回到過去 - haven’t really written much ever since getting back to LA, but this sums it up pretty well and reminds me of my own travels in korea and taiwan
end of quarter banquet was last night but only a select few people cried, myself not included. what i thought would be a cryfest turned out to be a camwhore sesh where i barely even ate because everyone either wanted to take a picture with me or wanted me to take it for them. it didn’t even hit me when lim lausu gave us a shoutout in taiwanese, or when zhang laoshi left. kind of hit when my favorite awkward teacher (li) left.. awkwardly.. but still not quite completely. doesn’t seem to have hit many others either. i guess we really are subconsciously active in escaping our realities, not quite wanting to wake up from this dream within a dream. and as lele and i were saying last night, the friendships we’ve made here were forged stronger through our mutual spirits of adventure. hence their progressions were quicker and escalated to such greater heights, but i believe like most friendships they are doomed to be short-lived, its growth stunted by distance. perhaps it’s enough to say that at one point in time, we were all shaped and influenced by the same people and situations. i’m going to miss this. thank you everyone for one helluva quarter!
last night in celebration of ending finals, we went to wax and luxy! highlights:
had a tiring but interesting trip to the south this weekend (台南＋台中＋彰化）
involved riding a boat for 30 min while a tour guide introduced local marine life on a loud ass loudspeaker for 30 min. landed at Cigu Lagoon and took some pictures, drew in the sand,
furthermore, saved Nick from tumbling to his death from the ridge of a salt mountain, saved nick from a motorcycle at FongJia nightmarket in 台中, stayed at the super luxurious/new/modern Beacon Hotel right in the center of the nightmarket，went to a rice castle where we made scarecrows, went to a famous temple (龍山寺）, and watched transformers 2, wanted, the mummy, ip man on the bus. commie narrated ip man for me the entire time <3 and thank god b/c i would’ve been pretty lost without it! can’t wait to see ip man 2 =D
while buying yam from a yam man near the temple, commie and i happened upon some insight. i took out a handful of change while the man was filling our box with honeyed yam. then we kept repeating “gin-kak-a! gin-kak-a!” trying to practice saying change (coins) in taiwanese. i then apologized to the man that i only had small change, to which he replied “沒關係，有小才有大” (in order to have it big, you must start small). we walked away with yam in our hands and wonder in our minds.
soo got to taipei 101 more than a couple minutes too late to make the last elevator going up, so ended up not going up.. will return on a later date b/c i feel weird living here for so many months and seeing the tower constantly looming somewhere within sight yet nevar having gone up…
today our taiwanese teacher 林老師 let us watch a movie (Monga) that has some taiwanese dialogue and some attractive taiwanese actors. she also fed us 牛肉麵、貢丸+青菜、水餃、蝦。。。 she even peeled the 蝦 for us!!! i wanted to cry when she did that for all of us.. she treats us like her own children and spoils the crap out of usss =’)
thenn after class, asen and i went to pick up a very pretty bouquet of flowers, buy my new canon ixus 105 BROWN, had dinner at MOS BURGER, then headed to 國家圖書館 （中正紀念堂 對面） to watch 林老師 ‘s choir performance. she was so cute on stage and we took hella stalker pics (super zoomed in with only you in it type pics that moms are exceptionally good at). afterwards, grabbed some grub at 永和豆漿 and now back at the dorm relatively early cuz we have to meet at the front gate at 7am tomorrow for our ICLP weekend trip to 台南+台中。
asen ka goa teh fb 上 ka-yi sia tai-gi , tiong-bun, spanish, … bo lang khoa e tioh goan teh kong sia-mih =) (除了 tai-gi kho^0 e peng-iu 以外）
today is 11/30 and my return flight is 12/30
we have 3 more weeks of school left and even though none of us are enjoying classes resuming after our 1 week off for thanksgiving, i’m pretty sure everyone is experiencing a bittersweet feeling because as soon as classes end, more and more of us will slowly board our flights back to our separate realities.
in this next month, going out with these amazing people will take priority over sleep, school, uploading korea pictures…
okay back to my daily morning cram sesh for class that begins in 1.5 hr lol. going to miss this. the greater the high, the harder the fall.
11/23/10
blogging from a city tour bus in gyeongju (a city in the southeast province of korea, ancient capital of silla kingdom from 57BC - 935AD, houses many historical relics therefore dubbed “museum without walls”)! just had a bibimbap lunch at a restaurant, now on our way to who knows where (the tour is conducted in koraen). this morning we visited the bulkhasan temple (gorg) and kinda got a taste of korean fury when we reassembled to get back on the bus 3 minutes past calltime and at the wrong gate..and the tour guide lady got angry with us. then a minute later put on her happy face and gave us the brochures for our next destination. next was a little culture center/museum that wasnt as interesting but had cool models of ppl doing early astronomical work. then went to another temple, but smaller. this one housed the earliest known pagoda from the silla dynasty (57 BC – 935 AD). after lunch, went to a tomb park where there were grassy mounds of tombs. connie and i ran up one while no one was looking (except the gods. i’m sorry!!!) and tumbled down haha. last night walking around gyeonju in search of food, we stumbled upon their more bustling district (kinda reminds me of old town pasadena but smaller and quainter. had amazing zhou at a famous korean chain restaurant that was featured in “boys ovr flowers” or something.
now sittin on tha train withg COMMIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE back to SEOUL . these koarens are SILENT and STOIC when riding public transportation. but korean we are not, therefore loud and cray cray we are.
tonight when we gte back to seoul, we’re staying at a different hostel than last time (last time wa s alpha guesthouse) . this time is jin guesthouse in another part of town.
whenever we pass by ppl wth suspiciously large eyes, we always turn to each other with wondering faces thinking “plastic surgery?” some ppl are realy obvoius… guess it depends on if the surgery went botched or not. sometimes i wonder if they aer content with the results of their makeover attempt.
my camera went kookooroo. the lens tries to focus but in trying to do so SHAKES LIKE A BABY that needs to be cradled and breastfed. probably gnna have to buy a new one when i get back to taiwan. interested in buying the same one we got for connie b/c it’s a canon, it’s not too pricey, and it’s BROWN
connie is singing “LOOKING BACK ON THE THINGS I”VE DONE…” BSB on this veryvery quite qorean train
11/25/10
our 730 am DMZ tour was cancelled at approx 815am (15 more min and our bus wouldve made it to the DMZ !! ) b/c kim jong il’s son decided to launch his attack on the s. korean island A DAY BEFORE the day we planned to go >( (btw, i was at gyeong-ju train station waiting to go back to seoul when we first saw news reports about the bombings. but of coruse it was in korean so we didnt know what was going on, just that it seemed imporant b/c the kroeans around us seemed grave and the same footage kept getting looped) so instead, we went back to jin guesthouse, slept to make up for the mere 2 hrs of sleep we had gotten the night before, went shopping bought high thick colorful socks for self and a crapload of kpop paraphernalia for my insane friends, ate more kimchi/bibimbap/bulgogi/kalbi… , exchanged more taiwan $ to korean won (spending a bajillion dollars here.. korea’s cost of living is way higher than any of us had expected. it’s pretty much american prices, sometimes higher). also checked out university street. cutesy modern architecture and walkable. exactly what i expected korea to be. climbed up a huge-ass mountain to check out the nightlights. then later went to the top of N seoul tower (atop another mountain in the middle o the city) via cable car and elevator for an even mor eamazing panoramic view of seoul. seoul is a crazy metropolis, far surpassing LA. also visited the teddy bear museum at the top of this mountain/base of the tower. basicaly it’s a rundown of korean history past/future , except the little exhibits have cute teddy bears as models instead of little plastic humans.
this city is bigger and more modern than expected. it seems like LA’s ktown, but way more expansive and way more modernized. like a mix between LA and NY . very cold too.. arctic chillz/siberian winds/idk. also, NO ONE speaks on the public transportations. they just sit there quietly not looking at each other. if anyone speaks, it’s usually a foreigner or a youngin’. it seems to be because koreans come off as very proud and care about face. maybe they think that if they talk, theyre disrupting the people around them, so they naturally know from their upbringing not to be rude otherwise it’ll be frowned upon. the gap between the train and the platform is alarmingly wide. the song that plays when the next platform is about to arrive (when youre on the train) is carefree and upbeat yet the passengers still remain stoic. no one quickly stands up to lend their seat to senior citizens like they do in taiwan. when someone relinquishes a seat, the ppl around them fervently eyeball the empty seat and claw their way thru to it , as if they had blinders on to those in need around them. 3 minutes is usually long enough for many shopkeepers/stallkeepers to get impatient with us for taking too long to make a decision and we have on more than 2 occasions been shood/cussed out of their shop. but, some people are exceedingly nice and patient with us for having minimal knowledge of the korean language. at a model traditional village near the chungmuro MRT station (a traditional korean village preserved in the heart of seoul), an old man of about 70 taught me how to spin a top with a whip. i kept wanting to give up but he kept telling me in korean / gesturing for me to pick up the top and just do it. speaking of memorable inspiring moments, at alpha guesthouse, i was stressing and frantically researching hostel booking information for our 2day 1night trip to gyeong-ju when a fellow boarder (american, male, about 60, talks to self, slightly weird, long-removed from american society, drifter/traveller) started asking me about school, my major changes, why i changed, and in my explanation i mentioned that life is random, you never know what’ll happen, to which he responded with something like: “sometimes a conversation can change your life”
anyway .. obviously these posts have not been well thought out but i’m tired. tomrorow we are visiting the main temples, doing a lil more shopping but nottoo much b/c i only have $50 US to last me our last day in korea, having our korean bbq feast dinner, maybe a little clubbing at night (just too see). then we fly back to taipei on friday morning. korea has been good to me, but i miss my 3rd home taipei (1arc, 2ucla). glad i took this trip though, i will come back with changed perspectives and a greater desire to familiarize myself with unfamiliar cultures.
11/27 (saturday)
soo on thrusday, our last full day in korea, we hit up 2 palaces but couldnt find the temple. sang disney and jaychou duets while trekking across the city to keep our spirits up haha. afterwards went shopping at dongdaemun (largest shopping district in s. korea). the fashions were good but everything was american pricing so i didn’t buy anything and neither did the other girls. only dion got a vest and something else i dontremember. we were all pretty pooped by this day from getting at most 5 hrs of sleep each night, oftentimes less, for the past week in korea. tried and succeeded in maximizing our time there. afterwards, we met up wtih dion’s friend Diane from UCLA who is studying abroad in korea and we went to a restaurant/bar district near Sinchon station to eat all u can eat kbbq. honestly it didnt taste as good as the kbbq back home in LA ktown, but the atmosphere was interesting, eating amongst local koreans, many of whom got tipsy from soju and were very loud. after dinner we decided to try to check out the clubbing scene in s. korea so headed over to somewhere i dont remember. the district had small shops and young (our age) patrons. couldnt really find any clubs but did find a very cute handcrafted goods store and almost blew the last of my money on a $15 sewn and stuffed zebra keychain. thankfully, lele and connie talked me out of it. dion and i thought the korean girl who ran the shop was very cute b/c she would sway along to the music playing on the speakers, and was very helpful and kind when we asked for directions to a coffee shop that was featured in some kdrama that we wanted to find. after the shop, we set out to find said coffee shop. the weather by now was freezing (literally freezing point) so we bundled up like babooshkas in scarves leaving only 1 eye exposed to the elements. found it after 15 freezing minutes, and after hanging out a little more in the freezing cold, got in taxis and went back to jin guesthouse, thus ending our last night in seoul.
friday morning was our flight back to taipei, and many of us got only 4 hrs of sleep, connie and i got 2 hrs from staying up chit chatting and looking at pics. lele got the most with 5 hrs!! bought an egg salad sandwich from the lady who stands by the MRT entrance #2 (we also bought one from her the early morning we tried going to the DMZ). she’s so cute and i love her for coming so early every morning to sell yummy yummy sandwiches. found the stop and got on our airport shuttle, crashed on the shuttle, got popped out at sincheon international airport, went in still dressed in our big coats 5 layers of clothes thick socks double pants and heavy shoes, got in a long line for check-in, and by the time we got to the front of the line, we were all wearing single layers of clothing. thank god for their heaters! b/c it was way too cold outside !! surprised it didnt snow, some korean friends were saying it was expected to snow that saturday but we JUSt missed it. anyway flew back to taipei and slept most of the time. got back, took a shuttle home, ate guabao and zongzi and it was orgasm in my mouth , slept, woke up to eat with lele and connie at gongguan nightmarket near our dorm, then met up with a-hi and a-kio to go watch harry potter a week late b/c the previous friday on openinng day we were planning our trip to korea.
some phrases i learned in korea:
kamsahamida, annyeohasaeyo, ego oelmayeyo, dokkbuki, chul,…
it is 630 am and we are about to head out. today we are going to the DMZ (Demilitarized zone) between north and south korea. American and South korean soldiers accompany us as we get as close to north korea as possible as americans. we’re all running on 2 hours of sleep. wish us luck that we don’t accidentally stumble from sleep deprivation across the border!
currently 530 am and buzzed so therefore its the best time to update tumblr!
i actually treid updteing it the other day and spent 1.5 hrs typing it but it didnt save, so i guess maybe i saved some ppl from reading some srsly boring shit
its been 2 weeks since the last update nad i’ve been to yeliu national beach park/keelung nightmarket to see the queen’s head rock and eat amazing drop sized xiang1 chang2, WAX for really chill lounging/clubbing and $100 unlimted drinks all night long, a crazy spontaneous trip to hualien/taroko gorge. we missed our train hd to illegally hop on the next one, sat in the freezing bike compartment b/c we didnt have seats, waited in the rain by a fruitstand for the shuttl up the mountain, went to the mountain and didnt do much, treid to leave the mountain but missed the shuttle going down so took one going up thikning we’d rest on the shuttle for 40 min like the bus driver rprosmied, but treally it took 2 hours 15 min for us to get to our destination… wanted to buy tix for the train ride bacvk but also wanted to go to the nightmarket so ended up buying 1:50am tickets for a 3.5 hour train ride…. nothing went right that day but it was fun fucking it up with friends =)
tonight was WAX again for connie’s bday. first we went to dinner at a seafood place that michelle knwe that took , metro and a bus to get to. then we gave her her cake and present which made her cry. success!
sick again, so missed out on Gay Pride Taipei 2010, rockwall climbing, an art museum, family dinner, Halloween clubbing at LUXY….. bahhhhhhhhhhh
tomorrow going to summon up my strength and go to danshui to check out the new studio my parents just purchased, and also maybe finally stop being lazy and get myself to the optometrist for some new glasses and possibly contacts yayy
the other day, rode on the back of a motorcycle (operated by a youngin’, so quite a diff experience from when my aunt scoots me around town). traveling on the surface of the city makes me feel so alive.. experiencing the city behind a plastic visor with cool wind whipping away at your clothes. scent of gasoline seeping into your helmet, mingled with the fumes of street eats. as opposed to submerging into the MRT at one location and emerging out of a similar stairwell at a dissimilar location. if i were ever to stay long-term here, i would get myself a license and buy myself a motorcycle.
listening to the bee gees makes me think of my future married life.. they’re just such classics. i miss my dogs
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pretty sure i got ripped off by the fruit lady when she sold me 1/4 of a small cantaloupe for $60NT ($2 US). to make things worse i think im having some sort of reaction to the preservatives she probably put in there. tightening of chest, head tension, facial tension, prickly sensation. im so mad >( i hope swindler fruit lady gets swindled one day herself >(
since my last post, i went to nantou and yilan over 2 weekends.
nantou was a 2day 1night trip arranged by the dorms attended by 150 international students from all over teh world. we took 4 busses, i was on bus B, our bus driver kept getting lost everywhere so we were regularly the last ones to destinations. also the planning of the trip wasnt very well thought out as we took longer than planned to get to each destination. regardless , i had a good time. we gathered at 7am and left at 8am, had lunch, and made it to sun moon lake sometime in the afternoon where we rode cable cars over mountains and oceans and clouds and moons. then went walkign around the lake edge and curiously enough, many of the aboriginal shops there sold wooden ashtrays with an upright penis carved over it. i bought a pair of leather sandals and black sesame mochi. then headed to our hotel which was in the forest which meant that for dinner we had some legit BBQ with coals, matches, a grill, and asian style pre- packaged meat. hotel rooms were really nice and modern and i roomed with michelle harmonie and connie. we watched the ugly truth and devils wears prada hehe.
BREAKFAST!! was rice in a bamboo stick. yummmm. went on a beautiful morning hike into the woods and it involved crossing a stream , climbing countless stairs, walking amongst tree tops (true story), meeting germans.. later that day we bid adieu the comfortable hotel and slowly made our *LOST* way to a temple where it was crowded and hot. slept all the way back and this time it was a quiet ride, as opposed to the way down where the leaders tried to get us to know each other by playing games and blasting KTV on the onboard screens. all in all, the escape to nature was worth the initial frustration regarding the bus situation
dad came on a thursday and since then we have chilled, he has visited me at gongguan, we’ve gone to nangang to visit gramma, and we’ve gotten dinner with his old college buddy. THE DINNER WAS AMAZING. indian style curry. the amazingness resided in the puffy wheat bread that you dip in green sauce or mango sauce or other saucces that we didnt order.
(sundaY) the yilan trip was 1 day and only for ICLP students (aka california kids). we went to a cultural museum with sloped ceilings, a whiskey brewery, a tradiational taiwanese center where we played old games and won little prizes, made our own cotton candy, bought sesame/nut filled mochi shaped like cocoons, spent 2 hours painting mini wooden beijing opera masks… etc etc too lazy to remember the rest =p. it rained most of the time there. it was interesting to see the japanese colonization period type architecture and imagine my gramma walking around in yilan, her hometown.
earlier tonight i went extremely out of my way thru the rain on a bus and 2 metro changes to purchase my first pair of lacoste shoes, quite expensivee.. but they were so pretty..
soooooo i’ve been sick. i got a free flu shot at ucla last fall. so this is the first time i’ve been sick in 2 years..
im soo in love with the chinese music ensemble here. the people are super friendly. and i wish i were staying longer so i could go thru a year with them. (i am seriously considering extending from only staying 1 quarter to the entire year.. we’ll see). we watched some clips of their year-end performance and theyre amazing and seem to be tight-knit. idk how else to convey this. and my english is going thru some SERIOUS DETERIORATION. deterioration is the biggest word i’ve used all week. and i wasnt even sure how to spell it just now. that’s how bad things are getting over here
lesbians roam these streets in multitudes. there are 2 types of couples. T+P or P+P, but never T+T. T means butch and P means femme. by butch i dont mean LA butch.. i mean girls with short asian boyish haircuts who wear oversized comic screen printed t-shirts and baggy shorts/pants. theyre all the same.. ugly haha. and the femmes usually look like normal straight asian girls. i always see a bunch of lez couples holding hands walking around MRT stations. one time i saw 5 within 3 stops. but never gays .. it must not be as accepted here. today during “thought and society” class the recent gay teenage suicides resulting from bullying in school (5 or so in the past month or so) was brought up and my teacher was totally homophobic. she told us her traumatizing story where in 6th grade her lesbian bff went with her to watch a movie, gave her a peck on the cheek, and she never called that friend again. i mentioned that she missed out on a friendship. then she brushed me off saying the experience weirded her out. loll
ive been lazy letting my buff gay friend dion cart me around on his bike. one time my girly lez friend bigflower also carted me around. genderfuckkkkk
the weather has been cooler lately. like a warm n breezy spring LA day. the other day connie harmonie and i played in the storm. the storm hit right when we were gonna head out for lunch but we went anyway with our fragile umbrellas b/c we were ravenous. my precious umbrella ended up inverting and we took silly wet pics in the wind and rain .
the day trip to miaoli was scenic beautiful but tiring and that’s when i got super sick with fever headache whole body aches etc.. pictures are on fb. next weekend is a 2 day 1 night trip to nantou, and next weekend is a day trip to yilan. also my dad is coming from the US on oct 14 so we will probably make a trip to hualian to visit my grampa’s seaside tomb. Im excited for his arrival b/c he will bring me my earbuds That i ordered on amazon.com and TOOTHBRUSHes. the toothbrushes sold here only come with soft bristles and i like them firm
ive gotten pretty well adjusted to the cultural differences, like ppl being more rude and less rude at the same time .. as compared to american standards. like they’ll bump against you without an apology and not hold the door for you, but at the same time you know theyre just like any other nice auntie who probably spoils her kid and family , and doesnt think theyre better than you or anything. like the vibe you can sometimes get with some people back in the US. hm what else. the service industry is pretty much amazing here, workers will go out of the way to serve you … and the way they greet shoppers/custoemers is very merry. also everytime you even begin to walk into a shop the manager will start announcing “YOU CAN TRY THINGS ON! LOOK AROUND !” nonstop repeatedly. annoying at first, now just the norm.
i want to stay at now forever
the other day while webcamming with alissa i had an epiphany. happiness is temporal because any given situation is also temporal. even if you found happiness at one time and place and were somehow able to indefinitely extend that situation, the happiness wouldnt necessarily stay. therefore you must jump from situation to situation in order to remain happy. always on the move, never lingering too long on any one thing. “nothing gold can stay”. this is why it’s called “the pursuit of happyness” .. happiness is fleeting.. it must be pursued.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHCkheMECeQ&feature=player_embedded#!