AudEmo

In the car

I am redrafting my thesis (it’s gotten to seventy pages yo) and eating cocoa pops in a paper cup and diluted iced tea in a ceramic mug. My winamp playlist is a rambling list of pop and country music from decades before me.

tammy wynette
lynn anderson
the beatles
petula clark
linda ronstadt
dolly parton
connie francis
the carpenters

I listened to the most ancient songs ever growing up. From my mother would come Lobo, Bee Gees and Sam Hui WTF. My dad has even older tastes and because of him my brother and I grew up knowing all the words to Connie Francis and Harry Belafonte.

Songs will always remind me of different periods of my life. Ayu’s Rainbow album and the theme song to GTO will always make me think of my first ex because when we broke up it was too painful to listen to English lyrics and have every emo song apply to my state of mind, so I started listening to Jpop. And I will always associate Justin Timberlake’s Senorita and Jay Chou’s Jian Dan Ai with my 2nd ex (who btw is too useless to even mention here wtf) just cos he listened to them all the time.

Right now my winamp list makes me think of all the times the four of us would pack into the car and drive four hours back to Penang. My parents would pop in Elvis or BeeGees cassette tapes, Doris Day, Harry Belafonte, Peter Paul and Mary, Cliff Richard, soundtracks to Oklahoma and My Fair Lady, even an American Bandstand album. But my alltime favorite was a greatest hits compilation of female country singers and I still whine that it’s missing now.

(But whenever my dad put in Deep Purple I would complain incessantly while my brother would say “EH DON’T CHANGE”)

Before leaving, my brother and I would have big decisions to make over which stuffed toy would get to go on the trip. Most of the time it was Lolo, this fat purple bear from Metrojaya who used to be pink. We didn’t dare wash him because we were afraid his arms would fall off. My brother’s pillow which he insisted on bringing every single time would take up half the backseat. We would fight over who would get the neck rest that didn’t leak air, and most of the time my mother would be stuck with the one that did.

My dad would occasionally yell out that he was falling asleep and my mother would pour Nescafe from a flask and feed it to him. I would usually fall asleep the moment we got on the highway out of Subang Jaya and wouldn’t wake up until maybe two hours later, but when I did I always sneezed and that was how my parents would know that I was awake.

My brother and I would cart along our Sweet Valleys or RL Stines or whatever we were reading then, and then pore over them cover to cover. I always got car sick. When we got to a tunnel, my dad would go “Tunnel! Hold your breath and make a wish!” and we would suck in great lungfuls of air and hold it until we got out into the sunshine again. Most of the time I forgot to think of a wish.

Sometimes we stopped at a rest stop for a toilet break. I always insisted I didn’t have to go because I hated public toilets. My parents would take it in turns yelling at me and turn me out of the car to pee. Sometimes we stopped in Bidor and had wantan mee surrounded by petai and durian sellers hawking their wares. Once or twice we drove out of the way to Kampar (I think) to buy chilli sauce because Kampar chilli sauce tasted the best.

We always drove by this lime or quartz hill that was shaped like a monkey’s head because miners had been extracting stone from it. I don’t know how it ended up looking like a monkey, but in my head I always called it Sun Wugong. In the past few years though, the hill’s getting more and more eroded and looks nothing like Sun Wugong now.

No matter how many times we drive by, it will never look like a monkey’s head again. And I will never be 12 and playing with Lolo and my brother in the back while my parents ride up front again.

Comments (26)

  • nice.

    i have this thing with songs too and how they remind me of different eras in my life. but what you wrote was very beautifully put.

  • *tear drop*

  • simple and beautiful post, but sounds like u r feeling homesick.. take care and all the best for ur thesis ya.. cheer up ya.. ^^

  • hai poor audrey. very nice post

  • aww…so sweet 🙂

  • reminds me of how my sis and i would record ourselves singing ‘how much is that doggie in that window’ on cassette. hahaha.

    and when i was 8, i tied plastic bag with string and try to fly it like a kite out of my window, cos my sisters were too old and had their own friends. my opposite neighbour thought i was an autistic kid wtf.

  • cute:))

    I think i won by listening to the most ancient songs ever- frank sinatra’s:P

    I remember I used to drive like that, in the car with my parents to sinai before it became dangerous:\\ I really miss that:[[

  • your post hits close to home because my mom is from penang and our family will drive there, but from melaka so it’s even further… and we always stop at the rest area where they sell pomelo etc don’t know what it’s called… nicely written!

  • hey, your dad sounds like a nice guy!!!!!!!

  • hahahhah uncle ooi hahahah
    eh i wanted to write the same thing also, about songs that associate me with my ex bfs. nice post =) i don’t want to grow old and die T______T

  • very sweet =)

  • awwww audrey ooi /boo

    do u remember our karaoke session in my car wtf.

    this is a very nice melancholic post i like it!

  • Lovely post 🙂

    I remember the karaoke sessions in Li Tat’s car… I have a video of you and Tze singing to Britney Spears dongggggt make me look for it ah wtf

  • a very poignant post. i totally relate, cept the best memories for me were singing along to kingston trio and john denver with my dad…:)

    it’s a little sad hey, to think that we’ll never be that young and innocent again.

  • Hi babe, you are really blessed to have such a CUTE dad.. Your parents are just sooooooo cool.. in return they are luckily to have a daughter like you… Ooohhhh.. makes me so wanna cry thinking about the old days… Sweet…. I dont WANNA grow old too but it since like i have NO choice when the clock turns for another 60 plus hours and DADANG.. One more year adds on… Sob sob sob.. Have a FUN weekend my dear… Hugs…

  • My dad loves all the old Russian songs (they are actually very nice) and thatz what I grew up with ….

    and he knows them because communist wanted to learn from Russia during those reform years sigh.

  • oh ya i remember singing to old hokkien songs in the car and was very very proud that i knew all the words to the songs… while my brother and sister snickered. never could understand why they were so mean but now, oh god, now i do wtf.

  • So touching… I always hated the bus ride from KL-Kuantan coz all I could see was long stretches of rubber trees. Followed by palm trees. Rubber trees, palm trees, rubber trees, palm trees… Zzzzz…

  • this is a really good post. everything you describe nearly exactly parallels my car rides to penang with my family when i was younger. i used to look forward to it so much. but like you, i will never be 12 again and that makes me very sad.

    beautifully written. 🙂

  • None…

    None…

  • do u remember the song u used to sing in the car b4 barry stayed with us in kl? u were about 2/3 yrs old then. it goes like this: oh oh fok len sai, fok len sai….. it took us a while to figure out it was actually auld lang syne that u were singing

  • sorry, the comment above supposed to be mine, not from fat her

  • Very, very nice post 🙂 meaningful.

  • Hmm. … signs you’re getting old 🙂

  • yep your dad sounds like a nice guy~ this is some seriously gd writing it resonates in your faithful reader indeed *tear

  • Same as Angie with dad’s favorite songs… hehe~~ anyways…ur dad is so cute lol
    i wish i had siblings and always stayed young while my parent never grew old=(

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