not help, but she did it to let me know that she was there –she would always be there. “Mom…” I mumbled to myself. “Don’t you think things would be so much better if you could spend more time with me?”

“Everyday, Andrea…” my mother’s soft words were the last sound I heard as I gave in to sleep. “Everyday.”

I take a deep breath and smile to myself through the tears that are still silently streaming down my cheeks. I smile because through it all, despite it all, I know she thought of me, everyday. Even though she was so busy with her working life and I never got to spend time with her, I adore her. And everyday, for the rest of my life, I will think of her as well. (709 words) [ grade: B]




‘The Conversion’ by Hamadatun Najwa bt Yusuf Wahbi

“No! That’s my final answer!” I was tired of yelling to Bree about not wanting to send a random ‘Friendster’ message to a guy who barely knew I existed in this world. All because of a function one night at our dad’s workmate’s place…

“But, it’s about time you got to know someone new in your life! You’re already 24 for goodness sake!” I’d say it was probably the billionth time I’d heard that from her lips. That’s how it went every single time. This was one of those other unfortunate times. She propped herself against the wall of the bed, stretching her legs out with her Macintosh laptop sitting on her lap. I don’t know how she amazingly and coincidentally found that guy on that ‘Friendster’ site.

Bree was my second sister – more like my best friend and my partner in crime, who had just gotten married to her flame from 3 years ago; destiny she called it. I, on the other hand, called it crap. “I don’t understand how you see love as something overrated,” she had often said.

Quite frankly, I never understood how people could not see it as something overrated. I had heard of one, too many sob stories of relationships and marriage, and I refused to be the victim in any of them. My deepest, darkest secret about it all… I was scared – full stop.

“Come on, little sister! Pleassee? Oh! Oh! I can type it out for you if you don’t want to!” she grinned at me with much anticipation. I rolled my eyes, snapped at her for one last time and marched out of the room. A non-risk taker, yes, I was known for that, and I have to admit to the truth of that. I always, and I mean always, went the safe way. I would just shrug ‘rather not’ to any wild suggestion anyone would come up with, and to me, this was wild. “You’re so boring! You don’t have any excitement in your life! You don’t even take the risk in finding any, coward!” she managed to shout out.

‘Shut up, I know,’ I silently responded deep down.

“AAAHHHHHHHH!!!” I heard Bree’s scream from across the room. “He replied!” my face struck with confusion. What? Who? Huh? “Hehe, um, I kind of sent it.”

“YOU WHAT?” This was crazy. She could not possibly have gone into my account and typed a message to that guy. But she did. It had been a week ago that she last suggested it, but she did what she wanted to anyway. She cajoled me in to reading it. There it was on the screen a message from that guy: nothing lame, nothing corny, nothing too cliché. A perfect ‘hello’ message, nice and different. I found myself smiling at the screen, amazed by his response and slightly tickled pink that someone would actually bother responding to my message (which I did not even send). ‘Ah, I’ll just reply to this guy’s message anyway. He’ll be off in no time. He’d be such a typical guy who has done this millions of times: he’ll keep sending a few messages, find out it’s not easy to get to know me, he’ll get bored of the routine, then he’ll go get some other girl with a click of his finger,’ a typical-Diana thought ran across my mind.

Morning, day and night – it all involved him. No, we did not have phone calls, we did not chat on-line and no, we did not phone text one another. We continued to send on-line messages. I was impressed, as I had underestimated him. He was everything that I had not assumed he was. An intriguing man of 27 who loved to talk, and also a successful lawyer. I found both of us talking about anything we could think about at the top of our heads. Despite that, I limited myself from letting him get too close to my life. I did not want him to know me too well. Most of all, I was scared to like him. ‘I am not going to fall for him,’ the robotic person that I was would keep reminding myself. But day-by-day, it was getting harder to not like this guy. “You should learn to take risks,” he said to me in one message one day. I had baldly told him my problem of trusting people and he had been willing to answer every single question I wanted to know about him self, just for me to trust him. He’s a charmer, I knew he was…and that’s what scared me. I was free-falling into the unknown.

One date led to several others , week after week, which later went on for months. I couldn’t help myself I was falling hard for this guy. I tried so hard to deny it, but it was of no use. He was the most honest guy I had ever met. He was not afraid to tell me his past, the bad and the good. We always spent good times together, simply with a meal and a long chat, which included a whole lot of uncontrollable laughter. My rock-hard heart just softened getting to know him. I just knew that he was so real, so sincere and genuine. How? ‘Because I trust him’ – I, Diana, had finally learnt to trust.

My heart raced faster than usual whenever I was about to see him. Butterfly feelings would rush over me whenever I saw him. Phone-call night became every night. Every song we shared, every problem we dealt with. His flaws, my flaws, our flaws – we knew it all, even the funny and stupid ones. I subconsciously found myself expressing myself, which had never been easy for me before. I felt like Sonny of the movie ‘I-Robot’, who developed emotions inside of him. Deep inside me, my heart felt so round, so full. I felt a certain type of happiness inside of me, one that I couldn’t even explain. He’s like the French fries of my Spicy McDeluxe Meal, not a must-have, but it wouldn’t taste as awesome without it. I wouldn’t say that I was happy because of him, but I’d say because of him, I was happier. Love - I didn’t think it was overrated anymore. This was real. It was the real deal… I was in love. I was in love with this man. The best part was, he felt the same way too.

It has been three years already. Marcus and I got married a year after being together, just like my parents did, and we haven’t been happier ever since. I still smile waking up beside him, the one man that I love. It’s amazing how he still gives me those funny feelings inside. I still find myself falling more and more in love with him everyday and I don’t know how he does it. He changed me even without realizing it himself, and I love him more for it. I learnt so much, and in fact I still am learning. It’s ironic how I refused to get to know this man, but it was all worth it. I took a risk, I risked it all, and yet again, it was worth it. Both of us always look back and have a good laugh at those early times that we started out, and see how we have grown together. I would not have asked for anything better.

Thank you God for blessing me with a wonderful man, thank you Bree for going against my will. Lastly, thank you Babe for being so incredible, I love you…

And no, love is not overrated, that’s for sure. (1497 words) [grade:A]