Rewind...Geret's Wedding

This August one of my closest friends got married to a wonderful man. I was so lucky to be part of their special day. They are going to Paris for their honeymoon this December. Baby you did well!!! Oooh...by the way Robb, I love the new look. It's sooo hot!!!

i've been screwing up times and dates lately. last saturday i was supposed to go to this wine and food gala at some hotel (see i can't even remember the name of the hotel) and i thought it was on sunday. i didn't realize my mistake till early in the evening and the event was almost over so i couldn't even rush to it. strange i've been so good keeping appointments before. i've rarely ever written schedules down, i've just always managed to keep them. its not even just appointments. i've been getting my classes mixed up too. it must be my mind being so preoccupied. or maybe because i haven't been sleeping lately, and when i sleep i have the most intense dreams. not good dreams but the ones you want to jolt yourself awake. lately my dreams have been about someone coming in and stealing my laptop and all my research papers stored in it. i keep having this dream, that i've been taking my laptop when i leave my house for a long period of time. i know border line paranoia. but you wouldn't think that if you know where i live. my neighbourhood is not cool at all, actually more precisely my landlord sucks. seriously, my place looks like a squalor. the hallways haven't been mopped since we moved here, that's about 4 months ago...there's garbage all over the hallways and parking lot, and some crazy person feeds the pigeons and crows every morning by throwing food on top of the garbage heap...arrrrgghh!! doesn't that make you want to come visit me...i should write all my friends each a letter and the headline will read, "come for a visit where wildlife battles it out everymorning right in front of her bird shit stained window."
another thing that's been on my mind lately is this girl i met on the bus. i was on my way home from school and i was just sitting there when i noticed this pervert who sat so close to me on a previous occasion. listen how creepy he was... i fell asleep on the bus, which wasn't that too unusual since my bus ride from UBC to home is about 45 mins. i woke up because i felt someone's skin against mine. let me just say when i sleep on the bus, my body is so close to the glass/window creating an extra 5-7cm space to further separate myself to the next person who might take the seat next to me. so when i woke up, i was shocked to see this middle aged fat man's body touching mine. he was wearing shorts and i could see the fat of his tigh spilling on my lap. instantly, i made eye contact, and he said, "you were sleeping." what's me sleeping got to do with you invading my space was the first thing that entered my head. i didn't even say anything, i was so repulsed that i got up and relocated to the back of the bus. and then, the creep sat beside another student who was also sleeping, she too got up. anyhow, i was on my way home, and this time the bus was packed. a girl was sitting beside me. i was in the inside seat and she had the isle seat. i turned around and i saw this fat man, the same fat man that takes advantage of sleeping students on the bus, hovering over the girl who was sitting beside me. so i said something to the girl. i said it in tagalog as i thought she was a sister. sure enough she was and she swung her shouders away from the creep. the next thing i knew, her and i were talking. the thing was that, it was unlike all other conversations i've ever had with anyone i just met. we skipped the shallow conversation and she just told me her life story. she wasn't pushy or needy or attention seeking. when my stop came, she also got off. she told me where she lived and i showed her my place. just before we parted she placed her hand on my elbow and she held on to me for awhile. i wanted to invite her up, give her my number but i didn't extend myself out to her. i haven't met anyone that lonely before. and i've been thinking about her and her situation over and over...and i wish i had done things differently. this was one time in my life where i could have given someone a part of me and i didn't... not that she asked for it, just i thought it was and is the right thing to do.

surprise birthday party

Last Tuesday was my birthday. And parts of the day Ariel and Jen were horrible to me. Jen told me she couldn't have dinner as she had to work. While Ariel dismissed my invitations to go out and celebrate. At six o'clock, I finally gave up and opened my textbook, I was ready to spend the night at home readingTitus. I thought it was a fitting text to teach me about vengeance and violence. I was just learning about Tamara's plot to bring Titus's vanished eldest son back to Rome when Ariel arrived at my house. I was pleased. I really didn't want to be alone. I didn't want to be one of those needy people that goes on a date (people Anya has told me about) with a stranger on their birthday because they have no friends to take them out. Nor did I really want to read Shakespeare's most violent play. I was such a perfect victim for I didn't suspect anything eventhough numerous blunders were done by Ariel and Jen. Ariel suggested this restaurant on Commercial Drive, I was so pleased that I said yes. It was funny because while we were at my house, Ariel dropped a hint, "Oh, are you wearing anything cool underneath your vest? You know how restaurants get so hot sometimes." Of course, I was clueless, and craved company that nothing she said really registered.

We took the bus to Bukowski's Bar and Bistro. And when we got there, all these beautiful people were waiting for me. It was amazing to see everyone. I was so happy! After dinner, Ariel, Jen, and Richard took me to Desire. Mark was so gracious to give us a ride. One of two hot men that gave us a ride that evening. My birthday was amazing largely due to Ariel and Jen's effort to bring all my friends in Vancouver together.

So yeah, I'm 32 and it feels good. The other day I stayed in bed till 9 in the morning. I laid there examining my body. The weirdest thing, other than my softer rounder belly (which is the result of long hours trapped behind my desk), nothing really shows my age other than my hands. My hands reveal different parts of my life. When I was seven, my sister was chasing me up the stairs and I got a sliver on my right index finger. I remember my sister with a tweezer in her hand trying to remove every single particle out, but there was one piece that was lodged so deep that we both gave up. And that piece of wood is still here to bring me back to that time in our old house on Tramo Street. My left hand ring finger has a scar the shape of a crescent moon from the time I sliced my finger using another hairstylist's chunking shears. It was the height of Rachel Green's hair sensation, and every third client that sat on my chair requested the Aniston look. I was so bored with the damned haircut that I experimented with different types of blades to achieve the same style. Those are only two scars amongst many. The numerous scars on my hands capture different moments in my life. As I age, they become an elaborate map of places where I had been and of people I shared time with.

final goodbye party

Flute girls


1B students
my noisiest class
1H
my favorite students
hard at work

School Festival

Last Day of School

smiles
soccer boys doing their dance routine
3J ninjas.

the mob

thrashing

on a jet plane

I'm on a plane on my way back to Canada. I've barely slept in five days. Hard week. Can't write in long sentences. Can't keep my thoughts together. They are broken...the tsukiji market, sushi for breakfast at 5 am...the internet cafe...yoyogi park...the hard gays at yoyogi park....meiji jinja...giant carps...Kobayashi sensei crying....me holding Kobayashi sensei's child....big bags and bluish brown circles around my eyes. I'm so tired. I just left Asuka and Tomomi at the airport. We cried promising each other that will meet again, and that the friendship we form is the one that will last over the years and will not be diminished by the distance that separates Canada and Japan.

stupid grammar

I’m at work, it's Sunday four o’clock and I hate the fact that this computer capitalizes “I.” Is the first person so important that it needs to be capitalized? Actually I hate the bloody English language and that I have been a fake for 3 years. How the hell did I pass as an English teacher in Japan for 3 years? I can’t speak this language never mind write. The rules confuse me, grammar doesn’t make sense, and then there are all these words that trip me each time I use them. I don’t know enough words to describe how I feel…I feel inadequate. Language is supposed to bring people together but I feel defeated by it. There is no accuracy in the way I use it, and the pleasure people feel when they use the exact word, well I can’t say that I’ve experienced that. If there is one insecurity…okay I have many insecurities but grammar is on top of that list. You know people hate the way they look, their weight, the fact that they can’t talk with the opposite sex, don’t earn enough money, think that their lovers think that they are bad in bed, pressure of choosing a career, dying alone, not doing enough, doing too much…NO!!! I am not haunted by any of these. I am haunted by grammar. I cringe when I see green underlined words on my computer screen. I hate subject verb agreement.

One of the characters in the Skin of the Lion by Michael Ondaatje hates words. He prefers fucking to speaking. He said that you could never fuck yourself into a corner, whereas words could push you so fast that you wouldn’t know how it happened. That is how I feel about grammar. I feel that I’ve been speaking English since I was twelve, why can’t I get it right? If I can sleep with grammar, I would have done so long time ago, then there wouldn’t be this frustration and anger on my part…actually most likely there will be…okay I have to stop this and return to work