I didn't want to be your neighbor any more

Friday my office crush in Hong Kong also showed up to a more important meeting in Shanghai with the senior guys.  We bumped into each other in the elevator lobby as we went to use the restroom.  He was surprised to find me (shows that he was aloof since I already walked by him before).

Later, he swung by my office area and asked how come I am working in Shanghai.  I instinctively replied, "Because I do not want sit next to you as a neighbor any more."  He cringed at the answer somehow.  It was meant as a joke but I can't deny it's really mostly the truth.  He then went to talk to the young girl sitting in front of me before he returned to talk to me again, which made me jealous.

He asked about everyone's background.  I dissed the Hong Kong office a bit but I think I should have just practiced my silence and diplomacy.  I promised myself that didn't I?  Just because in my mind he is someone I could confide to does not mean in reality I should trust him.  In fact, I don't.  I know he would just use people, for passport, for connections, for promotions.  I feel that in him, and I feel that he would just as well abandon friendship for the lack of useful cause.  I do not want to be that deserted party.  He told me that he always like China more than Hong Kong.  For now, I like Shanghai.  I like my new friends here and I like the feeling of home here.  Weather is cool and a bit rainy, just the kind of nostalgic feeling that attracts me.  I feel home.

Chasing H in the airport

Of course I feel like this is a total repetition of what is naturally programmed in me.  I know that almost twenty years ago, I started the same obsession with my biology teacher, with the child prodigy and then with my Aca Deca competition mate.  I know it repeats itself.  I know it's bad.  I hope yoga will help quiet my mind and I hope maturity and my learning of the feminine power can help free me from my programmed obsessive self.

So - it might be ridiculous to you and it might potentially be very embarrassing for me.  I was surprised to find that as I was getting ready to leave the office for my flight to Shanghai, my ex-crush walked into the office with his suitcase.  After chatting with his new associate for a while (he interestingly hired someone who is from the west coast and went to the same graduate school as my undergrad and also studied in Europe), he left with his suitcase.  I knew it was not appropriate for me to go to the airport with him.  I had not talked to him for months, alas.  I did however, find the in me a surging desire to follow him.  I did.

Ten minutes after he left (I waited), I managed to clean up and move toward the airport.  I wanted to see him outside.  I knew it was a conflicting emotion, one wanting to see him pulled by a very basic instinct of sexual attraction, and another the desire for self-control.  I know my emotion has not been the most trained animal on the block and I wanted to tame it in order to have a good life.  Letting me follow attraction is not a good idea.  When I talked about him and many other crushes after all, friends often ask if I actually slept with him. I know it is ridiculous.

When I got to the airport, my flight gate was not yet assigned.  I was left with time to kill and knew I couldn't help myself but to find out the gates for other more expensive flights leaving for Shanghai. I found Dragonair and had a hunch that his flights would leave from there.  I went there.  I looked around.  And as I was leaving, I ran into him.  He had headphones on as always and I waved and stopped him.  He was calm and collected.  I was too.  But then I have no idea what the undertone really is like.  I greeted him and asked if he was going to Shanghai.  He asked if I was going to 504.  I said no.  My gate has changed and I don't know what my new gate is yet.  He left.  I wonder what he thought.  Did it seem obvious that I was lying and would he have any inkling that I was stalking him?  He must have some sense of my obsession, not that it bothers him or that he particularly cares.

I am relieved now that I did see him and that now I can start my two weeks without him in Shanghai.  All is well.

On a different note, I am very interested in brushing up my flirtation skills.  It is so useful and the subtlety can loosen up any situation and why not wield the feminine power?  It makes life more fun definitely.  It can help my obsessive nature.  It puts me on the radar screen.  Speaking, like writing, is an art.  I not only need to know how to say the words with confidence, I also need to learn how to deliver the write message to the right person in the right way.  Live with flair. For example, I thought about my supposed date yesterday.  Why would the Frenchman tell me first about his lawsuit and not continue telling me what it is?  Why use that as a bait for me to get to know him further?  That definitely is an attractive trait and which female in her rightful mind would want to go out with someone just so he could reveal what his lawsuit is about in time?  Age certainly did not help the Frenchman with the artful craft of speaking.  I certainly need to brush up on that side.

"I like your inverted smile." says the Frenchman

Yesterday I got a strange call with a strange accent.  The person mumbled something about being from my business school.  He asked to meet me for coffee.  I figured out in the end amid my apologies for bad reception that he is the middle-aged bald European guy I see walking around town, whether it is on the escalator or having coffee at the Starbucks in my building.  I just happened to bump into him that morning when I was walking to work.  I agreed to meet him today.  Later in the evening, he called again and asked if I would have dinner with him at a French restaurant at 9pm.  I refused.  I wanted to go to hot yoga and had no interest for a very sudden request for coffee or lunch.

I met up with the guy this morning out of curiosity and a slight kick that someone is officially asking him out, no matter who it is.  He showed up but did not tell me anything about himself.  He again mumbled - I realized that it wasn't a cell reception problem but his own slurred foreign speech.  He said something about always thought I liked him a little bit.  He met me two years ago and kicked himself for not picking up the phone to talk to me then.  He liked my inverted smile.  That was what J told me before..

He wouldn't tell me anything about himself.  He said he's in a bit of legal problem and he would not tell me what it is.  He said he would not tell me anything because women would start vetting the guy afterwards.  He did not want that.  He just wants to have dinners and see him.. then eventually he would tell me.  What is that?  Do I want to know about him in the future? But we are meeting right now.  Why can't he tell me about it right now?  Why do you like me and yet know nothing about me?  I decided not to see him again. Even my curiosity is not enough to cover my impatience for his English skills and his potential liability as a downer in my life.

Gosh there are so many people with less than satisfying jobs and lives.  I appreciate the little sanity that I have here.

Looking forward to Shanghai - my changing heart

After my fixation on the Bay Area, I am now moving my target toward Shanghai.  Most of my friends have moved away one after another in Hong Kong and now I feel quite alone.  I don't even know how to begin meeting new friends.  I went to church with a guy friend last weekend and saw "World War Z" afterwards.  It was good to meet new people, even if they are younger and two couples.  Just like the wedding I attended before, I was seated with four or five couples.  I was the conspicuously the only single person there.  But no matter.

In any case, I feel fondly for Shanghai.  Not to say the city is better than any other, but it is the newness that attracts me in addition to being my home.  In a new city, there are new corners to explore and new experiences to have.  There I can reinvent myself.  I can be unknown and perky again.  I don't have to act awkward around my coworker any more.  I know there would be the same issues but it is rejuvenating to have more chances at life.  Besides, since my family is there, it is a way for me to actually build a base that will always be there.

After two years, I bumped into my old colleague in the same building as me.  He used to sit next to me and had moved on from his old job at the same time as me.  Now he is again my building mate and is also attending an executive mba program at my old business school.  I treated him to lunch.  Good to make new connections from old acquaintances.

I have been hooked on the new TV serie "House of Cards" after a church friend recommended it.  It indeed is very good.  I am attracted to the girl there, who looks like my affair's new girlfriend.  Looking good is my new hobby.  If I can lose a few pounds first that is.

Cherish life

It has already been more than six weeks into my coughing/bronchitis session and I am growing tired of it.  I want my energy and life back, where I can think clearly and exercise and go out and enjoy the city.  Instead I still move between work and my apartment half-zombi-like and pestered by incessant coughing.  My chest X-ray taken at the doctor's visit last week came back positive, but that did not prevent me from catching the 2nd wave of cold.  I really need to get better.  I did quit smoking entirely, a leisurely habit I had taken on since two years ago to experiment with different facets of life.

But all of this is no comparison to the chat I had with an old business school friend of mine, who informed me that his fiancee had surprisingly been diagnosed with reproductive cancer and their September wedding is now cancelled.  This is especially shocking given the proximity I have to the event.  The girl is around my age and my friends in banking have been feeding me stories of people around them being diagnosed with all sorts of illness lately.  We all think we are young and have time to burn before we get to doing what really matters to us.  Somehow we all think life will sort itself out and we would get enough time to do what we are meant to do in our short time on earth.  Yet the time is now, but it is slipping away.

"Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains."  So says Rousseau.  As we grow older, we are more aware of the limitation set around us by the unseen forces, power you are not as aware of as a young and innocent child.  I think back to the movie "Taxi driver."  You get a job, and then in a little while you become what the job is.  What more do we want? Just passing through life?  Enjoy the superficial comfort money brings and obey our expected duty to raise the next generation?  This all beyond me.

The tangible thing to do: I have signed up for a physical exam in August to care for myself.  I've never done so before.

Another one of my close friends has left Hong Kong this week.  I am again alone.  I plan to be in Shanghai the next two weeks for a change.  Hopefully I can learn something new in a new place and find opportunities along the way.  Hopefully I'll be again my whole self with my energy back there.

Adding to the simple pleasures of life - Netflix, Hulu, and conversation with a Shenzhen masseur

Whereas before I ran around Hong Kong seeking thrills, activities, new people, the last months I have been staying put at home mostly.  I find peace in my own place by myself.  After owning Apple TV for a long time, I finally managed to set up links to Netflix and Hulu Plus.  A few missing episodes of Desperate Wives and Mad Men in the queue, I am happy.  The two have a generous trial period (Netflix trial period is a month), and the $7.99 monthly fee is much more attractive than my nowTV suite.  Rather than giving money to the Li Ka-shing family by default, I called to cancel my nowTV today.  There is no need for 2 year contract now.  Who could plan two years in advance?!

To add to my peace and the simple pleasures, I went to Shenzhen for massage last Sunday.  I researched the best route to take there from Central.  Rather than transferring at Hung Hom and TST stations as I had done in the past, I transferred at Mongkok and Kowloon Bay. The whole trip took an hour but it was rather effortless.  I could read and surf the web like I normally do at home anyway.

It is probably good to note the conversation between masseur and me in Shenzhen.  She looked young but not too young and told me that it is rare for a girl to come to massage alone.  I suppose.  But I'm single.  I am not interested in engaging in coordinating activities with friends most of which don't have a visa to China or are otherwise not so close and would need my attention on the trip.  I do not have enough patience at times to act as a tour guide to people have no clue about China, either in language or in culture/history.  

She later said that she's single and born in 1976 from a family of five in Pingdingshan, near the coal mining town in Hebei.  She doesn't want to get married, so she says.  We spent the next hour talking about the strain of marriage and how modern marriages mostly don't last.  I need to be better to myself, she says.  Why do I earn all this money but not spend it on myself?  I'm the first person she's heard who come to Shenzhen not to relax but as a way to explore a channel to stay there for free while I rent out my apartment in Hong Kong (on airbnb).  When she saw me, she immediately thought that I am not the kind that would make myself look good and attractive through clothing.  I do I said.  I am just very stingy and think everything costs so much.  And I don't know what to do with old clothes.  They seem to cost so much.  Do I just give them away later?  I have accumulated so much.  Oh, she said.  If everyone is like you and keep all their clothes, would department stores have any business?

Sure.  I need to treat myself better.  She said especially if I'm single and young.  Should I be saving my money for my kids and husband in the future?  Even if I would be using my own money later when I am married, I'd need to consult with my husband and think twice before I buy a dress.  That is the exact thing my family's Shanghainese friend from the U.S. said to me.

I rejected two airbnb requests already.  I did not want to trouble with leaving my apartment when I should be in Hong Kong.  It is a great way for a side cash however.  I am thinking I might just invest in a better couch that can allow someone to sleepover, for myself and for cash and for company.

Here's the map of the city that I'm trying to get to know more - a closer and cheaper alternative to Shanghai.

"Tokyo is like an old wife" and "Marriage begins with misunderstanding and divorce begins with understanding"

A Japanese business classmate came to visit on a business trip from Taiwan, where he is currently living, and we went out to have dinner.  He seemed to be a mirror version of me in his quest to have a family and settle down.  On the other hand, he is toying with three to four girlfriends at the same time in Taiwan.  He says he needs to settle down, so that the society tells him, but he doesn't want to settle down.  I am the same way.  I don't feel how settling down and having a family can guarantee it would be better than my single life.  Most of the couples are unhappy, how could I really be a sure exception?

Why not go back to Tokyo, what seems to be a natural destination for someone to find a place to settle down in a hometown?  He says because Tokyo is like an old wife, he already knows it too well.  Isn't it true with all of us that travel and live in different parts of the world, soon our relationship with a place is not unlike our relationship with the opposite sex.

There is a timeline, that sweet spot and then the decay, where statistically speaking most people get divorced at the seven year mark, in what is known as the "seven year itch."  I remember an older executive in one of my old firms told me that "Marriage begins with misunderstanding and divorce begins with understanding."

In some way it is cynical, but it is not devoid of some truth.  We all need a little bit of mystery to spice our imagination to lend more feeling to what is otherwise a boring existence.  When all is worn out, like when I know all of the freeways in a place, and how people think and act, where the WalMart is and where a career is headed step by step, or like when someone knows too well what his or her spouse would say the next moment and there is no longer any romance of the relationship, we begin to draw away and lose interest.

Rather than settle down, I adviced, perhaps it is better to find a mate to explore a new place together.  Shared experience can bring a couple together, whether it may seem better or worse at the time.  The horse trainer put it right this past weekend, "Often it is not the present that brings us happiness.  It is the memory and the anticipation."  In that sense, we shouldn't live in a place where it may seem better as a settle down place, but in a place where we can find hope and transformation.  A place that gives us a sense of mystery and empowers us to want to conquer it, to get to know it and become better because of it.

A wedding and two crossed boxes with a 47-year old horse trainer in San Francisco

I just came back from a long flight from San Francisco, stopping in two different place in between so that I could save some cash.  I need to write this down before the feeling quick erode and I am back in my Hong Kong state of mind.

First - meeting my love who went away
After all the heart felt words and an affair that turned to a divorce on his side, he showed up with the 27-year-old flight attendant/neighbor that he is currently dating.  I tried to keep my cool demeanor, talking with my classmate who flew from Shanghai.  Funny enough, he was in SF to meet him as a business contact and the week before I had shared with him the shenanigan between my 'ex'-love and myself.  It was nice to have someone to sit with in the church ceremony and hang out together in general.  He is married with a kid himself but his old rough side has grown more mature as time wore on and I find him good to talk to.  My ex love kept emailing me, like asking who the guy is sitting beside me in the chapel (I told him who it is... anti-climatically).  He wanted me to sit next to him at his table at the wedding reception.  I was happy to be sitting elsewhere with potential singles at a table on the other end.  But... it didn't prevent this...

Bouquet throwing and bathroom crying.. how cliche..
When it came to bouquet throwing time, I reluctantly walked to a crowd of women, and stood in the back row.  Then his girl valiantly stood in the front row with open arms.. and what do you know.  She caught the bouquet!  So there I was, in a wedding of my friend who seemed to have it all and with my ex-love in the arms of another who caught the bouquet, where I could only stand in the back muted.  It was one of those 'My Best Friend's Wedding' moment.  My eyes welled up in tears, stimulated in part by the emotional speeches and jet-lagged psyche.  I had to excuse myself to the bathroom and cried for the next hour.  I did not dare to go back.  I knew I'd just lose it and embarrass myself and others.  It was one of the reasons why I did not want to become a bridesmaid in addition to not having time.  One girl waited outside in the stall forever for me and was seriously worried about me. Good thing was I did not know her.  Maid of Honor was there and I told her that the reason my eyes looked red and puffy was because I was moved by her speech.  I took a breather outside walking for a few blocks around Union Square in San Francisco.  When I returned, the cakes were already eaten and the wedding was over.  I caught the last goodbyes with a few people walking out.  An old Chinese graduate student who sat next to me wanted to take a picture with me so she could introduce me to a fellow PhD student who also moved to Hong Kong.

Nightclub, a stolen kiss and the horse trainer
An hour or two later, I ended up in the club lounge that the newly wed booked a block away from the wedding reception.  I saw him.  My love that I had buried along with the my best marriage years - he was there alone.  He came by and when he saw that a guy was talking to me he told me that I should keep on flirting.  "But what should you do when you have no real feeling?" I asked.  "Nothing I guess."  He told me that it was good to see me even if it is brief.  I told him that I felt sad.  He figured so, he said.  I had acted super cold to him.  Then we stood there.  His hand reached for mine and he reached over to kiss me.  Then he left.  We embraced there for quite a while.

The guy who talked to me earlier came back and became physical with him.  I said to myself, what the heck.  I did not have a strong feeling for him but I am only there for a short time and he was fit enough.  After a few moments of fondling around, I followed him home to Richmond, where he stayed.  He is a super neat guy and his condo, which I expected to be messy on an unexpected visit, was made up like a hotel room.  He is a third-generation horse trainer from Seattle, and his brother a jockey.  He was working in China for six years and followed a woman there.  He told me that they grew apart and he came back to the US.  Our conversations were fairly philosophical.  He said life was difficult for him in rural China where he did not speak the language and was the only foreigner that people stared at.  Even after he learned Chinese from a university he could not use it in those rural parts where people spoke dialects.  But after he came back to the Bay Area, the quiet suburb got to him.  He thought he could now speak to everyone, but instead, there is no one to speak to.  He lived close to the Berkeley horse track where he worked, and there is not a sound at night, not like the hustle and bustle in China.  But now he's stuck.

All that talk got to me.  Bay Area was very sleepy.  I missed how dynamic Hong Kong is.  I kept thinking that the place not for me.  Especially after talking to the horse trainer (who has no excuse for feeling lonely cause he's a Caucasian with his entire roots in the States) and also my father, whom I met right before his flight.  He said Shanghai is better.  Nothing changed in the Bay Area in the last ten years.  He walked from he used to park to UCSF and could not believe the efforts he took to find parking.  We visited our Daly City apartment, one of the places we stayed at and it all looked shabby.  He thought he wasted so many years.  Sure, most of us just run around in jobs that see no end, with no one caring and no real significance.  Suburbs are places of quiet desperation.

I came back appreciating Asia more.  It is happening here.  The faster pace meant that one gets to experience more life than elsewhere.  Being single is the norm in the city and one would not notice it as much as one would being all yourself in the middle of nowhere in the Bay Area.  Your existence does not matter.  It is about family life, but what if you don't have one built up?

I am happy about the trip.  I am happy that after all these years, I finally had sex with someone in the United States and I also crossed the age bracket unbeknownst to me.  47 was how old my ex-boss was when I started working with him and developing a long crush.  I fantasized sleeping with him and now I have done so with someone who is his age before.  I guess those boxes are crossed and I feel more satisfied because of it.

Lots to share, but I am happy to be back.  I learned a quick lesson there, and now I am in my comfort zone. My airbnb tenant paid me close to 400 bucks while I was gone and left the apartment in the same condition as I had left it.  That extra cash was sweet.