with an arm-flap of celebration

Watched USA v. Spain yesterday with J: Let's just say, USA, that your defense was so terrible (read: nonexistent) that even Torres managed to score. That's like a whole new level of failure. Granted, his hair was terrible, so it only made sense that some of his scoring ability has returned.

It was kind of embarrassing for the US, wasn't it? To put it mildly. To be fair, Spain = world champions and the US was missing some top key players (read: Donovan), alongside starting none of their WC squad and using terrified and inexperienced high schoolers instead. Or maybe that's just what it looked like.

Spain's away kits were indeed quite sharp (thanks, commentators, for your "oh god no actual football is being played, what can we talk about aside from the weather and the Barcelona-Madrid rivalry that is surely, surely rending apart the Spanish National Team with dissent from within" commentary) and oh Pepe Villa Silva Sergio Pique Iniesta Busquets Xabiiii Iker-- ♥

Nando, Nando, Nando. What will I do with you? I suppose I will love you in reality but troll your ass because it's fun. Jerk. You've ruined my favorite Liverpool song.


Oh and so much happiness for Li Na being the first Asian woman (and Asian-born-in-Asia) to win a Grand Slam singles title at the French Open today. :D Awesome. Now, however - vamos Rafa!

the art of day to day living

Friday, I had dinner out with P & her boyfriend and I love them :> They are so sweet and lots of fun and dinner was delicious! We had chwee kueh (yum) and bah ku teh (I am probably misspelling this) which are, respectively, Singaporean style water dumplings (not dumplings at all) and pork rib tea soup. Soooo good. Then we wandered around Jurong Point a bit, which is this gigantic ass mall full of food and shops and energy and each store blasting pop music (whether American or Chinese or Korean).

This weekend I have been recovering from my cold and am more or less better except for this infernal cough. That's been fun! And by fun I mean I finally gave in and bought some fucking medicine - it is the Singaporean equivalent of Theraflu, I guess. Lemon-flavored powdered medicine to which I add hot water and then drink. So that helped a lot with the decongestion and throat pain, but the cough remains. =__=; Ah well, there is only so much I can do, I guess, other than wait it out. I'm still inhaling water and tea at alarming rates.

I will get my shit together for the Philippines! This will require a bank trip at some point, potentially. Oh god, and packing, I should do that before i leave, yeah? Leaving Wednesday though, so I have some time to start making my lists (lists! my lifesavers!).

Lately, it has been so sticky muggy hot that I kind of want to claw my skin off. My ideal temperature range is from 15 - 23 C (57 - 74 F or thereabouts), so this is not a happy Mei. Having a cold in the summer is the worst and in Singapore it is summer all the fucking time, ergo having a cold in Singapore is the worst. Intolerable. I'll go check on the Philippines' weather now.

GOOD SPORTS NEWS: Carolina beat Duke 81-67 for the ACC regular season championship. ♥ We have come so far this season; it is so lovely. Let's go Heels for March Madness. :) Though to be honest I'm not sure how well I'll be able to keep up here in Singapore. In other fabulous sports news, Liverpool routed Man Utd 3-1 at Anfield yesterday with a Kuyt hat trick. Mmm, lovely. Biggest rivalries and some big wins.

Tally ho, Vietnam & Cambodia!

Hola, amigos! I'm off on my first out-of-Singapore trip to Vietnam and Cambodia over the course of 18 Feb to 27 Feb. It's our recess week (aka Spring Break) and I'm out here with L and A having a good time - meeting up with the boys in Ho Chi Minh City in a few day then going off to Cambodia. Right now we girls are in Nha Trang, Vietnam, which is this gorgeous (if touristy) beach town on the East Coast. We spent the day lazing around at the beach, with the hot sun tempered by the cool sea breeze. Have I said lately how much I love the ocean? I really do. I have determined I need to live within 3 hours of it no matter where I live - or at least close enough to do a day trip. Does this rule out Beijing? Oh I hope not. It doesn't rule out Singapore for sure.

We have had lots of delicious foods since reaching Singapore - plus a twelve-hour bus ride! Overnight sleeper bus! I have pictures. It was amazing - we got beds! Interestingly bumpy experience; L was up half the night afraid we were going to die. I woke up in the middle of the night feeling we were like caught in the middle of a hurricane. Looking at the window, I determined, nope, no hurricane.

I do have more interesting stories than that - and lovely pictures, I promise! - but really this is not the best time to share them, as I'm on spotty internet in the public hostel area. News and updates after the whole trip!

For now, let me just say, oh my god Torres, you absolute troll, ilu. Singing YNWA for your Chelsea initiation haze? Why are you like this? I knew I've always loved you. ♥

we all bleed red

On the MRT today, a boy was reading a sports newspaper that featured on the back cover a huge picture of Torres with the words "JUDAS SCUM", which reminded me that I haven't posted about this topic yet.

So Torres transferred from Liverpool to Chelsea, inspiring many mixed or angry feelings on the parts of many people, which is fair. I have thoughts about it, but they really come down to the following: I love and support him a lot and want him to do well, and though I am disappointed (THE NANDO SONG AND NIKE AD NOOO), I understand where this is coming from. But Liverpool is still my team, with or without him, and I'm not going to stop loving or following my team just because he's gone. Maybe I am not doing "fan" properly, without outrage and passionate outcry and wailing and gnashing of teeth, but I'm cool with that. YNWA.

I still want a Torres Spanish NT jersey and a Gerrard LFC jersey. (Good thing I was never interested in a Torres LFC jersey, I guess, but who didn't see this coming since the beginning of the season?)

how to prove that I bleed red?

LFC jerseys, why are you so expensive! I love you but I cannot spend so much on you, particularly since I am hoping for a Gerrard LFC shirt and a Torres Spain shirt. Yes, my biases are evident. Thus the point of displaying them on a shirt, right?

I have been told that Thailand is a good market for cheaper knockoffs. When am I going to Bangkok again? March, I think. Right, on the itinerary: the aquarium and shopping for jerseys.

Unrelated, I'm not a graphic designer at all, but I can be a font geek, oh my god yes.

i know what it's like to be a fan, trust me

Last night, Liverpool played Everton in the second Merseyside Derby of the season. A and I met up with some undergrad exchange kids from England (one of them is really cute and tall and blond and of course has the accent, but he's, like, 19 and ALSO AN EVERTON FAN /JUDGES FOREVER) to watch the game, but it turns out the bar we planned on going to misled us because they didn't actually have access to the game. So back to our individual dorms to stream the game we went.

So I'm watching the game and on Gchat talking with A about it, and chatting with some other people too. This conversation happens:

MEI: I'm watching football! :D
F: NFL playoff?
MEI: No. I hate the NFL. I meant soccer.
F: Why do you hate America?

What? :( Ffffuuuu.

As I told D, it's not so much that I hate the NFL (I pay attention, sometimes, sporadically and without much investment and in a shallow way - the Rams's QB is cute, seriously) as I love Liverpool and its slogans and songs (and players, yes). Don't you dare think all girls only pay attention to sports for the "hot guys". It may be true for some girls, it may be true for some sports (i.e., me and the NFL), but guys do not have the market cornered on wild and irrational investment in a team and how they do.

Speaking of such, WAY TO DRAW EVERTON, FFS LIVERPOOL. Up at the half, and then letting Everton score 2 within the first ten minutes of the second half, god. Liverpool, sometimes I don't know why I love you. It's a hard question to answer whenever anyone (like the British boy from last night) asks, "Why Liverpool?"

Because I like having my heart broken and my blood pressure through the roof, obviously.

At least I'll never walk alone, despite that.

coasting on these august waves

So the reason I've been so AWOL since coming back to NC is that the day after I get home, on Friday, a ton of my mom's old college roommates and classmates have come into town for a 30 year reunion type thing. She and J's dad know the same people, so it's an assortment of random Chinese people come from all over the US (Cali, Philly, STL, Toronto even...) to congregate here for the weekend to catch up and then head out to the beach for three days. So that's been busy and loud and full of Chinese! I've helped entertain some (actually exercising Chinese skills, omg, they are so rusty) and have otherwise hid out some too.

We then headed out to the beach for a week: Emerald Isle, NC. There was a house and it was full of people and the beach was lovely, the water was warm, and much food and relaxation (and mahjong) was had by all. I am now home and ridiculously tan and whining about skin cancer to all who will put up with me. It was a ton of fun though. FB contains all my pictures.

In some other updates -- my brother's voice has dropped! What is this growing up business, really? Still, J's little brother John (now seven, attending second grade, utterly adorable) remains my surrogate little brother. He's a total sweetheart and he makes me ridiculously happy. I sort of wish I'd been older and better able to appreciate my own brother's cuteness at that age; when he was 7, however, I was 16 and surly about him in the way of all teenage girls, I suppose. Now it's his turn to be the sullen teenager...

Also, I finally got around to reading and finishing The White Road by Lynn Flewelling and I enjoyed it much more than Shadows Return. But mostly it makes me crave the first two books of the series but I suppose I am glad that the series is continuing. I am also excited for Lorna Freeman's The Flames of Reckoning, though that will be ages before it's complete, much less out for public consumption. :(

In movie news, I watched RockNRolla, a ridiculous Guy Ritchie movie about London gangsters with British accents, heists and intrigue and action, and Tom fucking Hardy. His part was minor but I sort of rolled over in glee every single time he was on screen. He was fantastic as Handsome Bob. I wanted to hug him a lot when I didn't want to lick him, I DON'T KNOW, MY HORMONES ARE OUT OF WHACK WHEN IT COMES TO TOM HARDY. God. I want a sequel to this movie. (Or "This Means War". Right the fuck now.) On a more serious note, while Tom Hardy didn't have a huge role in the movie, I think he did a very good job acting and getting into his character. I will get on his and JGL's other movies soonish!

I was going to watch Velvet Goldmine today but instead watched EPL: Liverpool v. Arsenal. Cole got redcarded during his debut, ahh, I hope he is all right physically; Stevie played and looked absolutely fit; Nando was subbed in late in the second half and everyone sang his song (which delights me because fuck yeah TORRES TORRES); Agger might have gotten a concussion; and poor Reina scored an own goal in the 90th or so minute to equalize after a long Liverpool lead. ;__;. But I have faith in my team! And, yes, I suppose I've acceded to the fact that they are my team now. I will work on being a proper fan.

Ugh, I don't want to think about the RL I must face in a week, heading back to STL to pack and move and prep for the fall semester. This semester will be wretched busy with classes and work and Note editing and MPRE-studying (fucking ethics, how do they work) and form-filling (to hash out visas and applications and things I will need for my spring exchange to Singapore!!!).

But for now, I am content in these last vestiges of summer break.