Flawed

A friend recently told me that when you make your humiliation part of your creative process, you liberate yourself to, well, create. Hence, here goes my second blog post in all of 2009! Go me.

I've always had a difficult time with "putting myself out there." My wise teeny son likes to accuse me of perfectionism, but that's too simplistic. For decades I felt like I couldn't do anything artistically because (1) I was always surrounded by artistic people, (2) I felt the need to be completely original, and (3) I didn't want judgment, mostly from my own self. All this despite feeling like I was a creative type innately and that when I choose to lose myself in a project, be it drawing or writing, I was pretty damn good, at times even great.

Anyway, I'm now building myself a tenuous bridge and gingerly getting over it. Because you know what, being afraid of not being great is just no fucking way to live. I am simply too tired of it. I am simply too old for it. I don't have the same energy I once had to stifle whatever it is that bubbles out.

So from this point forward, I will use this blog to write and write and write. Most of it will be dribbly shitstain (like that's any different from what's come before), but I will do my damnest to resist the Delete button. And allow maybe only a handful of Edit. The self-censor mode is a bitter pill. It's a cliche to say that you're your worst enemy, but that doesn't make it any less true. The thing is, when you're pretty good at a lot of different things, finding the one true outlet to focus on can be a bit like [insert metaphor].

So there you have it. I've given myself permission to suck so that I can begin the process of sucking less.

I am now hitting the Publish Post button.

And the Winner Is...Me?

Forgive me my long hiatus, dear readers, and for hosting my own writer's strike (though I am from LA, after all). Life has a habit of sneaking up on me, those to-do lists color-bleeding into one another springing me into inaction--until that damning moment when I'm snapped wide awake wearing nothing but runny pinks. It's not a pretty sight.

Laundry metaphor aside (can you tell literal laundry is also on my list?), I feel the need to document the big upcoming change for the one loyal reader that's left. So, lonely reader, come August, I'll be moving to China, Mainland China--Beijing, to be exact. I feel overwhelmed, mixed, mixed up, a whir of hazy emotions set in spin cycle (damn, here I go again).

On the one hand, I'm thrilled I landed a respected, sought-after school considering the (by all accounts) shit-awful recruitment season and global crisis. And the package is killer compared to South America.

On the other hand, what the fuck--China? Really, self? I am, after all, so classically lazy that I dropped my Spanish lessons here once I figured out how to order a cup of coffee. China--with its gobbledygook alphabet and tonal everything will be devastating in its shock of culture (although to be fair, while I am challenged in the pretty-voice department, I am thankfully not tone-deaf, at least according to my karaoke scores). China--where my allergies-prone self is gonna have to break up in a huge way with Mr. Contact Lenses, my eyes already itchy and wet at the thought of the smog and the rebound affair with Mr. Eyeglasses. [I know that was cheesy, but they can't all be winners. -ed.] China--where the arms of the Benevolent Dictator will have long-reaching effects (YouTube was banned out of the blue for a few days last week, fer christ's sake). China--where, dear God, my physiological need for personal space will be utterly, terrifyingly eviscerated. And did I mention the smog?

But, on the other hand (careful readers will now note my deformed anatomy), China--where spawn will learn Mandarin, and take more theatre courses, and camp at the Great Wall, and be intimate with 5,000 years of culture. China--where I'll finally get my fill of Asia travel (one weekend to Angkor Wat to rekindle some childhood memories, another to Bangkok simply for the food-court curries). China--where my swanky expat compound will have a cafe that delivers, and a free gym clubhouse, and tennis courts (because you know how much I rock the tennis skort), and, and...

It's never easy, or more accurately, I seem to have a penchant for choosing the difficult over the easy. And as if I'm not free falling enough these days, last week an Argentine coworker stopped by my classroom to pronounce in her typical charming way: I would hate to be you. I don't know how you to it. Your life is so hectic. Do you even know any Mandarin? Heckling aside, she had a point or two. What *am* I doing starting over? Wasn't it enough to move from the northern hemisphere to the southern, without having to cross into the eastern? Didn't I bust my (professional) balls black & blue trying to prove myself here, and now would have to start all over? Haven't I wept enough tears bidding adieu to family in the States, without having to endure (at least) two more years of this melodrama? Do I ever learn?

And then, fortuitously, I ran into this feel-good quote by Mark Twain:

Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.

And soon after, I got no less than 21 photos of my new home in Beijing--3 floors of personal space, with windows wide flung to beckon potential clear skies and an outside world of possibilities.

I guess the jury's still out.

Earth Trek: The Next Episode

So lately I've been preoccupied (a kinder word than obsessed, although that's more precise) with my job search for the next school year and beyond. In the international school circuit, this process includes not only a search of school but of country and city as well, so you can just imagine the excitement- and stress-induced headaches I've had to endure. And, just because a city sounds fabu (Barcelona! Paris!) =! the school is great. In fact, many of the international schools in capital cities in Europe are second-rate compared to those in Asia.

What complicates it even further is this new school has to make the cut for being a decent workplace for me (there are quite a few draconian administrators out there) while being a top-notch academic institution with a strong performing arts for spawn (who'll be entering the 9th grade), and those two criteria don't necessarily marry well. There's a very unscientific formula to it all, weighted with a hefty dose of personal preferences. So after copious hours/weeks/ulcers of meticulous research, I've got it down to a list. My search centers around Asia because I decided that making 30-70% more than I do currently in Latin America (and Europe, where you often have to pay country taxes) is a good thing.

So here's my list, in no particular order. If you could live anywhere in Asia, where would you go?

I'm not posting the school names, just because. Of course, city grades are based on my own personal interests in the location, which can range from OMG, they have a Sephora there! to it's a foodie's paradise! to Holy Crap, there's a Hello Kitty-themed cafe! Package = tax-free salary, bennies, housing allowance, home flights, perks, etc.

School #1: Bangkok, Thailand: A school, A+ package, A- city (demerits for pollution, political instability, and being 20 minutes from downtown)

School #2: Shanghai, China: A- school, A- package, B+ city (demerit for pollution) [values added: spawn already has family/connections on his stepmom's side there. spawn really likes the city.]

School #3: Beijing, China: A+ school, B+ package, B+ city (demerit for pollution)

School #4: Beijing, China: B+ school, A package, B+ city (demerit for pollution)

School #5: New Delhi, India: A school, A+ package, C+ city (demerits for terrorist threat and too much stark poverty). [value added: a good friend already teaches there.]

School #6: Singapore: A- school [demerit for the supposedly insane workload], A package, A+ city

School #7: Cairo, Egypt: B+ school, B package, B city (demerit for my not owning conservative clothes and inevitably having to update entire wardrobe)

School #8: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: B+ school, A- package, A city

School #9: Tokyo, Japan: B+ school, A package, A city [value added: spawn really wants to go there.]

School #10: Taipei, Taiwan: A- school (demerit for quintessential type-A workload), A- package, A- city

And Another Thing

I'm back, although I don't yet have the vocabulary to describe what I went through back in May of this year. Still, I'm back and that's worth something.

Everyone Hates Me or (otherwise titled) Woe Is Me

It's as inevitable as the setting sun or death & taxes. There comes a point in every personal relationship I have when I become disappointing. (At least here at work it's taken me two years to get there.) And what I mean by that is I just don't need people enough or alcohol-induced socialization enough for whatever the fuck's considered normal, and this lack of need gets in the way of perception. Maybe it comes down to extroversion vs. introversion--not to be confused with shyness--but I really would rather spend my weekends/evenings strolling the city discovering new stuff all by my lonesome, or curled up with a good book, than with mass companions. This has served me well back home, but I'm finding that in the insular, artificially shrunken world of expatting, it stamps a big scarlet S (for "savant") on your forehead (or in my case, fivehead) the more your RSVPs fall resoundingly in the "No" column.

Case in point, last weekend I decided not to go to a progressive dinner party (the kind where you walk to a new home for each course) when I realized there would be kre8tiv games played in teams (such as, create a silly new dance with your teammates!). If there exists an alternative hellish social event as creative team games, I sure couldn't picture it (oh OK, a scrapbooking circle with Oprah fans?). The end result was alienation from a few coworkers. Because here's the thing about international teaching, you are certainly eating where you're shitting and your coworkers are indeed your friends, no matter how much you resist the notion. It's a mind-altering amalgam of that adage, "you can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family." sigh

ETA: This is all orthogonally related to whether I like my coworkers, which I do. There are some great people in the bunch.

My Vacay Officially Begins!

Hello, all you ardent readers. Here's my itinerary for the next 6 weeks, posted because I'm a list whore. If you plan to stalk & kill me, do yourself a favor and look for the Paris Hilton wig and white sunshades, mk?

12/23 - 12/27: Iguazu Falls (hopefully with a peek from the Brazil side)
12/29 - 1/7: Los Angeles, Coto de Caza, San Diego, Poway
1/7 - 1/12: Cruise to Cabo San Lucas and vicinity
1/12 - 1/25: Southern Cal again with side excursions to San Francisco and possibly Taos and Santa Fe, New Mexico
1/25 - 2/3: Back to South America for another coche cama trip, either north to Córdoba or south to Junin de los Andes to visit Elizabeth and her brood.

Now I want me a pretty little rag & bone! (Apropos of nothing, how good is that Argentine beverage ananá fizz?! It's like a boozy Cactus Cooler...)

The Season to Be Effin Jolly

Despite the title, I've nothing snarky to say, so I'm just going to post these pics showing me in rare form--i.e., happily getting on in social situations. Oh, I'm not the misanthrope I once was--those days are long behind me--though I will still choose my own company over a group one any day. (And I've a solo trip to Iguazu to look forward to...so woohoo.) It's not that I find myself fascinating; I just hate faking interest in other people when I don't feel like it, despite being able to do it well. Grinchdom and sociopathy aside, as of late I've been having fun (with an uppercase F) doing holiday fêteing with my coworkers. Fa la la la la...la la la la.

Welcome to the Dollhouse

These lusciously black dolls from San Telmo invoke some sorta irrevocable fetish in me. I swear it's not lewd or inappropriate--I just would love to line them up on my fireplace mantle, taking each one down every so often to whisper sweet nothings in her ear. When I was an immigrant kid in the US, my biggest dream outside of raising a colony of sea monkeys was to own a Shirley Temple doll, having just discovered the jaunty, curly-headed moppet on Saturday retro matinees. In bumper-sticker terms, I guess you could say I brake for dolls, the more cherubic, the heavier my lead foot.

One of my fondest memories from Cambodia was getting a sweet little French doll from my aunt Vanna who was living in Paris at the time (today she lives outside of Paris). It smelled stunningly like sugar with spindly limbs. The French intruder was adored so much that I had nannies lining up to create miniature Khmer outfits for it, resulting in a sewing-machine one-upmanship. I've a foto of me and the doll in matching batik tops and sarongs. If you're nice, I'll look for it.

My doll frenzy reached its altitudinous high when years later in the states, I stealthily snatched my younger sister's Baby Alive doll (remember those?) one afternoon and threw it kicking and screaming into the washing machine. I'm not sure what possessed me--lack of oxygen to the brain? But Baby Alive never looked quite alive again. To this day my sister has yet to forgive me for this crime of passion. (I am so misunderstood.)

Pond Life

I believe this to be true, that I was a whiny kind of kid. I remember sitting in a drab train station when I was 4 or so, feeling as though I would suffocate from chest-heavy gloom, the weightiness of which I wasn’t able to communicate beyond soft syllables. I was cradling an oversized mug full of lumpy ricemeal next to my face, hoping the scent of milk sugar would take me elsewhere. Except there was no elsewhere. We were in a neglected train station on the outskirts of Siem Riep, having just got words that the Khmer Rouge were near. When my cereal ran low, I lifted my head and wailed for more. I’m sure I wanted to cower in a corner or shake my mother for answers, but it came out ungracious. I was a whiny kind of kid, completely lacking the poise to deal with catastrophic changes. I was an embarrassment to my mother.

We had just evacuated our home in Siem Riep, a coastal town most famously noted for Angkor Wat. My father wasn’t around, so my mother somehow hauled 4 kids, a nanny, and a servant to the nearest train station to wait for … what? The details are vague. I remember the muggy heat though. I had just spent an entire summer tearing up lily pads. When our house was built, my father had dug out a pond beyond our kitchen door and garnished it with plump lily pads and orange fish. He’d taken great pride in the house, having designed the master plan himself. There was that circular stairway leading up two floors, a tiled recreation room where he played exotic American music, and of course, mosquito net decorating every inch of the bedrooms. No doubt when the Khmer Rouge burst into the backyard, they spotted a pond littered with shreds of lily pad.

Tonight I Miss My Mom

My mom married my dad when she was just 17 years old. It was an arranged marriage, though she’d already met him once. He was smitten with her, the story goes, when he first heard her singing in a throaty operatic voice on some local radio program. This was Phnom Pehn in the early 1960s. I can only imagine what he must have felt when he actually set eyes on her. My mom, you see, was a raving beauty. Long black hair, coarsely thick; fierce almond eyes, dark as coal; and cheekbones so cut you could set saucers on them. And gauging from the random photos of her in chic 60s fashion, she also possessed a perfect hourglass figure, something she refused to pass on to any of her daughters. Her claim to fame though were her lips, the lower one a perfect triangular jut, an exact replica of her real mom’s.

I say real because as a very young child, my mom was given away to be raised by her adoptive mother, who was actually the sister-in-law to her real dad. My real grandmother had birthed four daughters, each one probably a mounting disappointment in a culture that favored boys. For reasons unknown to anyone, my real grandmother plucked my mom, the third born, out of the entire girly bunch to be tossed aside. It was decades later before I realized how much this event shaped her, for although she was raised entirely by her adoptive mother, my mom lived just kilometers from her real family and saw on an almost-daily basis her sisters going about their business within their intact family, without her.

My adoptive grandma was Chinese and possessed a legendary personality of steel, perhaps the predecessor to the dragon lady stereotype. My mom has never said much about her upbringing, but I gather that she loved and respected her second mother with both a sense of foreboding and awe. Mah, as we children called her, had been married to a successful Chinese businessman. He died when my mom was quite young, leaving her under the sole care of Mah and her entourage of servants.

Mah was the classic storybook charismatic bully. She demanded love, loyalty, and attention, all high prices, but in exchange, you get a glimpse of her enigmatic smile and more importantly, her approval, which made you clamor for even more of it. I remember one time when I was 5, being asked by Mah to dance to her favorite Chinese operas. It was a hot sticky night. We were both bored. I loved my Mah and couldn't say no if I tried, so for what seemed like hours on end, I hammed it up for her in her suite, the one with the chilly black-and-white parquet floor and floral drapings. Delirious with sweat, I moved and swayed to flashes of my beloved Mah reclining in bed, smiling as she waved a silk fan in front of her face.

[More to come. Here’s a picture of my mom and me taken last July. She’s 64 now. I love my mom.]

Self-Portrait with Monkey by Frida

Went to a Halloween party last night dressed as the first lady of Unibrow herself, looking rather like something a cat might drag in, in the Castro.

Bizarro World

I'm shiftlessly layabouting in my gorgeous backyard, a pitcher of Paradise tropical iced tea nearby, wistfully trying to recall what life was like back in the states in a manner that only grass-is-greener types can understand. The details of being someplace else are usually vague and can elude me altogether. And it never fails to surprise me how when I'm here, I can't imagine being there, and the vice, she versus.

But don't cry me a river, as I do believe I have the best of both worlds. My stay here in Argentina is punctuated twice a year with a visit stateside, so it's 4.5 months here, 4-6 weeks there, etc. etc. Not bad... Still, you know how sometimes the ratio of things can feel just a tad off? Kinda like how there's too much peanut butter relative to chocolate in a regular Reese's cup, whereas with the mini-version, it's the perfect proportion? I'll break it down for you linear thinkers: In a large cup, pb/choc > 1, and IMO, you need 1 or less to get the perfect bite, meaning I would even allow for more chocolate than peanut butter in this gastronomical equation. Now admire the design of a mini-cup: pb/choc = 1! It's one-bite right or one bite makes might!

It's the same in the world of avian egg: Quail egg is vastly superior to chicken egg in terms of its albumen:yolk ratio. Anyone who's ever gagged on egg white knows what I'm talking about. Having said all this, I will entertain the idea that occasionally, bliss is achieved only in a non 1:1 scale--the Oreo cookie vs. filling being the classic example. (And those diabolical charmers at Nabisco have preyed upon this weakness in creating their Double Stuf spinoffs.)

What does this have to do with anything? Well I sometimes wonder if 4.5 months here is just too darn much albumen or peanut-butter filling. Perhaps the ideal quota for me is 2.5 months (or even 3), followed by a quick plane ride home to get my fill of bagels and boba. (Notice I'm not even positing a 1:1 ratio.) In any case, usually approaching my fourth month here, I begin to feverishly mythologize about what will be once I'm back in the land of the free! It's rather lame of me since everything revolves around food and clothes, but there you have it.

Anyway, because I'm a list whore, here're my must-dos for the next home visit, just for starters:

- Zen Zoo Tea, in Brentwood, home of the most awesome iced soy mint green tea. Also where I saw David Duchovny eating dim sum with his two adorable brats.
- The City Bakery, in Brentwood, for their heavenly pretzel croissant and brioche French toast laced with caramel brittle. Also, you need a spoon to drink their tarlike hot chocolate. Also where I saw Helen Hunt sitting in a corner with her laptop.
- California Roll Factory, on Santa Monica Blvd. Not the fanciest but hell, you can't beat their ingenious roll combos and spicy mayo.
- Buffalo Exchange, on La Brea, retro fashion at cheapo prices
- Thai Town, on Hollywood Blvd! Anywhere, everywhere, oh sweet Thai Town...for sure, Palm Restaurant for the Thai Elvis show.
- Movies, independent, foreign with English subtitles, the lot of them!
- Griffith Park Observatory: Haven't been back since it's reopened. Since I'm in the nabe, the culty Pinkberry frozen yogurt too
- Ethiopian food on Fairfax
- Bookstores, corporate as well as indie, spending hours on end lollygagging willy-nilly, being able to use my 20% teacher discount...
- The beach! PCH to Malibu, Venice Beach and those drum circles, Santa Monica Promenade, Laguna Beach with my niece and nephew
- Artesia, Little India! Footlong masala dosas, the Naz8 theatre with new showings of Bollywood film, where the concession stand serves up hot, piping samosas at intermission
- Driving!
- TARGET!
- Ebay!
- Netflix!
- And of course, seeing the people I love.

(Edit: Upon rereading this list, it's becoming abundantly clear to me what a shallow creep I am. GOD!)

This Is Spinal Crap

After a month of kinesiologia, my sciatica is finally incrementally improving, thanks to the patient and nimbly fingered Dr. B, who'll sometimes eschew sonogram technology altogether to spend upwards of 20 minutes massaging my vertebrate, rib by precious rib. Long live Dr. B and his Spidey senses! Dr. B 4-evah!

Here's where the magic happens. (Keep your oohs and aahs to a minimum so you don't disturb the other patients...)

And check out the awesome dumbwaiter! Sometimes while deep in waiting-room ennui, I get tempted to leave stealthy notes for the clerk upstairs, just stupid stuff like, "Beam me up to the 21st century, Estefania!" Or maybe one day I'll rig up two tin cans. zzz

Spring Day

Tomorrow is my birthday and as befitting such an occasion, here's my list of things to do before I die. Please god, let me accomplish at least 22% of my goals. Any higher might mark me as a happy person and be too much of a paradigm shift.

Apropos, I made an appointment with our international healthcare guy to up my life insurance 3x. So now I'm worth almost 100K and--in keeping with the great American tradition--way more dead than alive.

Stuff to do before I die, by no means a complete list and in no particular order (for example, I'm not opposed to #11 before #10):

1. See Angkor Wat again
2. See Paris again
3. Be fluent in French again
4. See Bangkok again
5. Watch spawn get into a top-tier college
6. Live somewhere cool in Asia
7. Visit India
8. Achieve Peace of Mind (or 22% of it)
9. Meet Leonard Cohen
10. Date Leonard Cohen
11. @#$% Leonard Cohen
12. Write a memoir
13. Be only 5% overweight
14. Wear white without staining
15. Go on a fucking cruise, the ultimate old-age fun
16. Get upper body strength
17. Watch the "The World at War," a complete DVD set
18. Execute the entire choreography of "Mahi Ve" flawlessly
19. Tour Laura Ingall's original homes and homesteads
20. Write the founder of spawn's old school and thank him

Today, being the first day of spring, was a huge deal in Buenos Aires. Droves of teenagers littered my view of the Rio de la Plata, necking and frolicking away under the sky blue sky (just like that Wilco song). I will say that it's rather cool to have my birthday in the spring rather than the fall. Fall birthdays have always suited my rather sombre nature: I take stock of my life and vow to put to use whatever renegade wisdom's come my way. Spring birthdays, on the other hand, invite a certain reckless, lawless response to aging. They say: Fuck responsibility, you still have health and libido, so go out and put some spring in your step, you hawwwt whippersnapper!