2008

Last year on the day before my birthday, I was out in SoHo by myself and a random woman stared at me for a minute at a crosswalk. She said "you should get a psychic reading. I see something big in your aura," and then she crossed the street. No attempt to sell me anything. Being the day before my birthday, I could feel it. So the next day I went and found someone to read my palm. The woman I went to was nothing special, perhaps not even remotely psychic. But she did say 2008 was my year, to contain a lot of traveling. She also said to Florida, California and the Caribbean... she got 1 out of 3 right I guess. So she was probably a quack, but still, I really wanted to believe that it was going to be my year. After an unbelievably crappy end to 2007, I was tired of feeling that way and was absolutely ready to shake it all up. Maybe I created some self-fulfilling prophecy right there, because 2008 is now recognized as The Best Year of My Life So Far! (So take that Year of the Rat!). I'm sad to see it go. It's been a helluva ride and it's so overwhelming now to attempt to sum up.

But here it is.

To start, I've celebrated a new year 3 times in the past 365 days- Gregorian, Lunar and Buddhist. A nice reminder that it's never too late to start anew.

I went to wondrous, exotic places that I'd never been to before, spanning 4 continents this year alone and completing my lifelong goal of seeing them all (minus Antartica) before age 30.

(23 countries and counting)

I got to go home again.

I got out of my comfort zone/rut and threw myself into the opposite. On the opposite side of the world. I traded in the concrete jungle for the simple life. I became a foreigner in an un-diverse setting. I had to learn how to pack light and re-learn how to ride a bicycle. (Now I only fear motorbikes).

I learned how to dive after a lifetime of dreaming about it. I surfed, took up samba, rode elephants, and kayaked with turtles. I slept in a bunk bed with flesh-eating ants. I got mistaken for a ladyboy. I learned some Thai.

I learned not to stress. Mai bpen rai!

Perhaps because I also experienced the joys of prolonged unemployment? Work is so overrated, ha ha. The truth is, I got caught in the great American recession, so it wasn't necessarily my choice to be in this situation, but my real accomplishment was turning that into an opportunity to grow in other areas of my life. I didn't expect it to last this long, but I definitely milked the hell outta it while I had (/have) it! Enjoying in the now, knowing that this won't last forever. So, poor in the bank, but so much richer at heart.

And yet, strangely during this super-duper-extended vacation, I think I've done equally valuable progress in building my career. I know what I want, and I know that it can happen.

I saw change come to America and experienced a renewed faith in the goodness/mental soundness of people in general. I was a part of the revolution that ushered in the first black president of the country.

I moved out of and back into New York.

I got to spend some serious quality time with virtually all the most important people in my life, and there are so many. I've been blessed with the best friends and the best family. And then I was enriched by the introduction of so many new people into my life-- people so different from me, people so the same (same same but different!), people that I never expected to meet, people that I never expected to like, big people, small people, red people, blue people. I met the gayest gays that ever gayed. I formed bonds with people without even sharing a common language.

I sorted out my priorities, I am comfortable in my own skin, and I feel truly truly TRULY blessed. I think, so far, I've lived a pretty full life-- full of discovery, re-discovery, adventure, joy and so so much love. All this, and still the potential for more.

Then, at the end of a year-long celebration, I turned 30, going out with a bang heard round the world. There was no better way to prepare, and now I feel ready for the next stage. Bring it on!

Happy 2009.

alone

It is commonly said of New York City that you could easily go through everyday life here, in this city of 8 million people, and still feel like the loneliness person in the world. We live alone in this culture, most often in our solitary apartments, on top of other solitary apartments, forming no real connections to the masses that surround us and only interact with them in the shallowest of manners. We push through each other in the crowded subways and streets everyday, fight for reservations at restaurants and tickets to shows, and lay awake at night unable to sleep while a zillion car horns blare and pedestrians chatter excitedly on the sidewalk outside our windows. There is life all around us, and somehow we are so removed. I can put on my Ipod and tune it all out.

Mark Twain called it “a splendid desert—a domed and steepled solitude, where the stranger is lonely in the midst of a million of his race.”

New York Magazine's cover story this week is about this so-called "Urban Loneliness," and how recent sociological studies are proving this to be more of a myth than we feel. How so? Humans are social animals with a hypothesized biological need to interact, ultimately ensuring the survival of the species (i.e. sex). Really, that's all it comes down to? Everyone needs someone to love them. Woop!

That's the ultra-simplified analysis. Read more here.

only in america

Where else but in America can an Amer-asian girl dress up in a sari and roll into an Indian engagement party in a Brazilian churrascaria with a carload of Filipinos, Chinese and Koreans?

Mat was one of my closest friends from my college days in upstate New York, and over the weekend he celebrated his engagement in a traditional Malayalam Indian dinner party. It was an intimate crowd consisting of family and church members and a few friends. Their pastors were present to lead the many Christian prayers and singing. The mood was conservative, but happy. An hour into the festivities, I felt happy as well, but something was missing. And then I slowly realized there... was... no... alcohol. OMG. I was at a party completely sober! Surreal. Luckily we were at a Brazilian bbq buffet, so I got intoxicated on meat instead, my drug of choice for the night. I inhaled 9 different kinds of bloody carnivore delights carved from sword skewers directly onto my plate, and finished myself off with 2 plates of leche flan for dessert. All I can say is praise the Lord my sari was adjustable. I had borrowed it from Nina in an attempt to be formal and culturally respectful... and also because this might be my only chance to ever wear a sari and their jewelry is crazy. Love it.

I tease Mat that his Indian traditions extend way beyond just his religion. His mother had set him up in what I affectionately termed a modern-day arranged marriage. Clearly mommy knows best. It's rare to see 2 people together and know that there could be no better match for each. After only 4 months of dating, he proposed. He said it was the easiest decision he's ever made. Isn't that how it should always be? :)