ankle's Xanga

Friday, August 10, 2007

Fri, 10 Aug 2007 12:49:33 GMT

I am so nauseous. Oyyyy. Stuck at a hostel in Moscow so that I can be closer to the communal toilets. I think a bought of food poisoning has really nailed me. It started in Siberia, and I thought I had licked it, unfortunately, I think it's chosen to stick around for a little bit.

Although I know that I'll be glad that I chose to stay for a few days on my own once my habitat group left this morning in retrospect, right now I really want to be home, next to a clean toilet, with my mom hovering over me to make sure that I get better quick. Being sick, alone, in a foreign country, amongst strangers at a hostel is not my idea of fun, but it is character building . . . to which I reply, I've got plenty of character, no need for more of this!

I was walking back from the Red Square where I attempted to be cultured and attend a few museums, where all I really was doing was rushing through in hopes of making it back in time before I threw up on some Russian artifact where the former KGB would bum rush me . . . didn't quite make it. Got sick on some bush on the sidewalk on the way back, and then again at the hostel. Oyyyyy.

The combination of the food poisoning plus the five hours of jetlag are really punishing on the body. I've got a million more flight miles ahead of me and three more cities before I make it home on Wednesday. Right now all I want to do is sleep and wait for it to all go away.

The joys of being independent and adventurous, sometimes.

Monday, July 30, 2007

Mon, 30 Jul 2007 05:11:14 GMT

I'm on the other side of the world. Ulan Ude, on the Russian border near Mongolia. Being the only Asian person on my team, I actually fit in better here than in Moscow. Funny how the world doesn't really feel that different, no matter how foreign it is.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Thu, 26 Jul 2007 15:32:57 GMT

Oh, and since I haven't done this in awhile . . . life updates! I'm in the process of moving back to the bay area and am apt hunting in SF. I've got a few more trips to new parts of the world before I start work in the fall, but this pretty much sums up my last six months or so:

I graduated from HBS, my parents were really proud :)

I finished the Boston Marathon!

I hiked to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro, although it nearly killed me . . .

The longest flight

Thu, 26 Jul 2007 15:20:38 GMT

I'm taking off today on a whirlwind tour of the world going east.

SFO-DTW-LGW-(bus)-LHR-MIL-SVO-ULD

Which translates into San Francisco to Detroit to London Gatwick taking a bus to London Heathrow to Milan to Moscow to Ulan Ude where I'm starting my three week volunteer trip with Habitat for Humanity's Global Village program, right along the border of Russia and Mongolia.

The flight back shouldn't be as bad, I hope.

I'm leaving today and I won't arrive in Moscow until Saturday morning, nearly 48 hours of flight time. I've brought four books and a blanket.

Wish me luck!

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Tue, 24 Jul 2007 23:12:49 GMT

I cry during really sappy movies. I cry during really sappy, bad movies. Let's not even get me started on the ones that are worth getting vaguely emotional about. I don't know when it started. Maybe in my teens. Maybe in puberty. It just comes, so easily, the tears, the empathy, putting myself in that spot and feeling how sad it must be (if not horribly hollywood contrived). Still, I don't care, it brings tears to my eyes. I've tried to stop it. I've tried to hold them back. I'm terribly unsuccessful. It's embarrassing. I sit there in the middle seat on a transatlantic flight and I'm tearing up watching something along the lines of the princess diaries. Tears of joy when the guy finally gets the girl, tears of redemption when the girl is finally revealed, tears of sadness to watch love unrequited. It's just not normal. Does anyone else in the world deal with this? Or am I the biggest sap alive?

Monday, July 23, 2007

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 05:53:18 GMT

I think I've grown to be more uncomfortable in my skin if that's possible. I don't know if I've grown away from who I was or am just realizing that I'm not exactly who I thought I was to begin with. Either way, sincere lack of comfort in whatever place I happen to be. Maybe I should just chill out.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 19:04:23 GMT

I found myself sitting in front of the fortune teller, who wasn't really a fortune teller, but more of a vessel for the divine spirit to enter. A voice for the rest of us mortals who wanted all important questions answered, such as, when is my daughter getting married? My mother elbowed me. Ask something! She instructed. I shrugged my shoulders in dismay, I thought we were going out for dinner, why am I here? I shook my head, hoping for some sort of reprieve. Fine, I heard my mother think, if she won't ask, I will. What's in store for the future for my daughter and her boyfriend? The ex-boyfriend of exactly five days. The ex-boyfriend that has been disloyal and deceitful and cold far too many times. The ex-boyfriend that has consumed my emotional life for the last three and a half years. The same one that my grandparents were currently fawning over in my graduation photos from June. Asking about wedding dates and great grandchildren. Oh god, why am I here?!? Birth dates and last names are dutiful given. The fortune teller waves her hands, does some sort of clapping/praying gesture and asks us to give her a minute. In a semi-concocted voice, she says that this match will not make it. It will never be. There are too many arguments. Disagreements. Stormy relations. I have to laugh, although silently and with a stern face as the rest of my family watches me. Aunts, uncles, grandparents, parents. Why am I here? What did I do to deserve this? I'm not even Chinese.

Monday, November 06, 2006

Mon, 06 Nov 2006 02:20:19 GMT

My dad knows, via my mom whom I do more of the day to day chit chat with, that I've been having a really hard week. Weekend away in NY, back to Boston. Another round of interviews tomorrow morning. My dad sent me an email to help cheer me up, he's the greatest, although his English skills aren't always. He says - You are my angle. You have to love a man that's trying so hard and is so sincerely sweet.

Friday, November 03, 2006

Fri, 03 Nov 2006 14:27:16 GMT

I gave myself bangs, the hairdresser did actually, but I have them again. I always go into this thinking they're so great, and then I come out with these short hair bits and don't know exactly what to do with them? Hrm, life change = haircut. I'm a girl. Give it to me.

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Thu, 02 Nov 2006 12:12:42 GMT

I've decided to move home. After all this rigamarole, I couldn't get the job I wanted in London. And it ends there.

I talked to my mother about it last night. As always, she is supportive, but she also believes that I am stubborn and pig headed and that I have been wrong. In all likelihood, I didn't need her to tell me that, I already knew. It does, however, reinforce the point that I may suck.

New plans include spending lots of money I don't have in an effort to pull myself out of this *yet another* emotional blackhole. Begs the question of whether I'm quite stable or not. I'm doing the massage, facial, haircut trifecta today. Planning a trip to NYC with some girlfriends this weekend. Going to Montreal to party with yet more girlfriends. Have tickets booked to both SF and London for the Thanksgiving break, will make the last min call there, but assuming it will be West vs. East. And that takes me into December, finals, and a new year.