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.
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