About Nude Not Naked

One More Day
Alex will arrive in KLIA on the 4th of January sometime after lunchtime. The happiness I feel inside is immeasurable. The cold in Europe means we will be frolicking in the sun for two weeks in some remote island. He needs a tan and I need a reason to wear the two bikinis I acquired recently.

In the pass, I have hardly spoken about him. To anyone, even to close friends. I think I guard my relationship with him dearly. I love him to bits and am very protective of him. Perhaps our love has been a long journey. It has taken me some time (approximately three years) to realize how precious he is to me. And now that I have found him, I will never let him go.



Wherever You Go
It is ironic. During our FIRST private moments together (away from E and the two other boys we were traveling with), he said the most unusual thing. “I promise I will follow you wherever you go,” Alex said. My heart was, “Yeah rrrrrrrightttttt…” with severe case of reservation.

We have traveled everywhere together. We’ve been to many places in Malaysia. One weekend a few weeks into our acquaintance, we took a trip to my childhood vacation spot, Fraser’s Hill. I described the place as, “beautiful highland with lots of flowers and trees, lovely English cottages and scones for tea”.

I was quite puzzled as to why he did not find the place as exciting as I did. I visited him family home in Scotland and found out why. His home was a “beautiful house with lots of flowers and trees, lovely English cottage and scones for tea’.

0_o




We’ve Been To Burma
The adventure of our lifetime. I remember clearly once we took a taxi to the middle of nowhere to see some antique. We bought home some stuff and got into the taxi again. On our way to the hotel, the taxi driver stopped his car in the middle of Yangon’s traffic jam. Without warning. Without signal. Without a clue as to why he did so.

My eyes followed him as he avoided motorbikes and the over crowded local minibuses. 20 meters or so, he bent down and picked up some dark piece of metal. He walked back towards the car, chucked the whatever black metal thing that dropped off the bottom of our taxi into the boot and continued driving us. Needless to say, we arrived safely.

There was this one time, the car door opened while the taxi was in motion. I could see the fuzzy tar road through the little gap between the door and the car. Got hold of the door and slammed it shut.

Classic.




We’ve Been To Scotland
“Just be careful of them, midges,” Alex’s parents said over dinner. Alex suggested that he would take me for a road trip around Scotland, visiting an aunt in his paternal grand father’s farm in Lismore, up up up all the way till John O Groats and then down the East coast from Aberdeen to Inverness etc and back to his parent’s home in down south.

“The what?” I asked. “What midges?”

“Oh you WILL KNOW what they are when you see them,” Alex’s brother said menacingly.

For days and days, I screamed whenever Alex opened the tent. “Careful of them, midges!!!”


Cost of campsite per night £20
Cost of dinner £30
Cost of watching a very nude Alex running away from midges PRICELESS




We’ve Been To France and Belgium
With friends. For the booze, of course. The last trip a week prior to my departure for Malaysia with two other workmates of his. The boys perked up during lunch hour when three younglings (who considered tearing 40s dresses after every few songs a norm to their singing routine) sang sexy numbers. I think these were the songs sung during WWII, to cheer the brave soldiers on.

Highlight? Stacking 12 crates of canned beer and 12 bottles of wine into our Audi. And getting away with it *wicked grin*




We’ve Been To Alex
Until now, that is. Alex asked me to join him in London for a period of six months earlier last year. He started working (big boy now) late November 2004 and he was happy playing a grown up. He said I would love it there and suggested that I leave Malaysia for London for a period of three years.

I thought he was mad. Leave all my friends, my shoes, my clothes, the unlimited spending and restaurant dine-ins? Madness, that’s what I said. I must admit that I have never taken a look at the price of anything I ate or purchased prior to being in London in March 2005. Being with him and surviving with him on his one person salary, away from my comfort zone and salary was such an amazing experience. It made me realise a lot of things that I had taken for granted in Malaysia and how sinful and inconsiderate my spendings were.

Being with Alex and being only with him (away from my friends, real and artificial) also brought us closer. I never enjoyed playing “Desperate Housewife” more than I did last year with him.

Each day was a blessing and each morning was a joy. We bathed together and hugged each other till he went to work. Then I worked from my iBook till lunchtime. I cooked us lunch almost everyday. In traditional pornstar high heels, of course.

He walked home for lunch and we sat happily in the living room, chomping down whatever I cooked. Then we sat in the garden, admiring the flowers that we’ve grown together. When he was off to work during the second half of the day, I continued working. Or writing. Or weeding.

Alex grew some onions in the back garden, so I could see the bulbs grow. He bought me a bird feeder and made me a bird table, so I had birds for company as I wrote and worked at my iBook.

Alex is the most humbling experience I’ve had. He does things that I never thought of doing. He does things that I now will do for him, because I love him. Because he loved me.

I grew up a Christian (a practicing one, having taught in the Sunday School for more than 3 years previously) and grew up believing that I knew what love was. Because God is Love. How ironic that I learnt love from someone many would consider a sinner and an unrepentant one, might I add. But this much I can say is true, I learnt to love from Alex because he showed me what love was.

Not hooblah jooblah words. Just pure love, in action.




But We’ve Never Been To Me
Not YET... but soon.

So now love has come to a full circle. And love has come to me. I am feeling very excited. I sincerely can understand Tom Cruise's need to jump on the sofa. I feel like jumping on the sofa, proclaiming that I've found me. And now that I've found me, Alex and I can go to there and be happy.

And I guess that this is the essence of Nude, Not Naked - a broken girl's journey to finding herself and finding love. The road was hard and the journey was long. But when she got there, the experience was like walking on water. Because love makes you light.



You've already won me over in spite of me
Don't be alarmed if I fall head over feet
Don't be surprised if I love you for all that you are
I couldn't help it
It's all your fault
~ Head Over Feet, Alanis Morissette.