it is so strangely warm today. we have, once again, those blue skies that stretch for miles and miles with not a single cloud in sight. you don’t get to see that a lot back home. it makes me think of texas, for some reason, and i have never even been there in my entire life.

i’m sitting at the library, dreamily attempting to draw up my research schedule for the next three years or so. it’s hard enough to plan the week ahead – three years! how does one go about doing that? there are tinkling sounds in the air, as if someone had left a musical box open in the library. nobody seems bothered. nobody seems to have noticed. i cannot stop myself from looking up now and then; i am not quite disturbed by it, only curious. i take a stealthy sip of hot tea from my tumbler. you aren’t supposed to drink in the library, but it is simply another one of those rules made to be broken. an ambulance goes by. that distracts me. ambulances bring my mind to places it does not want to visit.

it has just hit me that my glass ring has yellow, blue, and white streaks across it; my tumbler has yellow, blue, and white flowers on it; i am wearing a yellow top with teal and white earrings. entirely unintentional, i swear. but aren’t blue and yellow the best color-friends ever?  sunshine and sky, warm and cool, bubbly joy and calm.

and i, am ever randomly yours. because i had a matcha old-fashioned donut earlier.

i hadn’t really meant to do this, but i have enjoyed working on this blog so much… taking pictures, putting up pictures, and writing as if i had nothing but wads of (colorful) cotton-wool in my brain. taking off the academic cap and submitting to blind consumerism. letting things be exactly what they look like, and nothing more.

and so, the great moka pot was born.

he drew an outright laugh (open-mouthed, ha-ha sounds) from me, in the morning. again. i love dr. boli, i want to marry someone with a sense of humor like that, and laundry instructions get to me too.

i like listening to 90’s hits on streaming radio through itunes. the 90’s were good. my teen years. angsty, stressful, awkward, wonderful years. why do things always seem good in hindsight? in ten years, i will be reminiscing this time in japan – this awful year of The Aches – the heart, the stomach, the shoulders, the brain… it seems unbelievable that this time in my life may actually look like fun at some other time in my life. unbelievable, and scary.

it was cold today, and will likely be, as well, tomorrow. i am spending the time snuggling in my toasty room, drinking hot tea, working on translations, making the unbearably achy shoulders even achier than ever, and listening to the radio. doesn’t that smack of some hollywood movie? not the really recent ones, but the ones made in the 90’s. more than 10 years ago. seriously?

can you believe that it is november? already? can you smell christmas, already? almost over, my final year as a 20-something year old. and as i say, year after year after year after year, nothing to show for it. more blog posts, perhaps. this combination of pms and fall/winter-blues is not good for me. i just want to hide away somewhere and listen to joni mitchell all day and feel sorry for myself. for my parents. for my family. for s (where are you? what are you doing?). because, strange as it may seem, i feel guilty that i seem to be the only one having a run of good(ish) luck.

credo! credo! credo!

if i were to follow that title, this post would have tags related to marxism, consumerism, capitalism, even baudrillard. but i am not about to delve into a serious discussion on commodity fetishism here. as you may have noticed, i much prefer to keep my academic capers away from a space that i use to vent my frustrations on health and parents and ex-boyfriends.

we were just discussing the concept of commodity fetishism in class yesterday, and i got  to thinking about how material objects have become such an important part of my life since summer this year. granted, i have always been an avid shopper and i like to have things, but never to an extent where i felt as if i should sit for a serious shopping addiction test, or that i would actually fail it. it is fortunate that my singaporean head is screwed on rather tightly, and i have not (yet) gotten into debt or those financial woes that seem to beset some shopaholics.

all the readings on social psychology have instead forced me to psychoanalyze myself and question my compulsion to shop, dress up, and surround myself with pretty things. i don’t have an answer. things… commodities… just make me feel happy and secure, and for the past few months, much less lonely. take my mind off fears, make me feel powerful because i have the money to make life better, and give me something to look forward to when i open my mailbox (therefore the obsession with online shopping)… make me feel connected to a world that, otherwise, feels so far away.

for the first time in my life, i am checking out fashion blogs, fashion magazines, learning to do up my own clothes, looking at people on the streets and mannequins in store windows. feeling absolutely superficial because in my world – in the world of academia – you don’t quite embrace commercialism and consumerism, even if you choose not to condemn it. but i am shamelessly in love with this superficial world. it doesn’t make me sad like the other world does.

maybe i have a problem. but as long as my wallet (and wardrobe) holds up, i won’t let it bother me. not for a while. maybe not for a long while.

i slumped into a less-than-admirable, uncommunicative, i-hate-the-world-at-large mood since i got The Word on monday night. i cried a significant bit, was late for class on tuesday, and drank up all the remaining wine in my fridge last night (despite my acid reflux ban), and woke up this morning feeling rather magically normal.

the fact is, this isn’t about me.

i suppose it’s easier for me to detach myself from all the crazy activity happening back home, but listening to the Ps last night did break my heart rather, and i feel almost guilty for going on with my daily activities – reading and studying and walking and watching videos. but really, what is one supposed to do anyway?

all the glorious fall sunshine has continued, but we’re supposed to see some rain early next week. i have discovered that my closet-room is a heat trap – something i am bound to be thankful for in the winter, but for now, the afternoons can get so stifling and warm. i haven’t managed to put away my fan yet, and that is not quite normal considering we are past the halfway mark of october.

all my great travel plans have been shelved for now, other than a likely trip back home this year-end. christmas back home sounds rather enticing right now, even under circumstances that do not really quite shout party! but i do want to party. i want to celebrate the end of this less-than-perfect year, and the beginning of my journey into the grand 30s.

how i struggle with this – the need to run to you when fear hits.

and every time i believe i have conquered one, another one turns up. this is life. this carousel of fears going round and round like a recurring nightmare.

woke up to another bright and cheery sunday, which put me into yet another cleaning frenzy. when i see the sun shining like this, i get an overwhelming urge to put something out there to dry even when i have to dig around for clothes to wash. yes, even these days, when doing a batch of laundry costs me exactly 150 yen.

i have yet another class presentation to work on; these inane exercises in translating an english textbook into japanese are testing my patience sorely. the process goes something like this – transfer textbook from shelf to desk, do laundry, open a new word document, have lunch and read the papers, move the textbook within reading range, look at new items on etsy and read blogs, open textbook, watch an episode of gossip girls… i never quite get down to it, and really, all i want to do is go out and run in the autumn sun. i hate that nobody in the class really seems to take an interest in anything. i can’t fathom why these strange young kids in the masters class even thought of pursuing their studies.

on a separate note… i bought a crazy hat and took some bad pictures.

i am not usually a hat person, but this was crazy enough to cheer me up after my headache escalated into a fever and took me out of a performance a couple of days back, and also to take the edge off my shopaholic tendencies. i have pledged (not that anyone is aware of it) not to buy any new clothes for the next few months, but i will not count accessories, shoes and underwear. evil exemptions, i know, but… small steps. i have been inspired by the numerous fashion remixing and clothes makeover-ing blogs i found, and they made me terribly ashamed of how i have not been making the utmost best of the huge wardrobe i have.

if anything makes me feel a little less guilty for being the very material person i seem to be these days, it is that one of the professors i have much admiration and respect for told me that my research is of great relevance and importance, and that i should keep it up. happy, not because of the positive affirmation, but because i had always wondered if there was a point to all this theorizing and researching… and now i know that at least someone believes there is.

so many things running through my mind… where to start?

with the bad. so that whatever else that comes after that can only be better.

sis is going to lose one of her ovaries. worse (and what i have been trying to distract my mind from the past hour or so) is the fact that she is undergoing tests for the dreaded c-word. (think harry potter and he-who-must-not-be-named. i have so much fear of the word i cannot quite say it, nor type it.) but what i feel is secondary, i suppose. i keep thinking of the Ps – how they had lost one child, worry constantly over the health of another sickly one, and now, the one person we had always thought was amazingly healthy has to lose a part of her body. but… i have so much fear that i am afraid spelling it all out would make it all come true. so, onward to more cheerful topics we shall go.

i spent the last weekend at a major social psychology do in osaka – three full days of presentations and seminars and the kansai dialect. and the geeky verdict is that i totally enjoyed it. stimulating, and an eye-opener. but other than the research ideas that i took away with me (i start working on a new research proposal tomorrow!), my greatest revelation from the whole event – believe it or not – was that, for every one eminent academic, there are x times as many mediocre (or less than mediocre) ones. what a truly comforting discovery.

when i first took the plunge, i had accepted that i would likely be one of the mediocre ones (at best) for the rest of my life. and that hadn’t really bothered me (or so i thought). but after going through a number of presentations that left me restless with their… how would i put it… inadequacy, well, at the risk of sounding like an arrogant snob, i think i have a chance at being an above-average-academic (alliteration, always!)… in japan, at least, if nowhere else. i can’t even begin to describe what this thought means to me. excited and motivated, i am.

i am also eager to get started on making over my clothes and crocheting. we have been moving into fall and toward winter at a nice, slow pace. with some luck, i would have managed to make myself something nice by the time winter rolls around. i need the distraction and stimulation that comes only from doing something new and different.

it rained hard this evening and it hasn’t stopped yet. i can hear it still, and the occasional cricket, and trains passing by every few minutes. i am tucked up in bed with hot tea and crackers and a warm laptop.

hello, tokyo. i guess you aren’t all that bad after all.

i have managed to turn my entire sleep cycle upside down by not really getting any of it for the past 2 weeks now, and then attempting to make up for it by turning every waking hour into a sleeping one this weekend. it is now 11pm, and i don’t quite see myself getting back in that bed for a while.

this cannot be good for me, i know. i feel that familiar burning sensation in my throat again, which can only mean that the acid is back with a vengeance. but this is my life – this is how i work, and i suppose in some ways, i rather enjoy pushing myself and keeping myself all tied up this way. i cannot quite live the kind of life that my stomach dictates… cannot even cut out the coffee and tea completely, much as i try (coffee-holics anonymous…?). i won’t whine about it because i entirely deserve this; i know i do. i am only curious about how far i can push it. since chronic gastritis had been my diagnosis, can there be any point in attempting to change anything…?

despite the rain, i have been enjoying the weather when i do manage to get out. indoors, the infamous japanese stuffiness has been at work, as always. i need to wax lyrical about this. the central air-conditioning has been off for a month or so now (understandably), but there are no windows in most places and simply, no air. some forward-thinking stores have even got the radiator on – the radiator, if you please!! at 22 degrees…? they really have the strangest ideas. at school, i have made it a habit to arrive at class an hour early just so i can open the windows and air the rooms. the worst of it comes during choir practices. many of the studios are basement, windowless rooms; even when they come with windows, we are never allowed to keep them open during the session because of the noise from outside (or the noise we are creating inside? i am never quite sure which). half the time, i feel as if i must turn white and expire after pieces that require long, sustained breathing. nobody else seems to be quite as disturbed, and they manage to keep on all their numerous layers of clothes with impressive cool, while i, in a single t-shirt, cannot stop fanning myself vigorously with the score at every possible moment. this thing about living with bad air – somebody enlighten me please? it is one particular japanese phenomena that i have never quite grasped in all my years here.

my three boxes of cold-weather clothes have arrived, and are parked unceremoniously at the doorstep now. i am quite in despair – my room resembles a storage warehouse, and i cannot find any way of unpacking those boxes without displacing something else. this closet-room is a delicate eco-system, and i am afraid i have much taxed its limits. i could rent one of those trailer storage units outside, or live out of boxes for the next one year or so. i could also bust my budget and move out of the dormitory. none of the options are really enticing. i could, also, park some clothes in the fridge and the bathroom – now that’s an idea.

i have much more to go on about (like how i bought a beginners’ embroidery kit and am thinking of learning to crotchet as well. exciting moments in the life of a single woman.) but there is much pressing work to be done as i am building a little go-to-hungary nest egg. translations are coming in like wildfire again, and i have to catch them without quite burning myself. but the call of europe is strong, so… i just keep going.