So far this winter break, I have read these books:
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
A classic, and deservedly so. A very fast read. I'm working in Cat's Cradle next.
Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel
Extremely quick read, interesting but not too substantive. I think I would have loved this book in the fourth or fifth grade. Having read Garcia-Marquez, Esquivel's book (and for that matter, any other book written in the style of magical realism) pales in comparison. But it did make me hungry.
Middlesex by Jeffrey Euginides
Definitely recommended. Multilayered, meaty literature. One of those books that makes you sigh in contentment when you finish the last page, and feel as if you had lived the lives of those characters.
A Million Little Pieces by James Frey
Absolutely amazing, especially if you know where he's coming from. I love, love, love this book. It's not often one comes across a style so fresh, so different, so gripping. It just pulls you in and doesn't let go.
Edit: Too good to be true, I guess. The signs were there, and I refused to see them. Sigh. I still like this book, but I do feel a little let down.
The Flame by Gabriele D'Annunzio
Suggested only if you plan on reading it while in Venice. Otherwise, D'Annunzio's writing seems to drown in its own emotion. Hailed as "one of the greatest descriptions of Venice in the history of literature." James Joyce called this book "the most important achievement in the novel since Flaubert." I found it a little too sentimental, too fin-de-siecle (but of course that's what it's supposed to be like)...but then again, if I were in Venice reading this book while floating down a canal at summer's end, I am sure D'Annunzio's words would ring exactly true.
Saturday, December 31, 2005
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
quote of the day
The word 'politics' is derived from the word 'poly', meaning 'many', and the word 'ticks', meaning 'blood sucking parasites'.
- Larry Hardiman
- Larry Hardiman
Monday, December 12, 2005
dreamland
i am in my second week of barely leaving my apartment, studying from the minute i wake (around noon) until the minute i fall asleep (around 4am) sitting up in bed with a tattered issue of The Economist, my only repreive from this hell, slipping from my fingers.
i think the stress is manifesting itself in my dreams. here are a few choice tidbits from my dreamland as of late:
- i am part of a theatre group at school that i never signed up for but am obligated to take part in anyway. i have been assigned to the clean-up crew. i decide to leave, but for some reason i have to leave bouncing on one of those huge inflatable exercise balls with the plastic handle attached to it. but my ball was only half-inflated, and i looked like an idiot bouncing/dragging all the way across the grass field.
- i have a maniacal, abusive boyfriend with a thick southern accent, who is on his way to my apartment to beat me to death. i can feel him nearing and am petrified with fear, because i know he's going to kill me.
- i am at the hospital waiting room asking the clerk how much it is to get an abortion, having cheated on my boyfriend and gotten pregnant (the guy i cheated with is not in the dream at all--i don't even know who it is). the abortion costs $1700.00, which i do not have. my entire extended family is there. i get into an argument with my dad. my stepmother is being entirely smug. all of this is incredibly embarassing, and i am sobbing.
i think the stress is manifesting itself in my dreams. here are a few choice tidbits from my dreamland as of late:
- i am part of a theatre group at school that i never signed up for but am obligated to take part in anyway. i have been assigned to the clean-up crew. i decide to leave, but for some reason i have to leave bouncing on one of those huge inflatable exercise balls with the plastic handle attached to it. but my ball was only half-inflated, and i looked like an idiot bouncing/dragging all the way across the grass field.
- i have a maniacal, abusive boyfriend with a thick southern accent, who is on his way to my apartment to beat me to death. i can feel him nearing and am petrified with fear, because i know he's going to kill me.
- i am at the hospital waiting room asking the clerk how much it is to get an abortion, having cheated on my boyfriend and gotten pregnant (the guy i cheated with is not in the dream at all--i don't even know who it is). the abortion costs $1700.00, which i do not have. my entire extended family is there. i get into an argument with my dad. my stepmother is being entirely smug. all of this is incredibly embarassing, and i am sobbing.
Sunday, November 27, 2005
Here's a great website for those of us who are online all the time and are sick of registering for everyhing:
bugmenot.com
Public usernames. Why didn't I ever think of that?
bugmenot.com
Public usernames. Why didn't I ever think of that?
Thursday, November 24, 2005
Turducken is here!
The monstrosity is baking nicely in its own juices...will post pictures and review later!
Today I am eating:
Turducken with creole sausage and cornbread stuffing
Sweet corn cakes
Mashed potatoes
Roasted garlic lemon potatoes
Broccoli salad
Buttered corn
Stuffing
Pumpkin pie
Apple pie
Lemon poppyseed scones
Cranberry orange scones
...and MORE!
Today I am eating:
Turducken with creole sausage and cornbread stuffing
Sweet corn cakes
Mashed potatoes
Roasted garlic lemon potatoes
Broccoli salad
Buttered corn
Stuffing
Pumpkin pie
Apple pie
Lemon poppyseed scones
Cranberry orange scones
...and MORE!
Sunday, November 20, 2005
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
spending most of my time reading lately--absorbing rather than purging information--so i have felt less inclined to write. short update:
-we named my kitten Mouse, and i am completely and utterly obsessed with her.
-my sister came to visit and we went to the zoo and saw koalas shit on each other.
-i took the professional responsiblity test, and left feeling unprofessional and irresponsible.
-i was too apathetic to vote yesterday.
-i bought three pairs of adorable shoes for $13.99 due to pricing error.
-they hurt my feet.
-we named my kitten Mouse, and i am completely and utterly obsessed with her.
-my sister came to visit and we went to the zoo and saw koalas shit on each other.
-i took the professional responsiblity test, and left feeling unprofessional and irresponsible.
-i was too apathetic to vote yesterday.
-i bought three pairs of adorable shoes for $13.99 due to pricing error.
-they hurt my feet.
Monday, October 24, 2005
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
i am so proud of myself.
so. proud.
i just found and bought a round-trip ticket to Hong Kong from LAX, nonstop, on Cathay Pacific, for $503.00.
Five hundred and three dollars.
plus taxes and airport charges of course, but holy FUCK it's still cheap!
Victory dance!
*wiggle wiggle*
i just found and bought a round-trip ticket to Hong Kong from LAX, nonstop, on Cathay Pacific, for $503.00.
Five hundred and three dollars.
plus taxes and airport charges of course, but holy FUCK it's still cheap!
Victory dance!
*wiggle wiggle*
Monday, October 03, 2005
addictions
it just sunk in today that i am hopelessly addicted to two things: coffee and sriracha hot sauce. not together, mind you, but they might as well be, since they're sloshiing around in a happy stew in my stomach right now.
i'm the poster child for future heartburn commercials. i can see it now:
"i spent my twenties recklessly drinking caustic liquids that ate away my stomach lining. but thanks to prilosec, i now lead a somewhat normal life."
yum.
i'm the poster child for future heartburn commercials. i can see it now:
"i spent my twenties recklessly drinking caustic liquids that ate away my stomach lining. but thanks to prilosec, i now lead a somewhat normal life."
yum.
Monday, September 26, 2005
small joys
today i was driving home from class
when i decided to flip around and look for
a spanish language radio station to listen to
and i found a station where a woman was reading
what could, by its cadence,
only be a beautiful peice of literature
i listened and thought: this reminds me of
gabriel garcia marquez.
the rythm and the word choice were so familiar.
then, i listened more closely,
and realized--it WAS garbriel garcia marquez!
i had stumbled upon
a spanish radio reading of
"La prodigiosa tarde de Baltazar."
and all day i have been immensely proud of myself
for having been able to identify
Gabo in his native language.
and you thought this was going to be a poem, didn't you?
when i decided to flip around and look for
a spanish language radio station to listen to
and i found a station where a woman was reading
what could, by its cadence,
only be a beautiful peice of literature
i listened and thought: this reminds me of
gabriel garcia marquez.
the rythm and the word choice were so familiar.
then, i listened more closely,
and realized--it WAS garbriel garcia marquez!
i had stumbled upon
a spanish radio reading of
"La prodigiosa tarde de Baltazar."
and all day i have been immensely proud of myself
for having been able to identify
Gabo in his native language.
and you thought this was going to be a poem, didn't you?
Saturday, September 24, 2005
THEY'RE MADE OUT OF MEAT
by Terry Bisson
"They're made out of meat."
"Meat?"
"Meat. They're made out of meat."
"Meat?"
"There's no doubt about it. We picked up several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, and probed them all the way through. They're completely meat."
"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars?"
"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines."
"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."
"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."
"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."
"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in that sector and they're made out of meat."
"Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."
"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take long. Do you have any idea what's the life span of meat?"
"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."
"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads, like the weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."
"No brain?"
"Oh, there's a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat! That's what I've been trying to tell you."
"So ... what does the thinking?"
"You're not understanding, are you? You're refusing to deal with what I'm telling you. The brain does the thinking. The meat."
"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"
"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you beginning to get the picture or do I have to start all over?"
"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."
"Thank you. Finally. Yes. They are indeed made out of meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."
"Omigod. So what does this meat have in mind?"
"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the Universe, contact other sentiences, swap ideas and information. The usual."
"We're supposed to talk to meat."
"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there. Anybody home.' That sort of thing."
"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"
"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."
"I thought you just told me they used radio."
"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat, it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat."
"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"
"Officially or unofficially?"
"Both."
"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in this quadrant of the Universe, without prejudice, fear or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing."
"I was hoping you would say that."
"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"
"I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say? 'Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"
"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they can only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."
"So we just pretend there's no one home in the Universe."
"That's it."
"Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you probed? You're sure they won't remember?"
"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them."
"A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream."
"And we marked the entire sector unoccupied."
"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"
"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago, wants to be friendly again."
"They always come around."
"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the Universe would be if one were all alone ..."
the end
More stories from Terry Bisson here.
"They're made out of meat."
"Meat?"
"Meat. They're made out of meat."
"Meat?"
"There's no doubt about it. We picked up several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, and probed them all the way through. They're completely meat."
"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars?"
"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines."
"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."
"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."
"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."
"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in that sector and they're made out of meat."
"Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."
"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take long. Do you have any idea what's the life span of meat?"
"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."
"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads, like the weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."
"No brain?"
"Oh, there's a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat! That's what I've been trying to tell you."
"So ... what does the thinking?"
"You're not understanding, are you? You're refusing to deal with what I'm telling you. The brain does the thinking. The meat."
"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"
"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you beginning to get the picture or do I have to start all over?"
"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."
"Thank you. Finally. Yes. They are indeed made out of meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."
"Omigod. So what does this meat have in mind?"
"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the Universe, contact other sentiences, swap ideas and information. The usual."
"We're supposed to talk to meat."
"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there. Anybody home.' That sort of thing."
"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"
"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."
"I thought you just told me they used radio."
"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat, it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat."
"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"
"Officially or unofficially?"
"Both."
"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in this quadrant of the Universe, without prejudice, fear or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing."
"I was hoping you would say that."
"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"
"I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say? 'Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"
"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they can only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."
"So we just pretend there's no one home in the Universe."
"That's it."
"Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you probed? You're sure they won't remember?"
"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them."
"A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream."
"And we marked the entire sector unoccupied."
"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"
"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago, wants to be friendly again."
"They always come around."
"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the Universe would be if one were all alone ..."
the end
More stories from Terry Bisson here.
Saturday, September 17, 2005
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
new arrival
i have a kitten! she is the most adorable thing in the world.
she doesn't have a name yet--any suggestions?
i wanted to name her mephistopheles, but she has such an angel face, i can't bring myself to call her the devil.
Monday, August 29, 2005
meeting, anyone?
I am so sick of meetings. Ever since school started, it's meeting this, meeting that. Maybe it's my fault for having gotten involved in far too many meeting-generating organizations, but this is ridiculous. "Let's have a meeting to discuss our upcoming meetings!"
Fuck meetings.
Fuck coordinating your schedule with five to ten other busy, frazzled law students who have overlapping meetings. Fuck administrative fucked-uppedness. My skin crawls whenever anyone says the word "meet." My little blue dayplanner is more used than a two-dollar whore.
Okay...I feel better now. Just needed to vent.
off to my next meeting!
Fuck meetings.
Fuck coordinating your schedule with five to ten other busy, frazzled law students who have overlapping meetings. Fuck administrative fucked-uppedness. My skin crawls whenever anyone says the word "meet." My little blue dayplanner is more used than a two-dollar whore.
Okay...I feel better now. Just needed to vent.
off to my next meeting!
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Monday, August 22, 2005
one day at a time
it's strange being back in san diego, especially since this place has never really been "home" to me. i've always associated this city with school-induced headaches and my burgeoning inferiority complex.
it was even more strange when i drove back "home" to OC to visit my parents in a house so remodeled that it hardly resembles the house i grew up in. the hallways and bedrooms are in the same familiar places, but my dear baby sister is all grown up into a beautiful young woman and my father and stepmother have gone completely psychotic with religious zeal.
these past few days i have laughed and cried and shouted at the top of my lungs. i have climbed on precarious shelves to reach inside cobweb-festooned carboard boxes of my old things in the garage, untouched since i left the house after college, and pulled out old favorite books to bring home and old photos to smile at, and old journals to read through.
it's strange, but good, being back.
it was even more strange when i drove back "home" to OC to visit my parents in a house so remodeled that it hardly resembles the house i grew up in. the hallways and bedrooms are in the same familiar places, but my dear baby sister is all grown up into a beautiful young woman and my father and stepmother have gone completely psychotic with religious zeal.
these past few days i have laughed and cried and shouted at the top of my lungs. i have climbed on precarious shelves to reach inside cobweb-festooned carboard boxes of my old things in the garage, untouched since i left the house after college, and pulled out old favorite books to bring home and old photos to smile at, and old journals to read through.
it's strange, but good, being back.
Sunday, August 21, 2005
The Beach
On an island off the coast of Thailand, I found the closest aproximation yet of "The Beach (you know, the Leonardo diCaprio movie).
It's a place we heard through by word of mouth, doesn't exist on any map. Bungalows directly on the beach. A deck over the crashing waves, where people sit on pillows on the floor or lounge in one of the many hammocks, playing with the cats or sipping a fuit shake or wicked cocktail or eating delicious food.
At night, some of the best DJs I have heard spin buddha bar loungey music, breakbeats and house, and we all dance under the stars.
In December, the whole place is picking up and moving to an undisclosed location. The beach is getting to crowded, and they are moving to a lonlier place, now only accessible by boat.
We made friends with the bartender who told us where they are moving. Sweet.
It's a place we heard through by word of mouth, doesn't exist on any map. Bungalows directly on the beach. A deck over the crashing waves, where people sit on pillows on the floor or lounge in one of the many hammocks, playing with the cats or sipping a fuit shake or wicked cocktail or eating delicious food.
At night, some of the best DJs I have heard spin buddha bar loungey music, breakbeats and house, and we all dance under the stars.
In December, the whole place is picking up and moving to an undisclosed location. The beach is getting to crowded, and they are moving to a lonlier place, now only accessible by boat.
We made friends with the bartender who told us where they are moving. Sweet.
Friday, August 19, 2005
places i've been, places i want to see
I think I should start listing the places I’ve been since I graduated from college. So here it is:
Places I’ve been in the past four years, in no particular order (times in parenthesis if visited more than once):
Paris (3)
Lyon
Marseilles
Iles du Frioul
Cassis
Barcelona (2)
Mallorca
Cinque Terre (2)
Amsterdam (4)
Lisse
Siena
Prague (2)
Vienna (2)
Rome (2)
Venice (2)
Florence
Shanghai
Guangzhou
Hangzhou
Suzhou
Taipei
Kaoshuing
Hong Kong (2)
Bangkok
Phuket
Phi Phi
Ko Chang
Oahu
Vegas (10+)
Puerto Nuevo (4)
Places I want to see in the next four to five years (chosen because I want to do the adventurous, out of the way stuff while I am young, and leave the tamer locations for later):
Macchu Picchu
Teotihuacan
Tulum
Tortuguero
Galapagos Islands
Palau
Buenos Aires
La Coruna
Costa Rica
Honduras
Maldives
Goa
Mumbai
Seychelles
Laos (Vang Vieng)
Myanmar
Pamplona
I don’t expect to see all these places in four years, since I suppose in a year I will have to get a real job and actually work, but let’s see how far I get…
Places I’ve been in the past four years, in no particular order (times in parenthesis if visited more than once):
Paris (3)
Lyon
Marseilles
Iles du Frioul
Cassis
Barcelona (2)
Mallorca
Cinque Terre (2)
Amsterdam (4)
Lisse
Siena
Prague (2)
Vienna (2)
Rome (2)
Venice (2)
Florence
Shanghai
Guangzhou
Hangzhou
Suzhou
Taipei
Kaoshuing
Hong Kong (2)
Bangkok
Phuket
Phi Phi
Ko Chang
Oahu
Vegas (10+)
Puerto Nuevo (4)
Places I want to see in the next four to five years (chosen because I want to do the adventurous, out of the way stuff while I am young, and leave the tamer locations for later):
Macchu Picchu
Teotihuacan
Tulum
Tortuguero
Galapagos Islands
Palau
Buenos Aires
La Coruna
Costa Rica
Honduras
Maldives
Goa
Mumbai
Seychelles
Laos (Vang Vieng)
Myanmar
Pamplona
I don’t expect to see all these places in four years, since I suppose in a year I will have to get a real job and actually work, but let’s see how far I get…
from my tattered brown travel journal:
Entries from my travel journal: Bangkok and Cambodia
Sawasdee House, Bangkok, Thailand July 31, 2005
There is something immensely freeing about being somewhere completely, utterly removed from home, where all you lay claim to in this world fits into a small backpack.
Spending the afternoon sipping cocktails and lounging around on a triangle cushion. Being able to say when someone asks you where you will be tomorrow: “I don’t know.”
The bottoms of my feet are not black yet, which means I haven’t yet really begun to travel.
I have been eating everything in sight lately. The street stalls are so enticing, especially those that have huge pots of god-knows-what that you just gesture at for a scoop.
August 2, 2005
Last night Stella and I went drinking at this mobile bar that folds out of a van. It’s called Shark, and they serve 180 baht (approx. US $4.50) huge buckets of alcohol. The guys who throw this party were there drinking, and they attached a big bell to the top of the tarp that formed a makeshift canopy. Every time one of the guys got up and rang the bell, everyone at the bar got a free drink. The drunker the guys get, the more often they ring the bell. Stella and I started out with two buckets of alcohol, but then the guys rang the bell and we had four buckets of alcohol. They ended up ringing the bell 5 times.
We got smashed and met a group of cool travelers. When the bar-in-a-van closed, we somehow fit all eight of us in a tuk-tuk (which comfortably seats three small people) to go drinking some more. Fun night!
Siem Reap, Cambodia August 3, 2005
WHAT A DAY! Woke up at 6am in Bangkok to catch the bus to Siem Reap, which was supposed to take 11 hours. Of course, everything was delayed and it ended up taking us 18 hours to get to Siem Reap.
Before the border at Poipet, we got kicked off our comfortable double-decker bus and into the back of a modified pickup truck, which we rode to the border. Then they took us to an exchange house that looked very official but ended up totally scamming us on the exchange rate. My fault, though, for not checking the exchange rate before I left Thailand.
After the exchange scam, about 20 of us were herded into the back of what can only be described as a cattle truck, and we rode for about 2 hours on a bumpy, dusty dirt road, trying to avoid falling through the holes in the floorboards. The dirt eventually turned into mud, and we were forced to get out, put on our backpacks and walk 2 kilometers in the mud and heat to our dingy, waiting bus.
We didn’t arrive in Siem Reap until almost 1AM.
Angkor Wat, Cambodia, August 5, 2005
I don’t know how long I’ve dreamt of sitting here, writing this. I am near the central tower of the sanctuary of Angkor Wat (equal in height to the towers at Notre Dame). A strong, cool breeze blows at my back, I am seated facing inside, looking into an empty basin that may have been used as a reflecting pool.
This place is breathtaking in its harmony, immensity, detail. Every inch is covered with the most intricate carvings. It feels so great to have finally made it here.
Seven wonders of the world: two down, five to go.
Smiley’s Guest House, Siem Reap, Cambodia August 6th, 2005
What else can I say about Angkor, except that words cannot do it justice? Climbing around the temple-mountains, staring face-to-face with the Bayon, I could not find the wherewithal to write.
Sawasdee House, Bangkok, Thailand July 31, 2005
There is something immensely freeing about being somewhere completely, utterly removed from home, where all you lay claim to in this world fits into a small backpack.
Spending the afternoon sipping cocktails and lounging around on a triangle cushion. Being able to say when someone asks you where you will be tomorrow: “I don’t know.”
The bottoms of my feet are not black yet, which means I haven’t yet really begun to travel.
I have been eating everything in sight lately. The street stalls are so enticing, especially those that have huge pots of god-knows-what that you just gesture at for a scoop.
August 2, 2005
Last night Stella and I went drinking at this mobile bar that folds out of a van. It’s called Shark, and they serve 180 baht (approx. US $4.50) huge buckets of alcohol. The guys who throw this party were there drinking, and they attached a big bell to the top of the tarp that formed a makeshift canopy. Every time one of the guys got up and rang the bell, everyone at the bar got a free drink. The drunker the guys get, the more often they ring the bell. Stella and I started out with two buckets of alcohol, but then the guys rang the bell and we had four buckets of alcohol. They ended up ringing the bell 5 times.
We got smashed and met a group of cool travelers. When the bar-in-a-van closed, we somehow fit all eight of us in a tuk-tuk (which comfortably seats three small people) to go drinking some more. Fun night!
Siem Reap, Cambodia August 3, 2005
WHAT A DAY! Woke up at 6am in Bangkok to catch the bus to Siem Reap, which was supposed to take 11 hours. Of course, everything was delayed and it ended up taking us 18 hours to get to Siem Reap.
Before the border at Poipet, we got kicked off our comfortable double-decker bus and into the back of a modified pickup truck, which we rode to the border. Then they took us to an exchange house that looked very official but ended up totally scamming us on the exchange rate. My fault, though, for not checking the exchange rate before I left Thailand.
After the exchange scam, about 20 of us were herded into the back of what can only be described as a cattle truck, and we rode for about 2 hours on a bumpy, dusty dirt road, trying to avoid falling through the holes in the floorboards. The dirt eventually turned into mud, and we were forced to get out, put on our backpacks and walk 2 kilometers in the mud and heat to our dingy, waiting bus.
We didn’t arrive in Siem Reap until almost 1AM.
Angkor Wat, Cambodia, August 5, 2005
I don’t know how long I’ve dreamt of sitting here, writing this. I am near the central tower of the sanctuary of Angkor Wat (equal in height to the towers at Notre Dame). A strong, cool breeze blows at my back, I am seated facing inside, looking into an empty basin that may have been used as a reflecting pool.
This place is breathtaking in its harmony, immensity, detail. Every inch is covered with the most intricate carvings. It feels so great to have finally made it here.
Seven wonders of the world: two down, five to go.
Smiley’s Guest House, Siem Reap, Cambodia August 6th, 2005
What else can I say about Angkor, except that words cannot do it justice? Climbing around the temple-mountains, staring face-to-face with the Bayon, I could not find the wherewithal to write.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
picture album of southeast asia trip
I've put together an album of a few pictures from my trip. There are over 380 but I just chose around 80 to share-editing takes forever!
Click here to view
Click here to view
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Friday, August 05, 2005
Angkor Wat
(Siem Reap, Cambodia)
words cannot describe. i can't even try. you just have to come here yourself.
i will probably not be online again until i get back to Bangkok on the 12th. Taking a rest from technology, spending one more days wandering Angkor and then headed off to the beach on Ko Chang.
words cannot describe. i can't even try. you just have to come here yourself.
i will probably not be online again until i get back to Bangkok on the 12th. Taking a rest from technology, spending one more days wandering Angkor and then headed off to the beach on Ko Chang.
Monday, August 01, 2005
bangkok!
sawasdee-ka!
arrived in bangkok the day before yesterday, after my last night of partying in HK, which i spent at a small hidden bar called pruple six, talking and drinking with friends.
stella and i are staying at a guesthouse called "sawasdee house" on a street behind the monasery next to kao san road. it's well-decorated, full of chill young travelers, surprisingly clean, and our room has a balcony looking out onto the street.
it has been drizzling lightly for a good amount of the time we have been here, which is a good thing because it's less hot.
yesterday was our first full day, and we started it by eating breakfast at a small roadside stand. then, we headed to chakuchat, or something like that--the weekend market. it was the mother of all swap meets, so big we got lost numerous times, and impossible to exit from without buying a few (incredibly cheap!) items of clothing.
today, we went to the royal palace, and two temples, one housing the seated buddha and another called the temple of the dawn.
sitting inside the temple in the royal palace, gazing at the jade buddha, i felt a very different energy than when i felt at the various magnificent christian cathedrals of europe. today i felt a heat rising from inside me and radiating out to my fingers. in both christian and other churches, i always feel--how can i describe it--a pressure, like a pressing down, on my soul. and i am always overcome with awe. these are the houses that love built. whatever tyrannical and misguided methods led to the completion of these buildings, they are filled today with peaceful monks and priests, and visited by pilgrims who stand humbled before the reflection of the divine in what human hands have built.
the story of the jade buddha moved me. nobody knows who carved this huge 66-inch buddha from a single piece of jade. it was found in the 1400's when an abbott that had rescued a cement buddha from the ruins of a temple in chang mai noticed that some of the plaster had chipped off the nose, revealing a luminous green stone underneath. the priceless jade buddha had been disguised under a layer of cement. made me think inarticulable thoughts about the metaphorical diamond-in-the-rough that exists in all of us.
many of the temples around bangkok are covered with breathtaking mosaics made from the discarded remnants of chinese porcelainware. how poetic that one can literally build a temple out of broken teacups. it reminds me of stephen hawking's arrow of time, where he ponders at why we can remember the past but not the future, why teacups that have broken on the floor do not pick themselves up and become whole again. hawking's answer to this quandary came in the form of increasing entropy in the universe. but today i thought: some have taken broken teacups and made them, not just whole, but transcendent.
tomorrow at seven in the morning i head out on a 12-hour bus ride to angkor wat. i have been dreaming of this day for years, and i can't wait!
arrived in bangkok the day before yesterday, after my last night of partying in HK, which i spent at a small hidden bar called pruple six, talking and drinking with friends.
stella and i are staying at a guesthouse called "sawasdee house" on a street behind the monasery next to kao san road. it's well-decorated, full of chill young travelers, surprisingly clean, and our room has a balcony looking out onto the street.
it has been drizzling lightly for a good amount of the time we have been here, which is a good thing because it's less hot.
yesterday was our first full day, and we started it by eating breakfast at a small roadside stand. then, we headed to chakuchat, or something like that--the weekend market. it was the mother of all swap meets, so big we got lost numerous times, and impossible to exit from without buying a few (incredibly cheap!) items of clothing.
today, we went to the royal palace, and two temples, one housing the seated buddha and another called the temple of the dawn.
sitting inside the temple in the royal palace, gazing at the jade buddha, i felt a very different energy than when i felt at the various magnificent christian cathedrals of europe. today i felt a heat rising from inside me and radiating out to my fingers. in both christian and other churches, i always feel--how can i describe it--a pressure, like a pressing down, on my soul. and i am always overcome with awe. these are the houses that love built. whatever tyrannical and misguided methods led to the completion of these buildings, they are filled today with peaceful monks and priests, and visited by pilgrims who stand humbled before the reflection of the divine in what human hands have built.
the story of the jade buddha moved me. nobody knows who carved this huge 66-inch buddha from a single piece of jade. it was found in the 1400's when an abbott that had rescued a cement buddha from the ruins of a temple in chang mai noticed that some of the plaster had chipped off the nose, revealing a luminous green stone underneath. the priceless jade buddha had been disguised under a layer of cement. made me think inarticulable thoughts about the metaphorical diamond-in-the-rough that exists in all of us.
many of the temples around bangkok are covered with breathtaking mosaics made from the discarded remnants of chinese porcelainware. how poetic that one can literally build a temple out of broken teacups. it reminds me of stephen hawking's arrow of time, where he ponders at why we can remember the past but not the future, why teacups that have broken on the floor do not pick themselves up and become whole again. hawking's answer to this quandary came in the form of increasing entropy in the universe. but today i thought: some have taken broken teacups and made them, not just whole, but transcendent.
tomorrow at seven in the morning i head out on a 12-hour bus ride to angkor wat. i have been dreaming of this day for years, and i can't wait!
Monday, July 25, 2005
still alive!
just haven't been feeling like writing much lately.
had a great weekend full of sun and ocean that i will recount when i have the time to upload pix to go with the post.
thanks for all of your kind words--I was so moved by the touching emails some of you sent me. i must have done some amazing things in a past life to deserve the quality of friends i have in this one.
i'm doing very well, as is he, and i'm hugely excited about thailand.
this time next week i will either be in bangkok or siem reap, cambodia, at the doorstep of angkor wat.
maybe i will find, reflected in the sunrise there, my soul.
had a great weekend full of sun and ocean that i will recount when i have the time to upload pix to go with the post.
thanks for all of your kind words--I was so moved by the touching emails some of you sent me. i must have done some amazing things in a past life to deserve the quality of friends i have in this one.
i'm doing very well, as is he, and i'm hugely excited about thailand.
this time next week i will either be in bangkok or siem reap, cambodia, at the doorstep of angkor wat.
maybe i will find, reflected in the sunrise there, my soul.
Thursday, July 21, 2005
Friday, July 15, 2005
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
Of a loss
Things will be fine, I am sure, but it certainly feels right now as if the whole world is trembling as much as my heart. Here is my groping attempt at an explanation:
You used to lay at night thinking: if only you could meet a man who was kind, gentle, compassionate, who treated you like you were precious, special. Someone who would put up with your demanding moods, your sometimes irrational requests, your moments of neediness and overbearing bossiness. Someone who listened intently every time you opened your mouth, who would stroke your hair and kiss your forehead when he thought you were asleep. Who treated all his friends with the same kindness with which he treated you. Who would never, ever raise his voice at you.
Then one night you met him, that boy who was all of the things you wished for.
Three of the happiest years of your life are spent, evenings by the beach, in smoke-filled rooms, at parties, at home cuddled on the couch, whispering so as not to wake your roommates.
And –oh!- the travels, all over the world, kissing in the Piazza San Marco, meandering the streets of Amsterdam, tangled in sheets and sea-breeze in Mallorca, fish-taco eating contests in Rosarito, street food in Taiwan, half-moon parties under the stars in Thailand, sitting on a beach in Hawaii, both of you shutting your eyes so tight, “let’s try to remember this moment, never forget it,” you said then. And you haven’t.
With time came the familiarity, he became an old friend, so comfortable that you can't remember a time before his voice, a smile before his smile.
Your friends, you know, look up to your relationship.
Yet you’ve felt an emptiness growing inside.
It was always there, but its presence became more apparent after your time away
It’s an echoing void, a silence that is deafening, and when you think of him you feel it even more. But it’s not coming from him—it’s coming from you.
Perhaps it’s because you’ve never really allowed yourself this kind of love, you’ve never fully let yourself reciprocate.
Deep inside you feel a hunger, one that will not be satiated unless you hurt him, and you would never ever want to hurt him.
Really, truly, you don’t know what it is. But this is what you think it is: you want to be alone, to find yourself. You think it is perhaps impossible for you to find someone else until you have found who you are—until you are ready. You want to live life, if just for a few years, unfettered.
You feel—tethered, like a satellite that can’t go farther than the bounds of gravity.
He’s given you so much freedom, has never demanded anything of you, any more commitment than you would give, yet despite it all there’s this feeling that you can’t knock.
You fear that if you don’t leave, if you stay, you might end up staying forever, wondering for the rest of your life what would have happened if you had gone.
Is it better to be untrue to him or untrue to yourself? Is it better to be grounded than floating in space, aimlessly, for you can view your commitment as a tether or as an anchor.
Maybe it’s none of this. Maybe this is your greatest flaw, the constant discontent at everything, even the best things, in your life. Always searching for something, you cast all other things aside to find that they are, in the end, the things you had been looking for in the first place.
A saying inspires you:
If, in your fear, you hold on to love that you aren’t supposed to hold onto, it is better that you pass out of love’s threshing floor, into the seasonless land where you will laugh, but not all of your laughter, and cry, but not all of your tears.
You don’t want to live life this way. You want to laugh all of your laughter, you want to cry all of your tears.
How trite—despite all your reasons, it’s really just come down to a form letter, the classic “Dear John”: I’m sorry, it’s not you, it’s me.
It’s a tugging feeling, something you had felt three years earlier—sitting here alone you feel it most acutely.
You always say that upheaval is a catalyst for change. And change is in the air, it’s in your future, you can feel it’s weight already.
How do you leave someone so suited to you?
You are lucky, this is the second time someone has really truly loved you. The first time, you left.
Which has betrayed you, is it your mind or your heart?
You used to lay at night thinking: if only you could meet a man who was kind, gentle, compassionate, who treated you like you were precious, special. Someone who would put up with your demanding moods, your sometimes irrational requests, your moments of neediness and overbearing bossiness. Someone who listened intently every time you opened your mouth, who would stroke your hair and kiss your forehead when he thought you were asleep. Who treated all his friends with the same kindness with which he treated you. Who would never, ever raise his voice at you.
Then one night you met him, that boy who was all of the things you wished for.
Three of the happiest years of your life are spent, evenings by the beach, in smoke-filled rooms, at parties, at home cuddled on the couch, whispering so as not to wake your roommates.
And –oh!- the travels, all over the world, kissing in the Piazza San Marco, meandering the streets of Amsterdam, tangled in sheets and sea-breeze in Mallorca, fish-taco eating contests in Rosarito, street food in Taiwan, half-moon parties under the stars in Thailand, sitting on a beach in Hawaii, both of you shutting your eyes so tight, “let’s try to remember this moment, never forget it,” you said then. And you haven’t.
With time came the familiarity, he became an old friend, so comfortable that you can't remember a time before his voice, a smile before his smile.
Your friends, you know, look up to your relationship.
Yet you’ve felt an emptiness growing inside.
It was always there, but its presence became more apparent after your time away
It’s an echoing void, a silence that is deafening, and when you think of him you feel it even more. But it’s not coming from him—it’s coming from you.
Perhaps it’s because you’ve never really allowed yourself this kind of love, you’ve never fully let yourself reciprocate.
Deep inside you feel a hunger, one that will not be satiated unless you hurt him, and you would never ever want to hurt him.
Really, truly, you don’t know what it is. But this is what you think it is: you want to be alone, to find yourself. You think it is perhaps impossible for you to find someone else until you have found who you are—until you are ready. You want to live life, if just for a few years, unfettered.
You feel—tethered, like a satellite that can’t go farther than the bounds of gravity.
He’s given you so much freedom, has never demanded anything of you, any more commitment than you would give, yet despite it all there’s this feeling that you can’t knock.
You fear that if you don’t leave, if you stay, you might end up staying forever, wondering for the rest of your life what would have happened if you had gone.
Is it better to be untrue to him or untrue to yourself? Is it better to be grounded than floating in space, aimlessly, for you can view your commitment as a tether or as an anchor.
Maybe it’s none of this. Maybe this is your greatest flaw, the constant discontent at everything, even the best things, in your life. Always searching for something, you cast all other things aside to find that they are, in the end, the things you had been looking for in the first place.
A saying inspires you:
If, in your fear, you hold on to love that you aren’t supposed to hold onto, it is better that you pass out of love’s threshing floor, into the seasonless land where you will laugh, but not all of your laughter, and cry, but not all of your tears.
You don’t want to live life this way. You want to laugh all of your laughter, you want to cry all of your tears.
How trite—despite all your reasons, it’s really just come down to a form letter, the classic “Dear John”: I’m sorry, it’s not you, it’s me.
It’s a tugging feeling, something you had felt three years earlier—sitting here alone you feel it most acutely.
You always say that upheaval is a catalyst for change. And change is in the air, it’s in your future, you can feel it’s weight already.
How do you leave someone so suited to you?
You are lucky, this is the second time someone has really truly loved you. The first time, you left.
Which has betrayed you, is it your mind or your heart?
Sunday, July 03, 2005
cowboy hat random pajama insanity
Or, another weekend in Hong Kong:
Thursday night:
Canada D’eh celebration in Lan Kwai Fong. The colors white and red, and a profusion of silly hats and drunken Canadian madness ensued, and before I knew it, it was 6:30 in the morning and I was barely headed home. Due to admirable restraint on my part, I did not black out. Thus, I retain wonderful memories of the evening’s good conversations and new friends.
Friday night:
Hung out with a few friends at Isobar. Went home early (12:30am) so I could try to recover from Thurs. night’s partying and ready myself for Saturday.
Saturday:
Went to Stanley, on the opposite side of HK Island, for lunch at an adorable Vietnamese restaurant on a balcony overlooking the sea. Wandered around Stanley Market.
My newfound piano virtuoso friend Cal came over to take me and Maria to Kowloon for hot pot. We stuffed ourselves silly with all sorts of steamy hot goodness.
After dinner, we headed over to Victoria Peak to check out the view. My good friend Gerry, who I met in the Cinque Terre in Italy and was coincidentally in Hong Kong to visit his gf’s parents, met us up there, and we spent a few minutes taking in the spectacular sight of the night skyline.
Since it was past midnight by the time we were done at the Peak, we had some trouble getting a taxi back down the mountain. Luckily, there was one last bus leaving. We spotted two men walking past in their pajamas, up to the bus stop to wait for the bus. We snickered and pointed and ruminated on why in the world two grown men would be waiting at a bus stop on Victoria Peak, past midnight, in Snoopy pajamas. Then, we looked behind us and saw that there were at least twenty other people, all dressed in pajamas, also walking to the bus stop. We exchanged wild-eyed is-this-really-happening looks, and once it was determined that none of us were hallucinating, we boarded the bus with 20-30 pajama clad adults.
Then we told Cal to take a picture of them, and all hell broke loose.
They cheered loudly, and came upstairs (we had retreated to the second story of the double-decker bus) to surround us and ask us questions, and collectively let out “oohs” and “aaahs” at our answers. When we asked them “Um…why are you all wearing pajamas?” they answered, “It’s 12:30am. Why aren’t you in pajamas?”
Can you say random??
Turned out they were on some leadership training seminar, and this was a walking-around-looking-ridiculous-in-public-places exercise. Riiiight.
We headed over to Lan Kwai Fong to go drinking, and thus began and ended another night of great conversation and new discoveries.
What I love the most about this trip is all the amazing people I have met. Everyone is absolutely fabulously awesome, and I cannot believe my luck. Within one month of landing, I can name eighteen people I whom I hang out with regularly, each of them already holding special places in my heart. And to think I was afraid of being lonely this summer!
My flatmate is way cool and I can’t wait to go partying with her once she recovers from the jetlag!
Thursday, June 30, 2005
Today was my last day at my first internship. It was definitely a trip working in an office where I was the only person who wasn’t born in HK or China. I had fun groping around with unfamiliar civil procedure and even more unfamiliar grammar. I loved hanging out with my co-workers over dim sum at lunch, and learned a lot about a culture I thought I already knew very well (turns out I still have a lot to learn). I’m going to miss them!
My roommate arrives today, and my days running around half naked in my apartment (because I could, dammit!) are over.
Tomorrow is July 1st, the anniversary of the handover of HK to China. Nobody needs to work tomorrow, so tonight is a huge party night. Then again, what weekend night here isn’t?
My roommate arrives today, and my days running around half naked in my apartment (because I could, dammit!) are over.
Tomorrow is July 1st, the anniversary of the handover of HK to China. Nobody needs to work tomorrow, so tonight is a huge party night. Then again, what weekend night here isn’t?
Sunday, June 26, 2005
waiting
I still remember my very first journal entry. I was ten years old, and it was approximately 7:30am. I was waiting at my old elementary school for the big yellow bus to come take me to my new magnet school. My first journal was a small white diary with blue and red pencils and black horizontal lines printed on the cover. I wrote that morning in a very sarcastic voice, about how GREAT it was and how damned lucky I was for it to be raining and cold.
Subsequent journal entries that year would be about S, a boy in my class who shared my bus stop and waited with me each morning. I had the hugest crush on him for two years, but I could never gather the courage to tell him.
I was a horribly shy child, my nose always buried in a book. My fourth grade teacher had to call a conference to discuss with my parents what to do regarding my startling behavior of ignoring everything she said, preferring instead to spend my class time leisurely reading a novel. At the time, I was deeply engrossed in the works of Anne Rice and Gaston Leroux, the macabre content of which greatly disturbed my instructors. I’m surprised I didn’t turn out a goth kid.
It was not until two years later that I moved away from dark stories of vampires, phantoms, and the supernatural, to stories of the interminable suffering of mere mortals. It took me six months to finish the unabridged version of Les Miserables, and when I finally closed the cover of that heavy tome, I felt I knew much more about the sacrifice and inequity of human existence than a girl who had not yet begun to menstruate should know.
Fourteen years later, I am still writing, on this blog and in a tattered journal whose brown, coming-apart cover depicts an ancient world map.
Fourteen years later, it's still raining outside and I'm still waiting for someone to pick me up and take me somewhere safe, where I can sit, bury my nose in a book, and ignore all else.
Subsequent journal entries that year would be about S, a boy in my class who shared my bus stop and waited with me each morning. I had the hugest crush on him for two years, but I could never gather the courage to tell him.
I was a horribly shy child, my nose always buried in a book. My fourth grade teacher had to call a conference to discuss with my parents what to do regarding my startling behavior of ignoring everything she said, preferring instead to spend my class time leisurely reading a novel. At the time, I was deeply engrossed in the works of Anne Rice and Gaston Leroux, the macabre content of which greatly disturbed my instructors. I’m surprised I didn’t turn out a goth kid.
It was not until two years later that I moved away from dark stories of vampires, phantoms, and the supernatural, to stories of the interminable suffering of mere mortals. It took me six months to finish the unabridged version of Les Miserables, and when I finally closed the cover of that heavy tome, I felt I knew much more about the sacrifice and inequity of human existence than a girl who had not yet begun to menstruate should know.
Fourteen years later, I am still writing, on this blog and in a tattered journal whose brown, coming-apart cover depicts an ancient world map.
Fourteen years later, it's still raining outside and I'm still waiting for someone to pick me up and take me somewhere safe, where I can sit, bury my nose in a book, and ignore all else.
Saturday, June 25, 2005
ocean eyes
Just got back from a junk trip. It’s been raining cats and dogs for the whole week, but miraculously, today the dark clouds parted and the weather was perfect.
Lying in the sun, being rocked to sleep by the slow swaying of the boat, listening to the waves wash up on the nearby shore, I thought: I don’t believe I could ever live anywhere that is not near the ocean. All my life I’ve never lived more than half an hour away from the sea. I can’t count the times I’ve held my breath, waiting for the exact moment the sun disappears in a golden sliver over the horizon.
When I die, I want it to be in a beach house, where I can listen to waves crashing. I want to have sand under my fingernails and salt in my hair.
Lying in the sun, being rocked to sleep by the slow swaying of the boat, listening to the waves wash up on the nearby shore, I thought: I don’t believe I could ever live anywhere that is not near the ocean. All my life I’ve never lived more than half an hour away from the sea. I can’t count the times I’ve held my breath, waiting for the exact moment the sun disappears in a golden sliver over the horizon.
When I die, I want it to be in a beach house, where I can listen to waves crashing. I want to have sand under my fingernails and salt in my hair.
Saturday, June 18, 2005
Yesterday, I went in to work for a half-day, and then came home and took a giant nap. Woke up at 6:32 pm and took the tram over to a Churrascaria in Causeway Bay, where we all stuffed ourselves. HK$150 (around 20 bucks) for all-you-can-eat brazilian BBQ AND all-you-can-drink San Miguel. Yum!
The rest of the night involved drinking. I narrowly avoided the same fate as last Saturday by convincing a friend of mine to drink most of my Flaming Lamborghini. I'm feeling surprisingly un-hungover for a Sunday.
The rest of the night involved drinking. I narrowly avoided the same fate as last Saturday by convincing a friend of mine to drink most of my Flaming Lamborghini. I'm feeling surprisingly un-hungover for a Sunday.
Thursday, June 16, 2005
lost: beautiful friend, reward if found.
ever lose a friend by accident? when you have no other friends in common, and one day one of you loses their cellphone, and *poof*
someone just found my blog by googling "nadia richardson." nads, is that you? lost track of you awhile back and missing you like crazy. email me one of these days if you ever find this site googling yourself. remember khi and kenny rogers and that hill we always used to drive to to watch the sunset blazing...and that crazy night in someone's apartment with red bull and microwaved you-know-what, and jigga, and jb, and that girl with the big boobs who walked around topless all night? and campus pub, and dancing to "sweet home alabama," and driving to tijuana and having lobster in puerto nuevo and getting stuck at the border crossing in that ghetto-ass bus? sigh...always wondered what happened to you.
i should write down everyone's numbers one day, in a big book. a real phone book. pen and paper.
someone just found my blog by googling "nadia richardson." nads, is that you? lost track of you awhile back and missing you like crazy. email me one of these days if you ever find this site googling yourself. remember khi and kenny rogers and that hill we always used to drive to to watch the sunset blazing...and that crazy night in someone's apartment with red bull and microwaved you-know-what, and jigga, and jb, and that girl with the big boobs who walked around topless all night? and campus pub, and dancing to "sweet home alabama," and driving to tijuana and having lobster in puerto nuevo and getting stuck at the border crossing in that ghetto-ass bus? sigh...always wondered what happened to you.
i should write down everyone's numbers one day, in a big book. a real phone book. pen and paper.
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
you know you drank too much last weekend when...
You find yourself in the position of having to send the following email:
Hi,
Okay, here's the deal. I was very, very inebriated Saturday night, and I have absolutely no recollection of meeting you, or talking to you, or giving you my email address. Consequently, you seem a complete stranger to me (even though I realize I may have actually had a conversation with you that I am now no longer able to recall). The realization that you weren't a friend of a friend, or even a friend of an acquaintance, surprised me because I was faced with the fact that had I not been out with a group of very kind and responsible people, horrible things could have happened to me and I would have been too drunk to even notice. I'm not saying you're horrible or anything--I just was kind of freaked out to realize how drunk I was. In any event, I have a boyfriend. He's not the jealous type, but since I don't remember you, meeting up with you would be like going on a blind date. I hope you understand. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you, and wish you the best in all your endeavors, romantically and otherwise. Have a great week!
Sincerely,
K
Hi,
Okay, here's the deal. I was very, very inebriated Saturday night, and I have absolutely no recollection of meeting you, or talking to you, or giving you my email address. Consequently, you seem a complete stranger to me (even though I realize I may have actually had a conversation with you that I am now no longer able to recall). The realization that you weren't a friend of a friend, or even a friend of an acquaintance, surprised me because I was faced with the fact that had I not been out with a group of very kind and responsible people, horrible things could have happened to me and I would have been too drunk to even notice. I'm not saying you're horrible or anything--I just was kind of freaked out to realize how drunk I was. In any event, I have a boyfriend. He's not the jealous type, but since I don't remember you, meeting up with you would be like going on a blind date. I hope you understand. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you, and wish you the best in all your endeavors, romantically and otherwise. Have a great week!
Sincerely,
K
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Saturday night:
Met up with my newfound, really chill as hell friends and drank. A lot. No really, a LOT. Red wine barf is one of the most disgusting things in the world.
Sunday morning:
10am: woke up feeling like I spent the night drinking too much and barfing my brains out. realized that's exactly what happened. noticed that the door to my room was closed, which meant the cleaning lady had come in and found me sprawled on the bed half naked. great. texted ben thanks for delivering my drunken ass home in one piece. passed out immediately after.
1:00pm: woke up to find the cleaning lady gone and myself still half-naked sprawled on the bed. took a shower and headed out to go hiking, of all things!
2:30pm: realize that my idea of hiking (leisurely stroll along flat ground) is NOT my hiking buddy's idea of hiking (see photo below). when i breathe out, i can feel the alcohol stinging my nose. this can't be good.
4:30pm: reach the summit of the hike. by now, most of the alcohol has been sweated out and discover that death-defying hikes are a good hangover cure.
5:30pm: sauna.
7:00pm: hour-long foot massage.
8:00pm: back home. sleep like a rock.
Monday morning:
off to observe a court proceeding (stay of execution hearing pending hearing of appeal of summary judgment).
Met up with my newfound, really chill as hell friends and drank. A lot. No really, a LOT. Red wine barf is one of the most disgusting things in the world.
Sunday morning:
10am: woke up feeling like I spent the night drinking too much and barfing my brains out. realized that's exactly what happened. noticed that the door to my room was closed, which meant the cleaning lady had come in and found me sprawled on the bed half naked. great. texted ben thanks for delivering my drunken ass home in one piece. passed out immediately after.
1:00pm: woke up to find the cleaning lady gone and myself still half-naked sprawled on the bed. took a shower and headed out to go hiking, of all things!
2:30pm: realize that my idea of hiking (leisurely stroll along flat ground) is NOT my hiking buddy's idea of hiking (see photo below). when i breathe out, i can feel the alcohol stinging my nose. this can't be good.
4:30pm: reach the summit of the hike. by now, most of the alcohol has been sweated out and discover that death-defying hikes are a good hangover cure.
5:30pm: sauna.
7:00pm: hour-long foot massage.
8:00pm: back home. sleep like a rock.
Monday morning:
off to observe a court proceeding (stay of execution hearing pending hearing of appeal of summary judgment).
Sunday, June 12, 2005
Saturday, June 11, 2005
Last night I ate sushi and then went bar-hopping, ending up at 3am at a foot massage place in Causeway Bay called Big Bucket. You sit in oversized loungers while soaking your feet in big buckets of hot water. The hour-long foot massage was amazing. I giggled my way through most of it.
Got home around 4:30am and fell straight to sleep. Woke up this morning at 11 and headed to an Indian dance class. It was a lot of fun, and a great workout, even if I danced with the grace of a club-footed drunken penguin.
I found a charming alley right by my apartment that is an open-air market during the daytime. They sell all sorts of produce, seafood and meat. I bought an eggplant, some Chinese broccoli, a bag of shallots, two lemons, a papaya, and two gorgeous tomatoes for about US $3.00. I wasn't brave enough to buy meat from them yet--there are several butchers who hang their meat up on big hooks and slice off a piece for you.
The fishmongers display their dismembered fish on styrofoam trays, expertly butchered so that you can see the fish's heart still beating even as its body lay in pieces.
Got home around 4:30am and fell straight to sleep. Woke up this morning at 11 and headed to an Indian dance class. It was a lot of fun, and a great workout, even if I danced with the grace of a club-footed drunken penguin.
I found a charming alley right by my apartment that is an open-air market during the daytime. They sell all sorts of produce, seafood and meat. I bought an eggplant, some Chinese broccoli, a bag of shallots, two lemons, a papaya, and two gorgeous tomatoes for about US $3.00. I wasn't brave enough to buy meat from them yet--there are several butchers who hang their meat up on big hooks and slice off a piece for you.
The fishmongers display their dismembered fish on styrofoam trays, expertly butchered so that you can see the fish's heart still beating even as its body lay in pieces.
Thursday, June 09, 2005
it's raining outside and i'm loving it. strangely enough, my friendster horoscope told me to bring an umbrella out today.
i am in the process of listening (or at least beginning to listen) to each and every one of the 3923 songs on my iPod. Right now I'm on number 759. It's The Beegees's "How Deep is Your Love."
On the subway ride back from work today, I caught myself shimmying and tapping my feet, because Michael Jackson's "Thriller" was on. Who can resist tapping their feet to that song? Certainly not I.
Since the jury's out, I will venture to call the verdict: Not Guilty on the child molestation charges, but guilty on the misdemeanor charge of giving alcohol to a minor. Just a guess--I'll be surprised whatever the outcome.
i am in the process of listening (or at least beginning to listen) to each and every one of the 3923 songs on my iPod. Right now I'm on number 759. It's The Beegees's "How Deep is Your Love."
On the subway ride back from work today, I caught myself shimmying and tapping my feet, because Michael Jackson's "Thriller" was on. Who can resist tapping their feet to that song? Certainly not I.
Since the jury's out, I will venture to call the verdict: Not Guilty on the child molestation charges, but guilty on the misdemeanor charge of giving alcohol to a minor. Just a guess--I'll be surprised whatever the outcome.
do i look like a terrorist?
Do I?
Because there doesn't seem to be any other reason why my best friends at the Hong Kong Immigration Department would want me to jump through so many damned hoops in order to get an extension of my work visa.
I guess I shouldn't complain though--I'm sure the U.S. immigration process is much worse.
Because there doesn't seem to be any other reason why my best friends at the Hong Kong Immigration Department would want me to jump through so many damned hoops in order to get an extension of my work visa.
I guess I shouldn't complain though--I'm sure the U.S. immigration process is much worse.
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
listening to Louis Armstrong's "Dream a little dream of me."
went out to Wanchai yesterday, watched some friends play pool. didn't drink because i have been drinking too much lately. ended up in a very, very seedy bar that kind of freaked me out, what with all the prostitutes and all, so I left. The place just isn't the same when you're not blind-drunk.
the star of a long string of recurring dreams i had last night was grey goose vodka. someone had invented a way to make the label some sort of LCD screen sticker, where geese cascaded down in an endless stream, iridiscent and changing color from white to blue, even bright pink. everywhere i went in my dreams, all night, there was a bottle of grey goose vodka.
sweet dreams till sunbeams find you
sweet dreams that leave all worries behind you
but in your dreams whatever they be
dream a little dream of me
went out to Wanchai yesterday, watched some friends play pool. didn't drink because i have been drinking too much lately. ended up in a very, very seedy bar that kind of freaked me out, what with all the prostitutes and all, so I left. The place just isn't the same when you're not blind-drunk.
the star of a long string of recurring dreams i had last night was grey goose vodka. someone had invented a way to make the label some sort of LCD screen sticker, where geese cascaded down in an endless stream, iridiscent and changing color from white to blue, even bright pink. everywhere i went in my dreams, all night, there was a bottle of grey goose vodka.
sweet dreams till sunbeams find you
sweet dreams that leave all worries behind you
but in your dreams whatever they be
dream a little dream of me
Monday, June 06, 2005
illiterate literature major
Today was my first day at work. It's so funny feeling like an illiterate fool...I can't read any of the signs posted anywhere, get the "send" and "cancel" buttons reversed on the fax machine, and have to get someone else to type in people's Chinese names for me on documents.
Another thing I am surprised at is the almost universal weakness of handshakes around these parts. I feel like I'm breaking their fingerbones. It goes like this: both of us reach out to shake hands, and while I have just begun a firm, don't-mess-with-me-i-am-small-but-i-will-CRUSH-you shake, I realize that they have commenced the why-you-precious-lotus-blossom-i-am-sure-your-hands-are-made-of-jelly-hence-i-will-emulate-that-consistency-with-my-own-hand shake, causing me to immediately withdraw pressure to compensate for the disequilibrium of handshaking force. This results in a strange, dual-phase handshake on my part, starting out firm and ending weakly. Not a very good impression either way.
It's good to be thrown in the midst of law I don't understand. Makes me grope around for similarities and reinforces my own knowledge through comparing the differences.
Today, I drafted a will. I didn't tell them I haven't taken Wills & Trusts yet.
Another thing I am surprised at is the almost universal weakness of handshakes around these parts. I feel like I'm breaking their fingerbones. It goes like this: both of us reach out to shake hands, and while I have just begun a firm, don't-mess-with-me-i-am-small-but-i-will-CRUSH-you shake, I realize that they have commenced the why-you-precious-lotus-blossom-i-am-sure-your-hands-are-made-of-jelly-hence-i-will-emulate-that-consistency-with-my-own-hand shake, causing me to immediately withdraw pressure to compensate for the disequilibrium of handshaking force. This results in a strange, dual-phase handshake on my part, starting out firm and ending weakly. Not a very good impression either way.
It's good to be thrown in the midst of law I don't understand. Makes me grope around for similarities and reinforces my own knowledge through comparing the differences.
Today, I drafted a will. I didn't tell them I haven't taken Wills & Trusts yet.
Sunday, June 05, 2005
Sometimes when I'm wandering around Hong Kong, in some back alley, squeezing papayas at fruit stands and recoiling from the chicken feet on styrofoam pallets set out for sale, or just staring up, up, up at the buildings all around me, I think:
What the hell am I doing here? How did I end up here?
A few years ago I made it a personal goal of mine to constantly push my own boundaries. Law school was a result of that decision, and even though I'm always complaining about it, I can't deny that it's been a real eye-opener for me. The decision to work abroad this summer, instead of going the summer associate route in california, is likewise a product of my desire to do things differently--to put myelf in unexpected situations and see how much I can grow. It's also why I am, at the end of my internships, packing one small backpack and travelling for two weeks in search of whatever in laos, cambodia, and northern thailand.
Sometimes though, I wonder of this wanderlust is not in fact a form of escapism, in which case my perceived courage is instead cowardice at facing up to the inevitable routine I will have to settle in to at some point in life-probably sooner than later.
It's going to be an amazing adventure this summer.
What the hell am I doing here? How did I end up here?
A few years ago I made it a personal goal of mine to constantly push my own boundaries. Law school was a result of that decision, and even though I'm always complaining about it, I can't deny that it's been a real eye-opener for me. The decision to work abroad this summer, instead of going the summer associate route in california, is likewise a product of my desire to do things differently--to put myelf in unexpected situations and see how much I can grow. It's also why I am, at the end of my internships, packing one small backpack and travelling for two weeks in search of whatever in laos, cambodia, and northern thailand.
Sometimes though, I wonder of this wanderlust is not in fact a form of escapism, in which case my perceived courage is instead cowardice at facing up to the inevitable routine I will have to settle in to at some point in life-probably sooner than later.
It's going to be an amazing adventure this summer.
Friday, June 03, 2005
homesick
How much does a man live, after all?
Does he live for a thousand days, or one only?
For a week, or for several centuries?
How long does a man spend dying?
What does it mean to say “for ever?”
--Pablo Neruda
Perhaps I travel as much as I do because I feel that when I am displaced…is the only time I am truly living. Yet, after so much time in different places, where does one place the point of reference from which one is displaced?
Where is home for me now?
Traveling to new places, wandering around cities where nobody knows me…the anonymity makes me feel alive. But I am also struck with a longing for a constant place, one that disappeared somehow between leaving my parent’s house, perhaps stuffed in some cardboard box during a move from apartment to apartment—a place that perhaps exists now only in my heart—a place to call home.
Does he live for a thousand days, or one only?
For a week, or for several centuries?
How long does a man spend dying?
What does it mean to say “for ever?”
--Pablo Neruda
Perhaps I travel as much as I do because I feel that when I am displaced…is the only time I am truly living. Yet, after so much time in different places, where does one place the point of reference from which one is displaced?
Where is home for me now?
Traveling to new places, wandering around cities where nobody knows me…the anonymity makes me feel alive. But I am also struck with a longing for a constant place, one that disappeared somehow between leaving my parent’s house, perhaps stuffed in some cardboard box during a move from apartment to apartment—a place that perhaps exists now only in my heart—a place to call home.
Getting off the ferry from Hong Kong, I was approached by a number of taxi drivers and bicycle-with-carriages-behind-them operators offering me tours of the city. One old man was particularly persistent so I ended up paying him HK$50 to take me to the ruins of St. Paul. HK$120 would have gotten me a 2-hour tour of the city, but as I was riding in the carriage, I quickly realized I had made a good decision not to do the 2-hour tour. The poor old guy was sweating profusely and clearly laboring under the effort and the oppressive heat. I could feel the stares of passerby, probably wondering what kind of heartless soul—clearly an American!—would make this poor old man drag her around town in a bike carriage. I wanted to stop him but I didn’t want to offend him, since he was telling me how he had been doing this for many decades. Luckily the church wasn’t too far away. I slinked off the carriage in embarrassment.
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