home

'Rembrandt's embrace remained imprinted on my soul far more profoundly than any temporary expression of emotional support.  It has brought me into touch with something within me that lies far beyond the ups and downs of life, something that represents the ongoing yearning of the human spirit, the yearning for a final return, an unambiguous sense of safety, a lasting home.'

I have lived half my life out of a suitcase, sometimes seeing this world from thirty-seven thousand feet in the air rather than on terra firma.  I have to check & recheck where i left my passport and wallet and all other things that form the luggage of life on the road.  I lock my suitcases each time I leave the hotel room and twirl the combination lock.  There are visas from places near and far stamped in my passport.  Border officers or guards have carried out their routine dozens of times in my life.  I walk ever conscious of being on foreign soil, with an over-the-shoulder awareness.  Oh! for an unambiguous sense of safety in a lasting home.  It is the reality of the cross cut deeply into my soul that brings comfort of a final home that awaits me. 

-ravi zacharias

the land of plenty

time and time again - visiting home makes me realize how comfortable my life would be living in cali again.

cali is the land of abundance. so much space. so much food. the produce is astoundingly cheap.

you can get FOUR ginormous grapefruits for $1?! unheard of!
you pay HOW much for your 1 bedroom apartment?
what? she's having another baby!?

in cali, i have the luxury of using as many napkins and toilet paper without thinking twice. turning on the heater is like second nature. and my family does laundry here about 3x a week.

as wonderful as all of it may sound though, i realized that NY is my new home now.  i feel somewhat displaced here as if i'm living in a past that i like to look back on fondly, but doesn't feel like "life" in the here & now.

when i think of socal, i think of my family & my pockets of friends. but i have no grander view or vision of the city of los angeles.  whereas with ny, i feel like i'm a part of something bigger (a movement of some sort), which is both intimidating & empowering all at once.

there is a certain "one-ness" about living in NY- you just feel like you're part of this living, breathing city that brings people together and propels them to new heights.  new yorkers (or i guess you can say the transplants that call themselves new yorkers) take pride in living here and see it as part of their identity (one that is chosen and willed rather than one that is predetermined). 

there is something definitely unifying about being miserably crammed in a subway car of people in contrast to being miserably isolated in your car during la traffic.  something about ny and its close corridors (and this loss of personal space) just naturally bonds people together, even in the most irritating situations. misery loves company, so they say.

the calm before the storm

after a few weeks of mass holiday hysteria, i think i've been able to - for a brief minute - wind down a bit (i stress the brevity of it since i'll actually be heading home tomorrow for a week of wedding frenzy).

back-to-back out-of-town visitors, bachelorette party, baby shower, company parties, & white elephant exchanges (x3) have really put a strain on my social energy reserve.

despite a bit of disappointments & setbacks here and there, i'd say that 2012 has been a great year.  and i don't know why, but 2013 will be even better (my bday this year is a palindrome: 3.13.13!) - there's a certain level of hope & excitement in the air, don't you feel it?



also, i had some time to think about my new years resolutions (& have been getting ideas from those around me), and here are some contenders:
1. become a pescatarian
2. drink more water
3. read more books (and by more i mean at least one per month)
4. be more assertive (this one requires a bit of an explanation which i will not go into at this time)
5. invest in others (same as above)

and there are others that are a bit too personal to list.

two more hours until i'll be heading off the airport.  i don't feel too sorry leaving this bitter, cold igloo of an apt for one whole week... and into the warm embrace of the hong family & cali sunshine.

cheerio!

"Hell-A" to "City of Angels"

It feels good to be in cali again.

Though I do feel a bit disoriented not going back to my beloved hometown - good ol' hacienda heights, I am growing fond of my parent's new residence in LA (or more specifically a small town south of Pasadena).  NY living must have really deprived me of the everyday comforts of cali life, because my family has been surprised at my exaggerated appreciation for all the closet space.

The open range of land, the clear multi-lane roads (well in the suburbs), and the kindness towards pedestrians - this all feels foreign now, but at the same time oddly wonderful.  I've done a lot of sh*t talking about LA while I was in NY: too much driving, too much sun, too little culture in this lazy, urban sprawl.  But I think I've turned my back on LA for too long (approximately 2 years), because I'm slowly starting to recognize the merits of this forsaken city.  Four different people said "good morning!" to me while I was taking a stroll with my mom today - unheard of!

I remember I once said I had no definite timeline of coming back (if ever) to Cali.  But this trip home is making me seriously reconsider.

But don't hold me to that quite yet... after all, it's only been one day.



 -edit- It's been two full days and still loving it. And one of my first thoughts were-> "this might mean I'd have to change my basketball team??" Well I don't like the Lakers, so that means my default team would be the Clippers. Okay, well Chris Paul is pretty hot and their jersey logo has cuter font. Again, don't hold me to this, my thoughts are still a bit premature.

Old Forest - Wonderful Place, Worst Pornstar Name

My family has officially moved out of my childhood home.

Well to be fair, I've only been living there since 7th grade. But I've lived on pretty much the same block (in 3 different houses) since I was a wee babe.

I can't believe they moved out.

I say "they" as if I'm referring to some others, but I mean "they" as in my family.

I won't even have a room in the new house... I guess my home really is New York now (?)

While I was home, I was sorting through all the junk I've accumulated over the years and it was kind of hilarious coming across old yearbook inserts, gifts, pictures, love letters, diaries, etc. Even at the final reunion/bash at the Hong residence, my friends and I decided to walk through memory lane and look through all our awkward high school photos. Remember how skinny/fat we used to be? It felt like one of those montage-y Saved by the Bell episodes where everyone just reminisces about past episodes.

Good-bye house. I will miss the shenanigans.

must-read (esp all you californian/new yorkers)

Joan Didion's "Goodbye to All That"

"It is easy to see the beginnings of things, and harder to see the ends. I can remember now, with a clarity that makes the nerves in the back of my neck constrict, when New York began for me, but I cannot lay my finger upon the moment it ended, can never cut through the ambiguities and second starts and broken resolves to the exact place on the page where the heroine is no longer as optimistic as she once was. When I first saw New York I was twenty, and it was summertime, and I got off a DC-7 at the old Idlewild temporary terminal in a new dress which had seemed very smart in Sacramento but seemed less smart already, even in the old Idlewild temporary terminal, and the warm air smelled of mildew and some instinct, programmed by all the movies I had ever seen and all the songs I had ever read about New York, informed me that it would never be quite the same again. In fact it never was. Some time later there was a song in the jukeboxes on the Upper East Side that went “but where is the schoolgirl who used to be me,” and if it was late enough at night I used to wonder that. I know now that almost everyone wonders something like that, sooner or later and no matter what he or she is doing, but one of the mixed blessings of being twenty and twenty-one and even twenty-three is the conviction that nothing like this, all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, has ever happened to anyone before.

Of course it might have been some other city, had circumstances been different and the time been different and had I been different, might have been Paris or Chicago or even San Francisco, but because I am talking about myself I am talking here about New York. That first night I opened my window on the bus into town and watched for the skyline, but all I could see were the wastes of Queens and big signs that said MIDTOWN TUNNEL THIS LANE and then a flood of summer rain (even that seemed remarkable and exotic, for I had come out of the West where there was no summer rain), and for the next three days I sat wrapped in blankets in a hotel room air conditioned to 35 degrees and tried to get over a cold and a high fever. It did not occur to me to call a doctor, because I knew none, and although it did occur to me to call the desk and ask that the air conditioner be turned off, I never called, because I did not know how much to tip whoever might come—was anyone ever so young? I am here to tell you that someone was. All I could do during those years was talk long-distance to the boy I already knew I would never marry in the spring. I would stay in New York, I told him, just six months, and I could see the Brooklyn Bridge from my window. As it turned out the bridge was the Triborough, and I stayed eight years."

rest of the article

styska se mi po tobe

It was a short, but sweet trip to Cali. It was definitely nice to see old faces... and it's reassuring to know that if things go wayward in the east coast, I'll always have somewhere to turn to. But I have to say- there is a bit of awkwardness when I see people again... not that people are necessarily awkward towards me, but more on my part. I think it has to do with knowing that things have changed (or at least that I have changed somewhat) and not really knowing how to carry on. I guess I just feel uncertain of how I should act... the last thing I wanted was to give off an air of a snooty New Yorker.

Milan Kundera, my favoritest author of all time (as I mentioned time and time again), encapsulates these concepts of "nostalgia" and "homecoming" so perfectly in his short novel, Ignorance. The main character, a Czech expatriate named Irena, returns home after living in France for 20 years. After years of being away, she feels strangely displaced as everyone still perceives her as if she was the same person she was when she left:

"Earlier, by their total uninterest in her experience abroad, they amputated twenty years from her life. Now, with this interrogation, they were trying to stitch her old past onto her present life. As if they were amputating her forearm and attaching the hand directly to the elbow; as if they were amputating her calves and joining her feet to her knees...Twenty years of her life spent abroad would go up in smoke, in a sacrificial ceremony. And the women would sing and dance with her around the fire, with beer mugs raised high in their hands. That's the price she'd have to pay to be pardoned. To be accepted. To become one of them again."

I'm not necessarily saying that people were trying to discount my experiences or my time away... in fact, it was quite the contrary. But I do understand the feeling of disconnect... and the necessity to let go of, or at least stifle, those experiences and my NY self in order to fully fit in back in cali again.

But one thing I realized as I was basking in the warmth from missed loved ones and the sunshiney weather was that my wandering heart really did find its place in NY. It's strange because as I was talking to people, I actually caught myself referring to NY as "home." And when people ask me when I'll be returning, I find myself answering "indefinitely" or "when I'm old... like 40+". But who knows, maybe one day I'll be stuffed like a sardine in a stinky subway listening to "I love L.A." on my ipod, and my heart will just be overwhelmed with an unbearable yearning for my hometown. But until that day- you know where to find me.

Cali vs NY

I think it's funny how the people I meet here have this misconception that Cali people are really nice. New Yorkers know that I'm an out-of-towner right away, because they say I smile too much. My NY native friend claims that Cali guys are not as conniving and have clearer skin... she wants me to set her up with a "nice, LA boy." If you mean by nice, you mean lazy and unmotivated, why sure! Okay, I guess that was a little harsh and unfair to categorize all SoCal guys that way, but East Coasters really do have a different standard when it comes to ambition and career goals. I felt very humbled when I first came to NY, because I felt like I was constantly surrounded by people who were smarter and more successful than me. Coming from the suburbs of Cali, I definitely felt like a small fish in a big pond. In fact, I still kind of feel this way. Everyone is either embarking a prestigious career in law/medicine/finance or taking up the entrepreneurial spirit and starting their own business; this was somewhat of a rarity among the Cali folks from back home. I guess the New York perception of us is true... we're just laid-back beach bums who ride life on the slow lane.

Which reminds me, I'll be home in less than 2 more weeks. I feel like going home to nice, sunny California is like a cop-out; I am such a fair-weathered friend. Next year, I promise I'll spend the holidays in cold, moody NY.

Which also reminds me, ever since I was little I really wanted to go to Santa's Village (that's after LegoLand and Holy Land in my list of ridiculous theme parks I desperately want to go to). I wonder if the California location closed down? It was the closest thing to a real "Christmas experience" in Cali.


Thinking about it now, I'm sure it would be extremely strange and creepy.

some days

don't you just wake up and feel good about yourself and the world?

And others, you just wake up filled with nausea, self-loathing, and just overall "ickiness"?<-(really can't think of a better word to encapsulate this feeling). These past few days, I've been feeling the latter. I think it partially has to do with bad dreams. I hate not remembering my bad dreams because I feel so disoriented and vulnerable. Another part, I believe, is the effects of living at home. I know I've been living at home for nearly 8 months now, but I still feel like I'm transitioning. It's hard when you're used to living with friends and being fairly independent for 5.5 years and then coming home to a household packed with family members that like to ask you where you've been, who you were with, what you ate, etc. etc. etc.

Buuuut I should be grateful that I have a family that cares about my whereabouts and are genuinely concerned for my well-being. And I just need to stop complaining... or I'll turn into this guy:

(well, 'cept the $$$ part).

oh the places you'll go!

I was driving 'round town today, and I realized how relative distance can be.

Back in high school, I used to think my friend jane lived SO far from me. In fact, my friends and I would call go as far as to calling her house "China."

"Jane wants us to go pick her up..."

"Ugh we seriously have to drive all the way to CHINA?!"

But in fact, according to Googlemaps, her home is only a measly 2.5 miles away from mine. That's less than a 5k mini-marathon! (I should know... I ran one this past Christmas...) But you have to understand this was back in the day when all my buddies lived within walking distance from each other... Back when all we knew was Wilson High School, Puente Hills Mall, Thomas S. Burton Park, etc. Back when Brea Mall was quite a venture and a drive to Third Street Promenade was practically considered a road trip.

But now that our worlds are bigger and better, "China" is only a busstop away.

Having explored the far ends of the earth (or more like bits and pieces of Europe on the most haphazard Spring Break tour & a few more substantial trips to countries/islands in Asia), my standards have gotten higher as well.

I have this wanderlust... hence my blog url and headline. And it doesn't help that I carry this (sometimes misleading) romantic notion of faraway places. That's why I was so happy living in Seoul for the 5 months I was there. Even if I would be spending an average day walking around on the streets all by my lonesome and reading a book on the subway, it would feel THAT much cooler because I was in a different country. If I did the same here, I would just feel like a loser.

That's why the thought of moving back to this small armpit of a hometown made me die a little inside. I associated this town with everything ugly. Ugly street signs. Ugly houses. Ugly people with ugly driving. Ugly fob haircuts.

And I tried everything in my power to stay out of it. But now I realized I cannot fight it any longer. Whenever there was the option of Fight vs. Flight, I always chose the latter. Even in my relationships, when I didn't want to deal with people, I just fled. The main reason I moved out to West LA initially was because of a conflict I didn't want to deal with at home.

But I realized I cannot flee anymore and must embrace the ugliness. Or find some kind of beauty in it- whatever that may be.

From the wise words of Alain de Botton in his essays "The Art of Travel":

Home, by contrast, finds us more settled in our expectations. We feel assured that we have discovered everything interesting about our neighborhood, primarily by virtue of our having lived there a long time. It seems inconceivable that there could be anything new in a place where we have been living for a decade or more. We have become habituated and therefore blind to it. De Maistre tried to shake us from our passivity. In his second volume of room travel, "Nocturnal Expedition around My Bedroom," he went to his window and looked up at the night sky. Its beauty made him feel frustrated that such ordinary scenes were not more generally appreciated: 'How few people are right now taking delight in this sublime spectacle that the sky lays on uselessly for dozing humanity! What would it cost those who are out for a walk or crowding out of the theatre to look up for a moment and admire the brilliant constellations that gleam above their heads?' The reason people were not looking was that they had never done so before. They have fallen into the habit of considering their universe to be boring- and their universe had duly fallen into line with their expectations."

There are some who have crossed deserts, floated on ice caps and cut their way through jungles but whose should we would search in vain for what they have witnessed. Dressed in pink and blue pyjamas, satisfied within the confines of his own bedroom, Xavier de Maistres was gently nudging us to try, before taking off for distant hemispheres, to notice what we've already seen.

ps. totally unrelated but i saw yann tiersen (amelie soundtrack guy) this month and he was amazing.

Revisiting

If I had to pick one thing I dislike about the Los Angeles area, it would be its bustling driving culture. I personally enjoy walking and taking public transportation as I did all throughout Korea and when I visited the east coast. Even in the west LA area, I always find some petty excuse to walk everyday- oh I need to drop off that library book or I should buy some cereal from the market. I imagine when I grow old, I’ll be one of those visor-wearing grandmas who always takes evening strolls with her old grandpa husband.

Being the restless and jittery person that I am, I decided to take a walk around my good ol’ neighborhood in Hacienda this past weekend. I have to say it’s been a while. I was in the mood to be swept away by a wave of nostalgia, ready to scrounge up fading images of childhood days and to feel a general air of wistfulness.

But something about it all was a bit haunting.

All the houses seemed to peer out at me with their solid expressions- their boxy window eyes and their scaled garage teeth. Some, I noticed, got makeovers with paint jobs or freshly manicured lawns. These renovations were slightly jarring. I wanted things exactly how I left it, and those houses were just “trying too hard.” I passed by my old schoolfriend’s house except she doesn’t live there anymore. Some new family with three little kids roaming around in the grass. They didn’t know that I, this strange passerbyer, was in their domain once, knew the contours of their home, used their toilet. The all-too-knowledgeable ex-girlfriend.

Then, I passed by that one house… “my paradise dream home.” You know how there’s one in every block- the house that sticks out like a sore thumb. The one that’s been remodeled and looks too pretty and polished to be with the rest of its rundown neighbors. Just its overwhelming presence seems to taunt the others. In all it’s out-of-place glory, I remember wanting to live there. I wanted more than anything to knock on that front door with the “welcome friends” wreath and yell “I’m home!” But looking at it now, the pink paint was blaringly tacky and even the wreath seemed tongue-in-cheek. Oh, how fickle one’s heart can be.

Then, there was that one house with that scary german shepherd that could always be found growling behind its barred gate. “Beware of Dog” the words shot out as if the dog itself wasn’t a warning sign. My steps would increasingly quicken as I would pass by, secretly praying to God that the dog wouldn’t jump over the gate and demolish me. Just as a pre-caution, I would always scan the street for some straggling neighbors or opened doors- places I could run to for protection. But this time, as I passed, there was no angry dog- no sign even. And it made me wonder if the family moved away or if the monster died. For some reason, the thought of its death made me unexpectedly sad. The house seemed desolate without the echoes if its consistent bark.

All the houses, the empty street (the places that captured the golden years of my childhood) seemed suddenly larger-than-life… presenting new wisdoms that were unsettling rather than reassuring. My assuming arrogance shaken by the harsh reality that I couldn’t hold this place “this Old Forest Road” in a permanent snow globe immune from change or tarnish.

Next stop- Wilson High.