passion pit came on and it made me think of you. i've been thinking of you less - which is good, but occasionally i'd see something that reminds me of you. (occasionally is an understatement.)

i'm missing the states a lot today - not so much the place itself, but the routine i had established for myself. there are feelings we associate with places that are just different from feelings we have doing the same activity in a different place. i was on the train going home today, and it made me think of commuting on the cta home in chicago. most of the time home from a long day of work or school. there's a certain calmness about looking out the window and watching the city of chicago pass me by. the announcements on the train, the occasional extremely chirpy conductor on the red line at 6am, the feeling of going to a place that i, and a couple roommates, had established as home. i stood in the mrt, packed like sardines amongst other Singaporeans as the automated voice warned that the doors were closing. unlike chicago, when it is announced that the doors are closing, they really do start closing. 

i think about having to force myself to get my butt off the couch cos i have dishes to do, or laundry, or food to cook, or needing to get lessons prepped for the next day. sometimes i don't (many times actually), and fall asleep in work clothes till my 5am alarm rings, and i jerk out of bed. if ryan is around, he'd ask if i want to go to my bed. most of the time, i'd half open my eyes, mumble no, and turn a little in the couch. he'd turn the lights off, put a blanket over me, before heading back to his room.

part of me is glad though - that i don't have to get on a 24-hour flight for a long time to come, nor adjust to the cold winters, nor have my heart be beating so quickly and my feet brisk walking as i walk through a dark alley, that i no longer have the painful, almost tangible ache of missing my family. 

musings upon my return

The familiarities and peculiarities of singapore intrigue me. something i've noticed is the way hearing the singaporean accent still perks my ears up a little, though now it's everywhere. in chicago, it was pretty rare to come across singaporeans that i'd most of the time be listening out hard for that distinct accent.

my body remembers better than my mind which stop to get off at for which train or bus, which corner to turn to get to wherever i want to go. the trains are almost sparkling clean compared to chicago. there are many more elderly people here.

is it weird to feel foreign in the place where you're from? i feel like in the states it was so much of attempting to hide my foreignness - "faking" an accent, dressing differently, and now foreignness is felt so acutely within, instead of outwardly.

i feel myself clutching onto my purse, though there's almost no need to do that here. the wariness of crime in the states has ingrained such a fear. i feel alone walking the streets, maybe because home is always associated with hanging out with people, but i have yet to reconnect with many people yet. my room is still my refuge, as it was in chicago too. and my phone is too much a source of comfort - making distant friends seem so much closer.

i want to be present more, ya know. i feel like everyone kindof wants to but are afraid to. we hide behind our devices. there are the occasional ones that don't. or are genuinely not interested in interacting. i remember a friend telling me a story of her dad helping out at some tree planting event. there was free coffee and a bunch of tables to socialize at. he stood by the coffee intentionally because he just wanted to plant the trees and take off. but people kept approaching him thinking he was lonely or left out. he got really annoyed. i found that so hilarious. part of me wants to be that kind of satisfied with being alone.

dad helped me move the two single beds and bed frames out of my room (technically just one, the other frame we made into a shelf hee), and the queen sized one down from the attic. it took sooo much work but we got it done. i watched this video of a teenager on youtube one of those famous ones that are famous at wayyy too young redecorate her room with her dad, and i just felt like a child again. which is nice, but also weird.