Essays

Essays are written! But they are so bad. And I've stopped sleeping.

Next step: sleep. make essays not crap. profit. woo!

migration

So I've def changed a lot since freshman year of college... I would say the change mainly happened senior year where I decided that there was more to life than sleep and work and some fun should be in there as well. And obv fun is a huge priority while I'm in Singapore bc well, one of my main goals of being out here is to travel.

But... I'm starting to wonder if I've gone too far in the other direction.
I got certified for scuba diving recently and found the divemaster attractive. Nothing happened...and I'm not gonna let it happen but... the main attractions were these: curly hair (which he permed!?), a total sense of nonchalance about everything, being dumb(
what's the cat's name?
ebony.
oh, is that bc the cat is black?
huh?
like ebony + ivory
I don't know, I don't spell
), ability to play Set well and of course, the interest in diving.

Wow...seriously, what happened to me? At least he studied Aero Astro... in high school... sigh...

I don't like this blog

I think it's too sculpted. In order to avoid the cliche of writing about what I ate today, I've turned this a little too theoretical and hence pretty impersonal. If you read this, you still have no idea what things have been occupying 80% of my thoughts over the past few months.

So... in honor of how honest writing is the most touching writing, I will try to actually put down what I think. Starting with my next post.

For now, here's an exploding dog: are we okay

Went to a Soup Kitchen Last Night

No sure if I liked it. The issue is that in Singapore, it's hard to find the poor. Most of the time, the government provides for them in some way, given they're Singaporean and in the country legally.

One of my coworker's friends own a restaurant/gallery and have started closing the restaurant on Monday nights in order to cook food for the needy. The original plan was to cook the food then leave it in a room unattended so that people would be able to come in and consume without others seeing them. However, they weren't able to get attendance so instead they started asking around to know where the poor lived. The restaurant/gallery is located in Little India, one of the poorer communities in Singapore and they were able to obtain about 20 names and addresses of the neediest families in the area. So, last night, we cooked food. (I packaged the food) and delivered to these families. This was pretty fun. In some cases, only the kids were home so it took a while for them to open the door. Some of the apartments looked...like the families were faring decently well... but I guess you can't really judge.
The problem was that we cooked 46 meals and there were only 20 families we knew of that needed the food. The rest of the night consisted of walking around the area and trying to find people to give food to. I had...some major issues with this. Profiling is so incredibly strange to me. Especially you're doing it for something as extreme as ability to feed oneself. I honestly feel like there were about 2/26 people who I would have thought of giving food to under normal circumstances. One was a vet who seemed to have some mental/trust problems and was obviously carrying all his belonging on his person. I was... so disturbed when we went up to a group of men playing games on their cellphones asking if they wanted and needed food. I think inherent in this is some type of condescension. Walking up to someone and making hand gestures to make them understand that you've brought them food seems so ridiculous. Who's to say that they're not better off than you?
I know I'm vocalizing my thoughts incorrectly...but am not sure how else to say it. Going out and identifying who it is you need to help seems to be taking the feel good nature of community service to another level. Not only do you feel good for doing something good for others but you feel good for being better off? It's possible I'm viewing this all wrong and I should just learn to be more appreciative of what I have but... something about looking at someone and making the judgement that they need help seems so wrong and judgmental.

Yea, that's the best I can describe it.

Now the question is... should I go back? Net impact on world of going -> still positive. EV(feelings of people we attempt to give food to) > 0 ... assuming lack of starvation >> embarrassment over being mistaken as a homeless person

and yet...it feels wrong.

I'll prob try it out for at least one more week...

Singlish

In addition to "See what see" for What you looking at?, I've learned a few singaporean insults tonight!

See me no up = 看不起我 = You're condescending towards me
co-co-nut = smelly c-word
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 = the mother of all insults, something having to do with your mom?

Singlish

Overheard in Boston

Guy A: So she's always going on about herself
Guy B: Yea, I know. There's this one time at the end of the year when she kept on talking about how this hot dog vendor was in love with her and wanted to marry her. And she just kept on going on and on about it. And I told her, and this is only because it was the end of the year, "What does it say about you that even a hot dog vendor can get you?"
Guy A: Hahahahahhaa. That is AWESOME.

I think I have issues with people being elitist.

Lots of traveling

Just realized that my blog is been way too serious recently. So here's a pretty sunset from Kuching and a list of travels:

From Kuching

5/23-24: Kuching

5/31-6/7: Tokyo / Hakone

6/20-21: Bintan

7/3-7/5: Boston

7/6-7/10: San Francisco

7/10-7/12: San Francisco or Vegas. Convince me of one of them if you care

Feminism Here I Come...

But only in the more needed and productive ways.
Went to see No Day Off by Eric Khoo on Friday. It was a film about a 23 year old girl from Sulawesi Indonesia who is in Singapore to earn money to buy a house in Indonesia. She's married and has a kid and doesn't speak English. The camera focused only on Siti (the girl's name) and almost no other faces were shown in the entire movie. Everyone talked at her in 3 different languages in 3 different households. It was a screening done by UNIFEM, TWC2, Aidha, and HOME so obviously meant to show the hardships for domestic workers here. Obviously, it was decently biased. While the work might be correct, the loneliness it aimed to portray I thought was a little too exaggerated. Throughout the entire movie, we only saw her have conversations with another human being at the very end.

A Q&A ensued that blew my mind. Keep in mind that I haven't looked up any facts yet and all this information was gotten from various movements working to have domestic workers be able to take a day off.

1) Domestic workers (live-in maids) make about $250/month. It costs ~$600/month to hire a live-in maid. Where does the difference go? I had assumed the maid agency but no, it's the Singaporean government. The government's argument is since most maids come from Indonesia and they don't want to encourage unnecessary immigration to the country, they're imposing levies on domestic workers to be paid by their employers so that hiring a maid from Indonesia will be almost comparable to hiring a Singaporean. In addition to this, they have to pay a $5000 bond for immigration fees and if the domestic worker is "lost" they lose this deposit. Maids are also tied to their employers and forced to go back almost immediately after they're terminated.

WHAT? So instead of creating a minimum wage that would create the same effect on unnecessary immigration, the Singaporean government is taking the difference between a respectable minimum wage and what domestic workers are paid? Their argument for not creating a minimum wage is that they don't want to discourage competition. In what why are they not limiting competition in this case??

2) The current goal of the organizations is that allow domestic workers to have one day off per week. We suggested maybe having relief workers help out or having 7 maids work for 6 families. We were immediately shot down. 1 maid working for > 1 family is illegal and part time work in Singapore is illegal unless performed by Singaporeans and Singaporeans won't want to. Ok...

3) Employment pass provides certain basic benefits but domestic workers do not have employment passes and are excluded from these rights

4) Indonesia recently pass regulation stating that no more domestic workers will be sent to Malaysia because one domestic worker was assaulted in Malaysia. NGOs seemed to play a large part in bringing this about.

5) Human rights is associated with communism. WTF.

I'm working on getting more involved with UNIFEM and Aidha so hopefully I'll have an answer to all these questions... but for the time being... if you do any research that will shed any light, please comment.

Reflections from Saigon

HCM was awesome, mainly because of its abundance of cafes and what always happens when sasha and I are in a cafe.

The best part I believe was when we were wondering around saigon, looking for nothing in particular, but heading towards the independence palace. We stopped for some coffee "take away" and ended up having bubble coffee over the next hour. We both remembered that it was an awesome time but my recollection of our conversation was that it was about identity and her recollection was that it was about sex. The identity conversation went something like this: If we split your actions into things that you work for and things you fall into, what's more essentially you?
My argument is that people are constantly changing and shaping themselves to be how they would like to see themselves. In that case, is your nature defined more by things that you work hard to achieve or things that come naturally? And if it's the former, are your goals and aspirations what define you rather than your current state and current actions?

But more on this later...

The other conversation occurred over a $10 buffet breakfast at an ahotel near ours. We were discussing our reactions to seeing the Vietnamese countryside and meeting a girl who obviously had her share of emotional problems. The girl was anorexic, bulimic, asthmatic and had an uncanny way of redirecting the conversation to focus in on only one topic, which was usually either herself or hermit crabs. She had just graduated from university and was spending some time traveling SE Asia before entering law school in the fall. I found her to be a fascinating person. She was almost the exact opposite of me and was extremely open about personal details, making it a prime opportunity to understand someone fundamentally different. The difficulty for me is understanding why someone would choose to focus on the bad and have complete strangers feel sorry for me. But I suppose that's another topic altogether.
Meanwhile, traveling through the Vietnamese countryside had a much more profound effect on me. Our bus from Saigon to the Mekong Delta had a lot of random stops and at one of these stops, our driver got out of the bus and got out a canister of gas (for cooking, what are these things called?) and placed it by the roadside. As we drove away, I saw an old lady appear from an abandoned shop and drag the canister slowly towards the shop.

okay, bedtime. TBC...

random thoughts bf i forget

I LOVE shakshuka. It's how I take my eggs now. not poached, not scrambled, but shakshuka'd. I love Isreali food I think in general

Massages cause amazing realizations...and the sensation that you are a hot coconut cookie.

FMP = largest, hottest frat party in the world. All the "coolest" kids assemble there. prime example here:

From SashaSGFMP

aren't they just so cool with their partial nudity and smooth moves?

I miss twitter when I'm out of the country now...

Mambo Jambo night at zouk = square room... rain falling...miming dance project

oops..

lots of things going on... but i feel uncomfortable writing abt it in a blog. ironic right?

in other news...I'm going to try to get my diving certification! dunno when or where but seems like Jek might know what we need to do.

I've given up on my secret sprint triathlon in Bintan aspirations. Good thing they were secret so no one knows I failed...

mmmm...pizza

nom nom nom

Settling back in..

I heart my maid again.

For a while I thought that she didn't do much for how long I paid her for...but now i really appreciate how clean and shiny the floors and sinks are. I have no idea what she does and I don't really care to learn but it's awesome. I think I'll never go back to not having a maid... it's not just that I'm lazy...I did try to clean last weekend but obv unsuccessfully...there was a lizard in my apartment. ew.

Excited for Make-A-Wish and PIZZA tonight! they promised it was real pizza! nothing like john's or arturo's... but still real (!)

I miss Arturo's. SO MUCH.

Chili's is coming!

Catching Up

Bangkok:
Was there for 2 days...during the most violent of the protests. Funny thing is, the majority of the city was out celebrating and throwing buckets of water on us and a few people were out wearing red shirts...and well, mainly standing around.

First night: Went to the night bazaar...which had everything from new age decorative stores...but at maybe 1/10th the price. I once again, failed at negotiating... but got 2 awesome candle holders for US$ 1.50 each and a "tiffany's" bracelet for US$15. There was some food...but mainly deep fried and kinda spicy... but alcoholic drinks were about $1 ;)

From SG, Bangkok + Rawa

Second day: we saw temples, or Wats. Words and even pictures can't describe how incredibly shiny and closely positioned these Wats were. We really wanted to add the sparklies on all the temples to emphasize the shinyness and take away from the overexposure on our cameras...but only found out later that that was a mode available on Darris's camera. Here's an attempt at showing the shiny:

From SG, Bangkok + Rawa

more available here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/lele.yu/SGBangkokRawa#

The water fights seemed like they were starting but we only got a water gun sprayed at us a couple times. Our attempt to get a good meal in AC failed a little bit... as we headed to an expensive stuffy hotel with pretty bad food... but... it got us a free ride across the river to where we'd take a boat ride to our next wat

Third day:
We were supposed to go shopping...but here was where the protests actually affected our travels. the malls we were supposed to go to were closed so we ended up going to jim thompson's house instead. Shopped a little, then hopped onto a tuk tuk onto Khao San where the water fight was mainly going on. This was CRAZY. Water guns everywhere. People chasing you around with white stuff to smear on your face, people taking water bottles and dumping ice cold water down your shirt. The best part was that the merchants selling water along the sides would use a bowl to throw water at you as you passed. The key was not to make eye contact with ANYONE or else you'll be locked in combat... my strategy was to spray those smearing others with white stuff...this didn't work out too well... Afterwards, we found that all the paper in my bag had completely disintegrated...good thing we got plastic bags for our cameras, but this of course means...no photos :(

Our method of transportation from now on was tuk tuks as we were soaking wet and had white rice powder smeared all over us. Danger here: if you're sitting waiting for a red light in a tuk tuk, people will come over and pour an entire bucket of water all over you... and this will inevitably happen when you're just about to get dry. of course :)

Went to China town, but it was mostly dead, then went to get a massage, then went to dinner and tried for the sky bar...unfortunately, we weren't properly dressed...i think this is the first time anyone's given me a hard time about dress code!

Then we were back in SG for 2 days..went to satay... went out... darris was dressed in a t-shirt and board shorts, which caused some issues getting in anywhere...

...and onto Rawa. White sand complete with clear water beautiful mountains and a sky filled with more stars than I've ever seen... add to that some shooting stars :) We kayaked around the island, snorkeled, but were generally pretty lazy...

Question: should I get a waterproof camera case? It costs more than the camera...but I'd have such better pictures right now if i'd gotten one...

Busy Busy..

Sorry, no updates for now... have been very busy with the following:

Tioman
Stomache flu
Bangkok

leaving for Rawa tomorrow!!

will post stories/pics galore. Well, actually, tioman pics are already up at: http://picasaweb.google.com/lele.yu/ChinaTioman#

you even get some china pics as an added bonus :)

looong trip back

due to snow, ice, bad flight bookings and what not, my trip back consisted of:

train from Da Qing to Beijing
Hang out in Beijing for 4 hrs with aunt, uncle and cousin who wanted to practice english
flight from Beijing to Kuala Lumpur
sleep for 4 hrs in KL
head to airport and fly back to Singapore and take a cab to work

during all of this travel, I thought of the following:

CREATE TABLE MISSING
AS
SELECT
home
where
home.location = 'CA';

yea..i actually just wrote that...

Fortune Telling

I'm in China for the week visiting relatives and one of my cousins has recently gotten into fortune telling.  I asked him to take me to his shi fu and with only knowledge of my name and time of birth he said the following:

[note that under ying yang fortune telling, only 80% of your fortune is predetermined, the rest of determined by free will]

- I like to move around alot.  This basically continues until I'm 35 at which point I move less but I only settle down when I'm 45

- There is fortune in my future.  I make decent money from when i'm 25 to 35 as part of a company and after 35 I can start my own company and be successful.  After 45, I make good money until I'm 55 as well.  I should beware of starting a company before I'm 35 but after 35 it should be a success.

- I can go into the machinery business but not the raw materials business.  Fire businesses don't suit me but earth and water ones do.  Opening a restaurant is fine because food is under earth and water.  I shouldn't wear too much read and instead stick to water and earth colors.

- I'm really good at spending money.  I can earn lots of money and save lots of money but "girl, you can spend it too!"

- I have peach flower luck?  There are always people interested in me.  2010, 2011 are okay years to get married, but if I do, I'll probably get divorced and remarried, because of another guy.  2012 and 2013 are bad years for marriage.  In 2013, someone will set their sights on me and if I don't escape them gracefully, they will do great harm towards me.  2014 and 2015 are good years for marriage and won't result in divorce.  

- The guy I should be with is either much younger than me or at >2 and <6

- 2009 and 2010 are years for learning.  In 2010, I will not have too much money

Rawa

is pretty... Come visit!  

Some pics here... more pics (from me) to come.  http://www.malaysia-islands.com/html/rawa/beach/main.shtml

I spent the day getting up at 5am, getting a bus from Singapore to Mersing at 6:30am...40 mins after getting on the bus, we got off the bus and walked to customs to exit singapore.  We got back on the bus and 10 mins later, we walked to customs to enter Malaysia.  Why do you have walk across the border??

We got to Mersing at 9:30 and found out that all the hotels for rawa (there are 2 owned by rival siblings in a sultanate?) were fully booked.   The next ferry to Tioman was at 3:30pm and this became 5:00pm and eventually 8:00pm by the time I went to the ATM and had Ringgits.  Luckily, we checked back with Rawa and some people had not shown up so we were on our way on our little speedboat to Rawa..

The way to get to the boat was...get on a jetty, walk an unsecured plank to a boat carrying 2x4s, cross that boat, go to the next boat, then cross that boat again and walk onto the actual speedboat.  All in the pouring rain.  Awesome.  No seriously.  The scene was something I'd only really recognized from movies abt the war in Vietnam.  

Then, we realized that it was low tide so actually, our motors were trudging up mud.  Our boat went very very slowly for the next 20 mins which was a little disconcerting bc we were really low to the water and it was pouring outside...but eventually we found some deep water.  

We arrived in Rawa and the story gets more typical: lunch, suntanning on a pristine beach, wading in water (with corals), looking at little fishies (I think I saw Dory!), taking a looong nap in a hammock secured by 2 palm trees, looking at peacocks fighting chickens, "hiking" to the top of the island and around the island, dinner, cards, ping pong. 

There are a LOT of Americans here.  I think about 80% of the people here are american and the other 20% is taken up by one huge japanese family and us.  Surprising considering this is such a small island and is supposed to be a resort island for people in singapore?  Most of the people I meet in Singapore are British or Australian.  

Tomorrow: breakfast, kayaking, lunch then leaving for singapore again. 

I think a one day trip was actually perfect for Rawa... the only thing we didn't do was diving.. and I don't think my mom would really have been up for that.

Oh, other interesting fact.  Rawa is a private island owned by a sultanate or founded by one and that sultanate also started Bintan, the main Singaporean getaway resort island!  I wish I were part of a sultanate and could find and own these islands...though then I'd have to fight the Portuguese...

New Gphone app idea: image recognition for fish and bird matching?

My almost plans this weekend

Bali with brits - flight got back sunday night 2 hrs after my mom...so no

Phuket with other coworkers - expensive... plus wasn't sure i'd get passport back in time

got passport back from the US

Chiang Mai with awesome marketing googlers in thailand for maps launch - too expensive...and i would have told manager on wednesday that i was tkaing friday off

Rawa with other Googlers - failed bc i'd get back at 7pm on sunday and already committed to doing jiu jitsu at 1:30pm on sunday

so yea...  4 differnet opportunities to go to 3 different countries this weekend...and i passed up on all of them :(  But it's ok cuz instead my maid is coming, i'm doing jiu jitsu then wakeboarding in sg and possibly some rollerbloading...

interesting fact i learned today... filipinos take a lot of spanish things... and massacre them by making them simpler (taking away letters of the alphbet, etc).  For example:

Fencing in Spanish = esgrima -> escrima = filipino stick fighting!  

cuz like, they don't have swords or something.

and then i was looking for jiu jitsu classes and I saw:

http://www.jujitsu.com.sg/main%20main.htm

I can learn the art of filipino stick fighting!!

haha, i guess the "footwork" is similar?

Thought that just ran through my head

Hmm...it's 8pm.  I don't feel that hungry but I should eat because I will be hungry later.  Something light, easy and relatively healthy...  I know!  Burger King!

Yea, seriously.

On a separate topic, I realize I write almost nothing about what's actually going on and what I've been up to.  Do ppl want that?  Or are just random inner thoughts good enough?  

Fear of Insects

A long time ago, we had a conference where one of the ice breakers was to tell people what your biggest pet peeve was.  Most people said, dishonesty or traffic or immorality or smoking but I said bugs.  Just in general.  Bugs.  Of all things in the world, the thing that bugged me the most were bugs.  

I didn't realize then that moving to Singapore would be my worst nightmare come true.  It's like a safe haven for bugs.  90 degrees and humid means that it's always warm enough for them to survive and there is a plentiful supply of water nearby.  The most disgusting experience was one morning when I got to work and there were ants crawling out from inside my laptop.  I got rid of 5 of them but I'm pretty sure there's still another one lurking...  

I was really freaking out that day but then remembered that there was a time when bugs didn't bother me.  My reaction towards people shrieking when bugs were around was similar to my reaction to kids turning away in screaming "ewwww!" when cinderella finally kisses the prince.  I didn't get why it was gross.  You'll have to kiss a boy someday and bugs are the most numerous creatures in the world.  Just live with it.

It dawned on me why I dislike bugs.  It was all because of 1984, the book.  

While reading the book, I decided that I wanted a stupid fear.  One that wouldn't actually cause harm.  I thought that the fear of spiders wasn't too bad... but spiders could still be dangerous.  So, I decided that I would be scared of ALL bugs and when they came after me, all they had to do was surround me in a room of ants and I'd be all set.  So, I did my best to convince myself that I'm terrified of bugs.  And it worked.  Much too well.  I also didn't realize that I chose something so banal that really, it can be encountered anywhere but still the cause the same amount of distress.  I set it up so that Singapore would be similar to an interrogation room to me.... yep, good job. 

Well, now that I realize this, I've declared to myself that I'm no longer scared of bugs.  Unfortunately, I read 1984 when I was like, 13 so the fear of bugs has been instilled in me for about a decade and instilled during a time when my mind was much more impressionable (oh, Great Expectations, I really don't think I should have read you when I was 12).  So wish me luck.  So far I'm no longer afraid of bugs less than 1.5cm, which I think is a pretty big accomplishment :) 

I'm up for that = I'm down for that

I realized that I find unemployment an attractive feature in other people.  how weird.

Many volunteer organizations require you to pay in order to volunteer with them... that to me implies that you're doing them a negative service??  Like you dig this hole so they can put a pipe thru and have drinking water but what they're really doing is taking half your money to cover up the hole and using the rest to buy bottled water.  I'm sure it's not how it works...still feels weird.  isn't my time valuable enough?

I'm in Finance and I'm a trader

Now apparently means that you manage import/export of steel, manganese and other raw materials between Singapore, malaysia and the middle east.  Apparently it's a family business.

In the past, you might have traded oranges, or whatever was hot back then.  

Wow.  So different from my concept of what a trader is.  

Who wants a trip?

So I know that this has limited viewership...and is prob limited to those who I've talked to already...but who's in interested in a SE Asia trip this summer?  

I was thinking I could arrange one of the following:

Any subset of:

Singapore, Malaysia(kuala lumpur or langkawi), Thailand (Phuket, Bangkok)

Singapore, Cambodia (angkor wat), Vietnam (Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi [It's french!])

Singapore, Indonesia (Bali + ?) , Phillipines (not sure where)

or...

Golden Triangle tour?

So flight from singapore to any of these places is <$300.  Buses to malaysia and thailand available for like $30 and travel in beteween seems cheap too..

I guess you just have to wait for a good flight to singapore...

Any interest?  Should I start watching out for deals?

No pics coming... camera lost :(

Recent thoughts that have come to mind...that sound a bit strange:

- is he gay?  Or just Filipino?  Love of musicals, the movies Step Up and Bring it Ons (all 4), desire to go take a street jazz class and intimate knowledge of the male stripper move = gay? ... or just Filipino...

- if you constantly feel like I'm really smart in every little thing I do... maybe it's not so much that I'm smart as much as you're...

okay, that was basically my confession that I'm a bad person.  Done now.  

You know what I want?

A social blog where other ppl can enter posts too...  Cuz I feel like this should be on my list of sites to check (gmail, friendfeed, facebook, blog) but really all I'm looking for are comments on my thoughts...which don't occur until I write something... but I guess that's more of a forum.

In Kuala Lumpur!  Went to Batu Caves where there was some type of hindu celebration in the temples there...involving a decent amt of self flagellation by very strict hindus on the way to the steps of the temple.

Also, went to china town and got fake bags, tshirts, necklace, tie... oh chinatown, you are the same everywhere...

Pics to come.  Petronas towers are so pretty!  

Prioritization?

I think I've become more scattered and dilettante-esque than ever so maybe other ppl can comment and try to help me prioritize

Things I've been getting into or trying to get into:

Golf (coworkers have been starting...goal is to go to Indonesia for a day to play a game.  International Golf trip!)

Make a Wish Foundation (really excited!  hopefully this goes through)

Jiu Jitsu / thai boxing

Board game nights

Trivia nights

hip hop dancing/ salsa dancing

Fencing

swimming

[want to do more yoga too]

All of this has been put on hold due to my lack of internet and need for apartment cleaning... from a practical standpoint this shouldn't happen since i have internet at work...but still, shows where my priorities lie...

Internet coming on Thursday!!!!

purty...

omg i'm planning to do this in 2 weeks...that's possibly the scariest bridge i've ever seen..

http://www.nparks.gov.sg/cms/index.php?option=com_visitorsguide&task=attractions&id=64&Itemid=73

Stress Relief

My stress relieving activities pre-banking:

swimming

playing piano

drawing

[fencing and sailing, though these needed more planning]

My stress relieving activities post-banking:

watching tv

getting drunk

hmm...

You can't tell but I tried changing the format of this blog...

And failed

.

So I changed it back.  Google's pretty good at color schemes it seems

look upon the abyss without flinching

"Those who take delight in their own might are merely pretenders to power.  The true warrior of fate needs no adoration or fear, no tricks or overwhelming effort; he need not be stronger or smarter or innately more capable than everyone else; he need not even admit it to himself.  All he needs to do is to stand there, at that moment when all hope is dead, and look upon the abyss without flinching."
        -- Shinji and Warhammer40k

hmm...

I was talking to this guy today about how to fix our internal systems bc no one else in my group is around today. Turned out he was teaching an mba class tonight abt data systems. so now i'm at his class... and going to dinner after? hmm... kinda bored... kinda wanna leave...

ok, last one bf going to bed

The britney of taiwan...haha

I like more Taiwanese music!

There we go!

okay, this one is a bit on the sappy side...but kev has mad skills singing the girl part.

I like taiwanese music!

Mah Jong. So relevant.

Mah jong as an analogy for relationships.  What do you think?

I feel like most people are in the position of "ting", which is akin to check, where they're just waiting for the right piece to come along.  Everything's in order and set.  

I think I'm a step behind.  Still figuring out my pieces... and trying to figure out if i should go for the extra pretty hand with all the same suit for extra points or work with what I have for an easy win.  I think it's pretty early in the game though... so extra pretty hand it is...  

(not sure this analogy actually works...)

So, where are you from?

The best of part plane rides recently (after my period of constant sleep deprivation) is that they allow me some time to think and reflect.  Invariably, I make some type of resolution out of it, the most recent one being to start a blog :) 

Where are you from?  That's the most common question I seem to be asked these days, but surprisingly, it's also the hardest to answer.  I was just in Taiwan for a long weekend and a conversation while I was trying to purchase a SIM card went something like this:

Girl: [Noticing my accent]  Are you from the mainland?

me: Um, sure.  I was born in Beijing

Girl: Oh cool.  Can I have your Identification card for the SIM card?

me: Sure.  [hands her american passport]

Girl:  ?  But you're american?

me:  Oh yes, I haven't lived in China since I was six.  I've been living in the US most my life.

Girl:  That's cool.  whereabouts?

me: San Francisco area

Girl: Can I have your address?

me:  Sure...  xxx xxx xxx, Singapore

Girl: ...

The conversation is worse when people are actually from China or the US.  Then they find out that I'm really lying when I say that I'm from Beijing [note that i don't say i'm from there, just born there]  since I have no family or any other ties to Beijing anymore.   They also find out that while I have most recently lived in the bay area, I definitely don't associate with the california mentality.

So that leads me to ask... what would be the correct response?  I don't want to lie but this is a much more complicated question than people realize.  "I'm international" should be my response.  Or perhaps to make it simple, "je viens de Paris"

There are plenty of prejudices associated with any of the answers I could give and I don't feel like I fit into any of them.   I know that they're just trying to apply an easy heuristic but I feel like I want to be taken as just me, not someone associated with a location, a school, a social group... I think being migratory is going to give me the chance to do that :)  

 

Blogging!

Like many others living abroad... I've decided to start a blog to keep track of thoughts...communicate indirectly with friends and family back home...  5 brownie points if you can guess that the title stands for!