surely, dickens was referring to s4

"it was the best of times; it was the worst of times"
or so the saying goes.

most people have heard of my ongoing, and i daresay epic, war of wills with the children usas refers to as "s4." they range from grades 2-4, and every day is its own private bevy of madness. i seldom let people in, because i feel that it's a government nobody else could understand, nestled somewhere between a loving community and absolute anarchy. some days, i feel like i have my very own, fully taiwanese and completely awkward version of the partridge family, where everybody loves everybody else at the end of the day. and others, i feel like i'm waging a war.

my boss gave me the opportunity to give them up this semester, when all the classes changed. chris and i had to make a choice, and as much as they drive me crazy, i chose to keep them. there are days when i rejoice in the brilliance of my decision and days when i almost can't handle the misery anymore.

i couldn't tell you how many times i've trouble-shooted(shot?) this class with my co-workers. investigated discipline options. organized and reorganized the class. but ultimately it comes down to how i relate to them and how they relate to me. some of it was fixable and some of it was not, no matter what happens or who teaches the class. as it turns out, some kids who are trouble when they're three are still trouble when they're in third grade.

last week, i had to punish two of them for singing "down by the bay" while everyone was trying to write in their books. which isn't a big deal, except one was singing the verse and the other was singing the repeats. i can almost guarantee that they didn't plan it out. they just thought it was a good idea at the time. one started, and the other followed suit. and i would have been angrier, if it hadn't been so funny. i sent them outside for the chinese teacher to deal with them, mostly because i was afraid i'd laugh if i had to punish them myself. i told chris about it the next day, and asked him how he felt about it. is it me? sometimes, they have the capacity to feel like an absolute failure as a teacher and as a disciplinarian. and others, they lift my spirits. i find them funny, sweet, completely endearing. my boss has told me that the most important thing is that i haven't given up on all the kids who have worn the previous teachers out. really, she once told me, you're the only one who hasn't given up on them.

but he probably made me feel the best, when, after my anecdote and expression of frustration, he interjected "you know they really love you," he said. "that's why they do those things." silence. i think to myself, if they loved me, they'd keep my commandments, wouldn't they? "well, what i mean is, they don't do it just because they love to drive you crazy. they love that it's you."

you think so? really, deep down, i'm going to miss s4. i'm so strangely proud of them. proud of their absurdity. of their inability to sit still. of our inside jokes. that every time someone is singing loudly in the halls or making a commotion, i can say, "i think that's one of mine." and i'm always right about that.

here is a picture of us when we've actually pulled it together enough to be super class. and i feel that it pretty much sums us up.










be sure to survey the splendor of my required school uniform.

oh snap

i have 20 more days of work. 20! one month from today, i will be traipsing through the absolute middle of nowhere, asia. the cusp of civilization... oh, i'm so excited. i mostly want to see if the sky gets any bluer than that.

apparently, russia approved my visa. which is great. even though it took 4 weeks.

i spent today in fulong. it's always weird to see the pacific from the other side. i keep hoping that it's bluer or warmer or that maybe it smells different here, but it's the same. and maybe that's why i love it so much.

this past week was strange. we're down to only women at work. i suddenly have seniority. and i got absurdly ill on thursday. it was a fever and a cold or something, but mostly, i think it was pure, uninhibited, unadulterated exhaustion. and it knocked me flat for nearly 24 hours. i don't think i've ever slept that much.

also, chinese medicine is amazing.
but it tastes like ground chalk.
and goes down just as smoothly.

when sad, i find it often works to buy something you don't need

okay, just because i bought myself an ipod nano doesn't mean i'm not sad that chris left today. wow, double-negatives.

it's been about 6 months since my ipod died, and i finally broke down and bought myself a replacement. i figure... i could get 80gb, but i don't bloody need 80gb. come to think of it, nobody needs that much! this thing carries 1,000 songs. i could listen to it all the way from ulaanbatar to moscow and probably still have space leftover. i think i'm set.

today was a little weird. i went to the jade market to pick up my awesome stamp, engraved with my chinese name. i could only stay a short time, though, because all the green almost made me suffer a seizure. bought travel guides. slept. did my laundry. walked around because the sun was out. shopped. bought my nano.

and spent an unusual amount of time laughing.

i said yesterday that i really have nothing to complain about. which is funny, since i spend a lot of time complaining. or maybe reflecting. i don't know! but truthfully, all things have culminated in God putting me right here, and that's bigger than anything i ever imagined for myself.

but seriously, i just laughed today, for a lot of reasons. as a going away present, chris wrote me a letter, crammed with a lot of things, one of them being advice. and one piece of advice in particular about dating. encouragement, if you will. a reminder that i'm really good at selling myself short. as i normally do, i took the things he said and thought about them. sometimes i conclude that he's a jerk and proceed to tell him so, but most of the time, they're just harsh truths. i went online, where little reminders about my past dating choices popped up around me. so i thought about it. about the circumstances and what it did to me and what i became. and i just laughed, because it actually hurt as much as it did at the time. at the absurdity. not that all my choices or the fact that it hurt at the time were absurd. but a few, yes. and that, to me, today, was funny.

remind me to stop selling myself short.

that one time

"...think it'll be all right if i never leave my apartment till i'm old?"
-holly, p.s. i love you




a recent topic of interest has been pain that makes you wish that you could die. i'm not talking about physical trauma. i'm talking about disembodied pain, the kind that is so far inside you that you wish you could go tear it out, though you wouldn't know where to start.

i mean, people die for physical reasons all the time. something inside you stops working, and thus, you stop working. it may or may not hurt so much that sleep or unconsciousness or maybe even death are preferred. but for many, if you lie there or do what you're told long enough, that pain goes away.

but we explored this a little further: can you ever die of a broken heart, of actual emotional pain? most have heard the disembodied voice, the one from that indefinable part of yourself that screams that something is very, very wrong.

i spent a summer incapacitated. i went to work because i had to, ate because i had to, and planned my semester because i had to. and once in a while, i even smiled, because of the people in my life. and though i kept on moving, i can attest that there were days, weeks, even months that i woke up and didn't want to move. that i wished that i could just lie there as long as it took for whatever thing that was broken inside me to heal.




right now, i feel that way. i wish i could go to sleep for a few days or weeks, and wake up when it doesn't hurt anymore. i'm spent. i just want to call into work and ask if i can come back in a week, after not moving for the next 7 days. surely, it can't hurt that much then. i go to sleep to stop from hurting and wake up feeling like i hadn't slept at all.

can't i, please?

shit, son

I CAN'T SLEEP! WHY CAN'T I SLEEP!

it's the small things that matter

or so i've heard it said.

in general, i consider most things to be over-appreciated. appearance. money. fashion trends (not to be confused with fashion). large things (beds, cars, closets, refrigerators).

and conversely, i consider other things to be sorely under-appreciated. hot water. underwear. television on dvd. the quesadilla.


and lately, one more thing.

behold, the guava:














while it's everywhere, i mean under-appreciated like apples are in our culture. they're just... there. say you're standing amongst an array of fruit, and your choices are strawberries, watermelon, raspberries, blueberries, and apples. which one do you pick? i'll bet it's not the apples!
guava is similar here. mango season comes, and BAM... guava? what's guava? it also will not get picked over dragon fruit, star fruit, kiwi, or pineapple.



i really couldn't tell you why guava wasn't a regular part of my diet back home. wait, yes i can. because you don't find it at home. you eat things like watermelon, strawberries, apples, grapes, and bananas. not guava.

it's a simple fruit. it contains no potency, no zing. but i have to say it's one of the most consistent aspects of my experience in taiwan. even when mango failed me on both the fresh and ice sand level, i don't remember there being a time when i couldn't get guava. and every time i eat it, the better it tastes.

so easily forgettable. so underwhelming in taste and appearance. but time after time, when my body starts screaming for something that isn't processed or greasy or rice, there it is at 7-11 or in the school kitchen, sitting there, staring at me, reminding me of how much better i'll feel when i have some.

mix it with a little prune powder and a half dozen cherry tomatoes, and you have something i'll definitely miss when i go home.

a good thing

china called today.
(well, actually, they informed my visa agent who informed me)

and they're letting me in the country this summer, despite all the olympic insanity going on. (beijing was, at best, a questionable idea, you guys)

let's hope those russians are as nice.

what's that? oh yes, 20 lbs just lifted off my chest.

one day me speak pretty.

i promise, every time i sit down to write something, i hope to post something good. i actually have maybe a dozen entries, but none of them are finished, and they're about much more profound and/or entertaining topics than i've been posting lately. musings. quandaries. observations. things revolving around some of the following:
-abortions in taiwan... did you know that this is common and acceptable? i didn't until recently. even though it's legal back home, it's still not okay. if you get one, be prepared to vehemently defend your reasons to anyone who finds out. here, it's simply an inconvenience to having unprotected sex. wait, unprotected sex? yes, well, the sexual tension of youth culture here would require a few dozen blogs to begin with, so i'll skip it. but there's a machismo in asian culture that states that wearing a condom is emasculating. yet man-purses, sequins, and copious amount of hair product somehow are not. also, they apparently don't learn anything in sex education, because nobody likes to talk about it. i didn't say it, chris' taiwanese friend did. people are too conservative to talk about sex, but not too conservative to have it. hmmmm... christian culture kind of has the same problem, i'm discovering. but that's another post.
-the convenience store phenomenon and how it just might make the world a safer place. really!
-my new-found appreciation for socialized health care, followed by a commentary on how overpriced and inconvenient medicine is back home. i'd argue that we're paying for better health care, but we're not. i'd argue that we're paying for better medicine, but we're not. i'd argue that we're paying for more qualified doctors, but we're not. i'd argue that we're paying for a longer life expectancy and a healthier population, but we're not. i'd argue that we're paying for more personal relationships with our doctors... for convenience... for protection... for consistency... for safety and legitimacy... but we're not. WHAT ARE WE PAYING FOR!
-taiwanese fashion. how it can be gloriously rich and beautiful, or maybe its ability to burn your eyes out of their sockets.
-my infatuation with jay chou and chinese films.
-the hierarchy of asian culture. japan. korea. china. taiwan. hong kong. the philippines. indonesia. cambodia. thailand. vietnam. burma. india. no, they're not the same, and you'd be surprised. i learned this from taiwanese friends and other ex-pats, and slowly, it's begun to make a lot of sense.
-the glory of commercials on taipei buses.

all half-finished or only just begun. why? because my ability to write and speak has diminished severely. i can't write cohesive thoughts anymore, people. vocabulary? all my sentences and words sound the same. my sentences don't make any sense anymore, because i don't speak english. i speak esl teacher. it's a terrible half-breed of a language, both stealth and completely untraceable as it sneaks upon you. it begins with a sentence, and before you know it, you're asking questions like "what is your mommy's hair look like?" you're just too lazy to correct yourself and say "does" instead.

lately, i've contemplated bringing some of these esl-isms back with me and seeing if people notice. sometimes, i think it would be hilarious. people refer to each other as "the" something. "the" teacher joy. "the" brian. i wonder how long i'd have to say it before people stopped and asked me what was wrong with me. the other fun ones include: how to do? how to say? don't have! (instead of didn't) and speaking with your hands. a lot. also, counting things instead of saying "a", "the." make a line becomes make one line. bring me a pencil is now bring me one pencil. i haven't started calling things "my one" anymore, because i hate that more than anything, though i have started making the same sounds people make when they're unhappy. just wait till it comes out of me... you might find it to be the most terrible thing. ever.

we'll see if i ever rediscover myself enough to finish those blogs.

no time! no time!

for months, i've been suffering from severe insomnia. for a while, i thought it was stress or too much caffeine or anticipation. but the days and weeks have come and gone, and nothing's changed.

sometimes, while i lay alone in the dark, i put my hand on my chest, and i can feel my heart racing erratically. "calm down," i tell myself. there's nothing to worry about. yet it beats so wildly that i'm certain i'll die. i try and try to close my eyes, but sleep won't come. i try to write down my thoughts. what's wrong? did i forget something? will i get my life together enough these next few weeks? what if rachel and i don't make it into the program? is it him?

the anxiety weighs on me, even in my dreams. i toss and turn, wishing i could forget about my day, or my exhaustion, or the fact that i don't feel like i'm ready for this summer. wishing that, so long as my eyes are closed and i am, at least physically, sleeping, the anxiety will lift and i will feel free, unburdened, and excited.

my room is a disaster right now, full of half-done things. my half-done visa process. half-packed suitcases. books strewn about, because i've only half-decided to give them to angie and half-resolved myself to keeping them. half-answers on moving out, id cards, and international sims. the fact that this cursed mother's day event is only half-done, and chris' half-completed present occupying my desk and the end of my bed.

i calculated today. i teach 5 classes every morning, and 1 class every afternoon. except, last semester i was teaching 3, so let's average it to 2. i also teach 1 class every night, but that doesn't include when i was carrying double class loads after chad left. according to my calculations, i teach 8 classes a day, 40 classes a week, 160 classes a month, and it seems up to this point, over 1,600 classes this past year. i'd never done the math until now. and each day, like clockwork, i feel pressured to invent some new idea for them, to make learning fun and entertaining, so that they forget that their life of academic misery is only beginning.

and each day, the same things wear on me a little more. i'm very, plainly, completely dry. i've heard the expression "i've got nothing left to give" and i always thought it was an excuse. it's not. sometimes, while standing during the morning's song, i'm certain that i'll pass out right there on the spot, because i'm just drained.

but it's only 6 more weeks.

我的中華的朋友你好!

today, after work, i was tying up some loose ends on my visas and watching the office, and this clip came up:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AC1oj_SWJU

now, i'll be the first to admit that my chinese isn't great, but i've really come to appreciate this. i had to listen a few times to fully figure out what he was saying, but it's wo de zhonghua de pengyou, ni hao! which means, my chinese friends, hello!

okay, nobody else will think it's funny except chris, but i was dying.

oh no!

i am officially booked for this summer... trains, buses, hostels, flights. everything except those effing visas. but otherwise all confirmed. i get back to the states on july 10. oh man.

i was reflecting for a moment on the utter pinnacle of gruel i will be consuming in my summer months. the taiwanese say that chinese food is dodgy. they also said the same about thai food, and i found thai food, even that of the dodgiest sort, to be immensely more appetizing than the so-called food i often eat in taiwan.

but even so, i might just have to become a vegetarian in china, as one can't be too careful when we're talking billions of socially and politically repressed people. maybe unlike taiwan, they actually find a use for all those stray dogs.

kidding!

but seriously, it will be onto mongolia. now i've had damn good mongolian barbecue, but i've seen pictures of ulaanbatar, and we are talking the fringe of civilization as we know it. i borders (literally and metaphorically) on all those -stan countries i have no desire to visit. kazakhstan. uzbekistan. turkmenistan. like polygon-shaped states, i avoid -stans. one can only imagine what they're going to dream up while i'm camping in the middle of nowhere and living, it seems, just like abraham. which is totally awesome, i might add. i've heard rumors of raw meat, which, even in my hungriest of states, i'm not sure i can stomach.

russia is another story. i know people who've been to russia. i've heard stories about russia. i've had an inexplicable desire to visit russia as long as i can remember. i had twelve year-old fantasies about the glory of petersburg while reading anna karenina. don't judge me for thinking it would be sweet to be a member of the russian aristocracy. unless i was a woman. especially an adulteress. or a romanov. or living anywhere -bouts that whole revolution.
but still!

all that aside, among the stories, i've heard about how indescribably horrible the cooking is. how you wonder if it's really cat they're feeding to you. in which case, i won't live on vodka, but 7-11 or its kin might continue to rescue me.


then, as i make my way back into western culture, there's london. with countries with such a reputation for excellence in cooking, i've wondered how london's food continues to be so... so... disastrous. is disastrous the right word? it's like they are incapable of listening to the french. or the spanish. or the italians. hell, even the swiss, for that matter.

all this further pumps me up for mexican food and in-n-out. perhaps all that cheap hippie kickboxing will count for nothing in the end.

i wasn't meant to be cool

"too cool for school."
or so the saying goes.

a few months ago, chris walked into work, and proceeded to tell me about his awkward morning. on his way to pick up breakfast at a local sandwich shop, he saw a pretty girl and waved to her. moments later, he sneezed, producing a profuse amount of mucus in the process. you'd be surprised by how discolored and thick your mucus gets in taipei.

to curb the potential pointlessness of his tale, he explained to me his immediate thoughts while he furiously searched for a tissue. really, he said, i was thinking, cool people don't do that. do what?, i asked, sneeze? not just sneeze, joy. sneeze so that copious amounts of snot are emitted from their nostrils while they catch it in their hands and still try to save face, he replied. it's not about the sneezing, but about how awkward i looked doing it. think about it, joy. cool people don't do that.

his reflection on being cool did little more than make me laugh at the time. that is, until wednesday.

i was on my way to work, when i got road burn i haven't felt since that day with the truck. the day that left gashes in my hips for months, marred by the gravel. every day, i live in denial that i have another 10 hour workday ahead of me. i leave home with (sort of) sufficient time to get to work. really, "sufficient" is defined less by how early i leave and more by how gloriously reckless my bus driver is. it just so happens that my alley faces directly to a bus stop. unfortunately, my alley lacks crosswalks, and taking a crosswalk just to get to the bus stop would take me at least another 5 minutes. so to sidestep it all, i wait until traffic is clear, make my way to the center divider, then cross the second half of the street when it's (mostly) clear. on very rare occasions, i have a clear shot all the way across. and wednesday at approximately 8:20am, my friends, just happened to be one of those days.

it's common knowledge in taiwan, though not in most of the western world, that you can cross a street even if motor scooters are coming because there really are no set lanes, and they can easily go around you if you get in their way. i was hurrying to my bus stop when the scooters just started barreling down wenhua lu in my direction. i can make it, i thought to myself, though there was one scooter moving faster than the others. i hesitated for a second: do i slow down or speed up? going at my current pace will cause a collision. if i hurry, i can probably make it, and if i stop altogether, i risk the onslaught of traffic that follows the scooters about 5 or 10 seconds later. it was as if the crazy side of me, the one that compels me to do things like move to non-english speaking places, and the practical side of me were in combat. and for once, the practical side was just as strong. half my body obeyed its usual master, while the other half followed my practical side, remembering how little it wanted to hit anything again, EVER. and in the process, i completely bit it in the street. my legs slid out from under me. i lost my shoe. fortunately, most of the scooters weren't moving as quickly as i'd expected, so i had lots of time to hobble off the side of the road.

and i realized in that moment: cool people don't take dives onto gravel in the street. a cool person wouldn't be bleeding profusely from 4 open wounds in his or her foot right now. and cool people wouldn't be shouting profanities to themselves right now about how much that son of a bitch was hurting.

i did clean myself up once i got to work, and all seemed fine. i used to roller blade as a kid. i've skinned myself more times than i can remember playing soccer or with my brothers. i never bother to take these things seriously. so i cleaned my wounds, covered them, and went about my business.

and all seemed well, until today, the day after cheap hippie kickboxing. it was the hardest workout we've done in a while, but i thought i was fine. my wounds seemed to be scabbing, and they didn't really hurt while i was working out. i got home, showered, and cleaned myself up, only to wake up the morning after in excruciating pain and with a completely swollen foot. for the first time EVER, i spent my whole day at school barefoot. it hurt too much to wear my slippers. i couldn't go up and down stairs. i hobbled from place to place, and was probably crankier than usual. and my kids kept asking me questions about what happened, which just sounded plain silly when i omitted the part about jaywalking, since that's never a good thing to advocate to a group of 6 year-olds. since then, i've taken medication for the swelling, which seems to have improved and generally tried to keep it clean, though i'm still limping.

when i become such a wuss?

thought i'd share

JOY ELIZABETH MS
NX 627 14JUN TPEMFM 1530 1725
NX 8 14JUN MFMPEK 1845 2200



(that means i'm going to china)

it's official

"verbal contracts are as good as the paper they're written on."
or so the saying goes.

only, now i have a piece of paper that says that i'm going to china, mongolia, russia, and finland this summer!

well, that is, after i get my tickets to beijing and my flight from helsinki to lax. or riga to london to lax. but that's just a back-up.
and also, all those damn visas.

but still!
according to VodkaTrain, i'm going!

the great wall, ger camps, st. basil's cathedral, and the petersburg hermitage!
i'm so pumped.

it's all the small things that lead to one big thing

"it was the straw that broke the camel's back."
or so the saying goes.

i never understood that when i was younger, but life in taiwan has truly shown me the profundity of those words. especially when 70% of my job consists of "just one more thing..."

i definitely cried at work today. this has never happened before, not even when i was adjusting to everything. i guess you could say that, in a way, today broke me. i was so excited that i wouldn't have to prepare another demo class, only to get a phone call that i would be doing so in 15 seconds and counting. oh, and i was, i'm not exaggerating one bit, walking out the door. half of me even contemplated not picking up the phone at all, though the other half knew what was going to happen as soon as it rang. i taught my class, and my kids were horrible. terrible. the naughtiest they've ever been. because they know that when a parent is watching, i can't discipline them the way i normally would. if i'd been alone, they would have been standing against the wall so fast, they wouldn't have known what hit 'em. but oh, they know. they know that chris has them after me, so i REALLY can't do much.

so afterwards, i went up to the office, searched for the homework sheets, which i couldn't find, and then sobbed by myself for a good 3-5 minutes. unhindered. uninhibited. just some solitary sobbing, because i'm exhausted. really, truly exhausted. i've been pushed to the edge, with all the "just one more thing"s in my life. because i want my kids to do well, and if they don't, i take it on as my own failure.

to be honest, my kids really aren't that bad. it's just that my nerves are completely shot. i listen to crying all morning and sometimes all afternoon: wo yao wo mama! keyi ma? wo yao wo mama! keyi ma? wo yao wo mama! keyi ma?
YOU WANT YOUR MOM! I HEARD YOU! how about this: WO SHI NI XIN MAMA! i'm your new mama, kid! HOW ABOUT THAT!
though actually, i kinda like that kid. he's very sweet, just really young. then, one of the new kids doesn't like to wear socks. so he leaves them all over school. and while he doesn't really know his english name yet, i do find it hilarious that his mom calls almost every day that he's forgotten some random article of clothing, which later resurfaces in the ball pool or the toy box or the bathroom.
with all the crying kids, half of my older students are acting out for attention and the other half are trying really hard to befriend me. which is weird, because the ones that suddenly want my affections are the ones who didn't give a crap 2 weeks ago.
and then one screamed and stomped her feet because i was standing too close to her and i'm a foreigner. and she doesn't like foreigners. at 3 years old. she's 3! and i wasn't talking to her anyway! i was talking to my kids, the ones who tell me that they love me. at which point, my chinese teacher proceeded to tell the student that if she didn't stop having a tantrum, she would make me hold her hand and feed her. six months ago, i wouldn't have known the difference, but now i actually understand what they're telling the kids. and forgive me if i'm wrong, but a kid has issues if her idea of fate worse than death is having the white teacher help her eat her snack.

all of it together has completely destroyed my nerves. i'm so jumpy that i can barely listen to my older students saying hello to me. they chant it when i walk into the room, and my heart starts to race wildly. can people die of over-stimulation and emotional taxation?

it's weird to cry alone at work and not really be alone.

nobody was in the room, but we have monitors everywhere. big brother is watching, so i never fool myself into thinking i have privacy anywhere but a bathroom stall. nor did i have the emotional fortitude to care at the time. i pulled myself together enough to go to my next class, though a lot of people asked me over and over if i was ok for the rest of the day.

such overt displays of emotion have been quite the cultural experience in taiwan. in general, the taiwanese are not direct. so if someone yells or cries, they're not sure how to handle it. a few weeks ago, chris and i argued after the kids went home. we try to be direct with each other at work, because being in such close proximity would be really stressful if we weren't. everyone had gone home except for a few teachers downstairs when we started arguing. they told us when we went downstairs that they were certain one of us was going to quit. they were horrified watching things unfold on the monitor, though there was nothing horrific about it. we've explained to them over and over that arguments are helpful, and can actually make people better friends.

how do people get by without releasing things one in a while?

did i mention i'm beyond exhausted?
thank God it's friday.

i hadn't considered this

"and then where will you be?"
or so i've heard it said.

joy is a person who panics a little more about going home with each passing day. she's afraid of how fast the next 3 months will go, when 9 felt like nothing.

oh no, i hadn't thought of this.

to do:
work
save money
plan my trip
get my visas
save money
plan my trip
reduce my life to 2 suitcases
send said suitcases home
plan my trip
buy tickets
panic a little
say goodbye to chris/train someone new
panic a little more
finish my contract
move out
traipse through asia
return to the u.s.a.
and the scariest...
????????????


i have dreams every so often. weird dreams. dreams that i went home and said nothing to anybody. i just left. dreams that i went home with hopes of backpacking this summer, because it makes so much sense to return to the states then fly to hong kong and traipse and then go back again. and dreams that i never follow through, which i really regret, because i never got around to seeing that part of the world when i had the chance.

i guess this is going to be more work than i expected.

oh, no. no, no, no.

"how do i love thee? let me count the ways..."
or so the saying goes. according to browning, anyway.

i apologize in advance if this blog is too graphic.

2008 marks my 3rd year of no valentine on valentine's day. well, i did go on that date with drew last year, the day before valentine's day. but that was a first date, and i'm pretty sure we only picked that day because it wasn't as awkward as actually going out on the 14th.

the nice thing is that i didn't really notice this year. i'd like to think that this is mainly because i've grown a lot. a year of singleness in taiwan really kicks you in the romantic gonads, so when the options are complaining or growing, i pick growing.

but actually, this has more to do with the fact that i was sick on valentine's day. sick, sick. very sick. more sick than i've been in at least a year. and i don't know why. for some reason, my body woke me up at 3a.m., as if to say, "hey! you feel like crap! you don't want to miss a moment of it."

so for the next 4 hours, i couldn't sleep, i couldn't sit, and i couldn't walk. it all made me dizzy. so, i thought to myself, in my misery, maybe vomiting will help. and this is true, perhaps it would have helped. for those who don't know, vomiting, as i perceive it, is fate worse than death. every bit of it repulses me. and over the years, i've learned to control all manner of vomiting by strained mind over matter. and surprisingly, this works on most vomit-inducing situations: hangovers, motion sickness, watching others vomit, death marches on mount rinjani, gnarly taiwanese food, vicodin, being run over by trucks, dormitory life. in fact, i can remember the last time i got the stomach flu, and it was at least 12 years ago. this was also the last time i ever threw up.

but to give you all the magnitude of my illness, i prayed for the ability to throw up whatever it was that my stomach could not handle that night. prayed. and tried. for over 3 hours, i heaved. but nothing. forgive me, but i was under the impression that things of this nature came naturally. like putting your arms out in self-preservation. or procreation. nobody has to teach you to do this stuff. your body figures it out on its own. but apparently, it's been so long since i've thrown up, that my body has actually forgotten how to do it. either i've successfully trained myself in all manner of conscious and sub-conscious defense against regurgitation, or i'm somehow challenged. i like to think the former.

long story short, i managed to stumble into work for the afternoon class sessions, but was barely able to stand through most of the periods. i suppose this is why God invented things like story time, and especially valentine's day, as i just set my kids to making valentines and writing letters for the latter half of class. i've never missed a day of work, but i've spent most of the past 2 days sleeping, or wishing i were sleeping. and when not doing the previous things, just wishing i were dead.

God bless valentine's day.


p.s. i found this picture, and words really cannot convey how amazing it is. chris told me that some of my pictures make me look like i'm "special," but i can guarantee that none of them come close to his face in this one.

i remember a song that says "if you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with." and by that i mean, let's not forget love comes in more forms than romance, people. when i taught my kids about valentine's day, i reminded them that there are a lot of people to love, in a lot of different ways, not just boyfriends or girlfriends. and i'm thinking, sometimes, that's the best kind of love.

this is why i'm hot

"and they lived happily ever after."
or so the saying goes.

seriously, you guys, i'm an awesome story-teller. i've never been good at public speaking and i've never considered myself to be very captivating at parties and/or other occasions of the sort. really, i work with good material... london, homeschooling, my injury, rinjani... it's all gold. and also, i have an uncanny ability to remember tv shows and movies. topics like the office are a great fall-back. but something about teaching has transformed me into a natural and interesting story-teller. my kids love my stories... little red riding hood, cinderella, jack and the beanstalk. okay, so they're not my stories. but i will tell you, many of my kids have heard them a hundred times... they groan when i pull them out... but i remind them that, though they know the story, they've never heard it the way I tell it. for about 20 minutes, it's silent as they listen.

yes, i'm going to be awesome when i'm a mom.

so you should definitely watch this clip to see what i do every day:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsEXCS1vSUw

a news program came to the school and took video of me talking to the kids and telling them a story. and it looks pretty sweet online.

FUN FACT: in the shots of me talking to the two boys, jonas and benson, they're relating to me the epic of star wars, complete with characters, as told to them by teacher chris during story time. firstly, how awesome is it that 5 year-olds in taiwan love star wars? and secondly, how awesome is it that they're so enthralled in making sure i know the story too?
i was told to keep them talking, no matter what the subject was, and i asked a few questions, but nothing could keep a dialogue going long. until i asked them to tell me everything they knew about star wars. then they couldn't seem to say enough.

seriously. it's all i'm asking for.

"ask and you shall receive."
or so the saying goes.


wish i had what i needed
to be on my own
cuz i feel so defeated
and i'm feeling alone

and it all seems so helpless
and i have no plans
i'm a plane in the sunset
with nowhere to land

and all i'm seeing could never make me happy
and all my sandcastles spend their time collapsing

let me know that You hear me
let me know Your touch
let me know that You love me
and let that be enough

it's my birthday tomorrow
no one here could know
i was born next thursday
22 years ago

and i feel stuck watching history repeating
oh, am i just a kid who knows she's needy

let me know that You hear me
let me know Your touch
let me know that You love me
and let that be enough
-jon foreman

addictions

"i love you like a fat kid loves cake."
or so the saying goes.

yes, i have addictions, but i tend to think they're fairly harmless, and most of them come and go.
except coffee. and that's been since i was like, 16. i'm pretty sure i've lost that battle. mostly, i try not to think about how much it costs me each year.

there are worse things. like drugs. or alcohol. or sex. or a combination of all three and then some.


but currently, my addiction is jon foreman's new solo tracks! he's releasing 4 cd's this year, titled spring, summer, fall, and winter. i've already listened to fall, and he's just released winter.

i've gotta say, they're beautiful. they're introspective and just lovely to listen to. they're all acoustic, and the content is a provocative combination of His beauty and the pain of moving on.

example:
she said, friend, all along, thought i was learning how to take
how to bend, not how to break
how to laugh, not how to cry
but really, i've been learning how to die
i've been learning how to die



keep writing, jon foreman. thank you for saying something that goes so much deeper than the usual drivel our generation produces.

"would You create in me a clean heart, oh God, restore in me the joy of Your salvation"
it's been my prayer for a long while now.