words for reading

Soaking Walls

2011-10-19T17:23:00.001+08:00

One late night in October 2007 after a long day of work followed by an evening band practice I came home and opened my front door and saw something I didn’t even know was possible. It was raining in my house. I turned around and looked up at the clear sky, holding out my hands just to make sure no rain would strike them on this dry starry night. I then turned back to the house. I stood in the doorway, exhausted and confused, as my cats glared disapprovingly from the drier areas of the room at the water dripping from my sagging ceiling and my dogs playfully rolled in puddles and splashed about. Something was definitely wrong.

Imagine trying to straddle this while you take a dump.

A pipe had broken in the upstairs bathroom, flooding the top floor. The water eventually leaked through the floor and flooded the ground level, then leaked through and flooded my basement. To make matters worse, it was hot water, so the entire day I had been paying to heat the water that was flooding my house. For the next week had no bedroom and if I wanted to use the bathroom I had to do so next to an enormous dehumidifier. Getting distracted and diverting my stream a few inches to my left could potentially end my life.

For the next few crisp October mornings I woke up early and walked out to my back yard to pee. Since the flooding only destroyed the part of my house with the bedrooms, I was still able to sleep on the big cozy lazyboy chair in my living room. My kitchen was a mess, but despite it being a bit chilly outside I could still use the grill in the backyard to heat up my frozen pizzas. On the weekends I got away from the mess by spending time with friends who had spare bedrooms. It was a great opportunity for me to connect with nature and spend time with friends, and it even sparked great relationship with a friend that I hadn’t seen in many years.

A few months ago I noticed a small water leak in my house here in Hong Kong. It was slowly leaking through my bathroom wall and causing the paint by my bed to bubble and fall off. A week ago I finally got tired of cleaning paint chips and asked my landlord to repair it, which she agreed to do.

Having lived through the experience of having the majority of a large house completely destroyed by a water leak, the one week repair of a small leak seemed like no problem to me. I figured they would cut out a bit of drywall, patch up the pipe, repaint my wall, and be done.

On their first day or work, 3 polite and friendly (I think. They didn’t speak English) men knocked on my door while I was getting ready for work. One sat on my chair and started talking on the phone, another sat on my floor and started reading a newspaper, and the third man picked up a huge saw and started cutting my bathroom in half.

My small apartment was immediately consumed by a swell of dust as the man ripped apart the tiles in my bathroom. I scrambled to cover as much of my house with plastic as I could. I put my toothbrush and everything else I could think of in my refrigerator, wrapped the gaps around my closet doors with tape, and pushed as much of my belongings as I could fit my bedroom, which was the only part of the house with a door I could close. But after a few minute it was more than I could handle. I was coughing and gagging from the dust, as the two other men sat comfortably reading the newspaper and chatting on the phone. I left my house and arrived at work earlier than I had ever been.

11 hours later I came back to my house. The air was thick with dust and everything was covered in a thick layer of white grime. Half of my bathroom was completely gone, and the rest of it was filled with tools and supplies. My bathroom mirror was so filthy I couldn’t see my reflection in it. Unlike my large house in the US, I had no other rooms I could escape into and no friends with spare bedrooms I could mooch off of. The cleanest of my rooms was my small bedroom, but I had propped my bed up vertically against the wall to make room for my belongings. My entire life was confined to one 32 square foot room, filled with furniture.

I laid down on the floor, my body twisting around the various items in the room. I desperately wanted to poop and take a shower. Both of those seemed impossible. After a minute or two I got back up and walked to the gym, where I reluctantly confronted the superfluous agglomeration of wrinkly old man butts and needlessly exposed genitals as I walked through the locker room to the showers.

After one night of sleeping in a dusty room in which I clearly did not fit, my lungs felt like they were about to go on strike and I decided I had to find somewhere else to sleep. Thankfully, I have a girlfriend who was willing to let me stay in her house. But with no car my weekday round trip commute is about 4 hours, and there just isn’t enough space in her house for both of us to fit. I have time to wake up, go to work, eat dinner, and go back to sleep. I miss my big lazy boy chair, only having to climb over a large machine to use the toilet, and having friends with extra bedrooms. One small leak has caused me more frustration than my house getting almost completely destroyed. Now when I hear the ubiquitous drilling and hammering of Hong Kong I feel sympathetic and wonder how the person whose house is being repaired is surviving.

I know I should be thankful for even having a place to live. But what can I say, I’m spoiled and like having a bathroom and breathable air. I like having extra rooms for large recliners and a yard big enough that I can pee in it without the neighbors calling the police. But most of all I like having a private, quiet, and clean place that I can call my own. Hopefully this construction will be finished soon so I can get back to my normal life!

Kicking Babies

2011-09-11T00:17:00.005+08:00

A few days ago I was having so much fun playing Dead Rising and Forza on my xbox360 that I completely lost track of time. I was supposed to meet my girlfriend in central for dinner that evening and by the time I finally glanced at my clock I was already 10 minutes late! Not only that, but I had 20kg of laundry that I had to carry across an extremely crowded shopping mall and drop off at the cleaners before catching my bus! I had to hurry!!

I threw down my controller, grabbed my phone, put headphones on, grabbed my giant bag of laundry, and ran out the door. Earlier that day I had been listening to music with my regular open air headphones but was now using my in-ear isolation headphones. In my rush I neglected to account for the volume difference between these two pairs. At about 3/4 volume, I now had Trivuim blasting at a near deafening volume, and with no free hands to turn it down I was stuck with it.

I'm not sure if it was because of the video games, the loud metal, or that I was in a huge rush with a giant heavy bag I wanted to get rid of as quickly as possible, but I was in no mood to tolerate the wall of people occupying every inch of the mall between my house and the laundromat.

I charged through the crowd like a maniac, weaving between people, taking every opportunity to pass, and intimidating those I couldn't get past with the giant puffy battering ram I had between my tired arms. All was going well until I got stuck with a wall to my right, a slow fat woman to my left, and a tiny woman walking the opposite direction directly in front of me. I thought about what my next move should be. The fat woman to my left was unlikely to move, and barring some divine intervention, It was even more unlikely that the wall to my right would be going anywhere. My bet was that the woman in front of me, who unlike me had plenty of space around her, would see that I was unable to move and go around me. I watched her to see what she would do when suddenly our eyes met! This was the perfect opportunity for me to solve my problem!

Since moving to Hong Kong I've developed a lot of creative tricks for getting through crowds. I've used fake hacking coughs, air drumming to music, and skipping, but by far the most effective weapon I have is eye contact. If I want somebody to get out of my way all I have to do is get them to look at me. Once they do, I open my eyes as wide as I can and I stare, not at them, but behind them or slightly beside them. No smiling, no blinking, no emotion. Just two giant empty eyes. Everybody reacts the exact same way. Immediately after our eyes meet, they look away. After a few seconds they look again with their eyes, not turning their head, to see if I'm still looking at them. I am! They repeat this maybe 2 or 3 times, then eventually turn their head and look directly at me, as if to say "oh, you want to have a staring contest? bring it on!" I hold my unwavering blank expression. After a few seconds of this I abruptly switch from looking behind or slightly beside them to looking directly into their eyes, and give them a "why are you staring at me" expression. At this point they realize that I wasn't actually looking at them, but at something near them! Suddenly THEY are the asshole, and feeling foolish for having been staring at me for the last few seconds they step out of the way and let me pass. It works every time!

This woman, however, was different. When I shifted my eyes and stared directly at her over my big bag of clothing she just kept staring back at me! She had absolutely no reaction to what I had done. Was she trying to use my own trick against me? I INVENTED that trick and there was no way I was going to let some lady beat me at it! With no free hands for air drumming and the bag covering my mouth and keeping me from coughing I had no choice but to take evasive action. But what could I do? I was blocked from every angle, while she still had plenty of space to move! It was as if she expected me to stop, press myself against the wall, hold my bag over my head, and wait for her to comfortably pass me. Unfortunately for her, this was not happening. She had to be moved. If I couldn't defeat her psychologically, I would defeat her with force!

In the last few seconds before we collided my relaxed pace drastically changed to long and exaggerated steps. I firmed up the bag in front of me in preparation for our impending collision and kept my eyes locked directly on hers. I was sure this would make her move, but we just kept getting closer and closer, her path unchanged! Eventually we got to the point of no return. Our eye contact was broken as she got close enough that I couldn't see her over the bag in my arms and I braced for impact. I took my last steps with excessive force and confidence, and as I threw my right foot forward it suddenly struck something a bit sooner than I had expected. I moved the bag to the side to see what I had kicked. It was a stroller. Oh my god, I just kicked her baby!

I guess there is a first time for everything. I never ate sea cucumber until a few weeks ago, and until this day I had never kicked a baby. My mind spin wildly trying to figure out what to do next. In my defense, with the thick crowd and the large bag in front of me, I really could not see the stroller. Was this my fault? What kind of a parent uses their child as a cow catcher? I could think of hundreds of more ethical and responsible things she could have used to push people out of her way, but she chose to use a baby. I thought parents were supposed to protect babies, not use them to push people! What kind of mother was this?

But no, I just kicked a stroller while intentionally walking at full speed. There was no excuse for this. I reluctantly stopped, pulled my bag to my side and prepared to attempt an apology in Cantonese when I took a closer look at her child. There was a mesh cover pulled over the stroller, but I tried my best to look through it and see if the baby was ok. As soon as I got a good look I realized that there was something very strange about this baby. It was a Zara bag!

This lady was using a stroller as a shopping cart, no doubt with intentions of getting people to move out of her way in fear of kicking a baby! This was even better than my staring trick! Relieved, angry, and somewhat disappointed that somebody had developed an even better way of cutting through crowds, I resumed my pace and forced my way to the laundromat. Thankfully I won't have to add "kicking babies" to the list of new experiences I've had since moving to Hong Kong!

Reptiles, Chickens, and Crazy People

2011-07-03T01:27:00.000+08:00

For my first two months in Hong Kong it was easy to forget where I was. The majority of my past year or so had been filled with empty meaningless days, and sitting around job hunting felt the same no matter what country I did it in. However, since moving to Tuen Mun and working full time my life has gotten much more interesting. Every day I am forced to confront the reality of living in a country where I am perpetually lost and confused. Tasks like ordering a cheeseburger have become a frustrating game of charades, and figuring out where I am or where I’m supposed to be going has become downright futile. To make matters worse I have had very little time to acquaint myself with my strange and bewildering surroundings.

Today was the first day in over a month where I had nowhere to go, nothing to do, and an abundance of free time. I decided that I would spend this time intentionally getting even more lost and confused than I normally was, so I packed my bag with enough snacks and drinks to sustain myself for a day or so in the likely event of me getting hopelessly lost and set out for an adventure.

I started my exploring by exiting my building and bravely turning right. This immediately took me out of my comfort zone because until this point I had only ever turned left after leaving my building. It had always been open door, turn left, repeat. I had no particular reason for avoiding the right side of my building; I just knew where things were on the left side and when I was hungry or walking to work I never wanted to deal with any uncertainty. But today was my day and I was feeling wild, so to the right I went!

After walking under a highway, past a group of people with umbrellas that yelled at me for a reason I will never understand, and through an open square full of old men doing slow motion karate, I found an interesting looking wet market. As soon as I walked inside I literally ran into a row of chickens. There was wrapped chicken meat on the far left , whole chickens hanging from hooks in the center, and live chickens in cages on the right. I had never seen living chickens so close to chicken meat. I stood there watching them flap about nervously, trying to connect where each piece of packaged meat came from on their bodies, when an old lady snuck up behind me and started shouting in Cantonese and pointing frantically at the chickens. I think she wanted me to buy one! I tried to give her my best “I don’t understand a what you’re saying” face, but she just got louder and more energetic. This made it difficult for me to concentrate on piecing together what little Cantonese I knew, but finally I said what I thought was, “I would not like to buy a chicken”. She stood quietly for a few seconds and smiled. Then she walked over to the cage and grabbed a chicken! I panicked! Had I accidentally told her that I would like to buy FIVE chickens?? My Cantonese is unintelligible enough that “five” and “would not” probably sound about the same! I desperately tried to think of something else I could say, but my limited Cantonese was failing me. I did the only respectable thing I could think of for a situation like this. I ran away!

By the time I ran to the produce section of the market I figured I was far enough away to relax. To redeem myself for using Cantonese so poorly I practiced by walking up to each vegetable stand and asking for the price of something, repeating the price, then asking them to confirm that this was correct. After annoying every vender in the market and feeling pleased with my sufficiently inflated bilingual ego I left the wet market.

My next stop was Tuen Mun Park. My house looks over this park, but I had never taken the time to properly explore it. Despite looking like a large and attractive collection of foliage, it was actually the sounds that came from it that made me curious. All day every day I heard what sounded like at least a dozen terrible concerts happening simultaneously. There was always singing and music, but so much of it that it transformed into an eerie white noise of Chinese vibrato.

Once I got to the park I found rows of tents spanning as far as I could see, all filled with old people, tambourines, and keyboard players. This was outdoor karaoke for old Chinese people! As I walked through the park, people started staring at me like I was on fire. At first I was a bit self conscious. I checked to see if my pants were properly zipped then felt the rest of my body and hair to make sure everything was where it was supposed to be. I even briefly glanced at my reflection in a pond to make sure I wasn’t actually on fire. Thankfully I wasn’t. Then it dawned on me. I was actually the strange one in a large crowd that I found very strange, so I quickly moved along and started exploring emptier parts of the park.

Out of nowhere I found a reptile house. What a random but pleasant surprise! They had turtles, snakes, lizards, and even an alligator! I thought about how strange it was to have a reptile house in the middle of a park, but I guess it was no stranger than having me there. Satisfied with my adventure around Tuen Mun I waved goodbye to my new reptile friends and started walking home.

While crossing a walking bridge over Tuen Mun Heung Sze Wui Rd to my home I wondered why anybody would give a big road such a long name. I can’t imagine it being any less exhausting to say for fluent Cantonese speakers. My philosophy on road names is that the more relevant the road is, the shorter the name should be. It doesn’t even make a good acronym. TMHSW. If somebody asks for directions to my home I don’t thing I’ll ever be able to tell them because I know myself well enough to know that I will never remember the name of this street.

My concentration was suddenly broken by a tall man jumping in circles around me saying in clear English “hey hey hey, can you do 20 in 200? Can you do 20 in 200? In 200?” I quickly tried to make a facial expression that would indicate that I’m French or German and don’t understand English, but in the moment all I could do was frown and blink while he hopped in circles around me. Eventually he ran off down the bridge, started doing cartwheels, then exposed his genitals to a group of women walking the other way who gave him the finger as he ran away. Suddenly I didn’t feel so weird.

I also honestly didn’t know the middle finger had any meaning here. I always thought this was only done in America. During a European vacation with a few friends in high school I remember us throwing the middle finger everywhere. We thought it was funny and that nobody would care that we were doing it. If it turns out that this is an international thing I’m going to feel really bad about ruining so many European travelers vacation photos.

But this strange encounter was the first thing I had seen since turning right out of my house that I thought seemed normal. I imagined that if this happened in Philadelphia, people would have reacted the same way. I guess crazy is universal! It is amazing what makes me feel like home!

Fast and the Furious: Hong Kong Minibus Racing

2011-06-22T20:22:00.004+08:00

Why do people like roller coasters? I’m sure a psychologist or pathologist would ramble on and on about adrenaline, synapses, etc, but it just seems strange that we’ve evolved to crave and enjoy a certain degree of fear. I understand that evolution works in complicated ways, but this particular trait seems very counterintuitive to me. I would think our ancestors carrying the hunger for fear in their genome would have been eaten by tigers or toppled off cliffs. I can understand that the people who took the biggest risks may have reaped the biggest rewards and therefore been the most viable mate, but I doubt this characteristic was part of the evolutionary arms race for humans. The majority of those who didn’t grab that brass ring surely met their untimely demise.

I’ll be honest; I love roller coasters. I like them because they make me feel safe. Statistically, it is more likely for me to be hit by a bus while walking to the grocery store than it is for me to be killed on a rollercoaster. These are machines specifically designed to be safe as they carry riders around the air treating them to beautiful views and a nice breeze in their hair. Even sitting on a park bench there is always a risk of getting mugged or injured by a falling branch. During a massage somebody could be stealing your wallet, or during a nice relaxing dinner you could choke on a piece of chicken or get sick from chefs not properly washing their hands. I can’t think of a safer and more relaxing scenario than sitting on a chair high in the air with everybody around you locked to his or her seat.

But for those of you whom are adrenaline junkies and are thinking about visiting this part of the world, it would seem as though Macau is the place to go. They have bungee jumping off buildings, high stakes gambling, and exotic shows and experiences all geared to get your blood (and money) moving. Hong Kong on the other hand has much more relaxed and family friendly fun. Yes it has crazy parts, but these activities aren’t sold to tourists as publicly or abundantly as they are in Macau. Needless to say, I like Hong Kong!

But what can tourists in Hong Kong do if they need an adrenaline rush? Two words. Red minibus.

The Hong Kong minibus network has its roots as an illegal form of transport. Vans registered as taxis or goods carriers reacted to customer demand and an insufficient transport network by running unregulated service along corridors where climbing into the back of a stranger’s dodgy cargo van seemed like a pleasant alternative to riding on a public bus. The government initially turned a blind eye to this, but in the late 1960’s the growing popularity of minibuses began to pose a threat to regulated bus service. In 1969 the government finally acknowledged the presence and relevance of this illegal activity, but instead of enforcing and stopping it they opted to legalize and regulate it.

Today there are two types of minibuses, green vans and red vans. Green vans have government regulated schedules, routes, and fares. These busses operate just like a normal bus and run consistently. The red vans on the other hand have no set routes, no set stops, no set fares, and no schedule. They go wherever they want whenever they want. Their only goal is to get people in and out of the bus as quickly as possible while wasting the least amount of time and money covering gaps in service and latent demand.

Last Friday after a night of karaoke and a few drinks I found myself stranded in Tsim Sha Tsui at 2am with no bus or train service home. My only options were a taxi, which would cost about $250, or finding a red minibus, which would only cost around $20. The choice was obvious. I went looking for a red minibus.

Even though these busses usually don’t operate from proper bus depots, they are still relatively easy to find because somehow they know when you are looking for them. It is as if one of the qualifications for being a red minibus driver is psychic ability. While we walked down the street the appropriate bus pulled over, doors open and headlights flashing, with the driver calling for us to get in like a pimp luring lonely men into his whorehouse. We obliged, and the moment the majority of my body was inside, the bus accelerated down the street as quickly as possible, doors still open and me still clinging to the bars at the entrance step.

As I entered the minibus my first thought was that it looked and smelled like a mobile shed. The driver had bags of personal belonging, piles of dirty shoes and clothing, tools, boxes of random electronics, and a few brooms and cleaning supplies that clearly had not been used piled in the front of the bus. The seats were all wrapped in uncomfortable sticky plastic, the kind old people stereotypically put on their couches. After I sat down my first thought was to buckle my seatbelt. Where I expected to find a seatbelt buckle I instead encountered a large deposit of mysterious slime. I tried to wipe the slime off of my hand by rubbing it on the wall of the bus next to a sign warning that not wearing a seatbelt was illegal and may result in a fine, but this only made my hand dirtier. I then realized that the seatbelts had been wrapped under the plastic. Since accessing them was out of the question, I started thinking about where my head would go if the bus made an abrupt stop or was involved in a collision.

About 10 inches in front of me was a metal pipe, with an L shaped joint pointing directly towards the center of my skull. I assume this pipe was there to comfort passengers by letting them know that if the van was involved in a serious accident they wouldn’t have to worry about injuries or suffering because their head would immediately be split open by this strategically placed metal joint of death. In the very front of the bus hung a large red screen displaying the speed. According to the law, the maximum speed this bus was allowed to travel was 80km/hour, and at any speed above this the meter would start flashing and beeping loudly. It only took a few seconds for our meter to beep, and once it did, it never stopped.

This ride was a full sensory experience! I had the smell of burning engine and tires so strong I could taste it, the contrast of the lugubrious bus interior lit only by flashing red numbers with the brilliant neon lights of Kowloon flying past my window, the sound of a punished and tired vehicle trying to scream out warnings of its impending death over the high pitched beep of the speed alarm accompanied by the occasional chorus of screeching tires, and the G forces sliding me across the slippery plastic seat as the bus sped around corners with autocross intensity. I was scared! My heart was beating wildly and my sticky hands were shaking. I closed my eyes and tried to relax myself by pretending that I was on a rollercoaster, but it didn’t help.

Finally, on an empty back road near the gold coast, the bus came to a sudden stop at a red light. For the first time in about 20 minutes I could breathe! I looked around expecting to see a bus full of shaking and terrified eyes glimmering in the dark, but was met with one of the most bizarre sights I have ever seen. Everybody else had fallen asleep! Even my girlfriend had dozed off on my shoulder! How could people be scared of roller coasters but not of this minibus? Unlike a roller coaster, I was convinced that this bus ride was actually going to kill me! There were no bars or straps fastening me safely to my seat, instead pipes positioned specifically to destroy me. No attempts to adhere to safety rules had been made, and the mechanical condition of the vehicle had been clearly neglected.

But for now I felt safe and relaxed, breathing heavily at this red light. Then, from out of nowhere, a second minibus came to a sudden halt in the neighboring lane. Instead of waving a friendly hello to his fellow minibus operator, our driver glanced over with a scowl on his face. The other driver turned to face us and unleashed one of the most impressive scowls I’d ever witnessed. I guess having fantastic control over your forehead and eyebrows must also be requirements for minibus drivers.

At this point I had a stunning realization. This was not the end of my rollercoaster ride. It was the apex! Right now I was dangling over that big drop getting ready to fall. Whichever minibus was in the front would be the one to pick up the passengers ahead, and both drivers knew this! Suddenly our driver snapped his head forward to face the winding road ahead of us, grinded the minibus into 1^st gear, and started accelerating as hard as he could before the light even had a chance to turn green. We jumped ahead off the line, but the other bus was close behind. Our driver ran 1^st gear until the entire vehicle was shaking then quickly mashed the gear lever into second. When I looked to the right past my still sleeping girlfriend the other minibus was right next to us! No matter how hard our driver pushed they were neck and neck! Neither bus could pull away! This was no longer a drag race; it was a game of chicken! The busses just kept accelerating, our speed meter beeping loudly as the numbers crept higher and higher. Even around turns the busses just kept pushing harder, with speeds climbing well into the triple digits and tires screaming around turns as passengers sleepy heads bobbed back and forth.

Finally, the other driver decided he would rather miss the next few passengers than crash his minibus and plummet off the steep cliff beside us into the ocean, and abruptly slowed down. We had won! I felt an overwhelming sense of excitement and victory and almost started cheering, but quickly remember that everybody around me was still asleep.

A few minutes later we finally arrived in Tuen Mun and I exited the minibus as quickly as I could, still shaking. Before both of my feet could hit the ground the minibus was accelerating violently away from me. No roller coaster could have ever prepared me for the sheer terror of this ride. It really is one of the most exhilarating experiences in the world. Why would anybody pay to go to an amusement park or for bungee jumping and gambling in Macau when they could ride a red minibus for a fraction of the cost?

Feeling Surprisingly Normal

2011-06-16T22:05:00.000+08:00

I'm typing this on my phone while riding a TurboJet boat in the middle of the night from Macau to Hong Kong. That sentence makes my life sound much more exotic than it actually is, and I like that! What did you do last night? Oh, I just hung out under the starlight in the middle of the ocean in Asia on a TurboJet speedboat! Anyway, this has been a very exciting week for me, and not just because of the fancy boats I got to ride on!

I'm happy to report that after over three months of living in Hong Kong things are finally starting to get more normal for me in many different ways. One of the biggest changes is that in about an hour I will finally be in Hong Kong legally! I now have a work visa and should even be getting my Hong Kong ID card soon!

In America we always hear about illegal aliens and the “trouble” surrounding them. I never thought I would be in those shoes. I always pictured the life of an alien as being much more precarious, hiding from the authorities and sneaking to and from work in the dark trying not to get caught. But it turned out, at least in my case, to be surprisingly easy. I just went along with life as if nothing was different. I shopped, went to restaurants, and have even asked police officers for directions.

I’m not saying my life here has been all smiles and sunshine. I have had a crushing amount of stress these last few months. Whether I would ever find a job, if me arriving in the country too early would threaten my chances of getting a work visa, what I would do when my bank account turned red, and just what the hell I was doing here at all haunted me every second of every day. I can honestly say that the first two months in Hong Kong were probably the most miserable and stressful of my life. Being unemployed in the US was hard, but this was a serious test of my mental stability. A test I came close to losing.

But now that my work situation is more stable I am also feeling better mentally. The next step is for my body to adjust to a normal life in Hong Kong. Part of coming here with no job and no direction meant also having no money for food or furniture. For the first 2 or so months I lived in somebody else’s empty house with only a folding mahjong table, a small stool, and a cheap bed on the floor. In the kitchen I had one cup, one bowl, one spoon, a water boiler, and a pair of chopsticks. No refrigerator, no pots, no pans, and no microwave. My diet consisted of cup noodles, tea, crackers, and peanut butter. Every single day was spent job searching from morning to night, and I would only leave the house if I had to meet Leona for dinner or if I ran out of cup noodles and crackers.

During this time I lost about 20 pounds. I think this could be the next Atkins! For those of you trying to lose weight, all you have to do is give me all of your money, cut out all nutrition from your diet, mentally destroy yourself with stress, and move to China. It’s that easy!

There is one more element missing from this diet plan, but I think it may be specific to me. When I travel I almost always end up getting, very much against my will, a tour of the many bathrooms throughout whichever country happen to be visiting. I know this isn’t a nice subject to talk about, but this is my reality. Maybe I'm allergic to rice, maybe it is the stress, I don’t know. If only they marketed shirts that said "I went to (insert country name here) and all I got was diarrhea".

I had to deal with this every time I went to Europe, when I went to Australia, and even when I moved back to the US. It usually lasts only a day then goes away, but in Hong Kong it lasted for 3 months. Yes…MONTHS! This brings me to another problem. One of the most exciting parts about moving to Hong Kong was being able to travel to other nearby countries that I would otherwise never get to see. What will happen if I go traveling somewhere like Mainland China or India, both notorious for their spicy and bowel disrupting cuisine? Food in Hong Kong is generally clean, safe, regulated, and cooked very well. To be honest I've loved almost every meal I've had since moving here, even if they haven’t love me back, but if it treated my body this badly I can only imagine how sick I would feel in some of the other countries around here!

As if this problem wasn't troublesome enough, the countries that are most likely to give me food poisoning are also the most likely to lack amenities I've become accustom too like toilets and toilet paper. Kind of ironic, don't you think? Maybe this isn’t as big of a deal as I am making it out to be, but as a spoiled American I have always believed that it is a persons inalienable birthright to have life, liberty, and a plentiful supply of toilet paper in public bathrooms. I am actually offended when it isn't offered free of charge and in great quantities to me every time I need it. Never in my comfortable life in America or Australia did it occur to me that such a thing might actually be considered a luxury. What a humbling realization.

But I'm not here to ramble and speculate about the quality of international bathrooms. When I finally build up the guts to travel I'm sure I will, probably against your wishes, post about it at great lengths. For now I am just thrilled to finally be feeling more normal again. I can eat almost twice as much as I could a month ago, my diet is healthy, I’m exercising regularly, and my pants are finally starting to fit again! Looking back I guess I should be grateful that I went through this stressful and sick time of my life in a place with laser motion sensors on the toilets. It is nice to be able to relax and look forward to getting my visa stamped instead of wondering what the bathroom situation will be like once we dock!

Crossroads and Cookies

2011-06-09T00:04:00.006+08:00

I’ve traveled so much these last few years that I rarely feel far away from home. I’m not sure if this is a good or bad thing. On one hand it is nice to not have to deal with homesickness, but on the other hand I’ve been thinking more and more that maybe I no longer have a home to identify with. West Chester, PA will always be my hometown, but it isn’t my home. Here in Hong Kong I guess Leona’s house in Ap Lei Chau is the closest thing I have to a home, even though I have never and will never actually live there. I rent a house in Tuen Mun, but haven’t been there long enough to get that comfortable “I’m home” feeling from it.

But tonight for the first time in my life I actually felt what I could only assume was homesickness. I accidently fell asleep on a bus going back to Tuen Mun and missed my stop. Using very sleepy logic I decided to immediately exit the bus fearing that staying on it would only take me farther away from my house. I probably shouldn’t have done that. I was now standing by myself in what looked like an industrial park in the middle of the night somewhere in the New Territories. My first thought was to wait for the bus to come back the other direction, but I had taken one of the last busses out of the city and it was unlikely one would be coming back the other way until early morning the next day. I tried to use my iphone’s GPS, but couldn’t get it to work and I knew that nobody that could help me would be awake this late. At this point I could only think of one thing to do. I put on my headphones, picked a good podcast, and started walking in a random direction.

As I walked along empty streets and past closed factories I yearned for the comfort of all of the places I’ve called home over the years. I missed being able to navigate my way though Sydney so flawlessly, the constant flow of busses and taxis through Ap Lei Chau, and the security and freedom of my life in Pennsylvania. I missed being so acquainted with an area that I knew every backstreet and dead end. I suddenly appreciated all of the times I was able to read street signs and identify buildings. All I could do was walk, with Dr. Novella and the rest of the gang from The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe speaking softly in my ears about gamma ray bursts and the foolishness of UFO conspirators. I looked to the sky to see if anything was up there, but was met with only the ubiquitous haze that haunts the Hong Kong skyline. I didn’t know it was possible to feel so alone in a country so densely populated.

As I was walking I started thinking about my childhood. Maybe I should have joined the Boy Scouts. I remember my decision to not join so vividly. I was given the option of either going home and playing video games or staying at my school to make birdfeeders out of pinecones and peanut butter. My whole life I always wondered why any child would be crazy enough to stay after school to join this group, but I had also never been in a situation where I needed survival skills.

Then again, what survival skills would be useful in this situation? I wasn’t camping in a forest; I was lost in an industrial park. Even if I could make a birdfeeder I can’t think of any way for it to be useful. Plus I don’t even know if Hong Kong has pinecones, and last I checked I was fresh out of peanut butter.

Before I go on I want to point out for those of you reading this who actually care about my wellbeing that I’m fine now. Your life is probably stressful enough without having to worry about me, so I’m ruining the suspense for you. Right now I’m sitting comfortably in my apartment in Tuen Mun. I even stopped at a store on my way back and bought a delicious cookie! So don’t worry. For those of you who don’t know or care about me I’m sorry to ruin the ending, but not very sorry because I probably don’t know or care about you either.

Back to the story, since I couldn't build a birdfeeder my only option was to make a note in my iphone to buy more peanut butter then try to think of other knowledge I’ve gained over the years that could be applied to this situation. I have a degree in transport management, maybe that could be useful. I started thinking about urban design and street layouts. I decided to turn only at intersections where the perpendicular road was larger than the road I was currently traveling. This very quickly led me to a rather large road, which after only two blocks had a grade level railroad crossing. I assumed this was part of the light rail public transport network and started following a small path along the side of it. After a few minutes of walking my assumption was confirmed when a small commuter train passed by me. Not too much later I arrived at a rail platform and quickly boarded the first train I could. I wasn’t sure where the train was going or how I was supposed to pay for it, but figured I could ride it to a major interchange and figure it out from there. Luckily I didn’t even have to do that, because after 6 stops I could see my house! Hooray! My master’s degree was finally useful!!!

Looking back, this entire situation could be a metaphor for my life. When I get lost, I pick a direction and walk. Sometimes the road leads me where I want to go and sometimes it doesn’t, but if I keep moving I always end up finding something beautiful. In the last few years I’ve wandered so far away from the paths I intended to take that I don’t think I can ever go back. Instead, every few months I’m stuck standing at metaphorical (or actual in this case) crossroads wondering how I got there, where I should go, and why I didn’t take a path before that would have made me prepared. I can’t say I’ve made the best decisions in my life, but at least I’ve walked along some interesting roads. I also got to enjoy a delicious cookie!

The 10 Words/Phrases I Know In Cantonese

2011-05-25T02:27:00.006+08:00

I once read in an excerpt from a book by Stuart Berg Flexner called I Hear America Talking that the ten most common words in the English language are “the”, “of”, “and”, “a”, “to”, “in”, “is”, “you”, “that”, and “it”. According to Flexner, these ten simple words make up over 25% percent of our conversations! It is astounding to think that somebody could learn only 10 words and understand over a quarter of what we say!

Obviously the English language is extremely complicated and there is a distinct difference between understanding words and communicating. Learning 25% percent of the words doesn’t mean someone will be able to decipher and understand 25% of the ideas being transferred. However, if we really do speak these words so frequently I’m sure that if a new English speaker learned at least the pronouns, prepositions, and auxiliary verbs in this list they would hear them frequently enough and quickly learn to identify and understand them. This would give the listener a vague idea of what or who the English speakers were talking about and be a great first step in building their vocabulary.

As a person living in a country where I don’t understand the common language, this information was especially interesting to me. Are there words or phrases in Cantonese people in my situation could learn that would be so prominent in conversations? Over the last three months I’ve been listening to the people around me and have put together a list of what I, as a non-speaker, think the 10 most common phrases and words are in Hong Kong. I will also provide what I think each one means based on my limited experience. I invite native Cantonese speakers to review this list and let me know what they think.

The words, in order of frequency, are “la”, “mmm goy”, “Ngo”, “iPhone”, “nay”, “hi”, “ting mut cow gun tam on”, “ho”, “iPad”, and “dim ah”.

1. La (spoken with a flat tone)– A few weeks ago I had a primary school student ask me if I knew how to speak “chinglish”. I told him no and asked him to explain to me what this was. He told me “you just speak English but say “la” at the end of every sentence. Where’s your homework la? I am tired la. I don’t understand la. See? It’s easy la!”

La is easily the word I hear the most in Hong Kong, but it is also the only one in the list I have not been able to figure out a meaning for. From what I’ve learned, it is usually used to dictate emotion or feeling. “Hurry up la” would be a more irritated version of “hurry up”. However, in other cases it is used to make a phrase or words sound softer or more polite. I honestly have no clue when or why it should be used when speaking. Very often the “la” at the end of sentences will be drawn out and exaggerated, one of the many aspects of Cantonese that makes it so fun to listen to! “ok lllllllllllaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa”

2. Mmm goy (the mmm spoken in a low flat tone . Goy, like boy with a g at the beginning, is spoken in a higher flat tone) – If you plan on traveling to Hong Kong but are too lazy to learn more than 1 word, that word should be mmm goy. It is the single most useful thing you can learn in Cantonese. Want to get a waiter’s attention at a restaurant? “Mmm goy!” Want to order meal number 3? “Number 3 mmm goy.” Want to thank the same waiter when he gives you your change? “Mmm goy!” Need people to move so you can read a sign? “Mmm goy!” Want to get the bus driver’s attention so he knows you need to get off at this stop? “Mmm goy!” Want to thank somebody for holding the door for you? “Mmm goy!” The list goes on and on. I use this constantly in my everyday life, and it is always understood.

3. Ngaw (this is kind of hard to say. It sounds like the “ng” at the end of “song” followed by the “aw” in “paw” and is spoken with a rising tone) – This one is simple and not fun la. It means “I” or “my”. Next word mmm goy!

4. iPhone (sounds like iPhone) – Go stand on any street in Mong Kok and listen to passing conversations. As people walk by you will hear "iPhone" at least once every few seconds. Does this mean something else in Cantonese that I am not aware of or are people in Hong Kong really that obsessed with their iPhones?

5. Nay (like the sound a horse makes, but with a rising tone) – Another boring one. It means “you”. If you want a Cantonese friend to hand you their iPhone you can say “nay iPhone mmm goy”.

6. Hi (spoken with a flat tone) – Hi means is/it is/am/are. This can be used to confirm that something is correct. For example you can go to a store and get the salespersons attention with “mmm goy!” When he walks over you point to the iPhone in the display window and say “iPhone mmm goy.” If he keeps trying to show you a BlackBerry and you get irritated you can say “iPhone la!”. When he finally points to the iPhone say “hi” to confirm that this is correct. When he gives the phone to you make sure you thank him with “mmm goy!”

7. “Ting mut cow gun tam on” – This was the first thing I learned how to say in Cantonese after arriving in Hong Kong. From what I understand, it means, “Please stand back from the doors. Ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding!“

8. Ho (like Santa. Ho ho ho! But with a rising tone) – Ho means good/very/well. When people say “nay ho” I always think of somebody saying “you ho” in a derogatory manner and giggle, but this actually means hello. If we were to continue our conversation with the store clerk in number 6 we can now say “ho ho” to tell him that the iPhone is very good.

9. IPad (sounds like iPad) – I arrive in Hong Kong right before the iPad 2 was release, so the markets and streets were filled with iPad and iPhone chatter. A typical conversation in Mong Kok sounds something like this. “Ngaw Cantonese Cantonese iPhone Cantonese Cantonese iPad Cantonese Cantonese la. Nay hi Cantonese Cantonese ho ho Cantonese iPhone Cantonese mmm goy. Cantonese Cantonese iPad Cantonese iPhone la!”

10. Dim ah (spoken with an irritated tone) – This one took me a while to figure out, but I think it roughly translates to the English slang “whatever”. For example, my friends in Hong Kong will see this post and say, “John is trying to teach Cantonese? Dim ah.”

I wish I didn't see that

2011-04-27T23:44:00.003+08:00

Last Thursday while walking through the streets of Macau with Leona I saw a woman walk off to a secluded corner by the sidewalk, squat down, and empty whatever waste was in her body all over the ground. After she was done she wiped a few times and just walked away like nothing happened. You may recall from my last post that I get upset when people fart in public. Now that suddenly doesn’t seem so bad! I thought about taking a picture, but unfortunately my camera was in my bag and it would have been too dark anyway. Instead I just stood and watched, like a deer in headlights. I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. She just seemed so nonchalant about it.

At this point in my life most of my friends have houses, a husband/wife, and a stable job. I’ve decided to live a somewhat more nomadic life. Friends say they envy me, but I’m not sure why. Instead of stability and money, I have a few pretty photographs and a story about watching a woman shit on the sidewalk. Would I have traded this experience for a house and some stability? Absolutely! But for better and for worse, this is the path I’ve taken. People tell all the time that I’m a risk taker and that it is great for me to be living my dreams, but that’s really not me. I love consistency and security. I’m an incredibly boring person trapped in an unintentionally interesting life.

As a boring and somewhat rational person, my trip to Macau last week was unusual for me. It was so last minute that I didn’t even pack my suitcase. I just got on a boat and went there, without my toothbrush or a change of clothing. Luckily, the only hotel room left for the night happened to be at the nicest I have ever seen, with the rooms including complimentary toothbrushes, lights that automatically turned on when you open the door, a shower with 3 shower heads, and electric curtains that opened with the push of a button to reveal a huge windows looking out to the ocean.

The toothbrush and shower were nice, but why would anybody need electric curtains? I could see them being useful if they were remote controlled or on a timer, but they weren’t. You had to walk across the room and press a button to open and close them. Despite having no practical use, I could have played with these for hours. Like a woman shitting in public, electric curtains was something I had never seen before.

For those of you not familiar with Macau, there is more than just electric curtains and feces. Imagine dropping Vegas on Portuguese island in China. Go ahead, work your imagination and get that picture in your head, because this is exactly what Macau is. The landscape and historical buildings are gorgeous, offering a fascinating mix of Chinese and Portuguese architecture and culture. Being able to stand at the top of Fortaleza Do Monte and see the ruins of St. Paul on top of a hill in front of the city was breathtaking. And the food! Oh my, the food was some of the best I’ve had in my entire life! The first night I had 4 meals, and given the opportunity I would have gladly attempted to eat another! (also, in Macau’s defense, I’d be willing to bet that the sidewalk pooper was a tourist. The actual Macau residents I encountered all seemed like friendly, clean, and genuinely good people. Can’t say the same for the clientele at various establishments).

But nobody goes to Macau to appreciate cultural heritage or eat delicious shrimp noodles and Portuguese pork sandwiches. They go to gamble gamble gamble! Cutting through the rustic low-level skyline are massive casinos. Inside these casinos the décor seemed so geared at attracting Mainland Chinese tourists that had it not actually been in China I would have considered it racist. Blinged out dragons and lions abound.

When I go to a casino covered with gold and jewels I assume they paid for this by screwing the people gambling there, but the more elaborate and lavish the casino, the more tourists there were throwing money away. And when I say throwing money away, I mean that literally. Renminbi were being physically thrown all over Macau. If a casino had a tree, window ledge, statue, or water, people would throw money at it. One casino had a gold painted plastic tree on a spinning pedestal. They referred to this as “the tree of prosperity”, and people were literally pushing me out of the way to throw coins and bills at it! Whose prosperity is supposed to benefit from money being thrown at this plastic tree? This made roulette suddenly seem like a responsible investment.

As a child I would always keep a penny in the pocket of my Roos. If I passed a water fountain I would throw it in and make a wish. I loved the concept of wishing. It was so magical, and it always made me smile because I really believed that one day if I wished hard enough my dreams would come true! If my parents asked what I wished for I’d tell them world peace or to end world hunger, but I was really wishing for one of those awesome Power Wheels cars or a Nintendo Powerglove (which I eventually got for Christmas. It’s so bad…)

You know what’s bullshit? None of my damn wishes ever came true (except the powerglove, but I think that was actually a curse)! Now that I’m older I wish I had saved those pennies and put them in a savings account so I could use the money today to buy some candy bars or perhaps a tasty cheeseburger. I also know that no amount of money thrown in fountains will make this bank account appear. In a way I feel guilty for not sharing my experience with all of the people wasting their money in Macau, but these were grown men and women. I stopped physically throwing away my money when I was about 5 years old. I don’t think there is anything I could say to change their minds at this point, and definitely nothing I could say in Chinese. If I tried to tell my story in Mandarin I probably would have accidentally ended up either insulting their mothers or ordering food in Cantonese. I really need to start working on my Chinese.

Once night fell and there was no more sightseeing we could do we headed inside the casinos where I spent hours drinking free drinks and watching other people gamble. I’m always amused at the way people rationalize irrational decisions. After we tired of watching strangers lose tens of thousands of dollars per minute we headed back to our beautiful hotel. As soon as I got to our room I pressed the “open curtains button” and ran to the center of the curtains. I stood there with my hands high in the air and as they slowly opened and imagined an army of people below, all cheering for their supreme leader. I would order them to find me a stable career and ban public defecation, and they would applaud my decisions and do my biddings. Much to my disappointment nobody was there. Maybe if I had thrown a few dollars at the tree of prosperity…

Elevator Farting

2011-04-01T00:42:00.003+08:00

OK. Seriously, people in Hong Kong, please please PLEASE stop farting in the elevators. This isn’t just for the natives too. I’ve been forced to stew in the butt steam of westerners and expats during far too many ascends/descends. This is just about the lowest form of douchebaggery I have ever encountered. Dutch-ovening dozens of anonymous strangers? That is just sick! And once it is in there it lingers forever. I live on the 23rd floor! I have to stand there for twenty three floors of terrible stranger stink. Can people seriously not control their flatulence long enough to make it through an elevator ride? Perhaps I just never used elevators enough in the US or Australia to realize whether or not elevator farting is endemic to the entire world, but here in Hong Kong I travel between floors as many as 10 to 20 times per day. Maybe I just have bad luck (or stinky people living in my building), but this happens unacceptably frequently for me. It is disgusting, reprehensible, deplorable, and many other words I can’t think of right now.

Perhaps I am too hasty in my objurgation of these olfactory offenders. I almost never fart in public, even in open windy areas. I will hold it in and suffer until I am home and alone. Not just to the elevator, but completely inside my house. Very often as soon as my door closes I go off an elephant sitting on bagpipes. But does the world deserve to be free from my stink? Maybe I’m the weird one and people would find it strange to be so concerned about what other people smell. Perhaps it is time to strike back at a world that keeps farting on me! But even if I wanted to I know that I wouldn’t be able to subjugate strangers to what lingers in my lower intestine. What if an innocent child walked in the elevator after me? How could I live with myself after that?

Believe it or not my fear, or social awareness, or whatever you want to call it, about farting in public didn’t always exist. When I was maybe 4 or 5 years old I remember for the first time in my life feeling empathetic for the people around me after I passed gas. I never realized how unhappy my actions could make people, and I felt terrible. I never wanted to fart again! I still have this feeling to a certain degree and it is something that I think helped shape me as a person. To fart in an elevator is to be completely devoid of compassion. I bet Hitler farted in elevators.

Even if people must fart in public places, there are ways to go about doing it somewhat more appropriately and considerately. Shortly after my epiphany about the harm farting inflicts I asked my father to share his wisdom on the subject and he gave me what might be the greatest advice of all time.

Fart on smokers.

They are already producing an offensive odor, one that will likely cover yours. Elevator farters puff and run making the crime somewhat anonymous, but smokers stand right in front of you and pollute your air. This is your chance for revenge! If enough people fart on the smokers, they will eventually stop smoking in public, reducing the total of offensive smells. If a person eventually quits smoking entirely because people keep farting on them, then you could very well have saved them from lung cancer with your gas.

So there you have it. There are usually people smoking outside of any given building. Go let it out in the nice smoky open air. You’re welcome for the advice.

Creepy Fish Eyes

2011-03-25T17:13:00.002+08:00

Wow, I sure do write a lot about food. I’m not sure why. Maybe I should change the name of my blog to “Words For Eating” hahahahahahaahaa! Wait, that doesn’t really make sense. Anyway, I’m upset today because my fish won’t stop staring at me. Almost every night at dinner there is a steamed fish, with its milky dead eye, gazing deep deep deep into my soul. It is like the mona lisa, always watching me. As a proud and accomplished omnivore I am no stranger to eating meat, but as an American I am not used to eating meat with bones, feet, and eyes. It is pathetic. When I finally got the nerve to take a big bite of the fish it was like putting a large piece of fish flavored Cinnaburst gum in my mouth, but instead of flavor crystals it had tiny needles. I spent the next 10 minutes swishing the meat around from side to side trying to gracefully spit out all of the little pointy bones. In my entire life I had only ever eaten fish filets. Is it sad that I never really thought about whether or not fish had bones? I mean, I knew they had bones (I used to watch a lot of Heathcliff cartoons), I’m not THAT much of an idiot (maybe)! I just never thought they would be so small, plentiful, and camouflaged. This is going to hurt a hell of a lot more coming out than it did going in…

In the United States we are separated from the reality of what we eat. I remember walking through the butcher section of food stores and seeing almost no bones. I’ve lived my life on boneless chicken breast, ground meats, filets, and patties. Even when I would buy a whole chicken I wouldn’t have to stare it in the eyes before throwing it in the oven. Remember that scene in A Christmas Story at the Chinese restaurant (Deck the hars with bawrs of horry)? I had that exact same experience a few days ago, minus the racist singing. My duck, golden crisp and delicious, was frowning disapprovingly at me. Duck is one of my favorite dishes. I’ve been eating it for years. I’m a grown man, damnit! I know where duck meat comes from! Even when my nephew was 4 and we asked him where ducks come from he said something along the lines of “First ducks are yellow and live in the pond. Then they get bigger and go on my plate!” But still it was weird for me. Fortunately was hungry enough to get over it and I ate the duck anyway. It was superb!

Are we so pathetic as a nation that we can’t face (literally) the reality that we are eating flesh? Does our food really need to be disguised so well? It’s like how parents pretend a spoon of peas is an airplane or train so their baby will eat it. Stupid baby, it’s still peas! Why parents think a baby would want to eat an airplane or train is an issue I don’t have time for in this blog, but you get the idea. It is one thing to divert a baby’s attention from the reality of what they are eating, but we as adults are being treated exactly the same! At this point are we even capable of eating a dish with bones, or will we shovel the food into our fat mouths to fast and with complete disregard for potential “obstacles” that we either choke to death or crap out needles for a week? This makes me so angry I could kick a turkey, and then make a delicious roast out of it!

Every time I go to Pricerite in Aberdeen I knock over the same stupid chair!

2011-02-24T10:30:00.004+08:00

I don’t fit in Hong Kong. Physically that is. Actually, this isn’t a fair statement. I should say I am far too clumsy to walk anywhere in Hong Kong without oafishly knocking everything over. I am sure somebody much more graceful and elegant than myself would get by just fine. To make matters worse my Cantonese is bad enough that when I apologize for my clumsiness I’m probably saying something completely unintended and possibly offensive. A good example of this would be when I was corrected for my pronunciation of lobster balls while ordering food from a street vendor. Apparently I just kept shouting shrimp vagina over and over again.

Every day I wish I could be bilingual. I desperately want to understand all of the conversations going on around me, even the ones I have no connection to. While waiting in line, sitting on the bus, waiting on uncomfortably small chairs for my food to arrive, or walking through crowded streets I want nothing more than to understand what everybody is saying.

But why? Ironically, after 28 years of living in English speaking countries I’ve developed incredibly powerful selective hearing. I ignore just about everything everybody says in English because I know from experience that the vast majority of conversation happening around me are painfully uninteresting. Even knowing this, I can’t help but wonder about every word ever spoken in Cantonese within earshot of me. Next time you go out to dinner I want you to listen to how incredibly dull the conversations around you are and think about how boring the conversations at your table must be to other people.

Most of my recent dinners have been with my girlfriend’s family and entirely in Cantonese. This means I’ve been sitting at a table full of people talking, but I can’t understand anything they say. The feeling you get from an experience like this is difficult to describe, especially when it happens so frequently. It is like I am always eating alone, but surrounded by people I know. Sometimes somebody will say something that makes everybody laugh, so I will laugh with them. Then I immediately feel like an ass and try to pretend like I laughed at something funny that happened somewhere else in the restaurant.

I don’t have an exceptionally long attention span, so this has started driving me slightly mad. At first I found myself staring for minutes at pieces of food or objects in the distance, but too often these objects end up being people that most definitely become uncomfortable with me gazing blankly at them for so long. Lately I’ve been developing coping mechanisms to deal with the boredom. One of my favorites is trying to guess what everybody is saying. This is actually more fun than it sounds, but usually ends with me trying to keep myself from laughing hysterically at something I imagined somebody might have said. This probably looks crazier than laughing along with the Cantonese conversations.

I’d be willing to bet my imagined conversations are infinitely more interesting than the actual conversations that transpire around me on the bus, at dinner, in line, in a crowd, etc. I hate the phrase “ignorance is bliss”, but it does have a certain truth here. Maybe my life is more interesting not understanding what the people around me are saying. As soon as I can understand Cantonese the mystery and wonder will disappear from these situations. My selective hearing will almost certainly kick in, and I will just go back to ignoring everything. I guess I should enjoy not enjoying the conversations around me while I can.

soap and hoverboards

2011-01-03T13:23:00.002+08:00

I’ve always been a “body wash guy”, but due to monetary restrictions I’ve had to buy bar soap for the shower. The transition from liquid soap to solid soap has been surprisingly difficult for me, as I’ve found it nearly impossible to clean myself without accidentally throwing my bar of soap all over the bathroom. On average I drop the soap about 10 times per shower. If I ever go to prison, I’m screwed (pun absolutely intended).

About a week ago I dropped my soap at such an unintentionally perfect angle that it slid down the side of the tub, back up the other side, and went flying across my bathroom. The weird thing is, once it left the tub it just kind of disappeared! I’ve been looking for this bar for over a week and it is nowhere to be found! I checked the trash, behind the toilet, I even looked to see if it was stuck on the ceiling. I find it hard to accept that there is some sort of kleptomaniacal soap portal in my bathroom, but at this point it is the most logical explanation as to where it went. Maybe Back To The Future time travel rules apply to soap, and when my bar hit a specific speed it traveled in time. The Doc’s epiphany did occur after slipping and falling in a bathroom. Perhaps slippery linoleum is the key to cracking the mystery of time travel. If that is the case and Back To The Future theories are real, then I want a damn hoverboard!

Seriously though, soap can’t just disappear. This is annoying and I can’t afford replacing my soap every time it leaves this dimension or travels in time! I also seriously want a hoverboard.

the hunt for aircon

2010-02-08T21:10:00.005+08:00

While most of my American friends were trapped under almost a thousand millimeters of snow (doesn’t that sound so much more hardcore than “a few feet”) I was busy being hot and wet in Sydney. Before you get all excited let me assure this is not the “sexy” hot and wet, but the “humid with no air conditioning in summer” variety. I’ve been trying to think of cheap and effective alternatives to aircon, such as sitting on frozen peas, taping popsicles to my body, and putting a fan in front of the open refrigerator, but it’s hard to compete with the blazing Australian sun.

So today I went to the food store. I don’t know about other people, but I enjoy food shopping for many reasons. The most obvious is that I love food! Unlike bacon pattern scarves or cupcake shaped earmuffs, buying real food can always be justified since eating is essential for life. This allows me to bypass the “cheap-gene” I inherited my father by using the excuse “if I don’t buy this candy bar and these Doritos I will starve, suffer, and die”.

The second is because I love people watching, and food stores are great for this! Most shops have specific associated demographics, but in the food store all of these worlds collide! You never know what you will find around the next corner! Just today I saw a very young child standing up on the seat of his mother cart throwing chicken at other shoppers and pretending to surf while is mother pushed the cart around the store apologizing for him. How often do you see things like this happen in banana republic?

The third and most obvious is for the air conditioning! If it’s not cool enough for me I can always stand in front of the open freezer for several minutes acting like I am seriously considering purchasing a frozen lasagna… with my shirt off.

I also try to have fun. For years I’ve been balancing products in my cart to properly distribute weight for cart drifting. I make a game out of seeing how many free samples I can get before I’m recognized. I find a great deal of amusement in going through checkout lines with obscure mixes of products (ie. 10 gallons of bleach, a tube of whipped cream, and a lobster). Products like "budget bacon" still make me giggle, and nothing about ice cream has ever made me sad. It’s important for me to find ways to make even the little things in life enjoyable.

So there you go. I finally posted something in my blog. I’m sorry it’s not more interesting, but it is really hard to be creative when it’s this hot. Hopefully I will have more soon. For now, I’m going to go sit on some frozen peas. Hopefully somebody will mail me a box of snow before they thaw.

Comfortable Cockroaches

2009-08-09T23:40:00.004+08:00

I hope everybody is enjoying their summer. It is winter here in Sydney, which means I’ve finally stopped sweating (at least at night)! After the unbearably hot summer, this temperate winter actually feels a bit too cold for me. I’m becoming such a wimp!

One particularly cold day I decided to make soup and do laundry. In our house the vent for our dryer does not bring the air outside. It vents the warm air into our kitchen! In the summer this is not such a good thing, but on a cold dry winter day this was wonderful! In one room I had a dryer pumping hot air in my face, the fire of the gas stove, and my boiling soup! It took very little time for the room to get toasty warm and humid! I loved it!

Everything was great until my landlord saw the windows steaming up and decided to walk over. He opened our large glass sliding doors and commented that the kitchen was nice and warm. I happily agreed. Then he very politely told me that if the house ever got warm and humid in the winter that I had to open up the doors and let all of the heat out right away. I much less politely refused. He then went on to explain that it was because of the cockroaches (which we had not seen since we cleaned up all of the messes he left in the house).

He explained, and I am not exaggerating or making this up, that cockroaches enjoy warm humid temperatures, much like humans do (this part is actually true). Because of this, the only way to keep cockroaches out of a house is to leave all of the doors WIDE OPEN. This way the house will get really cold and the cockroaches will get uncomfortable. Once they are uncomfortable they will have no trouble finding the open doors and walking out.

At this point my head started doing summersaults. He was being 100% serious. How does somebody respond to something so profoundly stupid?? My brain started screaming at him, but my mouth wasn’t listening to my brain and only managed to silently open and close a few times.

He seemed satisfied in explaining his point, reminded me again that I should always open the doors as soon as the house got comfortable, asked me to explain this to the other housemates, then walked back to his house leaving our door completely open.

I stood there gazing blankly at my soup and started questioning the meaning of my existence as the cold winter air brushed against my face. In my life, every time I get comfortable will somebody make me open the door and let the cold air rush in? Maybe the soup symbolized my life, producing heat in a futile attempt at comfort, sustainability, and prosperity? Was I the dryer, spinning confused in circles trying to combat the evils of the world? Maybe I was the self-destructive wind, sweeping in to destroying myself every time I became comfortable.

How was it possible for a person to say something so stupid? If I recorded the conversation and played it back for him would he realize the very large and obvious flaws in his logic? Maybe his point makes perfect sense and I am the one that is too stupid to understand it. Am I missing something? Am I wrong? Is my entire perspective on life also wrong? Maybe everything I’ve ever believed is just an illusion. Do I even exist?

I stood in front of my soup contemplating everything there was to contemplate until I came to a conclusion that I rather liked. I was not the soup, the wind, or the dryer. I was John, a stubborn American student that was now cold. My soup was my dinner, the dryer was just a dryer, and my landlord was an idiot.

I shut and locked the doors, flashed a one finger salute over to his house, and ate my soup while the warm air from the dryer kept me and the cockroaches comfortable.

Seriously.

2009-05-26T23:42:00.003+08:00

Ok, this is probably the most serious I've ever been on this website. I absolutely NEED to find somebody to make me this bacon scarf.

http://monstercrochet.com/Patterns.html

If you know anybody that can knit or crochet, I will pay for the design, the material, shipping, and a whatever you think is fair for labor. I must have this!

ok, need to get back to work. I promise I'll post something soon.

*pinky swears*

Skinnys

2009-05-09T20:00:00.001+08:00

This week I’ve spent a good bit of time and money clothing shopping. It is getting cold and I have almost no warm clothing to wear! I decided that if I’m going to buy clothing, I might as well get something fashionable and in style. To make sure my outfit selections were up to date with the latest trends, since I am still stuck in the 90’s (I’m from the days of BUM equipment or hypercolor shirts and umbro shorts), I brought along a few women who were kind and patient enough to go shopping with me. Unfortunately the latest fashion for men’s pants is for them to be very very tight. I believe these pants are called “skinny” jeans. It soon became clear that I would inevitably have to try on a pair of “skinnys”.

For those of you that have not noticed, the proportions on my body are a bit off. My torso arms and face are all thin, but from the waste down I am much beefier. I have a larger than expected waste and long thick legs. This has never been a problem for me. Not many people are disgusted by slightly disproportionate calves.

I reluctantly wandered off to the dressing room with a standard light blue pair of skinny jeans (not purple, red, or green). Quality seemed ok. The stitching was nice, the denim was soft, and they were priced well. Since less fabric is used to make these I suppose they are also more environmentally friendly than standard jeans. I stepped into the stall and started trying to put them on.

Key word here: trying

Everything was going smoothly until they were about 6” away from my waste. The legging must have been slightly thinner where the knee is supposed to be, because they suddenly got stuck on my calves! I decided to take it one leg at a time. I grabbed the right leg a few inches above my knee and just started pulling has hard as I could. They slowly slipped across my leg, and popped into the correct position. At this point if I had flexed my right calf these jeans would have ripped in half. I could hear the seams starting to give, but I moved to my left leg anyway. I grabbed and pulled, but this leg wasn’t cooperating! No matter how hard I tried I could not get the left leg completely on so I decided that it would be best to give up. After all, there was no way in hell I was going to be able to walk in these!

Defeated, I pulled out my left leg then went to pull the right leg off. It wouldn’t budge. I lifted the leg in the air and started pulling down on the pants, but nothing happened! I started to panic! What if they were going to have to cut them off of me? Would I have to pay for them??? I started hopping around the dressing room pulling madly at these jeans, bouncing off the walls and probably frightening everybody else in the changing rooms. NOTHING! I eventually fell backwards, caught my breath and started to think. Where have I had a similar situation? Chinese finger traps!!! I relaxed my leg, closed my eyes, and tried to imagine the jeans slipping off my leg. I then slowly started pulling. Still nothing!!! AAAAHHH!!! At this point keeping the pants in one piece was no longer of any concern to me, so I grabbed the end, planted my left foot on the ground with the toes against the wall, pushed my back hard against the other wall and started pulling out and down with all of my might. I started hearing ripping sounds, but I did not care!! I just kept pulling and pulling! Slowly the pants started to move!! I could all but taste my freedom! Inch by inch they slowly scraped across my legs screaming out a symphony of popping thread and fabric until they flew off with a force that almost knocked me on the ground! I was free!!!

To hell with fashion! I bought a pair of normal straight legged jeans and got the hell out of there.

Believe it or not, I'm still alive.

2009-04-30T22:08:00.000+08:00

Sorry I’ve been so quiet. Classes are super hard here and I’ve been really really busy. I just wanted to let everybody know that I am still alive and well. Spinny has finally been turned off and placed in the closet. It will remain there until the warm weather comes back in September/October. Right now I am shopping for a space heater which I will lovingly name Toasty, Roasty, FurnaceFace, or if it has a fan Warmy McSpinnagin. Not sure on the name yet. I need to buy and use it first. I’m sure I’ll talk about it here when I get one

One interesting thing that was pointed out to me was that while I tend to name almost everything I own or encounter such as my fan (Spinny), my water boiler (茶), and the possum that keeps eating the plants on my balcony (Barak Obama. Thanks to Lorraine for the name!), I have not named my iphone or ipod. What is worse is that no matter how hard I try I cannot come up with appropriate names. The only name I could think of was Jane, which is a stupid reference to one of the books in the Enders series. Jane is an awful name for a phone! It just doesn’t feel right. For some reason this has really been bothering me. Does anybody have any suggestions?

I’m rambling, which isn’t all that uncommon in the world of blogging, but I’ve tried to keep mine at least somewhat entertaining. I should probably get back to work. I just wanted to say hi *waves to you* and let you know that things are fine. No injuries, no more sunburn, no abnormal body hair, and no giant spiders or wild animal attacks.

Actually the animal thing was close with the possum, and my housemate was bit by a pigeon which I ended up kicking lightly. Not even really kicked. It was more like shoving it with my foot.

Uuuuugh… homework… Hopefully I’ll post something more interesting later!

a long post about my feet

2009-03-27T00:14:00.002+08:00

It is thundering outside and I am in my macroeconomics class, which runs until 9pm (as opposed to the bus I need to take home which stop running at about 8:35). This wouldn’t worry me so much if it weren’t for the fact that I left my umbrella at home! I happen to have my computer (obviously), my iphone, my new ipod nano, and over $200 in text books that I finally got the money to buy today. The only thing worse than walking a few km in the rain is walking with about 3k worth of products that can be destroyed by water. This brings up two topics about Sydney which I would like to have a brief discussion about (not really a discussion, more like a one sided rant, unless you decide to comment). Bus schedules and weather.

My feet stink. Yes, this is relevant. There are 3 main contributing factors. The first is, I can’t afford new shoes right now so I wear my 5 year old flip flops everywhere. They aren’t particularly nice, just surprisingly durable. Eventually my heal will pop through the bottom, and on that day I will either find some new shoes or epoxy something to the bottom of them. The second reason ties somewhat into the first. Over these last few years I’ve probably put more miles on these flip flops than most have put on their cars. I walk EVERYWHERE (and have the blisters and tan lines to prove it). I would estimate that I walk roughly an average of 14km (9ish miles) per day. The third is that I haven’t washed them. I usually rely on rain to clean them, but I haven’t seen much of that recently.

To summarize, due to monetary restrictions I have very old footwear. I walk constantly which makes them dirty. I haven’t had a chance to wash them or walk around in the rain, so they are getting a bit funky. To summarize the summary, I have (1) Old flip-flops that are (2) worn all the time and (3) never washed. To summarize the summary of the summary, my feet stink.

Enough about my feet. I don’t particularly enjoy walking this much, but I live far from school and the only other way for me to get there is by bus. Lets explore the possibility of bus travel.

The busses in Sydney are very nice! They are almost always clean and many even have air conditioning. The drivers are usually friendly and will help you get to where you are going. I’ve found that I am rather fond of travelling via bus.

Here are the problems that exist with Sydney busses. Fare is decided by how many “zones” you travel while on the bus. Zones are decided by the distance you travel, not the number of stops or the final destination. These zones are needlessly confusing and make figuring out how much your trip will cost damn near impossible without asking the driver. For me this is not a problem because I would be travelling the same route every day, but it is annoying enough that I thought I should mention it.

The other problem (the one keeping me from riding the bus) is that they have detailed schedules posted at every stop. These show when the bus will get there and on what day. The problem is that this schedule is generally disregarded and the busses seem to travel at their own free will. It is very common for a bus to not show up, then two of the same busses to show up at some random time a bit later.

What this means is that I have to get to the bus stop unacceptably early in order to ensure that I will arrive in time for my class. For a real life example, I’ve taken the same bus at the same time on the same day leaving from the same stop and have arrived at class anywhere between 30 minute early to 15 minutes late (note: this bus was scheduled to run on a 20 minute intervals).

This is especially annoying when trying to get to my transportation management classes (about a 3.5km walk).

As a result, unless I can actually see the bus approaching the stop while walking to it I generally will not trust it to show up and will walk to where I am going instead. This is good for my budget and makes me feel nice and green inside, but bad for my feet.

The only time I decisively take the bus is when the weather is crappy, but it is almost impossible to predict the weather in Sydney. In the US we get hour by hour weather predictions which are sometimes off, but surprisingly accurate. Here is a typical weather forecast for Sydney:

Friday Fine.

City: Min: 18 Max: 23

West: Min: 13 Max: 27

What do they mean by Friday - Fine? Fine, you can figure out the weather yourself? The weather will be small in regards to thickness? Friday will be characterized by elegance, refinement and accomplishment? Friday will be a penalty or punishment for something we’ve done? Will the day be smooth to the touch? I find this vagueness absolutely hilarious, but most people just think I’m crazy when I see or hear the forecast in public and start laughing hysterically.

I believe the reason for this odd weather forecast is because nobody can actually predict the weather. The way it works here, it could be absolutely beautiful one minute, then storming like crazy the next, then sunny the next, then sunny and raining a minute later, then cloudy with lightning, then raining and sunny, then cloudy and storming, then back to absolutely beautiful. My iphone said it would be a nice night tonight, and all I hear is thunder!

So far I’ve found only one sure-fire way to predict rain:

If I bring my umbrella, it will not rain. Even if the forecast calls for severe storms all day. If I do not bring my umbrella, nature is open to display it’s own interpretation of what it thinks the climate should be like at that particular moment.

I suppose it is a bit arrogant to think that I singlehandedly control the rainfall for an entire city, but so far I’ve found this infinitely more accurate than anything any meteorologists can predicted. Take that, science!

I ate fish brains... and I liked it!

2009-03-23T22:16:00.005+08:00

It has been way too long since I’ve posted here. Way too many things have happened and there is now I can fit them all into one post. For now I’ll share what has kept me from posting. CLASS!

Class is hard. Very very hard. I have tons of work, and way too many things to distract me from finishing this work. Even thinking about how much more enjoyable life would if be if I were outside soaking up the fantastic late summer weather instead of sitting in front of my laptop reading boring case studies is enough to distract me from writing a paper for several hours, maybe even days.

Last Thursday I was awake until past 4am trying to study for a quiz the next morning (a class I had to wake up at 7am to get to), but all I could think about was the many delicious candy bars Cadbury sells in Australia, but not in the US!! I knew I had candy downstairs, but refused to eat it because it was so late and it was supposed to be my reward for finishing completing the quiz. The next day after getting back from class I was anxious to finally enjoy my candy bar, but was so exhausted that I ended up falling asleep on the couch with it in my hand. When I woke up I couldn’t find it.

If you see my candy bar, please call me.

Talking about passing out and not remembering things, I went on a wine tour in Hunter Valley a few weeks ago with some friends. It was a fun time! We found a dog that we borrowed for the evening, spooked some cows, took pictures of a wombat (unfortunately it was in the middle of the road and a bit flatter than normal), and of course sampled some tasty wines cheeses and chocolates! Unlike my last few wine tasting experiences, I decided it would be wise to spit the wine out after tasting (those of you that were with me for the NY wine tasting trip, you will no doubt agree that this was a good idea). I stayed dreadfully sober but also learned a few things about wine, most notably that I prefer beer.

------Pictures: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2075798&id=48501303&l=e9ced56497

I’ve also discovered that I love Indian food! On my way back from class I pass several small take-away Indian restaurants, so I am trying every dish I don’t recognize. So far my favorite is mango chicken! I’ve also been enjoying a lot of new Chinese food. On the weekends people like to go out for dim sum, which give me a chance to try all sorts of interesting, new, confusing, mysterious, and often frightening foods. This weekend I ate whole fish (brains, bones, and everything), chicken feet, and a peanut sitting in the bottom of a bowl that was originally filled with cow stomach. Believe it or not, it was mostly good (but the chicken feet didn’t have enough meat to make them worth the price in my opinion)!

I’m sorry I haven’t been keeping up with this as well as I should! Hopefully I will get used to school soon and start working more efficiently. For now, I need to get back to work! I have an online forum debate on the competitive advantage of Dell between the mid 90’s to early 2000’s, a report on the boundaries to converting to compressed natural gas, bio diesel or other alternative fuels for passenger cars in the states, and I have to pick a semester paper topic for my environmental economics class! That and it's already past 1am! AAaaahhh!!!! Busy busy busy!!!!

Filler

2009-03-10T21:49:00.003+08:00

I'm sorry I haven't been posting here much. Classes (and day trips to vineyards) have been keeping me busy! I have a lot to say, but I need to get my homework done first! For now I will leave you with this:

I bought a can of tuna fish at Coles today that had a warning on the label informing me that the product contains fish.

Haircut

2009-03-05T11:30:00.001+08:00

Dear Diary,

How are you today, Diary? Really? That’s fascinating, do go on! NO! YES! NNOOOOO! Wow, best story ever. Now let me tell you about my morning!

A few posts back I mentioned getting a coupon for a free haircut that I didn’t plan on using. Well… the place it is for is really nice and expensive and I just couldn’t pass up something worth so much for free.

Sooooo, I got my hair cut today by Amy at a salon called Design for Men. She was wearing sandals that were held onto her leg by at least 25 straps. I couldn’t imagine spending several minutes undoing and redoing each strap just to get them on and off every day, but if she is that dedicated to fashion then she must be damn good at cutting hair. This was comforting to me for some reason. I was very nervous about this cut because as you may or not know it has been a long time since I’ve taken care of my hair. (I eventually made a comment about the sandals and she told me there was a zipper in the back and that the straps were just for show, but she would wear them even if there was no zipper. Now that’s commitment!)

See, the problem I had with my old hair was that I was starting to look frighteningly similar to Crazy John, the mascot for a cellular store here in Australia (see picture). I didn’t want to have to deal with people stopping my on the street and asking me to pose for pictures with their cell phone. I’d like the attention, but I just don’t have the time.

Anyway, she asked me how I wanted my hair cut, but I had no good answers for her. Different. Good. Not ugly. I basically told her to cut it so that if she saw me out on the street she would be like, “damn, that’s a nice haircut” and that I had complete confidence that whatever she did would be fantastic.

The end product actually ended up very nice. I’ve never had anybody put this much effort into my hair. She even cut it in a way that will take little to no time to style in the morning! I am happy and my head feels much lighter!!

So there you go. Everybody can stop telling me to get a haircut now.

I don’t think I’ve ever talked about my hair for this long. I’m going to go eat a sandwich.

First Class

2009-03-03T20:37:00.002+08:00

Today I attended class for the first time in over three years! I dressed in a nice polo shirt, got there 15 minutes early, and sat front center. This time I’m not going to screw thing up!! I even raised my hand and answered the very first question the teacher asked… incorrectly! It wasn’t even a wrong answer; it was me flat out not answering the right question. I’m off to a great start. At least I stayed awake for the entire class!

Tomorrow I have to be on campus from 11am to 9pm (well, technically I will be there later than 9 because I am meeting people at a bar on campus, but I’m not counting that). I really hope I can stay focused and do well! I really REALLY don’t want to repeat my Shippensburg study methods, which consists of cramming, beer, oversleeping, and tacos. I hunger for knowledge, not tacos! OK, I do hunger for tacos, but not until after I’ve studied!

Last week I accidently stepped on a lizard while walking through my living room. That isn’t a sentence you hear very often in Pennsylvania. The lizard was ok by the way, I just mashed up a little bit of his tail. I was able to catch it and throw it in the backyard. For some reason this seemed very normal to me. I guess I am getting used to life here.

Do you know what else you don’t hear often in Pennsylvania? I had a kangaroo steak for dinner yesterday!! It was cooked rare with Jack Daniels sauce and served with veggies. I wanted to intentionally have it drip on my shorts so I could tell people the stain was from kangaroo blood! I am weird.

O-Week and poison fish.

2009-02-25T22:12:00.003+08:00

I was told to post more relevant stuff, so here are some more words for you to read. This post is not going to be in chronological order because I would rather type about today first and yesterday later. Just think of it as a timeline from a Tarantino movie, but not a movie, not interesting, and about me.

I really like trade shows and trade-show-like events. They are a good match for my attention span. Each booth is usually about three meters long, so while walking by people focus on every display for about 5 seconds. Having an undeveloped goldfish-like attention span, I normally focus on all things (whether they are 3 or 3000 meters long) for about 5 seconds unless they have flashing lights. These shows are a chance for me to act and feel normal! Yaaay!

Today was O-Week at the University Of Sydney, which basically means there were hundreds of these little booths trying to get people to join clubs or buy products. It was great to learn about many of the student organizations on campus and I decided that while I am studying here I might as well get involved!! Below is a list of organizations I am now a member of and why I decided to join.

Wind Orchestra – I like music and musicians! I really miss playing drums.

Epicurean Society – This is the food eating club. I’m really good at eating (except poison fish. See below)!

UniMates – A social group for international students that offers free coffee every Thursday and probably some other benefits!

Photographic Society – This group takes pictures of stuff then looks at the pictures. They seemed very nice at the booth, and I would love to have somebody show my how to use my expensive camera!

Musical and Theatre Society – I might be able to play drums for the pit. Who knows, maybe they will let me act! These pretzels…are making me THIRSTY!

Food Co-Op – This is a student run fresh produce store on campus. It is near the business building and joining gets me a discount. It will hopefully pay itself off.

Economics & Econometrics Society - sounds boooring, but I should probably join it. They do economics stuff (duh).

Chocolate Society – this is a club for people that eat chocolate. How cool is that????

Captain Planet Association – I used to watch captain planet EVERY DAY! Finally I’ve found a group of people that share my love for the show!

Bushwalkers – hiking. Why not.

Brusical – A club for people that enjoy drinking and brewing good beer. This is a school funded organization, so my uni will hopefully be paying for my hops and barley!

Tomorrow I am doing a photographic scavenger hunt around campus with a few friends, then I might join the Legos club, the commerce society, and maybe even the archery society!

In total I got 5 candy bars, 19 lollipops, 6 t-shirts, 5 cloth bags, 3 bottles of juice, an apple, an Apple coffee mug, 4 pens, a pack of cards, a pack of chocolate gummy bears, a coupon for a free haircut which I will not be using (for now), coupons for two free beers which I will be using, a pair of chopsticks, instant coffee, a bottle of shaving creme, free hot chocolate with purchase of churros, and more sunburn. According to the pile of crap in the middle of my room, I had a successful day!

I had my first bad food experience yesterday. I ate some bad fish, which resulted in the quick and forceful evacuation of everything in my digestive system. Fun times! This could NOT have come at a worse time because I got a free ticket for a concert that night from a friend in the band Houston Calls (good band! Listen to them at www.myspace.com/houstoncalls). They were playing with Ace Enders, Hellogoodbye, and New Found Glory! I did NOT want to miss this again!!

I decided to down half a bottle of stomach medicine and tough it out. The good news is that I didn’t throw up on anybody. The bad news is that I missed half of the show was scared to get to involved or drink in fear of throwing up on somebody. Despite my good behaviour and fashionably late arrival I got carded while there... TWICE! People in Australia seem to think I am a lot younger than I am which is nice, but sometimes annoying. Every time I talk to people in the university or sign up for programs they always assume I am an undergrad student! Do I really look like I’m in my late teens???

One mistake I keep making that does not help is referring to my masters program as “school” or “college”. In Australia “school” is K-12, “college” is a private high school (I think?), and “university” is…well, a university. It seems like I will never learn to speak Australian! This mix up usually causes mild confusion, but I have had a few people believe that I am a high school exchange student (for those of you that do not know, I am 26 years old)!

I need to go get some rest so I can collect more free crap tomorrow. Hopefully I will stay away form poisonous fish!

Food For Thought

2009-02-23T22:50:00.001+08:00

Am I really what I eat? If so, then I am a mix of Thai food, sushi, McDonalds soft serve cones, and Chinese candy. Let me tell you, I am one happy Thaushioftservandy! There is no doubt that Sydney has the best food in the world, and I am so very glad that I have the opportunity to enjoy it every day!

I want to take this opportunity to answer the second most frequently asked question about Australia (three people have asked me). They DO have Outback Steakhouse in Australia! The menus look almost exactly the same (yes, they have the bloomin’ onion)! This made me start thinking. Australia has American-Australian restaurants. What would the American equivalent to Outback be here in Australia? Where can I get some authentic Australian-American food? (does that even make sense? If it doesn’t read it again and again until it does.)

I consulted Google Maps to help me with my research. Since my heart and most of my stomach still lives in Philadelphia, I decided to search for “American Sydney Philadelphia cheesesteak”. Guess what the first result was.

Hooters.

Really?

An American’s perception of Australian food is steaks and Fosters. By that logic, an Australian’s perception of American food is big tits and chicken wings. I’m not sure if we should be proud of that or not.

After getting distracted by a colourful bird for about 10 minutes I eventually made my way back to the computer and looked at the second restaurant Google maps offered me. The place was called The Sugarmill Hotel. Sure enough they had a Philly cheesesteak under the Sugarmill Subs section of their menu (first mistake)!

Philly Cheesesteak: Shredded beef (so far this looks correct), caramelised onions (spelled incorrectly with an Australian “s” instead of an American “z”), melted cheese (this looks delicious, except for that “s” back there), and …mustard? WHAT??!??

I would LOVE to have somebody from this restaurant find my journal and explain to me in person why the HELL they consider mustard a main ingredient in a philly cheesesteak! Did they just look at pictures of philly cheesesteaks on the internet and think, “Crikey, that cheese looks bright yellow! It must have mustard in it!” That’s cheez whiz, dipshits!

Ok, lets be honest here. Philadelphians don’t have much to brag about (except the Phillies… FINALLY). There aren’t many things people from Philly hold near and dear to their hearts, but do NOT mess with Wawa, Philly cheesesteaks, tastykakes, or Philly soft pretzels unless you want a beer bottle filled with pennies chucked at your head.

Food for thought: I wish I could have thoughts for food and eat my own thoughts. It would probably taste awesome and save me SO much money. Would thoughts be considered vegan? They come from, but are not actually part of living creatures. Hhhmmmm…

Grab life by the HORNS!!

2009-02-22T14:45:00.000+08:00

Whoops! Wrong side.

I'm a student!!!

2009-02-21T11:00:00.002+08:00

You should all be happy to know that I am now officially a student! My post grad orientation started early on the 18^th, catering specifically to non-morning people like me by offering a bottomless cups of tea before they started their boring lectures! This was great because for one of the first times in my life I was able to stay awake for some of the PowerPoint presentations (or as they refered to it, “death by PowerPoint”), but bad because shortly after they started welcoming us I realized that I really REALLY had to pee. In an attempt to look like a good student I chose a seat near the front of the room. I didn’t want to stand up and hop across the entire hall disrupting everybody and embarrassing myself less than an hour after starting school! In my head I could imagine the professors saying to themselves, “see that obnoxious American who thinks he’s too good for orientation? Lets give him F’s!”

So I sat there shifting around in my seat trying my best not to wet myself as the speeches went on and on and on, each one more boring than the last. They told us things like, don’t wave large amounts of money around while walking down the streets at night, if you actually attend your lectures it might help you get better grades, don’t eat poison, and that missing your dog from your home country is a normal emotion for an international student. Regardless of the words they may or may not have been speaking I only heard waterfalls and flushing toilets.

After four hours they broke for lunch and I promptly located the bathroom and lost about 2kg in one minute. I should market this weight loss technique! I’m sure there are people stupid enough to pay for it. Lose weight and feel better in minutes, all in the privacy of your own bathroom! Results guaranteed! Brilliant!!

At lunch they let us roam free in a large room with free sandwiches (that’s the best kind of sandwich!). It was a great chance to meet a few people, including a real American! How cool is that! I know somebody from the US!!!

Before I go on I would like to explain how I dress myself every morning. I usually force myself out of my covers, roll off of my bed and fall to the ground, then drag myself still half asleep over to the drawer with my clothing. I pull out (with my eyes still closed) pants and a shirt and put them on no matter what they are. This means of selection is completely random and I usually don’t match. To be honest I don’t even know what it means to match. Fashion is not one of my better qualities! The point is, as a result of random selection I ended wearing my West Chester Indoor Soccer League t-shirt to orientation. This was great because a lot of people wanted to talk to me about soccer! I even had a few people ask me to join their soccer leagues or teams! How cool is that! The only problem is that I bought the shirt at a thrift shop and have NO clue how to play soccer!! People were unwilling to accept this reality and insisted that if I owned the shirt then I MUST be a fantastic player. Even after making it abundantly clear that I do not play they still absolutely insisted that I call or email them about getting involved with the sport! If I have time I might actually do it. Who knows! Maybe I’m a gifted soccer player and I just never realized it!

Once orientation finished I had to complete the needlessly complicated process of enrolling for classes, then I got my student ID! I tried to make a funny face and give a thumbs up in my picture but they weren’t amused at me and requested that I look normal. How boring.

Well, this is enough writing for today. I’m going to go enjoy some Thai food and a Kinder Surprise Egg!! (Oooooohh I wonder what is inside!!!!)

Croc Tank

2009-02-20T19:22:00.003+08:00

If the fall does not kill you the crocodile will

A more realistic image for swooping bird sign

2009-02-17T14:00:00.002+08:00

The image on the swooping bird warning is not an accurate representation of what it is like to live with the Australian wildlife, so I drew a new warning image featuring an Australian mosquito.

Warning, birds will go for the face.

2009-02-17T13:56:00.003+08:00

Even the stuffed animals in Australia will kill you!

2009-02-16T19:25:00.003+08:00

Check out the bloody snout and claws. How cute!!!!

Burning in the rain

2009-02-15T21:36:00.002+08:00

It has been a while since I’ve posted anything significant here and I apologize. I’ve been very busy sightseeing, hanging out on beaches, hiking, eating amazing food, and spending my nights on the harbor drinking great wine/beer. It’s a hard life!

So here is what I’ve been up to.

The Bad:

It has been raining like crazy every day this week. I’ve always heard that you can get sun burnt even when it’s cloudy outside, but to be honest I thought it was just a myth generated by the sun screen industry to boost sales during cloudy days. Perhaps some sort of conspiracy? I don’t know... The point is, I didn’t believe it! I especially didn’t think I could get sun burnt during a rain storm with a big umbrella over my head. Well guess what, I did! How much does it suck to get SUN burnt at the beach without even getting to see the SUN!

Last night I saw the biggest spider I have ever seen in my life crawling across the wall in my living room. I absolutely freaked out and went ninja style on it with my shoe, waking up my flatmate and leaving dozens of foot prints all over are freshly painted white walls and ceilings. This thing was between 2 and 3 inches long, brown, and covered with hair. Creeeeeeeeepy! There was NO way I would have slept until it was out of the house! Lucky for me about after 40 minutes of searching I cornered it and gave it a good smashing.

The good:

On a brighter note (pun intended), the place I got burnt at was very interesting. It’s a town up north called Manly Beach, which is known for surfing and fish+chips. It was beautiful even in the rain! I took a ferry there with a friend and we walked some really nice trails!

Last week I decided to start looking for a gym to exercise at while studying here. I sent out a few emails asking for tours and info, but to be a smartass I also told them that my fitness goal was to be able to do flips and acrobatics.

On Friday I got an email from a Russian ex-circus performer who does personal training at a nearby gym offering me back flip lessons. Needless to say I am intrigued! We are meeting today to go over times and prices. Hopefully things will work out!

Sorry there isn’t anything more interesting! I’m sure once orientation starts next week things will get a bit more hectic! Between now and then I have TON of pictures to post! I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentines day!!!

This was an awful place to park!

2009-02-12T17:42:00.003+08:00

my new slippers

2009-02-10T21:30:00.003+08:00

Good news everybody! It looks like this heat wave is finally ending!! About 5 minutes ago I turned Spinny off for the first EVER (excluding the time I spent transporting my stuff from my old room to my new house)!

I also got some great new Futurama slippers! You know you're jealous!

2009-02-09T13:31:00.002+08:00

Who the hell would buy tasty when you can get EXTRA tasty?? Do they also have mediocre and sub standard cheddar?

Budget bacon????? Ingredients: Fat, Pink.

Feast your eyes upon my whiteness. If I had some blue I could make my arms into a tribute to America!

2009-02-08T20:00:00.002+08:00

Hey, check out my hot tan! Chicks dig tan lines, right?

NO???

Damn!!

Lets get to now already!

2009-02-07T16:17:00.001+08:00

I think it’s time to finally catch you up to “now”. I am tired of posting about the past and anxious to start wasting your time with the irrelevant events of the present! Lets see if I can get you caught up nice and quickly!

In the past week no large spiders have killed me.

I love my new house. I have a wonderful private balcony (which is where I am right now) and the biggest grill I have ever seen in my life.

I am slowly starting to get used to the heat. Instead of my entire body being soaked with sweat after a short walk I only get dampness around my arms, down my back, and in the “private” areas.

I have a flatmate from Slovenia who I get along with very well so far.

I’ve been told several times that I seem very nice for an American.

People here think Americans and Canadians hate each other.

Spinny the fan is doing well and is still on 24/7. I’m toying with getting a larger fan and naming it Rotary McCooly

Paddy’s Market is the biggest collection of random crap I have ever seen and I love it. You can buy a shirt, a new muffler for your car, swords, a wig, computer speakers, a basket of fruit, deodorant, bulk watch batteries, and get a message without walking more than 10 meters. When I went I bought an Australia shirt, an Australia oven mit (so funny), a new luffa, and dried pineapple slices.

The live crabs at the fish market are very cute, and also probably very delicious!

Chicken doesn’t taste like chicken sometimes.

The Simpsons and Futurama are on TV almost all the time and I love it!

The busses are the cheapest, easiest, and fastest way to get around, but prefer taking the trams (light rail) because it makes me feel like I’m at an amusement park! There is also a monorail, which I am anxious to ride.

The air smells better here.

People are running or relaxing in the parks 24/7

I’m still a bit sun burnt

I bought herbs from a local garden and can't wait to cook with them!

Cockatoos are annoying.

That is all for now! It makes me so happy to hear from people that actually took the time to read these posts! It means so much to me that you would let me waste so much of your time, and it makes me even happier to know that so many of you enjoyed it! You are all wonderful!!!

Mexican fiasco and my new home sweet home!

2009-02-06T21:34:00.002+08:00

1/31/09

Today I wanted Mexican food so I walked to the mall food court and ordered myself a very bland and unsatisfying burrito. I should have gone to the Japanese restaurant next door with all of the food traveling around on conveyor belts! It hardly seemed worth the walk to the mall, so I decided to make it worth it by walking into every store in the entire mall (excluding ones that would obviously have nothing I need, like jewelry and barber shops).

Some of the most significant discoveries were made in the grocery stores. They have almost everything we have (including Heinz ketchup and….Mentos!), but everything is different! It’s so freaky! The people there probably thought I was crazy because I was walking slowly around the store getting excited celebrating the discovery of simple things like peanut butter and frozen pizzas!

2/1/09

Today I moved into my new house! I can’t wait to get settled in! Hopefully a bit later on I will have some pictures to show you.

To move all of my stuff from my dorm room to the house I had to call for a taxi, which I did. I arranged to be picked up outside at 11am. 11am came and went. No taxi. I called a few times and they kept assuring me a cab would be there shortly.

Still, no taxi.

Finally about an hour and a half a small taxi driven by a very VERY old man came speeding up to me. After abruptly stopping in the middle of the road he shouting something I couldn’t understand out the window.

I decided it would be best to just yell back “Yes!”

This pleased him! He started turning the cab around to face the different direction which involved scraping the back of the cab into a large curb, forcing the entire rear axel of the car (which was almost unwilling and defiantly not fit for such a task) up the curb and into the grass, then smashing it back down onto the road. This abuse was repeated with the other side of the car and the curb running on the other side of the street. I cringed as the car banged and scraped it’s way around. Why he didn’t drive a few meters farther and turn around in one of the many open parking spots I do not know. In a sick way I enjoyed watching it the same way people seem to enjoy slowing down and looking at car accidents. Then I remembered that I had to actually get into this car and go for a ride!

I wasn’t sure if I should be terrified by his obvious lack of concern for his vehicle wellbeing or impressed by the dedication he put into turning his car around.

He stepped outside of the cab and started saying more things I could not understand. I think it might have been English, but I am not sure. If you’ve seen Hot Fuzz, think the old man with the guns but more Australian (if you haven’t seen Hot Fuzz stop reading my journal and go rent it. NOW!)

I answered “Yes.”

I must have answered correctly because he opened the trunk and we started filling the car with all of my bags.

Once we were all packed and ready to go I sat down in the front seat next to him and we were on our way! Boy was he talkative! He just talked and talked the entire way barely stopping to breath (and barely looked at the road)! At one point he even pointed to my guitar and started singing! This would have been great if I could understand what he was saying!

I spent the entire ride trying to guess what my response should be to his “words”. After some remarks I would say yes, after other I would give a calm laugh, and after others I would disagree. A few times he seemed upset with my responses, but for the most part he seemed to really enjoy our conversation! When we got to the house I handed him a 20 hoping it was enough. It was and he handed me my change, said a few of what I can only assume were kind words, and was on his way with a friendly wave out the window.

Finally, my new home sweet home!

The first half of week 2

2009-02-06T06:09:00.006+08:00

1/27/09

Today was the first time I’ve seen a spider since getting to Australia. I smashed it with a large rock. Hopefully all of the large spiders watched and will fear me from now on! That’s how spiders work you know. You need to assert your dominance early in the game or they will walk all over you! I AM THE ALPHA MALE! *pounds chest*

I also ordered my first pizza since getting here. It was awful! On a brighter note I bought a card reader for my camera, so I can finally start taking pictures and transferring them to my computer!!!

1/28/09

Today is my 26^th birthday! Unfortunately nobody in this hemisphere knows that except for me. To celebrate I was going to go visit the Sydney opera house and sight see around that area, but the weather is supposed to be crummy so as sad as it sounds I plan on spending my birthdays in my room watching movies on my laptop and reading. My feet and brain are sore and I’m sun burnt. A nice quiet motionless day might not be so bad.

On a happier note I’ve already gotten several happy birthday messages from people that knew Sydney is a day ahead of the US! I can only hope the friends I meet here are half as wonderful as my friends in the US!

For dinner I went out and ordered fish and chips at a small local restaurant. They do not have ketchup here. Instead they have “tomatoes sauce” which costs extra and tastes like garbage!! I need to add that to my list of things I miss. In fact, lets take a look at my top ten

1. 1. The people I love and care about (that’s you!)

2. 2. Kitty cats and doggies (even the stinky one)

3. 3. The internets!! Oh interwebs, how I miss thee!

4. 4. Pizza and ketchup. It is awful here!! But I guess they make up for it with great Asian food!

5. 5. My drums. All I have to play on is my desk and the walls. I bet my neighbor hates me.

6. 6. Knowing where I am. I am lost all the time. I don’t even really know where I am right now.

7. 7. Having a car. As much of a pain in my ass as my car was (I will NEVER buy anything German again!) I adored it and I miss driving.

8. 8. Cold air. It’s sooooo hooooooootttt…

9. 9. Having an income. Even if I get an amazing job and work the max hours I can by law I will still lose a considerable amount of money every day.

10. 10. Understanding how much each coin is worth. Some of the coins are very large and take up my entire wallet. I wobble when I sit because my wallet is so fat with metal. I like my butt to be symmetrical and these coins are totally messing everything up!

11. 11. The gym. I know I said 10 and this is 11, but I really wish I had a gym to go to. I bought some stretching exercise ropes at Kmart and already broke all of them. I need to find a place to work out!

1/29/09

I am aware my birthday was yesterday, but today is my birthday in the united states, and since that is where I was born I’m going to go ahead and consider today my real birthday, because I had a wonderful day! I took the train into the city and walked around the domain, the royal botanic gardens, and the beautiful opera house. I can’t wait to show it off to anybody who visits! After that I decided to do a little more exploring on campus and discovered that there is a museum not too far from my dorm (however I did not go in it).

Once I was finally exhausted and tired of the sun I headed back to my room for some water and muesi bars, but took a detour to watch some cricket. I sat there for an hour and still have no idea what they were doing.

I can’t wait to show off my pictures!

Note: Pictures can be seen by clicking here

What I look like in this weather

2009-02-05T09:59:00.005+08:00

While walking around campus a few days after I got to Sydney I accidently took this picture with my cell phone. I think it is a good visual aid for explaining the weather.

The sun feels and looks like it is about 30cm (~1ft) from my head but hidden behind those wonderful clouds!

First weekend and Australia day

2009-02-04T21:44:00.001+08:00

First weekend

Life got a bit less exciting after the first few days. I got a bank account and an iphone. I met a few people, but no relationships got developed to the point where I would ever see them again. I started dedicating all of my time to finding a place to live and worked on setting up my class schedule for the coming semester.

I looked at some really crappy houses. Rent was cheap, but damn! I have to keep reminding myself that I need an academic environment if I want to do well, so I’ve been declining “party” houses which are generally the cheapest. I want friends that are fun, but not friends that will steal my laptop and sell it for drug money. I don’t want to accidently step on a hypodermic needle while walking to get a glass of water late at night (I mention this because it was a story told at one of the houses I looked at). No matter how much I tried, the cheap side of me just wouldn’t let me check out any expensive places.

Finally my father said it best. How often do you get to live in Sydney? Treat it like a long vacation and live well. He was absolutely correct, although a bit out of character (how do you think I learned to be cheap?). I don’t want to be miserable every day I’m here! I decided to bite at a very expensive offer for a room in a suburb about a 20 min walk north called Glebe.

I love this house! I need to get pictures. It was furnished and as soon as he showed me the open bedroom I was sold. My entire life I’ve always wanted a room with a private balcony! I had to have it no matter what the cost, so I decided to suck it up and throw all of my cash down the toilet to take the room.

The only problem was that he was still looking for people to take the other rooms. I might end up with creepy people, but it’s a gamble I was willing to take. I think I am an agreeable person and will hopefully get along with whomever else lives there.

So yeah. I will eventually have a place to live, but not for a week because it is still being renovated. I can’t wait!

By the way, asian food is amazing and cheap here. I got a a smoked eel sushi roll for ONE DOLLAR aud, which is about $.70 usd!! After that I had a huge tub of Thai food for 6 bucks! I love it!

Australia Day:

Today is apparently Australia day. I took the train to meet one of my sister’s friend at a park for food drinks and Frisbee. I’m still a bit overwhelmed by everything and I was probably boring, but it was really nice to be able to sit down and talk to people! Everybody seemed very friendly and it was a great change of scenery!

It eventually started raining so I headed back to my room. On the way I picked up some great cheap sushi and got totally drenched (for the first time not from sweat), but it was worth it!

When I got back to my room I looked in my mirror and noticed that I had an unusually long hair growing in my right eyebrows. Now, I have naturally bushy eyebrows (thanks dad), and normally I wouldn’t waste my time writing to my family and friends about my body hair abnormalities, but daaaamn! How in the hell did I not see this before??? It was seriously about an inch long! It just amazed me. Totally blew my mind! I tried to get a picture but it really didn’t do it justice because it curled and looked shorter. Seriously, how did I not see this before??

I also burnt my lip as a result of extremely poor judgment, but I won’t bore you with that story.

Next few days in Australia:

2009-02-03T16:46:00.001+08:00

I know you are probably sick of hearing (reading) me say this, but I feel like I need to say it again. It is WAY too hot for me here! I never thought I would miss snow within hours of arriving! While walking around in my adventures below I actually had people laughing at how sweaty and distressed I was. One girl actually said to me, “it’s not THAT hot!” Unfortunately I was too hot to think of a witty response so I snapped back with a very clever, “um, yes it is.”

Aaaaaanyway, I quickly exhausted the number of things I had to take care of on campus, so I eventually started exploring off campus. On my first trip out I wandered around for a few hours trying to find something useful and eventually found a great multi level shopping mall hidden within a city block. Upon entering I was greeted with a very familiar site… Kmart!

I had never been so happy to see a Kmart!! I ran in overjoyed, arms waving and sweat flying from my flapping limbs. I started grabbing goods left and right! I got shampoos and soaps, yogurt topped muesli bars (now the staple of my diet), a towel, a cup so I could drink water like a normal person, and some sunscreen which I desperately needed! I also got what I consider my greatest investment to date. A small electric fan! When I am in my room it is ALWAYS sitting directly in front of me on full power (as it is right now).

I adore my fan. I named it Spinny and so far it is my best and only friend in Sydney! I’ve caught myself on too many occasions talking to my fan. I think the heat may be getting to my head…

I’d like to point out that nothing is air conditioned the way it is in the states, so everywhere I go I am still disgusting and drenched. It’s hot here. Have you gotten that yet?

Part II of my first day in Australia

2009-02-02T18:18:00.002+08:00

Hey everyone! I fixed it so anybody can leave a comment. Just select "anonymous". Enjoy reading!

Oh your God, was it hot in my room. I threw my stuff on the ground and immediately got a shower because in all honesty I smelled like somebody wrapped boiled cabbage in a used jock strap. Mmmmm, Sexy!

I’d like to flash back and remind you that I forgot to pick up my arrival info at the airport. So here I was, with no idea where I actually was.

I decided to not let this stop me and wandered out to try and find the international student office. If anybody would be able to help me, it would be them! I had their address on some paperwork and figured I would eventually run into a map that would help me.

After a good bit of walking I found an “info” stand with a large map! Horray!!! Even better, somebody had left a paper copy of the map sitting in front of it!

“This is my lucky day! “ I exclaimed aloud right as I noticed that the building I needed to find was on the complete other corner of campus.

I turned around and started heading off in the right direction. About 40 minutes and 6 Liters of sweat later (about 1.5 gallons) I got to the building and was greeted by a sign informing me that the international office had been moved to the 4^th floor of the Russ building.

Russ building? OK fine. Let me bust out my shiny new map and find it!

There is no Russ building… Wtf!

I decide to re-adopt my initial strategy and just start walking. After an hour or so of pointless wandering I finally broke down, pulled out my map, and asked somebody where the Russ building was located.

“Oh, it’s this building right here” they said pointing at my map as if I were a fool for not knowing.

“The one marked ‘construction site’ On the other side of campus?”

“yup! You’re way off out here!”

“Yes, it would appear as though your observation is correct…”

So I walked across campus again, perspiring like I was in a damn sauna and panting as I begrudgingly hauled my stubborn sun burnt legs along. I would have killed 100 adorable puppies with my bare hands for just a single ice cube.

I finally got to the International Office and they welcomed me to Uni with a smile on their faces and told me to stop by the computer center to set up my “UniKey” and get a student email address. This building was across the street from where their office USED TO BE! AAARRGGGHHH!!!! They also told me I should attend the new arrival meeting at 10:30am. I asked what time it was because I genuinely did not know. It was 1:30pm. I guess I missed it.

So off I went to the computer center. Once I got there a man who seemed very comfortable with the warm weather was happy to start setting up my info, but eventually informed me that I would have to see the people in the Fisher Library computer lab to finish getting my wireless internet activated. It was located ON THE OTHER SIDE OF CAMPUS!!!

If I wasn’t so exhausted, sun burnt, and sweaty and I if I still had any energy I would have jumped across the desk and beaten him in the face with my laptop.

So off I went AGAIN! I can not stress how hot it was for me. For all you east coast people, you know that as soon as it’s 60 degrees F you will be outside with your tee shirts and shorts. Can you even imagine 100??? That was a rhetorical question. YOU CAN’T!! It was 100, but to me if seriously felt like the sun was resting inches from my face poking me with pitchforks filled with burning hay, laughing burning and taunting me like napalm launching hyenas.

I reluctantly made my way to Fisher library. I don’t know why, but it really bothered me to see so many people walk by seemingly enjoying the weather. At this point I was literally drenched with sweat. My pit stains had become upper body stains, then eventually full body stains. There was no part of my clothing left dry.

After what seemed like a 20 mile walk, I eventually made it to the library and the assholes made me go up stairs to get to the computer center. STAIRS??? You dicks, I hate you…

Finally I was there! I was ready to have my computer set up so I could access the internet, but all the nerds behind the desk did was hand me a pamphlet with directions for setting everything up myself. WHY couldn’t they have given this to me at any of my other stops?? Whatever, no point in wasting energy getting violently angry over this.

I spent about 30 minutes in the library downloading and tinkering with network settings, then I was done! DONE! Yay! Now I have wireless internet!! Wait, what does this small print say??

Students are allowed 6mb of internet usage per day and only select sites for research can be accessed.

*smacks self in forehead then winces in pain due to sunburn*

I decided that the only thing I could do was retreat to my room to lap water from the faucet like a dog (I had no cup) and take a few more cold showers.

If nothing else I guess I’m starting to learn my way around campus.

First Day In Australia

2009-02-01T13:05:00.003+08:00

I finally have the internet!!! YAAAAAY! I have SO much to tell everybody about these last two weeks! I was hoping to post everything in one big entry, but it ended up being over 10 pages long in MS word and I don’t want to eat up too much of your time at once. I figured the best way to handle this would be to post something new every day until I’ve caught up to present time! So bookmark this page and keep checking back!

Ok, first I want to give a big shout out to the wonderful people I spent time with and met in LA. I would could write an entire book on what happened that weekend, but unfortunately right now I really need to focus on the southern hemisphere.

So here is part one of my backlogged Australian journal. I hope you enjoy reading it:

First day in Australia:

So where do I begin?? I guess the best place would be walking onto flight 839 in LAX. I was absolutely terrified about sitting still for over 14 hours, but it ended up being tolerable. My seat was crammed and uncomfortable, but it was next to a very nice younger Chinese/Australian girl who’s ear I talked off for the first few hours of the flight. I probably asked her a million questions about Australia and made her give me pointers on what little mandarin I can speak (so far I can tell people that I don’t speak mandarin, and I can order two beers. Not one, only two). After that I fell asleep for about 10 hours and woke up just about there!

Once I got off the plane and claimed my bags I got immediate attention form every customs agent in the airport. Anybody that had a chance to see my guitar’s flight case will know why! There must have been 12 different officers that walked up before I even got to the front of the line and asked me what was in the case. When I would tell them it was a guitar a few got excited and started short guitar conversations with me. So far people seem nice I guess!

While waiting in line I watched them tear apart people’s luggage, searching every little pocket and flap, open every container, and basically separating everything regardless of whether it should or should not be in more than one piece. When I got up to the inspection station I expected them to pull out the rubber gloved and lube, but the guy simply asked, “do you have any food from the US? “

“Yes I do” I answered .

I held up my fresh pack of Mentos with a big smile on my face.

Aaaaaaaaand, Freeze frame!

(Yes, I actually did this. I really hope they have Mentos here in Australia! It has become an obsessions!)

“Ok, you’re good to go. Next!” he repied

“Really?” I exclaimed in amazement! “You don’t even want to go rummaging through my guitar case?” Immediately realizing that that is probably a really stupid thing to say.

“Nope.”

I decided not to push the topic and quickly moved along.

I may have moved along a bit too quickly because I forgot to check in at the new student desk to get all of my information and arrival paperwork. Instead I hopped into a cab and we started driving.

“Where to?” the driver asked.

“Wesley College building in the University of Sydney” I answered.

“Where is that?”

“Um… I don’t know”

Shit!

“Just drop me off at the University of Sydney. It is between Camperdown and Darlington off City Road. I’ll find it from there.” I finally said.

This is exactly what he did.

If you don’t mind I’m going to sidetrack from my story for a second. Actually, even if you do mind it’s going to happen anyway. What are you going to do about it? Travel back in time fly here and stop me?? I’d like to see you try, jerk! Ha! Oh geez, I’ve gotten sidetracked from sidetracking. Ok, back to my off topic topic: It is HOT here! The people who live here have been saying that it is uncharacteristically hot for Sydney, but for me it was INSANE! It was SNOWING when I left Philly, and now it is in the mid 30’s (mid to high 90’s in F)! I am wearing WAY too much clothing for this kind of heat. In fact, if I had a better razor I could have shaved my entire body and walked around the streets naked pouring ice water on myself with one hand and fanning myself with my other and I still would have been too hot! To much info? Absolutely, but I wanted to make sure I got my point across. That point being I am unbearably hot! A roasting inerno! Ok, back to the story!

So here I am somewhere on campus literally dripping with sweat carrying a giant duffle bag, a guitar case the size and probably weight of me, a large suitcase, and a medium sized bag for my computer. So have one, two, three, four bags and how many arms. Well there’s one, and two… hhhhmmm

Did I mention I lost the wheels to my luggage so I couldn’t drag it behind me? I really need to get a picture of all of this later so you can see what I had to carry. If I get around to it I will post it for you.

I need a damn sherpa or something. I just started wandering around campus panting wheezing and dripping, lugging my bags behind me in all sorts of strange and probably spine damaging ways for what seemed forever until finally I found it, Wesley College! The building I was staying at looked like a small castle! I was so excited!!! I crawled my way to the door and literally collapsed into the entrance. A man ran out to me and asked if I needed medical help, but I just told him that all I wanted was to check in as quickly as possible so I could shower!

A friendly lady walked out to me and showed me to my room. She opened the door for me and I stepped in. Picture a closet with a poorly maintained cot, but the cot clearly had been slept in recently and the sheets had not been changed in the last decade or so. The large windows that looked out to campus didn’t even have curtains! Lucky for me I think she noticed the extremely disappointed look on my face, or maybe just felt bad for me because I looked and smelled like I was an inch from death and decided to find a nicer room with curtains and clean sheets.

She eventually came back with news that she moved me to room 386 in the “New Wing” (which was ironically a very old wing).

In the brochure it said that all single rooms had bathrooms and linen service. What this meant was that the building had bathrooms somewhere in it and that they give you sheets when you first get there, but they aren’t necessarily clean. Even my “clean” sheets had mysterious sticky stains, but I decided to just try and ignore them. What doesn’t kill me can only make me ill or maybe give me a rash. Maybe both.

The fresh maker

2009-01-17T04:04:00.004+08:00

A few days ago I was driving west on rt. 30 towards York, PA. I was in the far left lane with a tanker truck speeding like crazy towards me in the right lane.

if I let the truck get next to me I would never be able get over, so I accelerated as quickly as I could and cut in front of him. He was NOT happy and started honking and flashing his light. I sped off to get away, but this maniac started weaving around traffic chasing me... in a freakin tanker truck!!!

Eventually I hit a red light and had to stop he swerved over to the lane to get next to me. He turned his dome light on, rolled down his window and started screaming and swinging his arms at me. At a loss for things to do I pulled out my roll of mentos, ate one off the top and held them up for him to see with a huge smile and on my face.

Aaaaaand freeze frame!

He was not amused.

Jet lag

2009-01-16T15:26:00.006+08:00

first, I am really really tired. I haven't really slept in a few days. I got 10 minutes of sleep last night, then a few hours of crappy sleep on the plane. Now I'm in Los Angeles and messed up by the time difference.

Lets think about this. The time difference between PA and CA is 3 hours. The difference between PA and Sydney is 14 hours!! that is CRAZY!!!

but yeah, I'm still alive and have a weekend of fun in LA before I head off to Australia. Yay!

10 things I want to do in LA:

1. Drink American beer

2. Eat great mexican food (seriously, do they have tacos in Australia???)

3. Throw a cheeseburger at a celebrity that needs to be knocked down a peg

4. Piss of Dodgers fans with my Phillies hat

5. Get a haircut in Hollywood

6. Find Eagles fans to watch football with

7. Watch my friend's band play live (shaimus.com)

8. Try and etch my name into the hollywood walk of fame. You better hide your star Matt Damon! I have a chisel and I'm not afraid to use it!

9. Hang out with some great friends!!

10. GET SOME SLEEP!!!

This is it.

2009-01-15T16:30:00.001+08:00

I have to be awake in one and a half hours to get my stuff together and out the door to catch my flight to LA.

Crazy. Time flies when you're having fun!

Philly

2009-01-05T12:24:00.001+08:00

This was my second to last weekend on the east coast, and I think I spent it very well. I took the train into Philadelphia with some friends on friday, ate some good chinese food, bought some curry (my friend got a nice wok!), then rented a private karaoke room and spent about three hours singing, drinking, and eating sushi! As if that's not enough, we went out after that and danced around a bar near market east and had to rush to catch the last train out of the city!

On saturday we drove back to the city and did toursisty stuff since I've never really been sight seeing around here. We got lunch at the reading terminal, posed for pictures in front of oversized game pieces, fought through skaters to get our picture taken in love park, walked through rittenhouse square, watched the huge tv in the lobby at the new Comcast building, the drove back to West Chester for some pizza and a soak in a hot tub.

Life is good. I can't believe I have to leave all of this!

This must be it, welcome to the New Year

2009-01-02T13:05:00.000+08:00

I'd like to start this off by thanking everybody for coming to my going away/family christmas party on the 27th! It was great to see so many people even though I didn't have a chance to sit down and talk to as many of you as I would have liked.

Ok, so you probably read my email and clicked a link that sent you here. This is my "blog" (I'm not fond of the word blog, but it will have to do for now). While I am in Australia I plan on posting stories on this site! Feel free to comment as much as you want!

Right now I really don't have much news regarding my trip. I've decided to take guitars instead of clothing and I still don't have a place to live. Lets save that for a later blog post, or blog entry, or bloggerie... whatever it's called.

Getting closer

2008-12-21T16:06:00.000+08:00

This is for real. For real real. I’ve been unemployed for over a week, I have less than a month left to go. Shit.

I guess now would be a good time to pull my head out of my ass and start getting ready for my future life, but I have a feeling that this won’t happen. I’ve come to realize that I am an extremely lucky person and I really believe that somehow everything will absolutely work out for me when I get there. Everything always does. I used to think that catching every red light, always having it rain on my vacations, failing at love, and always losing tons of money on every kind of gamble (including exchange rates…) made me an unlucky person. Now I see how having such great health, so many wonderful friends, a great family, and an open world of opportunities makes me so very lucky. Seriously, my life is awesome and always has been. If you’re reading this, then yours probably is too. It’s just hard to realize this until you have to say goodbye to all of it. Even through the hardest times I’ve always had my health and my friends, and as long as they both stay intact I will live a very happy life.

Maybe I’m crazy, but I really truly believe that I can just show up in Sydney with no friends, no place to live, no money, and no clue what I want to do with my life and somehow all of the pieces will fall together and I will end up a better happier person. Am I scared to death to do it? Yes. But what’s really scary is that I’m probably right.

For now I’m doing my best to enjoy what time I have left in the states. These last few weeks have been very interesting and I have a feeling it is going to get more interesting. Some of this might be “bad” interesting, but I’ll deal with that when/if it happens. For now I’m having fun. Lots and lots of fun!

I should probably think about going to sleep some time soon. It’s past 3 am and I’m laying on a friend’s couch in Harrisburg after a wedding and a fun night out in town. Life is good.

2008-12-21T16:05:00.000+08:00

So close

2008-12-01T11:21:00.000+08:00

Here I am on November 30th, just 1.5 months away from leaving. I have my tickets, I think I have a place to stay for 2 weeks once I get there. These next few weeks are going to be stressful.

At least I only have 10 days of work left.

mmmmmmm, I'd enjoy some summer weather right about now!

Time

2008-11-17T02:17:00.000+08:00

Where did it go?

Seriously, wtf. This isn't funny guys. Give me my time back.

Anyway, I just locked myself out of my house, so I'm spending my precious hours sitting in my back yard freezing my ass off. It's a good thing my laptop is keeping my legs so warm! About a half hour ago I was trying to keep warm by climbing all over my house looking for a way to break in. It's nice to know that our house is secure, but kind of annoying that the dogs didn't even notice me trying to pry open windows and pick locks. Worst watch dogs ever.

I guess in a way I should be happy that I have a house I can be locked out of. In a few weeks I'm just going to have my guitar (maybe) and a sense of adventure.

Me asking me questions about me

2008-10-06T01:49:00.000+08:00

Lets get one thing straight, I’ve never been the most eloquent person. I’ve never considered speaking and writing to be my ‘forte”, but regardless of my shortcomings I generally have a lot to say.

At this point everybody and their mother (I’m really not exaggerating) have been blogging for years. I don’t expect strangers to stumble upon my site and be swept away by my writing, however it would be welcome! I do feel I have somewhat of an obligation to give the people I know love a place to see what I’ve been up to and on my mind. So as a refresher, lets review who I am.

Q: Who the heck am I?
A: My name is John. At this moment I am 25 years old and I have every intention of keeping it that way. I was born and raised in West Chester, Pennsylvania, USA to an average middle class family. I have an enormous amount of respect for my family (both immediate and extended) and too often do a poor job of keeping in touch with everyone. I hope that this journal will help change that.

Q: What is my favorite color?
A: Blue

Q: Where the heck have I been all of my life?
A: For the most part I’ve been in West Chester, PA. I did spent 4.5 years studying at Shippensburg University in Shippensburg, PA. The longest I have ever been away from Pennsylvania was for a two and a half week trip to Europe.

Q: So what, am I scared to leave or something
A: Yes! Incredibly! But I’m doing it anyway, so back off!

Q: Where do I know?
A: I have a BA in Information Management and Analysis, and Supply Chain Management from Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania. I'm somewhat knowledgeable when it comes to music, specifically percussion. I also enjoy learning about cars and currently have a Mini Cooper S I‘m trying to sell!

Q: What makes me so great?
A: Most of my power is derived from my double-jointed thumbs.

Q: What do I do?
A: I’m in massive “save money” mode, so not much. I work a lot. I am currently employed by a pharmaceutical distribution company doing pricing and contract analysis for major corporate accounts (currently about 140-150 million $). When I’m not at work I spend most of my time getting ready for school and playing guitar or drums.

Q: What are my short term goals?
A: My short term goal is to move to Australia and get my Masters degree. Things are looking very good!

Q: Why Australia?
A: Why not?

Q: Where do I see myself in 10 years
A: Honestly, I’ll be happy if I’m still alive. I have no clue what I will end up doing with my life. Ideally I would like to find a way to get rich while making the world a better place.

Q: Do I expect anybody to ever read this?
A: No.

Blog

2008-10-03T11:20:00.001+08:00

I have an xanga already, but this might work better. I'll come back and play with it later.