The bad, we choose to forget. The good, we always remember.
In which I sleepily write about the most fun I have had in quite a while.
In which I sleepily write about the most fun I have had in quite a while.
Tonight, while on my way out of work, I felt a rush of cold water around my waist. No, it's not as if I have saline implants that could and would suddenly burst but I do have an awful relationship with water of any kind (people or otherwise). In my short lifetime, I have, under my belt, five instances where my precious cargo has been soaked with agua. Tonight, the victims were my USB and my memory card. A far cry from the soaked iPod and cellphones of before. So, in an effort to try and save the pictures in my sad, soaking gear (at least the ones that are still readable), here I am blogging a bit absentmindedly about a trip I barely remember--annoyed that I have lost almost 2/3 of my photos, annoyed that my piggy USB (which I loved) probably won't function anymore, annoyed that I haven't had the time to do this sooner. Has it really been that long? Seven weeks? What time is it? Why am I not yet sleeping?
One serendipitous moment in school, before I even had the work I have now or the new school dilemma currently plaguing my academic life (Do I even have that? An academic life?), I was asked if I would like to come to Hong Kong. So, throwing caution to the wind and hoping that generous people in my life would step up, I said yes. I mean, who would say no to the idea of eating so many roasting plates? Haha, just kidding. I thought it was a great idea, because what do I have to lose but a few shreds of my dignity while dragging a luggage (and failing miserably while doing so) out and about the streets of Kowloon? And really, I have been looking forward to a break of any kind anyway to assure me that life is still flowing towards the good times. It's not like I'd stand up in front of a lot of people, read things from a paper and stammer my way through the excruciating minutes of a practiced speech. It's not as if I'd spend half my day wondering what it would be like if I were a student of the oldest tertiary institution in the country, toying with the idea that if I fix things as soon as I get back, I might actually make it by fall. It's not as if I have made up my mind about Hong Kong if I were to live there, that this is the smell of Hong Kong on any given day: the exhaust from the city streets, a faint smell of the nearby sea, a mix of dewy mornings and cold wind, fresh noodles with steaming hot soup and the very faint but pungent undernote of roasted fowl that I seem to find around every block. No, it's not as if I would've done all that. Or did I? Would I? Could I? Let's see, what do I remember from this trip?
I vaguely remember walking so much that by the third day, I've lost all sensation on my feet, I remember figuring out how to enable a gluttonous life in CitySuper and looking for hunting the best egg tarts in the city (because really, food is the highlight of any trip--leisure, school, business or otherwise). I remember freaking out because there is no chatter when you walk to the MTR, that the sound is just heavy footsteps, the occasional clanking noise of coins falling off the ticket machine and subway tram doors opening at every stop. I think I remember waking up on the first night (dawn?) to see my roommate (Hi, Mary!) reading about Factor Mobility for school, realizing that well, that's how it's done. I also remember losing my MTR pass because I was so intent on finishing my very large milk tea (and you know, staring at people on court for what seemed like a shirts vs. skins pick up game. God, I love men.) I remember bursting into a The Smiths song once, when a double-decker bus passed us by. I remember a lot of talking about school and the future--how there are so many young achievers out there that it's a little disheartening, and perhaps even a bit unfair to wait for your turn for such a long time. Most of all, I remember young, impressionable people walking everywhere and anywhere to forget things and at the same time, think them through. We could do so much more if the world lets us.
Real or not real? I don't know. Perhaps I don't remember the right things about the trips I take after all.
