I think people like to preserve their memories.

They do it in different ways through different mediums.

The good thing is, many other people probably share the same memory/experience too, and many of them want it to be preserved as well.

While the initial group may have it preserved in its purest form (i.e. in the way they remember it), it could differ in various degrees as compared to the latter, in ways of nuances and subtleties.

People experience differently, feel differently, process information differently when they are placed in the same situation.

I feel like Anthony Chen has just told my life story, somehow.

Ilo Ilo seemed like a completely new story to me, and yet strangely, incredibly familiar.

I could laugh at a particular scene or conversation while others may wonder what is so funny, or find it hard to comprehend. Something so ordinary and plain, something that I probably wouldn't notice in that era, but so skillfully captured and aptly represented.

Even though Anthony Chen and I were born more than 10 years apart, the film made me feel like we lived in the exact same place at the exact same time.

Everything, details so mundane and routine, but so weirdly relatable and incredible it stirs up the insides.

Conversely, my maid was Indonesian, but I guess we went through the same pain and misery of seeing her leave. Somehow we were more than maid & employer's child, more than simply just friends. 

Same same, but different lah.

The film dug out a treasure I buried deeply, and it is something that I will definitely hold close to my heart.

Cheers to the maid generation. *clink*

P.S. Yeo Yann Yann and Jiale were really good. Actually the entire cast was fantastic.
P.s.s. I watched this film 2 times and it was after the second time because of a certain someone when I watched it the first time making dumb personal commentaries HAHA that I was filled with this untenable yearning. It didn't help that my parents and sister visited her right before Sept hols while I was busy with promos and PW. Coupled with the terror of getting back my results, fear of being retained, and the ridiculous amount of stress my mum never fails to put on me, I became really emotional, cranky, and angsty. Almost suicidal, almost unpredictable. I don't know whether if I should say this, but I teared a couple of times during in one single math lesson. (Yeah I guess you could chide me for not paying due attention to Mr Ang, who is super nice. I felt guilty, really, but I couldn't help it.)