A stressful weekend

I just moved to a new apartment, on the edge of the campus. I was the first one to get there, so I got to pick my bedroom among three. So I got this big master's bedroom with a queen size bed. Pretty awesome.

This week was quite stressful. I found myself very very busy, maybe until tomorrow. Job applications, teaching a class, leading workshops, doing research with Betalian, learning HTML and Photoshop, going to the company for my marketing intern. Besides, my car needs a smog check, I need a haircut, I need to buy things for the empty apartment, still wait for the university to deliver my desk and chair and bookshelf. If I do not suffer a heart attack this week, I think I am healthy enough to live until 100.

Two events ruined my self-confidence though. One is that I had a very very bad phone interview for a job. I was asked some trick questions, and I stumbled on almost all of them. One answer I provided was "I guess I do not know." Honest but disastrous. It is probably no big deal, but it hurts my feeling of invincibility. Seocnd, only one student signed up for my class so far. I was not the one to be blamed, as they forgot to put time and location on the time schedule until last week and I was recruited as the instructor only 2 days ago. But still, I am taking it upon myself, as if I am a big failure, and this class is only one little manifestation.

On the bright sight, however, I find myself to be a perfect candidate for consulting jobs now. I just filled out an application for a big consulting company. I applied for the same company last year, and I find that I had so much more BS to talk about than last year. Not bad at all.

I am now still the only person in the three bedroom apartment. I hope my roommate will never move in, so I can enjoy it all to myself!! mmmmmmmmhahahaha.

The big interview is over

I think I did well on three of the interviewers, but the second one was a little bit intense and hostile. I hope he does not have the final say on my future.

I have been feeling great in the past week or so. I got so much done. Way to go.

procrastination

Holy cow, I was supposed to do something productive tonight. Now I had this long blog entry about Wondre. Well, it works out better this way. As the blog entry began to form in my brain, I had to get it out on the keyboard. Now I still have one hour before sleep, so do something that will make it a productive day.

Oh, by the way, tomorrow is a big day for me, as I will be interviewing for a job I really want to have.

My friend (Wondre)

If you still remember my "writing plan" blog, you know I still own you this one: my friend Wondre (of course, as well as the last part of Yuphen. Sorry that my writing was sort of slow recently). I have been holding this spot for Wondre for a long long time. I know she is special, but as the time passing by, I unconsciously blocked the memory about her. As the life goes forward, I do not dear to look back, as if it would dig out some of my flaws that I had been tried to forget. And besides, we haven't contacted each other for a long time. So I am not the only one to be blamed.

All of a suddenly, she re-emerged with an email. For certain reasons, it reminded me how important my past was to me, and how great a friend she was, and how many memories we had shared (I know she will be reading this blog some time. But I promise, this blog is not intended to use these cheesy words to please her. It is just how I would have written without knowing she would be reading. Okey, stop over-analyzing. Just go to the facts).

Oh, one more thing before I get into the real meet. You know Gmail tried to match the ads (showing up on the right side of screen) with the content of email, right? For some reasons, one of the matching ads for Wondre's email is called "Device to beat kids". I do not know how that happened: She just innocently mentioned something about children. Get serious please, Google!

I met Wondre for the first time in high school during a gathering organized by the Literature Club (I, Wondre and Zexum were all part of it. Until today, Wondre and Zexum are still best friends, as far as I know). There were some silly activities during the gathering in a classroom. I think Zexum made a speech or something, since she was the leader. Wondre and I happened to live in the neighborhood close-by, so I was responsible to escort her home (I remember in high school, boys need to escort girls back home if there are evening activities. I do not know whether it is required by the school or it is just a made-up rule by boys). Anyway, we had a very interesting conversation on the bike for about half an hour. For some reasons, we promised to write letters to each other. It might started as a joke or something, but it turned out that we really took it seriously.

Before I go on, here is some background information. Wondre wrote beautiful essays (of course, great hand-writing too, always in blue ink and semi-transparent sheets, as I later found out). In the Literature Club, I was the fake one. I did not write well. Even I tried hard, I paid a lot of attention to the structure, the logic, and hidden meanings, the moral lessons. After I finished a "masterpiece", I bearly could read it myself. It was like looking at myself in the mirror in the early morning with sleepy eyes: it does not look like me. The same for my essay: it does not look like mine, as so many things were hidden or got over-analyzed. Wondre's essay was different: very visual, always creating an atmosphere with few strokes, almost like a master painter who can always get to the essenses of the nature, or the people, or the spirits that might be floating around.

So for me, Literature Club was a cover that I could divert the spot light of "math nerd" away from me. Also, it was awe-struck by the fact that people of my same age and similar experience could creat something so beautiful, and I just cannot (well, English, my second language, have gave me a greater freedom to create, as I do in this blog. Thank you very much, English). For that reason, I admired her, as writing came so natural, as she breathing in thoughts and breathing out words like a fish in the water.

So get back to track. We began to write to each other. It was our secret communication. One morning, when I arrived school, I would found a letter sitting neatly on the teacher's big desk in the front of classroom. Then she would got one. And then it was my turn. During some period, the exchange was so frequent that we wrote every day. Two reasons kept me going with the letter exchange.

One, it was a joy to write, especially to Wondre. I was a sensitive boy, and I often suspect whether or not I was normal at all, so I tended to suppress my sensibility. Writing to her made me feel free. She was not in my same grade, we did not really know each other well, and even better, she was younger than me, so I felt very secure to write to her. By convincing myself that it was to give Wondre some advice and guidence in school as an older brother, I really acted selfishly so that i had a chance to discover myself.

Second, it felt great if you had a secret friend that you can always talk to but nobody else can. Every morning, when I got the letter from Wondre, I acted like no big deal, calmly passing the rows of seats, put the letter in my backpack, waiting for a quiet moment to read it. But what really went through my mind was something less noble: I peeked at other people, noticing that they were guessing how my secret friend was? was it he or she? if she, was she my girlfriend? What were we writing about? How came we had so many things to write about? Let me tell you, it felt great to be the center of the attention and gossip, especially it had nothing to do with my academic achievement and had every ingredient of something romantic.

You may ask, was Wondre my girlfriend? Well, it was complicated. No, I did not have any intention to have a girlfriend then (To be honest, I was not mature enough then to understand the meaning of relationship then. I thought that 1) having a girlfriend was not good when you were a high school student, 2) but if you had one, everyone will envy about it. So it was a forbidden fruit. With my moral self-rightousness and the incredible lack of self-confidence. a girlfriend was out of the picture.) However, I had every intention to make it look like one. As I mentioned above, I liked the feeling when my classmates guessed or teased about who my secret pen pal was.

To make the deal sweeter, I kept my parents and my Niangniang guessing. Because during the school recess, we wrote to each other through snail mail. My Niangniang asked me a couple of times, and I refused to answer. Since I did not have mailbox key, I eventually figured a way to take out the mail using two small stickes. It felt great because I finally had my privacy. How pathetic, I might say now. However, back then, this kind of small things kept me together so that I did not snap and lived rather peacefully with the oppressive environment in my family. (Oh, please do not get me wrong. If you read my earlier blogs, you know I love my families as a fact. However, living in my family as a 15 years old kid was a miseable experience. I am happy I eventually have got out almost unscratched, but I do not blame them for everything they did, because they meant well).

So one day, I embarked on a journey to visited her in her hometown (2 and half hours by bus) in the summer. I did not even tell my family, as if that was as rebellious as I could go: a secret day trip to see a secret friend, maybe just to prove that I can do it. The bus was over-loaded, so when passing every checking point, we had to dodge, as if the bus was under a massive attack. When I arrived there, she and I climbed a small hill to have a nice view (or maybe there is a temple there or something). I forgot most of it, but a joke that I always remember. It is not even funny, but we had a good laugh then. Okey, okey, the joke is as following: When we walked on the trail, she said,"Xiaolu (little alley), Tongzhi (comrade)", but I thought she was calling me "Comrade Little Deer". Funny, huh? Anyway, we overplayed the joke again and again during our walk, as it was the funniest thing in the world.

Then I was about to head to college. One afternoon, we biked all the way to the suburban on a land-bridge. She told me that she liked to watch the train passing by under the feet. I was not sure why it was so enjoyable, but I wanted to see it too. The other side of the bridge was still under the construction, so there was virtually nobody on the bridge. We talked and talked until the train came, with the smoking flushing out of its industrial chimney. It came, it went. To this day, I still did not get it: why watching train was interesting? (Well, I guess people are different. Last year I had a housemate who can watch the fire burning for an eternity). Anyway, I think we talked a little about the future. I did not remember what I said about my future, but I know I felt then that college was the best thing to me: I could get away from my family, and besides, in college, all my dreams would come true, and besides, as I grew up, my hometown was now too small for me--I was going to fly far and high, leaving my old friends far behind.

Eventually, college turned out to be great, but not as great as I thought would be. We still communicated with letters. One way I got a letter from Wondre, with a 2-inch passport photo and a depressing letter. I was quite freaked out. I thought Wondre would do something stupid to herself. (To this day, I still do not know whether I was over-worrying). I think I immediately wrote a letter back, blah blah blah. I told it to my then girlfriend Yuphen. She was worried too. Just to comfort her, I promised her that Wondre was like a willow branch, wavering under strong wind but never would snap itself. I do not know whether I could convince myself with that, but that thought made me feel better.

Eventually Wondre went to a college next to mine. She did not change too much since high school. To me, she was still the little girl I knew, writing beautiful essays and suffering from being sensitive. How Zexum, Wondre and I were in the same city again, thousands of miles away from where we started. We had some gatherings to renew our friendship, but they were more like a formality that I neither loved or hated, so my memory there was all blured.

Later in college, one of my best friends (well, my friend "Jegal", if you still remember him) told me that one girl was calling into some radio show to confess the love for me. I do not know how he got the link, as I assumed that in radio shows everything was supposed to be anonymous (that's the whole point of those kinds of radio shows right?). However, I immediately thought of Wondre. It does not matter whether my guess was justified. It was probably false anyway. What really mattered here that that the thought came natutally to me. All those years our friendship was quite "aimei", tracking all the way to the letter-writing. I never denied to my friends or family whether she was indeed my secret girlfriend. Until today, I still believe that, besides the events I described in "Yuphen" blogs, it is the most romantic event of my entire life. I kept these letters until two years ago. (When I visited my home two years ago, my dad told me that he was selling my apartment. Then I burnt all the letters I have, including Wondre's. For me, that apartment was an era. It was the last thing that confined my freedom, but it was also whether I wrote these letters, whether my Yaya died, when my Niangniang made delicious meals, where I got up at 6am for a morning run, where I studied to nail the college extrance exam, where I sang aloud to disturb neighbors. I felt very very sad, so I burnt my memory. And now, I feel my eyes are all wet. I think of my Niangniang now. Last week when I called her, she was not well. I think she is losing it to the old age).

Anyway, back to Wondre. That's pretty much all the important events that I remember now. A couple of days ago, her email emerged, probably in a hope that Zexum and I can be together. I told her not to bother. I really appreciate all her effort. I still do not know what she did, but she mentioned something vaguely in the email, and saying sorry about them. Well, really, nothing to be sorry about. If sorry has to be said, then this blog will have too many "sorries": sorry to guess Wondre as the calling girl without a reason, sorry to burn Wondre's letter, etc... But I don't. They are all part of the whole story about Wondre and me, and it just happened this way. They are treasurous.

Finally, let me say this. The life is a circle in every possible way. We started writing secret letters to each other, now I share this rather "secret" blog to Wondre. From the blue ink on factory-titled sheets to the cyber-font on computer screens, something is unchanged. I am still honest as I was before, still struggling here and there, but still with great ambitions, still sensitive, but now with a better writing style. My mind could still overwhelm me, and my heart could still break once a while. However, in this blog, I am safe to speak, safe to stipulate that, on the receiving side, my friends are watching and caring, sometimes with me as the secret boyfriend. Oh, so nice to be young,pure and innocent.

Got an interview

Also, here is what I wrote yesterday when I was procrastinating.

After running out of laudable inspiration of blog topic, here I am to blog about the music I am listening.

My favorite music is stil belong to "10,000 maniacs", especially their albums in 1990s. I love Natalie Merchant so much that I can almost listen to her singing for eternaty. "Noah's Dove" and "Stockton Gala Days" are my all-time favorite.

But I have more. Recently I have been introduced to classical music, almost by accident. Vivaldi, Bach, Brahms... I know it is almost uncool to love classics, but it was good. I guess I will never be an real artist, but my whole life journal seems like a process of discovering the beauty of arts, first acting, then modern dance, no more and more music and design. One special album for me is "Vivaldi's Ring of Mystery". I stole this album from Phoebe without her knowing under the classic category on itunes. It was a fascinating story with great Vivaldi music. I guess deep-down I am fascinated by fairy tales full of imagination.

Antoher funny song was "The nights Santa Went Crazy" by "Weird Al". A good rap song is Jay-Z's "Big Pimping". Other music I listened to often: Counting Crows, Billy Joel, Stars, Belle and Sebastion, The Delgados, Amelie soundtrack, Missy Higgins, Sara and Tegan, etc.

The youtube channel I love to watch: Lucy in LA.

The online video clips I love to watch: Daily Show and Colbert Report.

The magazine and newspaper I read: Time, New York Times.

The books I am reading or has finished recently: Bee Season.

The movie I would like to watch: Little miss sunshine

The ipod TV I am watching: 24 (season 4) and development arrestment (season 2)

It sounds like my cultural life is pretty cool, right?

Interview

Yeah, just finished a 30-minute phone interview. I am not sure how I did this time. I think I did well, but according to my last year's experience, my own sense of how interviews went did not predict the outcome. So get my figure crossed.

web tracking

Pretty cool, right? That's my newly-installed webpage tracking on my blog. Readers, now I know who you are, haha. Today, one from China and one from East Coast (I thought that my site is blocked in China). Maybe more though, as I still do not know how to read the report.

Well, I actually have no interest to see the stats on my blog. I do not really care who is reading and who is not. The real thing is that I need to learn webtracking skills for my internship, and my blog is the only site that I manage right now. (Well, let me take it back. I actually care about my readership, as I feel that is a great way that my friends and strangers know my life. However, I have no intension to change my way of writing just because of my blog traffic). Anyway, I think I need to let you know that I am tracking it. But you probably do not care anyway.

You may ask, why learning webtracking? Well, much is business secret and since I signed a confidential agreement, I do not think I can say too much. What I can say is that we are going to launch an advertisement campaign for some sort of online competition, and I am in charge of managing the whole campaign, especially buying ads from Google's Adwords. So I need to know how to track the clicks from the ads.

That's the perk of working in a start-up. Just think that I have only worked there on and off for 40 hours, and now I can be in charge of a project. Calling shots in a company. Isn't that cool? As I was interning in this start-up company, all of a sudden I found out that I really loved technology. Here, everything has, or will have, a technical solution. Among solutions, there are good ones and bad ones. It is very different from sociology, where everything is messy and sometimes politically charged and your intelligence sometimes is not respected simply because you will in a different sub-field. Well, I have a phone interview with a big-name company for a permenant position..... Well, you can see that I am steering away from sociology, even though I have two (actually three) single-authored paper for submission this month or next.

Betalian is as crazy as before. She will demand all kinds of statistical tests. Some of them are just trash, but she won't listen. I then just learn new things and log in hours. Not bad for me either. Do you know cluster analysis, contingency analysis, multidimentional something (I forget the name)? Now I do, thanks to Betalian for these stupid learnings. Now she is out for vacation, so my email box can be quiet for a while.

What else? Nothing too much. Well, I am also learning HTML code when I milk my time during the internship. I feel 10 or 20 years down the road, I might have my own business, and that is a good way to prepare.

My friend (Betalion)

Let me sketch her real quick. Betalion is a law school professor. She is a straight talker. She say a lot of "F&*%" on the cellphone. She is demanding, as I can see from her interaction with her husband and RA. She just cannot shut up, not in a bad way though.

I work for her recently on a project she has to finish soon. In fact, I need to work on that tonight after the blogging. She is up for tenure review. A lot of stress, as you can imagine. She is lucky to have me, as I am commited to get it done. On my part, I get paid well, and now I have a good contact in law school.

Three examples of her straight talks.
1. She gave me the time sheet, and said, "Hey, I paid you with a good hourly rate, so do not screw me over with the number of hours. Okey?"
2. She was talking about something else, but somehow she segwayed into something like "my marriage is falling apart, but that's my problem to deal with."
3. "I hate ASA. It is too hieararchical." That's exactly what I feel. I never speak that out lout, but nothing can stop Betalion from saying that.

It is quick a shock to hear those initially. But on the second tought, why are not everything like her, to speak out honestly what they think? Now if you would excuse me, I can going to do some hard-shit work for her project now. F&*%.

My friends updates

I have started my friends blog such a long time ago. When I decided to give an update today, I have to go back and create a spreadsheet to match the real names with the fakes one I created. "W" is still yet to be filled. Since that will be my last one in the 26 formal spots, I get overcautious, so nobody has be selected to fill the spot. I also know the last part of "Yuphen" is still pending for another day. But here are some updates.

Amsol still is my best friend. Somehow our friendship shifted. Before, it was I that hung on him to buffer the cultural shock. Now the relation is more equal. Rather than I asked questions all the time, it became information sharing. And I like that.

Brey went back to S. Karea this past year to do research. He finally had a girlfriend. She is an artist, Korean American. This one will last, I think. And I am happy for Brey.

Chestina is in trouble, as far as I can tell. She is depressed often, always stressed about work and obsessed with small issues. Maybe marriage problem. That's my best guess. Next year she will take a year off to be a clerk for a judge. Have I mentioned that she actually had a law degree before she came to the department?

Dermon got married two years ago and now even had a baby boy. He got a job in Texas. I wonder how he liked it there?

Elpen. I haven't seen him for a long time. He kinda quit school and worked in a start-up company now. still doing some obsessive shopping to have the best high-tech gears. He was in the same summer program with me.

Friggy: I saw him once this year when he returned to Stanford. He did not change a bit. For example, he came to the house for dinner one day, and immediately lost his hat. He is now in texas too, doing a ph.d. degree in engineering while working for some companies, maybe.

Glip: Well, he is my advisor. His life is not stable, as he moved back and forth between two top universities in the past year or two. This coming quarter he will teach in China. I do not think he is very productive recently, but he has a book about CR coming up.

A trip to Montreal

It was this year's ASA meeting. I came back today, with a great impression about Montreal.

I rented a bike for three days, and biked every single day. I think I covered almost every cover that three-day biking can cover. This place was very european. People looked relaxed, weekdays and weekends. A lot of Cafe, very few cellphones. Mostly white, especially blonde. People look slimmer than a generic American. Ladies are attractive and guys dress very well. Food are quite expensive, but my sample is only in tourist place. People bike in the city all the time. In fact, when I passed by apartments, a lot of families have bikes on their balcony. I guess that's keep them fit.

I biked in small streets with bricks paving the way. I tried it fast, so that my whole body was shaking violently along with my mountain bike. It might cause some brain damage already. It reminded me the movie "cinema paradise", my favorite non-English movie so far. I also biked far away along the bike trail. Once I saw a random fox, and once I saw handrens of people gathering in a park, dancing in uniform, just like you will see on TV of the group dance in Europe.

Once I was walking on the street and realized that the guy in front of me was smoking pot. I stayed in a shabby hotel with friend Brian. He had a hard time sleeping, probably due to the prolonged sunlight time. I hope it was not because of my snore (do I snore at all? I do not know.) One night he taught me how to play "risks" game, which he installed in his computer. He told me that was how he killed time when he drove up and down in Carlifornia prison system for his interview. I learned it quickly. Within two hours, I kicked asses of 7 computer-controlled players. I guess video game can always bring me joys, as if the success is too rare in real life, so I treasured every single opportunity to enjoy even I know it was sorta fake.

Overall, I attended maybe 3 sessions in total (including the one I presented a paper in a roundtable session), met with two universities through employment service, met a good future contact on the airplane, biked about 60km to cover the city, visited 3 museums, watched 1 3-D IMAX movie, passed numerous parks, saw the most romantic marriage propose in my life ( the guy contacted a street performer a month ago to make sure he and his girlfriend would be picked as "innocent" volunteers that day. After they suffered some fire and knife hazards, the guy got on his knees and proposed. The girl was in a shock, the guy was in a satisfying smile, and everyone else was sheering. Quite something, isn't it?)

See http://picasaweb.google.com/songhua/200608Montreal

Special dinner

Today, Chi Theta Chi had a special dinner. I cooked a "killer shrimp soup", and got quite good reviews. Riding on my pride, I tasted all kinds of liquors, and now I think I am half-drunk. That's great. Because now I do not need to bike out to starbucks to continue my paper tonight. Rather, I had two hours to waste. Maybe I should watch "liar liar" again. But for now, let me see how much I can write for this blog entry. I sorta have the urge of finish off Yuphen entry today, but in a second thought, maybe I should leave it for a sober day.

My recent blog entries have been half-assed. Seriously, not too much going on anyway.
But more seriously, a lot have happened, and I was just not in the mood of blogging my desperation. Let me have a review. For a while, I have been desperate about my future. This past year not everything runs okey. I tried to get a job with full confidence, but results were rather mixed. It was hard to keep my cool in these situations. More often than not, I have doubts about myself, whether all the confidence was actually based on illusion rather than reality.


The summer was a turning point. At least I got my cool back. First it was the summer institute, through which I realized that I still had the potential to learn new things, and indeed I would be a good student if I eventually go to law school. Second, it was ALC program. I gave lectures there, and realized I was actually a good teacher. If I could work myself up to have a good five-minute start, the whole lecture would be a breeze. Then I got an unpaid internship in a start-up. Then I got hooked up with a law school professor. I am going to be her RA for a while. Not only it paid quite well, but also it could lead to a very good recommendation letter for my future use and abuse. Not to mention that I am write a very good paper. I've tricked myself into thinking next Tuesday is the deadline. This afternoon, before I was cooking, I was writing that paper, halfway through it already. It could be a home-run.

awesome trip

I was with my friend the whole day. We took caltrain all the way to SF. Lunch at fisherman's whalf. Then biked all the way to Sausalito. Took 1 and half hour kayaking. Back on bike, all the way to Tiburon. Took the ferry back. Took caltrain back. We both got sun-burned into raccoon faces.

I never expected that doing sports with a girl could be so much fun. But hey, she is gay, so what's so surprising?

An album to admire

Of course, my album. It is my life since 2005
http://picasaweb.google.com/songhua

Here is the trick to do the photo album. 1. Download the newest version of picasa with web album function on google. 2) create an account on picasa web album. 3)organize you photo through picasa 4) everything else is streamlined.

a video to view

So the business summer program is wrapping up. A lot has been learned, as it allows me to see a world never seen before from inside ivory tower. I wonder whether it is a career-changing event or just a blimp that falls along the roadside. Hey, check it out. I made this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhNGAY9WhvI for the summer program.

Continue: My friend (Yuphen)

It is easy to put off things and then just never look back. By escaping my best and worst memory, I maintain a sense of invincibility, pretending that I never cared to begin with. Yesterday we had a practice session of our final presentation for my summer school. I was video-taped again, and my teammates watched it and talked about it. It was quite a relief afterwards, because I could put this one behind. But more important, I think this time I got it, the secret of a nice presentation. The trick? Treating it as if you are talking to a friend. So here I go again, to continue my story with Yuphen. Like talking to a friend, I can forget that I am actually closely watched by my own consciousness.

So our streak of bumping into each other continues. It might be a little exaggurated by a love-struck me, forcefully interpreting random chances into pre-determined destiny. We kept studying together, and more importantly, taking study breaks together. McDonald's is our favorite place late night, because you can get unlimited refills for coffee. What can be more attractive than freebies for poor students like us? I would stare at her for long, and she would stare back. Usually I won the staring competition, and then she would ask, "what are you thinking?" For some people, it is easy question. But for me, everything has to be filtered through my rationality, I had a hard time to explain. She was not happy in some occations when I dodged the question by talking nonsense.

Once we had a compitition on how many cups of coffees we can drink. I do not remember who won, but I believe that I drank 6 cups. Back in my dorm, I had a hard to fall asleep, twisting and turning for 2 hours before a dream carried me away.

It was still Febuary. Winter in Beijing was cold and snow fell. Yuphen injured her feet when slipped on the way to get hot water for her dorm. We head out to the McDonald's again. The snow was still melting. It was freezing. I held Yuphen's hand for the first time, pretending that was for the sake of her injured feet. She did not refuse, and I did not back out. One old lady had a random conversation with us when we crossed the road. My face probably reddened for no reasons, like a kid joyful because he stole a cookie jar without being noticed. Yuphen seemed to be highly spirited, talking and smiling and laughing when the old lady asked about her injured feet.

So here I was. Being rejected a month before, I worked myself into being accepted. I still do not understand what went through her mind because she probably knew my little tricks along. However, on the flip side, I guess that's just the way people meet and have relationships. You have to take risks. Stupid things (what else?) can add up to show how you care.

Anyway, we did not declared that we were in a relationship, but both of us just accepted. I liked her ponytail a lot. It was straight and smooth. My finger went through it, or my head touched it. It is like when you go to a nice hotel and hit the premium mattress and swear that you just want to glue there forever. I gave her cheap flowers, picked fresh from the random school gardens. It might be offensive to my rural dormmates to claim that I was poor then, but I believed I was. Spending my parents's money from their meager salary was just not my style. So I had little tricks to entertain Yuphen, but never to outlandish. I think she enjoyed it.

We had long walks at night around the campus or outside of the campus when the weather got warmer. I saw love-struck young couples passing by, and felt lucky that I was one of them. Always holding hands, and eventually we had our first kiss. One night I recited a poem to her, "When I got old...", freshly learned from a literature class I was auditing that time. This seemed to leave a strong impression on her. Several years later she reminded me this event before I could remember myself.

One day before her birthday, I got two bottle of birthday spray-string things from a store. As usually, we had a long walk to plan for the next day. It seemed that both of us had classes, so probably we wre going to be good students as usual. When we walk over the overpass of the main road, I took out the spray bottles, shouting "happy birthday" and spray all sorts of string on her. Of course, eventually I passed her one bottle so we could have a fight on the overpass. Afterwards (It might happen another day actually, but it seemed fit better here anyway), we lean against the fender of the overpass and stared the millions of cars passing under us. We had some discussion about something. I am pretty bad in remembering our conversations, because most of them are not important at all. They came up just so we could spend more time together. We decided to skips the class the next day. Instead we went to Heaven's Temple.

That's why I still believed that Heaven's Temple is the most beautiful place in Beijing. We arrived there in the early moring. Spring was coming, and greens were everywhere. It was still wet on the ground, recovering from the previous night's frost. We walked through the quiet alley between the trees. People were exercising TaiJi. It was nothing like the city I experienced on a daily basis. So peaceful and quiet.

It was a good time for maybe 2 or 3 months. We biked to difference places to take pictures for photography class. We even biked for an hour to watch "Titanic" with the free tickets from her parents. We also watched "Fall the the Legend" together in the library. I did not like it at all. I did discover one more thing. I did not enjoying watching movie with her. I guess I was a very private person. I would be completely absorbed and cry by touching dramas when I watched movie alone. But when with her, I felt very distracted, probably too aware of her presence and did not want to be judged. Years later, I watched "Fall the the Legend" again, and loved it so much that I purchased the video and soundtrack.

But good time did not last long, as things began to go downhills very soon and eventually fell apart.

(to be continued...)

MobiTV Visit

MobiTV Visit
Originally uploaded by kjmurray.

That is my first time trying "blogthis" function. Just want to see how it works. By the way, can you find me here?

graduation 

graduation! 

Move out of terra

Sorry that I haven't blogged for a while. I moved out my beloved co-op a couple of weeks ago. I was house-sitting for ten days afterwards. I stayed with the depressed wife for a couple of days before she also took off. They had a dog called "Ringo". It was a very stupid and spoiled dog. One day I had to prepared some chicken and rice for the dog because he went on a hunger strike. I was tough, but he had to take one medicine with stomach full. As much as I wanted to teach him a lesson, I did not want him to die in my hand.

Now I live in a graduate apartment. The summer institute at b-school kept me busy day in and day out. I learned quite a lot about business and whatnot. I also started to EA in Chi Theta Chi, my summer residence last year. I just had a delicious fish dinner half an hour ago.

Some more twists about my future plan. I finally decided to be on F-1 status for one more year. Switching visa is much much a hassle, and using OPT time is not only time-consuming but also wasteful, because I might need it in the future if things do not work out. I am heading to Montreal Canada for an academic conference. This will be my second foreign country that I ever visit.

I have some graduation photos on my laptop. I will upload one or two very soon.

Life is a baseball game?

People like to use metopher to talk about life. Sometimes you hear too much about it, it becomes criche. For example, life is a river, life is a box of chocolate, life is a struggle, etc.. But sometimes you have to wonder: who was the first person to come up with the metopher and how did he/she feel when he/she came up with that? It probably was based on real experiences, with which I believe that the metopher cannot fit better.

So this is how I feel right now: Life is a baseball game. You have to go up and keep swinging. You are lucky if you get a single once a while. Sometimes you hit a homerun. Congratulation. And most of the time you will just be struck out. Big deal. When you are out in the field, you have a chance. When you sit on the bench, you are just safe. So which one do you want to be?

I guess I was out on the field swinging this year. Some major disappointments, and i do not want to hide how disappointed I am. However, small good news also accumulating, makes me hopefully of what is going to happy next year, or even in two months. I am not in the mood of summarize all these here for the time being, because I am very busy and will be so for the next two months. But be patient, readers. While being struck out was part of life, I will let you know if I am lucky to steal a base some day. I will describe to you all the cracks of the bat, all the pops of the grove, and all the whooshing sound of the wind.

My dad is going for visa!

It is 8am in China, June 5. My dad is going to apply for his visa. Good luck!

My friend (Yuphen)

Yes, I have not forgot my promise of finishing all the 26 friends. Now only Wondra and Yuphen left. Let me have a try on Yuphen. I always worry about whether I can give Yuphen a fair assessment at all. Too many things are too personal. Hiding them would hurt the blog, and disclosing them would infringe on privacy with a biased perspective. Well, let me at least try....

Yuphen was my girlfriend. My love interest in my only serious relationship up to day. It happened 8 years ago, and I called it off eventually. Relationship turned out to be too taxing for my young mind. To be honest, courtship was a mating game that people (animals) have been playing for thousands of year, or now I know. However, while I was in the relationship, I was caught in surprise by how much attention and devotion I had to commit, and I burned out. I burned out so badly that even to today I cannot emotionally relate to her. No anger, no regret, no love, no pity. Two days ago, she emailed me that she resigtered for a marriage. I felt nothing, nothing at all, not even a pinch of "what if", but a shit load of half-assed "I wish you happy".

It is sad that our relationship collapsed after 6 months, and it is even sadder that it still gives me lingering bad taste. For this, I have no one to blame but myself, so I take pity on myself for still being in the singletown and being an emotionless asshole. But deep-down, I know I used to be passionate, romantic, caring and brave to expose my own vulnerability. And I also know that Yuphen used to see the best side of me.

It started quite accidental. In sophomore year, we were studying for the finals in the same radio station studio. We took study breaks together, seemingly enjoying ourselves to be study buddies. Not too many similarities to pull use together, but two things stand out: working in the radio station and a shared aspiration of being a great journalist. I still remember one day we were study in two rooms only seperated by a glass wall. During the study break, we began to draw cartoon pictures and funny comments with inks on the glass. The other side could see through but could not erase. So a war of cartoon drawing erupted on the glass wall. We surely shared a good laughter together.

Some time during the winter break, I decided to pursue her. I want to emphasized the "decide" here, because it really came up as a decision to me when I lied on my bed one night, thinking and analyzing. I could not remember what exactly went through my mind, but it was mainly about the thought that I needed to have a girlfriend. Subcounsciously to me that time, however, I first discovered the enjoyment of connecting with a girl. Human females were wonderful species: they are soft, they are kind, they are less judgmental. By the way, I was also biologically programmed to like their body shape, their scent, their pitch, everything. Hey, why I need guy friends at all if I could be with Yuphen?

Well, I started this blog two weeks ago, but I did not come back until now. As if I tried to avoid writing it. When it started, Yuphen told me that she had registered for a marriage. A couple of days ago, I got her wedding photos. Time flies, scenes change, only I still stay in the same place, as if a sudden and short starvation stopped my growth forever. Well, let me continue the story with Yuphen....

So the winter break was over. I went back in Beijing on Feb 13. I planned to give her a surprise by visiting her home on Valentine's day. After I arrived nearby, I tried to give her a call. Her mom picked up the phone, saying Yuphen was out with a friend, presumably a guy. I was quite disappointed.

Several days later, school restarted. We met each other again in the radio station. Still hanging out like friends, although both she and I knew something else were going on. One night we took a long walk together. I planned to confess, but I just did not have enough courage. So I asked her to walk a circle and circle again around the dorm areas. It got really late, and it was now or never. So I did it. My heart beat got so fast that it almost blocked my breathing rhythm. She calmed me down. We sat on the steps. Now I felt the freezing temporature that conducted itself through the cement of the steps, through my pants and all the way to my butt and the rest. I believe I shivered somewhat. She then told me how it was impossible. She was not ready, blah, blah, blah. It was like the TV talk from romantic drama, and I was crushed.

It was probably my first encounter with depression, only that I did not realize it then. I felt the life in general was quite meaningless. I drank much more. I hid myself in the basement and smoke one cigarette after another. I even once called the "help hotline" of China Youth Daily, although I am still not sure up to today whether it was necessity or it was I that wanted to act up. Anyway, things actually turned out brighter than I could expected. I was persistent in pursuing her. I do not know why I did not take "no" as "no": either I really cared for her, or I believed that persistence was how you get a girl. That's the first bomb in our short relationship, because later I was not sure whether she cared for me or she was just moved by my persistence.

We still remained friends. That period was very strange, because I kept bumping into her randomly. Twice, we were seated together in big classrooms by the most random assignment. If you believed in fate, where else you should look for it. I was not superstitious, but we was quite perplexed. This actually became our continuous conversation topic, better than any ice-breakers.

(To be continued..)

what's worth blogging

Once in a while, it will come through my mind: What's actually worth blogging? Well, that is a rhetorical question. The whole point of blogging is to get rid of the judgment, so everything I think is worth blogging is wroth blogging.

I guess it takes stupidity in order to enjoy the life. I was stupid to think that I should double my running milage today, so I ran the campus loop twice. It turned out to be a better experience. In the first loop, I paced myself better; and then when the second loop hit, I was in a runner's high. Time and road scenery went by in a different pace. The rhythem of my breath was in a flow that I did not need to manage it. My leg muscle was more relaxed, while the frictions with my shoes made my foot bottom a little hurt. After the run, I was calm. I look out of the window. The wind is blowing through the leaves of trees outside. Leaves swing like the notes on a music sheets. The sun light casts different shadows on different leaves. The leaves grow out of the branch in a beautiful fractal (a word relevant to chaos theory) way, random but in a unnamed order. I haven't been in such a peaceful mind for a while.

Tonight is my house's special dinner. During lunch, people were talking about what to wear. How stupid! However, really think about it, how else you can enjoy a special dinner. Not everyday is a groundbreaking enlightment, not everyday is you conquer Mt. Everest, not everyday you earn your first million dollars. Life is full of mediocrity with sparcles of excitements here and there. So what's wrong with doing something stupid to enjoy the life? Moreover, dressing nice isn't that stupid, is it? Let me look over my wardrobe now...

Every day a struggle, every day a triumph

I really suspect that I have some chemical inbalance in my body. That makes my morning quite miserable. My solution is to work out on a bicycle machine for 40 minutes every morning. People might think I am addicted to workout. To some sense, I am. But to a broad sense, I deny it. I care less about building the body or make myself more physically fit. Rather, it is really about how I am going to make my day. It is a struggle that people with a peaceful mind rarely understand.

I am now in a spurt of productivity. I just finished a third chapter of my thesis tonight. Also last night, I got a good idea of a journal paper. I am going to finish that paper in two weeks, I think.

I started my second to last entry of my 26-friend series (Yuphen) last Tuesday. I haven't been working on it since. But when it comes out, it will be a good one, I promise.

Other news: 1. I got admitted into a summer institute conducted by Stanford Business School. I guess I am going to learn something about business this summer. This could potentially diversify my appealing when I look for a job in the future. 2. I had my fMRI study today. It was a follow-up of my hypnosis study. I got an image of my brain as a momento. Pretty cool.

200th entry

Last Mother's day, I blogged about my mom. And again, happy mother's day. I will not call you, as it will feel pretentious on your part. Besides, I do not have much to say anyway. I would rather be a bad son than living in an awkward moment. After the biology class, I begin to understand my pre-natal environment (a.k.a. my mom's stomach) determined who I am. Quite scary, as if the worst curse for a bad son is: to allow the time reverse, the mom stressed herself out during pregnancy, so that to guarantee the bad son would suffer from depression. That's the darkest implication of what I've learned this quarter.

Some small summeries about my life. Since this is my 200th entries, I deserve to have a summary, don't you think? My dad will be coming to visit. I know it is probably his most glorious moment in his retirement, I want him to get visa and plan travels smoothly. On the other hand, I do not think I would enjoy too much the time when my dad is visiting. Just do not have too much to talk to my dad. I do not think he would ever understand me and vice versa. But, if I can pretend to be enjoying the time throughout, then he will be happy and I will be happy eventually, knowing he is easily deceived. Anyway, complicated feelings.

I think I have found my identity. Cannot name my idnetity for sure, but I know I get more comfortable with my body, my thoughts, my logic, my feelings and the world around me. Sometimes, I lip-synched outloud, sometimes I moved my body with the music, I told people my so-called secrets, I said "hi" to people without being too shy, I talked about myself without judging before-hand-"how other people gonna react to this." These might be nothing to a lot of people, but for me, they are great leap forward. I've fought my own demons all the time, and I begin to see the chance of winning.

On another hand, my personal relationship takes another dip. Nothing major, but it just gets a little bit annoying. Why me again?

Run No. 129 this afternoon. I think I am physically ready for tomorrow's performance, during which I might be honored because I am graduating this year.

Start a day with a hug

Over last weekend, I was talking to a girl in my dorm in the morning. She told me that she broke up with her boyfriend because she found out that she was lesbian and sort of cheated on him. Then two morning later she saw me in breakfest and gave me a huge hug. So here it is. Letting another person know a big secret is building an intimate relationship.

When she hugged me from the behind with her right arm, I felt the female's soft body, surrounding me like a warm scarf in a cold winter. Couldn't smell too much, but if there is a smell, I must've liked it. I lowered my head, trying to rest my head on her hand, as if resisting the gravity was making me tired and I just wanted to let it go and flow. My neck touched gently with her breasts and my backhead was with her face. If there is a snapshop taken that moment, I can tell you why it is the most beautiful photo that human beings can ever produce.

The hug really made my day. I was all happy and full of energy. Subcontiously, I know I liked the hug a lot, but got them too rarely. Thanks, XXXX. Do not want to name you, just in case people want to track you down.

This is my 199 entries in my blog. I am quite surprised that I have kept blogging for such a long time. Some of the entries are great, and others must be crap. But I try not to be sudgmental. Do not expect appauses from my readers, and do not care if people read wrong meanings into my blogs. That's what keeps me going and going, eventually will leave a precious time capsule for an older me.

These are days

"These are days" is one of my favorite songs by "10,000 maniacs".

These days I live happily. With one small imperfection though. When it first emerged last Friday, I thought it was no big deal. Actually, I thought it was part of my plan anyway. However, it annoyed me in minutes, hours and days, just randomly creeping into my mind, unannounced. Before I realized it, it already pissed me off a bit, like water sunk into a sponge, little by little, until it got all heavy and dripping.

Other than that, it is perfect. Tomorrow I am going to give two workshops. My boss finally wrote a recommendation letter for me. She is very willing, but she is a big procrastinator. So it took me 1 months and maybe 5 emails to get it nailed. Talking about American inefficiency! I will perform dance one more time this Sunday. It will not be my best show, as I know that my physical capabilities are going downhill fast in the past year or so (not to help is my ankle injury). But it will be my fanale, my swan song, something I can feel happy and sad at the same time, something that I do not want to get a video tape of but always remember.

SF and Spring MIgration

Today I biked all the way to SF with Victor. It is about 45 miles. I got a flat tire in the middle, and Victor helped fix it. I only had my T-shirt and my short, so I was freezing after 10 miles or so because it was so cloudy and windy. At one point, I had to jog with my bike to keep myself warm. But nice experience over all. I am very happy that I did it today, although my legs feel like full of mercury right now.

I went to watch the Spring Migration show today. I was in the same show in the past two years. This year decided not to do too much dancing, so I did not audition for a piece that I was likely to get in. Now this piece turned out to be my favorite tonight, and I am little regretful that I was not in it. I said to myself,"If I just strech myself a little bit, maybe I could've put that off, dancing while finishing all other shit." Well, too late, dude. My decision is mine to regret, and I know I cannot have it all, as life is full of imprefection.

I sent an email to Hope, my favorite dancer, choreographer and person:)

Hi Hope:
I watched spring migration tonight. I love your piece! It was mesmerizing that I lost track of time. (Just so you know, the other day I got a hypnosis test, and my hypnosis score is 8 out 10!)
Your dad was actually 2 seats away from me. He was saying, "That's my daughter! Why the program booklet does not include the Columbia Law School thing?" He must be proud of you.
Anyway, I waited in the reception place for maybe 15 minutes and did not have a chance to see you there. Just wanted to say hello and tell you how much I enjoyed the piece. Hope everything else is well too. For me, I have got a post-doc position at Stanford for next year. I am
also on the waiting list of three law schools. I hope one of them will work out eventually and then I will make a decision of whether I will take it. Life is well for me, though less about dancing and more about dissertation recently.
I will come to see your show with Margaret Jenkins, although I am not sure which day.


I do not know I want to publish this email. I just want to, because I know I will sleep better tonight if I do.

Brain wiring

I am about to study in Stabucks, but my ipod need recharge. So it gives me some time to write this short.

I just called my dad to make sure he is on track to get his passport and visa. He is not a good listener, and I am not sure I get my point across. He also does not seem to ask questions, so I am not really sure whether he gets it. Of course, my Ningbonese gets pretty bad, so if he did not get it, it is partly my fault. But all in all, I just have problems in general to communicate with my family, before and now. Nothing changes.

I finally got a check-up on my ankle and it turned out to be okey. But I was afraid that doctor would tell me something was wrong. Overall, fear is one of my major weaknesses. I fear a lot of things: being wrong in answering questions, standing out in a crowd, social dancing, being rejected, making a potential wrong decision, wasting time, or nothing. In elementary school, I cried when the teacher caught me red-handed for some insignificant wrong-doings. Fear got me away from a lot of troubles, and that why I can blog about it rather than working at a night-shift in a fast-food factory today. However, these fearful experiences take a toll on my even today, makes me a tentative, reluctant, over-cautious social coward. I really do not know I can ever reconcile with those early experiences.

The other day, I was listening to a biology class. The teacher said that there is one important area in limbic system that manages fear, sexual behavior, aggression, depression and punish and reward reinforcement. I guess that's the part of the brain that really messes me up sometimes. Somehow in the early childhood, the wiring of this part of brain took a self-protective route. It helped me manage my early life, but now all of a sudden I find myself so different from most of people in the united states.

I guess my ipod is done, but I am about to leave. This blog is another self-over-analysis, my signature way of blogging. Somehow, knowing all the truth is not fun, but I cannot resist but writing them all out. The knowledge was gained by learning new insights into familiar words. For example, I have very different understanding about self-esteem, fear, abuse, depression, anxiety, spiritual etc. than before. I hope I am getting wiser.

blood donation

The past two weeks I am trying to stick to my schedule. Work during the weekdays and relax dueing the weekends. It works out quite well. On work, I had a draft on my chapter two last tuesday. On relaxing, here is my last weekend. On satureday morning, I went for a bike ride: 14 miles of Portola Valley. Returned to my dorm, and found out a vomit mass in one of the bathrooms from last night's party. Cleaned it with Yani. Unintentionally clogged the sink because we used absorbant powder which dropped into the pipes. After it was done, I went for a blood donation. Felt like Comrade Lei Feng! A little tired afterwards, normal for blood donation. Had a good 10-hour sleep.

On Sunday, I chatted up with my friend Victor in a coffee shop. We planned to ride 35 miles all the way to San Francisco next weekend. Sneaked into the second half of a Gilbert and Sullivan musical. On the way out, I saw Marshal and Maimi, so I chatted again. At night, I watched the movie: Good Morning, Vietman.

It is Monday, and I plan to recover from blood donation. Ran about 1 mile. Felt a little tired still, but I know I am still in a weak but good shape. Now I am typing up a blog before I head out to get some dissertation work done. Isn't life sweet?

What else did I do? Well, I have been reading some good books: Kite Runner and The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint. I am on the waiting list of three law schools. Try to keep my hope alive. My dad is getting his passport on May 20th, and I hope he will get visa in time. I am going to watch the dog and the house for a professor. I guess my dad could stay in the house too. My dissertation is going well. I can almost see the end of it. I realize that the management team began to fall apart, but just hang on for 5 more weeks and then we can say we had a fantastic year. What can beat that? The spring migration dance concert is coming. In the past two years I am a dancer, and this year I will be among the audience. Pitiful and content. I got a score of 8 (0-10) on my hypnosis test. Last night when I was on the bed, I tried to hypnotize myself. Small tricks, such as I can concentrate on my arms so that they rise or they attract to each other. It is the power of belief. Since I believe in hypnosis now, the belief makes it all possible.

OMG, it is real! (II)

Remember the 3D photos we used to stare at. It is a great analogy to hypnosis. With the help of two dots, our eyes can be locked into another stage where the 3D images begin to present themselves out of ulterly random chaos. Same with hypnosis. With the help of a hypnosis master, the mind switches to another stage. While I was hypnotized yesterday, I was highly aware I was hypnotized and I knew that if I just shook my head, I could get out of it. But why should I? The 3D images are so beautiful and amazing that they eyes are willingly to be locked. My mind kept exploring the sensation that I never experienced before, and my curiosity finished off the loop that the hypnosis master's master plan. Awesome!

I had a run a minute ago. According to my running log, the first time in 10 days due to the rainy whether. I intentionally used some hypnosis technique: focusing on something other than my exhaustion. It worked! It felt like a really good run. And the more I think about it, the more it began to make sense. For example, I always feel less exhausted when I run a new route, because I am easily distracted (or focused) on the new scenary. What's why I can hit 7-8 miles when I ran the West Lake. I do not think I can do it by running campus loop twice. Cheering also works. When people cheer for you, you are so focused on not letting them down, and your body just stretches itself to it ultimate edge without you even realizing it.

On the dark side, I also realized that it could be used to make people stupid. Now I am ulterly convinced that religion takes advanatge of it to convince people that when they concentrate, they will feel an unworldly sensation, because of god or whatever. Nonsense. People's mind is amazing because it could be shaped into different sensations (probably due to evolutionary advanatge), and contributing it to another person, god or whatever, just belittles human spirit. Well, it is not my fault. Maybe some day I should find an evolutionary advantage for believing in god, then I will be ulterly speechless, as if I picked up a stone to hit my toes.

OMG, it is real!

I am talking about hypnosis. Yes, I was hypnotized for half an hour this afternoon. Amazing. I thought I was not the type easily to be hypnotized, but I guess I am after all. It is quite an experience, but hard to describe. Moreover, the guy, david spiegel, is a M.D., and he explained the hypnosis phenomenon to us pretty well.

Tin y Dancer, Almost Famous and Da Vince Code

No matter how old I grow into, I always find myself being silly in retrospect. (Well, you can say it is quite silly to retrospect at all).

Anyway, I am listening to the mixed CD D. made for me last year. It is all smiling, as if to celebrate my life wasn't that boring after all last year. I was pursuing her as my love interest, but I also knew her imperfection from the day I knew her. I have no way to judge whether all those were rational or reasonable. I just did what I felt right at that moment. And now I can relax and smile at my own sillyness, only to hope the episode would not diminish my tendency to be silly again. And of course, I no longer feel awkward to wore the "I Heart NY" T-shirt. When people asked whether I had been to New York, I said that my friend gave the t-shirt to me. It is amazing how I once assumed that these artifacts were as dead as tombstone, only to find they got back to life with the passage of time, presenting a new layer of meaning to me. Now it is the track 03, Tiny Dancer by Elton John, that is dancing through my ears. Studies showed that ipod is destorying the ears of the young people. And I say, bring it on. Indeed, there are some brilliant songs there.

I have been keeping up the schedule with myself. Up early and down early. Now I have the whole morning back, and also began my morning work-out plan. So far so good. I think I can do with 7 hours of sleep again, when I have this neat schedule.

Classes are all going well. I wasted less time on line, and spent more time reading. I just finished a book "The Da Vinci Code". It is quite an amazing book. Besides being really enjoyable, it confirmed one of my thoughts: "religion is all about limiting human's interpretation of the real history". But it went beyond that, "religion is actually fun. All the amazing stories and symbols, songs and texts. What makes it amazing is the fact that it is shared by so many people. Not the opposite, that people believed it because it is amazing." A really fun read. I could not put it down for a while. Now I am picking up another book, Kite Runner.

The class I am supposed to teach this quarter will be cancelled, I am quite sure, due to the low enrollment. Several reasons: 1. the class did not make the Time Schedule, 2) the title turned people away. Anyway, bad lucky, but I am still a good teacher.

I am auditing a Human Biology class. It is fun class, as I began to understand the bahaviors of the people around me and, more importantly, myself. I probably would have more to say when the topic covers sexual behavior, mental health or spirituality. Indeed, the instructor is an atheist and teaches about evolution. He does not hide that he suffered from mental problems sometimes, and I think I understands him: the peril of being a thinker without the comfort of blind belief. However, when they shine, they shine through. His class has 500 people. Yesterday I arrived at the classroom 10 minutes before the lecture and I got the third to the last row. I guess I can use this to comfort myself, using a sentence from the movie Almost Famous (co-incidently, it's theme song is no other than Tiny Dancer): "Some day, you will be cool," the sister told the narrator of the movie.

Also, I have a swimming class and a weigth training class. I am not really taking them. I just want to convince myself so that I will take my work-out schedule seriously. Tomorrow will be a busy day, and I accept.

up early

I have been getting up early before 8am and sleeping before 1am for two days. That's very promising. By 10:30am, my usually time to step out of my dorm, I already get qiute a lot work done.

Sad thing is that the class I am teaching now does not have any enrolled students, although I have a bunch of auditors. I suspect the title of class might turn undergrads away: "data analysis and management in social science". I should've come up with a more sexy title. Now it is too late. Hopefuly they wouldn't cancel my class.

Update

I guess I really own readers some updates of what's happening in my life. It is quite uneventful recently, but I definitely have something to report.

Spring is coming, and I might take a swimming class this quarter. I am also teaching a class this quarter on SPSS. Today I had the first session. I was nervous about how many students gonna show up and how it would go, but afterwards I found I was quite a good teacher.

My life priority is change, I figure. I got out of a dance piece today. I felt bad to abandon the group, but I did it. It is hard to give up things. That's why I accumulate so many burdens on my shoulder. I guess I am learning to give up things. One quote from the Time Magazine struck me: Life is not about what we can do, but about what is worth doing. I got a video ipod recently. My old one died. I am quite happy with the new one, because it is COOL!

I got quite a lot done on my chapter 2 of the dissertation over the break. I think I am over the most recent writer's block and back in my swing. I guess I should ride on the momentum and do more of it. I have applied to graduate with Ph.D. this summer, so I have to finish the whole thing by September.

I got a letter saying that I was waitlist by a law school. I am quite hopeful about the chance, but I am not sure. In the meanwhile, I need to talk with my boss about the post-doc position at my school on Thursday. All of a sudden, I feel good hope for next year.

I try to come up with a good daily schedule. I am writing it out as a psychological reinforcement for myself.
7am: Get up
8-10am: Readings
Then get some workout or go swimming
After lunch: I will either teach my class, or prepare my class, or take dance class, or do my work in the lirary.
5pm: Running? I am not sure. If i have morning workout, then I do not need this one. By the way, I ran again today, the whole 4 miles, the first time in two weeks I think.
6pm: Dinner
7-11: Study. Whatever. Be productive.
11: Return to dorm. Play some piano, chatting with people, calm down, sleep at midnight. or 12:15pm latest. By the way, now I can play most parts of "Fur Elise" or "For Alice", the famous piano music.
I hope I can stick with it, because it will be good for me. Starting from today.

Wow, I haven't written a good blog for a while

And this one is not a good one either. Just want to catch up a little bit.

Spring break is almost over. Really nothing major happening in life. I am preparing to teach a class this quarter. They will pay me over the summer, during which I will take a grace quarter to finish my dissertation. Still do not know what I will do in a long run, but I am taking one day at a time.

Just back from a ski trip. I was with Victor's family. Victor is the real name of my Amsol in my first ever blog on friends. He has a loving wife and cute boy. We drove to the ski resort on Wed and ski for half a day. And then we stayed in Reno. Eating steaks and played video poker. The second day we went to ski again, and then retreated to Reno at night. The third day we were back.

The trip is relaxing. My spring break would otherwise be quite boring without it. I snowboarded both days. Once I took a wrong turn and got lost. It started to snow and I could not see anyone or lifting chairs. For a moment, I was quite pessimistic about maybe a snow mobile will come to rescue me. Well, I found a way to get back to track in 10 minutes, and Victor is now just laughing at me for being such a panic boy.

I also have a closer observation of their family in action. I really liked the relationship. Nothing seems to be fake. They love each other, but they also argue and fight. Even when I am present, they just act like themselves rather than putting up some bullshit cover to present the best part. They provided the best resources for their boy, but also discipled him well. I wouldn't be surprised if their kid grows up to be a great person.

a small lapse

In retrospect, I think I had a small depression in the past week. I did not really know how I got into it, and did not realize how I got out of it. But I just know it happened, by comparing the mood and my work productivity. Well, whatever. It troubles me too much just to think about it, so stop intellectualizing!

Yes, II rejected the CUHK offer

After ten days of nursing my left foot, I am back running. It feels a little uncomfortable in the first 500 hundred meters, but after that, it feels normal. In the future, I wish I will be more careful.

Procrastination on my thesis is a big theme for me this quarter. I am busy in thousands of things, and they give me perfect excuse to not looking at my crappy thesis at all. Now things are winding down, and I hope I will be break enough to open these files over this spring break. Also, my paper is rejected from Social Forces, and now I need to revise this paper too so that I can submit it to other journals. Still not much information about law schools and post-docs. I just hope I will not be stuck with a worst case scenario.

I am going to teach a class this spring quarter. This will make a good quarter for me, and also add a nice item to my resume.

Spanish final exam is coming. I am review the book one chapter after another. I think I have a very good sense of the language now. I can read well, with the assistence of online dictionary. If people slowed their speaking enough, I can catch a phrase or two. Just finish the piano class. I can play some simple scores after several practices. My music reading is bad, but my muscle memory is pretty good, thanks probably to my dance training. I think I should play several pieces really well, so that I can show off once a while.

rejection of an offer

I turned down a great job offer in the past several hours. Haven't regretted it, and maybe I never will. It just feels right to do so, even though I cannot see its immediate effect yet. I need to see my advisor on Saturday. I guess I have a lot to explain, and I still do not know how.

my left foot

I almost felt that my left foot cracked last night. Last night is the last perforamance of "Urban Nights". We had small glitches several times. Then in the free improvising mode, I jumped high and then someone pushed me. I landed on the upper-surface of my left-foot, and I heared three distinct sounds of "cracks". a lot of thoughts went through my mind that time, "oh, my gosh, fractures". I played on the ground for a while, until the acute pain was gone. And then got up to finish the piece.

After I came back, I was very worried about the foot. I hope this is not the end of the physical activity. The foot is fine in any normal activities, but I feel some pains when I pressure it inwards. I hope it will going to heal. I have never been so scared about my injury. Before I would just laugh it off, believing it is going to be fine. Not this time. I was lying in bed thinking about it for a long time before I fell asleep.

I bought some flowers for my dance group last night. It was a hit. I feel you can make people happy by justing doing small little things. Besides, since there are other dance groups also, my group members now felt they were special because they could hold a flower back to the dorm as their trophy. Of course, I went back home empty handed. I just could not resist the temptation to give away as many flowers as possible, so I left none for myself.

In general, life treats me well (if my foot will be okey). I lowered my expectation about my future, so it felt better. I did not call Zexum yesterday, because it was Sunday in China. I felt very awkward when I called her on weekends, and could imaging her mom eardropping (I know her mom actually quite well). So I will call her tonight. I am going to visit my friend's place tonight, maybe catching some glamorous moment of Oscar. And then back to the management selection meeting, which is quite stupid to begin with. I have helped to set up a compost plot for my house, and felt like a big achievement. I finished the chair painting, and I hope I will upload a picture of that soon. California keeps raining, and I hope the weather next week will be good. If my foot heals, I should resume running at time soon.

unfair

Last post is a little bit unfair in describing my current life. In actuality, I quite enjoyed it. Both positive and negative feelings existed, but I do not know which one is the REAL reality. So just want to be fair and balanced, like fox news.

Losing control?

Although I am managing it well, I know I am not doing well recently. At 8pm tonight, I felt that I was so exhausted, an exhaustion from days of disappointment and crazy schedule. I lay down for a while, listening to some music. Phone rang, and a stupid conversation. Smiling faces on the surface, I know I am sinking pretty badly.

How so? Well, it is all stupid, because it is all about expectations. I thought I would have a lot of options for the next year, but it turned out not to be the case. The options I have right now it not bad, but I am just not satisfied because of the high hope. Most of the time I hide my ambition quite well, but once I strike, I want to hit the target. But this time, I might just miss it badly. Sigh....

So there is really no big deal. Working in hongkong, or stay in my school for one more year on post-dos. Either is not bad. But what really hits me is my growing doubts about the matching between my ambition and my ability. I have been cruising all the way until today, and now I face a first ever drawback in my whole life. Live with it, I tell myself. But another voice is always there, telling me all kinds of negative things about myself. So that's the state of my mind. I have been planning my game all along, but all of a sudden, I find myself not in the driver seat any more. So a little bit car-sick now.

Ok, let me describe my day today. This quarter is my busiest, and here is why. Last night, went to bed at 1am. Got up at 9am. Shower, eat, and went to class of spanish at 10am. 11am, meeting in the library. 12:00am, department talk. 1:15pm, voice class. 2:10, meeting with my tutee. 3-5pm library work. 5pm returned to my dorm. Played some piano. 6pm dinner. 7pm, spanish homework. 8pm lay down a bit, called Zexum. 9pm, dance rehearsal. 11pm, return. More spanish homework. Almost every single hour was occupied. Crazy day it is. Tomorrow will be similar. All the way until Saturday. Take a break on Sunday. Next week will be better, as I will finish off all the spanish homework and dance rehearsal. I think I am over-committed this quarter. Part of my problem is that I do not know how to throw away burdens as I walk along. Rubbish!

My column

Finally, I think Beijing Daily is going to publish my column. This is my third installment. I think I will be famous soon. Just kidding. No, seriously.

A World According to i-pod

American students listen to music every single minute, no matter whether they are working, studying, eating, jogging or sometimes even sleeping. In the past several years, Apple’s i-pod has become a ubiquitous school gear besides the backpack and notebook. If you also get this little metal box with white earphones, congratulation: welcome to the “cool-kid” club!

However, buying i-pod is not the only monetary investment. Music costs money too. For most students living in a dorm setting in China, pirated versions of music CD usually comes handy. The ultra-cheap price hides the real market values of the music. American students live in a totally different world. They would never suspect a plain-looking lady holding a baby on the street is actually a vendor of illegal disks. Talking about life experience……

Anyway, as the poorest among all demographics, college students usually get around by illegal downloading. The university has recently tightened the rules and several of my friends have received a warming email for their misbehaviors. However, this cannot stop brave souls from trying, as students exchange CDs and swap hard drives. Just in case my university is looking over my shoulder right now, I am here to declare that all the music in my i-pod is indeed legally procured. And conspicuously, I’ve lost all my receipts!

Some students in my dorm are hippie types. They seem to know the names of all rock bands and the histories of how each song was made. They go to all kinds of live performance, as if it is a ritual of coming of age. A big nerd as I am, I often suspect that not every performance is as fun as they describe. This reminds me that I used to always question the quality of pop music concerts in Beijing, although I had never been to one actually.

When we cook, two big speakers face the kitchen and blast loud music. Sometimes it is even hard to chat with people two feet away. People will sing along when the music is familiar. At one time, we kept playing the musical “Rent” over and over, and the kitchen would produce all different pitches of “five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes, how do you measure a year?” I figure the composer is a mathematician. Sometimes students get all hyped up, and they will do some happy dances along with the music.

American students’ love affair with the music is probably seeded early in their children. Churches are the art center of local communities, and a lot of kids participate in the chorus. Schools never force-feed students with academic materials, so students freely choose singing and dancing as their life inspiration. Recently, “American Idol” TV program has set up a dream workshop. Singing well, you are Kelly Clarkson. Singing awful, you are William Hung. Either way, you get a record deal and gain fame over night.

My taste of music has been changing under the influence of my friends in my dorm. The 3,600 songs in my i-pod have recorded the shifting landscape of the music dear to me. Some early favorites have been shuffled aside, and new songs gain prominent locations in the play-lists. After some painstaking research, I have found three tricks that, if I play masterfully, would make you well respected by cool kids in America. First, repeat after me, “I HATE Celine Dion!” (or even better, say, “I am over Madonna now.”) Second, procure as much knowledge about “the Beatles” as possible and always boast about that. Third, play a musical instrument, preferably guitar. Oh, did I forget to mention i-pod?

Why?

It is a short one. I just called Zexum, and she was busy. So we just talked for about 5 minutes and then she said she had to go back to work. And I said it was totally okey. Then I felt bad after I hung up.

I have been telling her that it is okey to plead "busy" when I call her in her busy time. In fact, having her own work and being serious about it is one major reason why I like her. However, human emotion can trick me into something else, and I guess I have to live with it.

.... (Two hours later) Just kicked some serious asses. Finished some monstrous homework in two hours. Thought it might take more, but obviously it does not take that long.

A weekend!

Hi, kids, I am here again, happy about the weekend. The small obligations combined to make me hard to breath, and at least now I am feel a sigh of relief since I have two days to finish up unfinished business. However, things still keep piling up even over the weekends, so I really need to glue my ass on the chair and do things one after another.

My advisor emailed me a minute ago. Obviously, he got to know the job offer from someone else and asked what I think. Damn, I thought I can have a better answer for him than the one I had now (I do know knpw). I tried to hide the news from him so that I will have some time to see other options and wait for other opportunities. Now I may hold on for one more day and just give him a damn and indecisive answer. That's not the image I want him to have of me.

Stretched out for sure, but am I stressed out? Hell no. I felt alive, mainly because of my friends I made in the past year or two. For good or bad, I slowly lost the connections with my chinese fellows that used to be my only network. I do not even think of calling them at all at any more. Maybe I just do not care any more. Maybe I just happened to know too many of their imperfections and found out that I had alternatives to them. For example, I know one person is never honest, and the other friends seem to keep the eyes closed. I was the one to shout out "the emperor does not have clothes on," but that only ruined everyone's good feeling. Another friend was only friend when your status is high, but easily abandoned you when you are not. Yet another..... Fuck. I admit that I am imperfect, but I wouldn't trade my integrity for anything! So here I am. On this crossroad, I feel the constellation of the people around me shifting and shifting. Sometimes I feel nostagia, but more often than not, I find myself much enpowered, because I have options on friends now.

I do not know why I want to be so negative in this blog now, because originally I intends to praise my new friends. One friend especially deserves mentioning: a girl from my dance group. She embodies almost all virtues I value much, and she just treated me with a lunch. Also, another crazy girl in the group. We just played around so much that I was no longer sexualized with her. Another male friend is the one of the two persons who actually know the reason of my Hangzhou trip (besides my blog readers).

I called home yesterday. My parents just purchased a new apartment. It costs a fortune, but it all worths it. My dad told me one reason is to have face among his colleagues, and I was quite touched by his honesty. I know it was hard for him to tell me (or everyone else) about this "shameful" reason, and I am happy that he began to treat me as an adult now. Thanks, dad. I chipped in some money to help them out. But I know more importantly, they can earn faces by telling friends and relatives that "our son gave us money from the US to buy the apartment." This is quite laughable, but it comforts me just by imagining their happiness of saying that.

Also, I accidentally read an English blog of a friend. She used to have a blog of Chinese, and I read that blog regularly. The Chinese blog is just too neat: every emotion is processed and thought through, and each entry could be a text-book essay. Every time I read it, I had to wonder, what is she REALLY thinking about? Obviously, I am a bigger fan of her English blog, because I can just take the words and sentence as they are. I guess that's also the reason why I keep an English blog. It is just now sincere I want to be while blogging, and I do not want to my native language to mess it up with all its subtlety, nuance and weird connotations. Sometimes, knowing less and knowing more.

Now it is time to paint the chair. I started two weeks ago, and now it is time to finish it!

Amazing run around West Lake

I had a great run around West Lake two days ago. It took me one hour. I estimated it was about 1/4 - 1/3 of a marathon. Maybe I should shoot for half a marathon next time? I did not feel too tired because of all the attention I got on the road. I guess that's why I also love stage performance. Keep it on.

My friend (XXYY)

(Written on Feb 16, and revised on Feb 20)

I know I will write about her some day. I wanted to when I was in China last month, but after I came back to the states, I gave up the motivation. It is just hard to write about her when physically far away. A sense of detachment never works to my favor. However, now I am back in China again. Currently typing in a Youth Hostel in Hangzhou, waiting for Zexum to show up. I think I should pick up this thread yet again, although not sure how good a job I can do for now.

XXYY is a skinny skinny girl. Skinny is usually a word for physicality, but for her, it is also of her personality. She was lovely when we were in high school together. She stood out in an unconventional way. In school, usually good students are also popular. She is not a good student, but she manages to be popular. She is extremely intelligent and well-versed. Has a quick wit, only for social interaction, not for academic studies. Somehow, academic studies are just not good enough for her. I used to be one of the kids who want her attention to. Because for me, her approval indicates that I am not a nerd after all, and proving that was very important to me.

But her smartness is probably wasted. Not because that she does not study hard, but because her smartness is used mostly to fend off others’ abuse and bullying. (I realize this point after I was much old). People like to make fun of her, just because she is so smart and always protects herself well. Nobody really understood her back that time. I was also one of them who like to make fun of her, as if she is the perfect girl to practice flirting with. Now I realize that we actually made some injuries to her that probably she herself never realized how bad those wounds are.

Anyway, those wounds do not manifest themselves in any obvious ways. Maybe I am just so sensitive that I create some dramas out of nothing. But here is my theory, right or wrong. XXYY is insecure underneath her impenetrable shell. That’s why I found that her skinniness is also part of her personality: a person suffers quite much that all the suffering manifest itself on the exterior, and sadly, nobody understands that suffering.

I do not know why I should be that sentimental. After all, that kind of story happens every day in China: a young soul got smothered by good-willed or bad-willed friends. However, I felt bad about it because I, and my friends, used to take advantage of her, mostly out of senseless joy. I quite regretted that now, and I am sorry. And I know I should let nobody know about this regret, as it would only show how condescending I am now.

All my feelings aside, here are some facts (By the way, I am quite proud that I am one of the few who really understand her, know where she get to today and concerned about where she is heading. But I regret that this understanding comes too late). I attended her wedding last month. I arrived late, and she was busy tending different guests. She looked exhausted, as she should. After guests began to leaving, a bunch of core friends still stayed. Friends made fun and told jokes, most of them not even funny and most of them were quite gross. She dealt with them well and appropriately, just as she did back in high school. A daring girl, no boys could get an up-hand over her. The scene reminded me how she was treated by friends back in high school. I used to think she enjoyed it, but obviously she was not.

After a fun-less half hour, I was about to leave. She accompanied me to the elevator, and we hugged. She suddenly cried, as if she finally got an outlet from those bullying. My hands held her bony back, feeling bad. Without masks, she was just a little girl crying in other people’s arms. And I guess that she really needs this kind of break, finding a safe place to cry. I am very happy that I was that safe place that night, as if it could redeem me from my insensitive treatment of a great friend back in high school. A great friend? I want to say so, or at least want to think that way.

In any account, this blog is strange. I do not really have pity or feel condescending towards XXYY. But if you read this blog, I bet you will feel that way. And I am sorry if you do, because that’s not what I want to convey. Sometimes I feel sad about the reality, as some stupid people have all the attention and some great people are left forgotten. XXYY is a great person, but not a lot of people appreciate that. She is still proud of herself and never lose self-confidence, but one day, maybe she herself will forget her own greatness.

You may ask, how great she is? I do not know for other people, but for me, she probably changed my life trajectory for ever. She was free, unconventional and love literature. That was part of the package that convinced me to switch from science to liberal arts, joining the literature club, went to people’s university of China for sociology, and finally landed in another country and still loved the arts so much. Among all my 26 friends in my blog, XXYY was the one that I interacted with the least. However, Every time when I came to China, I wanted to see how she was doing. Because deep down, I seemed to understand, knowing her is also about knowing myself. And so far, getting to know her is quite a fun and amazing journey.

a meal on Songhua

I helped a grocery store run, so my friends dedicated this meal to me. "On Songhua" is a pun here! 

Hongkong and Hangzhou

I went to Hongkong for the job interview. I have to say that I was an instant hit in Hongkong. I was especially good in the Q&A session, as I nailed all the questions but still paid respects to those professors, some of which were smart while others were not. I got the job, though I was really not sure whether I should go.

On a related story, I saw AlphaBBQ again in Hongkong. We went to watch a dance show together. It was quite amazing. Here are some words I wrote down after I went back to the hotle.

******

I think I have something to say to the blogs. Now I am in hongkong again, having this stupid job talk. I got this job (of course!), but do I really going to take it? Anyway, let’s not think about it right now.

I just watched the Cloud Gate Dance Troupe’s performance. I do not know how to describe how I liked it. The pieces are almost perfect in its own way, but I feel something is not right. It is just too well planned in small details that I do not get the whole point of the pieces.

Anyway, that’s not really important tonight. I saw Alphabbq again tonight, one month after our last encounter. I treated her the dance tickets and she treated me a late dinner. She looked tired, and I find my words were not able to cheer her up too much. I think I am not doing too well recently either. Many responsibilities I have taken this year have taken a toll on me, and I am just hanging on, trying so hard to be a "perfect" person. I guess everyone has those hard times, and she probably needs some good sleep. I am a little worried about her losing sleep, because when I am stressed out, sleeping is usually the first indication.

After I said goodbye to her in the train station, I felt sad. (Strange that I did not feel that way last time. For some reasons, I sorta know that I will come to Hongkong soon again. Not this time though). I was on the train, flipping over some sad coldplay songs on my ipod. I know I get into this emotional slump. Tomorrow is totally unknown, and every goodbye of today is just sad sad sad. Sometime I hope I can just break down one day, to really sort through my thoughts, to throw away those unnecessary burdens, and to emerge as a person with no history.

I am being stupid here. But hey, it is my blog, and I say whatever I want. Strange thing is: After I wrote it out, I am no longer sure whether it was what I intended to wrote to begin with. But what the heck!

****************

Now it is back to Feb 20, and I just read her blog about the same event. I always think her blogs are better in presenting the facts, as mine tends to be analytical so that the facts are actually distorted. Anyway, I have been reading her blogs quite closely. But the strange thing is: when I met her, I pretended that I was not reading her blogs. For example, I pretended not knowing her new hair style, although she posted the photos early on. I still do not know why. Maybe unconsciously, I regard reading a blog is equal to stalking a person, and I am not fond of admitting that.

Finally, there is this photo of "sogo". Every time I met Alphabbq, we would pass that same logo for some reason. In January, we met for two days, for each day I remembered the logo. On a third, when I was wandering in Hongkong at night alone, I passed it again. I took a picture of it, thinking whether I should ask her out for a walk again. I eventually refrained from that and chose to visit several museums by myself. This time we saw it again, and finally I realized that it is at the entrance of the train station, where we usually departed. No wonder! Now this photo seems to have more meanings for me: not only a location we passed together, but also an emotion of "goodbye".

Thanks for her wish of "good-luck", I did have a great time in Hangzhou. During my time in Hongkong, I felt this long distant relationship had taken a toll on me and my confidence got eroded quickly. However, meeting Zexum in person reassured me that it would be a huge pity if I missed this good girl. We had a most civil discussion about our relationship and I was assured that we were on the same page. We finally held hand the moment before I hopped on the bus, a moment I only wish happened earlier. Both of us have some decisions to make, and I am still not 100 percent sure. However, I am very optimistic now. I am going to call her in a minute.

Catching up

Wow, it has been a while since last time I blogged. Here are some catch-ups.

I finally had my dance debut. After the performance, I sent out this email to my dancers to explain my piece.

*****************
Hi, that's my last "Hi dancers" email. Thanks so much for being in mypiece and dance so well tonight!
You may have been wondering, "why is this piece called 'beans on thefloor'?" Well, it refers to a silly story during my childhood: When I wasabout 5 years old, I was very stubborn. One day my grandma handed me abowl of breen beans and I was happy eating. However, one bean was droppedon the floor. I asked my grandma to find this ONE bean, but she couldn't.Who knows how far the bean had been rolling? I then cried andcried and cried, insisting on finding this bean. Eventually, my grandmasecretly took one bean from the big pot and shouted, "See, Songhua, I'vefound it!" I believed her and happily ate this one precious bean Which Ithought that attempted to escape me.
That's all about it. Now my grandma is very old, living in a seniorcenter back in hometown. I think I should pay some tribune to her, since Igrew up with her rather than my parents until I graduated from highschool. The idea: I love her as much as I loved the bean on the floor whenI was a kid. So this piece.
Best,
Songhua

Beaten

Life goes alternative days and years. One day you are up there floating and the other you get smashed on the ground like a flat pancake. Today I am the pancake, flatter than you can imagine.

It starts with an exhausted body after yesterday's performance and a realization that I might be done with dancing or anything related with the youth. Also, I really a long-distance relationship (though not really started) might not good for me in the end. I did really bad in spanish class, as I did not really get what's going on there. Then I practiced my job talk and realized that it needed quite some work. I went to an oral communication tutor, and I thought that I did badly there. Then I got a call from the consulting company: I was kicked off in the second round. I know I did not do too well in the interview, but hard facts are always hard to swallow. Now swallow my own pride and realize that I am just one of the little guys on the street with only a crappy life story to tell.

This may sound crazy. But when I am in a down day, I can't help suspecting whether spending the past six years here is actually a mistake and a big waste of time. I really hope not, but this thought just sneaks in when my mind is in the most vulnerable stage. When it occurs, I feel helpless. I know the exact reasons why my life needs a change and almost see when it is going to happen, but I feel I am running out of the tricks of "how".

I need to put myself together before tomorrow though, because I have another practice job talk coming up. Well, doing well there would be crucial, because I constantly need those small successes to remind my worth to myself anyway. I hope I wouldn't be a piece of shit tomorrow.