You are Some Kind of Wonderful

… That was the text message I recieved this morning.

That made my day, my week even.

IT was such a simple little thing, A friend was leaving and I was teaching his class.  I knew his flight left at 11 so at 1030 I though I call say “bye good luck etc”, then I though hey since I’m with the kids I’ll have them say bye to him too.  Well talk about reaching out and touching someone!  He was really happy about it, and then sent me that text.  🙂

It’s surprising the things that end up meaning a lot to someone.  The best part was how happy it made him makes me wanna go nuts with the nice nice for people.  Actually, My friend Mel is also leaving and one of her co-workers made  a little video for her saying bye and I am thinking about doing the same thing for my friend who just left as I’m teaching his class.  Not sure if I’ll get to it but it seems like a nice thing.

I’m plotting nice things… hopefully I’ll follow through on them.

Decisions decisions… and a little bummed out.

Bah, life!  Full of decisions, the hotness for some, personal hell for others. OH OH PICK ME!!   I loathe making a choice, boo what if I pick the wrong one?  What if, even worse, they are equal?  Everyone else seems to have no difficulty with these things meanwhile I agonize over what I want for lunch for Christ’s sake.  Boo

So what is the current crisis?  I guess crisis is a little strong, dilemma I suppose.  What should  I do next?  I love Taipei, I’ve left a few times I’ve even lived elsewhere and I can honestly say I love it there, the climate is lovely and toasty with mild winters, fun easy work, good pay low cost of living.  Sounds great hu?  So what’s the problem!

Well, I’m not Asian, and sometimes that rocks (like when it comes to rules we just get to ignore because we’re not local) and sometimes it sucks asshole, big hairy asshole.  I hate that I have no rights even though I’ve lived there for  nigh on 8 years, really??  Ridiculous.  They have stupid laws that actually discriminate against us, like this new tax law, we have to pay 3x the tax in the first 6 months of every year, no matter how long you’ve been a resident, you think I’m kidding, I’m so not.  Owning property and businesses is silly complicated for us, plus I live in a nation of tiny, or supposed to be tiny people.  So I am constantly inundated with comments like, you would be pretty if you weren’t so fat, and wow you run marathons and work out, so cool.. but how come you’re so fat?  You look terrible today, did you gain weight… the list goes on.  What it boils down to is no matter how much confidence I have, people still look at me like some HUGE beast.  Even the other foreigners get swept up in it, saying things like well if I ran that much I would be thinner than that.  Fuck off.  Yeah, I’m a little chubby (especially right now.. lazy girl on Vaca!) but Jesus, you all make me feel and it sound like I’m pushing 375.  I think my personal favorite is, it’s not your fault foreign people are just fat.  Even if no one says anything, you can see it in their eyes.  Know what I never see?  Admiration, attraction, appreciation in anyway trust me I’ve been looking.

Whine whine whine, I hate this whole line of discussion because no matter how you go about it, you come off as a