The kin…

Boy and girl go down, To the place by the water. Creeping into the afternoon, Young aren’t so young – They’re getting restless

I hope that the nuclear leakage business in Japan due to the earthquake/tsunami doesn’t worsen; and I’m definitely relieved that all our family/friend ties there are all safe and sound as far as we know. I don’t really have the heart to blog about such things, it’s all a bit close to home, considering I was in Tokyo just 12 months ago. Also, being Taiwanese with strong Japanese ties, we hop over there for holidays all the time – like how Kiwis and Aussies holiday on either side of the ditch.

Today started like every other day – despite being a Saturday, I was supposed to wake at a certain time, but of course I ignored my alarm clock and snoozed and snoozed and snooozed. So when I finally, rather abruptly woke up completely, I once again had that huge wave of panic, oh no, what’s the time – how far have I overslept?! Luckily all was well and the boy had txted telling me to take my time. It was only quarter past nine.

We made the long drive out to Takapuna to the Department Store where he bought a very nice Topman blazer and shirt, whilst I pranced around like the distracted mind that I am, touching, smelling, feeling every fabric and fragrance I could get my hands on. I ended up with a nice loot myself (I’ll get to that later, below) and after a bit of “so where are we actually going?”, we managed to find the lovely waterfront cafe that my special lady friend* had taken me for my birthday last year. The single scoop ice cream would have more than sufficed for my taste buds and waistline, but I have an inability to pass up chocolate ice cream (because it’s always soooo good and satisfying!) , so I asked for a scoop of berry sorbet on top of that. The boy certainly didn’t complain nor fake chivalrous refusal at all, every time I offered up some of my ice cream to go with his mango sorbet, haha.

Polaroid taken at the beach. I couldn’t be bothered scanning it in, so took a digital photo of it instead.

So I know we weren’t technically supposed to be out at the beach today, but luckily everything’s fine on the NZ shores and we enjoyed a nice spot of sun by the sea, with views of such clear seawater that it was hard to imagine what’s happening both north and south of us. My mind’s been churning at high gears lately, and it didn’t help that yesterday I skipped a 3-hour percussion workshop to go home on an earlier ferry, and ended up tagging along to the boy’s 4th year Environmental Law lecture. I ended up scribbling down three full pages worth of… well heck I don’t really know nor remember… thoughts of some (definitely illegible and sporadic) description? I know he was curious as to what my mad writing speed recorded in black ink, but even I don’t remember by the second it’s made contact with paper. I have a tendency to do that – write like a mad woman and forget. Forget until I come back at some much later point where I’m calmer, and try and see my previous thoughts through fresher eyes. Unfortunately it’s not that effective in clearing my mind at all, but at least I feel like I’ve written it somewhere as a record that I can refer to and remember later.

On the topic of writing in notebooks, today we checked yet another Paper Plus to see if my favourite notebooks-in-which-to-write-lyrics-poetry-angry-stuff-anything-fake-diary-thingy was still being stocked, and was disappointed to find that it wasn’t. A peek in Borders reminded me of how much I enjoyed scribbling in a pocket soft cover Moleskine during my Californian trip, so I contemplated the larger version in a hardcover… but at $42, we were just not meant to be. $42!!! I stood there thinking perhaps, yes, the collection of my thoughts and creative streaks combined is worth far more than that monetary value, but $42 is just ridiculous for the torture that it will no doubt endure.

This led to an afternoon of browsing all the various Moleskine notebooks online and eventually ordering 3 products off BookDepository.co.uk. I know, I know, I’ve JUST endorsed them in my last blog post, but considering I just ordered the exact same notebook for the pound equivalent of $21.94NZD, I just can’t help mentioning it again. I just hope it arrives ruddy soon, because after a quick google search, I found out that the Warehouse Stationery stocks the particular line of spiral bound hardcover notebooks that I’ve been using since I was 16. Yikes, that’s just 2 months short of being 4 years. I really, really don’t want to turn 20. Don’t want to cease being a teenager. A lot of people have said I’ll get over it, and pointed out how it makes no difference, etc – but it hasn’t changed the way I feel about my age. I’m scared of growing older – and I’m only 19! Imagine me in a few years’ time, oh my god!

 

Anyway, back onto the topic of retail therapy indulgence, I walked out of the Department Store with the above make up: lipstick in a “Beguiled” shade, and nail polish in “Airplane”. This is the darkest shade of lipstick that I now own, and I like that it matches my dark cherry shade of OPI nail polish. I don’t know what’s come over me in the past year and a bit. Ever since buying my very first lipstick (a very bold, bright red by Shiseido) for my 7th form ball, my lipstick collection has slowly but surely been expanding. Due to my heavy partying and drunken dancing with some of these babies, though, there’s been a few casualties in the form of a lipstick snapping (Chanel, I wanted to cry, but managed to re-attach it thanks to googling how), some damage done by the lid because a stick wasn’t wound down far enough (Shiseido, sad to say), and one lipstick that I was really mad at myself for losing (aka forgetting on the couch in the hostel) in San Francisco – that one was a (Maquillage x Alexander Wang). I think at this rate I may as well do a lipstick post. Some people have asked me about my makeup before (like that old jewellery post I did), so maaaaybe.

Bargain of the day was an A&F t-shirt in khaki green that I scored for $10, whilst the splurge of the day goes to my Something Else sweater from their new Winter 2011 collection. Apparently it’s only been out a week, and already the one I picked up was the last one on the rack! It was on the expensive side of things, but it’s pretty much what I’ve been looking for since last winter, so I’m over the moon about it regardless. Possible photos soon.

Since I seem to have started a trend of once again posting up my more lyrical/poetic writings in blog posts, here’s one from a few nights ago when I had trouble sleeping at 2.11am:

I’ve been everywhere,
Seen everything
But you’re the only
who stirs jealousy.

We’re living in my bed,
Fucking in my head
The heat’s too much,
Still, I want your touch.

Summer’s been a battleground
Philandering through too many rounds.
But the leaves will fall
We’ll call it  a draw.

Tell me where our lives will lead.

Last thing: I’ve been listening to this song over and over. Go look this band up – The Hundred in the Hands. We were discussing today how they almost sound like what The XX’s 2nd album should sound like, haha:

*Some of you know/refer to her as the “hot redhead” often featured in photos from late nights out; I’ve mentioned said bestie as either Lottie, Char, Charlo, or Charlotte. I should really be more consistent, but I really do call her all those things.

So we hold it close, When we feel the most – Like a love that we could not leave behind

Three photos I took in LACMA a couple of months ago. I don’t know what it is with my obsession – and often OCD – about numbers; especially the number 3.

I have such a great love of art galleries, art museums… and as I mentioned here, I’m often more preoccupied with the space itself, rather than what’s in it. I took those photos in a section of the art museum where the minimalism just got too much and I was far more interested in the floorboards and white walls, than the large canvases featuring large blocks of colours that were on said walls. I know, I know – it sounds terrible – but whilst I’m into countless forms of art, there are just some things I find more fascinating than this “minimalistic” theme in this wing of things.

“Those who are trying to find love will end up with hatred, frustration and insanity. Those who are trying to find wealth will end up totally neurotic, psychotic and totally crab. Because if you are trying to find something, you have basically, intentionally, intuitively, and individually accepted that you do not have it.” – Yogi Bhajan

I read this quote just before, and it’s completely gripped me in the sense that I find it so true. Or at least, the latter part of it. Such a bittersweet declaration that most of us would not think of viewing things this way. Or perhaps, more correctly, we wouldn’t want to.

The good news with me posting this blog entry is that, hurray, I’m still alive and haven’t suffered from any major nerve damages from my wisdom teeth removal surgery on Thursday. The bad news is that all those worries I had about general anesthesia should have been the least of my worries. Shortly after surgery (sometime after 8am), I woke at around 9.15am and the first thing that gripped me was how sore my throat was, from whatever pipes they had shoved down it to help me breathe and suck out saliva, etc. The next thing that I felt was the fact that I couldn’t feel most of the bottom half of my face. All of this so far is pretty standard, thus far, and I was relieved when my surgeon said I should be able to feel in a few hours, and that I would be able to eat rather normally by that evening – fantastic news, really, as I was starving by that point.

However, my paranoia and problems began when I started asking my sister, my friends and friends of friends who had had their wisdom teeth removed as well, to see how long it was before they regained feeling in their mouths. My sister merely said “a few hours”, and the worst I’d heard was “12 hours”, so I was thinking surely, by midnight at the latest, I would be able to feel and move my mouth. I spent much of the day mooching and lounging around, reading, watching TV, falling asleep in the boy’s arms whilst watching TV – that sort of thing – and making a general dick of myself by not being able to talk properly because I couldn’t feel my tongue and my jaw was locked up pretty tightly.

By the midnight, 1am mark, everyone had gone to sleep, and I asked my mother to wake me up in the morning to see whether or not I could feel or not, or if I should ring my surgeon up (apparently she had nightmares about this, oops). I was starting to freak out that I wasn’t even feeling any tingling in my face, you know, signs that the local anesthesia was wearing off – and my bottom lip was cold! I even started having thoughts as to whether I’d rather I had a paralysed leg or a paralysed bottom jaw… my imagination pretty much took off and ran far, far away into the realms of worst case scenarios. After failing to sleep in bed, I ended up on the couch, channel surfing and trying desperately to fall asleep. I ended up making myself a “cup-a-soup”, which I had to keep sticking my finger in, to make sure it wasn’t too hot and that I don’t burn my mouth – because obviously, I couldn’t feel a thing. Luckily, the hot soup seemed to help bring some further tingling and feeling into my tongue, except that it didn’t affect anything else. The last time I glanced at the clock was 3am and my imagination was driving me insane.

The next thing I knew, I woke to my cat prodding my face at 5am. And I thought my face! I can feel! I’ve never been so happy to be woken up at such an hour by my cat before, and the rush of adrenalin resulted in me not being able to sleep for the rest of the day.

Anyway, the point is – yes, I can feel everything now, thankfully, although unfortunately, these painkillers aren’t doing anywhere near enough to help sedate this constant pain I have, even when I’m not moving my mouth. I succeeded in my endeavour to devour an amazing burger from Burger Wisconsin today, but I had to cut it up into tiny pieces with a knife and fork in order to eat it. In the meantime, I keep checking on these stitches of mine, wishing and hoping that they would quickly dissolve and my wounds will heal so that my favourite pastimes (it seems to be) of talking and eating wouldn’t be so painful!

I’ve been listening to Radiohead’s new King of Limbs – does anyone have any thoughts on it yet? It’s on its second play right now, and I’m rather undecided. I guess it will be typical for it to grow on me (as I expect it to), but thus far only one track has really stood out to me.

A reaction starts, when

When I sit down to blog these days, I get really confused as to how to structure the posts. These days, I’ll end up with a couple of dilemmas I can never seem to decide as to how I’d like to tackle: often I’ll likely have something in mind I want to blog about, at length, but then I will also often have a set of photos either from that day or that just got processed that I’d just like to throw in for good measure… the problem is, I can never seem to decide which way round to order it. A huge chunk of writing about whatever the topic of the day is, followed by menial ramblings and some photos; OR, photos and ramblings, then huge riff raff at the end?!

I’m so indecisive with everything. It pisses me off enough as it is, I’m sure people around me must be so sick of it. Maybe that’s why I often form “favourites” at restaurants and such, and I will 99% of the time order the same thing. Boring, you may say, but I tend to go to specific places for a specific dish, etc.

But oh shucks, I had meant to do my whole blog rambly thing and then post photos of my very delicious day, but now that I’ve mentioned food and all, I can’t escape this order. I partied late into the early hours of this morning, and only got three hours of sleep before mum hauled me out of bed to go to the Clevedon Farmer’s Market with her. That sounds like she did a mean thing, but I did promise I’d go with her. We ended up having a scrumptious brunch at Maraetai beach (pics below).

Then later this evening I had a catch up with some friends over an amazing meal at Mezze Bar – the restaurant that I raved about here, and once again ordered the roast chicken with risotto, as well as sharing some Spanish meatballs. It was thanks to that meal at Mezze last month that inspired me to cook risotto twice since, and probably once again, soon!

My solution to aforementioned dilemma – posting a second blog post for today. Why not?! Lots of people post several times a day.

Bottle and mirror art work on the wall of the cafe.


Mum’s brunch order… mmm!


My eggs benedict was amazing.


Mum & I on self-timer & the hood of our car. It wasn’t very well thought out, but we had a lot of laughs taking this photo – we were against the sunlight, and it was fiddly…





Lamb Kebabs – they were very well spiced.


My roast chicken and risotto, again!

SPANISH MEATBALLS FTW!

Sometimes I spin around for days. This valid and logic motion is what keeps me from moving

I had a very interesting 21 hours during which I did nothing but indulge. Films, music, drinks, conversation and company. It felt like living at present was living in the past. I always think that company can make or break whatever it is that you’re doing. I could be listening to the same music, watching the same films, drinking the same thing, but if it’s with someone I find uninspiring and boring, or someone too inappropriately provocative and drama-bringing, then I just won’t have anywhere near as good of a time.

We watched Into the Wild, followed by An Education, both of which I’d like to delve into, maybe in a post a couple of days from now, because I don’t think it would do Into the Wild any justice for me to sleeplessly blog about it. One of my best friends, Takuma, is always raving about that film – quoting it, and referring to it when he’s feeling down or when he feels like life is out of perspective – so I’m happy to say that now I can finally discuss it with him at length. I just need to work out the time difference between here and New Orleans, and what his schedule this semester at Tulane is like. I hate how its such a mission to try to have a verbal rather than email interaction with such a close friend.I guess it makes us cherish what conversations we do manage to have with one another, but it’s also such a hassle!

Here are photos from November 13th, 2010 – the day I spent with my sister in Santa Monica, and later at a college party when I crashed at her dorm. I’m going to slowly post my photos from California over time… it might take a while… Also, I specifically picked out a bunch of photos that I’m in, because (as you may have noticed) I’m hardly ever in any of the photos I post, since I’m usually the one behind the camera – so it was nice to have my sister around for helping me provide visual proof of my wanderlust:


Santa Monica beach.


Bridge over the Pacific Coast Highway.


PCH.

Jandals and Doc Martens in hand, the sand was just sooo nice beneath my feet.

I didn’t realise that the life guard hut said “KEEP OFF” until after we took these photos and Liv decided to tell me…


Free towel came in very handy, thanks Pepperdine!

Liv being a silly cutey.

I freaking loved these dinosaurs! My expression in an earlier photo was pretty priceless… but it was really dark :/

3rd Blvd/Promenade.

Lunch! We really regretted picking a restaurant near were a guy was busking via means of smacking on drums as hard and fast as he could, for as long as possible…


REALLY GOOD STEAK SANDWICH. I was so full afterwards.

Me being very happy with my new $20 hat.

Did I mention? I FUCKING LOVE THESE DINOSAURS.

Impending sunset.


SUNSET!

Liv took these silhouette photos of me under my strict, strict instruction, yay.

I can never decide which I like better.


The good ol’ 534 bus we had to wait for.

Touristy photo at Liv’s school with the sign. She couldn’t fit the whole thing in but that’s okay… this was right before we had to hike up a bloody steep and HUGE hill…

Going oooouuuutttt!

My first American college party experience. It was hilarious to say the least: “THE COPS ARE HERE! GET INSIDE!” vs. “THE COPS ARE HERE, GET OUTSIDE TO THE BACKYARD BY THE POOL!” – uhh sorry, everyone’s wasted, which is the correct set of instructions? To leave, it turned out.

Beeer pong!

Also, after last night and today’s marathon listening, I still, still can’t stop listening to the band Blonde Redhead – their discography is so big that I wouldn’t even know where to begin my recommendations to post a youtube link of. As Daniel and I were saying, they’re such a good band to escape into, akin to My Bloody Valentine; but the upside is that with such a large body of work, you never have to repeat just the one album, as you would do with MBV’s Loveless.

I’m goin back home to the west coast, I wish you woulda put yourself in my suitcase

*I wrote this entry, and then wished that I had written it from the bottom upwards. But it’s 2.36am so I can’t be bothered with rearranging and editing so that it still makes sense… just scroll and scroll and scroll… at least it gets happier as my thoughts run on?*

Yesterday my younger sister departed Auckland after 3 weeks of holidaying back home with us, and I really, really miss her already. The airport was in a state of chaos yesterday – I know most airports are, but the hectic state in which the Auckland International Airport was in yesterday, was above and beyond anything I’d ever seen in NZ before. Firstly, it took us forever to find a spot to park our car , almost akin to that of shopping malls in the pre-Christmas rush. This never happens here! We had admittedly gotten to the airport on the late rather than earlier side of things, but still well on time… except somehow the queue dragged and dragged, and eventually we were told that some system required for travelers to the states was down, and things had to get authorised by the US first, before they were allowed to manually enter something or another. After over two hours of hovering around, Liv finally managed to check in – officially the last person to do so… well after her “last boarding call” as well as flight time! Obviously the plane would have been delayed by then, in order for her to board, but the announcements of gate closure and the whole “final boarding call” thing really didn’t help us with our stress. But funnily enough (and I love her for this), Liv’s biggest concern for mum and I was the rate at which our expensive airport parking was ticking up at. It was evidently the least of our concerns by then!

I’ve always hated airports, except when I’m picking up someone. Because, frankly, who likes to see loved ones depart, regardless of the reason? And if they’re not a loved one, then I certainly wouldn’t be seeing them off an an airport, unless I was doing a favour to someone by dropping them off. It took every mature ounce of self control in me that I could muster yesterday to not let tears roll down my cheeks – after all, Liv is simply going back to Malibu to resume her study and golfing, but I couldn’t help but feel left behind – like I’m missing out on precious sister time with her whilst we’re still young. It certainly wasn’t easy the first time round when she first left in August, but it hasn’t gotten any easier now, seeing her off for her second semester

I wonder if saying goodbye to people gets easier for anyone else?

Goodbyes are my biggest weakness. In mandarin, “goodbye” is translated literally as “again” and “meet”; so my grandma has always said if there was no parting, there wouldn’t be the joy of reunion. In a way, this is perhaps the only thing that keeps me afloat when I think I can’t handle saying goodbye. Writing this now just makes me miss not only my sister but my grandma. I wish I could put into words all the things I’d like to say to her. She was such an influence on me as a young child, and I know a lot of is has carried over – such as my love of words, reading, writing, literature in general, and quotes and the art of chinese proverbs (which I really need to work on). Perhaps a story and tangent for another day…

Here’s a song that Liv and I have been listening to repeatedly for the last day she was here: “West Coast” by Coconut Records. The lyrics are oh-so-appropriate, and the song is really cute:

For a second there i thought you disappeared
It rains a lot this time of year
And we both go together if one falls down
I talk out loud like you’re still around
And i miss you
I’m going back home to the west coast
I wish you woulda put yourself in my suitcase
I love you
Standin all alone in a black coat
I miss you
I’m goin back home to the west coast

The bright side to this entry is the fact that I’ve finally gotten my developed films back! I took a couple of rolls of Ilford black and white film in LA and San Francisco, and I’ve uploaded them all to my photography site, so click here for the full set. Seeing these just makes me 1/ really, really want to go traveling again; 2/ not regret having killed my left shoulder by carrying a fiml slr as well as a dslr around everywhere in a bag; 3/ miss using b/w film, and wish that film development wasn’t such a hassle (I had these mailed back to Taiwan for processing as it was far, far, far cheaper, even with postage fees).  Here are some of my personal favourites:

I remember how excited I was on the plane when I took this… and how I wondered as to how good this photo, and the trip would turn out to be.

Powell Street in San Francisco, at the bottom of one of the cable car lines. I love love LOVE this city.

How amazing is this music store?! It was completely filled with 2nd hand music equipment. Found in North Beach.

Golden Gate Bridge, of course. With an Amanda-spin.

Under the in famous bridge.

It took me ages to get this shot – I had to time it so that the people all around me all sat down or ducked down at the same time!

View from inside the cable car.

Palace of Fine Arts.

Post office in Hollywood.

Window of Urban Outfitters, Cahuenga Blvd.

On the way up to the Getty Centre.

Getty Centre after dark with long shutter exposure. No one dared to walk in front of me and my camera – I had to ask them to please proceed!

I admittedly stalked down a few (hopefully unsuspecting) people to get some photos…

Like this.

Self portrait in a series of mirrors at the souvenir store. It’s also my first facebook profile picture change in a year!

Oh yeah, before I forget, one nice thing came of the long and arduous wait in the airport check-in queues – we passed a lot of the time chatting to a cellist who studies in Lansing, Michigan. The guy was super nice and relatable to talk to (not to mention a bit cute, shhh); turns out he’s actually pretty amazing, according to not only the internet, but youtube results. I’d always said… in another life, if I were to be a classical musician, I would totally pick the cello.

So cheers to yet another chance encounter with someone who shone a bit of light on my day and also a little on my dreams. Sometimes it’s nice to have the world seem a little smaller.

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