Escape From St. Andy's

This was it, Move Out Day.

It only seemed like yesterday that I first moved in. Of course, it always seems like yesterday when you're only thinking of Point A and Point B, and disregard everything in between. Yesterday was an all-out cleaning day, a desperate fight to reverse a whole year of passive littering.

Being the only vacant slot left on the cleaning roster, I was in charge of carpet, walls, and furniture. I thought I lucked out since I didn't have to do the bathroom, nor the kitchen, which none of it is my mess because I always clean up after myself there. Perhaps most ominous is the refrigerator, whose contents have seen the beginning of time. Of particular infamy is the vegetable crisper, whose contents are anything but crisp, but more like a primordial soup. Had the fridge not been cold, I'm sure several new species of multicellular life forms would emerge from there. I thought that was the worst part of cleaning...

...until I started work on the living room sofas. The cushions are always cleaner-side-up, but in this case, they're both equally horrible. I had to scrub off what must surely be cum stains from one cushion; something this tenacious can only be issued forth from a man - only I'm not that man, because I don't really get that lucky. Oh God, I'm sure an entire season of CSI can be based on these cushions alone.

There is, however, something that I DID contribute to in the living room, and that was the Recyclables Mountain, which I took it upon myself to move. That's probably because I almost never cook, but rather reheat things from cans and the like. Carrying a huge garbage bag full of plastic milk bottles with caps intact, I was horribly tempted to stuff it into the already-full trash compactor, just for the euphoria of hearing them explode with an acoustic experience probably reminiscent of fireworks, or the wringing of bubble wrap of an amplitude multiplied by a factor of 100,000.

Sadly, the hippy inside of me told me to put the bag of bottles next to the already-full recycling bin instead. Dammit. We all have some hippy inside each and every one of us, and it is up to ourselves to fight our inner hippies. Otherwise, every country in the world will register a negative gross national product. I have failed and now I'm ashamed.

Among other treasures left behind in my living room are a tall cylindrical traffic pylon, and a roadwork in progress sign with a 30km/h speed limit on the bottom. They've been here all along, so some drunkass predecessor to the suite must've "borrowed" them while stumbling home through a construction site. ("Aaaah dunno, they just follllowed me hoooooome! *HICCUP*")

The best course of action was to leave them at a nearby construction site and hope that the work crew will adopt them, but once again, I was tempted to use the legally-mandated power vested in these relics to my amusement. After all, wherever I place that sign, traffic will be forced to slow down considerably, so the best road would probably be a high-traffic area like Westbrook Mall. Fuck you, Inner Hippie! I won't yield to you this time!!! Screw it, these things are just too heavy to carry that far...but the feeling of power in my hands is just too overwhelming...arrrgh, but somewhere there is probably an embattled construction worker out there wondering why the hell are cars flying past him at 100km/h. And so ends my internal struggle.

Having left these artifacts at the construction site next door last night, where they can find a new home with a loving family, there was nothing left in the living room of concern. This only leaves the walls and my bedroom. Even though I began the cleaning up process weeks ago, my room still required a painstaking weekend to clean up; the walls weren't too bad, although I was sure they made the walls white to make he cleaning experience miserable.

So having finally done cleaning, it was finally time to get the community coordinator to check my work. He's an alright guy, but seeing how his room is CONSTANTLY spotless, one can only imagine that his idea of socially interacting with others consists of wiping the furniture. In other words, I expected the comco's inspection to be a nightmare since he would probably hold me to the same exact standards of cleanliness that he instills in his own room.

It turned out not to be that bad - other than a few small things he wanted me to fix, like the dust on the blind slats, he was okay with my room. Finally finishing off the work and getting a pass, I was finally free to go.

With my vehicle loaded up, I headed off to a temporary future of living under the dominating eyes of my parents.



Arthur waiting for me to get into the packed car and drive.

Vernon Shall Taste My Cold Steel

I'm back from a weekend iaido seminar at Vernon.

They certainly picked the right venue - there is nothing else to do in that town that would distract our focus from training, other than winery tours. And we all knew that if we engaged in that activity, it would quickly degenerate into a winery crawl, and it would certainly look bad the morning after when we have to attend workshops instructed by the head of the Canadian Iaido Association. Therefore, such attempts to appease our oenophilia are out of the question. (As a compromise, we opted to knock back beers before bedtime and watch a hilarious satire on the American dystopia called Idiocracy instead.)

I've been practicing iaido for almost a year now. What started out as merely something to complement my kendo has become a deeper look into what it's like to be a samurai. Nevertheless, no matter how much I train, I don't think I can ever be a samurai. It's not because there is too little to associate with present culture and society, but rather because the whole self-disembowelment-upon-command thing doesn't really float well with me. You've probably heard of it as seppuku or hara-kiri. If my boss ever commands me to make a wide U-shaped cut across my abdomen so that my intestines spill out, and then wait for my best friend to behead me as a coup de grâce, I'd cut him down before he is able to finish his sentence.

That, however, doesn't put me down in the bottom of those idiots who watch Highlander movies and think they are the shit when it comes to samurai expertise. For those of you unfamiliar with the movie (and TV show) franchise, the premise is that for centuries, our world has been populated by immortals who can only be killed by beheading, and who must fight with wallhangers until only one is left standing victorious. That One shall receive The Ultimate Prize - a $2 gift certificate to Dairy Queen.

So here I was in Vernon as part of my efforts not to fall into the above category of ignorant fools. Even though we practice with iaito, unsharpened swords not fit for cutting, it can still be dangerous because the tips are still very pointy. I was practicing with my senpai's sword, which has the distinction of not only being the heaviest sword in our class, but also having the blade with the longest tip, which made sheathing it a bitch.

One technique involved turning around and thrusting the blade behind me. Since I had to hold the sword with one hand for this technique, I got careless and allowed weight to catch me off-guard, so that the tip of the blade fell abruptly dropped mid-thrust, and would've went through my thumb had the phalangeal bone not stopped it. It was quite a gusher, and I compressed the wound with a cold wet paper towel for some time before giving up and putting a bandage over it anyway to allow it to clot on its own.

This wasn't the first time this sword tasted my blood, but it was certainly the first time it had such a big drink. Thus, besides improving my iaido skills with more intensive training than usual, this seminar was beneficial towards furthering my study of the samurai in that I have learned to somewhat bleed like one.

If not that, then I've become closer towards perhaps someday getting $2 off my strawberry sundae.

ACF After-Aftermath

This time, I was awakened in the middle of the night by the sound of heaving from the bathroom.

Surprise, surprise. My roommate drank too much during the Arts County Fair. I don't understand how people can lack so much restraint as to drink their way to nausea. Isn't the feeling of sickness sufficient negative feedback to tell them to stop? I guess when you're that drunk, not even getting a rusty vinegar-coated screwdriver stuck into your eyeball is sufficient negative feedback.

I've only gone as far as an unpleasant throbbing hangover on a few occasions. The only times I've ever engaged in alcohol-related vomiting was when I was tactfully forced to down a tumbler full of straight vodka for a Russian brother, and when I was stupid enough to down a foot-long cheesesteak into a stomach already occupied with copious amounts of cocktails.

The sound of the shower running marked the reprieve. However, I nearly slipped on the bathroom floor this morning. Can't he dry his feet so he doesn't leave the bathroom like a lake? All you have to do is stand on one foot, hold both ends of your towel, and run the towel across the sole of your foot in the same motion that you use to dry the unreachable parts of your back. Oh wait, if that drunk fool could stand on one foot, he'd probably also be able to pass a sobriety test to avoid being busted for DUI. Worst of all, I was revolted at the sight of dried puke on the toilet, caked on the inner surface of the bowl and under the seat to greet my ass the next morning.

But then again, my roommates are disgusting enough to bring food into the toilet in one form or another.

ACF Aftermath

I was woken up by cheering from atop of Gage Towers this morning.

I recognized that resonance of merry inebriated mirth, but was surprised it was so loud that it came all the way from Gage. I was even more surprised that the hoopla came so early in the day, when everyone is supposed to be at school.

Then the epiphany dawned upon me that today there is no school because it's he annual Arts County Fair, a huge outdoor concert held at the Thunderbird Stadium featuring homegrown bands and alcohol. Lots of it. As a regular student, I would have had this day marked on my calendar the moment the date was announced, but since my undertgrad days are long gone, it's just not that exciting anymore because I've done it all.

Besides, having names such as Pride Tiger and DJmy!gay!husband! in the performance lineup doesn't really give me much further incentive to go.

Besides the concert itself, this event is marked with the monopolization of alcohol sales by the sponsor brewery, whose product tastes suitably watered-down for a sports stadium venue. This has in turn brought out the creativity of the students towards, shall we say, the breaking of that monopoly.

My friends usually just put a small hole in a juice box or open the box along one of its seams, drain the juice out, and replace the contents with their favorite alcoholic beverage before resealing the box. After all, since non-alcoholic drinks are not prohibited, the security at the gate would not ask you to open your juice to check.

However, I've heard that some people go as far as sneaking into the stadium in the middle of the night, shortly before the event, and digging a small hole in the hills surrounding the field, burying their alcohol, then covering it back up with the divot they just took out. They would then mark their alcoholic cache by the number of steps downhill from a landmark on top, such as the second brick from the ticketing entrance, or say the fifth fencepost from a certain tree.

With so much alcohol on premises, you'd know that crazy drunken debauchery will be a highlight of ACF. You'd also know that no matter how many port-a-potties they set up, it will never be sufficient to handle the onslaught of people having to pee at any given moment. That's why the preferred urinal is the chain link fence atop the hills surrounding the field - for both boys and girls alike. Unfortunately, the sheer volume of urine generated by the sheer volume of people always turns the soil at the base of the fence into urine mud. Even less fortunate for the people who engage in fights in that area, probably over pissing space or accidental cross-streaming of pee, as they usually end up rolling in that urine mud.

If that isn't enough violence for you, then you can check out the mosh pit just in front of the stage, where people regularly emerge in a bloody mess that makes raw hamburger meat look like a block of tofu. As for me, I preferred to sit and watch from my home camp on the hills, while further down, some incapacitated jackass stripped down naked to everyone's cheering, only to have his audience turn on him by throwing beer at the buck-naked guy as security hauls him away.

So knowing the crazy times that my roommates would go through, I shut myself in my hole and braced for the chaos to come when my roommates come stumbling back from the event.

When I finally emerged to see what damage my roommates have wrought after they have swaggered and verbally slurred their way home and settled down, I was surprised to see that things weren't that bad. I guess it helped that the Community Coordinator gave them a lecture, when he came in to bail me out of locking my own keys in my room. Coming to think of it, I should've locked myself out on purpose long ago to tactfully bring up this issue without being a ratting goody two-shoes. I was impressed...

...until I went to the bathroom and found beer bottles in the shower. Not only that, but I've noticed a sudden drop in my shampoo supply, a freakin' 1.18L family size. I don't mind my roommates using some of my stuff, so long as they ask and I don't tell them to fuck off. If only I could procure some radiotherapy drugs to use as an additive to expose their culpability with tell-tale baldness.

At least it wasn't as bad as last night, when I was going to brush my teeth and noticed the corner of a condom wrapper lying next to my toothbrush and toothpaste. I guess I should be grateful that whoever it was had enough modesty to not display the spent contraceptive there for all to see as a trophy of his sexual conquest. (But then again, such a trophy could be generated without 2nd party assistance...) Thus, I should also be grateful that I didn't have to boil or throw away my dental hygiene implements.

Sadly, I can't be glad that this kind of event happens only once a year, because this kind of shit happens more often than that.

Sweeping The Dead

Yesterday was Qing Ming Festival.

Or 清明節 in Chinese, it is the day when Chinese people go visit the graves of their ancestors because they neglect them the rest of the year. Activities usually include the presentation of offerings and the cleaning of the tombs, mainly by sweeping.

Being Good Friday and the closest holiday to Qing Ming, it was on such an occasion that my mom, uncle, and I went to the good ol' mausoleum to pay Grandma and Grandpa a visit. No, we are not rich enough to afford our own family mausoleum, so my late grandparents have a slot in a wall shared with many other neighbors. For some reason, the mausoleum's permanent residents consist almost solely of Chinese and Italians, so I hope my grandparents have learned to speak Italian since their stay there, although it is kind of amusing to think of them going on language exchange with Mr. and Mrs. Benito Mussolini.

Upon our arrival at the mausoleum, we could see people burning offerings such as hell money in a designated oil drum just outside the main entrance. No, we do not have the same definition of "hell" as Westerners; we basically use "hell" interchangeably with "afterlife". (Coming to think of it, next time that Chinese cab driver tells me to "Go to the hell!", I shouldn't take it so badly.)

Anyway, for those of you who don't know, the Chinese believe that you can give presents to your dead loved ones by burning the paper version of it. Unfortunately, this custom has driven such a lucrative industry that things have gotten pretty out of hand, with paper gold bars, paper cars, paper cellphones, paper iPods, paper pets, paper houses, paper servants and concubines, and even paper Viagra.

Regardless, I no longer see any point in burning hell money, as the ridiculously large denominations (Hell$100,000,000 banknotes, for God's sake!), and the fact that everyone is burning them in huge wads means inflation must be astronomically inconceivable in the afterlife. I can picture Grandpa going, "$75,000,000,000,000,000,000 for a stick of gum!?!? WTF!?!?"

That said, back to my grandparents. Seing how the mausoleum's management has tended to the maintenance of the complex's floors, there was no need to do any sweeping - another tradition that has tragically fallen prey to modern economy and pragmatism. Instead, I wiped the dust from the facestone with a wet wipe, while my mom and uncle cut and arranged fresh flowers to be placed in the attached vase.

Being done before them, and having silently made the necessary communications with my grandparents while cleaning them up, I decided to take a quick tour of the place. Most of the slots on the wall were either occupied, or pre-purchased for future..."moving in". It must suck to be the guy stuck with the section of the wall that has the electrical outlet. I guess they reserve that spot for those who died by electrocution.

I was saddened when I happened upon the resting places of those around my age or younger, who presumably died either of traffic accidents or terminal illness. It was even sadder when I came across the grave of a one year old baby, his grave poignantly adorned with knitted baby booties and teddy bears. It was humbling in the sense that it made me feel fortunate to have made it this far.

Afterwards, my mom and uncle came out with the processed flowers, placed them on the vase, and we made our prayers and took the traditional three bows before my grandparents. The overall experience was rather solemn and grim, but a must in order to pay our respects to our ancestors. I don't think the mausoleum is a place where anyone would want to go - the interior is too bright and well-lit for goths, and the atmosphere is too depressing for everyone else. But then again, such a place really isn't meant for the living, is it?

On the way out, Mom started creeping me out, in the way that Chinese moms always somehow manage to do to their kids. Having bought the slots adjacent to Grandma and Grandpa for the rest of the family, she nonchalantly reminded me how she and I will someday reside next to our grandparents, as if the mausoleum is one big apartment complex. I bit my tongue to stop myself from retorting that if I had to spend eternity, or until the bombs drop, with two generations of Chinese parents (or in-laws to my possible wife) breathing down my neck, it would truly be the Western definition of "hell".

Anyways, that's beside the point - I am immortal.

PS - Sorry I didn't take any photos...God knows if any of the mausoleum's occupants decide to jump in front of my camera and spoil my shot.