Boulevard of Broken Dreams

Di suatu malam bulan lepas, room mate lama aku di college telah menghantar SMS.



Zai's SMS : Let's take a walk down memory lane. Ko ingat tak dulu ko ada minat sorang budak tu, aku rasa nama dia keluar surat khabar.



Oleh kerana SMS tu aku baca dah lewat malam, esoknya aku terus call Zai.



Memang betul lah ini kisah a short walk down memory lane. Masa aku baru2 kat IU dulu, adalah dalam 40+ budak Melayu kat situ. Separuh budak PPP/ITM and separuh budak ATU (American Top University). Bebudak ATU ni belajar English kat u aku, supposedly for 1 year, before they were to be located to top schools in the US e.g. Yale, Harvard, MIT, Brown, etc. Mr. X ni pun a product of the ATU program, that's why he ended up at Minnesota Twin Cities, among the very good school for engineering la..anyways, bebudak ATU ni aku nampak enjoy semacam. Ialah kan, dapat sponsor from good companies such as Esso, Shell, Petronas and also JPA. Diorang ni pegi US direct after SPM. Bertuah badan.



Dalam reramai budak ATU kat u aku ni, aku dulu ada lah minat kat sorang mamat ni. He was tall, fair and ada iras2 Acis (Hasridz Mushridz Hashim) ok, now jadik Sheila Majid punye. Apa yg aku buat dulu, aku hantar email, dia balas, and aku ada gak amik gambar dgn dia masa gathering raya. Caling-calling kekadang ada jugaklah. Since dia pun orang JB, so kita rasa mcm senang nak get along. He was like 2 years younger ok, but heck with age, it's the compatibility that matters. Ayah dia keje government, pernah datang ke US for some work and singgah ke u aku ni nak ziarah anak dia. Masa tu lah mak aku amik kesempatan kirim baju kurung n food kat aku. Aku ingat lagi, masa ayah dia datang ke rumah masa hantar segala tok nenek yg mak aku kirim, aku masak nasi lemak you..huhu...suka betul ayah dia dapat makan nasi lemak tu...



But our frienship did not go far. One thing had happened which made me totally lost my respect to him, and he knew it. He was sorry and that was it. Aku pun belajar kalau nak minat orang, kena tengok perangai jugak. Biasalah, jiwa remaja kan..So, since the "minat" was off, kitaorg akan jumpa bila ada gathering, atau bila time raya, he and his friends would pay a visit to our apartment. Everyone of my room mate knows about this story. And they all semua tahu aku minat untuk saja suka2lah, nothing serious. That was it.



Then I got to know that he continued his study at Purdue. I never know what has happened to him since then, until I got Zai's SMS.



Owh, what had happened to you man? Did you finish your study and go airwol, or did you not finish your study and ashame to get home? Or did you finish your study and did not contact Petronas to register your study completion? Man, how I wish that you complete your study. Kesian dekat your parents. They had such high hopes on you man...



Bila nama dah keluar paper ni, maknanya orang dah tak dapat carilah kan. Where on earth can you be?



There goes another gem.

There goes all the taxpayer's money to sponsor you man (duit Petronas tu duit rakyat Malaysia jugak tu).



Pulanglah. Bayar lah balik duit Petronas tu beb...banyak tu, at least RM250,000.