The Lighthearted Wanderer

So despite how much I tried to catch up from the homeland on my traveling adventures, I barely got to the plane ride before I got back to the States. And now, back on campus and my tale has been left alone to rot... Maybe I'll just hit the highlights, or tell my story in a non-linear fashion. I've let too many experiences go by without documenting what I've learned or how something has affected me. We'll see how it turns out, another option is just simply moving forward and talking about things as I go along. Anyway, the first week of classes for the spring semester is here upon us. A month after the new year has rung in and my resolutions were made in the haste of fireworks and smoke, but I have a feeling that with some of the classes I'm taking there will be more steadfast resolutions to come. For sure this is a blogging Fail and it's probably bad etiquette to publish thoughtless musings, but at least at the end of the day I got something in the show for what ...

December 26, 2009 My birthday was ushered in somewhat unceremoniously when my mom realized while packing that it was 12:40am and wished me Happy Birthday. Operation International Packing Mode had hit a snag and my mom had switched from putting pasalubong in a box to a suitcase and back to a box again. I went to sleep slightly uneasy about whether or not we would actually finish packing in time, but trusted in the Happy Birthday spirits to send good luck our way. That day we went around doing some errands and then called up my aunt to see if she and the fam wanted to have lunch. We went to BJ’s at the Del Amo Mall, where the Happy Birthday spirits got us a parking close by and right away despite it being Return Bad Christmas Gift day and the mall was completely crowded. The Happy Birthday spirits weren’t able to shorten the wait though, so about 40 minutes later we were seated and proceeded to order right away. My 1 1/2 year old cousin was great before-dinner entertainment, of course....

December 25, 2009 As was usual for my California side of life, I woke up super late and just lounged about mostly. Somehow my parentals were able to wake up to take my aunt and grandparents to the airport after the festivities the night before kept us awake past 4am. Since our perception of the day finally caught up to the official calendar date, my mom and I rushed into International Packing Mode. Weighing scales and 50lb luggage galore, of course accompanied by lots of television watching (the sickeningly sad Christmas Laker game included). There is definitely an art of packing that my mom possesses that I have yet to see anywhere else. Let’s hope that it’s genetic in some way or I’ll pick up the tricks through diffusion (that’s my science brain at work). It was a pleasant surprise to find a Scrubs marathon playing and so in between the depressing Laker game and appeasing my mom by tuning in to The Filipino Channel just to show her that nothing worthwhile was playing, I watched a cou...

So it’s actually January 2nd here in the Philippines, but all week I’ve been making mental notes of things to blog about, so this is my attempt to get everything in: December 24, 2009 My Christmas Eve had a slightly unusual twist, while I was watching a movie I got a call from my aunt who was looking for my mom. My grandpa had been taking a nap after eating and they weren’t able to wake him up. And talk about completely inopportune timing, it happened when my doctor aunt happened to be on a flight and my mom (who’s a nurse) was at the end of her shift at work and it’s always difficult to call her then. So in addition to being inopportune, my grandparents were scheduled to fly to the Philippines that morning, and so if they had to keep him overnight at the hospital they would have to miss their flight. A very hectic Christmas Eve indeed. Fast forward about 6 hours, 1 aunt late from their flight, 1 mom late from work, and 3 eerily calm sisters later, the Christmas Eve festivities finally...