g'dome chen

i came home today, checked my caller i.d and there it was: a call from G'dome Chen herself. then i check my voicemail and surely enough she leaves me a message: "Vi, it's me, call me at _ _ _-_ _ _ _. i call, ask what's up because i'm so very skeptical as to why she's calling me.

maybe i was skeptical for no reason. she just wants to take me out for my birthday dinner; however, she is only available mondays, tuesdays, thursdays and fridays. she asks about this coming friday. i tell her i have plans. we've made a date for next monday, june 6th. i will swing by her place to pick her up. i have no idea where we are going. it was cool that she called. can't slam a person for remembering my birthday and offering to feed me. then again, maybe i should wait to see exactly WHAT she plans to feed me before i congratulate her on attempt to be humane.

updates will fo' sure follow.

one more thing: she tells me her son's tennis instructor is a certain O. Gonzalez. LIKE WHOA

everyone needs a shredder

After re-reading one of E's previous entries about moving out and getting rid of all the paper in her room, I was inspired to go through a purging process myself. Unlike E though, I'm not moving out. It is just about high time I clean that damn bedroom of mine. After all, its only been 14 months and I've run out of other clean bedrooms in the house to seek refuge in.

It is true. How on earth does one human being accumulate so much paper in one lifetime? Why don't I throw this shit out and why do I insist on clinging on to seemingly useless things such as notes from my poli-sci 200 class? Ah, but then I started to review the notes and re-edumacated my ass on things such as the Meech Lake Accord. Some things, although perhaps with much more sentimentality such as notes from my Japanese friends who I met while in Nagasaki, wound up in the trash. I stopped convincing myself that I would actually sit down and write to these people again. It's been 10 years and I never kept in touch with the Japanese kids after 1996. Then there are the twisted notes my girlfriends have written to me during moments when they've been tres bored in high school science or marketing class. These are precious, albeit, very mortifying to re-read! I cannot for the life of me throw these girlfriend notes away. At least not this year!

I came upon another note written to me on the back of a cut-out of Michael Jordan and it said: "I can't read you sometimes. Maybe things between me and you would be different if I won 4 championships? J/K." And thus, I launch into another edition of Straight Out of The Vault, only this time, it's not about other people, it is actually about Bino:

T gave me this card in July 96; it was actually a belated birthday card. We use to jokingly trash talk each other b/c I was a Bulls fan and he was a Sonics fan. I rooted for Jordan while he cheered for Kemp. I told T he reminded me of Kerokerokeropi because he had a cute frog-like face (yeah, I gave such flattering compliments as a teenager). By the end of grade 12 and for the entire summer I swore we hung out every single day; like literally spent 20 hours together each day. He was nice and kind, unfortunately too nice and too kind, and back then I thought he was cute as a button but always knew he was also pretty boring because he was so very agreeable. We never officially dated or anything because I was too busy avoiding life and living in denial. After the summer was over I decided I didn't want to hang out with him anymore so instead of telling him the truth or even coming up with a big fat lie, I just decided to avoid him at all cost and not return his phone calls. He didn't do anything wrong, like I said, I was avoiding life. Funny how I morphed into this anti-social nutcase after high school.

After sitting by my bed looking at this weird card and starting to think back to my time hanging out with T, I dug out my grade 12 year book to see what he wrote. Its been so long since I've actually read what anyone wrote that I forgot the fact that T took up 14 pages of my yearbook to scribble stupid things. I shouldn't say stupid, that's not fair. After reading it through once, I thought to myself: WHOA, dude was totally in love with me, writing stuff about how he thinks of me as his best friend, how much fun he has talking on the phone with me until 5:10am every night, how cute I look when I eat Score blizzard from Dairy Queen and how close he feels to me because he can talk to me about anything. Just the usual high school lameness right? Sure, however, I got really embarrassed reading this, not because it's so bloody cheesy and corny but because it reminded me that ok, yes, he may have been way too passive and boring for my liking, but he was a really good and kind person and unfortunately, I was anything but good and kind in return. Why was I such a horrible teenager?

He also wrote "sometimes you're so sweet and sometimes I think you're really really scary, I think you need to work on the consistency of your kinder side J/K". Actually, I doubt he was just kidding about me needing to work on my kinder side. Reading this sucked; it just sucks to be reminded about how mean and rude I was to people who really didn't do anything to me other than try to be nice towards me. As weird as it may sound, I always knew that T really liked me but somehow it totally grossed me out. At 17, compliments from other people just weirded me out and I really didn't know what on earth to do with my "emotions," let alone OTHER peoples feelings for me. I chose to deal with my emotions and other people's emotions through denial and being a complete fuckface! Despite how un-cool I may have been towards T, he's always remained the nice guy and calls my house every year on June 2nd to leave me a happy birthday message. He stopped calling a couple of years ago. LOL. Don't blame him. I wouldnt want to wish me a happy birthday either, given my attitude. I thought to give T a call that day...but why? To say what? "Oh hey, sorry I was so lame and mean to you 9 years ago, take care and let's chat in another 9 years!" Right...

Anyway, I felt horrible about myself for the rest of the day but managed to clean up my room pretty good. I threw out the Michael Jordan card and part of me wanted to throw out my yearbook too but I did not. SIGH. Now, if only they made cerebral memory shredders!

travel

Last Tuesday, my friend T (the radical feminist) called me up to invite me to accompany her on a one month trip to Israel. Not just any invite but an "all expenses paid by her dad" kind of trip. I was totally stoked and was touched that I was second on her list of invitees; her girlfriend was first, of course. Unfortunately, like her girlfriend, I am also swamped with work and so, had to decline. I also declined for safety reasons. As much as I would love to travel to Israel, the political and cultural context of Isareal in 2005 just does not appeal to my inner neuroticism. Perhaps in my next life, when I am a Jewish cat.

In other travelling news, chEEse dropped me an email yesterday to let me know about his research scholarship in Taiwan next year. Turns out, chEEse and I will both be in Asia during February and March of 2006 so he will try to drop into Vietnam so we could have coffee; Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk of course! Although, I'm thinking no ice because I'm not inclined to trust the water in Vietnam.

ethnic fashion & food

"ethnic jewellery" is all the rage in fashion these days. and what do fashion magazines and stylists mean when they say ethnic: "tribal, south american topaz and Native pieces." also popular are "ethnic slippers and sandals" such as "moccassins, chinese kung-fun slippers and Indian embroidered or embellished slip on shoes."

similarly, at most supermarkets, the "ethnic aisle" is where you would find fish sauce, couscous, curry, seaweed or nori, etc. funny how pasta is not in the ethnic aisle and when argyle print was all the rage, nobody bothered to declare "ethnic prints for sweaters are all the rage."

like C+C music factory once said, "things that make you go hmmmm" (btw, what the hell happened to Freedom and the gang anyhow?)

"You're My Dog!"

While in Montreal, BF and I watched Sin City, only because BF is ga-ga over Jessica Alba. Whateves...she's allright, you know, if you like that big boob, big ass, big lips, big puppy dog eyes look...

Anyway, while we were in the theatre we caught the trailer to Jet Li's new movie Unleashed. Let me tell you, this is ONE hell of a movie! The gist of the plot is this: Jet Li is a man raised as a dog, trained to fight and destroy his opponents in illegal, underground fight-clubs. The main character in the movie is perhaps the collar/leash that Li is forced to wear by his master, some fat British man in a fat white suit. Blah blah blah, Li somehow escapes his fat master and winds up at the doorstep of a blind piano man played by Morgan Freeman, who teaches him how to be human. I've been telling BestBuds about this movie for the past couple of days and she REALLY seems to enjoy my Jet Li impressions. I could have sworn one of Li's line in the movie was this: "My name is Chucky," when Freeman questions him about his sordid past and identity. But apparently, BestBuds checked the website and Li's character actually says: "My name is DANNY." haha. This is only funny if you are aware of the fact that I use to have a Chihuahua named Chucky. Furthermore, BestBuds points out to me that the subtitle of the movie is "Danny the Dog." ahahhaa. You have to admit, the concept of a man being rasied as a martial arts dog via a state of the art stainless steel collar is quite a hoot. Well I don't know why this movie's got me all reved up but don't worry, I don't plan on dropping $12 to see it. HOWEVER, I'm not opposed to accompanying any of my dear friends to the movie theatre if they're dying to see it.

Well, since BF has his Alba eye candy to drool over, I might as well find me some fine ass 5 foot Man-Dog to slober over. And yes, pun was very much intended.

Mon petit frere

I'm still in french mode after coming back from my Montreal trip. Updates of that trip will have to wait as I need to save something to procrastinate on when I get back into the office tommorrow. In the meantime, the photos from the trip are posted on my album.

I wonder if my brother Paul thinks I'm a freak. I'm sure he does, but I'm also convinced that he must think I am the coolest mofo on this side of the galaxy. Today I drove him to work in "his car" (translation: my mom's car) and as I was driving, I sneezed twice. The second sneeze was accompanied by saliva chunks, some of which landed on his dashboard and some that landed on his left hand. He was truly disgusted and had the nerve to ask me "why are you so gross???!!!" I laughed, apologized and promise him that I'd wipe and sanitize his car when I get back home. He tells me not to worry because he always sanitizes his car after knowing that I've driven it.

Other famous quotes from little brother directed at me in the past and more recently include:

• "You know Vi, I wouldn't be surprised if you were bisexual" [yup, just another night at the Nguyen Family dinner table last month....]
• "I have 3 parents in this house and you're the strictest one!" [followed by some crying after I wouldn't let him do something--i forgets]
• "But Vi, it's the Philladelphia FLURRIES" [followed by some more crying because I told him it's FLYERS, not FLURRIES. he had some nerve as an illiterate 5 year old, telling ME, a sophisticated 11 year old, how to read]
• "Vi has fleas in her crotch" [his response to Eng as she was making a home video of birthday wishes for my 16th b-day. lovely, ain't it?]

Oh little brothers...what to do with them. Well, despite everything you've just read, little brother has grown up to be a decent human being: he's well adjusted and no where close to being as dysfunctional as I was at that age. Plus, he's grown up to give me advice:

• "If a gay person likes you, it's a compliment. You should be happy if anyone thinks you're good looking."
• "Geez Vi, you need to do something about your big gums and small teeth...its looks freaky"

Kids. Boy do they grow up fast.