Planning stuff is exhausting

Hi! Well... it appears my last post was two weeks ago. Sigh. Anyways, I guess I kind of forgot to mention what I have been up to lately.  As part of my constant desire to do stuff (and a strange inability to stay stagnant for too long)...

... I am off to China for a holiday!

Sweet!

I leave in two days and return roughly 9 days later on November 8th.  Just a short trip really, I didn't really feel up to leaving for too long with my New York City trip just around the corner.  I am going with my friend (Isaac) who is originally from China and has been studying here in Australia for two years now.  He is going back home to visit his family for a few months over the summer break, he asked if I wanted to come so of course I jumped at the chance.  Having a Chinese native who can speak the language and knows the areas would be such a blessing.

While I have been on big overseas trips in the past, this is the first one that I will be organizing myself (eg. not through a travel agency or with parental help). I've quickly learned through this experience that planning trips is a long and complicated process... there are flights to book, travel and medical insurance to obtain (and decipher), hotels to search, dates to organize, packing, transport to and from airport to organize, the transport options while at your destination... and some of the websites are in no way straight forward (I am looking at you China Eastern Airlines...).

But a good learning experience nonetheless.

"Wanderlust: a strong desire for or impulse to wander or travel and explore the world"

I have recently come into awareness of this amazing word and have thus promptly fallen in love with it.  Wanderlust... I wonder if that's me? 

Another possible tattoo idea? Hmm, perhaps when I feel I have earned the title, which isn't quite yet.

Anyways, see everyone soon!

You guys!

Haha... uh oh... I'm drunk again, and have now logged onto Blogspot.  Words are about to be spilled!

You guys are awesome! Yes you, the readers, you fellow bloggers especially! I really enjoy blogging.  I enjoy writing even though I have a back-log of things to write about at least 2 months long.  But foremost I really enjoy reading posts of my favourite bloggers and I really wish they posted more often so I had more to read when I am bored at work (which is basically all day long).

My favourite bloggers are listed under the "My Favourite Blogs To Follow' side bar on the right... S.Love (so real to herself), Matt vs The Real World (living the good life I hope to one day have), Tori Tea (I am pretty sure I am in love with you), RPG Called Life (a cool chick who enjoys video games... that's the dream!), Intrepid Boy (you are a bigger legend than you know), I enjoy reading every post.  To be honest I am not exactly sure why... it is just something that is apart of me now.  A ritual, a habit, just something that above all I can call my own.  My own blog in its own corner of the internet with its own followers, its own posts, its own personality, its own people it follows in return.

Last time I had a few drinks on my own and decided to blog was over a month ago (I don't drink very often) in which I rambled quite extensively about my hopes and dreams about my New York City trip.  While NYC is always on my mind, I think I will try and refrain from talking about it yet again.  Although when I say that it is always on my mind, I literally mean always.  Whenever some bad luck happens, such as missing the bus, or losing my phone, I immediately think to myself "if I was in New York right now, alone with no help, how would I now adapt to the situation?"

It is actually pretty cool, in a way I am trying to prepare myself mentally as much as possible for my big trip as I know once I am there I am literally on my own with no family or friends within any reasonable distance to help me out if I get in a bind.

Anyways, moving on.  Yes, so, I have had a couple of beers on my own at home to enjoy my Friday night end of the week.  It was a tough week, so I thought a quiet night of beers, music and video games would be awesome.  So, what's new?

Well the other week I mentioned how I had a date, but I never really wrote a follow up post to it.  To be honest it actually turned out awesome (despite the mishap where I said I would call... but forgot to call... yeah... she was not happy!, but whatever, I smoothed it over eventually haha).  She wasn't quite what I was after, so I let her down as easily as I could... but hey, she got a very expensive dinner paid for by me so she can't exactly complain, we have ended up being friends so win win I guess.

Majority of the reasons to turning her down, despite how awesome she was, was a small clash of differential life-style choices (I'm rather spontaneous whereas she enjoys step-by-step planning, for example), but also the fact that, to be just a tad selfish, I am enjoying far too much my current bachelor life-style of living out of home, partying it up, living the free life.

Today however that philosophy took a rough turn.  The douche at work was at his ultimate douchey-ness, my supervisor was on a mission to drill me as hard as he can on the quality of work leaving me to defend it defiantly for a good 30 minutes, and it was Friday which is naturally a tough day anyway.  And as I was on the bus heading home, reading the last 50 pages of the seventh Harry Potter book (argh it is so intense at the moment!) I couldn't help but think 'sigh... I guess it would be pretty cool to have a nice girl to come home to after a long day'.  Hell, even just someone to have a few casual drinks with over dinner would of been great, instead of my weet-bix and oats cereal for dinner that I threw together for myself while watching The Big Bang Theory episodes at my computer in my room... as I said, living the bachelor life haha!


Alas, I guess regardless of my desire of having a bachelor life or a relationship one, either way it is out of my control.  I have big dreams for the kind of girl I'd like to be with in the future, and I hope everyday that I'll be lucky enough to find her some day, someone to join me on my stupid ideas or crazy adventures, and mostly just to keep me in line... but I guess until then I'll just live life as best as I can.  Working hard, having fun and traveling the world, who knows what the future holds, as they say.

Some day I truly, truly hope I find her.

Review: Eight White Nights - Andre' Aciman

I have recently finished reading one of the most fantastic and memorable books I have ever had the privilege to read.  Eight White Nights by Andre' Aciman is not in my usual genres to read by any means, with most of my favourite books having at least one sword battle or some magic, but as I was browsing a discount bookstore that had recently opened up in my area by chance I grabbed this book and thought I'd give it a go.

I'll be honest and admit that I only justified buying it at first because it was set in New York City, but as I sat down, not really expecting much at first (as I had never read this genre nor author before) I can honestly say I was vehemently hooked before the end of the first chapter.  It was absolutely enthralling, I loved every page.  Perhaps I am just naive and am not used to this style of writing therefore I am automatically impressed the first time I am exposed to it, however, and I believe this is to be the true case, it is in fact simply a brilliant book by a brilliant author and anyone, regardless of genre preference, would enjoy it just as much as I.

I would read it every single day while on the bus, then even late into the night despite having work early the next day. Some chapters shook me to the core, I thought I had dissected the characters' personalities and quirks quite accurately only to be thrown off course at a turn of the page. Brilliant stuff!

While reading I would sometimes come across a quote or line that really latched on to my being, so I would write them down for safe keeping:

     P216 - Clara: "Don't you think that if you've never wanted to be known by anyone the way I know you it's because I may want the same from you?"

I loved this line, it was so honest, so straightforward, it was a welcome relief from the otherwise cryptic messages that the main characters insisted on presenting to one another.  I got the sense that it took a lot of effort and self-sacrifice for Clara to say this, but I know I for one was glad she had.

    P243 "But if we do become strangers, and I do learn to hate you, and watch you turn your back as soon as I walk into a room, just know this: that no part of me will ever forget this week."

A lovely line.  It breaths desperation as the character was so afraid of what they might lose, so afraid that they cast aside their defences that they had kept held for so long and just said what they felt. It resonated in me quite profoundly my own fears of how love might be in my own future, will I too go through this fear some day? Perhaps I now know the perfect line to say if it does arise someday.

   P256 "Printz, I shouldn't tell you this, because you don't deserve it, but you're the best thing that's happened to me this year."

Again we see the warmth in the otherwise almost hostile shield the characters protect themselves with. These little moments of selfless admissions mean the world to the ones they are intended for, and I know as I read this I could imagine how powerful words such as these would be if ever said to me by someone I cherish.  Or, in other circumstances, if I said them to someone else even.

Out of context these lines won't make much sense I know, but I didn't want to give anything away, and I mainly posted them here to get them out of my emai inbox where they have been sitting acting as reminders for the last few months.

It was a sad day when the last page was turned as I knew I had just finished for good what had been quite the moving experience over the last few weeks that it has taken me to finish the book.  I may seek out other books by Mr Aciman, or I may purposely not in an effort to preserve what I believe was one of the most perfects reads I have ever come across.