The Reality of It All

Funny what a little thing can do to one's psyche. After watching 一リットルの涙 and タイヨのうた, I'm starting to abstract myself away from my surroundings again. Looking around me, I realise that family is family after all; despite all the cordiality that people accord to me when I'm around, you still feel a little left out. This has something to do with the difference in culture, I guess. This is true even among those who are Asian of lineage. They may look like Asians on the outside (and probably are, based on genetics and other "objective" forms of measurement), but their behaviour is surprisingly American (what's new?), as in the way they act, think and do reflects the predominant culture here. And yes, they never fail to remind you that you are still, a foreigner in the lands, even though you might be speaking the same language and look similar to them.

And the age. That little disparity did not occur much before, but the difference in age and depth of thought is starting to show up more prominently now, after almost a whole semester of interaction. The kids here can be really whiney sometimes, but apart from that whiney-ness, there's also a general lackadaisical attitude towards the entire idea of studying in general. I humbly call this the "high school effect", where they are still living in their world of high school where everything is fun and games, and they have no real concept of the "real" world. Conversations are generally typical of that of 18-year-olds, and I miss the banter that comes from being in the workforce. Speaking too much kiddy talk does really weird things to my brain, and I'm suddenly drawn back to my basic isolationism policy with regards to handling people. I long for a real decent real life real world conversation, but I don't think that I'm going to be expecting much of that for some time to come. Listening to some of their explanations and arguments sometimes make me shake my head; watching them trying to shoot down my explanations based on real experience just makes me shake my head in wonder. Guess that sometimes, somethings need to be learnt the hard way.

*sigh*

So many complaints about things, so little that I can do about it. Anyway, I figure that my relationship status is as great as before (read: none in existence), and will likely to stay that way, considering the fact that there does not seem to exist a suitable person who is "my type". Guess most of them are still girls in their own right, and thus act the way they do. This makes me think back about the failed attempts I have in the past. Well, to a large degree, it could have been pure rashness on my part, but I figure that the girls I asked out were girls who don't really treat my feelings real enough. Girls will be girls, and I don't think that I'm going to get involved in any such things for a long time to come. A*STAR will be so pleased.

And I've been recently shot down on the quality of my poetry. Honestly, I don't give a damn if people don't like my poetry; it's mine and mine alone, and I choose to write it in anyway I see fit. If people enjoy them, that's good; if they don't, then too bad. I'm happy just writing poems as and when I feel like it. Which makes me wonder if the compliments that I've been receiving all these while are really compliments or just comments made to humour me. Or it could be another subterfuge of the locals trying to "prove" American superiority in the use of the English language. This... subtle "proof" of American superiority is occurring so often that it's not even funny anymore; should I consider this as some form of prejudice? I mean, it is okay to be proud of one's nation's achievements, but isn't it a bit xenophobic to just shoot off degenerating another person's culture? Perhaps degenerate is a tad too strong, let's say tease. Well, for the most part, the teasing is in good fun, but sometimes, the covert meaning of the tease is starting to irk even me.

And NaNoWriMo is a disaster. I found that... I just couldn't write anything. Totally nothing. Zero. Nil. Nada. Nadir. Totally and completely without anything to write. The words and ideas just didn't want to come out. I feel miserable that I've failed in this task that I deemed to be not too hard to complete. Maybe novel writing will remain as a "one day" affair; one day I'll write a novel.

And as I type all these, it's actually 3.40 am in Pittsburgh, USA, and I'm having a Calculus test in like 6 hours. I guess I should stop and go and sleep now. Maybe more mulling will shed new light to how to interpret the current environment and thus how to react. But meanwhile, I'll just maintain a cheerful outlook to the world, and wonder miserably inside what's going wrong. And time is ticking... just less than two months before I stretch the age gap even further.