Wednesday! So happy today! I could sing and dance and bring all the Disney character energy to the stage!

Last night I sat straight up in bed at approximately 4am for no apparent reason, checked my email, and discovered my work visa has been approved! That’s right! I’m officially a Hong Konger now!

I am so happy! So happy! So, so, so happy! Happy Carnival to me! This is the BEST Mardi Gras gift I could ever receive! Hurray!!!!!!!!!

I can’t wait to buy that one-way plane ticket and never come back to South bumfuck Dakota ever again. YUCK! There is nothing you could offer me in this whole universe to convince me to return to this cursed wasteland ever again. Too much Ghost Dance Energy. We don’t belong here. We never have. That’s why it’s so hostile all the time over little effing insignificant thing. Time to listen to the Spirit and GTFO.

*immediately starts parading down the middle of the street in feathers and beads, totally sober, just to piss everyone off*

The best part is… now that I have “secured the bag,” I can delete LinkedIn from my iPad and not log into it again until my new job contract ends. I hate LinkedIn sooooo much. Ugh. The vibe there is just Heads Up Asses all the time. It’s nauseating. My desire is to not have to use it at all anymore. I’ve learned that connections are currency and in-person networking is more valuable than ever. That’s why I’ve already joined a social club for women in the city.

I’m so happy. I finally get to live my dream of living in a huge international city! If I never, ever have to live in a tiny little town in the middle of nowhere ever again, it will be too soon. Give me noise. Give me traffic. Give me a million people from everywhere on Planet Earth coming and going, all day, every day. Give me late night city walks and midnight snacks from the markets.

I am gonna ride on the top level of the double-decker every single day. I am gonna ride up and down that escalator until I try every pop-up restaurant along the way. I am gonna go to the beach and do yoga and rent a junk boat with all my new friends just to take a million ridiculous pictures for Instagram. I’m gonna do the day trips and travel all over Asia. And of course, take more ridiculous pictures with every single piece of dragon art I encounter. Year of the Dragon, coming in hot!

How is learning Chinese going? Well, it’s been interesting. First, I tried to take an online course on Chinese History taught by a Harvard grad slash professor at [Unnamed U.S. Military Branch Academy]. Given these elite credentials, one would think it would be one of the better classes on this subject you could find online. Wrong. So wrong.

It was honestly so bizarre. He started with the topic of opium, which is a strange way to start a history course about China given that the Opium Wars were pretty recent in the grand scheme of things. What even is the timeline we are trying to establish here?

So about 15 minutes in, he started saying shit like “Most people who use opium are actually casual users. We don’t all have addiction problems like all the people you see in these photos. For example, I made this lesson under the influence of opiates! It’s not a problem! They’re safe to use if you have real pain! It’s just like having a glass of wine after work! We are SO MUCH MORE RESPONSIBLE here in the West! That’s why we can be trusted with opiates and they can’t!”

Right.

Okay, so, as a person who has seen the ugly face of Addiction more than once, that sounds like the voice of Denial. I literally said to my brother, “Yo, am I the only one who thinks this professor sounds like he’s one missed painkiller prescription away from sucking dick for heroin on the street?”

Unfortunately, as a person who has seen the negative effects of opiates firsthand (including the death of a childhood friend from a fentanyl overdose), this one “lesson” was a dealbreaker for me. I decided to turn off the computer, walk out of the virtual classroom, and never return. Yep, so, no more Western Versions of Asian History for me. From now on, I want to learn about these cultures from the people themselves.

Enter Chinese Dramas! Yasss! This is what I want! I want to learn about the every day lives of normal people living under the different Imperial Dynasties. I want to see what they wore, how they lived, what they talked about, how their lives were.

Enter Perfect Match, which just came out on Netflix. This is my first C-Drama ever and I am OBSESSED! OMG! I don’t know any Mandarin, but I got sucked in so fast. It’s set during the Song Dynasty, which was a hotbed of literature, art, and poetry. It’s about a family of women who lose their farm and have to start a tea house business in the big city to survive. Hijinks ensue!

It’s hilarious, heartwarming, dramatic, emotional, all the things I love. One minute I’m laughing, the next minute I’m crying, the next minute I’m mad because I just want Kang Ning and Chai An to make out already!!!!! Then there’s the 4D-chess levels of plotting, scheming, and espionage taking place on one little street corner. Not to mention everything is beautiful. Forget modern streetwear. I need a fur-lined silk robe with custom embroidery, stat. Just to wear in my house, obviously. And can we please throw in a matching pair of house slippers while we’re at it? Yasss.

Luckily I’m only on episode 15/30, so I have more of the series left to enjoy. Sometimes I just close my eyes and listen to the dialogue, even though I don’t know what they’re saying. Right now, I’m just interested in hearing spoken Chinese. As I said, this show is in Mandarin, not Cantonese, but it’s okay. I just want to know how it sounds so I can start imitating it.

Reading is interesting. Again, I don’t know what it says, but that’s not my focus. Right now I am going through every line looking at each individual character. I like to look at every individual character to see how it’s unique. I really want to tie a Calligraphy class when I get there so I can really get up close and appreciate the artistic aspects of the language.

Gotta go. I need to dance around my apartment to my Brazilian Carnival Playlist! And then take care of very boring, practical things, like going to the grocery store and cleaning the bathroom.

Ugh, my iPad is on a weird mission to try to force AI on me. Lol, hell to the no. I’ve suffered my whole life to create my art. I don’t want a soulless robot trying to finish my sentences for me. Like, sorry that you, Mr. TechBro Programmer Person, need to outsource your brain to a computer because you cannot use a dictionary or learn another language or write a sentence or draw a picture or use critical thinking skills to sort through search engine results all by yourself. We don’t all have that problem. Sucks to suck, I guess.

Whatever you have to do to destroy society, I guess. Why build something great that will last when you can just destroy everything other people made before you? It’s like watching a toddler throw a tantrum on the beach and knock down all the sandcastles. Pathetic. Just pathetic.

Off now. Ta ta!