As I walked through the immigration and customs channels at the singapore checkpoint on my way back from three non eventful days at Taman Negara Nature Park, Malaysia, all i cared about was getting back to work.

Have i really turned into such a bad workoholic? Well i think i know the aswer for that one. But as i was pondering over whether i actually am a bad workoholic or a good one, i started recollecting why i decided to take a break and go on this holiday all alone?

My trip to Taman Negara had started three nights ago when i left work and went home to pick up my rucksack and got a cab to the railway station. I had been planning this trip for a while. I wanted to go see the oldest rain forest in the world. How is that different from any other rain forests, i wouldnt know, i have been to some cool areas in the Western Ghats in Southern India. The experience i had trekking in western ghats was probably the only experience i have with rain forests and mind you its not a pleasant experience especially in the season just after the monsoons when you have these leeches wriggling on the ground and somersaulting towards bloood. And to escape from those blood suckers, you have to apply soap on your legs and carry a bag of salt. The suckers melt in common salt.. do u know that.. well now you know.. i have to find out why that happens.. meaning to find this out in the wikipedia for a while now.. as usual i am digressing.

Anyways, the train journey from Singapore to Jerantut in Malaysia was probably the most uneventful part of the journey to the rainforest. The train took the same tracks it takes on every other day. They looked just like what you can see in the picture on the right. Now the train was supposed to reach Jerantut at 4:00 AM but it reached at 5:00 AM. what difference did that make? well nothing, we anyway had to wait at the train station which looked like right out of malgudi days. Man, i wanted coffee so bad and the small stall didnt open until 6:30 AM. And right when i was about to have my coffee, the cab that was to take me and group i was supposed to travel with came along.

Jerantut to the Taman Negara National Forest is about 3 hours by ferry upstream on the river Tembeling. Now, while waiting for the ferry to start, i did what i am really really good at. no, not the foot in mouth thing.. but i dropped my camera and broke my UV filter. Now that is a good way to start a holiday. luckily, my t houghts didnt keep coming back to this and i forgot about this.

Well to keep things short, the journey to the resort was quite comfortable. Your eyes kinda get used to seeing shades of five colors - brown, blue, grey, white and green. Apart from the intermittent boats that pass you by which are in different hues altogether. Apart from a stop for fertilizing the forest, nothing else pretty much happenned. While i decided to fertilize the forest, i had to find a nice spot and a tree that would probably thank me for providing it with some extra nitrate supplements. I did my best, but trees being trees and humans being humans, i couldnt understand if it said thank you or it scolded me for spoiling the natural perfume of the forest. in any case, i made sure there were no "no fertilising" signs around.

I continued reading Shantaram while the forest got thicker and thicker and the trees started becoming taller and the foliage becoming greener, the sun playing hide and seek with the clouds and the rain clouds threatening to pour, well it had to, i was going to a rain forest. duh!

Now, i dont want to describe in detail all the three days i spent in this rain forest. I trekked about 12 kms over 2 days, visited the bat caves and squeezed my way through some narrow parts of the cave, smelt like at shit after coming out, got bitten by leeches and got my blood sucked out, tried the canopy walk and bought some forest honey. It was a relaxing and nice break from work and i figured out that i am hardly as fit as i used to be.

As i reached home after the break, i did realise that even though the break was good and i visited the oldest rain forest in the world, i didnt feel too good about the holiday. was it because i went alone? was it because i couldnt take my mind off of work sometimes, was it because i was reading Shantaram and was living his life through the book. I dont know. all i know is i didnt feel the break was good enough.

I took this holiday to escape but i guess i am stuck in too many things for escapism to be of any value add to my well being. I still have to face the daily routine and solve the issues that are pending.. my life has become all about work. i am not very happy about this. but then what can i do, i have to earn and i have obligations.. and it doesnt seem to get any easier as days pass by

As usual as i sit at home watching national geographic and overloading my hyperactive brain with more information, the brain's othe region starts to process random thoughts and one such random thought that i had now was what the hell have i done in the past 60 days of my life?

Well i used to have thoughts which had longer time spans.. such as what the hell have i done with my life thus far and what am i going to do with the rest. but then i figured, does anyone care about it? Well i dont care if someone cares, do i care? At the way life is turning out, i dont really care.. I mean yeah u have all those dreams and and all skewed ambitions and all the rest, but then how the hell does it matter to you at the moment? Ok ok.. i am not going to get philosophical or pshcyopathic here.

What i am trying to say is simple, the past 60 days of my life, if that were a snippet of how my rest of my life is going to be, man i am a goner. All i did the last 60 days was work work work work work, come home late, go out for a few beers some days, watched like 2 movies in the theater, missed some 3 others with friends, missed like 3 parties that i should have gone, went to probably 4 parties over some weekends, didnt play one round of golf or one game of tennis, did not hit the gymn even once and neither the swimming pool, somehow managed to keep the weight constant, did not see one episode of desperate housewives, watched almost all episodes of Seinfeld, finished one book by Kazuo Ishiguro, didnt read the past 4 issues of national geographic, filed my taxes, got my alumni clubs accounts closed and audited and filed that return, declined requests from shaadi.com citing one reason or the other, talked to mummy every 3rd day and dad and sister every 7 days, cooked dinner at home atleast 2 times a week.. well cant think of anything else.

Look at that laundry list, that is so damn boring. I love my work so i enjoy that part, its like a challenge, but the rest of it.. its just bloody monotonous. i am losing it man.. i need some change. I need to do something else other than this routine. I need to read more, and man, i need to get some bloody excercise. I tried running once and i could manage 3 kms in 35 mins at a decent pace so i know i am not that unfit but am no way close to my required fitness levels.

And hey those who read this, dont u start saying i need to get laid. its hardly the answer. I think i know what i need to do.. I need to make my $$$s and travel around the world.. for starts, i am off for the Easter weekend, off hiking at Taman Negara Rain forest, Malaysia, the oldest rain forest in the world. Maybe that time will help me get a little bit more perspective on this life!

p.s: i just dont understand, why we feel all shitty about life and yet are afraid of death.. nah, am not suicidal, just another curious thought! we keep saying life sucks yet we continue living.. thats bloody ironic if you ask me

I hate walking out of my office into the alley next to it during lunch hours. You would have to experience it to understand what i am talking about. The alley is lined with shops that sell trinkets and stuff and there is this one shop that sells footwear and even has a mirror next to it. And come lunch time, half of singapore's ladies or in this shop pretty much blocking the passage between me and a much needed lunch.

I have been meaning to send a letter to the management office of the premises to atleast move the shop over to someplace outside the alley. It really becomes tough to move an inch and what would take me 20 seconds to walk on a normal hour would take like 2 minutes and man, you have to understand 2 mins is a looong time when you are really hungry.

Anyways, what i dont understand is the ladies' craziness for footwear among other things. I mean, all my girl friends have like closets full of footwear of all kinds and colors and shapes and heel sizes. I sometimes wonder why one would need so many. and some of these girls go the next step to get a matching hand bag as well. I never could understand the psyche and rationale behind the number of shoes and hand bags a girl owns. And even after they have 20 pairs they would go ga ga about the new shoe that the other girl in the party is wearing.

I mean, how many shoes would someone need? I mean for me, i have a black pair of formals, a brown one cos u cant wear a black one with brown pants and this doubles as something i wear with jeans to clubs, i have a pair of running shoes, a pair of tennis shoes, a pair beach sandals, a pair of golf shoes and a pair of hiking shoes. So that makes it about 7 pairs. Now going by the same logic, ok, i may give the girls a little bit of room about the heels that would want.. so maybe 10-12 pairs at the max.. Man, i am talking about closets that have 20-30 pairs.. thats scary isnt it?

And man, trust me the worst combination is when you accompany a girl whe they go footwear shopping. I swear i dont know what to say when they ask me if some footwear looks cool on them.. I mean its just a footwear, isnt it..