Heart to Heart

We contact doesn’t mean we connect. The connection between people comes from heart and soul and not just the activity being carried out.

A girl can be flirting with you but she may only be looking for some temporary excitement from your guileless reaction while she has already got someone in mind that she would only be faithful to. A guy can be going out with you for a date but he may not be thinking romantically about you because he prefers someone else.

Love is a matter of heart, a matter of lots of feelings that lead to commitments and continuing activities. It is not any single activity happening that signifies the existence of love. Although some activity does signifies some landmark in the route of love.

I sent Minna (the person using the Youtube account called minnaslyfan) a request letter of the song I’ve been looking forward to sing for so long. The letter was fairly long and well written. I wrote it with considerable effort because being able to produce the duet of A Whole New World is important to me and I really hope this person can be kind enough to produce the song with me. Inevitably, I have doubt how reliable and how responsive she can be. In my mind, I told myself if this girl cannot produce the song with me after more than 2 weeks, I would start looking for other potential collaborator.

Collaborator? Yes, the intended relationship in the request was professional and nothing romantic. I did share some personal interests and personal details with Minna in the first letter to build a friendly environment for our conversation.

The next day when I check my Youtube account, BLAM!! I saw a mail as long as the one I sent out. It was Minna’s mail! I was overexcited when reading it. What’s most important is her tone and attitude in her reply. Not only being prompt, she was very friendly, very responsive and very enthusiastic to work together and be good friends. Minna talked about her plan in recording the song for me and shared some manageable amount of her interests and life. It was joyous to learn from her that she is very interested in Asian cultures and would appreciate my help in translating some lyrics of Chinese songs. Although very enthusiastic, Minna’s attitude was sincere and demure; there is no flirtatious or suggestive element in her language or overall appearance. I appreciate that very much.

I know it when a girl suddenly becomes suggestive or flirtatious; it is not a good sign. Instead it is often a good indicator for me to leave the girl. I learned this hard from an experience, but the experience will guide me through my entire life.

It was about the mid-year in 2009, I met a girl called Clara who is older than me by 3 years. She and I took the same graduate module that time studying about mathematics in engineering. We started talking when I noticed her in the library and realized that we were in the same class. After talking for a while and discussing concerns about tutorial questions, we found each other to be suitable enough to study together. We started studying together for exams.

One day after consulting a teacher about that mathematics module, we left the teacher’s office together. When passing through a corridor, I held the handle of a door to allow Clara to walk through the door, and then I felt Clara’s hand holding firmly over my hand on the handle. It was too sudden, it was unnecessary, it was long enough to feel unnatural, and it seemed too much like a flirt. I buy the signal and went on to be very nice to Clara. She had been very nice too. We studied together at school even through the night. It was her preference to study at night and I was being nice to be her company. One day I felt that it was too much for me to bear studying through night anymore and I told Clara that I couldn’t make it. She begged me to accompany her but I insisted that it was not good for me. Her attitude towards me changed drastically after that. She was not as friendly anymore, and she became difficult to contact (ignoring phone and very late reply to text message). After exam, I tried to call her for an outing but she ignored my contact, even though she said before exam that she would like to go out with me but it had not been the right time. I have not heard from her then on.

I realized that her signaling at the start, by holding my hand “unintentionally”, was purposeful and insincere. Giving me a false impression of potential love, she wanted to cheat me for my time and intelligence (academic intelligence in specific) to study with her and after that she had no intention to follow up in friendship or in any other way. I was devastated. I learned. Now I met Minna and things are very much different.

To Minna’s request about translating lyrics for her, I don’t even hesitate a bit in doing it for her. I cannot be happier that I’m able to help her. She is an important person who can produce the song with me. I started imagining how great it would be when the song is done. How envious people would be when two of our beautiful voices are combined properly in such a glamorous song.

Our email started taking off. We exchange our mail one per day and we talked about how the song should be produced. I remember that my second mail to Minna was 2 times the length of my first mail to her, which is very long and I didn’t expect her to reciprocate that. But she did!! Her mail was as long as mine if not longer, and even more enthusiastic than mine. I felt so grateful to have met this person and I no doubt want to continue the communication. We wished each other Merry Christmas and we started to talk about what is “I love you” in various languages. Good feelings and affection seemed to build up naturally instead of all of a sudden.

In Christmas Eve 2010, when I heard the fireworks celebrating the day, I was writing a mail to Minna. I felt very pleased to be typing a reply to her. I told my mom I was replying to her, and I showed my mom some of her Youtube videos. Shockingly, my mom asked me “do you want to marry this girl?” I didn’t know what to answer to her because I didn’t expect this could be the first thing my mom said when she looked at Minna’s video. I did show my mom pictures of other girls I liked before, she often comments about the girls based on her feeling, usually in a neutral and objective way. I wonder why mom had that special reaction this time. I guess my mom saw something unusual on my face when I talked about Minna. It is perhaps something unusual that I didn’t even notice.

Minna and I maintained our contact almost every day since then. We learned about each other’s contact details, each other’s lives, and each other’s interest in songs of various genres. There are a lot of things in common that we wouldn’t have found if we didn’t talk so often. Our basis of relationship was built upon the frequent contact, trust and knowledge of each other’s lives.

Two weeks had past and I didn’t feel any urge to find another collaborator to sing the song with me, but I wait for Minna. I want to sing this song only with her.

To be continued…

--TK

(This is Minna and TK’s story episode 2, episode 1 was posted on 8^th May 2011 titled “The beginning”, Minna followed up episode 1 with “A new fantastic point of view... ♫♫”)

A new fantastic point of view... ♫♫

Hi all!♫

As you read you can try and spot all the animated film song lyrics I hid. ;D

When I was a young girl I used to dream of a handsome and brave man who would come to me and make all my dreams come true. We would live happily ever after; loving each other like nothing else mattered. As I grew older and I actually started dating, I soon realized life didn’t seem like a fairy tale. I was just happy when somebody told me he loved me, and even with all his flaws and our incompatibility I wanted to show the world I'd stay with the man. I was unhappy in my relationships and I made mistakes. I should’ve easily realized my behavior indicated my feelings of needing something else. Guess I was too persistent in trying to make it work when it was clear it didn’t.

Slowly I realized I was forgetting my dreams. A dream is a wish your heart makes, and you should always listen with your heart. Finally understanding this, I decided to live alone and get to know myself before getting to know my future husband. I told myself; some day my prince will come if I wait for the right time.

I didn’t have to wait for long.

In addition to my background story I should tell you I’ve uploaded my singing on YouTube and I’ve uploaded a cover of A Whole New World. This is where a prince in disguise comes in. Once upon a December I got a private message on YouTube. Kennytktk was interested in singing the above mentioned song with me. His approach was very polite and I got the feeling he was very enthusiastic in making a duet and he wanted to convince me to do it with him. I didn’t think one moment of not doing it. I was very flattered he liked my singing enough to ask me to sing with him.

Listening to his singing, I liked his voice and his likes in music. Learning he’s Asian, I was very eager to learn about Asian culture from him and so I hit him with questions and many sentences showing him I’m very happy to know him. Thinking back he should’ve been freaked out by my spontaneous mails. But, we both enjoyed the time we spent writing to each other, and the time was right to meet someone special. This is how I feel about it.

At the beginning our communication was of course just friendly and there was no romantic tone first. Maybe we both felt something earlier than either of us said anything, but I guess we were both a little scared, neither one prepared. It’s hard to say when we fell in love completely, or maybe it was a loving relationship right from the beginning.

Here I am, writing my point of view of our story to our blog. Wondering if my writing is any good compared to his wonderful text, pondering if it’s too personal to be written here. But, people want to share joyful and essential things in their life, and what could be more joyful and essential to me than our love?

Thank you for reading! All comments and followers make us very happy ♥

--Minna♪

Following Minna’s welcome message

Welcome! As starting material of this blog, I’m going to share our love story in a micro-story form. It will consist of 3 episodes in our blog.

Both Minna and I are pretty spontaneous persons. We do come up with things randomly but one thing doesn’t change: all are about love. Some examples include love of movie, love of Asian culture, love of Finnish culture, stuffs related to celebrities, stuffs related to important events in our lives or even some excitement after watching a sporting event that makes you feel love for your country. Surely sometimes we are also going to share about dislikes because only if there are things that we dislike, we like the things we like more and more, and this is love.

Do you have a watch?

Opps, how can I ask something so random to our readers when I’ve been talking about our blog!! This is how random we can be! The question is one of our private jokes. No explanation needed, Minna and I would both grin when we hear the question. Private joke is an important part in the bonds formed by loving couples. If you like to joke or if you like reading jokes, we welcome you to share yours!

We hope this blog can become a platform for our readers and us to share about love and life. All comments are welcomed. All readers are welcomed, singles or couples. We will revert to your comments and it is our pleasure to make friends with you!

We will post our blogs in various forms such as random write up, true micro story or fictitious micro story. Enjoy reading! Enjoy commenting! Enjoy sharing!

If you’d like to comment and don’t know what to share, it is good too to share with us whether you have a watch, seriously!

--TK

The beginning

Why is there no lesson in the school that teaches us how to get the love we look for so desirably? If there is such lesson, many students would definitely sign up for it enthusiastically; I’ll study very hard to understand all to be taught and all to be shared with me. However, it is too difficult to teach people about love because every couple comes together in their very unique way. Everybody feels loved differently and perhaps only the one right for you would do best “teaching and learning” love together with you, not a school teacher.

I decided to start looking for love after my completion of undergraduate study. I was then like a little boy who is too proud of own academic achievement and did not understand anything in the world of love.

I watched “Thor” (Marvel Studios, 2011) today (7^th May 2011) and the development of Thor from an impulsive boy to a wise man with patience and wisdom is very educational and motivational. Many guys grow physically into an adult first and still bear the impulsiveness of a boy, until some meaningful experience is encountered, a boy slowly learn about the world and transform into a man.

In the world of romantic love, what do I need to do? How should I look? Where should I look and when do I take action? Perhaps there is no one else more clueless than me. I was naïvely thinking that several phone calls or msn messages can possibly get me a happy and lasting relationship.

Attempts were made trying to call up attractive girls. Sometimes I could made appointments and most of the time they are disappointments. I was told that if a girl would go out alone with you it is obvious that she likes you. Well, you guessed it. I didn’t manage to date anyone for a proper outing other than a simple meal.

Jennie, an attractive and popular girl who dances well, my pursuit ended when I realized her heart had not been with me ever. Shanny, a girl with good badminton skill; my pursuit ended while she joint the cheerleading team and found her boyfriend there.

“The one belongs to you is always with you, you don’t need to find her too hard. You should just open up your social circle and she would most probably appear.” I told myself. Thanks to Shanny while I was in one-sided love with her, I worked hard to find out what are the things to do and not to do for my love one. All the blessings then should go to another girl whom I’m more suitable to.

I started joining activities I never joined before. I was a choir singer in my secondary school but I didn’t join choir again. I joined Frisbee training, which is a mixed sport; I joined Outdoor Adventure Club for their outings; I joined scuba diving trip and have got my open water diving license. In all these I was hoping to see someone really right. I didn’t get into the main school team in Frisbee; scuba diving trip was expensive and not as fun as it is thought to be and I felt some loneliness too because I went alone and others went with their friends. Now I agree so much that having a brother (good friend) to go out together is so much better, and I understand this need for my girlfriend’s single friends when they need her.

Then I decided not to waste time anymore, not to waste energy and not to waste money for this endless pursuit anymore. I shall focus on my graduate research study. Do what I like and what can develop me into a better person. I jog and swim regularly, I focus on my research work and I make Youtube video of my singing when I have free time.

Production of songs on Youtube serves 2 purposes for me, one is to practice my interest in singing and to showcase my training in vocalization; another purpose is to look for people of similar interest on Youtube as friends. Persistently produced some songs for a period of time, my Youtube account had a collection of perhaps 12 songs then.

One day I was browsing for like-minded friends on Youtube who are also singing cover like me. I was searching in this song called “A Whole New World”. A theme song of a popular Disney animated film Aladdin. This film is not something I watch during my childhood, but I was introduced with this film buy a female friend who once jogged with me regularly for a semester. I found a guy singing only the male part of the songs and some girls used his recording to record cover. Many of them do not have particularly outstanding performance. I happen to navigate away from the song to listen to another guy singing. From his Youtube profile picture, he seems Asian, perhaps Vietnamese and he’s got a muscular built. “Ohh!! This guy is pathetic, how can he sing so poorly and still upload to Youtube” I was thinking. I become interested in this guy due to his confidence and courage. In his page, I find a girl who asked him to sing duet with her. Wondering how this girl’s voice would be, I followed the link to listen to this girl, whose Youtube name is minnaslyfan.

Wow!! How could this beautiful voice have asked a pathetic voice to sing duet with her! I was very shocked after listening to minnaslyfan’s singing. I saw a cheerful person with crisp voice. I had then browsed through more of her videos and I found “A Whole New World” again. It is a song I wanted to sing duet with someone who sings well and is not shy to publicize her singing. I started to write a request to this girl. And this is how we have made our first contact. 

To be continued…

--TK

Welcome

Hello everyone! Welcome to me and my boyfriend's blog. Expect these random posts from me. He will most probably write something smarter; after all he's the more intelligent of us, in my opinion ^^

This blog is based on our shared interest in both Finnish and Asian cultures, and the blog will contain all kinds of topics related to Finnish or Asian. I'm from Finland myself, and my boyfriend is an ethnic Chinese; he's born in Malaysia and lives currently in Singapore.

I'm just writing shortly this time and welcoming you all. I hope you become a reader! Thank you!!

I wish you will enjoy the blog!!

--Minna♪