Seasons of love

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes.
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred moments so dear.
How do I measure my 2011?

In lines of code I checked in?
In nights I overworked?
In mornings I struggled to wake up?

In songs I listened?
In miles I traveled?
In courses I took?
In cups of hot tea I drank?
In glasses of wine I tasted?
In words I out-poured myself?
In G+ posts I shared with friends?
In smiles I exchanged with strangers?

In number of packages I received?
In number of shuttles I missed?
In number of visits I paid to doctors?
In number of hours I spent in gym?
In number of inspiring talks I attended?
In number of interesting people I run into?
In number of people who came and left my life?

In number of times I broke down?
In number of times I cheered myself up?
In number of times being too straightforward?
In number of times I truly appreciated friendship?

It's time now to sing out though the story never ends.
Let me remember 2011 in the life of friends and love.

Working hard but daydreaming even harder

I had an additional obsession due to my new phone. The speed of the phone consuming the battery is like me finishing the baked potato chips without anyone else watching.

The consequence was that I had one more item in my bag which was the cellphone charger and my newly developed compulsive behavior was to take out the charger everywhere I spotted an outlet to feed my new gadget.

I didn't enjoy this experience too much. I seldom made any phone calls nor did I receive any. I used the phone mostly for checking time/weather/emails. It doesn't matter too much if it runs out of the battery. Therefore, the reasoning made me go easy with it.

Unfortunately, I didn't have this kind of luck with my other hobbies. Sometimes, I looked at my overflowed closet, all I want to shout is "I wish I knew how to quit you."

The Chinese traditional philosophy suggests that we should not pay too much attentions to any belongings. All in all, we, as an individual, came to this world alone and will leave the world alone one day. However, I think some of those small addictions, healthy or unhealthy, did turn out to be useful tools to handle a person's daily little happiness or disappointments. If they do work, then why not? Aren't those small stubborn addictions helping us go through the interludes in life and understand ourself better?

I wish people who smoke stay happy and healthy.
I wish people who exercise stay happy and healthy.

In summary, I long for the right amount of living wisdom. Not too much, not too little, just right there.

漫搵英雄泪，
相离处士家。
谢慈悲剃度在莲台下。
没缘法转眼分离乍。
赤条条来去无牵挂。
哪里讨烟蓑雨笠卷单行，
一任俺芒鞋破钵随缘化。

Happy Holiday Shopping

I enjoyed online shopping a lot. It was time efficient, less human interaction /interference and gave my daily life some persistent small expectations. However, I did have a great real life holiday shopping experience recently.

I managed to get to the downtown. The main purpose for the trip was to activate my new android phone. In less than 20 minutes, I got it set up and found myself wandering the streets aimlessly.

I stepped into a footware store and received an instant greeting from a middle aged guy.
"What can I help you today?"
"just look around...nothing in particular." I said absently.
Usually, I expect that would be the end of the conversation. However, he carried on the conversation by asking,
"What kind of sports do you do?"
"Me? Kickboxing." I started to pay a little bit attention to the guy. He is about medium height and has a masculine figure.
"Try vibram." He suggested.
"Oh you mean those five toes shoes?"
"Yes. Kickboxing requires frequent pivoting on the ball of your foot. You need a good pair of shoes to give support ."
I was surprised because what he said was absolutely true. I didn't observe that much requirement of the pivoting of the foot and hip in other sports activities. Nor did I expect a salesman would know in such details.
"That is very true. I wore asics running shoes to the classes." I started to take the conversation seriously.
"Well, that is different. Try vibram. You will know the difference."
"Size 7." He measured my feet.
"Yeah, that was expected."
He brought me a pair of new shoes. I didn't expect it was so hard to put those shoes on. My toes refused to separate as the shoes want them to be. I got frustrated.
"It takes some time initially. No rush. " He said.
He sat beside me watching me to separate the toes clumsily.
" I was a professional kickboxer before. I was in tournaments."
"Oh really?", I stopped trying on the shoes and stared at him.
"I hurt my left shoulder because the bag I tried to punch was too far from me." He said.
"What a pity! Does it heal now?"
"Yes. But I was not able to go back any more."
"My teacher was also a professional before. She run into financial problems in 2008 and had to switch to teaching." I felt a little bit sorry for him and tried my best to continue the conversation.
"I can imagine that." He nodded.
" I love kickboxing. I finally put them on!" I stand up.
"It is a great sports. Now show me some kick." To my surprise, he pivoted slightly and suggested me to kick his left leg.
"I can't do that." I looked at him.
"Try it." He encouraged.
"Ok." I put my hands over my head and did a fast kick.
"Nice kick, young lady."
" Thanks, thanks. Now I know what you talked about. The whole control of pivoting through my feet and strong support." I looked at him happily.
"Yes." He smiled.
Unfortunately, the store didn't have the size of the style I like. I felt sorry.
"No worry. Remember the size and look online. Wear the shoes to your kickboxing classes." He comforted me.
"I will. Thanks for the help. And happy holidays!" I gave him a big smile.
"Happy holidays!"

The next stop was a small Jewelry store to enrich my personal earring collections. It was very crowded by people who were looking for holiday gifts. The checkout line was further slowed down by the exquisite gift packaging requirements.
"I don't need gift packaging. It is for myself." I handed the ear ring to an elegant old lady behind the counter.
"ok. I will put in a small pouch for you then. How beautiful the ear ring is. I am pretty sure it was just out this morning." She complimented.
"I don't know why I always prefer gold and black combination." I said.
"Yeah, it is stunning. And black matches your hair and eyes." She smiled.
"Yeah, maybe. A part of me always want to be stunning." Both of us laughed.

Stepping outside the Jewelry store, my next stop is my love and hatred, lulu lemon. Notoriously expensive but comfortable, the shopping experience is beyond words and forgetting very fast purposely. :-)

The last stop is that famous Korean bakery store with "Paris" in its name and Eiffel tower as its icon. I randomly sampled some bread and proceed to the checkout.
"Your ear muff looked really cute." The in-season white fluffy ear muff with blue flash light made her look very pretty.
"Oh, if you pre-order a cake, you can get that too." She handed me the brochure.
"Maybe it is a good idea to get one and wear it to the Sandy's SF concert." I thought to myself.
"It is very expensive also." A young guy interrupted eagerly.
Both the girl and me didn't know how to respond to his words. Suggesting the real value of such a cute stuff was not helping indeed. There was a silent awkwardness before three of us burst into laugh at the same time.
"I will think about it. Thanks." I said.

My shopping trip came to the end. I think I enjoyed it so much because of those fleeting community moments with others. The moments can be transient but uplifting.

The pursuit of truth

My office is close to a tech talk venue, a kitchen, a laundry room , a piano and a gym. They helped me fight against my everyday blues.

I remembered vividly it was a Monday morning, with a cup of coffee at hand, I was intrigued by a tech talk title which was Physics, Mathematics and Philosophy. I immediately convinced myself to skip team meetings and attend the talk instead. Why not? If Monday becomes less organized, it won't be a Monday.

The talk turned out to be a disaster. I walked away from the talk with the following three points.

• The speaker really loved a comic book about a life of a logician.
• In reality, the logician held his pipe in his left hand, while in the book, he used his right hand to hold it.
• The logician had quite a few love affairs in his life which were omitted intentionally or unintentionally. The speaker has not figured it out yet.

To be continued.

Girlfriend

I assume everyone has one or two old and honest friends. You never expect any compliments from them. Instead, they always have the gift to make you feel awkward or stupid of yourself. I firmly believe the power they own comes from the long term friendship. They grew up with you and know you too well.

Without exceptions, I have one. I got an email from her one day. In the email, she told me she would be joining another common friend of us for a three-months road trip in US. They planned to meet in Chicago. She would like to fly here couple of days earlier and stay with me.

I didn't hear from her for years. The latest updates about her was that she travelled with her husband to Germany and stayed in an expensive castle like building as a happy housewife. Of course, I was expecting the arrival of an old friend. I busied myself getting the little apartment as tidy as possible and stocked some snack and drink before her arrival.

She arrived couple of hours later than the schedule.

"What a shabby building it is!" she said when we were dragging her heavy suitcases along the stairs.

" Yes. The building is very old. I don't think the carpets on the stairs got washed ever. " I explained.

We finally managed to get all her luggage to my apartment.

"It is so small." She said.

"This is what I can afford." I watched her unpacking and took a closer look at her cosmetics bag.

" Haha. I will tell everyone that Miss Shanghai stay in such a poor apartment once I am back to Shanghai." She exclaimed.

I didn't know the definition of everyone she referred here. I was only hoping my parents were not in her definition of everyone. And again, she was still proud of the "Miss Shanghai" joke she invented. In old times, she used to call me "Miss Shanghai" in public. I had to face the suspicious looks from others and explain there was no such beauty contest and even there was one, I would have no chance to win the title at all. At the same time, she would keep laughing and enjoy my embarrassment.

"Do you want to have some drink?" I asked.

"It is April. I didn't expect it was so cold here. I need some hot water to make ginger tea for myself. It is always a good idea to keep your body warm. You also need some. " She replied. Meanwhile, she took out several instant ginger tea bags from the pockets and threw them onto the small study table besides her without turning around to look at me.

"Thanks. I will boil some water." I went to the kitchen.

The heavy footsteps and the noise of the keys suggested the return of my roommate. I hurried to open the door for him. He shouldn't be too surprised since I told him that I expect a visit when I was cleaning the apartment several days ago. He looked at both of us with a puzzled expression and then turned around walking to his room without saying anything.

"Your roommate is a male???!!!!" She shouted at me. My roommate paused with his back to us for a few seconds and then hurried into his room. The awkwardness was further strengthened by a huge sound of a door being slammed.

"It was a long story. He is my labmate. He is a nice person. You don't need to worry about anything. " I retreated to kitchen.

What I really wanted to say at that moment was far more than that. Every year, I had to do relocation because of the rising rent or the family status changes of my female roommates in the past. I started to realize my life was full of those small troubles instead of a big one. And those trivial small things were eating up my willpower step by step, making me feel old and tired. Exactly like what Barbara Pym summarized in Excellent women, " I wondered that she should waste so much energy fighting over a little matter like wearing hats in the chapel, but then I told myself that, after all, life was like that for most of us - the small unpleasantness rather than the great tragedies; the little useless longings rather than the great renunciations and the dramatic love affairs of history of fiction."

But I didn't think she needed to know all those details.

I suggested several dinner places and the possibilities of getting free ice cream treat at certain restaurant. "I am tired after the long flight and would like to have something light. Maybe porridge is enough for me." She said absently. "Oh miss. Porridge is a very luxury thing in this mid-west small town. We don't have any good Chinese restaurant here. Let's try Thai food instead. I believe that spicy Tom Yum soup and chicken satay will cheer you up. " I said. The whole dinner and chat were cheerful. She updated me on people I knew or barely remembered the names already. As a return, I told her as much as possible about our common friends in US. "Most of them stay at east coast and doing great."

The next day, we planned to visit downtown. To our surprise, we spotted a parking ticket on her car. After carefully reading the scribble of the policeman, we realized we didn't specify the date on the visitor parking slip.

"This is your first visit. I believe we can do a rebuttal on this." I said.

" Why bother? I am just a foreign tourist. I will be leaving here in two days. How could they locate me?" She said playfully.
She further validated her point by sharing with me numerous cases she run into in China and the tricks she played to get out of them without penalty. I was not sure the reason I lost my patience was that I worried about their safety in the next 3 month road trip or I didn't really appreciate those "street smartness" which apparently she enjoyed so much.

"You'd better behave neighbourly here." I said abruptly. "You need to follow the rule since you are going to be driving for 3 months in US. They designed the rules expecting people to follow not to play with. I will go back and write the rebuttal letter right now." I looked at her with a deterministic look.

There was an awkward silence between us. Finally, she said, "You never changed. You are always bossy and wanted everything under your control." Your old friends were capable of attacking you, weren't they? It was depressing to know your friend had such opinion about you since teenage. I reflected sadly and wished I did not appear too much that kind of persons to others.

I broke the silence by suggesting a walk to campus beach first. She was still looking particularly angry. I was afraid she might reject my idea and continue the argument. Apparently, she thought better of it and tried to get out of this unpleasant conversation as well. She nodded and followed me quietly to school.

We finally reached the campus beach. A bunch of teenagers passed by us, laughing out loud. With the lake and the blue sky as the background, they all looked outrageously handsome and carefree.

"Wow, all of them can be models for abercrombie. It much be spring break again." I commented.
She turned around with a big smile.

"Do you still swim regularly"? she asked.
"No. I gave up. Too much trouble. " I replied while staring at the blue lake.
"Ah, what a pity. You used to keep very short hair and wear shorts in summer all the time. You were completely tanned by swimming. You looked very good in short hair. " Her soft speaking tone implied that she was trying very hard to fetch some old memories.

I enjoyed the peacefulness swimming brought to me. The water indulged me with its soothing sound and powerful support. I could either drift along with it or speed up against it. In both cases, I was no doubtfully still embraced and protected by the water as a spoiled kid. I refused to wear goggles from the first beginning. The reason was simple. Fish never blinked, same did I!

"I was swimming all the time in summer back then. I believe any hair style would look better on a younger me."

"How was the job market in US now?" She took a concerned look at me.

"Totally screwed up. I am looking for jobs around. But under this situation, I don't really hope too much." I said.

I took out a brainteaser book from my bag and handed it to her.

"See what I am reading now to prepare for job interviews. Does the book help bring some old memory of our high school life?"

She could not help laughing while turning the pages. "It is ridiculous."

"I know!"

"I will be moving back to Shanghai very soon with my husband." After some hesitation, she continued, "Three of us are planning to learn mahjong in shanghai to kill spare time."

"Mahjong?"

"Yeah. If you cannot find a job in US, just come back and join us. Mahjong needs 4 players and you can fill in that slot."

I am amused by the picture that four of us, best friends since high school, sitting around a table and playing Mahjong sincerely. We used to sit together engaging lots of things, such as doing homework, preparing for exams, making jokes, sharing snack, cursing teachers or gossiping. And now, the ladies are adventuring into Mahjong.

"Thanks. I will join you guys some day for sure. And I need to be served with good hot tea." I said.

"Definitely. We all live by tea." She replied.

"And friends."

chit chat

"I found it was difficult to make girlfriends in graduate school. I sort of had the impression that most of them tried to behave civil rather than friendly. " One day, I discussed this with my labmate sitting next me.

"It was expected. Women hate each other." He said without looking up from the scratch paper full of the mathematic derivation and rubbing his pencil against his head.

"Well, you don't know too many girls. How could you draw such big conclusion?" I felt little bit irritated by his statement.

"I read from somewhere." He replied.

"You mean, those books you flipped randomly at borders and never bothered to buy?"

"JY, what's wrong with you?"

In the meantime, he put down his work, grabbed the mirror on my desk and started fixing his hair. His hair was as curly as instant noodle and very untamed.

"Your flying hair seems more eager to greet others than you do." I complimented.

" I need to get a hair cut soon."

That ended the conversation. Like most other sporadic conversations in lab, it was careless but amusing.

Sports Injury

Couple of weeks ago, I had a sports injury for the first time in my life. My injury attracted fair amount of attentions from friends, acquaintances and curious strangers. They all laughed after my explanation and a few of them gave compliments on the injury for its good purpose.

Usually, my side of the conversation went like the following:

"It was due to kickboxing."

"Oh, no. I was not beaten up by someone. I kicked into the air and got hurt. "

"Ah, yes. It is a fun sports if you did it correctly."

For some reasons, the injury reminded me of an old sad song called Mr. Bojangles. I hummed this song in my head when I was limping around the campus.

" I knew a man Bojangles and he'd dance for you

In worn out shoes with silver hair, a ragged shirt and baggy pants

The old soft shoe

He jumped so high, jumped so high

Then he lightly touched down."

Apparently, I jumped so high, kicked so high and then I heavily touched down.

As always, my internal world is built upon songs after songs.