i remember / oboeteimasu #1

while you were driving..

while you were bathing..

while you were waiting..

while you were just sitting doing nothing.

did you ever have a sudden recollection of your pasts?

like, suddenly you remembered about this certain incident you had during your childhood..

a reminiscence.

..

i was frequently cycling with my bike then. i can't remember when was the first time i got my bike. was it second grade? nah not sure. though i remember one thing, i was the last among my cousins, learning to pedal. 6 years old i guess. kindergarten. i mean, riding the two wheels bike. i was relying on the extra smaller wheels at the rear side, for quite some time. longer than i should be. when cousins of my age had already using two wheels bike.

i still remember that people, the adults; be it my father, my uncle or my brother, they didn't think highly of me. i still remember clearly how did it feel to be belittled by other people. heck, i was a small kid then, yet i understand what did it feel like. being looked down upon. which is the reason i could still remember this very well. the feeling, the tension was high back then. it's stored deeply somewhere within my hippocampus cells.

until one day i showed them that i could also do it.

uh huh. now that i think about it, didn't i keep having rivalry with my cousins? (in academics i won, that's for sure. ;p)

oh. i still remember. the first time i finally rode my two wheels bike. i was so happy. tanoshii katta. it was at my dad's kampung, Sungai Kechil. i think it's quite late, maybe 5 or 6 pm. so my dad wanted to go home. but there i was, kept cycling in a circle. round and round. so happy. "hey look at me! i didn't fall!" well i didn't exactly say that, i think i was just smiling, laughing happily. dude, it's a first time thing.

that's why i could understand Yowamushi Pedal very well. i was similar, a lot like those characters. we want to show people that we could also do it, and that it's fun to ride a bike. just pedal!

erm, this is just an intro.

the reminiscence that i was having just now was not the story above.

i didn't know how the hell did my brain republish this story while i was driving. was it at the traffic light? roundabout?

anyway, this story happened during my fourth grade or sixth grade. i'm not entirely sure. but i'm sure it was around the time when i used to go out with my friends - going to play video games at the pusat komuniti or gaming cafe, or watching football matches at other primary school, or just going around our taman perumahan. that's my world. chiisai. very small huh my world when i was a kid? LOL.

bmx was popular then. ugh, i didn't remember what kind of bike i was having. there was one time i had a bmx i guess. not granny bike like Onoda k.

erk, off topic again.

i love manga. comics. books. there's this bookstore i used to go to buy the books. of course, i relied on my dad to bring me there. however, when i felt like it was hard to ask him to go there, (you couldn't just ask my dad like that you know....he's a.....never mind) i would go there on my own! with my jitensha! it's not that far..i don't know.. 3 km? right now, you're a big person, of course it doesn't feel that far, but when i was a kid, it's quite far laa...

i only need to go out of my residence, and then cross a railway (it's guarded with gate and traffic light) and then cross a roundabout at the pekan. seems easy huh?

the residence part? to not be seen by others that might know me? easy.

the railway? it's quite scary to be honest. i think at that age, i might have watched a movie or something regarding train or railway killing people. i was praying it was red light so that i get to wait with others and cross it together. yeah numbers win. or so i thought.

it's easy as well, because i've been cycling with friends using the road. already used to it.

the tricky part....

it was the roundabout.

i think i might not understand how the roundabout worked back then. i knew which direction the vehicles go, but....i didn't know which sides have the right to go first. which one is the priority. like when a car circled the roundabout, and another motorcycle waiting at the exit, whose road is it? who could go first? i might have get that in confusion then.

it's not easy for me to cross the road, to be honest. i was afraid of an accident. i was afraid..of many things. i was afraid that my father found out that i came here. i was afraid that the adults would scold me if i cause problems. that's the only thing kids worry huh?

and thus.. i had to cross the roundabout..the road is quite wide.. oh forgot to mention, this roundabout has a clock tower in the middle. the thing is...i didn't really have to go into the roundabout..i only needed to cross at the exit part..funny oh funny.

i didn't know what's wrong with me that day. usually it's not a problem to do this. but that particular day..i made a mess. while crossing the road.. oh wait, i didn't remember whether this is while i was going to the bookstore or going back home.  maybe while going home.

anyway, while crossing the road....i suddenly paused pedaling. in the middle of the road. why? because i was hesitated, and scared, and doubted myself. wavering. i was taking my chances crossing the road while assuming the two motorcycles at the other side of roundabout were not coming to me that soon. yet, they were already close to me! and thus i stopped. it's like when you unintentionally block people in a hallway, you want to let them walk first and at the same time, they also think like you..ahahah..

i stopped there for quite some time..didn't know what to do..so scared..didn't realize that i was making a ruckus there..blocking the road..to be honest, i was waiting for the motorcycles to go first...but how were they going to, when i was blocking them? hahaha.

sweating. couldn't hear clearly that people were shouting at me. i was filtering outside voices i guess.

somehow i managed to pedal a bit to the front, but still blocking people. i was making it worse, by going northwest, when i should just go straight. i was not sure how long i was there, for me it felt a long time. but it could be just for a while...

finally, i managed to go to other side of the road...

then this one pakcik........said "ni apa la" with his palms directing towards me.......

erkk....

i was still scared that more people going to scold me...or beat me.... dup dap dup dap..my heart.. fortunately..the people witnessing it already went their way.. at the same time, i was afraid there might be people there that knew my dad and told him...ahahha...nanda kore..

anyway..i reached home safely. and read my comics happily! lalalala~

there's a lot more stories about me and my bike. later then.