E-mails

Sometimes it can get annoying when you've written many many emails to friends back home but they don't bother to write back. This is not the first time I've felt this way. Back when I was doing my undergraduate degree in the UK I felt the same way. I would spend at least half an hour writing about my life and asking about what's been going on in good ole KL but I wouldn't get an instant reply. Once in a few months one of my friends would write but it really didn't feel as good as those emails that I would get everyday as a reply to an email I had written. The emails that came once a month or every few months felt detached, like a summary of the important things that happened over the few months. It would be oh, we had a gathering at such and such place and had a good time. But the emails felt impersonal. I don't know why... but after 5 emails of "oh, we hung out at _____ the other day with ___, ____, _____ and _____ and wish that you were here..." it gets kind of boring. I want to know the little things that they're talking about. I wanna know what life is like for them over there. I want to know their thoughts and feelings, their ups and downs, their highs and lows. But maybe I'm asking for too much?

I've been told that it's very easy to connect to my emails, that I write pretty well. Maybe it's just coz I like to write. Maybe it depends on my mood....but I have been told many times that I express myself very well through my writing. I'm not quite sure everybody has that bit of talent (hah, perasan lah pulak). I also realize that when one is back in "happening" KL, one gets way too busy with work, family, the mamak, sale carnivals, weddings, late nights and tv that one has very little time to spend in front of a pc, writing an email. Even I know I get too busy sometimes to stay in front of a pc to write emails to friends all around the world when I'm back in KL. But I know I made the effort. Say for instance when a friend, E left for the UK. Oh I was the only one who wrote to her every night or every other night coz I knew how much it meant to get an email from friends back home. And a friend N who studies in Australia has learnt how much communication between friends is important too. I hate to say it, but she was one who always had an excuse for why she didn't write to me or why she didn't send photos that she promised to send. But now that she's in the same boat that I am, she has been the most reliable friend I can depend on to ensure that I'm still a part of her life. At least I feel that way anyway.

With the rest, I don't know. Everyday I don't get an email from them is a day I feel more detached from the close friendship I have(had?) with long time friends. It's very sad but I can't force them to write to me now can I? Oh, and since it's been a while that any of them have written, it's harder to start an email I'm sure. You know the feeling. The one where you don't know how to start an email coz you have to tell a particular story from the beginning because you haven't told your friend anything about a particular event in your life. Then you feel like you won't have the time to actually sit down and write this really long story from start to where it currently is. Finally you pacify yourself by saying that you would tell the story to your friend when he/she meets up with you in the future. So from now till then (maybe a month, maybe a year, maybe more than a year), the friend wonders if the friendship is going to be different now that two friends aren't communicating as much as they used to. Sure, it's not like meeting up everyday at the mamak to chat about ones day, but at least it's better than no communication at all.