After 1 1/2 years, with many false starts, missed deadlines (I've missed deadlines like 4 times) wrong turns and dead ends (not to mention misguided directions!), I have finally reach near the end of my journey where the dissertation/thesis is concern. Now is just some proof corrections and minor revisions (unless my supervisor decides that she still needs me to send her one more revision - I hope not), I might be able to finally format it nicely, have it printed out and sent to the binders all by next week (since I am going out of town til Sat and most places are't opened for long/ or opened at all on weekends).
Next week will see me highly busy as I have to content with much work before going out station the week after. Maybe it is the end of the month before I can actually see down and think about what I am going to do after all this. It is like deciding what to do with your life after breaking off from a long term relationship (not too long this one, only slightly longer than 1 1/2 years but a rather intense, love-hate relationship at that which is always nagging at me even when I am away from it). This relationship has sucked out most of my enjoyment for simpler pleasures in life. I take a month to read magazines that could be read completely in 2 hours. I haven't even had the chance to savour a foreign magazine I have bought recently, on an impulse, because my mind was not at it (even though I had time since I was awaiting a verdict on my work from the other people who were reading it).
However, I did manage to read two rather interesting stuff. Actually more than two, but I am singling out these two. One is the decades old "Feminine Mystique" by Betty Friedan and the other is a paper on the book "Emily Climbs" by Lucy Maude Montgomery (my favourite childhood author) and F.W.H Myers on parapyschology and Lucy (I refuse the convention of calling her by her last name) had used his ideas in her writing of the Emily trilogy (could there be fans of her work out there reading this post?). I would like to write more about the latter but I will begin first by writing more on the former. On Betty's seminal work. Why? Because event though she was talking about conditions almost half a century ago, I see the revival of what she had discussed about in this part of the world (and maybe even in the western side of the world). Why do I say that? Because I can easily identify with what she said, even though she was talking more about my grandmother's time. But then, Malaysia in the 1950s and 1960s is very different from the US in which Betty was talking about. Some might say that Malaysia is still trap in the modernist age of 1950s and 60s US, but I beg to differ. It seems to me that Malaysia is living a very schizophrenic condition that is part 1950s America, some of the 1960s and part in today's world. How much of each is in each...well I might do an actual piece on that since this is quite interesting research. Maybe some sociologist here might already have done something of that nature. Nonetheless, what is more important for me is to critique on women's condition here.
But, after this thesis is sent up, I am gonna give my brain a rest and read a lot of fiction and indulge in other hobbies I have put on hold for almost a year. And exercise more!
It seems that this is a pretty bad year. Some call is bad feng shui. Bombings everywhere. Disasters. No wonder I haven't felt particularly happy since after New Year...
