Dear Little Turtle

I hate you. Or, at least I did. 

I still remember the first time I met you: so petite and dainty like a fresh spring rose, with a smile so sweet it almost give me diabetes. In my mind you are toxic, dangerous, loathsome. Yet people surrounded you with adoration, and the combination between their awe and your aura of beauty hurt me and burned me like the sunlight turned the vampire into ashes. Looking at you from a distance hurt me. Being with you in the same room hurt me. Your existence in this world hurt me. I envied you, can't you tell? I can be as witty and as gaily as possible, yet the eyes will still be on you. I was the kind of people that others will easily stepped on just to be a tad bit closer to people like you. As if your glamour would spread. Diarrhea spread, glamour not so much.

Then we're somehow stuck together. I still hated you that time. A tiny part of me was still insecure, but I have grown to love myself too. I had someone who love me. I had a good job. I was invincible in my own way. And most of all, I know for a fact my boyfriend couldn't care less on how you look. Which is a big plus. I was still uncomfortable with you, and still loathed the fact that you probably sailed through life thanks to your looks alone while I have to strive and pull myself out from the bottom of the abyss just to where I was at that point. Which is not entirely true. I have had many helps too along the way. But still, I was not as good looking as you are. So we're stuck together. Big deal. I care only about getting out of there ASAP, and I really don't care about your existence.

Then we talk about work. You said you wish you could get a job like mine, I told you how to apply. Me and my big mouth. There is a good, a really good chance that you could end up taking my position. You, after all, got all the necessary requirement for most Indonesian job: soft spoken, cute, a total darling. Yet I still told you how to apply, because, you know, I'm careless like that. When it worked out, I thought I gained a colleague. Which is really cool, because then I can use you as my sub when I can't go to work, and I can get more hours as your sub when you can't go to work. I maybe honest but I am not dumb. Everything has its worth. We didn't stay colleague for long though. Somewhere along the way, with the speed that match a viral disease (or it seemed like it), we ended up being closer and closer to each other. The next thing I know, we were friends.

Even then, sometimes I didn't know if I was really your friends or if you were just using me, as a diva would use her entourage. I have people shamelessly called themselves your best of best friends, and even as I teased you about it I can't help thinking, "What if it's true? What if they are really her BFF and I am nothing but a bystander?". But at that point, I like you so much that I really don't care. It was too much fun to be with you. You exasperated me every time you got sad and just hide in your little house like a good little turtle. I would knock on your house and wave a little cucumber (read: invitation to have a good time) and hope you will take the bait and let me have fun with you, because I really do enjoy your company. We laughed together, eat together, cry together. Description ceased to exist, what we are to each other is unimportant, all I know is that I had fun when I was with you.

When I have to move out, it seemed that our friendship would not last. Our conversation got shorter and shorter and, combined with your tendency to retreat to your 'house' when the world is too much for you, at times I thought that was the end. You didn't care. I started to forget. Of course, none of it was true. A good friendship is the one that will stay forever and you will never forget the how-to, just like riding a bike. Ours was equivalent with a super-solar-powered-with-extra-booster-back-to-the-future-bicycle. Pretty rad and much amazing. You were the one I called when I broke up with my boyfriend. I was the one you told when you got married. I dished out how I was going to meet this man out of nowhere from a dating site, and you enthusiastically cheered me up because you know I can, all while chowing down a big plate of Tuna Satay. Some things never changed.

And here we are. Both married, both with kid(s). And I still envy you at times. I even wanted your kid marrying someone from my side of the family, just to have your good look in the family. I know, I love you so much. The only reason why I keep doing what I have to do, braving myself and trying to be good and successful is just because I don't want to fail you. I think highly of you, and you might not know this. You stick to your gun, take the risk, defied all odds just to have your dream. Just to have what you wanted. And that is awesome. You might do it because you felt you don't have any other choice, but you still did it and sticking to it. And that is still awesome. I don't think I've ever done something that brave or that gutsy. Well, I could get crazy at times, but it is different. I don't really fear anything, so whatever crazy things that I did are not me being brave, it's just me being crazy (and reckless). And this is why I adore you so much. You got beaten in life, and you cry and you pout and you're sad, but you still got up and live your life. That's called endurance. That's called gutsy. That's called taking the life by its balls. No, for real.

Living in US taught me a lot of things. Being so far from my friends and family allowed me to see more things objectively. Most importantly, I learned that a$$holes are not race-related or geographically-bounded. The translation is: A$$holes are everywhere. The realization came to me almost like the Sixth Sense scene where the kid whispered: "I can see a$$holes..." Oops. I mean, "I can see dead people." Living in US helped me prove my theory: people are people. There are nice people, there are kind people, there are assholes and narrow minded people that would go hell-bent on trying to make you live the life that they think is correct. And knowing that they're a$$holes still doesn't help. It still hurts when you are subjected to such a$$holery, or to see someone subjected to it. Ideal world would be a place where people actually care on what other feels, regardless of their race/religion/whatever worldly attribute they choose to identify with themselves. For instance, I do not think I should adhere to "How To Properly Eat Sushi Without Insulting The Japanese" which includes the proportion on Wasabi vs soy sauce that I can use in my sushi and the angle on dipping the said sushi plus how long I should dip it for. At least not when I only ate $3 supermarket sushi that I bought on sale. My motto is: live your life the way you wanted to, but leave mine alone.

[To be fair, that motto is kinda f*cked up since I've been trying to make people good about themselves and be more sympathetic and caring to other people A.K.A changing people's life, all to achieve my own goal for peace on earth and the day where I don't have to say "What dafuq is this sh*t??!". Each to it's own I guess.]

Of course, knowing what's happening is not the same as managing your feeling. And so, little turtle, you have all the right to be grumpy, to be sad, to cry, to be mad. People can be evil, and there's no change in that. You would think you know someone, just to have that person turn into beast in front of your eyes, or in your computer/phone screen. You get the gist. When that happens, don't look into them. Look into you. You are kind, you are sweet, you are full of love. You are brave, you are strong, you are precious. You reached out to me and keep me close unconditionally, and that alone shows how special you are. Whenever the world seemed to be against you, read this letter again and have faith in yourself. Look around you and think, think hard, will you change any aspect of yourself just to accommodate what people say? And then look deeper and remember yourself as I see you: my darling little turtle, so brave and so gutsy. I would call you an armadillo, but a turtle seemed cuter. So there. 

We live, we learn. Unfortunately some people doesn't. You can't change a person's heart, nobody can, not even themselves unless they have a strong reason to (and a great self control to boost). But you, you're something else. Everybody is something else, to be exact; but we're not talking about everybody else, we're talking about you. You love, is special. Don't let anyone else talked you out of it. Don't let anyone else convinced you otherwise. Don't let anyone else made you feel shitty. And if they do, kick 'em in the balls. I love you, my little turtle. Now go and kick some balls.