Detours of a south east asian prairie girl

Can’t say it’s been a dull year. By far, we’re talking monumental highs and devastating lows. It started with a bona-fide bang, 2 months of holidaying in Asia. The rest was a nonstop roller coaster that I could’ve done without. Tonight, at the end of 2007, I am filled with cautious hope that a personal big battle has not yet been lost. Cautious hope goes a long way; it’s a placebo effect. To those of you who have seen me moped and cried through this and provided loving support, thank you so so so much. It has been an all-consuming affair indeed.

Classy crab dinner in the Gion district of Kyoto was probably the highlight for the foodie in me, although there are no shortages of highlights foodwise. Word of advice for anyone who loves food, ya gotta go to Japan.

I took up photography seriously for the first time. My head is spinning still, but in a good way. Art and design has never been as thrilling, which is seriously confusing the Vulcan in me.

At one point in time, I juggled 4 jobs and put new meaning to the word ‘moonlighting’. Tiring, yes. But ya sure learnt a lot about what ya can and can’t do!

The biggest lesson: I am no longer satisfied being an armchair traveller. Which means, I gotta save up some serious dough in as continuous a fashion as possible.

Most satisfying purchase that I did not want to spend money on: A new dishwasher. Ho-hum, but oh the wonders of a working dishwasher!

Top choice for film of the year: Todd Haynes’ I’m Not There.

Favourite TV event: Battlestar Galactica Razor!

Top request from friends and family: All-butter chocolat croissants, made, proofed and baked with looooove.

Most enjoyable book: Hmm, too many. Really really liked The Earthsea Quartet from Ursula K Le Guin tho. Brilliant.

Top booze discovery: Viognier. Effing delicious! Beer Lao is a very close second.

Top “lines” that friends said about me to me, with love:
1. You’re a drama queen.
2. You used to get along with everybody. Why the edge now?
3. Aiyah, [insert my Chinese name], I know you. You *are* weak!

Hmmmmmph.

Last movie of the year: Enchanted. Enchanting indeed. Fantastic funny laugh-out-loud somewhat gender-bending fairy tale, what’s not to like?

So, 2008 practically here, shall we make merry?

You better know what you’re doing before you bend the rules, that’s all I’m sayin’.

To live, find me in a big city with lots to do. A town where I can work hard and have options for activities. Friends to see. The clink of glasses in amber rooms crowded and merry.

For escape, let me lie on an empty beach with a lone vendor grilling fresh caught fish for company. I’d be the happy girl under the shade drinking pulpy juice from a young coconut. Orwell by my side, maybe something lighter. I’d imagine myself as Pi, perhaps, although his was in truth, a tragic tale. You catch my drift.

If I am to die, let me ride into rain so fine that it is in fact, a mist. Light on my face, cool enough to fool me into believing that I am alive. This so that I may see my road ahead. Let this grey mist be my blanket and let I fold gently into its night.

To love then, is rather simple. Where you are, there I am. You do not want distance and I am happy to oblige. Yes?

Going through some kind of transition right now. Feeling the pull from various directions and within. Really need to travel. Can’t, for many reasons. I suppose that’s the fight or flight response and flight is mighty tempting at the moment. In any case, my arse needs to stay put despite feeling wild.

Well, Holly Cole’s calm smoking vocals are helping at least. Perhaps I can be the hero in her cover of Tom Waits’ Tango Till They’re Sore:

… make sure they play my theme song, I guess daisies will have to do
just get me to New Orleans and paint shadows on the pews
turn the spit on that pig and kick the drum and let me down
put my clarinet beneath your bed ’til I get back in town

let me fall out of the window with confetti in my hair
deal out Jacks or Better on a blanket by the stairs
I’ll tell you all my secrets, but I lie about my past
so send me off to bed for evermore …

Off to bed I better go, ipod buds in my ears, impatience begone!

I see your picture everyday. I blink and time moves. Perhaps more so here than where you are. Where you are. Where are you? There is the picture of us, wet from sea salt spray, messy hair. We grin into the camera, cross-legged and happy. Never mind the unflinching sun, never mind the hot dirt.

Someday I will find you. Someday on a yellow thin strip of sand, grey waters surfing in and coconuts falling hollow to the ground, you will find me. When the last of the fading sun’s light dips below, you will see me. We will be much older, of course. But you will see me and know me. I’ll hold out my hand to greet you, my friend, and just like that, the sounds of us playing as children do, will ring.

Today, I am here on another side of the world. Tonight, my thoughts are simple. And in this quiet separation, I simply miss you.

Just saw I’m Not There, a brilliant reimagination of Bob Dylan’s personas and ages. As he showed in Far From Heaven back in 2002, director and writer Todd Haynes makes movies with the most loving hands and eyes. The searing intensity and colors from the 1950’s Far From Heaven are now sparkling shades of grey and white in this new film.

The soundtrack rocks, the actors the best bunch out there. Michelle Williams is delicious in somewhat of a cameo role and Cate Blanchett as Dylan’s medicinally-addled rock alter-ego brings down the house. This is one heck of a smart film with tons of technically sharp imagery and loose connections. And loose in the most fantastic of ways. I mean, the Beatles on helium, no way! Go see it in the theatre, the surround sound and big screen will wow you, I promise.

One of my favourite singer-songwriters. Vienna Teng writes and sings beautiful lyrics in English, being from the States and all, and once in a while, she throws in a fun gem. This is one of them, complete with hilarious banter: