Where's the romance?

What's up with being always careful in relationships? There seems to be rules that you need to play distant, treat bad, that you should not feel until you're sure to feel. F..k it!!! And then the worse you get, the more you're glamorous!
Basically being nice, honest and in touch with your feelings, all that is crap! Yes, you might say that this is a pamphlet written on an angry mood. Nevertheless, there are some truths that should be said no matter what.
It's just too easy to use fear as an excuse, it's just too shameful to hide oneself behind a shield of pride, to protect oneself because feelings are humiliating. They show that you're vulnerable, that you're weak... that you're human. What in the world is wrong with everyone, the good thinking people, the conservative behavior?
I believe inspiration is the best thing that we have and that expressing it is one if not our only right. So go out there and tell her/him what you feel because in the end we never say it enough, because eventually that's what really counts... Your feelings!!! Be romantic, cheesy, inspired, smart, whatever... but be it and act it!
It's all about love.

...

C'est l'amour qui tue... Aime à en mourir.

Ghost stories...

It happened a couple of weeks ago. I was about to fall asleep, my mind was conscious but everything else seemed to slowly black out. All my body and limbs were suddenly paralysed and no sound could get out of my mouth. There seemed to be someone or some noises surrounding me but I made my best not to pay attention. The first time that ever happened to me was about 10 years ago in Taiwan. Nevertheless this time was much more intense. On the one hand I was choking, fighting to breath and on the other hand my body started to shake as if in a transe.
I wasn't scared since I'd experienced it already but I was puzzled by the new symptoms. So I decided to tell my lil'sis. She asked her aunt who might be more enlighted on the subject and when she got back to me she said: "It's very serious...".
Um... basically she told me to sleep on my sofa in the living room for a couple of nights as it seemed a more "proper and safe" place for me. If not, I was to move my bed, in any direction by about at least 10-15cm and before going to bed I was to silently tell: "I'm going to sleep here tonight. I don't mean to disturb you. I moved the bed so I hope it's ok with you." The third option was to consider moving out.

At the end of the conversation and this for about 3 days on, I was literally freaked out; I was having goose bumps and was shivering under the shower, watching TV, sitting at my desk, etc. The thing is I've never really believed in ghosts and eventually I did move my bed at 3am in the morning. (IT WAS HEAVY!) And by doing so, I recognized them, I provided them an existence. Afterwards it brought me peace. Some people might think I'm losing my mind but you have to remember this is part of the culture here and I only realized that recently. Wait, there's more...

I went to Kaoshiung last week with my mom. It's the second largest city in Taiwan and we visiedt my aunt there. At dinner one night, we met a woman, who was an old friend of our host. Well, let's cut the crap, she is able to see things, tell your former lifes and convey a god's words. So my mom started to ask her questions about her business, my brother and of course me. Among other things, she said that there was a child standing right next to me. Supposedly he's my future son. Usually a child spirit lingers beside the mom's side and most of the time, it results after an abortion. However for some odd reasons, the child sticks with me and keeps calling me dad. My mom of course brought up the someone-sitting-one-my-chest experience. The woman explained that it wasn't serious at all; the child might have just wanted to play with me and was just jumping on my tummy. As my mom started to relax, the woman suddenly said that there was another one. Then here comes the real crazy part...
In one of my former lives, I used to be a German officer and because of my position, I had to kill people. As you might know Buddhism revolves around resurrection. If one does good, one is bound to revive as a human. If not, then one turns into an animal. So since I'm still human, it means that I had to harm out of my will, it was only my job but then my victims might find me one day. That wasn't the case. In fact, my wife in that former life wasn't a good person and she turned into some kind of eagle. And she was standing next to me as well...
At one point, my mom asked why? Then the woman told her that my wife was seeking my help. She wants me to help her become human again and the main reason why both the child and wife manifested themselves is because they knew I would meet the woman and ask her. And all this will end when I go to a certain temple in the East of the island where I will pray a god with whom I'm more connected and who is best suited to protect me in this life.

Whether I believe the whole thing or not is not the question here. And for those looking for a scientific explaination, look for "sleep paralysis" on Google and you'll get your answer. The whole story seems too much to believe not to mention true but there are other reasons that makes me consider that woman's words with careful respect. Ghosts play a real part in people's lives here and only here do I allow myself to take in some of the belief.

Freedom...what???

I recently bought an electronic dictionary. Yeah, I gave in. However I have a reasonable excuse for my sudden purchase impulse. My Chinese class is becoming harder and I had been killing my eyes using the paper book dictionary I bought 10 years ago - which, by the way, is still very useful and also, I admit it, I found out how to use it only recently. For those who know what a Chinese-English dictionary looks like you'll easily understand how painful it can sometimes be when looking for a character.

Anyways, back to the main track. The "e-dico" (I'm too lazy to write the whole thing) is designed by one of the main manufacturers here. It's got super nice features and the ones I find particularly useful are the ability to write the characters (as such with a PDA) and also it "reads" the characters for you. All in all, it has saved me a lot of time in my Chinese learning.

I have to say that I haven't been playing around with it. I only use what I actually need. So one day, as I was showing it to my lil'sis' Michiyo she came upon a dramatic discovery... Yes, she was playing with the illustrated English dictionary; basically you choose a category, select a drawing and a nice electronic voice reads the definition. As she was fiddling with the device, she suddenly turned to me and showed me... It was in the "Dessert" section. There was a drawing of what resembled McDonald's fries... Why was it in the Dessert category? Well, that's a whole other question... Anyways, when she selected the drawing, what an outrageous surprise was I to "ear-witness"! The nice electronic female voice intangibly pronounced in a scary precise robotic almost welcoming way these 2 words: "FREEDOM FRIES". I was shocked, offended to the highest point. I knew that Taiwan was overwhelmed by American-English language, food, clothes, music, movies... yes, I dare say the word, culture. But that was the limit. I almost fainted in front of my lil'sis' who was kindly smiling at my discomposure.

Seriously speaking, a dictionary is supposed to convey knowledge in the most objective way, is it? I'm not one of those French people who likes to hate whatever comes from the US just because it provides a sense of higher values... even cultural superiority. Nope! Yet finding... no hearing Freedom Fries coming from a dictionary is somewhat mind-racking. As I said the manufacturer is one of the biggest in Taiwan... probably the biggest one. I'm gonna have to file a complaint and have them translate French (US manufactured salad dressing) into CONS (Chemical Orange Nasty Sauce)... one might want to find out the meaning in French... again, if you actually do, "excuse my French".

Taipei-Chunan, a journey back in time and traditions

I took the train back to my hometown on this rainy Sunday. This time I was not tired enough so I could enjoy the landscape out of the crazy capital.

One could objectively say that Taiwan is not a really beautiful country. However as my eyes caught glimpses of the views that my huge window offered I realized that no matter what, I'm emotionally attached to the country. An old woman growing her vegetables on the tiny parcels that surround the railways, some abandonned factories reminding us of a different time when they were contributing to the booming economy, blocks and blocks of rectangular houses grayed by time and humidity, wild and urban palmtrees, red (sand), green (trees), gray (houses) as dominating colors. My roots grew in this earth... and for a short moment I was caught in a nostalgia reminding me why I came here.

My journey had yet another purpose. I was to attend the funeral of one of my grand-uncles. I had never been to one before and I was expecting some serious cultural confusion. A huge tent that looks like an outdoor supermarket was set in the middle of a street for the occasion. And as I got there, I was definitely confused. Seeing the faces of aunts and uncles created a slight awkwardness because both our feelings were torn between the happiness of welcoming a family member and the gravity of the moment. I didn't know if I had to smile or cry... or both.

The prayers had already started that day. Time passed by between prayers led by Buddhist monks and songs played by a group of musicians. When the first day ended, I decided to stay with my younger cousins and "keep an eye on the soul" of my grand-uncle - if my translation of the Chinese is correct. In other words we were to stay awake and make sure to replace the 2 incence sticks that were to burn all night. I did this also because I didn't know my 3 younger cousins very well having spent all my life abroad so it was the least I could do... for my grand-uncle and for myself. One of my cousins had a bad cough, another one passed out after 2 hours and slept the rest of the night in the van parked under the tent for us to use as a shelter from the freezing weather. Fortunately they brought a computer so we watched movies to kill time... What can't technology achieve nowadays?... People arrived the next day around 6am. I had the time to have some vegetarian breakfast (because you have to eat vegetarian until the funeral ends) and change before the prayers resume. At around 10am, I stood up in front of a huge crowd that I didn't dare watching. As the older attending cousins bearing Li (李) as my name, I was to represent my generation and proceed with the ritual. It's needless to say that I was really nervous because nobody had been able to tell me what I was supposed to do... Well I would learn later that nobody really has any clues and the process differs from one Buddhist expert to the other. And of course all the instructions were in Taiwanese, a language that I sort of understand, yet hardly when it comes to Buddhism. Fortunately older generations did the ritual before me so I had a vague idea. So basically it goes: facing all the family members wearing black gowns, taking the incense sticks, praying, getting down on the knees, pouring 3 cups of alcohol in a basin filled up with sand, presenting the crown of flowers and then the fruits to the altar, bowing 3 times face down, standing back up and finally bowing twice to show respect to the family members.

When the family prayers ended, it was the turn for friends to come in and there were so many of them that the family had to leave the tent and give room for the ceremony to proceed. Before going to the mountain and accompany the coffin to the mountain for the cremation, I bumped into my grand-aunt. She was resting from the crowd and we had some time away from the bustle and hustle for a private talk. She was doing most of the talking and I didn't want to stop her. It's difficult to imagine how big my family is and I'm scared to lose track. You see, I recognize a lot of them from blurry images I have from the past before leaving Taiwan for over 20 years. Even though there is for sure a family bond from each and every members, they are still strangers to me. I don't consider them as strangers and neither do they, but there's no way to deny the time gap that separated ours lives and experiences. Listening to my grand-aunt, I felt I managed to fill that gap... a little... filling the holes of my blurry memories, learning from the past to uncover who I am...

I missed my granma and granpa funerals... those who held together my part of the family and who still takes a big part in my past memories. When I look at my relatives, I see a smile, I hear the sound of a voice, I recognize my grandparents... pieces of souvenirs that I collect because they define me as well... because I'm trying to complete a puzzle of myself with incomplete pieces... Even though I will never go back in time and live 2 different lives in 2 different countries, I'm here to collect as many pieces as possible, tiny parts of me that I can find in each and every relatives... I didn't sleep for about 36 hours but it was worth it. The funeral was long and painful but I "enjoyed" it; I took it more as a to-take-on-willingly task than a forced-to-fill-up duty. We all had plenty of time to grieve and I got to collect more pieces.

I missed my granma and granpa funerals so the very least I could do was to go to my grand-uncle's one. Farewell Granma, Granpa, Grand-Uncle... hope to talk to you one day and together we may complete the puzzle.

Late double new years' resolution

Tribute to my classmates

The second term has already started. I survived all the Chinese tests, the numerous typhoons, earthquakes, Taiwanese gossip backlashes... and a Faye Wong concert (actually it was nice). I have admit I wouln't have been able to get through if it wasn't for my beloved classmates. We did lose a couple of them on the way... Derek - the daddy of all parties in Taipei, Jennifer "Canada" - though you were the shooting star of our class I hope you're well wherever you might be, Tchad - be the lord accompany you in your endeavors... and you still owe us a farewell drink, amigo!

All in all, the ones who remain still keep a real class spirit going and I reckon it's rare among all the students I see everyday at our school. I'm just glad we got to stay united. So here's my little magazine cover tribute, something that only sums up a tiny portion of our friendship.

Here's a short intro/personal message so this will look less private a post:

• Michiyo (the big pic): well, if cute was a person... ...I love learning useful Japanese with her, e.g. "There's a lot of sand!" or "The wind is strong!"
• In order of appearance in the Tips section:
  - Kaori: always looks tired, knows her way in Taiwan (lived here 15yrs, no wonder) and has a mysterious boyfriend who we assume rides a motorcycle and carries a Japanese sword
  - David: my rosbeef bruv, wears fashionable clothes (too fashionable) and likes to drink Smirnoff ice because our bloody British comrades think it's a girl drink there... Bruv, keep it up
  - Fanlin: a very "healthy" vegeterian girl... keeps saying she wants to lose weight (really she doesn't need to) but keeps saying: "I want to eat something sweet" or "I want to eat Tswooa Ping (ice cream made with ice chips, sweet sirups and toppings), because it's only water"... yeah right!
  - Jennifer: a very smart girl who eats slow but that's probably because her order always comes last. And I will never be able to remember how you say Happy Birthday in Swedish.
  - Albert: he's been having problem with his eyes recently... probably thanks to the fresh and pure air of Taipei. With David, we ended up becoming frequent patrons at a very likely lesbian bar and we get discounts there too. Isn't life great in Taipei? Next time I'll ask for Platinum Member cards...

Well, hope you guys like the cover... Hum, hum! I already received some complaints from the "victims". All I can say is: "Excuse my French... and I'd love to see some retaliation."

Love :-p