A beleaguered fortress

I had lunch with a successful friend who is a partner now at a major bank.  She married early and always heard my complaint but every time very matter of factly tell me that marriage is not what I think it is.  Like quite a few people who tell me that marriage is overrated, she likened the situation to a beleaguered fortress, a popular Chinese novel that describes life as a situation where people always think the grass is greener on the other side.  Those in the fortress want to get out, and those from the outside want to get in.  This applies to marriage, employment, etc.  But what about the guaranteed companionship that comes from being married?  She said before that it doesn't always work like that.  When you want company, your companion may not be present.  When you want to be alone, that person is there.  Who says one should get married or have kids? she questioned me.

I have to be honest with myself.  I am kind of nerdy and not someone I'd like to date if I am a guy.  I am kind of serious and most of my recent memories have centered around trying to make it.  Trying to stay afloat in a competitive world where I don't fall into the cracks.  I have been lucky to be where I am today, with a career I am satisfied with and a job that I am comfortable at.  It could definitely be a lot worse.

Talking with friends who have lived in Los Angeles a few days ago, I kind of realized that I somehow I have affixed myself on the idea that I need to return to the Bay Area many years ago, even though it is not a part of my life right now.  Yes indeed, SoCal is warm and offers surfing, and people are not as nerdy.  Why should I forever be associated with the nerdy Asian American types just because I went to college in that environment?  I like having that set of friends but there is a big world out there to explore, to try out the different outfits to see if they are ones that would suit me the most. Why not take this chance and do that.

I started to notice all the characters in Hong Kong, their diversity and energy and drive.  I like being Chinese.  It feels good.  I no longer have to justify to myself or to others who I am.  I can own up to it.  There is so much to discover and learn about China and the region.  Maybe that search and pursuit to go back to the Bay Area will all end with me liking this place once more?

Dad in hostel and advice "guys think with their dicks"

All's set for my return to San Francisco for my friend's wedding.  Interestingly enough, my dad would also be there at the same time as I found out in my last call to him and he mentioned he would be there to renew his visa.  More incredulous to me was rather than sticking with his normal adventurous airbnb arrangement, he said he had reserved a San Francisco hostel, sharing with five others.

I have to say that I was rather embarrassed by this again.  Somehow my family is just not normal enough to join the normal world that I live in, no matter how I try to look at it.  I worried that he would not like the rough environment there and who knows what kind of weirdo he would meet there.  A search on the internet said the hostel as one of the worst experiences the people who stayed there had.  As expected, there were drugs, piss etc. The conversation to convince him to switch did not go well.  I said it very bluntly that our family is better than being beggar-like like that.  He simply hung up and did not pick up again.  I shall just let things be I think.  It is good that he is being adventurous and I have to admit that part of my motivation of him being has to come from my own vanity.  This is no different than a chapter from the novel "The Glass Castle."  

On the other hand, besides totally much more than the 27 single female friends beyond the normal marriage age (even by educated liberal today's standard), I did receive an important advice from my ex in SF.  He said that the best thing I could do for myself is to look my best in the next year.  I need to make sacrifices and not eat the stuff that I normally eat.  I need to lose 10 to 15 pounds and I need to dress my best.  Guys are visual animals and think with their dicks.  When I am successful in losing weight and looking good, I would feel and act attractive, and that attracts people.  I agree.  Nothing is easy in life and we just have to try.  There is also no better way to spend money than looking better.

I do have more time and energy to feel womanly now that I have more control over my work hours I have to say.  And indeed, I can probably make money in the long-run if I just invest better rather than killing myself.  I do realize that there are so many more interesting things in life than making money (which is also important to me, just more fun doing it passively than actively).  I like reading about a lot of different things and I like developing long and meaningful relationships.  I'd like to experience being a mother.  I'd like to live a full life.

That said, despite the fact that there are very few guys that I feel attracted to, and I'm not sure how this looking good can really improve my chances.  My feeling for my Chinese coworker kind of backfired.  I think he is nice enough and kind enough to befriend, but my ego has been hurt and I really have ignored him completely for the past three weeks.  Even when I wanted to be nicer and talk, I found myself mostly silent (also being sick and coughing didn't help).  When he found me alone at lunch on Friday, he struck up a conversation saying how quiet it is.  I looked at him blankly and did not respond.  Before he went to lunch, he deliberately walked to the girl sitting next to me asking if she wants to have lunch.  When she said she already has plans, he walked by me without saying anything and then went and got his sandwich all by himself.   I have no more interest to hurt myself either now or in the future and it really isn't worthwhile to build up a relationship with him even if he could be such a great friend in my imaginary mind.

I'm attaching a picture here which I don't fully get.  But I take the advice from my ex graciously.

27 single girlfriends

I just sat down and tallied my single female friends around the region, all 27 of them.  They are ones I know for sure are single and not those choosing to be single or already dappling about in the dating pool because they belong to the beauty contest category.  The number indeed is staggering and disturbing, as all of them have good income and relatively good education.  It is not helping I know to fall down the path of negative thinking, but the numbers speak for themselves.  Can I be the few who buck the trend and land a good balanced life?

Lunch with a reporter and excursions with a dating agency

I had lunch with a Bloomberg reporter that I've known for a while on Monday.  A very down to earth Chinese who spent a few years in Oregon and Arizona, he seems to know about life in small town USA.  He just had a baby and overall seemed to like all the places he had been.  One needs to appreciate where one is at and not start to appreciate it all when you leave.  Oregon was green and Arizona was a desert.  One just needs to appreciate the geography when one is there.

I went to a dating agency yesterday.  I was kicked out of another repeatedly for no reason.  This time they accepted me, but it is exorbitant, costing HK$6000 for 3 introductions.  The lady who didn't have any makeup on herself and looked rather drab told me that I was dressed more like a mom type in the bird-print top I had on.  I should work on my hair and makeup.  She then handed me the prices for professional photography.  "Competition is more fierce in Hong Kong.  Other girls, graduates of Harvard and Insead all know how to package themselves.  They all took those professional photos to start."  Even Gweilos care.  They say those tops with large prints remind them of their mothers.

I went through her database and made my picks.  Half of the guys work in IT.  There are a few dorky Asian guys.  I felt a sense of entrapment thinking that I may be trapped with a guy like that for the rest of my life.  Yet I have to be the one taking professional photos to impress when the guys never needed to do that.  The strategist did say that all guys are looking for in a mate are "young and pretty."  This is a depressing reality.  I am no longer young and I can't say I'm extraordinary.  My brother today told me over im chat that the chance that I would find my perfect partner in Shanghai is 0.  So drastic and heartless.  If I want to deceive myself and dream, then by all means I should go on.

I had lunch with another potential employer who was interested in hiring someone like me in his team.  It also being a Chinese firm with marginally better platform, I acted rather reluctant.  This is especially true when I am considering altering my lifepath altogether.  I should just enjoy the present for now.

After a day in the park

A Shanghainese friend visited Hong Kong and I decided to reconnect.  I went to Chinese University with her while she visited another one of her friend.  I find the countryside calming.  We biked around Sha Tin and went as far as Tai Po before it began to rain and we returned.  I continued my cough that I thought I recovered from last week. I should be better to myself.  Turning a leaf in life definitely reprioritized my goals. While I still want to pursue a career that I enjoy, I hope to do it along side with all my personal development goals.  I want to pick up a hobby that most people in this part of the world do not have the time or the awareness to do.  I want to try new things, golf, club med, pamper myself.  I want to be good to myself, while there is no one else around to be nice to me.

I think I live in the busiest and loudest part of the town of the busiest city in the world.  This provides endless stimulation to my senses that it often drowns out my own voice.  It is easier to drift with the flow, work within the same system.   I want to find a peaceful spot, solace within the storm that I can retire to regularly.  Too bad to do one would need to add the necessarily cost of transportation and going to the airport.  Ok, I really need to stop whining and get busy living.  Recover first.

I'm ready for the plunge

A week back in Hong Kong and I am already feeling like leaving again.  I feel like the convenience of the city  has served as a disguise for a full social life.  One can easily get lost in the shallow relationships - so easy to make friends and so easy to meet, yet no one could give minimally to friendships and relationships and feel like one has so many.  My friends seem to connect with each other much more.  My friend from Shanghai again reminded me that life in Shanghai is much more settled.  I know my experience would be different, having not lived there for a long time.  But I know the settled feeling both there and in the States.

I feel stimulated and distracted in Hong Kong, but little belongs to me.  People come and go and I don't belong to the city ultimately.  I had my fun and my experience but it is now time for something else.  In any case, it'd be very difficult to have a family here.  I know I miss many aspects of the city, its international flavor, its convenience. Yet to everything there is a flip side, the international flavor comes as a weird mix of different people who come together and then leave, and the convenience comes at the price of the lack of commitment and people coming here just to make a buck and leave.  I can hardly think about investing in a bigger place but how could one actually live in a small apartment like this as a family?  Also identity wise, I don't really belong.  In the US, I feel American and can talk to lots of people and in China, I can also talk to a lot of people.  In Hong Kong, I can only talk on the superficial level to the expats passing by and at surface level to the locals.  It's been a long time.  It is time to try something else. In any case, I am not meeting that many new people.  Any place becomes stale after a while.  It needs a jump start.

All I need is to clean up my apartment little by little and put it on airbnb.  I need to sell some old clothes and clean it up a bit more.  Let's see how my tropical fish will do with the automatic fish feeder.  If it becomes a problem, I shall give them away.  They've lived well for over two years and managed to not lose a single one from their company.  I think that's an achievement in itself and a pretty good run for the short lives of tropical fish.

I am ready to take the plunge.

A place for guys who can't cut it

Hong Kong as a financial center attracts the ambitious alpha males for sure, but somehow it is also a refuge for those around the world who come to take advantage of the lack of education of the masses of people in Asia.  I seem to often wonder what people are doing here sometimes.  If one really wants to find one's self, they'd go to more harsh places like Africa or keep on moving, yet they stay - with no clear purpose or long-term plan.  The only thing I can tell is that they are enjoying the number of women here and readily give out the attention they like.  This has become more obvious every time I come back to Hong Kong from traveling elsewhere. Maybe it is the lack of real jobs for those who are not in finance.. maybe I should just be more forgiving to people because one day I might just end up in their shoes.  But one thing I feel more and more is that I don't have a lot of time to waste meeting and hanging out with people are just have little to contribute.