Karmic Krap

Wednesday 28th June 2006

Karma comes in all forms.

There are two main categories. There's delayed karma, which is, in good time, what goes around really DOES come around, eventually. Just wait long long only. Then there's immediate karma, which my galpals and I used to call "immediate dolat".

Like that time I was fifteen, during hockey training at the School of Physical Education (is it still called that now?), I passed a snide and terribly angsty-teenager remark to Mardi and Izrina about one of the action-terror girls from the CJC girls' hockey team. They were there at our training because we had a friendly match with them. The CJC girl I dissed did not hear my remark and neither did any of her teammates because at that time, I knew the meaning of keeping it discreet. Yet, somehow, during the match itself, one of the other CJC girls accidentally hit me right SMACK in the area between the nose and the right eye with the curved end of her hockey stick. She was about to take a hit when I came in from behind her and tried to steal the ball away (konon on the defense laah!). I poked my (pink!) stick into her area and managed to flick the ball away but she did not immediately realize the ball was gone and took a long hard swing with her stick anyway. Without the ball in line to receive the blow, her powerful swing followed-through for her stick to meet my face. Causing me to pass out momentarily, in the hot sun and on the rough Astroturf.

I came to, minutes later, on my back, with a throbbing face, facing a crowd of anxious, worried and sweaty girls. With a swelling bump where the end of the stick hit me. (No, that is NOT the cause of my pesek nose hokay?!). Oh and in the midst of all that drama and all that pain, in one tiny gatal corner of my mind, I remember that I was feeling glad it was only the CJC girls who were there that day, together with my Crescent girls. For if it was any of the cute CJC boys or SPE boys, I'd curl up and die a shameful death. Especially if it was one of the CJC boys I was crushing hard on last time. Heh.

Since it was a purely an accident and the CJC girl really really REALLY did not intend to hurt me ( I still believe that to this day!), I knew that this was a damn good example of "immediate dolat". Immediate and extended, as the big bump on my nose looked like a second nose sans nostrils from one angle. It didn't help that the redness subsided quickly and the huge bump took on a lovely flesh-coloured tone with nary a mark nor a bruise on it, making it really look like a nostril-less second nose. And it stayed looking like a second nose for about a week. Which happened to be the first week of Hari Raya Aidilfitri. Yes, I went Hari Raya visiting that year with a second nose, folks! Some of my tak-slalu-jumpa older relatives with poorer recall abilities thought I was actually born with that second nose and it took them some time to gather up the courage to ask my parents if they have ever considered surgery for me. Oh the pain!

To rub salt into the wound (or bump!), that second nose didn't even muster enough pity for me to get extra duit raya, hokay?! If I remember correctly, I got just as much as my brother and sister did, if not less. And those two did NOT have to go around with two noses, mind you! Perhaps I scared the relatives so much, they didn't recover in time to pity me. Perhaps they were all terperanjat berok at this miscreant in a baju kurung and saddened by the fact that this miscreant was related to them. Oh the pain!

But I digress.

So karma is everywhere. Whether delayed or immediate, it can be in many forms and yes, I have pictures of the second nose as proof. Having said that, I realize, despite the traumatic second nose fiasco that was obviously karmic and a few other life experiences I had later that were also obviously karmic, I usually don't think twice when I want to pass a nasty remark about someone or something I don't like or when I want to do something not-so-nice or when I am just not feeling that I want to be nice at all. I just forget that I'll get the shit slapped on my face back one day if I give shit out.

Hello? Y'all cannot judge me, hokay?! I know I am not the only one guilty of this. I guess so many of us are like that and it's not a new epidemic, it's just age-old human nature. We are all fundamentally not very nice. Maybe it evolved from our caveman days where survival of the fittest is the key and being nice just gets no one, nowhere. Caveman A would not think twice about bonking Caveman B on the head with his club for that extra bit of mammoth meat. Or Cavewoman A would, in an instant, reach over and brutally twist Cavewoman B's unsupported animal-skin clad right breast just because Cavewoman B's cosy little cave had an extra little cave room which Cavewoman B cleverly turned into a guestroom for out-of-towners who would happen to drop by on the the way to the next continent. Maybe karma is just a mere theory, something that is so intangible, it is hard for us to take it seriously until it hits us on the face (for me, that takes quite a literal meaning!) so we do things that are not very nice and take it for granted our joyride will never crash and burn. Maybe we can have all the morally-upright theories in the world hammered into our thick skulls but we will never ever really want to be really really nice because then life would be freaking boring and we'd all be like Pleasantville at its peak. And our faces would ache because we all smile so much (and not because of hockey sticks and CJC girls). Maybe we all just enjoy the drama of not-being-nice sequences and consequences. We are all natural-born drama queens, no?

However, almost all of us go out in public on most times, appearing to random strangers as nice, sane and most unlikely like a serial gossiper/killer/bitch/a**hole/jerk. Not many of us walk around displaying our darker/bitchier/laser sides liberally. Only when with those who understand us or love or like us unconditionally, do we let them in on the secret of our shortcomings. Or we make them feel the brunt of those shortcomings. And we hope karma doesn't catch up.

Yet, I notice that there is a difference in people who are important, think they are important or want desperately for other people to think they are important. They want to set themselves apart from the other not-so-popular/powerful/talented/rich/beautiful people. They think they deserve the attention. They think they can get away with it because as popular/powerful/talented/rich people, they are entitled to throw their weight around. So they bring out their not-nice side in a snap to bring themselves above the masses and karma theories and such go out the window. What's more important than being important to the other unimportant people? Karma my ass, retorted our latest diva. Tsk tsk.

I don't know. I guess I will never know what's the real deal. Why karma's everywhere but people are still intent on not being nice to each other, important or not. Though I am no saint and I am definately no angel, I am trying to be a nicer person. Have been at it for quite awhile now, whether it is obvious or not to anyone. I guess that's why when someone is not so nice to me, I feel the impact tenfold. So y'all better be nice to me, hokay? Nowadays I very senang merajok, you know!? Ask Azim. He'll give you my rapsheet. Oh well. I'm not important enough to be not nice to begin with, you know? I only stewardess lah. No biggie. Heck, I'm paid to be nice to people. Both important and not-so-important people.

Karma and Emirates stewardess paycheck notwithstanding, I'd say, it is nice to be important but it's still actually more important to be nice.

:)