eileen and me enjoying popsicles on our riverboat ride

tactics

i'm not sure what jet lag means, exactly.

but as a result of the time difference between NY and korea (13 hrs) i have been alone and awake with the crickets, awake every night this week. or not even this week. 5 days, or whatever.

it is so weird that i've not even been back a full week yet! despite the insomnia, i already feel myself emerging from the grumpy mood i was in. perhaps attributable to the totally praiseworthy gym schedule that i'm on now! so much of my body is sore, i love it. it's only at times like these that i'm really conscious of having a body, as opposed to a body shaped robot that i control. yes, like krang.

okay, i've been sitting at this computer too long. i tried extra hard to overexert myself today, so i hope i can fall asleep quickly...so i can wake up and spend some money.

the first time i see u penn recognized/plagiarized in korea

finally! pictures!

oh blogger. so fresh and so clean and so idiot proof!

anyway, this first of many pictures to come is of me in tokyo, getting made over at the bobbi brown counter. carolyn and i thought it a brilliant plan to spend an hour having this done during our limited stay, because japanese women have really good makeup skills. you probably can't tell from looking at the picture, but i have gold eyeshadow on! and my lip gloss is "nectarine".

unfortunately, you will have to wait for me to re-visit a bobbi brown counter to see what "nectarine" looks like on me, because i have not recovered my makeup bag from narita airport, which is where i lost it two days ago. how apropos? tokyo is a selfish mistress.

if i sound slightly delusional and nonconsequential, it's because it's 5:30 am and i am so jetlagged that i am posting on blogger rather than sleeping so i can wake up nice and early for my 12 pm personal training appointment tomorrow! at gold's gym. which is surprisingly female friendly! i hope it is fat people friendly, too.

or maybe i'm not jetlagged - maybe it's the two bottles of diet coke i drank tonight in lieu of eating.

crap, i'm stupid.

anyway, better go downstairs and get the alarm clock. i need to take a shower tomorrow morning. my first since saturday morning korea time...that means friday, US time. crap, i'm stupid.

well, enough insomnia. i'm going to save a better and more coherent post for tomorrow, when the euphoria/neuralgia of my first workout in weeks is coursing through my veins and i feel the need to document that, too.

it's not what u accomplish it's what u can endure

i'm ba-aack!

it feels clean and safe and low-stress to be here in poughkeepsie. i had some good "reflection" and "digestion" of my "experience" in korea while on the plane, but i forgot how it congealed together. it seemed to end up with me deciding that being in korea wasn't a total waste of my precious youth. but i don't really want to think about the past year in depth again right now. i didn't really feel anything when i left my school, my host family, my relatives, or the country...with the exception of sweet relief!

relief at being done with korea's inferiority complex and mass social immaturity. done with being told that my korean sucks, yet being expected to understand everything that is being said around me. done with having no control over the food i eat and then totally transforming into a piggy when i do. done with feeling like the lack of stimulation or challenge in my life has turned me into a halmeoni. done with vice principal han and the unbelievable shit that was my work environment this year. as so many people have said to me, "please try to forget the bad things that happened to you this year." i'm not a victim. my willfully poor memory will see me through :^)

but...you know. also relief that this year (or really just this semester) taught me what i don't want out of life. eg, monotony, helplessness, and abjection.

i love at the end of the corrections when the mom decides that it's time to make some changes.

i'm going to cut my hair. why? because i want to.

i'm going to take a career inventory test and give myself some real long-term goals. why? because i'm tired of always scrabbling to give myself an array of completely divergent options and then racking my brains to choose the best one.

we all know one woman's take on korea: "if you can survive this, you can survive anything!"
or "you'll start missing korea and think about coming back...then decide NEVER AGAIN!"

how about, it was part of my life. and now it's over.