"The Universe tends to unfold as it should..." (Black Prisoner from Harold and Kumar)

(Actual date: February 08)

So I was in class the other day, asking my students what they planned to see when they got to their respective study-abroad countries. One student, the boy, said that he didn't like Australia. I asked him why he wanted to study there if he didn't like it. He said he wanted to study and make money as a geologist (umm, anybody know any rich geology majors?). So, I asked him if he had ever been to Australia. He said he hadn't. The question that inevitably followed was, "Then how do you know you don't like it?" He didn't answer. I asked him if he understood (his understanding of English, well, it's not stellar...). He remained silent and unchanged. Finally, I asked him using different words. At this point, he snaps at me and replies, "I know what you are asking, I don't know the answer!"

In a culture that would rather smile and move on than confront you, I admit to being rather taken aback. I looked at him for a moment before saying, "Thank you for answering. It's okay not to know the answer, but you have to tell me you don't know." I then went on to explain how it can be rude NOT to answer someone than to just say you don't know.

Anyways, the whole ordeal made me a little sad, yet a little proud of myself. Here I am, in a new country, and I'm starting to really enjoy myself. For now, I am right where I want to be, and I never truly understood what a privilege and a blessing that was. I mean, here is a guy who is about to go into a field where he is going to have to learn all these things he doesn't want to (he actually got angry at me the other day for telling him that in order to take geology classes, he would have to take physics. He insisted he didn't like physics and would not need it to learn about geology. He is going to have quite an awakening when he goes to Australia...). Even when I was taking business classes I enjoyed (which were the classes that didn't have much to do with business), I knew that I would never be able to handle a desk job, dealing with balance sheets and investments and sitting there waiting impatiently for the end of the day to come. It's just not me. So here I am, not needing to worry too much about money, working 33 hours (in a profession where 20-25 hours is a lot), and getting to learn so much about the other half of the world from simple conversations from my local students.

Even outside of Vietnam, there are plenty of people, especially in Corporate America, that don't really want to be there. And yet, responsibility, bills, thoughts of retirement loom over their heads, rendering them unable to imagine possibilities beyond their jobs. I was just lucky enough to have a mom who encouraged me to go abroad and the naivete not to realize how difficult it would be to settle into a life halfway across my old world.

(WARNING: Soapbox moment, please avert your eyes if you think you might barf)

So to all those people, I gotta tell you, as scary as it is to take those kinds of risks, there is no feeling quite like being able to handle your own. To know that life is throwing you some serious curve balls, and yet you can still whack them outta the park. The scariest part of jumping is that momentum just as your feet leave the ground. After that, life tends to take care of you in its own mysterious way. Even if it doesn't go the way you intend, I think the people who at least try to follow what is in their hearts and take that leap, unknown as it is, end up with a life that is better than they themselves could have figured out just from their own reasoning. At least that is how life opps have presented themselves to me.

As this wonderful lesbian movie puts it, "You can never be sure. But you take the plunge anyway. Sure is for people who don't love enough." Of course, she's talking about being in love with another woman, I just want to feel like my day has purpose.


feel free to comment if you think i'm full of shitzer.