Monterey, CA

Wednesday, Sept. 1st. Los Angeles.
"What are you doing for the labor day weekend?"
"Nothing. You?"
"I don't know yet. I'm getting an extra day off."
"Come visit me! [pause] There's a cheap airfare on..."
"Yeah? Should I? Should I?"

Saturday, Sept. 4th. SFO airport.
"Haniiiiiiiiiiiii"
"Aaaaaaaaah"
And hugs. And greetings. And 'nice-to-meet-you' to her boyfriend. And talking.
"It doesn't feel like I hadn't seen you for awhile!"
"The last time was...last Thanksgiving when you came to visit me in LA."
Jean, her boyfriend, "That has been awhile then."
"Well, Jean, it just means that Harah didn't really miss me."
And laughter.

It has been this way for..about five years, now. Prompt decisions and appeals to travel. Harah has always been easy to talk to, who listened and gave advices, who was open for advices and contradictory ideas, who was there for you to cook for you and be with you.

We caught up in the car, on our way back to Monterey, Jean being our silent faithful driver. Harah informed me of our schedule for the next three days as if she was a travel agent.
Jean and Harah seemed like a married couple already--everything they did seemed natural, and I could sense the maturity and depth of their love when they talked about each other in the other's absence. They looked lovely together. Living in this beautiful city, one of the honeymoon places in this country, maybe they had adapted themselves into a honeymooney couple. And maybe it was them, maybe it was the place, but I had never missed Alvin as much as I did there.

Jean and Harah took me to 17-mile drive, an aquarium, and......many other gorgeous places I cannot remember the names of (sorry Harah :/). One of "Jean's pointers" in 17-mile drive insisted of a path through a luxurious hotel, right besides a huge golf course. The green pastures followed by rocky blue ocean. I couldn't stop letting out my admiration: Waaaaw. Aaah. Ooooh. Haaaa!! Pictures. Food. Food. Pictures. Everything with a good amount of time. And more food. Maybe that's why I like traveling with Harah so much.
I even got to visit a military base with two marines who go to Harah's church to practice their Korean. I expected something I had seen in Hurt Locker, but it was rather....well, unbusy and peaceful.

"You literally saw EVERYTHING around here," Jean would reiterate on my last day there, when we went to a sushi restaurant where Harah used to work at.
"Fiiine. I won't come back to bother you. You come to LA next time, then."

Beautiful people in beautiful places. Another awesome trip with Harah+1. Check.

extras

I found out that my friends who get gigs as extras get paid more than I do, a full-time worker at a nonprofit.
"Whaaaaaa," I said in awe. I mean, seriously?
If it were for money, I wouldn't have even applied to nonprofits. But the reality seemed somewhat ironic to me.

"Man, I should be an extra on the weekends."
"You should! But most productions don't film on the weekends."
"Ah. Fair enough. Makes perfect sense."
"You can still try. You never know."
Luke kindly instructed me, telling me the process of being one, and working as one. I was and am still hesitant, but thought, what the heck, it would be fun, at least. He told me where to go, and I downloaded the application form: Full legal name, union name, phones, sizes (bust/bra, waist, hips, dresses, pants, shoes), age range, etc. etc. I thought, geez, too much information! Not even my parents know all this. Then casually, "Will you do nude work?"
I still have to get used to this city.

An Education

Unlike most parents in Korea, my parents never pressured me to study. Even coming from a family full of educators, and an educator herself, my mom supported my dad's theory: one learns the best when traveling, not in classrooms. So instead, we traveled whenever we could.
In fact, I had to beg my parents to send me to a private academic institute that everyone else was going. "I'm gonna fall behind!" I'd rant, but my dad calmly would say, "you can still keep your grades without going to that."

"...you should tell us why you educate us," firmly says Jenny (Carey Mulligan) to her headmistress (Emma Thompson), after being startled by her parents' reaction to the marriage proposal (you don't need the school if you have a good husband). I paused the movie and thought, yeah, what's the point of the education system when one can learn so much more by "living it"? If you know the answer, or have any idea, please enlighten me. I continued with the film without having a conclusion.

I was not happy with Jenny--I could not sympathize nor empathize with her, as you are supposed to with the main actors. Carey was dazzling in her beauty and acting, but I found the character hard to love, unlike for many others. I wondered what she was doing the whole time, when it was clear that she wasn't in love with David (Peter Sarsgaard). And I honestly couldn't imagine that David was married already, like I could from the very beginning when I saw Up in the Air. And up until the revelation, I believed that he was madly in love with Jenny. And maybe he was. But either way, such idea sickens me now.

The father (Alfred Molina) bringing Jenny some tea and biscuits, and telling her about listening to the radio that announced that C.S. Lewis had moved to Cambridge, and all through the closed door, was heartbreaking. I melted with Jenny and with the father, played by one of my favorite actors. What a wonderful scene.

Did I enjoy the movie? Yes--it was smart, well-paced, charmingly-acted, and immensely entertaining. Did I like the movie? Well, yes, I think.
Right after watching the film, I sat still trying to think the message the filmmakers wanted to get through. Education system is bad? But Jenny ends up going to Oxford and lives "happily ever after" with a new boyfriend. Don't trust much older men to be your lover? Well, Jenny knew that he was a con, yet still wanted to take advantage of him. It wasn't about trust, really. Was it?

steward

There's a sinkhole in Guatemala City.
Al Gore is getting a divorce.
Tropical storm hit Central America, killing people in Guatemala, Ecuador, and El Salvador.
The possibility of a "continued war" of North and South Korea is still in the air.
Israel prepares for showdown with two more Gaza aid ships.
An woman stabbed nine people as they slept in a train in China.

Yet our lives move on.
Yet my life moves on.
Still praying and worrying about getting my frigging Californian driver license.
Praying that my car wouldn't be towed, as my guest parking days have expired, and I can't do anything about it until I get my car registered. After I get my frigging driver license.
Still sleeping in the trains to rest my eyes.
Sighing and frowning as I read the articles, yet doing nothing about it.

"The world is going mad," I grumble, yet I don't do anything about it.

tabernacle of memory

"Like wandering Jews, Mexicans had no true home but the tabernacle of memory."
-Richard Rodriguez

I took my coat off, closed the book I'm holding hostage of, and glanced over the tiny window.
I'm here again.
The City of Angels, where my different tabernacles of memory seem to collide, yet merge into other cultures when the least expected.

이번에는

"Tienes que echarle ganas, Hani."

언제부터인가 계속 쉬운길만 찾아왔다.
나중에 힘들까봐
나중에 고생할까봐
아프지 않으려고
슬프지 않으려고
눈물 흘리기 싫어
눈물 보이기 싫어
나 자신을 보호하기 위해
다른사람들을 밀어내왔고
어리석은 행동임을 알면서도
하면서도 미안해하면서도
내게 쉽게 보이는 길을 걸어왔다.

이번에는 부닥쳐야할까봐.
뻔히 보이는 아픔을 달게 겪어야할까봐.

senior

2am, and Amy was still working on her project. "I've been a bad student today!" she said. And believe me, Amy is the last person you'd think of when you hear "bad student."
"How did THAT happen?" I asked, as I was getting ready for bed.
"Senior."
Just like that, without any hesitation. Calmly and simply, senior.

When I was a freshman, I was more than ready to go out to the "real world" and start making history. The idea of college seemed insignificant where there were too much to be done out there. Now that I'm a senior, I don't want to get out of this little college world in which I'm, well, rocking. Then the idea of graduating in 5 weeks becomes more nerve-racking than exciting.

Joel and I talked about battling against the materialistic (often referred as the realistic) thoughts in order to do what we really wanted to do. Teaching in Egypt and becoming fluent in Arabic for him, and working for non-profit organizations for me. I thought passion and love were all that mattered. But with this tight monetary reward we'd get by doing what we want to do, we decided that saving for the grad schools we both want to go to was out of question.
But God will provide, my parents always said. He always does.