Monday, August 29, 2011

Then and Now 13 - Now and Then

Then and Now 13 - Now and Then
Time: Early 2011, married, and late 2007, single and at my apartment.

I've written twelve Then and Now posts, three experiences for each of the four periods of my unmarried life, and I've just barely begun relating the good times I had back then. But this Then and Now is going to turn the standard format on its ear: instead of taking a great day in my unmarried life and comparing it to the boring day I just experienced, I'm going to take a non-eventful day in my unmarried life and compare it to a day of travel as a married man.

A few months ago, I finally got the go-ahead to take my wife, our son, my sister-in-law and myself out to the main city to have a long day of fun and adventure. That day, my wife and son woke up at the same time, and while my son and I were ready to go immediately, my wife needed nearly an hour to get all of her makeup and dressing up ready for her to go. In the meantime, my son was in a bad mood because he had just woken up, so I stared at the wall for the whole time while I waited for my wife to finish. Finally, she was ready, and we went downstairs to be on our way.

I suggested that we drive there to avoid long lines and waits for buses and stuff, but my wife disagreed and wouldn't budge from her position, so I let her have her way. The bus took nearly fourty minutes to arrive. In the meantime, I stood around, staring at the sky and daydreaming while my sister-in-law played with my son. When it finally arrived, it was a very, very slow ride through muddled and packed streets to get to the train station that would take us to the main city. My son seemed to be pretty excited about being on the bus, though, so I was glad he was having a good time.

At the train station, my sister-in-law bought us some bread and coffee at a local convenience store while we waited another twenty minutes for the train to come. I mostly just stared at the sky, but I woke up now and then to chat with my wife and son. We boarded, and the train got to its stop rather quickly.

When we got off, we went to a local temple. Things were actually pretty interesting here. There were a lot of nice statues and placards detailing the history of the place, and there was an artificial waterfall in one of the corners that I took a couple of pictures of. But we didn't look around for long; my wife soon took us back to the train stop so she could go window shopping at a few clothes stores. I stood beside her and stared blankly for about fifteen minutes.

We finally hopped another train up north to a carnival, just three blocks outside of the station. It was so close that I could see the ferris wheel over the buildings beside us. I suggested that we just walk for three minutes to get there quickly instead of waiting for the shuttle, but my wife disagreed and wouldn't budge from her position, so I let her have her way. When we got there about fifteen minutes later, we bought some tickets and went inside. I wanted to get in line to start riding some rides with our son, but my wife disagreed and wanted to stand in line to rent a baby carriage. She wouldn't budge from her position, so I let her have her way.

I stood in line for about twenty minutes to get the carriage, then we loaded up our son and went to the first ride, a miniature train that went around the carnival, where we stood in line. An hour later, my wife, son and I rode the train. They both seemed to have a great time, until the ride was over: my son then threw a screaming fit because he wanted to ride again, so my wife and I had to calm him down. When that was over, we went to the ferris wheel to ride it, where my sister-in-law held our place in line so we didn't have to wait another hour. On the wheel, both my wife and son seemed really happy at going so high and seeing so many things, so I was glad for them.

We left the carnival, then hopped another train to head to a popular tourist spot next to the ocean, where there were tons of shops to visit and things to buy. My wife and I went there on our first pseudo-date in Then and Now 9, and I had been there at least three times prior, but my son had never gone before. My memory gets a bit hazy here, because all we really did was walk from one shop to another while my wife looked at clothes and stuff, and my son and I played crane games here and there. Aside from hanging with my son, I found myself zoning out several times because I was just so bored.

My wife got stuck on one clothes store for about twenty minutes, so I excused myself to go take a walk with our son by the ocean and talked with him. A while later, I got a call from her saying it was time to go, so we hopped a final train to get to a place where another bus could take us home. When we got there, my wife and son were hungry, so my sister-in-law and my son walked to a convenience store to buy some food. My wife was silent, so about fifteen minutes of wall staring later, my sister-in-law and son came back with the food. I wasn't hungry, so I just sat there while everyone ate, and I stared off into space some more.

We then walked out to the bus stop that our bus was coming to, only to see enough people to fill three of those buses standing in line waiting for the next one. I suggested to my wife that we take a taxi home, and for the first time the entire day, she agreed with me, and we found one to take us back. We rode down darkened streets for about fourty minutes before we got home. Everyone showered, then we went to bed.

When it comes to adventure in a married man's life, a day like that is about as wild as it gets.

As for one working day before I got married...

I woke up at 6:00.
I played video games.
I went to work.
I taught students.
I made $100, $70 of which wasn't going to daily expenses.
I bought a can of Pringles for dinner, because I didn't feel like doing dishes.
I went home.
My hamper was almost completely empty; laundry didn't need to be done until Friday night.
There were no dishes that needed to be done.
The floor was absolutely spotless and free of junk, dirt and misplaced furniture; sweeping didn't need to be done until Friday night.
I ate my Pringles.
I emailed and called some friends and asked if they wanted to hang out the next day.
I watched TV.
I played video games.
I fished my subway/train map out of my memories box, found a good place to visit, and left the map next to my keys and wallet for when I woke up the next day.
I lay down in bed and daydreamed about the adventures I would have after I woke up.
I slept.

That was a typical work day in my old life. Not too shabby.

Monday, August 22, 2011

Then and Now 12 - Adam

Then and Now 12 - Adam
Time: Mid-2007, single and at the hostel.

Adam was another in a long line of internet friends that I met from my profile on the public computer. We first met up at a McDonald's, and I'll never forget our first hello. Everything about Adam screamed artist, from his beret to his thick rimmed black glasses. I was expecting him to be excessively critical and judgemental like the hipsters I knew back in college, but I've seldom met as friendly and approachable a guy as good ol' Adam.

Sitting down to a couple of hamburgers and fries, it didn't take long for me to find out that he was, indeed, an aspiring filmmaker. Another filmmaker from this country, who made it big on the international stage, was his idol. We had a great talk about his dreams in life and all the adventures I had had in his country by the time lunch was finished. We went outside to take a little walk, and Adam showed me a couple of his favorite clothing and department stores outside. That was about it for our first meeting. I definitely wanted to hang out with this guy again sometime, and I made sure to exchange numbers for a second meet-up.

The next time was for another lunch. We met up at the train/bus/subway station, and walked by tons of advertisements and little shops set up on the way to the train stop. He talked more of his dreams of making movies, and to be honest, his optimism and enthusiasm were quite contagious. When we had come out of the station and onto a wide open road up top, I was keeping a smiling, wandering eye on the many buildings around us, and trying to translate and decipher what the different signs outside of them said.

The restaurant was on the third floor of a very tall building. The window provided an excellent view of the throngs of people outside and the stores around them, and the walls were covered in beautiful traditional art pieces. We had some boiled vegetables and meat. I was a bit worried about the prices of the place because I was running out of money at that time, but Adam assured me that he would pick up the tab. While we were eating, he told me that he had written and directed a commercial that aired on local TV a while back. I was suddenly even more intrigued with this guy, like I was sitting across from a mini celebrity. I asked him to send me a copy of the commerical so I could watch it at home sometime, and he said he'd try to find one and email me later. After lunch was over, he had to get to school, so we parted ways and decided to meet up again later.

A few days later, he sent me an email with a resume he was planning to send to a local director, so he could intern on a real life movie being made. He asked me to check his English as a sort of cheat to help him get the position, so of course I helped him out. I guess I really proved myself to him during these past few meetings, because the next (and final) time we met up, he brought along his best friends with him to meet me. One was a taller local guy who seemed a bit shy, and the other was a pretty cute, but also shy, girl.

The four of us went out during the night to walk the busy streets and find stuff to do. We tried stopping at Adam's favorite restaurant to get something to eat, a little place in the middle of a dark alley sandwiched between two busy roads. But they seemed to be closed for some reason, so we just kept wandering down the road.

On that hot summer night, we walked past hundreds of other locals rushing up and down the street, and dozens of stores that lined the road on either side. After a while, we came to a tea shop that really seemed to be popular, so we all waited in line and got some good drinks to help cool us down. Adam talked a lot about the movies he wanted to make as we left, and we other three just kind of stood there and happily let him gush his heart out.

Our next stop was a local restaurant. There was no door leading in, leaving the insides completely open to the night air and bugs. It was cramped and hot inside, but with that many people around, I knew that that probably meant the food or service was excellent. Still, I felt a bit out of place because I didn't understand everything that everyone was saying or what I could eat, but my three new friends helped me out a bit as I struggled to understand the menu and what the cook said. I don't remember much about our conversations (other than Adam's love of movies, of course), or what I ate, but my memories really open up when the four of us decided to go to my three new friends' college campus so they could show me around.

It was an expansive, beautiful place. It didn't even feel like a college campus; I know mine back home felt like a fenced off mini-town away from the country, completely filled to the brim with political kooks. Here, though, the college felt like it was part of the town itself. Its winding roads went around and through fields of grass, then joined up with the wide and busy roads of racing cars all around it. The buildings were tall and windowed, allowing little peeks inside at people immersed in their studying or reading.

The four of us shot the breeze about unimportant stuff for a while, and eventually, we split into two separate groups: Adam and I, and the other two. He must have been feeling as open and free as I did at that point, because after a while, he suddenly looked at me with a big grin on his face. I smiled back and asked what was up, and he said we should rent some motorcycles and head up into the mountains to do some hiking and camping sometime. It sounded like a lot of fun, to tell the truth. I definitely wanted to hold off on the trip until I had some money to spend, which wouldn't have taken more than a month or two to save up.

It's too bad that that's the last I heard from Adam. I guess I was expecting him to call me up when he was ready to head out, and by the time I remembered I was supposed to be doing something with him, I had met fourty or fifty other friends and had gotten distracted by the fun we were having to remember to call him back. Nonetheless, Adam was a good friend for the brief time we knew one another. He showed me some cool stuff, I helped him out a bit, and that college campus was a sight I'll remember well.

And why did we never talk again? It wasn't because I had chores to do, work to complete or marital fights to endure. It was because I was so very busy with the many excellent locals of this country that Adam, as great a guy as he was, just slipped my mind. I know it sounds douchey, and I still feel bad about it, but that's just how great my life was going back then.

Sorry I never got the chance to take that trip with you, bro.

As for today...

I woke up at 9:30.
I watched internet movies with my son.
My wife and I went to the gym, then we went home.
I ate lunch.
I took my son out to see some diggers, then we went under a bridge and out into the countryside to see some ducks, then we went to the arcade, then we went home.
I went to work.
I taught students.
I came home.
I folded and put away dry clothes.
I hung up wet laundry.
I did the dishes.
I cleaned up the floor and table.
I watched internet movies with my son.
I slept.

Monday, August 15, 2011

Just a spectator

Back in high school, I took a general education class in Psychology. When reading the textbook, I found a lot of things I disagreed with... mostly because I was a depressed, lazy loser looking for any reason to absolve myself of responsibility for my own happiness. I read up on and understood the concept of self-fulfilling prophecies, but never admitted that I engaged in them. I studied the chapter on depression, and seethed that these egghead scientists had no idea what it really felt like. The section on suicide, and why people choose to kill themselves, especially made me rage. How dare they claim to understand what I was going through?

I was a fool. A lazy, entitled fool.

But there was one thing that that book discussed that stays with me to this day. It was something that my depressed self, unmarried man abroad self, and current self could all agree was (politely) absolute horseflop: the book said that choosing between two positives was much more stressful than choosing between two negatives. That is, choosing between becoming a doctor or a teacher would cause more overall stress than choosing whether to lose your cancer-ridden arms, or lose your life.

I have changed immensely from the boy I used to be, but even my dumb older self could see how full of crap that "fact" was.

I had positive-positive troubles before I got married. Which of these fine girls should I date? Which of these well-paying jobs should I take? Which friend should I hang out with today, and where should we go? Aside from feelings of confusion, or maybe even feeling unsettled at knowing that a decision would impact the next year or so of my life, none of the stress I felt from those decisions compares to what goes on in my life now. Every decision in my married life is a negative-negative decision. But more importantly, all the decisions in my life result in the exact same three outcomes:

If I want to do it, but I'm not allowed to, "You Can't."
If I don't want to do it, but I have no choice, "You Must."
If I want to do it, and I can, "Hurry Up."

Let me provide some examples.

- Wow, the Gabriel Knight games were awesome. I've always loved jazz, but who would have thought New Orleans had such a rich history to it? Germany and France looked amazing too; I can't wait to go see those places for myself, to see how the real deal surpasses the games' portrayal of them.

Marriage says: You Can't. If you leave, your family will not have any means of emotional or physical support from you. And if you take them with you, everyone in your family, in-laws included, will whine at you every day about the selfish choice you're making. This isn't even getting into the fact that you don't have the freedom to do anything you want in the country you're in now; why do you think another country will be any different?

- That girl is really cute. She's a sweetheart, and she's got all the physical attributes I'm into. I'd love to take her out sometime, or at least get to know her.

Marriage says: You Can't. You took an oath to be with your wife for the rest of your life, and even if you didn't, you can't betray your honor to do what you want. But more importantly, how would an affair affect your family? And what time of the day could you possibly platonically hang out with this girl? Your wife and son always need you around. Your wife doesn't sleep with you, and you can't seek sex elsewhere. Deal with it.

- God, I'm bored. I've been sitting in this house for three hours just watching TV and staring at the wall. I can't play video games because my wife and son are awake, I can't sightsee alone without getting called to come back within a few hours... hmmm. I think I'll take my son out for a while.

Marriage says: You Can't. The weather isn't perfect, and you'll never get your son out the door before your wife or mother-in-law jumps down your throat about how he'll get sick. Lecture them all you want about how viruses, not weather, make you ill, they'll never listen.

Marriage says: Hurry Up. Stay out for more than a few hours, and you're going to get called and asked to come home. Refuse at your own peril.

- I'm hungry. I think I'll get some food at the convenience store before I go home.

Marriage says: You Can't. You're running low on money because of all your wife and her family's financial debts that you've taken care of, and you must save every dollar.

Marriage says: Hurry Up. Your mother-in-law can't take care of your son forever.

- I want to play a video game, and pretend I'm someone important for a while.

Marriage says: You Can't. Your family's up, and both your wife and son get upset if you ignore them for too long.

Marriage says: Hurry Up. Your family will be up/home any moment.

- I need to use the bathroom.

Marriage says: Hurry Up. If you stay in there too long, your son will start pounding on the door, and your wife has things for you to do around the house.

- Are you kidding me? I've done the laundry every day for the past ten days, and there's another load in there? I barely did the laundry once a week when I wasn't married, now I do it every day. Why do people keep changing their clothes three times a day around here? I don't want to do this again.

Marriage says: You Must. Laundry is your job, and if you skimp out on it, your wife will just find it fair to have you do something else to make up for the laundry you didn't do.

- Dishes again? I didn't even use any of these. I don't want to do them.

Marriage says: You Must. Dishes are your job, and if you skimp out on them, your wife will just find it fair to have you do something else to make up for the dishes you didn't do.

- The floor is covered in toys, and the table is covered with my wife's junk. Again. This is the thirtieth time in a row I've cleaned them up, and I don't want to do it again, considering that my family will probably just mess everything up tomorrow.

Marriage says: You Must. Cleaning the floor and table is your job, and if you skimp out on it, your wife will just find it fair to have you do something else to make up for the floor you didn't clean up.

- I've been working every day for the past four weeks. I want to take a quick break for a day or two.

Marriage says: You Can't. Remember all the money you lost cleaning up your wife and in-laws' financial messes? You need to make more.

All in all, I suppose I do have a choice in these matters. I could divorce my wife and run off to live a life of fun. I could make my wife do all the housework, and tell her to stuff it if she ever complained, thus provoking a possible divorce. I could take significantly more than the $100 I get a month for gas to go to work, cigarettes and a snack here or there.

But I won't. Because the "choice" is negative-negative: sacrifice, or hurt my family. And yet, I would hardly call that a choice. "Do this, or the kid gets it?" Is that a choice?

Am I even alive? I don't feel any different than an electric fan: someone pushes the power button, and it turns on. Someone tells me to take out the trash or go to work, and I do it. This is my life, and I'm not even a part of it. Literal years have gone by with no input from me. I'm a spectator on my own life.

Negative-negative decisions are the worst kind of decision, and they are the only ones that I make. Do what I hate, don't do what I like, and hurry the hell up if I manage to escape my cage for more than a few minutes. Every moment of my unengaging, monotonous married life is planned and set in stone from the moment I wake up, and I can't describe how much it depresses me.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Then and Now 11 - Clubbing

Then and Now 11 - Clubbing
Time: Late 2007, single and at my apartment.

Around the time this Then and Now happened, I was in the market for a girlfriend. I had several girls hanging off of me, but my pride at being such a catch, and my sense of honor that wanted to search for the right girl instead of dating and ditching a hundred one night stands a year, kept me from moving further with any of them. I think it was exactly this cool, confident and kind standoffishness that made me so attractive to these girls. And it's probably why I had such a great time for this Then and Now with not one, but two girls who took me out to dinner and a club.

I got an email one morning from Mary, who was interested in meeting up with me to just hang out for the night, and of course I was all for it. When we met up, I saw that she had brought her friend Isis along with her. They were some really funny girls, and full of energy. When we first met up outside the subway/train station, they really took the lead in our conversations. They were enthused to just take me around from place to place around the train station, and seemed very happy and proud to explain what their country had to offer.

We first took a walk around a construction site surrounded by tall fences. The two of them insisted that we walk to a faraway bus stop before we headed off to dinner, because they had stuff to tell and show me. The first thing we did was to pass by, and try and decipher, a bunch of vulgar graffiti spraypainted on the construction site fence. I won't repeat some of the things written in English, but I don't think it takes too much imagination to guess what they said. After that, we crossed a very, very wide street that ran between the construction site, and a huge park on the other side complete with massive water fountain in the middle. In no time, we were at the bus stop, and on our way to dinner.

It was kind of dark by the time we got to the restaurant, but it was absolutely worth it. I think the architect really had to be commended, from the ornamental pillars leading into the restaurant, to the aquariums in the walls and floor that housed hundreds of brightly colored fish. We all sat down and shot the breeze for a good hour or so, and dinner arrived. I had a steak and fish at their insistence, and though I really prefer to eat meat mixed with vegetables or sandwich bread, I have to say that the meal was really delicious. We took some funny pictures with me sandwiched between these two awesome girls and grinning like an idiot, while they pressed their hands on their cheeks to make mock kissy faces on either side of me.

After dinner, we hopped another bus to head to a club in the middle of town. It was on the fourth or fifth floor of a very tall building, and the bouncers were very intimidating. This was only the second time I had ever been in a club, so I don't know how to rate the music. It was loud and full of bass, and made it very difficult for me to talk to the girls.

The girls and I sat and got some drinks. I had a whiskey and coke, and started feeling even more chipper in no time. Looking around, I noticed that even though the music was loud and ready to give everyone a good time, the fifty or so locals in the club were glued firmly to their seats. The foreign DJ was working hard, but the dance floor was completely empty, and it seemed that everyone was just trying their best to shout to one another over the music.

After I talked (shouted) with the girls for a while, one or two brave locals made their way to the floor and started bobbing up and down with no rhythm whatsoever. As painful as it was to watch them, I still admired their incredible bravery to get up there alone. And so, I decided to support them. I beckoned for the girls to follow me, and we went up there to join those brave souls. Then, in no time, locals were coming from every direction to dance. Some bobbed around, some just kind of swayed back and forth, but nobody really seemed to know what they were doing. Well, except for my girls, who were doing that really sexy slither thing that women do at clubs.

I'm not exactly a master of dance, myself. However, I was lucky enough to have a roommate back in college who knew a lot of moves. So on the dance floor in my new country, I thought back to a party that he once took me to, and tried to remember what he taught me. And so, I began to dance. I don't know what the dance is called, or how better to describe it, but it's some kind of hip hop line dance where you take two swaying steps forward then two swaying steps back, then turn ninety degrees to the left or right and repeat the moves.

I must have looked pretty silly because I hadn't danced in about five years, but that didn't stop most of the locals from keeping their eyes on me as I busted a move. One of them, a nicely dressed dude, even stood to my right and copied the dance to the best of his ability. After a good ten or fifteen minutes of sweaty, hot, bass thumping dancing, the songs switched from heavy, slow dance style to a much faster set of songs. I stopped dancing, and the local who joined me congratulated and shook hands with me for my incredible skill. He was obviously drunk, but still.

At that point, I smiled a broad smile, waved to everyone and went back to the table with the girls. High fives and smiles all around, of course. I guess I made an excellent impression with not only the locals on the dance floor, but the girls, too. Isis in particular seemed to be quite a bit more interested in talking to me at that point.

Mary started to feel kind of tired after a while, so we all finished our drinks and headed back outside to go home. The buses had stopped running by that point, so the girls and I waited outside of the club until a taxi came by. I let them take the first one, because I didn't want two girls standing alone on a dark street at 1:00 in the morning, and after we exchanged hugs and smiles, we parted. Another taxi came by shortly thereafter, and I went straight home to a relaxing shower and bed.

It wasn't long after that that not only did I start dating my wife, but the website that hosted my email account went down, so I never got into contact with either Mary or Isis after that. But that surely was a night to remember.

As for today...

I woke up at 6:00.
I played video games.
My wife and son woke up, so I turned off the computer.
I played cars with my son.
I roughhoused with him.
I went to work.
I taught students.
I came home.
I cleaned up the floor and table.
I hung up wet laundry.
I did the dishes.
I watched internet movies with my son.
I slept.

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Then and Now 10 - River Walk

Then and Now 10 - River Walk
Time: Mid-2007, at my bud's aunt's place.

My bud and I took a trip one day to the outskirts of the city we were living in, far from our aunt's place. It was a very hot day that day, so we dressed light before we went out. Thankfully, laundry was done for the next few days at least, so we were able to avoid that creepy mosquito pit in the middle of the building our house was in.

I don't think we had any specific plans on what we wanted to see that day, and in fact, I don't remember us discussing any details about anything we would do. We just kind of up and left the house, looking for a good time and things to see. Our walk took us a good mile or so out of the crowded part of town where all the small businesses and people were. We walked past a lot of buildings on the way, and down several streets.

The first interesting thing we saw was the bridge over a trashed up river below us. It was oddly constructed in that the bridge was straight and solid enough, and offered plenty of room on the side for cyclists and pedestrians to cross, but the roads leading to and from it wound around in curves at either end. Traffic was a mess there, with some cars waiting at red lights on the incline and decline at either end of the bridge. My bud and I had no trouble getting past everyone though, because hey, we were pedestrians.

That was the first day I saw another foreigner in my new country. He whizzed by on a motorcycle really quickly next to us, and when my bud and I got up to the red light where he was waiting, I saw clearly that there was another foreigner, and potential friend, sharing the experience of life abroad. He zoomed off at the green light before I could wave a hello, but it was probably for the best, because I didn't want to distract someone on a bike.

My bud and I continued on to the end of the bridge, and into a new part of town. This place was even more glutted with people and businesses than his aunt's neighborhood, and I had a blast just watching people bustling around in every direction, taking peeks now and then into the stores nearby to see what they were selling.

One of the places we went down was a small alleyway between two streets with a lot of residential areas between them. Unlike America, where most people are only outside because they have something to do or somewhere to go, the locals here were outside and just hanging out. Most of them were older folks in conservative dresses and sleeveless shirts just talking with one another, sharing a meal of vegetables or some drinks. My bud and I got a couple of looks as we passed by, and I just smiled in response.

After a good walk around, and seeing a car that heavily resembled the Scooby Doo Mystery Machine, we heard some very loud local music blaring over a nearby speaker, along with people saying things I didn't understand. We followed the sounds to an outdoor puppet show, where dozens of locals were watching some intricately carved and dressed puppets conversing and fighting with one another. The painting in the background of the mini-theater was a beautifully drawn and painted set of mountains under a blue sky with a shining sun high above, adding even more to the already lively show.

I think the story involved two guys fighting over a beautiful girl with flashy puppet swords or something, but then again, maybe it was about two friends sparring with one another to prepare themselves to rescue the girl. I honestly couldn't figure out what they were saying. Because I couldn't understand very well, my bud and I watched for only a couple of minutes before we decided to continue on our way.

We were pretty sunburned by this point, so we decided to start heading back home. After a long walk, we stopped by the river that we crossed earlier to sit down on some benches and catch our breath. Well, to be honest, it was mostly me. I was still pretty out of shape at that point in time, only a few weeks after I went abroad, but my bud was sympathetic to my situation. I think we were there for about ten minutes or so, just watching boats sailing upon the waters ahead of us and the grass waving below us. That was also the day I saw my first local ants, which were surprisingly small in comparison to the ones back in America. I caught one and let it crawl around on my arm for a bit, then let it go.

Before we got up and left, I noticed a boat full of locals passing under the bridge ahead of us, and several of them were staring at us. They were a couple hundred feet away, not enough to make out faces or anything, but when I saw them looking in our direction, I waved hello. To my surprise, several of them waved back. My bud then teasingly chastised me for having a big head and enjoying the attention too much.

When we were back in town, the two of us went to a local tea shop to get something to drink. It was on the second floor of a moderately sized building with people living above it, and the shop offered a full windowed view around the entire city about us. There were quite a few other buildings to look at from there, and a nice view of the park, too.

My bud had his usual passion fruit tea, but I decided to be adventurous and not have my usual fruit tea or black coffee. Against my bud's warnings, I had star fruit tea instead. It was horribly, horribly salty, so much that I couldn't even finish it. But I tried, I guess, and my bud and I had a good laugh about it (after he told me "I told you so," of course). After that, we tiredly took ourselves back to his aunt's place to play some Guitar Hero and PSP in the glow of the fading daylight.

Not my most exciting of days, I know, but this was a real day of firsts for me: my first trip outside of our immediate neighborhood, my first close encounter with another foreigner, my first sight of the local non-mosquito insect population, my first visit to a river, my first puppet show, my first awful tea drink... though this day didn't have the flash and flair of the days to come, it was still another day of choice and uniqueness in the life of an unmarried man.

As for today...

I woke up at 10:00.
My mother-in-law came over to watch my son.
My wife and I went to the gym, then we went home.
I started a load of laundry.
I ate lunch.
My wife showered our son, so I played video games.
Fifteen minutes later, my son came out, so I turned off the computer.
I watched TV.
My wife and son took a nap.
I played video games for about fifteen minutes, then my son woke up, so I turned off the game.
I watched internet movies with him.
I went to work because I had no classes scheduled for today, and I thought that was odd. Unfortunately, I actually did have classes, so I rushed home to get ready.
I went to work.
I taught students.
I came home.
I folded and put away dry clothes.
I hung up a mountain of wet laundry.
I played cars with my son.
I watched internet movies with him.
I slept.