Taiwan-Update #8 July 12, 2006 + Everything else
Before I update on my travels in Taiwan last summer (2006) on the "Love Boat"...this is the current update on my life.
I feel the world has started to slow down, and I can finally catch my breath. I fell out of a one and a half year hurricane-tornado, and I'm no longer spinning. It's the first time in a long time I felt space and time have opened up for me and now I can travel at warp one. (well at least it's slower than warp 10) This semester -- my easiest -- is turning into something good -- I could tell. I'm approaching the sort of wonderful realization that I should reconnect with a lot of people I have lost touch with over the last two years...maybe...
I think that it's time to return to basics; to touch base with my humanity. Somehow I lost it, and have drifted into a self-loathing pit of work and ego. It's been due to my production classes, my work, my ambitions, and a lot of school related things. It's been too long since I really thought about my life and what it means to me -- especially what I want from my life. Since entering that "GREAT" film school called USC -- and I say that with caution nowadays -- where things were supposed to happen, I quickly realized there's more to it, more to what I want in life than that ideal dream of JUST becoming a director, but even then I feel just being able to do that would be WONDERFUL and a dream come true. Unfortunately I am a person of many interests and am never satisfied. It's a blessing and a curse. And because of the things I'm discovering and learning each day, my life has become a repetitive self-perpetuating epiphany. Like I'm rediscovering my life goal everyday, constantly searching for a convenient answer to where I want to go, but only to realize the next day I am passionate about another idea and another purpose. With all these different intersecting and distant paths and passions, it's been a really weird experience. I used to think, once I found some degree of direction, that's all I needed. It was definetely the case when I spent 2 years trying to get into this film school, but now things have changed. For the better? Probably. I feel like I'm a much wiser person in general. It feels like the more I learn, the more I crap out more passions out of my ass. I really admire some of my friends who drive toward one particular goal such as directing, and think of nothing else. I even admire those who haven't found direction yet, because they have a clean slate with nothing on it. I have waaay too many interests. It might be good to just dedicate my self to one of my loves and start letting go of some things I care about. The world's always testing me. Why can't I just knock on destiny's door and beat down those guys who like to "test you" down to the ground? Or rather just have some omniscient being tell me what my purpose in life is. Have them bite my dust for a while. But of course, it's all nonsense, and I have to live with it and live on.
Ok so lets get down to the core of what's happening.
My LJ, in the last half year has only seen the surface side of me. Pretty dull I have to say. I have only talked about what I have done and what accomplishments...well...I have accomplished. When really all this crap-- all this subjective crap--that might look good from an observer's standpoint really has no bearing on my soul and happiness. Heck! Happiness is what I really want. But now I can't figure what the hell my happiness is since I'm changing so rapidly. 23 years (I'm feeling old) and I'm still stumped....well...I still have a few more decades in me, so I guess I still have a headstart. Only 10 percent gone! Woo hoo! I'm not 100 yet, and I'm expecting to live to 300. I think I'm heading in a fairly good pace of self-realization. Since I started to write this entry, I told my self "I will not talk about where I work, what amazing thing I did in school, what I plan to do in the future, or what cool things happened to me." Because really, that is just the shell of me. I'm just gonna talk about the inner me...but not too much, or I'll soil myself.
Lately, I have gotten a lot more sleep, which totally helps my mentality. In terms of the health side, I'm still not there yet. I need to go to the USC lyon center to exercise and train my mind into thinking "I must do this routine" because its supposed to be part of my life -- it's for my well being. I can do it. I can do it. I always find myself looking back into the past, because only 2 years ago, I had unlimited will power with an iron will that would never falter. I wish I had that back -- that sort of untainted idealism with a concrete and focused goal. God I was so relentless back then. I loved that time. Things were simple. they were good. I think it's because the world is becoming more and more complex in my eyes. You know that saying where the more you know, the more insane you get. I'm sort of feeling that way. I'm no genius, but I'm definetely feeling it.
I started meeting with old friends, and keeping in touch with ones I met last semester. Great people. I think I should really start taking the initiative and going out and meeting people rather than being cooked up in my apartment in front of my computer monitor watching awesome j-dramas, anime, tv shows like 24, lost, battlestar galactica, heroes, and the like. I really need to "get a life" or rather in more polite terms, "get with it."
__________________________________
So I finally decided to continue updating on Taiwan. Doing these entries remind me of the time I did this for China. Those entries took at least 4 hours each because they were so dense with content. For the taiwan trip, it's less dense (content wise and intellecual-wise), but longer as a trip. The duration of the trip was almost two times that of China Synergy -- an entire month.
Chronicles of Taiwan
Time: 9:00 am
July 12, 2006
The shock of my friend's death the previous day really hit me hard. I couldn't believe a death from a fading friendship could have affected me so much. But having known him for a while, I suppose there was the history that floated in my mind.Whenever those memories loomed, I would feel defenseless and just crumble. I remember this happening in front of my dorm room at the Taoyuan Vocational Facility where we were staying for 4 days before heading off to Taipei once again. I felt like I had no power at all, being so far away from my home, where friends and family were. I was definetely outside my comfort zone, and that's entirely a new experience -- and rare-- because I'm a pretty resilient person. This was really the time when I felt I shouldn't be on this trip. It's the first time I ever felt totally out of place, lost in a place in the country side where there was no contact with the people surrounding me as well as the people at home. I really thought this trip was a odd mistake to begin with because I couldn't tune in to the trip as well as the realization I had come to Taiwan. The after-effect of my cinema production classes (specifically 310) has really taken a toll on my spirit and health. Traveling so suddenly probably wasn't the best thing I could have done. I really confirmed this by the end of the trip. The trip definetely had it's fun moments and I made some good friends, but I definetely felt what I experienced wasn't totally meant to be. You'll see why in other entries of this trip.
For most of the day I was in sort of this weird stupor. It's the feeling you get laying down on grass looking at the sky. You float, and feel aimless. Things move faster than you, but everything feels slow in general, like being segregated by the world around. Caught in a dream state I'd say.
The day started off with an activity where all of us learned to make hand made butterflies. I did it, but consistently felt frustrated with my lack of concentration due to the previous night's events.
People were laughing and smiling around me having a great time, while a big black bad ass cloud hovered over me and shot lightning. I felt the distinct "cosmic indifference" you'd see in hitchcock films.
Why were we at this crappy vocational school anyway. The rooms are hot and humid as hell. When you'd take a shower, you'd be taking another shower in your own sweat.
I decided to take a walk back to my room, and then to a convenient store 2 miles away (because we were in the country side) by foot.
I had some lunch, and the whole love boat group were taken by bus to a shopping area where all of us just went about having our own fun. The bus trip there I spent little time talking to anyone because I was still caught in my depression. The whole time I listened to songs that made me even more depressed. Great. Awesome. Super.
Exploring a nearby city of Taoyuan province in Taiwan.
Sogo is a big department store chain in Taiwan. I walked around by myself, not knowing where to go or what to do.
I found a steak house, some massage places, a bunch of eateries, and such. none of which really interested me. Though I did have steak later.
Inside Sogo
These two girls are our "guides/advisors" for our group. They were both younger than me, which is weird for me. Both college students.
I went to a really cheap family restaurant where they have steaks. It was ok.
Asian restaurants in general aren't that great at making steak, unless you go to an eclectic chic restaurant run by an asian sous chef with formal training.
I left the restaurant and didn't really document the rest of the day.
I was so out of my mind that I just let things float through. I really did a terrible job documenting this day. But better entries will come, when I've recooperated from the loss of a friend.
Night arrived, and that's it. A pretty uneventful day..
More updates later.
I've resolved to finish up the chronicles of taiwan at least before summer comes.
Thanks for reading.
I feel the world has started to slow down, and I can finally catch my breath. I fell out of a one and a half year hurricane-tornado, and I'm no longer spinning. It's the first time in a long time I felt space and time have opened up for me and now I can travel at warp one. (well at least it's slower than warp 10) This semester -- my easiest -- is turning into something good -- I could tell. I'm approaching the sort of wonderful realization that I should reconnect with a lot of people I have lost touch with over the last two years...maybe...
I think that it's time to return to basics; to touch base with my humanity. Somehow I lost it, and have drifted into a self-loathing pit of work and ego. It's been due to my production classes, my work, my ambitions, and a lot of school related things. It's been too long since I really thought about my life and what it means to me -- especially what I want from my life. Since entering that "GREAT" film school called USC -- and I say that with caution nowadays -- where things were supposed to happen, I quickly realized there's more to it, more to what I want in life than that ideal dream of JUST becoming a director, but even then I feel just being able to do that would be WONDERFUL and a dream come true. Unfortunately I am a person of many interests and am never satisfied. It's a blessing and a curse. And because of the things I'm discovering and learning each day, my life has become a repetitive self-perpetuating epiphany. Like I'm rediscovering my life goal everyday, constantly searching for a convenient answer to where I want to go, but only to realize the next day I am passionate about another idea and another purpose. With all these different intersecting and distant paths and passions, it's been a really weird experience. I used to think, once I found some degree of direction, that's all I needed. It was definetely the case when I spent 2 years trying to get into this film school, but now things have changed. For the better? Probably. I feel like I'm a much wiser person in general. It feels like the more I learn, the more I crap out more passions out of my ass. I really admire some of my friends who drive toward one particular goal such as directing, and think of nothing else. I even admire those who haven't found direction yet, because they have a clean slate with nothing on it. I have waaay too many interests. It might be good to just dedicate my self to one of my loves and start letting go of some things I care about. The world's always testing me. Why can't I just knock on destiny's door and beat down those guys who like to "test you" down to the ground? Or rather just have some omniscient being tell me what my purpose in life is. Have them bite my dust for a while. But of course, it's all nonsense, and I have to live with it and live on.
Ok so lets get down to the core of what's happening.
My LJ, in the last half year has only seen the surface side of me. Pretty dull I have to say. I have only talked about what I have done and what accomplishments...well...I have accomplished. When really all this crap-- all this subjective crap--that might look good from an observer's standpoint really has no bearing on my soul and happiness. Heck! Happiness is what I really want. But now I can't figure what the hell my happiness is since I'm changing so rapidly. 23 years (I'm feeling old) and I'm still stumped....well...I still have a few more decades in me, so I guess I still have a headstart. Only 10 percent gone! Woo hoo! I'm not 100 yet, and I'm expecting to live to 300. I think I'm heading in a fairly good pace of self-realization. Since I started to write this entry, I told my self "I will not talk about where I work, what amazing thing I did in school, what I plan to do in the future, or what cool things happened to me." Because really, that is just the shell of me. I'm just gonna talk about the inner me...but not too much, or I'll soil myself.
Lately, I have gotten a lot more sleep, which totally helps my mentality. In terms of the health side, I'm still not there yet. I need to go to the USC lyon center to exercise and train my mind into thinking "I must do this routine" because its supposed to be part of my life -- it's for my well being. I can do it. I can do it. I always find myself looking back into the past, because only 2 years ago, I had unlimited will power with an iron will that would never falter. I wish I had that back -- that sort of untainted idealism with a concrete and focused goal. God I was so relentless back then. I loved that time. Things were simple. they were good. I think it's because the world is becoming more and more complex in my eyes. You know that saying where the more you know, the more insane you get. I'm sort of feeling that way. I'm no genius, but I'm definetely feeling it.
I started meeting with old friends, and keeping in touch with ones I met last semester. Great people. I think I should really start taking the initiative and going out and meeting people rather than being cooked up in my apartment in front of my computer monitor watching awesome j-dramas, anime, tv shows like 24, lost, battlestar galactica, heroes, and the like. I really need to "get a life" or rather in more polite terms, "get with it."
__________________________________
So I finally decided to continue updating on Taiwan. Doing these entries remind me of the time I did this for China. Those entries took at least 4 hours each because they were so dense with content. For the taiwan trip, it's less dense (content wise and intellecual-wise), but longer as a trip. The duration of the trip was almost two times that of China Synergy -- an entire month.
Chronicles of Taiwan
Time: 9:00 am
July 12, 2006
The shock of my friend's death the previous day really hit me hard. I couldn't believe a death from a fading friendship could have affected me so much. But having known him for a while, I suppose there was the history that floated in my mind.Whenever those memories loomed, I would feel defenseless and just crumble. I remember this happening in front of my dorm room at the Taoyuan Vocational Facility where we were staying for 4 days before heading off to Taipei once again. I felt like I had no power at all, being so far away from my home, where friends and family were. I was definetely outside my comfort zone, and that's entirely a new experience -- and rare-- because I'm a pretty resilient person. This was really the time when I felt I shouldn't be on this trip. It's the first time I ever felt totally out of place, lost in a place in the country side where there was no contact with the people surrounding me as well as the people at home. I really thought this trip was a odd mistake to begin with because I couldn't tune in to the trip as well as the realization I had come to Taiwan. The after-effect of my cinema production classes (specifically 310) has really taken a toll on my spirit and health. Traveling so suddenly probably wasn't the best thing I could have done. I really confirmed this by the end of the trip. The trip definetely had it's fun moments and I made some good friends, but I definetely felt what I experienced wasn't totally meant to be. You'll see why in other entries of this trip.
For most of the day I was in sort of this weird stupor. It's the feeling you get laying down on grass looking at the sky. You float, and feel aimless. Things move faster than you, but everything feels slow in general, like being segregated by the world around. Caught in a dream state I'd say.
The day started off with an activity where all of us learned to make hand made butterflies. I did it, but consistently felt frustrated with my lack of concentration due to the previous night's events.
People were laughing and smiling around me having a great time, while a big black bad ass cloud hovered over me and shot lightning. I felt the distinct "cosmic indifference" you'd see in hitchcock films.
Why were we at this crappy vocational school anyway. The rooms are hot and humid as hell. When you'd take a shower, you'd be taking another shower in your own sweat.
I decided to take a walk back to my room, and then to a convenient store 2 miles away (because we were in the country side) by foot.
I had some lunch, and the whole love boat group were taken by bus to a shopping area where all of us just went about having our own fun. The bus trip there I spent little time talking to anyone because I was still caught in my depression. The whole time I listened to songs that made me even more depressed. Great. Awesome. Super.
Exploring a nearby city of Taoyuan province in Taiwan.
Sogo is a big department store chain in Taiwan. I walked around by myself, not knowing where to go or what to do.
I found a steak house, some massage places, a bunch of eateries, and such. none of which really interested me. Though I did have steak later.
Inside Sogo
These two girls are our "guides/advisors" for our group. They were both younger than me, which is weird for me. Both college students.
I went to a really cheap family restaurant where they have steaks. It was ok.
Asian restaurants in general aren't that great at making steak, unless you go to an eclectic chic restaurant run by an asian sous chef with formal training.
I left the restaurant and didn't really document the rest of the day.
I was so out of my mind that I just let things float through. I really did a terrible job documenting this day. But better entries will come, when I've recooperated from the loss of a friend.
Night arrived, and that's it. A pretty uneventful day..
More updates later.
I've resolved to finish up the chronicles of taiwan at least before summer comes.
Thanks for reading.