"au revoir"Los Angeles

An. Amazing. Night. Period.

Tonight was the first day of the annual Asian Pacific Film Festival held at the Directors' Guild Association in Los Angeles. As part of the digital histories program, Steve invited me to come and even got tickets for Cathy and I to go together. At first I was quite hesitant because I wanted to spend more time at home with the phamily but since he went through all the trouble, there was no way I could pass it up. Plus deep down, the nerd in me wanted to go watch underground films again. There's something about the general, popular films that just don't cut it.

We arrived in the gorgeous lobby and meet up with some of the fine ladies from the DisKovery Center, including Jeanie (Steve's mother) and Michi (my favorite senior). Jeanie was gracious enough to give us some bao for dinner and we happily munched away as I scoped out potential suitors for dear Cathy. We got as far as the "cool yet sophisticated" polished guy in white blazer and trucker hat, the dreadlocks man, and Mr. Beret with the wiry hair. After a couple of good laughs, Steve came out from the V.I.P room and we started chatting up about him being a "closet" starstruck by one of the actresses from China. Using Cathy's term, anorexic, tanned, Asian Barbie. The fact that she kept fiddling with her super short dress and her boobs looked like they were ready to make the jump for it was unnerving and drew everyone's attention. Oh and the fact that she sparkled from head to toe didn't help either.

Our film for tonight was "Au Revoi Taipei" directed by Arvin Chen. It was a completely playful, and as Mr. Chen stated himself, "silly" film. I loved it.

"Au Revoir" opens up with a montage of the city of Taipei at night. It's the standard introduction of the setting from wide city shot, to medium shots of every day life and the bustle of the citizens. Then camera catches a couple on the street; the girl gets into a taxi cab to leave for Paris and as she drives away, the boyfriend watches her leave. This boy, Lai, is the center crux of the movie but not the main character. Later on we see him go through a daily routine of working at his parent's restaurant, riding the streets of Taipei, reading a French language book in the bookstore, and ending with a phone call to his beloved asking her to contact him again. Gradually, his daily routine is added on with other characters such as his friend Gao, the "Uncle Bao" who frequently eats at the restaurant, Bao's nephew and his orange suited mobsters, and even a pair of cops. One day out of heartbreak, Lai decides to fly to Paris and win back the love of his girlfriend. He agrees to make a small delivery for Uncle Bao in exchange for the money to buy a plane ticket. During his little adventure, audiences discover the two cops are after Bao after finding crucial evidence of smuggling. Bao's nephew, Hong, a street cad who looks for cheap thrills and exciting heists, over hears his uncle's business arrangement with Lai and decides to take the loot for himself.

Soon all the characters become intertwined in a big chase after the secret package that Lai is carrying, including an innocent bookstore worker Susie, who has a deep crush for Lai but is unable to come to terms with her love. The adventures is filled with funny lines from Lai's amusingly monotone friend, Gao, and silly tactics by Lai and Susie in the attempt to escape the cops. And very much like the director stated at the start of the film, it ends on a silly note. Each character has their own ending and thus conclusion to their romanticism but the most entertaining section is of Lai and Susie doing the lindy hop inside the bookstore, surrounded by other customers also doing the lindy hop. =] Very appropriate Mr. Chen.

The central theme of this movie was romanticism. Chen starts off with Lai's romance with his girlfriend and Paris because love is classically tied in with romanticism. The sheer idea of being in Paris and engaging in the atmosphere of lovers is the quintessential image of love's romance. There is also a bit of nativity in Lai's romance; his dream of holding on to a long distance relationship, his studying of French so he can talk to his girlfriend and someday eventually join her. When he encounters Susie at the book store and tells her his plan, she replies with "that's very romantic". He responds with "is it?" And then she says "well doesn't your girlfriend think so?" Lai's response afterwards does not show much confidence in knowing if his girlfriend does think his education in French is romantic.

Even after the girlfriend breaks it off with Lai, he comes up with the crazy notion of wanting to fly to Paris and win her love back. This is a clear sign that his romantic notions of their relationship will not yield despite the break off. His parents tell him that it's a silly idea and this is probably for the best. He should be finding a job as oppose to flying to Paris but he refuses to listen. Here, Chen clearly separates Lai from the "general society" of his parents' sense of reality; forget spending money for love and get a job that has security. As Lai pursues help from his "Uncle Bao", he becomes enlisted in a small delivery in exchange for the money for Paris.

Chen is using Lai as a the boat to drive the narrative forward, but also catch other characters' stories in its net. As Lai is discussing the business deal with Uncle Bao, Hong overhears their conversation and immediately decides to take the package for himself. Hong is a real estate agent who sells apartment housing as a living, courtesy of his uncle. However by night, Hong and his hooligan of ruffians do petty robberies such as the mini mart. After over hearing this deal, Hong becomes obsessed at the prospects of performing a great heist. This is his romanticism. Chen showcases this through Hong's actions and behavior. He sends out his ruffians to retrieve the package, despite their lack of common sense and skill. And even equips one of them with a gun. Later on, after the ruffians have kidnapped Gao instead of Lai with hope that they can an exchange, we see Hong discussing relationship issues with Gao and giving him advice on how to woe his co-worker Peach. Then when he calls Lai to do the exchange, he has stumbles on his words in finding a location to do the swap as well as verbally threatening to kill Gao and throw his body into the river but then shaking his head to Gao to reassure him that it is a lie. Twice. Also later on we find out the gun is fake.

Uncle Bao's character provides an interesting twist to the romantic notions. As an older gentlemen who creates the appearance of being a crook, he still relishes in the romance of his former days. His romanticism is captured in the mafia dramas that he watches in every scene that he's not talking to someone else. These dramas are overdramatic with terrible acting and cliche plots, and yet Bao finds amusement every time. Another character who indulges in dramatic romance is the lady innkeeper at the "palace" sex hotel. We catch a quick snippet of her watching the love scene between two characters who are swearing their eternal vows in the middle of a fight. But then when Lai and Susie enter in the hotel, she barely acknowledges then and says : "for a quickie, I'll give you 500 but for the whole night it'll be 800". A very crude line about sex, depraved of all romance and passion and measured only in the amount of time it can last. But in reality, that's what the sex hotel is for and what most of the customers come seeking.

The cop's romanticism is divided between being a high chase pursuit cop and having a loving relationship. Both shatter as they collide into one another. The cop is so obsessed with being the top notch cop and having exciting pursuits that he allows his love life to crumble. Until the day his girlfriend decides to walk away from the relationship and brings his romance to an end. He does desperately try to pursue her but only finds rejection and eventually dissatisfaction with his job as well when he discovers his pursuit was for a framed photo.

Gao in my opinion is the most interesting character because of his lack of romanticism. As Cathy pinpointed, Gao has the same monotone attitude as Khao from our own family. He's tall, awkward, seems to lack personality and is extremely funny. He is about to be drafted and wants to ask his co-worker Peach out. However, he becomes nervous around her and is unable to ever the get the words out. In every scenario with the characters however, he both plays to their romances and demises it. For example, when at the open eatery with Lai and Susie, he "conveniently" slips away to allow the two to be alone, thus playing to Susie's fantasy of being with Lai. But when kidnapped by the orange suited hooligans, he interrupts their "scheming" by stating: "Oh you can drop me off here". As well as suggesting good dumpling places and beating them at majong. He eventually develops his own romance which in the end is simply being able to say "see you tomorrow" to Peach and have it be true.

Scenery, music and language ( connects the characters)

"we have nothing to fear but fear itself"

As the days are starting to fade away and Japan becomes a closer reality than I could hardly believe, the butterflies have morphed into creepy, crawling tingles of fear instead my stomach. I keep trying not to think about my anxieties and the previous problems in Singapore with Trang, but of course my low self esteem always brings those memories to the surface in such cases. Everyone is telling me how great and awesome it is that I have such an opportunity. Somewhere inside or outside of me, I know it's true. The more I talk about it, the more amazing the position becomes before my very eyes. But at home, within the confinements of my room and parents' oppressive love, I feel lonely and with a lackluster spirit. I have found myself rebelling in silly, juvenile ways against my parents' authority for stupid reasons like not seeing friends. I don't know if my maturity has truly been stunted from being MIA for about a year or because there's a deeper message that I'm trying to get across.

I talked it out with Lawrence and the both of us agree that perhaps I just need sometime to digest all of this. Or else the Japan things feels too much too soon for me. One second I'm preparing for interviews, the next I'm working on sending out documents for my work visa. And now I'm busy scheduling people left and right for "last minute memories".

Alas, a good book, my journal and my coffee shop sounds amazing right now.

check-

I've never felt so defeated before today.

It was a normal day where I did normal things and got a lot done as well managed my time well. Yet it was the greatest falling out I have ever experienced since the time I received my fat F in philosophy.

I don't know if things between Trang and I are settled quite yet. I made phone calls and wrote emails, but would it ever be enough? I don't even want to argue with her anymore just because every time I receive another email, I feel this anxiety attack in my chest and my sense of logic just gets replaced with fury and then I become defensive. All day, all I thought about was how I shouldn't care about what she says and how much more hurt she is than I could ever be. I was caught between feeling torn up and wanting to be the bigger person.

Then I got the email about my score from the interview with Santa Monica. 5 points. I'm short 5 points of just passing. How did I score so low?

I think there are two questions that I failed on and I should have elaborated on the last question instead of just blurting out whatever came to my head.

And despite the nags and lectures from Me, crying and being with her made me feel better. A bath didn't do too badly either and watching a Disney movie is a sure-fire way to awaken up the hopeful spirit.

It won't take too much or too long for the disappointments and heartaches to come crashing down again though. This is only temporary relief from reality. In all honesty, I feel quite lonely and sad here at home. It's not just the going through the motions that makes me feel sad, it's the lack of advancing. And yet while I was in the shower, I thought back to the time when I told Dan about Cathy. About our relationship and how when I finally decided to do my own thing, I figured it out and ended up the better person because of it. Maybe this, this is just another test to point me in the direction that is right for me.

Most people from Bowdoin either go straight to grad school or into a job. Maybe I'm not set out for either. I have a teaching certification, I'm damn creative, and I have great interpersonal skills despite what my cousin might think. It's true; I wasn't thinking clearly and did not feel I was in my comfort zone anymore. However with kids, I just have a natural instinct to play and nurture them. I have to trust that instinct and my other abilities. I just haven't put them to work in a while, which is why I feel I have no self confidence.

Maybe Dan, you made a much bigger impact on my life than either one of us could have predicted. If this is the turning point, and the slap in the face that I needed to wake up again, I will search you out and thank you in person. For now, I send my best wishes to you in that you are pursuing your goals with the full force that I need to have for my own. Defeat is temporary, quitting is forever.

phamily ties -- sorta, it's nguyen actually

I don't even know where to begin. Perhaps that is because there doesn't seem to be a clear beginning to all of this. It almost seems like the unraveling of our family legacy. If Ba could see this, she would be heartbroken. In some ways, I almost wish she could be here to witness it so that maybe she could put a stop to the deterioration of family.

I miss the old days, when I could climb the many stairs up to Anh Hi and Anh Huy's room to sit and play video games. And we would just hang out in Ma Ba's room to watch movies or play cards for an entire afternoon. There were never any conflicts and everyone just seemed so much happier then. The house was always occupied by someone and atmosphere was full of the smells of great food and Anh Huy's piano melodies drifting about.

How did everything wonderful about Vietnam suddenly fall into pieces at the beginning of modernization? I can't even begin to explain how angry I am at Ma Ba. Not just angry like furious but also very hurt at what she has done. It almost seems like she single-handedly ripped our family into two. As much as I understand her to be the head matriarchy of the family now, it doesn't mean she should be cruel and insensitive to our family members. Especially Trang.

I can understand why my mom doesn't want to go back. I don't even feel to keen on going back this point.

Alright I have to interrupt this post and get down to the nitty gritty. If I can't get out, I'll be stuck in this family loop forever.

To be continued! When Trang sends me another hateful email!

guts and all

I still feel horrendously wretched from my mistake in Singapore.

Most of the time, I feel really unhappy. I think that's the main source of my problems. Lately I've noticed a lackluster in my behavior, creativity, wit- everything that I once prided myself in seems to have vanished. As if overnight, I aged like Vip Van Winkle. I think it's because I can feel myself slowly reverting; despite my protests and feeble ways to keep myself true to who I am, I can feel the effects taking place. Just from my recent hang outs with Cathy and from talking to Danny. Everything that has happened recently that bothers me slightly, it's me feeling trapped and resigning to the current situation. Like a square block trying to fit into a circular mode.

Or as Gretel put it: "donning on my mask"

I can't believe I would ever say this but, I'm REALLY looking forward to seeing Kenny tomorrow. I just want, a rule hug I guess. Or maybe it's my single factor that's ringing through my ears. I don't want a boyfriend necessarily; just the feeling of being wanted for who I am. Whoever that is.

And now more Murakami. Because he seems to be the only one who understands me.

"I find it hard to talk about myself. I'm always tripped up by the eternal who am I? paradox. Sure, no one knows as much pure data about me as me. But when I talk about myself, all sorts of other factors-values, standards, my own limitations as an observer- make me, the narrator; select and eliminate things about me, the narrative. I've always been disturbed by the thought that I'm not painting a very objective picture of myself. "

"What I'd like to know more about is the objective reality of things outside myself. How important the world outside is to me, how I maintain a sense of equilibrium by coming to terms with it. That's how I'd grasp a clearer sense of who I am."

"I spend more time being confused than not."

"outgrown"

"When I used to read fairy tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought! And when I grow up, I'll write one-- but I'm already grown up now," she added in a sorrowful tone: "at least there's no room to grow up any more here." --Alice in Wonderland

As Lewis Carroll put it so eloquently (and in a believable childish narrative style), I think I have outgrown my home city. And although I tried to make my peace with being "at home" with my parents by reconnecting with my family members and finding ways to move on with my life despite the lack of physical movement, it's coming towards a year and I am running out of patience and ideas.

Here, I'm already grown up. Just like Alice felt already grown up inside of the White Rabbit's house. I suppose the appeal aspect behind Wonderland is not the escapist theme it carries in Alice's adventures, but the hidden struggles of a child transitioning into adulthood that Carroll inserts in between sub adventures. Bits and parts of Alice's journey where the inner child inside all of us, who has locked itself up in a secret room away from the injustices and contradictions of the adult world, is able to peek out and find a comforting friend.

I need to figure out how to move on.

looped in memory lane

Today my thoughts are on my family dynamic. After traveling to Vietnam and seeing the big mess of a knot that everyone tangled themselves in, it makes me fearful of the distancing paths family members are now taking everywhere. I always grew up with a strong sense of family ties because of my cousins and relatives who live within a 5 minute proximity. Also it seemed that family meant automatic friends. You had to find a way to like one another or get along because well, if you couldn't rely on your family, then who could you rely on?

In Vietnam, that principle doesn't apply so readily anymore. People hold up hurt feelings and no one tries to find a compromise anymore because, well simply put...it's much easier and less of a heartache to just break off ties than to try and cling on so the fighting can continue. I learned that lesson from Trang herself. Even though she says work is extremely busy and she hasn't gotten a chance to relax at all, I still doubt I will ever hear from her again until maybe the summer when Me, Bo, and Danny go back.

Now with family here, the usual cousin hang group consists of Cathy, myself, Danny, Vivian and on occasion, Khoa. This has been the "after school club" since I came to America when I first started playing and babysitting Vivian. Our adventures covered every inch of Om Noi's backyard, to Vivian's bedrooms, to every shop in the local malls. There were years of good fun and lots of laughs.

I left all of that four years ago when I left for college. After the upsetting events of Cathy's poor decisions in college and the effects on our whole family, I couldn't turn to those old memories for comfort anymore. It seemed like every joyous moment was for nothing after the lies and deceit. So I kept my back turned for all four of those years. I chose not to care.

So today, Cathy invited Danny and I to go to a meet and greet with some of the artists who worked on Tim Burton's new Alice and Wonderland movie. It took place at the Nucleus art gallery in Alhambra where they displayed a variety of other art work inspired by Lewis Carroll's short novels. The artists first showed off some of their art work and pieces that they worked on for the movie, describing the process of taking a drawing into a more rendered graphic picture and then combining several ideas with landscape, textiles, lighting, and actors into one completed finished picture. I came to the Meet & Greet with the expectation of hearing about the unique interpretation of the novel and new spin the artists were trying to add to Tim Burton's version. However th emore they discussed about the thought processed and how all ideas were accepted, the art of Alice seemed to lose its edge as one collaborated and cohesive piece of work into a variety of ideas worked in together. I suppose it's more difficult to have one cohesive piece of work when you have hundreds of artists all drawing and editing the same characters.

Anyways my critique on Alice will be for another day's blog. In the meantime while I was listening to the presentation, Cathy and Danny decided to meander around the block because they quickly grew bored of the talking. I didn't mind too much because it wasn't as in dept and interesting as I had hoped. Afterwards, we wandered over to a shop called "Cha for Tea" which served a variety of fusion tea blends and Asian simple meals like curry and rice. We ordered two bags of fried crispy chicken and I got a green tea ice cream cooler with boba while the other two ordered the Love at First Sight with Apple Jelly and boba.

I feel like I'm getting much into the details of the day rather than just reiterating the conclusion of the day's events.

My overall opinion of today was that it while there were interesting and entertaining moments, I felt like a large amount of time and money was heavily wasted. Not that I think spending time with my family is a waste of time or money. On the contrary, I'm much less frugal around them than with anyone else, including myself. But I felt that the jokes were semi-out dated and the humor unchanged. Maybe I really am becoming a prudish, old, crazy, cat lady after all. I felt like our conversations were juvenile and repetitive. Come to think of it, I can't recall anything that we talked about today, or if I even said that much.

It's not that I'm trying to distance myself from my family. I actually think singing loudly to Disney songs is fun to do as well as walking around to explore areas. But there's something about today's events that leave me feeling tired and unfulfilled. Usually at the end of a long fun-filled day, there's a calming satisfaction in the bottom of one's stomach. Like a cat filled with contentment and his only desire is to lie flat and calmly release that content through purrs in between steady breathing. I feel nothing of that sort.

Perhaps I have changed too much. Or maybe, there hasn't been enough change to my happy family dynamic. I don't know.