Year in Review

As the year draws to an end, it's time for another self inspection.

What is your biggest regret of the year?
What is your best memory?
What are you most grateful for?

I've had my share of ups and downs this year. Overall I'm happy with the way I handled myself throughout my trials, perhaps that's why the powers above saw fit to bless me with this happy place I am in now :)

Very very content. Finding new friends and new hobbies are good in themselves, but finding new friends that enjoy the same hobbies are amazing, I couldn't ask for more.

Plus this year I got to travel and, for the first time, record my experiences with the camera Sung graciously gifted me with :) My friends made me feel very loved during my travels, as if enveloped in a warm embrace.

I'm also grateful for the blessings those around me have recieved, a big congratz to those expectant parents, new parents, newly weds, newly engaged...I can't imagine how next year could possibly be better than this year, but in this moment...anything seems possible.

Love and happiness for us all :)

On Marriage

I read this article recently on perfect marriages. In the article, the author referred to couples that had spent 30+ years in loving harmony, and asked them what their secrets were. I decided to paraphrase some of the quotes here as they were really touching...

This was regarding a couple, Calvin and Alice, who had been happily married. When asked, he confessed that, "he'd spent his entire life trying to impress her"

"Imagine being married to someone for 30 odd years who still wants to slay dragons for you, who inspires you, day after day, to be the sort of person worth slaying dragons for...Where do you go once you've known love like that?"

After Alice died, Calvin recieved a letter from a reader who wrote that after reading about his marriage, she started judging her boyfriends from then on by the criteria of, "But will he love me like Calvin loved Alice?".

I've always been a believer in Love...even after countless others told me that the best one could probably hope for in life, was to have a good friend beside you in your old age. Most said that they believed relationships usually start with passion (firey and hot), which cools and solidifies to love (steady and dependable), and then lessens in ardor to affection? companionship? friendship? That's not going to be good enough for me, and I don't know why it should be good enough for you either...

Reply

A friend of mine read the "poem" in the post below and asked if I was planning on writing a second edition. Since I wasn't intending on writing a poem in the first place, but had just wanted to express my thoughts, I hadn't planned on writing more since that blurb already adequately summed up my feelings.

However, apparently he felt the poem was so bleak and negative, he had to write a follow up to lighten up the mood? I was surprised and interested in the fact that he felt the need to write more, more so than the poem itself...but what he said is amusing too ;) Here it is...

"Though the fear be great,
the barrier be formidable,
and the mask flawless;
The hope and joy
of seeing face to face,
without mist or mask,
must and must
prove greater still."

Masks

I think it must be the wish of many men,
to be known and loved for who he is.
And although there is fear as to if
he will find one who will want to,
and be able to break through
the barriers and understand him,
the fear that he won't be judged beautiful
after he has been seen through must be greater.

What Pseudo Historical Figure Best Suits You?

You scored as Dante Alighieri. According to you most of humanity will spend at least some of their afterlife in hell. You have a high likelihood of being exiled, but anyone as bloody fucking romantic as you deserves what they get. You have an exceptional moral code, overshadowed by the fact that you yourself cannot uphold it. Your existence bears a definite irony, although of fairly Christian morality, many pagans, satanists, communists, and intellectuals admire you and your works for all the wrong reasons. Also, the brighest star in your sky is never going to be your lover... It takes a lot of grief to be the cartographer of hell. Dante Alighieri 67% C.G. Jung 67% Miyamoto Musashi 50% Friedrich Nietzsche 50% Charles Manson 42% Sigmund Freud 42% O.J. Simpson 33% Adolf Hitler 25% Stephen Hawking 25% Mother Teresa 25% Jesus Christ 25% Steven Morrissey 25% Elvis Presley 17% Hugh Hefner 0% What Pseudo Historical Figure Best Suits You? created with QuizFarm.com

2, 4, 6, 8, Who do you Appreciate?

[Ok, so I'll admit that the previous post was way too long. I was practicing essay writing! Where else do we get to write essays nowadays...I'm glad at least *some* of you read it, even if I did have to force you...]

While reflecting on a discussion sparked by my Belonging post, I decided to message a friend to thank her. Last year upon my return to Toronto, I had found myself sitting idlely on my hands a lot of the times as most of my friends were no longer in Toronto. I felt that she had taken me under her wing and generously invited me out when I would have been bored at home otherwise. I thanked her to her surprise (she asked me if I was drinking at 11am), and told her I appreciate it.

The next night, it was my turn to get pleasantly surprised. The gist of it was, a friend messaged me saying he felt he hadn't been talking to me as much, and he wanted me to know he thought of me. So sweet!

Such simple gestures, but says so much. So dear readers, who do you appreciate?

Belonging: In the End...

(Please read Belonging and Belonging T(w)o in order first)

There are a dozen different analogies that come to mind when I dwell on the topic of belonging: E.T. wanting to go home, ship afloat with no place to anchor, butterfly flitting between flowers etc. The gist of it is, I'm lonely and I want to go "home".

Ironically, I am living with my family and have been besieged by familial duties these few months. Recently I have been busying myself re: new family house. I am in full charge of all the financial/legal/administrative aspects. But far from feelings of belonging, I am increasingly stressed and disgruntled with the responsibilities for a dwelling which I feel/know I won't likely live in for more than a year.

Ungrateful? Ironic? New family home, but still not happy! Bad Janet!

What's more ironic is just a few posts down I was trying to describe the panic that enveloped me when I realised next year I might be miles away in law school, with no family obligations.

What do you make of it? Am I confused? Scared? Lost? Spoiled? This I know for sure though, I've taken minutes away from your life by these 3 long posts. Minutes you won't get back!

Writing stupid stuff helps with my law school essays :)

Belonging T(w)o...

(Please read Belonging post below first)

I remember this time last year, I was feeling ill at ease at the prospect of remaining stationary (and in Toronto to boot) for a whole year. Well I didn't end up being in Toronto exclusively, and it wasn't that bad, still...the feelings have resurfaced again this year. Anywhere I am, I remember what I'm missing in other places: when I'm in Toronto I miss the exciting non-stop action in HK, when I'm in HK I miss the stable, solid, dependable blandness of TO, when I'm in TO with guy friends I miss my Amazon babes in SG, when I'm in SG I miss ...you get the idea.

Maybe I'm ungrateful. I've been told many times that I'm really blessed to have been able to travel/reside in so many places. I feel very loved and am delighted to have found friends all over the world. Please don't mistake this rant as me saying I don't appreciate your kindness. It's just that I can't help but always feel like a fringe member, a stranger you welcomed into your home with open arms, but never really a part of the family.

This bout of self scrutiny came about after reflecting on my friend Victor's birthday celebration this weekend. Short summary, he had 13 friends spend almost an entire day with him to celebrate. This had been planned via 30+ emails days before. We went rock climbing-dinner-movie-pub-bubbletea, from 3pm to 3am.

Besides noting that he must be an incredible guy (he IS pretty awesome), I was hugely flattered/surprised that I was included in the planning/celebration. I have only been acquainted with him for 9 months, and it was only Sept. that I even started talking to him directly (via MSN). So I feel somewhat like an adoptee, like I've been accepted, but also felt like I don't quite belong...most of the people there had known each other for 4+ years.

I also enviously wondered when I'll ever be able to accumulate 13 friends in one place to celebrate with.

What's it going to take for me to belong?

But is it all my point of view? Maybe no one thinks of the adoptee as not a member of the family. Maybe I'm greedy in wanting to belong to all the places/people I've loved when it's only possible to belong with extended commitment.

Someone recently told me I was a hybrid (re: Not really from HK, but not totally a CBC- Canadian Born Chinese). I thought that was an apt description. Hybrids have a hard time finding mates though, much like how mules are often sterile. That makes it very very lonely. Horses, donkeys and mules might all look alike, but one of them has a hard time finding a partner.

Belonging

Recently I picked up this book I had started reading from last year. It was about the same time then as well. I had chosen it as the topic really resonated with me. This is how one reviewer summarized it:

Most of us who have lived overseas or even been away from our homes for a while will probably know what it is to feel pangs of longing for home, even if only briefly.

Writer and traveller Isabel Huggan has been putting a lot of thought into what it is that makes us at home, where it is that we belong.

She's just finished a book on the subject, simply called: "Belonging".

Isabel Huggan hails from Canada, but has spent much of her adult life living in other parts of the world, from the very different climes of Kenya, to the where lives now, in a stone house in the foothills of southern France.

It's from there that she speaks with us on Life Matters, about identity, belonging, and what makes someone truly at home.

As someone who's constantly been on the move, living in a different city every month/year, moving every 2 or 3 years, her words are my very unspoken thoughts. When I first started it, I was so touched by what I read that I jotted down notes/quotes from it. To date, I have filled up 10 pages (double sided) of that small notebook.

Every year I go through the same soul searching; every time I have to explain where I'm "from", I have to think...where is my home? To be honest, I have no idea. Maybe that's why I love to travel so much, because I'm still looking.

Hard Work for an Asterisk

I got my degree sent via courier yesterday. I hadn't bothered driving 1.5 hours to attend the convocation. Upon reading glancing through the convocation ceremony booklet, I was delighted to find an asterisk beside my name. Apparently I had graduated with distinction! It warms my heart to see my hard work did pay off, after all, not many people got that extra asterisk!