A Good Year

I would become a musician just so I can write a song about Sundays. Perfect Sundays are sleep in Sundays, make brunch Sundays, read a book Sundays, clean your apartment Sundays, two hours in the coffee house Sundays, dinner at your favorite Vietnamese restaurant Sundays, Hutong Sundays. It's been a year of good Sundays, and, when you have a moment to stop and breathe, you realize, it's been a good spring, a good summer, a good autumn, and a good winter.

In the spring I got kissed under the CCTV tower, and it felt like the Eiffel Tower from the fifth dimension, and even though it was concrete blocks all around us, and even though my heart was crushed for the first time in my life, there's nothing like the feeling of love at first sight.

Summer was -- what a bloody, hot mess. All I remember about summer was staying up way too late, drinking way too much, and climbing into a taxi way too early to work. Summer was being on the back of motorbikes, plucked yellow flowers, Hutong labyrinths, shared silences, and feeling seventeen. If I could write about all the moments in between, summer of you and I would be it.

Autumn was celebration and goodbyes. We were stuck in a typhoon in Shanghai and in the hotel lobby, we talked about youth, and zines, and hopes, and dreams, and bigness, and overreaching, and catalogues, and ideas, and schemes, and that moment, that moment was the birth of something great. From that moment, we faced challenges against time and money and ideas and I remember slumping against your desk, "can we really do it? we can't really do it can we? my god." But we did. Autumn was a milestone. Autumn was seeing visions and ideas transform into paper, and form, and rock hard reality. Whatever becomes of you and I, and of this partnership, we will always have autumn and greatness of two passionate people coming together.

Winter followed autumn, and all the goodbyes that accompanied the season. All of a sudden I calm down, and cook, and breathe. It's nice. It's the best I've been. All I want is kindness, and thoughtfulness, and more mindfulness for you, and I, and in the new year together, I hope all of us will be grow a little stronger, a little more sincere, and most of all, embrace all it is that we have given each other.

Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence

Spending Christmas in bed with a fever, in a lot of pain, and alone isn't exactly how I pictured this go around. Say it with me.

I will never drink again. I will never eat meat again. I will never breathe second-hand smoke again. I will never put myself in a position where I have to drink, eat meat, and breathe second-hand smoke again.

I wish I could say this is post-party syndrome. That we stayed up till four in the morning and were too drunk to realize we kissed the wrong people. I wish I could say in a perpetual effort to lose weight, it's really nice to not be able to keep food down. But alas, no, the truth is less glamorous. The truth is two days before Christmas I've vomited out all the hopes and dreams and disillusions I have of this place. That is all fine and good, but trust me, I will never ever, ever, put myself in a position for work, or otherwise, where idiots drink shots of expensive wine. I'm done.

Merry Christmas and All That

A moment, if you will, for every Christmas or Chinese New Year's you miss. In Ohio I used to stare into the January cold and think about all the extended family gatherings I was missing. Some 10 years later I'm staring into the December skies of Beijing, past the misplaced Christmas decorations spilling out of malls, and I'm thinking of New York, and all I want to do is watch Breakfast at Tiffany's and cry. Someone very important to me and to a lot of people is getting married soon. I learn of this on Christmas morning, and joy is the only word I have sitting here across the world. She is mentor, role model, generous, thoughtful, brilliant, a woman of impact and more than anyone I know, deserves a happiness that is wholly her own. Joy is the only word.

As for me, even though talks of "marriage," "love," and "dating" seem to be getting the second most hits after "work," "clients," and "proposal," I have as much desire as a nun. I don't want to deal with innuendos and men interested in whatever they see in me. I'm taking at least a whole day this New Year's to lie very still in bed, and read, because, I'm tired, god I'm tired (again). I don't know if it's a problem if the only time I feel alive is when I'm with you.

Merry Christmas, you and you and you.

You Remind Me of Someone

To him I said, "you remind me of someone," and before I finish my thought, he'd already guessed whom. Patterns are interesting. The more people you get to know, the more adept you are at figuring out their motivations. What was once mystery becomes a story that belongs to the collective human experience, or morphs into an insecurity or revealing characteristic that makes them human. Flaws are good. We played a game of pointing out each other's flaws for the purpose of figuring out the puzzle pieces, but in a way, it's like what had been deduced so long ago, having flaws, and admitting to them out loud, makes us all a little bit more three-dimensional.

I've always loved people. He says, as a flaw, or as a compliment to his cynicism, "you're easily impressed." I confess it makes me vain, or careless with my inability to have time to maintain so many relationships, but this genuine appreciation, and interest in everyone and anyone, will always be something that I cherish deeply. So as we sit, and as I watch this all too familiar face, and as I confront him, I feel a certain pride that swells from deep within. It is nice to grow, and it is nice to confront, bravely, all our strengths and flaws.

I have grown leaps and bounds in the past year, and the woman emerging from the chaos, is someone who is in control, who has a deeper understanding of herself through an better understanding of others. I believe empathy will always be the strongest possession we have as humans. It took a lot of loss to gain this knowledge, but I am deeply in debt to every person who has sat across from me and looked me in the eye, who pushed me, or was ambivalent of me, or was kind to me.

This mad place, with all its wonders, has given me so much. I'm humbled by every moment.

Hoppípolla

Finally you find the people you're supposed to be with. Finally.

Stargazer Girl

It is amazing what switching your Adium status from various versions of "busy" and "working" to "available" can do for you. If I'd known this meant I'd catch up with friends with whom I don't have a long email chain relationship with, then I'd done it sooner (of course, this all hinges upon one's availability while working, as that's the only time I'm really on Adium). Well, the few days of lull that I'd enjoyed before another waterfall of work was indulged in a healthy amount of reading, Wong Fu Productions watching (Philip Wang you gorgeous cute cute man), and an afternoon of chatting all made me wonder why I chose for life to be a series of battles, instead of well, basking. Of course, this so says the girl, who with a few days of lull, went around the office brief in panic, whispering, "ahh, I'm kind of bored." My boss is a genius. I have been programmed to think overtime is norm, and feel guilty when I'm in between projects. His ability in general in allowing us to take ownership in the company impresses me, if it wasn't for the fact that most of the time we're running around like blind bees trying to complete a project. I wish I could have had a serious conversation with him today when we talked about the future direction of the company, but my brain was too fixed on a not-yet-finished proposal downstairs, and all the details that needed to be kneaded, and all the tasks that needed to be delegated.

But instead of work and men (which is all I talk about in this personal blog, who the hell still keeps a person blog btw), I'd like to talk about Wong Fu Productions real quick. I want to talk about how they are genius and great not because they necessary do spectacular work (although, in some respects, they do, and they're like, how old?), but because their choice of work is niche and fulfills a market need that is so obvious, and because they are so genuine, and their work so positive, and relatable. Love, at a level with issues that we can all identity, laid out in laymen terms, none of this artsy bullshit. All of this in the backdrop of the Asian-American life, bam, genius. I always watch these So-Cal kids with envy, thinking it would have been wonderful to have belonged in a crew of nerdy Asians. My So-Cal friends have had opinions otherwise, but WFP paints a picture that is clearly too idyllic for my own good. All a girl needs is a Phil Wang. I have no idea why I'm still not tired of ABCs.

The whole point of this entry was to write a few poetic lines about a friend, who I just had a conversation about life and love, but I just got way too tired. This entry is also delirious because my brain is fried from 16+ hours of work today... and I'm vomiting words to decompress and lighten the weight. Cheers cheers.

Till next time, I'll tell you a story of a friend.

Yourself and Others

Two of my best friends are leaving this city. I try my best to prolong any moment I might have with them, be it a text message, a hug, or an excuse to have another conversation--because, no matter how kindred of spirits you thought you were, distance always wins, and times like this will fade. It's like she said, in the end, you are dependent on yourself for inner strength, no matter how wonderful the people around you are. Dating is tragic, because in the beginning, you both have so much, so much to share, so much to be sleepless about, and you think you've found a kindred spirit, and for whatever small reasons you have to part, in the end all you lose is a friend. He said, but you have to pick and choose, you only have enough strength to play the nice guy. You have to choose like there's a playlist in front of you. You have to choose to nurture your relationships.

Stage 2

My boss said I'm different, and my co-worker, "you're like high, but in a serene way." I do feel serene, having molded into a routine of biking, cooking, working, reading, so much reading, but the very idea that I'm so different from say, a month ago, is maybe enough of a indicator that stability is far from me, and that's ok. I'm enjoying the seasons. I'm enjoying hearing the rustling of leaves, to have friends over to just read and not talk. I'm enjoying cooking so we don't have to drag our ass out into the cold. I'm enjoying good whiskey in the living room. I'm enjoying hopping out and be at a friend's place in 10 minutes, watching her draw in the Hutongs. It's quiet here. How nice that it is so quiet here.

A very close friend has left, and another will leave in two weeks. In a way, I'm reluctant to replace them. I'm no longer the girl who earnestly attend every function I get invited to, or indeed, seek out social gatherings. If I could, I'd rather stay home and read and draw all day.

Yes, a good state of mind, no?

Two Moons

Goodbye You and I have not been very kind to each other. I have not been very kind to you, and in turn, you have not been very kind to me. In the beginning, we were only two vulnerable people sharing a walk to nowhere. In the end, I've grown too much to bear your world. But that's okay. Sometimes, the best moments in life are walks to nowhere. They don't even have to be walks by side by side. We never did, in fact, walk side by side. We were always strides apart, until I sprinted away. I will only remember the best moments, only the romance, the moments where you moved me like a novel or a scene from a good movie and a taste of good wine. I will remember smashed cigarettes, a fleeting, sad smile, and I will remember the music, and I will absolutely remember the tree where you dove, and there were no words.

Thank you, and goodbye. I wish you well. I wish you take your hopes and dreams, and make heartbreaking things out of them. I hope you kill the rage, get rid of that chip in the shoulder, and love again like you really believed in it.

Goodbye

There are many goodbyes here. This city is stitched by goodbyes, farewell parties, and temporary friends. His leaving hits hard. I was on my bike and having those "last time" moments. Last time turning a left to his apartment. Last time signing in at the door. Last time ringing this doorbell. Last time seeing that smile on his face. The hardest thing though, the hardest thing is that it's not him, it's them, the both of them, like a blip in memory, may fade into night, like they're finally climbing out of the world of 1Q84, back to normality, and on nights on my own, would I wonder: did we ever exist?

We did. Thank you for the love.

Goodbye

After two years, I'm finally finished with 1Q84. I'd held off on volume III for two years because a friend who was a staunch Murakami fan said: volume III felt like somebody else wrote it. Maybe it was the length of  time it took to finish it, but the slog of 1000+ pages paced over the span of two years -- worked. It really isn't the type of book you ingest in one sitting. It's the type of book you read, sitting in the nook by your window, looking across your apartment complex to observe your neighbors like 牛河 or 青豆 did. All the criticisms of the book, that it's too long, too slow, too repetitive, I get, but like one of those annoying art movies where the scenes are too slow and closeups too many, there is beauty in the excruciating as the three characters raced to their fated ends.

Like slowly swallowing bullet. That's what reading this book felt like, whether that's good thing or not, the images stay.

China, you're my 1Q84, one day we might sort each other out. Until then, kisses.

Happy Refrain

 

When he turned and looked at me and said "New York?" and I nodded back with a smile, "_New York_" I knew right there and then that someday, oh someday, I'll be back to you, my New York, with a lot more love and even more heart than before. Believe me.

Contentment is a strange thing. You find it inadvertently, maybe it's always been there in your lap but you didn't, couldn't notice it, because you were too preoccupied by work, and parties, and rage. Then one day you calm down, ride your bike, and all you know is that bundle of joy, and it is a joy that blooms from deep within, not even by the number of wonderful people you know, have gotten to know, but an inward feeling of: yes, I'm singinggg in the rain.

I am... happy. Like, cheesy, Disney-cloud happy. Like, a happiness made of layers of mesh and fiber that all together, is unbreakable. Like, the type of happiness that you hang onto in remembrance of all the memories, and all the good people you've known and touched, and have touched you.

Happiest Thanksgiving to family, friends, near and far.

My Best Friend's Wedding

Your best friend from grade school gets married. You go to the wedding in your hometown only 30 minutes by train. She lives in the same apartment that you used to always knock on as an eight-year-old -- right after lunch at home, you'd both ride to school, always. You didn't know the meaning of best friends until you met her in second grade. When you get to her apartment almost 20 years later, when you knock on that same door, when you walk into her room and see her again, your heart breaks a little. Pieces.

You'd never been the type of girl to care for weddings. You'd never collected clippings or a Pinterest for wedding ideas. You'd never even dreamed about the big day when you're swept off of your feet. Then you see her, darling and dolled up. It reminded you the first time you met her. She had such a kind, pretty face.

You hung out all the time as kids. You secretly took pride in the fact that you were the two prettiest girls in class, or so you thought. Well, maybe you have your off days, but she was, had always been, and on this day, the most beautiful. On the day before you left for America, you spent a whole afternoon with her trekking across Nankai, your stomping ground. You don't even remember what you'd talked about, but it was like being outside yourself, watching two little girls standing tall, grabbing onto each other and already worlds apart.

You wrote letters. You wrote letters and you wrote letters. Letters were precious those days, and hearing from her always felt like a tug from a parallel universe. You lived your life. She lived her life.

In a way, being apart kept you together.

Regularity

All of a sudden you calm down. You read books. You go to bed by 11 and wake up by 6. You become obsessed with cleaning. You start cooking with recipes in hand. You really like fluffy scrambled eggs. You go to work early. You read books related to work. You read fiction. You spend as much time as you can with one of your best friends leaving in less than 16 days. Your conversations largely revolve around his girlfriend that you both love. You live vicariously through that love. You like living vicariously, because it seems 10x more real than love on your own. Your friend says you love everyone and no one. You're in love with love. Then you get bored, and you become cold, and you start to like cats. You almost, almost took one in, and if it weren't for the fact that she meowed all night, you really may have just done it. You called her Minako. Even the office cat likes you more, because she could tell that you changed. The office cat's name, Xiao Bi,  is homonym for "Little Cunt." You're still not sure whether it's a boy or girl, but you can stroke it now with all the calm in the world. Your friend calls you "keener" because you're waking up early, and eating healthy, and cleaning, and biking, and turning in work on time. He's a sloth on the other hand, not the deadly sin, but the one that clings onto trees. He looks like Buddha and occasionally the Madonna. You tell him he has a face that needs to be drawn by a 17th century painter. A large expressive face with big water pools for eyes and a half-smile that could rival Mona Lisa's secrets. His description made you feel old, like you've given up on being young. Instead you're too busy honing yourself, burying your head in books, loving in a different way.

Your body loves you. You have no idea how you sustained a lifestyle where you drank until 4AM and woke up at 9AM to do more work. You kind of miss it, but you kind of don't.

Beloved

Just got the first draft for our short short documentary for 本能 PAPER INSTINCT. It looks good, with much much gratitude to friends, without whom this will not be possible. In the space of four minutes looking at this, I am simply thankful to my job, my boss, my co-workers, and hours of overtime. Hard work pays off. Hard work pays off. There were moments in this journey when he and I were on the verge of giving up. I remember it so clearly, hunched by his desk, we asked ourselves, "Can we really do this? Is this really possible? Is it a dream?" Then the inexplicable weixin message that came late at night: 我们要留名北京设计周! 十一黄金周全国旅游的大婶大叔小孩学生都要走过我的展览! 我们的*。妈了个逼的!

That was that. I know we're young and naive. I know the hours don't ever seem enough. I know I'm married to my job, but everyday I'm thankful deep down inside. I'm thankful for coming to Beijing, for all the people I've met here. Just the other day, sitting at Re's home, we counted off nationalities around the circle, and there were 7 different countries represented between 8 people. Not even in New York is there diversity like this, but what's more important is this collective zen for something more, more than what is predictable, to be in a roller coaster life that is China.

Next up at work is Johnnie Walker. Excited, just.... excited.

Sniffing yadong with my taxi driver

So I really like that they give you these giant straws for your drink like it's absolutely foul to drink from the bottle, and while I'm sucking on this herbal fruit tea concoction that promises to "bring down the fire," I watched this dog that's been passed out on the floor like he's dead or deliriously happy. All the cats and dogs I've seen in Bangkok are always passed out from the heat, and, I hope, deliriously happy. The heat is nice. It's like a constant hug, deliriously happy.

As for the people, well one thing you gotta remember is that the king really is everywhere. I went to the Art & Culture center, and half of the Thai art history timeline seemed to be about the King, i.e., and in 1970, King Bhumibol really got into painting, five years later, really into sculpture. But it really is hard to not like a king who speaks four languages, plays jazz with Benny Goodman, and looks damn good in round spectacles.

Everyone besides the king seems nicer and more Buddhist than the Chinese. I'm retracting my spikes and littering thank yous with a smile like a bad American habit. Must fortify spikes so as to not get jibbed back in the mainland, a girl's gotta be tough in the Jing, either that or be a pale delicate flower.

I'm kind of enjoying relying on gestures and stupid English. When people ask me where I'm from, I still find myself saying China, though the American inside me swells a bit too. My taxi driver said he only knew four words in Chinese, and he proceeded on saying them with the enthusiasm of a twelve-year-old: ni hao, xie xie, zai jian, and ke ai! He looked young himself, maybe my age, is that still young? He keeps on giving me mint candy and rubs yadong, this palm oil that's slightly sweeter than fengyoujing on my hand. "Put against nose." He instructed, and repeated this four more times before we reach my destination, each time with smirk.

We listened to the latest Lady Gaga featuring Beyonce that sounded exactly like the old Gaga to me. He's singing to it and I remember the days when I used to fall asleep to the radio, and now I have no idea whether the latest Gaga got flack from Pitchfork or not. So this is when you know you're getting old.

"Ke ai!" I laughed. "How to say ke ai in Thai?" This is what I mean by stupid English.

"Norak," he laughed back then pointed at me, "norak like you."

This was when I regret not kissing a few more Italian boys in my life, and also my Thai taxi driver who knew long ass sentences in English but only four Chinese words.

Beastie

This urge ain't healthy. I haven't touched a drop of alcohol or man for two weeks, and while that's fine and all, while it's liberating to write a dozen letters to buddies, ten dozen words to the blog and Field Notes, read three books and sketch buddhist temples, I fear a backlash coming soon. It gets especially bad at night, when the playlist swings from some hipster croon and drops to a club beat. I get a little itchy and antsy. Beijing has made me into a beast, ready to burst and rage. Most of the times I just want to be a man, so I can sit with my legs uncrossed, wear a wife beater, glide on my longboard, smoke a bunch, pick up women. Maybe my perception of men has gotten a little skewed (you think?), but that's all I thought about while shuffling down Patong, leaving without much more than a furtive glance at the go go bars.

Bangkok's famed red light district has now degenerated into a zoo, filled with tourist friendly vendors selling fake Rolexs by sun down. It's just as well, but whatever images I had fueled by fiction, it all comes down to the fact that walking down the streets of Bangkok, I just wanted to be a dude. None of this weird checking you out girl you so cute shit. Thai men are like the Italians of the east, and I like them, I like the nolas and I think they cute, but a girl just wants to feel real sometimes.

When I was 21 and he was 27 (and I'd thought he was so old), Ollie said once that you gotta cherish it, because one day this beauty will fade, and that's when you'll really feel sad, because no one's checking you out on the street, that's when you know it's all gone. I get that too, I do. But for once it'd be nice to switch the roles so I can check out some fine ass without hiding it, pick em up, pick em up, play some games, use what God gave you.

Don't let the beast eat you alive.

I can't wait to turn 30.

Can't Sleep or Won't Sleep

Can't sleep or won't sleep, thinking about that wakeup call at 6:30 to take on the Bangkok Chinatown. That's what'll always do you in you know, excitement. They say it's one of the last remaining real Chinatowns. They say it's the largest one in the world. In my brief memory from a walk with local friends, thats tonight, I recall a whirl of colors, people, food, smells, a whole lot of gold, shark fins, and charred surfaces. I recall my mouth dropping, and my mind forcing this scene down like a soul imprint. It's the kind of memory you want to keep forever, along with holy, that radiating smile of his, or fuck mate, the grace he puts in making steak, or I am a piece of shit, the way a man can shatter like that. It's a heartbreak. All heart and all break melting with the canvas that is Bangkok Chinatown, the last real big Chinatown in the world, with the gold and the shark fins and charred surfaces until I can only smile in absolute shock. This place sticks. It remembers. 

As for what's real and what's not, I'm not so sure anymore. I change my mind every other second. The deep revulsion I felt for this city as we drove deep into its concrete heart was only three days ago, the shock was like being fucked in the ass after a year of Beijing traffic, pollution, pressure, people. All the megapolis charm was lost on me the first day, and as we floated on the crowded sky train squeezing through the city, all I wanted was a resort with my Junot Diaz. 

A day later, i fell in love with the city. Literally, a boy at the noodle stall smiled, I think he's laughing at me for probably being the fiftieth foreigner with her Lonely Planet guide doing the food walk at Th Tanao and hell, that was the only way that I could have found his noodle dish. But he smiled in such a way that it was a heartbreak. The kind of smile you just don't find in China, so embracing, and kind, so very kind, a smile and nod that said all it needed to say: I got you girl, I got you.

Crater City, Elephant Building, and The One That Got Away

{The Elephant Building} …a 40 storey building that was being constructed in the mid 90’s. It was almost done when the Asian financial crisis hit and the construction had to be halted and was never finished. The bottom half of the building is in use but the top half is abandoned. To get to the roof you have to walk up 20 flights of stairs as there’s no working elevator past the first 18 floors. On the roof of this building is a overgrown rooftop garden, a pool covered with algae, a helicopter pad, and the most incredible city view that I’ve ever seen. In every direction there you can see to the horizon, and late at night the lights of Bangkok seem to stretch on forever. - Yuer in Bangkok, Summer 2008 Bangkok swelters like a crater city. If you told me all this heat and wonder was built on a large impact crater that collided seven years ago, that it's the simmering remnants from this meteorite -- zinc, iron, rock and metals that pave these streets -- I'd believe it in a heartbeat. This city is a post-apocalyptic scene, a metropolis racing to the future built on ashes. Crisscrossing between unfamiliar lanes and stalls, I get flashes of scenes from slick scifi visuals like Bebop or Tekken. A future that couldn't quite catch up with itself, a mesh of cultures old and new. The explosion of markets, traffic, people, motorcycles, decrepit buildings from a bygone era, modernized buildings next to stalls held by tarp.

This place is manic. It's coming undone at the seams, and yet, there's something deeply deeply serene and humane about it. I'd probably burst with it, if I could make any sense of it. But, reflections should be saved for later, maybe in front of the computer back at the desk job, or in a handshake with a client, when a sudden and consuming urge for the heat, the city jungle, seizes.

Bangkok is build on memories. With every step I take, I think of the boy and girl who wrote endless emails on the ways of this world. Back in California and New York, she lived vicariously through his journey. His journey could be tracked over the map of Southeast Asia through Internet Cafes. Calls were made. Emails were written. She told him, hey, you go have fun, don't get stuck in Internet Cafes. He would reply, babe, I wouldn't be doing this if this isn't fun. Darling, babe, sweetie, and any other derivatives of affection always sounded so crass before him. She'd actually visibly flinched once overhearing her roommate in college. Because isn't it domestic. Isn't it so...old? Isn't it so...settled?

She called him by a nickname that was by no way a derivative. It was a nickname that he hated because it reminded him of some douche bag in high school, but the name stuck because she was selfish like that, and because he deserved more than babe, darling, sweetie.

Maybe what all great loves need is a great distance and a deadline. In California she paced all over San Francisco and Santa Cruz, met all sorts of hippies who said she looked like Guanyin while she chewed on what stood before them. To go, to not go, to go, to not. He moved too, the most beautiful boy she'd ever met. He'd moved with the audacity to take on continents, devour food and books, endure long hours of bus and trains rides, drank like a dirty expat, and at the end of it all, romanced via Skype at rundown Internet Bars to find her across the world.

He said, I could probably write a guide to the best Internet Cafes across South East Asia. She said "no" to drinks and "no" to new friends in order to cradle a phone instead in New York. She had no idea what love was, but it probably happened sometime during the long email chains on Laos and Jungle Beach.

Maybe what all great loves need is an expiration date. So we raced against time. So we loved against tides. So we broke at the seam, when continents finally took it apart, and maybe that's fine, because in Bangkok City, I see the boy and girl together. She's piling on the street food. She's praying in the temples. She's trekking everywhere, nowhere, pressing memories that will always remain, and will always be loved.

The Luckiest One

Greatest Birthday EVER. Thank you Joan & Banning, I love you guys. Thank you Ronald, best partner in crime ever. We don't hug enough. Thank you JJ, for still being so boss and Johnnie Walker, even though I know tomorrow I'm gonna complain about it. I still have so much to learn from you. Thank you Chris, for being the best ex-boyfriend ever. I LOVE YOU. Thank you WIFE, see you tomorrow. People are great.

The Taco Attack

It all started with tacos.

I had to have it, have it like I had it too easy living four blocks away from the best street for Mexican food in New York. Any late night taco cart would do on Fifth Avenue, Brooklyn. Problem was, this is Beijing, and finding good Mexican food is as hard as finding a good man. All week I had been bugging my expat friends about tacos, dropping the idea during dinner conversations, slipping it in while they sip on their drinks, prodding gently during cigarette breaks... "How about them tacos...?" Until finally, it took a fellow New Yorker to take the bait, and we set out, entirely unplanned, to find this crazy hidden taco joint owned by some guy who used to live in Texas that I'd read about on some food blog a long time ago.

"How about them tacos," came New Yorker friend's text on an unsuspecting Sunday night. "Yes, I think it's on #9 Dongsishitiao." I texted back, this all based on the fallacy of somebody's Foursquare info.

New Yorker friend corroborated that his friend just went yesterday and said it was the best tacos she's had in Beijing.

"OMG tacos okay let's meet up. I come by bike!"

10 minutes before our meeting time, I was turning on Dongsishitiao when two dudes on motorbikes ripped my phone from my jacket pocket. The robber had a quick hand and light touch. I almost didn't notice it if it weren't for my bad habit of listening to music while biking too fast. All of a sudden the music stopped and I'm standing at the intersection with my white handphones dangling in thin air. I watched the two guys speed away. The guy on the back, presumedly the one who had my phone/Internet/gps/camera/ipod/weibo/email/LIFE tucked warmly in his jacket looked back with the most unaffected expression -- no glee, no guilt, no glint in his eye, no evil cackling, nothing.

I'll remember that look. I'll remember his middle aged face, his sunken eyes, and the wisps of hair while I considered chasing them down and the slightest possibility that my bike might morph into a batmobile so I can bamboozle, bazooka, and bat the shit out of these motherfuckers. But I'm no catwoman. I was a woman on a mission to find tacos, and all of a sudden I was left without a phone, Internet, or GPS, and worst of all, after a couple of loops, #9 Dongsishitiao did not exist.

My friend later said, yup, no #9, no tacos, no Qing Qing. While he was circling around for the mysterious #9 in the labyrinth of Hutongs before confirming with his friend that oh... it was actually in another Hutong a couple blocks away, I was oddly serene. Angry. reeling, shellshocked, yes, but my brain secretly enjoyed being finally woken. The events that proceeded were as mundane as dirty laundry, except this story didn't take place in 1998.

1) After giving up asking poor old Chinese grandmas about a "small taco restaurant," I suddenly realize that I was... 2) Right in front of another friend's apartment complex who's from L.A. and liked tacos. What if he knows?! Of course he would know? What if he's home? Should I just knock on his door? Is that a faux paux without calling first? 3) Five minutes later, a door swung open and he's all confused and I'm all hahaha sorry and he's all you're crazy and I'm all where is this taco place?!?! and he drew this nifty map. It was all great, except it's definitely not #9 Dongsishitiao and I was so late. 4) 15 minutes later, I biked home, ran up six flights of stairs, and wrote an email to New Yorker friend. "Phone stolen, call my landline." 5) When I realized my friend had a landline in this new apartment that I took over for her, I remember thinking "what a waste of space..." I didn't like things that weren't functional and shoved the phone in a corner. When it rang for the first time since I moved in, I thought a ghost was shaking me alive, hallelujah! 6) I told him my address. He showed up later, calling my landline saying he's here. I ran all the way downstairs. No one there. I ran all the way back up. "Where are you?!" "I'm here?" "I don't see you?! Ok I'm gonna shout from my window, stay on the street." "HEY!!!!!!" 7) "Hey!" He shouted back, a shadow of a figure emerging beneath canopied trees.

I got you. I really did. Not through a million digital bits through iMessage or Weibo. I got you face to face, feet planted, knocks on door, with all you can eat tacos.

Welcome back to the dumb phone life.

Damn Son

Becoming evil was never quite apart of the plan. Becoming evil is the three hundred pound gorilla descriptor I'd like to use to summarize all the other adjectives people have used to describe me: nonchalant, distant, regal, polished, cold, weird, careless. There's never been such a gap in my own perception of myself despite an unwavering phase of selfishness, but I'm pretty sure those adjectives are close to queen bee bitch at this point. I guess that's what being selfish is all about. In order to tone it down a notch, I'm going to practice the following:

1) Smile more 2) Read more 3) Work less

I kind of want to go back to New York for a little bit just to make sure that I'm still a real person. Was I even real in New York? Did we really sleep on a Ikea mattress pad for like, half a year and folded laundry as a Sunday afternoon ritual? Does that make us real? I met a friend of a good friend in New York and he talked about biking to Fort Tilden, living in Chinatown, and food trucks. It made him all flesh and bone. It made him not Beijing but New York, as if the sticker of permanence is still between Gramercy and Upper East Side. I wonder if that's partly why I love Joan so much, that some corner in my brain has programmed New York as home, and that I know one day I will curl up on her couch probably, back to the place where I had a role, a place, and where tacos are nearby.

All of a sudden I get what he means when Ryu said, "I wish we'd known each other in New York instead of Beijing, not this crazy place." It's appropriate that he forgot he ever said such a thing.

Everyone of us talk with so much ambition about living and working and striving in Beijing, but let's be honest, on some level we're all running away a little bit. On some level, we're not just looking for opportunities and help change things here. We're running away from Ohio, from New York, from stability. We're running away from parents, from the hurt, to pull revenge by being the best we could ever be. We're running away from dead ends, routine intersections, boredom and mediocrity. Does that make us cowards? No, I don't think so. I think it makes us a very deeply conflicted group of well-meaning, idealistic, lost kids who are too bold for our own good.

I want all of us to be ok. I want the idealists in all of us to be in tact even if we fall and break our pride and bruise our courage. We're too lucky not to.