I see your true colors

This year’s birthday was certainly of the more eventful sort. Honestly I wasn’t very thrilled for this day-not sure why either-and I woke up on Monday feeling particularly normal or rather, dull. After the daily routine of breakfast and reading the papers, I got up to my room to use the internet and maybe start on some work. See? How efficient am I, haha.

So imagine my surprise when Andrew came back looking very worried and anxious. Apparently he’d gotten 4 summonses and wasn’t aware of it. To add insult, Monday was the last day of this discounted rate of 50% on summonses. I decided to follow him-because I’d probably be stuck at home anyway, no difference-and we literally flew to The Curve’s kiosk counter to pay up.

The queue was already at a respectful length when we got there-and we waited until 1:30pm ish for the counter to open.

While waiting certainly got on my nerves, it was the fact that everyone’s true colors shone through, most of the time it’s ugly to watch. I continued to be aghast at the thick-faced people who actually just jumped the queue thinking of no one but themselves, obviously. I get it, you are desperate to pay your summonses-isn’t everyone doing the same thing? A little consideration would go a long way, mind you. And the person who did it in front of us was an old lady! She isn’t old as in really old, but perhaps in her fifties to sixties. And one minute she wasn’t there, the next moment she was, like David Blaine. The lady in front of us was pissed, and I can’t blame her. She was the only one who actually reprimanded her (loudly too) for what she did as clearly no one wanted to tell an old lady off. But still, you’re evidently old enough to understand common etiquette!

As if she was doing the right thing, her daughter even came over and stood up for her, saying that she was her mom and all that nonsense. Erm, hello? How does that apply to this situation? Evidently you inherited your hard-as-rock skin from your mother. Either way you deserved all the summons you got.

Also, there were people who tried to ‘cheat’ the long queue by asking people close to the front to pay on behalf of their part. Nice try. One guy brought a huge wad of 100 dollar bills-we think that he was paying for a lot of others-and held up the queue for almost half and hour. Or more. Just…. what. In your friends’ eyes you’re probably a Good Samaritan bordering on saintly, but that’s just as inconsiderate as cutting the line.

In total, I think we waited for roughly 5 hours, and everyone was hot and bothered by then. All was not lost, Andrew and I made a new friend and shared a currypuff and iPhone tip or two. What can I say-definitely one of my more memorable ways to spend a birthday.

But Malaysians who think that they can get away with jumping the queue is seriously annoying. Most people may be too polite to tell you off-just wait, you might get karma handed to you on a plate, with embarrassment as the appetizer. Don’t say we all didn’t give you an early warning.

The people you find in cinemas

Ever been to the movies and realized that the audience are either too quiet or overboard with the noise level?

As a seasoned (ahem) movie goer you should probably be able to identify these characters when you chance across them. The ones that are obviously plain irritating are those who make your movie experience one that shouldn’t be remembered. Or gone sour. Whatever, I digress.

First, I shall start with the annoying kids who won’t shut up. Seriously, did your parents teach you anything? As in, try not to make unnecessary noises while out in public? This isn’t your home living room where you can shout and do as you please. There’re other viewers in the hall as well, so if you can’t keep your trap shut and behave, don’t come in, rent the DVD when it comes out or something. Read this quote somewhere: “Silence is golden, duct tape is silver.” Hear that, parents?

I’ve several experiences that I recall the ridiculous rackets: when King Kong released, the cinema halls for the movie were huge. Really big. So there’s a considerable amount of space for people to walk up the rows to their seats etc. And halfway during the movie, I swore I saw kids running down the isle, laughing and talking. Erm, excuse me? And there was Transformers, which a kid won’t stop talking behind me and another cried when the camera focused on a head shot for Optimus Prime. What about that movie, A Christmas Carol, when Hwee Lynn had to tell a kid behind to be quiet? And not to mention he kept kicking the seats. Parents who bring their underaged kids to watch a totally adult movie is also beyond me. Why would you bring your baby to watch Michael Jackson’s This Is It? He will obviously cry through most of the scenes than break into song.

People who kick your seats from behind are plain annoying. It’s ok to fidget, but when it comes to kicking seats, are you even aware of that? It’s quite inconsiderate when you assume the person in front of you won’t mind, or won’t notice the chair shaking.

Okay, now that I’ve talked about the noisy people, it’s time to touch on the quiet ones. I know that the silent audience is much better than a loud one, but some times isn’t it too quiet for words? There’re probably many factors to a laughing group of viewers; the amount of people in a cinema, the type of people in the cinema and the genre of the said movie. Generic movies that will tickle your funny bone are [most] animated films, rom coms and and comedies in general. But if you get a odd mixture of people in the cinema I guess the laughter won’t be as pronounced as usual.

While watching Vampire Sucks, I think it was the small cinema and lack of people and probably the fact that not all the viewers hadn’t watched/read the series. The movie was hilarious, a total mocking of the books and movies. Can’t even do it better myself! Although there were several name drops and jokes that even I can’t comprehend. I guess there were too many Twilight references. And what’s with the Canadian jokes? And somehow the Jersey Shore people and the Kardashians got dragged into this. So if you haven’t been keeping track of America’s most popular reality shows and E!, you probably won’t recognize half of the jokes they’re talking about. Oh, and did I mention they’ve a Taylor Swift spoof as well? Kinda obvious since ‘Becca’ (ala Bella) was strumming a sparkly guitar (gift from Edward? HAHA) and singing in that twangy style which doesn’t really bring anyone else to mind but T. Swift.

Speaking of that, her newly released (or leaked) single Mine is now playing on the airwaves. I really admire her song-writing skills but no offense-Mine sounds like a repackaged version of all the songs she had ever done. Maybe it’s time to take on a new angle?

I know that cinemas have no written rules on the noise level, but I still people ought to be considerate in this matter. There are some who will tell you off for being too loud, and others who rather sit in silence and endure because they wouldn’t want to cause a scene. So please think about others sitting amongst you in the hall. (:

And yeah one more thing. People who forgot to silence their mobiles and as a result their blaring ringtones of Rihanna or what not bouncing off the walls! Whatever happened to the public service announcement before a movie starts? Someone should request that those notices be put up again.

Ok, rant over. Been drafting this since yesterday.