Moving to the East Coast is a mouthful.

A move to the East Coast popped into my head when I was 22-ish sometime in 2009 or 2010 when I was sitting in my flourescent mosquito netted room in Vietnam. I never did open that window. I wanted to move here for several reasons but mostly to see and feel another part of the United States that I had not really given the time for - geographical barriers perhaps. Much of our nation's culture is rooted in the East Coast. It makes sense doesn't it - after all our "founding" happened on this side, Washington D.C. is here, and Matt Damon's from Boston. How about them apples?

The accents, the culture, how people acted, and felt and talked about things. I felt that this would inform my politics, education, and intellect. Everything that I had known was just still so little. Just as I had made my move to Vietnam - I wanted to feel it, I wanted to experience it. I may not seem like it, but deep down inside, I really don't give a crap about your perspective. Yes, I can be swayed perhaps temporarily. However, I will not believe what you say to me or really absorb it until I myself judge or go through the experience itself.

My curiosity lead me here, along with the departure of my childhood. I often feel that my childhood is something that has passed, and I certainly feel that I've entered another "era" of my life. Perhaps it was the process of falling in love for the first time and then leaving it behind. Perhaps it was just making a move to another city in a way that isn't quite the same as living in Vietnam for two years when I had yet really felt strong pain or heartbreak. Perhaps my heart broke in more ways than one. Whatever it was, it left me in what felt like another part of my life - so distant, literally and figuratively. I found myself in Baltimore.

Baltimore is an interesting city. Much of what we may know of it comes from media and shows such as "The Wire." Yet, so many things are filmed here, House of Cards, Veep, and so much more. Aside from tax cuts, there's something about Baltimore that is film worthy. From the beautiful homes of Baltimore, to the simultaneous small town and urban city feel that you get from walking from one town to the next.

Baltimore is like that place that you never think about. Sorta like - Ontario, California. No one ever thinks about Ontario, California, but hell I spent almost 15 of my most formative years of my life there. I am so very Ontario, Californian. I enjoy suburban convenience, I like my peace, I think cows are cute, farmers were my friends, and I enjoy small towns. I grew up in a neighborhood immersed by the working class. Moving to the East Coast and being in such a privileged institution, I am removed from the working class. Instead there's this constant juxtaposition I am facing. Here, I've placed myself in a different setting, removed from the local community. That is something that I have not been able to shake off since I've moved here.

I lived in Bolton Hill for a short three months. It's one of those strange places in Baltimore that you would never find yourself in, but I did. Nestled next to the Maryland Institute of College of Arts - I moved here temporarily and lived with a nice family. They were into theater, photography, you know the ivy-league/private school artsy kind. I mean to open their home to people - it was already "different" for this neighborhood. Bolton Hill is one of those places where people have fresh milk delivered to their door. People here also have cars but they will get their organic groceries delivered. People here have grand pianos in their windows and their homes are impeccably decorated with authentic vintage furniture.  Not the goodwill kind but the kind passed down by generations. Bolton Hill is where Frank Underwood lives. There is only one cafe and one restaurant in Bolton Hill and no grocery stores. People here detest the "save-a-lot" a few blocks over. They have their own separate Halloween the weekend before the real one (which I am convinced has racist undertones). There is a man that literally vacuums the streets every week. I was constantly shifting here - as an Asian female I knew I was perceived as "non-threatening" to the people of Bolton Hill - I even started grating my cheese. This place bothered me, and I would never live here again.

I felt like writing this because I've had a mentally tiring week. There is something so fundamentally missing from the way people interact with each other -  a connectedness to the work - humanity.

Tomorrow I have a whole day to myself. I'll see where it takes me.

Saturday thoughts.

Through my eyes, I can make you fall in love with any city. What a revelation I just had, and how much power this holds.

Of course, I must give credit to the good friends and folks I meet along the way that too help me fall in love with a city. Their eyes, their open-ness is what makes it magic and all I could really do is pass it on to the next.

One time I showed a boy around L.A. and simultaneously at that instant, he fell in love with the city and perhaps me too.

Strangers

Lately, I've been encountering people through the different random things that I buy off craigslist to furnish my new apartment. For the first time in my life, I have a place of my own and I've furnished everything in it on my own - more about this another time perhaps.

When encountering random people - there's a rush to it, for a moment you enter their lives and they enter yours and the possibilities of friendship is sorta fun. Even if it's just surface conversations with a random person you would never in your life speak to. When you graduate from college, you don't really meet people as frequent, as we get older, people sorta get into their own lives. They get their own apartments and stay indoors and watch netflix and don't talk to people.


Goodnight.

And then what?

We were driving into the dark freeways of Maryland or Virginia - I'm not sure which one since the states here are so close together -  and so literally white marks were about the only thing that reached out to our eyelashes. The green trees at night absorb even more color. We were talking about our lives, as car rides usually succumb to, because it's a time where you can just stare at what is in front of you, listen to the light radio waves around you, and also feel that you are going somewhere. We were going somewhere. Our conversation shifted into about what we would accomplish in life. Getting a partner, getting a car, buying a house. And my friend had just bought a house - at our young age - which to many people would be the epitome of the so-called "American dream."





"...and then what?"


There was a pause in his speech as I stared off into the dark abyss that laid before us. The question and the abyss coincided perfectly at that moment. I had no answer nor did it seem that he wanted one.  We were going somewhere, and I suppose that's all that really mattered.

Everyone has a different spirit that guides them.

My journey is different from yours. What will make you whole is shaped differently from mine.

Staying up late.

The hustle will be promising.

Life feels super tough right now.

As I heard on the streets "the struggle is real!"

Putting into perspective it is not that tough. I still eat what I want and have shelter and people who love me. But all in all it's tough for me. When the threat of the future is looming over your shoulders making it undoubtedly heavy both physically and on your soul - it can get to you. I'm overdramatic. I've always have been extremely fatalistic and hard on myself. I got better in Vietnam - to trust and let go, but of course a few years back into America I am again returning to the habit of being hard on myself.

Also I fell down a small flight of stairs today on my ass. This is what happens when my mind is distracted. And when you wear socks on slippery wood. I usually bump my head on things and I tried really hard yesterday to avoid accidentally running into things but this morning that was the cherry on top.

FUCK YOU LIFE.

Say things with conviction.

Say things with certainty, confidence and readiness because that will take you somewhere. No need to doubt oneself because that can only lead to uncertainty.

Cooking food.

I've always been the type to cook my own food. Perhaps I get it from my parents who didn't enjoy eating out unless it was 99 cent day at Popeyes or dim sum. My mom's voice rings clear even when I'm thousands of miles away, "I can cook that at home, don't get that."

Needless to say, eating out is not my cup of tea. I am internally grumpy at small portions, I think it's stupid when a single dish cost more than a week's worth of groceries, and low and behold, if I can make that at home, I don't want to eat it.

Usually when I go out and eat - it's for the social aspect of hanging out with my friends which I love. It's a societal thing to eat out and to go out, but when the bill comes a little bit of me cries on the inside - I can't help it - a reaction that's a product of growing up relatively poor and in an extremely frugal household. I'm a lot better these days and I enjoy eating out but ultimately a home-cooked meal is priceless.

As of late, I've started to post things that I cook in a more social-media friendly manner with the hashtag #chefbutton (a play off my college radio dj name ms. button). One day I have a conversation with a really good friend of mine who I haven't chatted with for a little whiles she says,

So what have you been up to other than cooking?

Taken aback a bit, I laugh on the inside because of course all she knows that I do is cooking because that's all the pictures that I post. I also spoke to my cousin the other day,

You're cooking pretty complex foods.

And today it dawned on me that because of what I share on social media it's what people think of me currently. The thing is, I've always cooked my own meals for myself in this manner but now there is this attention to it that others recognize because I put it on social media. I'm really happy to share it with people, folks seem to love to see what I cook. Food gets the most likes on Facebook. So I wonder what else of me can I share with the world? I do have conflicts with it, but I also value the sharing aspect of it a lot and if I can share a piece of myself with the world than why not?

Believing in my sunshine!

Because that's all I got!

Nothing is wrong.

During rural home visits to the homes of young girls in Pacific Links Foundation scholarship program.

I had a chat on the bus with a friend of mine yesterday about this. It must of happened when I turned 25. Slowly but gradually, this looming pressure of being "an adult," getting married and having kids crept up on me. My big girl dreams of success and travel are no longer valid. Instead, I have a problem.

People are starting to get "worried" about you. 

Why would someone be "worried" about me. As if the path I have chosen in life is inherently wrong. It's very micro-aggressive.

"Why don't you get a husband so you can buy us all Christmas gifts?"

"Do you have a boyfriend?"

"Any changes? Do you have a boyfriend?"

"Even other 27 year olds like you have two children by now and you can't even cook chicken broth"

Ouch. I know this seems silly but that last one really hurt because it came from my mom. Someone who has a good head but once and a while but very rarely she will say something like that to me.

One time she followed me vintage shopping/exploring in Australia. I took them to a random neighborhood to this huge garage sale. She wanted to go with me. But throughout the whole thing she was grumpy about it. "What did Berkeley do to you? Making you like this kind of stuff..."

In my mind I'm like, "What are you really trying to say?"

Perhaps she was just like "This neighborhood is scary and I don't know where we are, we've traveled so far, and I am uncomfortable."

Instead she decided to bag on my world class education. Good one. The kind of education that people will die for and one that perhaps people all over the world dream of going to. Albeit Berkeley is the place where I came to love vintage things. But her argument was non-sequitor.

After that trip we also went to a flea market. She followed me to that as well. She bought a beanie and really liked it. She actually went back on her own to that flea market. I was proud of her. Alas lessons learned as you are near one another - a thought that I have been thinking about a lot as I decide my next steps in life. My mom is a good person with a good shoulders one whose calm. I can't stay mad at her for too long because ultimately her love for me is very strong and alas I am the way I am because of her. If she was even a bit more slightly nag-ish than I probably wouldn't live my life to the fullest as I have. She rarely says ridiculous things which is good because I am an anxious person to begin with, a person who plays by the rules, and likes to please people and keep them happy at the expense of my own.

Perhaps by saying that other women my age already have children - she had a couple of frustrations. I think 1. she misses me and 2. is uncomfortable with the fact that I am not sure where I am going with my life.

I've always never been the type of person to follow traditional pathways. When I was young I've always deflected my mom's comments like, "What kind of girl are you to not be able to clean" with my "THIS IS AMERICA, MAMA" speech. I'm awkward as fuck. I didn't get my first boyfriend until 21. I didn't really fall in love until 25. I'm slow and I get it. I have issues with opening up quickly and am pretty insecure. I take my time and pressuring me is no way good. In fact, I'll probably be more inclined to do the opposite.

I want to fall in love. Don't get me wrong. But it's the invalidation of my "self" that bothers me. It's as if attending two top institutions in the world coming from a refugee family that doesn't really speak English really well is not enough. And even then you don't have to come from a top institution to be "enough."

I am not enough, folks.

The world is always telling me that I am not enough. This super educated, smart, creative happy person.

So what does this mean when we tell women and girls that we know. You are not enough until you have a man in your life to "take care of you." What does this mean when we tell rural, migrant, refugee, women and girls who have less economic opportunities. You are not enough. And until we learn to stop telling women and girls they are "not enough" than perhaps the world will be less of a place for us to thrive for all.

I had a divorcee tell me that once. The contradiction in her sentence born perhaps out of bitterness of what she doesn't have and what society has deflected upon her in her lifetime. Instead on her focus of being such a badass strong woman for raising two kids she focuses on the negative and inflicts it on the nearest target - me. Perhaps she was told that she was not enough one too many times and continues to be looked upon as "sad" because she doesn't have a complete unit.

Well world, fuck your complete unit.

Nothing is wrong with you. Nothing is wrong with me - in fact, I'm great and I believe in myself and my journey. My journey is mine and no one can ever take that away from me. I'm a good person. I'm sorry, world, you tried beating me down but my spirit is too high to do so. To take it a step way back, I was the egg that survived and made it. Watcha going to do about that. (Also, this would be a side rant, but there is a war against girls in the womb with selective abortion) World, you tried breaking my heart, you tried to tell me that I could not amount to anything, you threw me curveballs left and right and I continue to survive, I continue to thrive.

Nothing is wrong.

---

“You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart will always be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place.”

---

I love Karen O.

Your shitty pictures are my pet peeve.

Seriously folks, seriously.

---

I want to love you, so I stay away so it doesn't wane but instead grow stronger.

Thoughts while feeling under the weather.

I don't think I gave my experience in Vietnam justice. Will write about it soon nearly three years later.

See the rainbow?

The Universe is saying a few things to me.

I noticed it yesterday after doing a few stretches on the floor. Rarely do I do them, but when I remember it's nice. This week, life brought me to Arcade Fire, my friend Sally, and who knows what now? My brother has been calling me more lately as he's facing an awesome life decision within his work place. He calls and includes me in the process which makes me happy that I can somewhat help him through his decision making just by listening. My aunt (who works for the post office) texts me to ask for my address - which might mean a package! (but I'm getting ahead of myself). My former interns receive journals that I got from Vietnam and mailed to them and texted me a photo of the one she chose out of the three. Mom calls me to ask about renting cars. She also calls me to ask about google mapping. She calls me to ask about restaurants in the area of Chino. She asks me about burrito places with the name "Maria" off the 15.  I also realized that I've been asked to be near a waterfall this Sunday. I love waterfalls. I love what they are and what they mean to me and the life that they offer. The signs the signs. Can you see it? Can you hear it? Can you feel it?

---

Disappointment comes in interesting forms doesn't it? Is it really disappointment or is it sadness for something that is perceived to be at lost and no longer there? But how do you know it's there in the first place? How do you know you've really lost it when you've never found it?

---

Channeling my inner front woman - cause aw hellz I'm going to need it for the next month.

---

Believing in myself, believing in human connection, believing in the spirit.

---
Why is it easier to purchase than to interact?
However, why does it feel so empty?

---

Note to self: To keep from Friday becoming a bit of what I've been dreading since I woke up...(Fridays are the worst for me. Fridays come with so much pressure to do something. You are faced with what you've been avoiding the whole week, which is loneliness, which is free time, which is self.) Tonight: organize my music, do laundry, stretches, write a story about my commute to DC and my internship and everything post-grad. Go into that zone.  How can I contribute to myself tonight without wanting to make the perilous task /effort to interact with others? Fridays are the worst.  But I like human interaction unfortunately. I like it but I'm stressed out at the same time and I don't know how to juggle the two. I feel like there is a life long problem here.

---

"Say I love you before the sky tumbles"

Love!

You think you get it but you never will.

---

I feel so uncomfortable, like all the time.

My favorite reminders come from my friends.

My really good awesome friend Meg (seriously she is - look at what she created, also superbly excellent at snapchatting) from the MPH program sent me a snap chat this morning. It showed a picture of our mutual friend in a store with what seems to be cute clothes behind her and the caption "I feel like I'm in Kim's closet."

I woke up, saw it and laughed. (How flattering thank you!) It's also a running joke between my classmates that I am "the coolest person they know" and "we keep you around because it makes us cooler."

It made me happy and reminded me what I am to people.

With my incoherent blogging comes more!

I don't think it can be better said. I was perusing the internet as I do when I am freaking out in my mind and I came upon this girl's blog. I love it!


Now, "stop freaking comparing yourself to others" she says.

It's like a dance, life that is.

Gonna have to face it right now. Head on. Go through it all. The ups and downs of the next few months while keeping my head up high. Things aren't handed to you and people don't know about you. Time to paint the sky and find the right fit. It's like a dance, it's like a shake-up that one day it will fit but you gotta try.

Search search search and find. Find home.

Oh yes! My thoughts, where have you gone?

Not quite sure to be honest!

Because I couldn't have said it better.

My weekly horoscope:

Ask for it. Own it. Love it. 

Make it. Be in right relationship with it. Spend it on education. Spend it on things that help your body and your health. Spend it on travel, especially if it helps your business have a greater reach. Expand it by giving freely of yourself without refusing payment for your efforts. Devaluing yourself is so snore. It doesn’t help anyone, especially you.

Repeat after me: I allow others to see my worth, value my contributions and give me a fair trade for all that I do. 

It helps if you can recognize your talents but if you know you don’t, ask a trusted friend to remind you. You don’t have to wait until your ready to be ready. A violet doesn’t refuse to be violet. It doesn’t refuse to be adored. It’s not ambivalent about where it takes root or how much sunshine it drinks up. It just exists. 

Commit to your existence. 

It’s not a big deal. You’re already here, don’t worry about taking up too much space. The space you take up is yours for the taking. Take it. Own it. Love it. Because when you do you give others the the idea that they could too. And that’s why we are here, or one of the perks of this whacky escapade. If our lives amount to anything it’s never in relationship to the amount we amassed. It’s in direct relationship to the amount of love we inspired. That’s your real worth. That’s your real gold. That’s your real gift to us all and there is nothing wrong with being able to pay your bills and spend a weekend in a beautiful hotel eating chocolate ice cream and hanging out in bed with your lover. 

- See more at: http://www.chaninicholas.com/jupiter-leo-horoscopes-week-july-14th/#sthash.N0yRtQ9t.dpuf

The rhyming on this lyric is so good.

You bring the ocean, I'll bring emotion
Together we'll make a love potion
You bring the ocean, I'll bring the motion
Dancing all night in slow motion

-Family of the Year//St. Croix

Trust

in time. That's what I tell my heart. Trust in time.

---
"The Universe is under no obligation to make sense to you" - Neil Degrasse Tyson

I'm gonna fight it.

This internal struggle of mine to want to settle down. In my head I feel an overwhelming sense of wanting to go back to California to settle down. To be in one place for a while, to build what I feel like I haven't built, a relationship in particular. Settling down is not real. It's imaginary. People who have settled down have convinced they have. I'll let you in on a secret (they have no idea and are not settled at all.) So why chase this preconceived notion of being settled down. I am fucking settled down. My heart is happy. I am doing what I want with this world. I am eating what I want and I have goals to still meet. Anti-thesis of settling down is living. This is not to negate the fact that for those that have followed the traditional "settling down" route of marriage and children are lesser, in fact, their path is to be celebrated along side mine. They demonstrate that love comes in different forms, that marriage can be one thing and raising the next generation another. I am also not against that totally and want that for myself but I am also not going to get caught up in feeling bad that I have not yet taking the traditional route sooner than others. 6 billion people on this earth - let's celebrate all the different aspects of life.

I snap back into it know that a move back to California will not ever return to this imagined settling down that I have envisioned for myself. In fact, California as I know it will not be like it was before. The bay area as I know it will not be like it before and if I can get over this fact and be content with my heart and where I am than I will be okay.

There was this quote I saw in the world wide web - if it doesn't feel wrong than it isn't right. If it doesn't feel uncomfortable than perhaps that's not what it is. Soon I will have my Master's degree. 26 is very different. 27 will be even more so. This looming pressure to accomplish when really I should celebrate what I already have as a 26 year old. I forget how old I am sometimes. As you progress age no longer matters.  Only 10 percent of the U.S. population has their Masters.

Anywho.

I keep so much inside me but somehow it leaks out and people see my colors. For some reason I have never done art in front of people but people I barely know assume that I am artsy and creative. I find that entertaining and am not sure how they come up with that conclusion but I am flattered that I can have that affect on people. I wonder what would happen if I was uninhibited with my emotions. Shit could potentially be colorful crazy if I let myself shine at all times. I wonder how it could look like to have my channeled innerness come to the surface at every point in contact I make with the physical world.

Life process.

Loose leaves.

I have this wonderful opportunity to start all over again and to build something new over here. I can rebuild and rebuild and it wears on me, but at the end of it all life is about building and growing. That's what makes you feel alive doesn't it? At least that's what makes me feel. If I did not face my fears and overcome them in this manner than what else is there to do than to go to work and retreat in the usual?

I know I'm seeing and feeling many things for the first time. The east coast is a different story and I have a feeling I'm suppose to stay here so I can see what lays ahead. My friend Lillian once told me (about Vietnam) "opportunities will pop up that you'll never imagine" and I've taken this to heart ever since and approach life in this manner. When I am most scared, I think of that possibility.

I also think about the time I jumped from a waterfall in Laos and how scared I felt. I was SO SCARED. But I had manage to get to the edge with the encouragement of an Australian man (who was rather handsome) whose spirit and kindness I will always remember. He didn't have to help me but he did and that meant the world to me. I really really wanted to jump. And imagine standing on the edge of a stunning light turquoise gushing waterfall having walked already on the edge, staring down at the abyss and massive unknown (having seen other taller people jump with no harm.) I didn't know what was below, in fact it could of been anything, but I wanted to jump so bad, but I was scared. So I held my breadth and just said FUCK IT after moments of hesitation because it was my decision: me, myself and I. Did it feel good? Absolutely.

I cannot imagine my future because I don't know what's really there. I can only take in what is in the present and move forward with what I have and the things that surround me.  I have to remember that. That this is what it is. This is it. There is not another time. At the same time there is balance - to not overwhelm yourself in thinking that now is the only time. Balance.

Gotta just keep believing.

Because that's all I have. That's really all we have.

At the end of the day when your mind drifts into a place where your mind and body are no longer in control and all that has accumulated in the days worth drifts into clear incoherent whispers of infinite possibility.

Heard this somewhere on the echoes of the world wide web.

Your heart gets broken several times before Friday even comes. And then you hate Fridays. You hate Fridays because you can't bear to be alone. But then Sunday comes again and you go on with the world of heart breaking and the healing that occurs over time.

Stop fretting over your broken heart, my friend.

Soon it will make sense.

Today.

I just wanted to say that I feel extremely happy today.
All in the company of good people even in conversations with strangers.
My hearts so full and I see the tides shifting. Thanks.

Whoa.

"CANCER (June 21-July 22): Now that Mars is beginning his lengthy retrograde through your solar 4th, Cancer, you can expect surprising shifts and energy-surges revolving around your relationship to the concept of home in the months to come—yes, even in light of any thoughts that you'd already made plenty of progress in this arena over these past months. 'Home' is a broad topic, of course, which covers your literal residential dwelling, its décor, and those you share it with; the geographic locale where you currently live, the one you fondly remember and/or the one you yearn for; the family relations (whether blood or not) who help provide you a sense of emotional security (or fall short in doing so), and your own efforts to do the same. One or more of these thematic sectors is likely, therefore, to demonstrate continuedunsettledness… which needn't equal disaster but probably involves a handful of irritants that'll demand your attention, on behalf of ultimately securing greater internal peace-of-mind. This week especially, please keep your eye on that big life-anchoring prize. Between possible jolts in your career zone and the lovely-but-potentially-sidetracking influence of certain relationships, self-assuredly rooting your own intentions is presently a full-time job."


dead on.

Perhaps I don't need to go anywhere but here.

Let's see.

Maybe love is always in the wrong timezone.

I hear you on that.


---

My wise roomie4life: "It feels subtle no? It's still a day full of extra love but I see it as a day to remind ourselves to love each other in order to maximize capacity as many days of the year as possible. A day to be reminded to be intentionally romantic if it is not your strength."

I get excited over really good sentence structure.

And I'm alright with that.

This Valentine's Day I'm going to not be scared of myself.

With the inauspicious date approaching, I brainstormed a myriad of ways to not be by myself both literally and figuratively.

Hang out with friends.
Watch a movie in my apartment.
Drink wine.
Go to a bar.

Like all Friday nights, I try not to be by myself because I fall into what I'd like to call a Lonely Friday Night Spiral. It's the fact that whenever I stay in on a Friday I get pretty sad and lonely. Then I start thinking about the things I don't have, the things I want, and my mind wanders to thoughts of wanting to settle, wanting to find the one, and self deprecating thoughts of how much of a loser I feel.

Well fuck that.

On one of these nights, I asked myself: Why are you so scared to be by yourself?

Where is my self contentment? Where is the love for myself? Where is that all knowing happiness that one gets when all is good? Why does it have to come from another? Can it truly come from others?

--

I'll spend Valentine's day with friends yes, I'll maybe do some art and send them to friends! That sounds like a good idea.

Thoughts on a Sunday.

I hope the world really hears me this time around.

---

I guess I finally did it.

---

I've sorta had this crazy (not so crazy) colorful life adventure through several cities and countries and my heart is just ready to have one in one place with one person, to not let that part of me be the empty part, and let the colors of life fill in a different fashion. Sometimes I have strong feelings, I believe it will happen, and then it will. I haven't had strong feelings in a while. There isn't a place that I really really want to be and for the first time in my life I have no idea where to go next. I don't really want to wander. I know I want to solidify my roots. There's one thing for the world to fill that empty for you. There's another to try to fill it yourself with consistency. Sorta like when one thing in your life is constant, you are free to focus your energy that are of your heart's content. I'm a strong believer that with idleness comes creativity. With Ugly comes Good. That without one the other cannot exist.

Sunday Funday.

Even though this came from those dumb lists of life things you should know before the age of whatever, I loved this:

You are going to have moments of unbearable loneliness.  You need to learn how to love being with yourself, because ultimately, no one has the potential to love you like you can.  It is beautiful to love and be loved, but these are just hints as to how to regard yourself.  If you regard yourself highly, and learn to turn loneliness into soothing solitude, you will be capable of giving and receiving truly transformative love.

via here.

Will my heart ever be free?

?

Sometimes you can't help but feel that the world is a bad place.

I have a few things that I am certain about and when that feeling comes it is usually strong enough to compel me to trust it. 

The world is such a strange place with forces so bad you can't even imagine the amount of Ugly that prompted such behavior. On this I felt feelings that I never knew I could. I miss home. I miss comforts. In Vietnam, I never really had such a strong feeling like this. Perhaps because I considered Vietnam to be home. 

This is what I see.

My favorite story teller in Vietnam! <3 td="">

The princess

Looking down for once.

Rooftops

Glows.

Dry.

New heights.

Let it snow foil.

My favorite meal in Vietnam.

Durian, Papaya and friend Giang = best combo.

Miss this little munchkin.

These amazing ladies warm my heart. 

Fuckin' bamboo and duck soup. BUN MANG VIT TO MY HEART. 

Stacks on stacks.

Mangosteen my belly.

Delighting in broken bones.

How I feel about studying.

Yes yes and more yes.

The moon ain't full tonight. 

Train station views.

Rustic vs modern.