What is with bamboo?

I was having lunch with a friend at one of the school cafeterias this morning, and what do you know? Bamboo chopsticks. Well, aren't they fancy.

The "eco" in eco-friendly definitely doesn't stand for economically.

These days, it seems like if it isn't "eco-friendly", it's not cool. "Earth-friendly beauty" in terms of make-up is a total paradox in my opinion. They really try, don't they?

Living the student life.

I had spent a week or two dedicated to getting some writing done every night, but I've been finding it more and more difficult to set aside a chunk of time to just sit and be creative. Acting as the president this year for the departmental association of East Asian Studies at McGill has given me a lot more miscellaneous tasks to get done-- emails to send, meetings to attend, events to organize-- and by the end of the day, I'm just exhausted to the point that I don't want to do anything but sit and... well, do nothing. But yes, this is basically all just one huge excuse for not having been productive in my writing as I would have liked to be, as usual.

In any case, aside from dealing with school-related activities and going to class, what I've been doing lately can basically be summarized by the following images.




Basically, a decent amount of calories. But on a more serious note, I suppose I've just been trying to distract myself with a bunch of things that I've been hoping would serve as forms of therapeutic activities, in one way or another. Socializing, having a few drinks, baking, doing some brainless reading... it's been quite enjoyable so far, although I'm not quite sure if it's really achieved anything. Probably not.

Speaking of which, "brainless reading" is a horrible oxymoron. But I can assure you that it was quite true and very applicable in this case. I have never been one for reading chick lit-- in fact, I had only come across the term "chick lit" when I actually looked up what kind of genre these books would fall under. Out of the many books I've read in the past, I have only ever read approximately three "chick lit" novels in my life (excluding stuff like The Babysitters' Club when I was in elementary school, and even that could go under 'mystery'), but I was feeling particularly stressed one day, and so, picked up two of these chick lit novels from Indigo.

I'm not sure what to say. I've read another book by this 'Sophie Kinsella' (which, I read, turns out to be a pseudonym) before back in my high school days. I've never read The Confessions of a Shopaholic, but I had happened to pick up another one of her books called Can you Keep a Secret? at a book fair when I was on vacation in Asia one summer, and desperate for anything in the English language. Then, years later, I picked up this one called Remember Me? at the bookstore last week. And well... the two books are basically the same. Office ladies stuck in a junior position until, by some stroke of luck, they meet a multimillionaire and off goes this ridiculous romance where-- for some unfathomable reason-- a regular, base-salary office lady with (really) minimal intelligence would suddenly attract a social elite, thus given another opportunity at "a better life", half supported by this horrid excuse of a romantic relationship and the other half by the idea that the guy is, in fact, very rich.

I don't know, I just felt dumber and dumber the longer I read this book. Which, fortunately, didn't take very long at all. But I wonder how these kinds of books manage to have such a huge audience-- I mean, sure, it can be seen as a sort of fantasy relevant to the billions of women working in cramped offices in dull, urban landscapes everyday, but... really? I don't understand. I just remember myself hoping throughout the entire novel that the protagonist didn't actually reflect the psyche of an average woman in the 21st century. It's a little horrifying and, well, embarrassing.

Anyway, I'm now reading my second Kirino Natsuo novel, called Grotesque. I read her other novel, Out, quite a few years back and I liked it. I'm only about two chapters into this one so far, but it's probable that things are going to get more, er, grotesque soon and I'm pretty excited. Kirino is a thriller, murder-mystery novelist and, from reviews I've heard and the one other book I've read from her, I'm hoping she might do a decent job in this one too.

I'm rather glad that I'm not taking any English courses this semester for once. I'm only 3 credits away from completing my English program, so I just have one more course on American literature in the Winter semester; in the meantime, I'm free from English classes this semester. In the past two years, I had been taking mostly English courses and often felt horribly overwhelmed by the sheer amount of reading and writing-- which is to be expected of an English program, I understand, and I appreciated this, just that it gave me no time at all to read anything for leisure and not for class. So I'm hoping to use this year to get some work outside of school done, while I still can.

Should be fun!

Like a bottle tossed into the ocean.

Today, I received my first sympathy card.

Actually, I think it's a bit too early to receive one as my mother is still alive. But it struck me as something so strange and foreign, like it's hard to believe that it's truly meant for me. The formality doesn't seem quite appropriate yet for someone my age. Sympathy for who, me?

But then I remember, that when my mother does pass away, it won't matter how old or how ready I am to receive the entirety of being a mature member of society. I will have to do it regardless, because no one else will do it for me.

I suppose this may come as a surprise for anybody who may be reading this entry, but this summer has been so very stressful for me. It was so long and tiring, and because I had decided it would be even more tiring to share what I was experiencing with others, I had kept it to myself. To give a short summary, my mother was hospitalized for a few weeks in July and is now on palliative care at home. Basically, just over a month ago, we were told that my mother (who is suffering from heart and kidney disease which then entails many other dysfunctions within her body as a result) is incurable and has a life expectancy of approximately one year left. Putting the details of my mental state throughout the summer aside for another day, the summer progressed and is now coming to an end, with me getting ready to leave home again for my last year of university in Montreal.


Two friends and I went for a walk along the West Dyke Trail this afternoon. It was a splendid time of taking photos, climbing hills and chasing grasshoppers as we would have 10 years ago. But as our energy levels died down after a while and my friends were occupied with studying the many plants available for viewing at the public garden, I detached myself from them for a bit and turned around to look at the landscape behind us.

As I stood there staring across the field into the far distance, I suddenly felt a strong sense of loneliness, of a fear for the future that is appearing to be so forlorn and desolate; a life without my mother. The strong breeze, the rustling of dry grass, the bright but sunless sky that reached into neverending space... the sudden occurrence that the world is so vast and empty hit me so rapidly that I could only think of one thing: I am scared to be left alone in a world like this. At that moment, I felt as if I was frozen in a place where my past was but a faint flicker; the future seemed blank like the pitiless sky that-- unlike us-- will always exist, surpassing time and space, and I will be here and gone like a vapour in the wind.

You might think that I am a bit too young to think of these things, but keep in mind that having a dying mother at home and all... well, I can't help but be constantly wrapped in a cloud of slightly existentialistic melancholy. Life is so very short. Growing up with a single mother has made me an independent person-- indeed, probably much more independent than most girls my age-- but also extremely aware of my vulnerability as someone who will be completely on her own in this world without my mother.

Well, in any case, I still have some more time at school to decide what to do by myself from here on. But only so much time, and I will have to make my decisions soon. But you never know, many things can happen within a year's time. As even this short, summer season has proven.

Where will I go from here?

I've never had blackberries before, actually.

Today, I'd like to address the topic of those handheld devices that every other young person seems to have these days called the "BlackBerry".

The first time I learned about the BlackBerry was in high school, when a friend of mine worked at Bell Mobility and received a BlackBerry to use, free of charge, for working there. Not that anyone she knew had a Blackberry back then since most of the people who used it were businessmen, but it seems to have become the complete opposite in recent days.

It started with some people I knew who were studying commerce in university. It was the "cool" thing to have if you want to do business-- or rather, at that point in time for them, if they wanted to be pretentious. All these university students started popping up with a BlackBerry of their own, furiously typing away text messages to their other [spoiled] friends that own a BlackBerry, or distracted at work or in class by the small screen through which they browse the internet... because who can stay away from the internet for more than a few hours these days?

The BlackBerry isn't the most cost-effective phone, since the phone itself is quite expensive in addition to the monthly fees you have to pay. I guess I don't really have a problem with that since it is your choice whether you want to spend that much money on a 4 inch piece of plastic and metal, but what I do find [even more] ridiculous is the BlackBerry Messenger service, commonly known as "BBM".

If you take the bus in the Greater Vancouver area, the most common ads you'll see over your head are-- other than the annoying sex sense ad with a picture of two teenagers making out-- the ads for the BlackBerry that span across two ad spaces. At the bottom of the ad would be one of many horrible slogans that the company came up with, like "Define your friends from your frenemies", "Get connected with your inner, inner circle", "If you can't say it here, you probably can't say it". Personally, I think the most outrageous (or not?) goes something along the lines of "You know they know you know they read it". Apparently, BBM records if the other person has read your message or not in a conversation.

Why would anyone want that? I think the only thing it would be convenient for is if you're in an emergency and you type "HELP" to someone, and if you know they've read it, at least you can have a peace of mind that help may be on its way. But that is an unlikely situation. Instead, it seems to me like this is going to create a whole lot more drama for the tweens, teens, and young people out there using this device. Why would you want to know if someone has read your message or not if it's not that important? Why would you want someone else to know that you have read their message? What happened to privacy?

I don't think I'd like it very much if people knew what I did on my own phone. I can read your message and decide to reply or not, whenever I want. Why would I want anyone else to know what I do? I also don't need people to know where I am 24/7, so I don't see why I would need BBM. But without BBM, what is the point of getting a BlackBerry, at my age anyway? Oh, who am I kidding, it's not necessary at any age, really. But I find it especially devastating that young people are getting attracted to this type of thing, spending money and signing a contract they probably don't need and most likely can't afford on their own. Do you really need to talk to your friends all the time? There are so many better ways to connect with your friends, and I hardly think text messaging is one of the most effective ways in doing so.

Perhaps it's just especially annoying for me when I see my friends checking their BlackBerry every other minute when I am hanging out with them, or teenagers not being able to look away from their little screens for over a minute during a short bus ride. Sure you can stay "connected" to your friends this way, but I think I'd much rather spend quality time in person, or even on the phone, than texting short, meaningless sentences to my "friends" about nothing important. I text on my phone too, but for me, I think texting is more of a way to eventually lead to a more efficient and worthwhile way of communicating, maybe meeting up at someplace else or whatnot. Not a way to rid myself of my own boredom with the excuse of "talking" to my friends.

By the way, if you own a BlackBerry and are reading this: by all means, carry on with your life.