Sports, Physical Education, etc…

we learn together over time that tolerance is more appealing tn theory than in practice. ah, we wait at ease, we wait to see – we are waiting here for catastrophe

I’m getting terribly behind on travel posts (I can’t believe it’s been two months already!) but I don’t want to rush them and want to do justice to all the fun and photos we had. This… putting off of sorts has definitely been brought to attention by the boy, so it’s definitely not like I’ve forgotten about it, it’s just a matter of time…

The truth about me is that I’ve been very lacking in motivation since circa 2004, and the sort of motivation I’m talking about is something of an all-round kind of motivation. The sort of drive that isn’t limited to one area of life or activity at hand – rather, something that spans across daily life in general, and dreams at large. But I’ve completely surprised myself these past couple of weeks by my new-found resolve to, well, put bluntly, try. I feel like I’ve spent the better part of the last decade running away from expectations of me, and avoiding the deadly word that gets thrown around a lot when people talk about me: potential. (Don’t even get me started on the whole idea of “potential”… trust me, I’ll never shut up.)

Anyway, what have I been doing away from the blogosphere? I’ve stayed ahead in my course readings, I’ve actually practised the bass (I know, right? It’s my bloody major and I often neglect it more than I should) and I’m determined, bloody determined to get things the way I want them. I want to get myself to where I want to be, or at least, in the direction of where I think I want to head, because frankly I have no idea where I want to “go”, as such. Today the boy and I washed our cars in the rain, as it was our mutual day off from uni. It sounds either more romantic or more dreadful than it actually was – and downright stupid, I know. But we did it despite the rain since it was already planned, and both our cars were dirrrty so it really couldn’t be ignored any longer. The “me” a month ago would’ve probably just sat inside and kept reading whilst the boy went and washed his car, or somehow negotiated another day to do it – but I’m glad that I got off my arse and did it today.

Also, I joined a gym last week, and I made sure to join the new fancy 24-hour franchise gym, because then I’m not limited to the crappy opening hours of traditional gyms. Believe it or not, for once I was the one urging my friend (who has been a member there for sometime, but I know doesn’t go often enough) to make a gym date with me, so that we can’t let each other down and have to show up. And show up we did. Yes, yes it was well after nine that evening, but I pounded out around 3-4km on the treadmill at a decent pace, and I didn’t even need Angie to hold my hand through it. I did my core exercises and other things and then… I felt fucking great. Then today I had a complimentary one-hour session with the personal trainer that also happens to manage the gym, and I am getting a programme made up for me so that I have more of a sense of direction as to what exercises I need to do for the fitness level and strength areas I want to achieve. He said he was really surprised by how motivated I am, and how a lot of people are all groggy and laid-back about it all, but I seem really determined to achieve things. And I guess I really am. I hadn’t really thought that much about it until then – how suddenly motivated I have become. All-round. Not just in one degree, but both. Not just with uni, but with hockey, with trying to be a better and happier person all around.

Then yesterday at my hockey trials I ran my butt off and tried my very best, even though I didn’t get put in my ideal positions. They’ve restructured the grades and so there are 3, maybe 4 teams’ worth of people trialing for the one team. I think I did well enough yesterday, but I’m definitely going to step it up for the second round of trials next week. Watch this space. Hopefully this time next week I’m gleefully chirping about looking forward to the hockey season… rather than being disappointed about it.

I thought I’d share the dinner that I whipped up for my mum, cousin and myself tonight – I have a tendency to make recipes up as I go, so today I’m pretty happy with how my pasta turned out. I started off with a bunch of tomatoes… then the next thing I knew I was all, phew, sorry to say so myself, but this sauce is bloody delicious. It’s a shame the boy had football training and missed out on it. (On the topic of football, did anyone see Barcelona and Messi’s ridiculously amazing result today?!!!) So, courtesy of a very full fridge, I’d cooked: sirloin steak, fish baked in lemon juice and ground pepper, butter pan-friend zucchini, pasta in some randomly concocted sauce, and mushrooms with melted butter and bacon. Ahhh I’m hungry all over again just thinking about this!

 

 

By the way, how do I hold onto this surge of motivation? Is it even possible/probable?

I didn’t mean to scare you, but I miss you… Catharsis’ burning

I’ve been surprisingly productive today – I finished up the last couple of (major) items for the boy’s early-Christmas present and let him open them extra-extra early. They’re early because I leave New Zealand in a week, but now they’re super early because I didn’t have the patience to wait any longer to give them to him, haha. I also managed to plant some lettuce and tomatoes in the backyard, which, for anyone that knows me, is an amazingly huge feat because I refuse to do any form of gardening since I have terrible hayfever and I’m not fond of gardening anyway. But it’s for the greater good – who doesn’t like fresh salad from the backyard?

The big, exciting, screaming-at-TV event of the day was the fact that the Black Sticks (NZ’s national hockey team) drew with the Netherlands and get to progress through to the medal rounds of the Champions Trophy. Non-hockey fans/followers/players won’t know what the heck I’m on about, but it’s basically a very large and important tournament and it’s being hosted right here in New Zealand at the moment. I ended up watching the game a bit delayed, but I made sure to not have accidentally heard or seen the score beforehand, so the Black Sticks coming back from 3-0 down to draw up even was just incredible. Best stroke I’ve ever seen as well.

In other matters, let’s talk about the Food Channel. I don’t know what it’s like overseas, but I’m sure everyone must know of an equivalent? It’s the channel that I always turn the TV to, whenever I’m leaving the lounge and mum is still in it. I’ve never paid attention to any of the shows before – in fact I usually consciously tune them out because there is just way too much impossible-looking and far too flash sounding food on there – until the other night… I saw the most amazing recipe for a mango cheesecake, topped with a lemon and basil syrup, that I even recorded the darn thing. And then I proceeded to watch the Food Channel for a whole hour between 1-2am just earlier. What is happening to me?! I Next, I dug out mum’s Jamie Oliver cookbook (his first one, the only cookbook I’ve ever used) and actually skim-read through the whole thing and dreamt up all the weird and wonderful times I might have cooking some of the things in it, and for whom and when this may someday happen. In fact, I’m seriously craving some lamb shanks or a good roast pork at the moment. This is so abnormal for me. And I have a feeling the boy’s stomach is about to become a very lucky, well-fed one in the near future.

The other thing I did today was take a ridiculous amount of photos of my affectionately cute and adorable cat. Mum and I were sitting on the couch, about to turn and snap at Flakey to get off the dining table (he obeys because he knows he’s not meant to) when we noticed something was on his nose. Turns out it was a polystyrene ball and we thought it was the most adorable thing ever, so of course we had to whip the camera out. Mum also decided to adorn him with a hat from one of her porcelain dolls… I don’t think he enjoyed it much, and this is a ridiculously image-heavy post, but he is just TOO CUTE.

AM I RIGHT OR AM I RIGHT? He’s cute even when he looks confused and agitated, haha:

Mum took these ones below (and the one of Flakey sleeping, on the right over here):

And Happy Early Birthday, Christine – I know you’re reading this and wishing you had a cat. I hope some smart people got you a cute kitty for your birthday on Friday! (and sorry that I did not…)

The taste of life I can’t describe, It’s choking on my mind

Thank you, for all your kind words. It’s definitely helped a little, towards feeling somewhat less isolated. I’ve been quiet for a week, joined at the hip to the boy, ever since his last exam last Tuesday. We’ve done so much (and arguably very little…) this past week, I simply don’t know where the time has slipped away to. In this week we’ve watched a lot of films, a lot of Boston Legal, ate and drank too much; but I think the two most significant events were going to a cinema together for the first time, and SEEING PORTISHEAD.

I know, I’ve rattled on about my excitement for Portishead in virtually every blog post for the past couple of months. And it wasn’t unjustified. They completely blew my mind. Beth is so, so, so goddamn amazing. The main letdown for me was the crowd. I need to stop wasting my time getting angry and bitching about the crowd, but let me just say this – they were more disinterested than teenagers at a classical concert! The boy and I were pretty much the only people singing along and getting really into it – and we kept getting told off for enjoying ourselves! That pissed me off so much. I only have crappy photos (below) because I was too busy singing/dancing/crying/laughing/snogging and oh yeah – arguing with the arseholes in front of me – to be taking photos, but I do have several videos that have rather good sound quality that I’m really happy to have. I used up 4GB on my little Canon point-and-shoot, just mostly from taking videos. Even on the videos the sound quality is so good that it sounds like it could’ve come off their live album. As I said – Beth was fucking amazing. I still can’t get over that. Just her voice, her execution, her tone. Oh, I’m dying of admiration. And I’m not even a vocalist – but I love her voice and appreciate her singing abilities that much. The other thing about the videos is that you can hear the crowd around us fucking chatting. I mean – are you serious? 1/ YOU’RE AT PORTISHEAD. 2/ It cost a hundred bucks. 3/ IT’S FUCKING PORTISHEAD!!! People are crazy, stupid, retarded… and largely inconsiderate!

I think the main thing I have trouble dealing with, asides from the arseholes, is the fact that the concert felt so disconnected. Yes, it was amazing. Yes, it blew my mind. And I know concerts of your favourite bands always feel so much shorter and time flies – but their set was over an hour (I’ve made a playlist out of their setlist), and yet it was such a seamless blur. Not just to me, but to the boy also. Sure, we were quite under the influence of many rum & cokes, beer and the odd vodka concoction – but we weren’t thaaat intoxicated, we were fully onto it and aware of everything… and yet there is this huge disconnect. As in, I felt like I was watching a video, even though I was singing along and could feel the bass vibrate all around and everything was so real… but really, moreso surreal. It’s the craziest feeling. I’ve been blown away by many bands in my time, but nothing has ever felt close to this. The crazy thing is that, I would totally believe it if somebody told me that it didn’t really happen – that I WAS just watching a video. That’s how surreal it all feels to me. And surprisingly, to the boy also. Sorry for being repetitive. It’s just so fucking weird that I can’t stop saying that! But walking out of Portishead is probably the saddest thing that’s happened all week. That’s happened in a long time.

So, some photos. There aren’t any of the boy and I that are, ahem, PG… that’s why they’re not on here. Yerr. The photographer in me is just dying of embarrassment and “oh my god I neeed a media pass to get my cameraz in”-ness, but here is proof:

Tickets

Euan, Gina and I (we had no idea where they went after a while, they were on the opposite side)

Oh Beth. How she spends the majority of songs standing like that, because of all the spaaaaarse space in the music. Even so. Amazing stage presence.

The second saddest thing that happened all week was saying goodbye to the boy this evening. He starts work at a prominent law firm as a summer clerk tomorrow (for obvious reasons I’m not naming anything here), which meant he had to go home and get his shit together. Aka – iron his shirt. Apparently French cuffs are hard to iron. As I’d said – he should’ve just taken me home with him, but y’know, can’t win them all.

A photo of us, each. I took this photo of him trimming our hedge for us, from my bedroom window. I like how voyeuristic it looks, ha.

He took this photo of me when I was waiting for my turn at pool. I seriously suck these days. This is my “pretend I am totally pulling my weight in this pool-playing partnership” face. We were at his friend’s 22nd birthday dinner, and her house is oh-so-very amazing. Indoor swimming pool? Yes please. Unfortunately we didn’t get to utilise that. But the lights in it were super romantic-looking at night.

And oh yeah, so apparently in addition to Taiwan and Hong Kong, I’m also now going to be spending a week out of my Taiwan-time in China instead. Going with my dad on his business trip. Now I have to re-shuffle all my plans… and work out how to access Gmail over there. I am a chronic email-checker. Gmail is ALWAYS open on the first tab of my Firefox, you see… crap. Lots of rolls of film to be taken of course!

Youth in a rude stance, Dancing on the edge of dawn

Little do I need to say more – the All Blacks have finally won the Rugby World Cup (after 24 years!). I think TV3 got it pretty spot on when they said something along the lines of, no, it won’t bring world peace or stop poverty and cure diseases, but for a moment in time it has brought great happiness to this rugby-mad nation… The media and definitely social media has already well-exploited the topics of how well the French played and how nail-bitingly-close the game was (8-7, with the French dominating possession for much of the second half, for those non-rugby-fans reading this), so I shan’t further ramble about it. But I will admit that I ducked under the blanket I was snuggling in on the couch, and said to the boy “nooo I can’t watch this!” when the French team were attempting their last (luckily missed) penalty kick in the game.

The other great thing about the world for me right now is that I’m virtually on summer holiday. I’ve got a piano test that has been re-postponed until tomorrow, but on top of that, all I have left to do is accompany my friend for his assessment tomorrow, and jazz school is officially over for the year. I have a LOT of practising to be doing though.

I’m not at home, so I can’t make a playlist, but I shall leave this post short and sweet with cute pictures:

Bella, one of the cats in the boy’s household. The one I favour (shh)… although she can be quite the snobby little bitch, I think she’s suuuper duper adorable and magnificent most of the time.

Bilbo, the boy’s beloved dog.

And the cutest of all cutes, Flakey! Here’s him on my lap supervising my composing all-nighter that I pulled last week to finish three compositions in one night.

He’s so so so cute.

When I finally convinced him to give my lap a rest and to sleep on my bed instead.

The next morning, still slaving away at my deadline.

Purrrrrrrrrr.

And yusss, we just attained tickets for Dan Deacon’s show in February. I don’t understand – why do artists not come and tour here more during November/December, and instead wait for late Jan-Feb-March? Since it’s winter in the northern hemisphere anyway, it’s not like they’re particularly busy touring then? Of course, this is me being ridiculous and saying that musicians aren’t people and don’t need a holiday. Eye roll.

I am the heat in an empty room, the cold coming through the walls. Your sofas’ old, but I am new, and there is better on the brew

THE ALL BLACKS ARE IN THE WORLD CUP FINALS!!!!!!!!!

Now that my uncontainable excitement is out of the way, I am so dead this week. Two playing assessments and three compositions due… and I’m blogging. Because I don’t know what to compose and I’m sitting here listening to a range of both jazz and non-jazz music trying to be musically inspired. I can’t find the right chords… I just. Argh. I know I could be doing some playing practise, but I feel like I need to finish at least ONE song before mid-week.

On a completely different note, something’s always kind of bothered me – the whole “Asians with Western names” issue. What I mean is, since New Zealand has a lot of immigrants, a lot of people just assume that everyone has a “real” name from their home country, and that their English name is on many levels not their “real” name as such. I know that (and know of) a lot of people who moved over here got to pick out their English names before they moved out of Asia – and that’s fair enough. But I get kind of annoyed when people and systems such as the school-roll back at all my schools used to ass-ume that Amanda isn’t really my legal first name. I actually find that kind of disrespectful. Sure, it’s a very viable thing to assume, but assumptions suck (especially incorrect ones, which are often the case), and I just don’t like the undertones of “you don’t really belong in this country/you’re an immigrant“, etc. I know I’m probably just overreacting and a LOT of people don’t mean it that way, but a LOT also do. Just in the way they go dumbstruck with “oh, reaaally” when I clear up my names with them. Social reasons aside, it is soooo frustrating to have to constantly ask people to fiddle with documents for me, because whoever had entered the data to begin with had just assumed that my Chinese name goes in front of Amanda. It’s frustrating also, because I just feel simply undermined – because I know that I always fill out forms with my names the right way around, but people just think, “Oh, she’s Asian, I had better switch her names around so they’re correct”. NO. NO!

For the record, yes I was born in Taiwan, but I was born with both a Chinese and English name (for god sakes, my sister’s “English” name is actually Norwegian, so my parents are obviously well Westernised based on that fact alone), and I’ve lived in New Zealand since I was six, so that’s almost fourteen out of the twenty years of my life! Plus, my dad’s worked for American companies in Taiwan for over twenty years and my mum’s done stints overseas before we were born, so it’s really no surprise they gave both my sister and I names in both languages when we were born. We even went down to Internal Affairs all those years ago when we first moved here and paid some unearthly sum to get a legal document that binds my names in both languages so that I will never have one of those awful mishaps my mum has when she buys a plane ticket under the wrong name and has to produce multiple IDs, haha. Amanda is my legal first name and my Chinese name is my MIDDLE name, and then obviously my surname goes on the end. I think that a huge part of the problem also lies with the Asians who don’t have their names and documents all in line. So they’ll socially be called one name, but the name on all their documents and transcripts are completely different, and it just makes the lives of lecturers and so on, much harder. For example, not to pick on them, but all the other Asians in my year at jazz school are Korean boys. None of their names paper what we call them verbally. Not their fault, but does make life annoying for me when people go “no, but what’s your real name though?” – and might I just add, in the six years I had lived in Taiwan, most of the time I was called by my childhood nickname (that everyone I know in Taiwan still refer to me as these days), rather than my Chinese name anyway, so I honestly find it really hard to even vaguely connect with this “real name” assumption.

The most ironic thing is – Amanda is even on my Taiwanese passport, and people still meddle with my name, ha. Reminds me, I reaally need to renew it.

Here’s a photo I took on the drive down to Rotorua for our trip a while ago and it’s one of my absolute favourites. It looks even more mega authentic on film than it would have on digital because it gives it like a rustic touch. And gotta thank the really shitty film I had to buy when I was out of decent film for a while:


Driving to Rotorua – taken on some crappy nondescript colour film; Nikon F3.

 1. Love Me – Rubber Kiss Goodbye
Just a really chilled out cute song with a really simple but effective bass line. Oh, and I love that chink-chink guitar tone, mmm. This song totally makes me think of being a teenager.

2. I’m Not the One – The Black Keys
I am so jealous that Felisa gets to see them in a few days’ time. Especially since they bloody cancelled out on coming to the Big Day Out this year – which was most annoying because they were the main selling point for me this year, grr! Waiting on their new album. I know bluesy rock gets repetitive and they aren’t known for being poets with their lyrics, but there’s something about their smooth sounding tracks and aptly-put lyrics that makes me such a fan.

3. Fine For Now – Grizzly Bear
I am becoming the Cat Lady and I am not fine. And this song is great, but if I listen to it any longer I may lose whatever illusion of “okay” I have. They’re definitely a band that took a lot to grow on me, but once I got hooked, I listened to them for hours on end. Plus, the guitar in this is amazing. Just go listen to it.

4. Wildfire – SBTRKT
To continue on from my last post, this is also another Laneway artist for next year. The boy and I have been fairly hooked on the album over the past week and weekend. I was apprehensive at first, but heck. What is it with us and music? It’s like we do music like other couples do movies or whatever. I mean, we do movies too, but only at home. Can you believe that in the two years and three months we’ve known each other, or the almost-nine-months we’ve dated, that we’ve never stepped foot inside a cinema together?

5. Rescue Song (RAC Mix) – Mr. Little Jeans
There was a week or so several months ago when I was totally hooked on this song. I wanted to be rescued. Badly. Her real name’s Monica and her voice is looovely. And she’s cute too, so better not let the boy catch wind of that, cos she’s brunette. Oh wait, I think it’s safe. He doesn’t like her music. I am totally just being a twat, by the way.

6. I Can’t Wait – Twin Shadow
Yet another Twin Shadow song, I just couldn’t help myself – he’s still on high rotation if not repeat. This song totally reminds me of A-Ha’s “Take On Me”, but I’m not 100% sure since they don’t sound that much alike. I could totally link a more comparable song, but this one was too good to pass up – dad used to make suuuch a big deal about how it was from back when music videos were new haha. Anyway, this song just reminds me of music from decades ago that my dad would listen to.

7. Twin of Myself – Black Moth Super Rainbow
Short (and arguably crappy) but very relatable lyrics. I’m sold.

8. Anywhere Anyone – Dntel
Because sedated sounding electronic songs are very soothing.

9. On the Verge – Terence Blanchard
I am so in love with this song. It was written by Aaron Parks and my god I wish I could write like him. Been listening to his album “Invisible Cinema” on repeat whilst in bed. Amazing brain food.

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