13. On how I am apparently not Chinese

So in a recent class discussion on why we think Tao Qian's hidden utopia at the end of a peach blossom spring (世外桃源) wouldn't work from a modern perspective, the first thing that obviously came to my mind was: a tiny-ass, bottle-necked gene pool that would result in some serious inbreeding (that will get pretty gross REALLY FAST), and a terribly low resilience to random natural disaster, that all lead to the sheer impossibility of such a community of that size to survive in a cave for 600+ years. The class kind of all smiled knowingly when I mentioned those points, because all the other people who volunteered came up with things along the lines of technological isolation/retardation and an extreme lack of commerce because everyone in the community is a self-sufficient primary producer.

I swear I'm the only person who's taken biology in any form beyond high school in that class, because everyone else apparently speaks Chinese to each other before/after class, half can't seem to understand the professor, and most likely all of them are majors in business, economics, or actuarial 'science.' Not to mention this class would be like cheating for them, because they most likely learned all these texts, in Chinese, A YEAR OR TWO AGO IN CHINA (Oh wait, except they still don't know English and this stuff is taught in English, FUCK). Most of them give me sideways glances just because I speak without an accent, and don't apparently wear layers of sunscreen/BB cream/cakey makeup/brand names that only Chinks care about; because by their standards, I only have a 3rd grade education past which the only area I excel in more than them, is my English; that they are simply better than me in every other learned field like MATH and STYLE and how to CATCH MEN; because I'm too tall, my frame too large and "white," my style STANDS OUT as opposed to fitting in like everyone else's (Korean fashion, as that's what's HAWT right now all over Asia); that I'm not at all feminine and womanly and proper and cute and giggly and sighy and looking like the wind would blow me over and need a small yellow gentleman to flatter my frailness; because I actually stay awake listening to the professor drone on without snoring DESPITE sitting in the first row, that I actually have manners and don't slam the door on the person behind me on purpose; that I most likely never had the joy of having an older yellow gentleman buy me expensive gifts like real Tiffany diamonds or collections of real Chanel/LV/Gucci bags or a luxury suite just for me in exchange for being his mistress -- Christ, this list can go on forever.

Bottom line is as title says. Despite my inner philosophies based on how I was raised (and how, in a lot of ways, I retain that style of thinking), despite the fact that my parents and I are actually more traditional than them, we are the outdated, old China of (only?) 11-12 years ago.

But really, I don't mind or even care about all that. All that is further reinforced here is the exact extent to which the culture here sucks ass: close-minded know-it-all conservative mid-westerners on one end, animu otaku weaboo newfag /b/tards somewhere in the middle, those sneering-down-their-nose-at-any-other-Asian fresh-off-the-plane Chinks massively congregating in their little hole, and finally, ignorant liberals - bless me for finding out that they can even exist.

It really seems the same wherever we've been. I can hardly approve more of this wanting to resettle near the city.

12. On 'rolling' and momentum

As a rare antithesis to procrastination, I started on a project due in a week and found myself not able to stop to even make a post.

This is new. More on this later.

11. On the ridiculousness of 'fashion'

Update 4/6/11: More cleanup.
-

(a.k.a. boredom, part II)

weight - 143.8 (morning)
armpits - 35
boobs - 37
under boobs - 30 1/2
waist - 28 1/2
flab - 33 3/4
hips - 37 1/4
calves - 14 5/8, 14 7/8


P.S. - Stuffing myself on bagels for dinner (we're talking about around 3 here) apparently translates to my weight staying the same next morning. Note well taken.

10. Boredom, rain, and bagels

Yesterday was a ridiculously unbusy day at SPS. Extreme boredom on our part, perhaps, but for the locals, an unbusy day for us meant a good day for them. (You'd think rainy weather would make people more depressed than usual. The answer is no.)

I ended up reading ~80% of the book depicted to the right, and Duane (my shift partner, a med 1 student) claimed to be studying on his laptop at first, but after the first three or so call-less hours, it sounded like he was playing Minesweeper from the amount of mouse clicks he generated. Most unfortunate of all was Mike (also a med 1), who was 4 hours early for his shift after ours and who ended up snoring on the futon half an hour in. Poor kid. He claims he only has a bed and no study space at home, and from the looks of it, he probably makes very little use of that bed, to boot.

At least it happened to be a training day, meaning instead of guarding a ghost building, we had Mary and Rick and 10 other group leaders and 40-ish new volunteers-to-be occupying a large room on the opposite side of the floor. Bored group leaders on break would occasionally come in to say hi/offer free food and drinks, and yesterday, it happened to be leftover breakfast for the trainees: a good dozen Panera bagels with at least five different cream cheeses, a half box of yogurt, and a half box of Granola bars. Some anonymous group leader would always bring a surplus of free food, and if it's not eaten, some other hungry group leader would end up bringing it home. This Saturday, it so happened that Evan (an undergrad a year above me) had the fortune of being in the latter position. Unfortunately, he traveled by bike. This all formulated into a Jing and Duane and Mike becoming extremely overstuffed on bagels for the rest of that pleasant afternoon and early eve.

I don't think I want to see another bagel for at least a month, as good as the experience was.

-

I took a 2-hour stroll around the prettiest green places on campus today. The best kind of rain is the recent kind of scattered showers: slow and occasional enough to not pick up so much dirt and debris to turn the river yellow, but just enough to turn waters the same green as the neighboring woodlands. Plus the alternating cracks of sun between dark shifting clouds is breathtakingly beautiful.

It's good to slow down once in a while. Too often we pass these places by with another destination in mind, becoming oblivious by habituation to just how much alternative charm nature parades us.

I'm reminded of the same sad pity I used to feel for Central Park every time I ran.

9. On Habituation

As I was walking home today and passing Barnes & Noble, I became reminded of how, on a midsummer afternoon almost two years ago, sitting on the second floor of the same store and each sipping a 36 oz Inta Juice smoothie (how the hell we managed to finish those remaining a mystery aside) and idly observing life on the ground-level, Jarek and I suddenly both, separately yet simultaneously, came to the realization of just how ridiculous ridiculous cars below looked. They were alien. No pedestrian or occupant of those gliding capsules seemed to notice a thing.

It's more than a bit unsettling how little people see such things. We are trained since childhood to be aware of the oncoming approach of these odd metallic giant beetles (for on that three-floor height, we saw and understood why they were always compared to and named 'beetles' by disconnected outsiders for the first time), but taught or assumed to never question their existence, or why, or how, we came to be so comfortably oblivious living alongside, so willing to launch ourselves inside them like the slightly controllable yet still fully potentially dangerous people-catapult rockets that they are. They've become so very natural, so very taken for granted, so very expected.

-

Who does the marketing, and how, is the true drive behind the propagation of any technology through society. Which appliances and tools we hold dear to our hands and hearts yet do not think twice about, how they come to be, and all things that happen to them post invention by the original thinker - all are in their complete control.

We live at the mercy of visual designers and businessmen.

They are hidden and unrealized.

8. Picking Up

As I was reading through old notes before class (as is my habit for social insects) today, I remembered I dreamed of ants the night before.

In a lab setting.

With me observing what the professor lectured about from yet another day's class notes on ants.

I love this class and all, but this is just getting a tad too creepy. I've never dreamed about any classes before - not even the ones I loved more than this one.

-

Unrelatedly, learning the principles of design (part of which involved color theory) in a bullshit-y class is actually sort of revolutionizing my view on some things. It's kind of interesting and scary at the same time to suddenly, automatically, and almost-subconsciously, start unraveling every man-made object I see in terms of its aesthetics and design.

But seeing them and recognizing them in that light, to approve or disapprove of them, is still a long jump from being in the position of purposefully designing them in the first place. Those latter shoes I have a rather difficult time imagining filling.

I'm way too used to mindless freedom in creation.

BACK WITH (A LOT) MORE SCIENCE.

SORT OF.

So, even though I didn't specifically follow through with the whole experiment sobre writing/arting/related weight loss mentioned in my last entry, it got me thinking about some things - such as the fact that, as of this past January, Jing reached a record high in terms of fatness at a whopping 175 pounds on my 5' 7", ex-athletic frame. For comparison purposes: at my best shape four years ago, with a noticeable-only-to-myself bit of tummy fat and solid legs of muscle, my weight was a stable 130-135.

Disclaimer: The rest of this entry gives a pretty holistic view of what my body is and what I've been up to for the past three months, in blatant honesty and complete lack of bias. For those who know me, I'm not the type to treat weight as some personal feminine top secret info; I've been pretty detached from my body image for pretty much my entire life, regardless of how skinny/fat I have been through the years. What my body looks like has nothing to do with how I perceive myself as a person, and for much of my life, I've been pretty oblivious to its exact state/how it comes across to other people (because uh, neither did I care). Until this winter, that is, with my acquisition of a scale. At which point I had to become aware for potential health risks, if nothing else, as my BMI reached that record 27.4, and I was officially Overweight with a capital O.

A briefing on my weight history/body type:

I was born to a 6' 0" mesomorph father who had put on weight since his college years, and a 5' 5" ectomorph mother who, until she gave birth to my siblings at the high age of 38, was often mistaken to be ~20 years younger than she actually was and sometimes confused as my sister. It has been evident since my preteen years that I had the, perhaps, 'misfortune' of inheriting my father's body type. Photographic evidence depicts a Jing who has been a stick of a loli until right before I hit my growth spurt at age 11-12. Around or right after the time I moved to Alabama and started 6th grade, I suddenly had a significant amount of baby fat that went away just as quickly by the time I started Stuy. At that point, I was just 14, 5' 6", 125 lb, and wearing size 3 pants at an isolated event I still remember. (My first pairs of size US junior pants. Before that, I was still wearing children's sizes.) I joined outdoor track spring of freshman year, and trained for cross country for the first time the following autumn. I was oblivious to the state of my body until more than a year later, junior year, well into my 'acquaintance' with Phil and his effect on my first noticing how my body is packaged with clothing. As mentioned above, I became 5' 7" by that time or so (and have remained the same height since), consistently stayed between 130 and 135 pounds, and wore very standard size 5 pants. My hips fitted perfectly, while the thigh area always had a bit of give thanks to my then-awesome super-trackie legs. In terms of female body types, I became a 'rectangle,' or 'banana.' Both terms refer to the body type where chest and hips are equal, but the waist is significantly less defined than that of an hourglass. What's more, when weight is gained, the first place fat is stored is at the tummy - the worst place in terms of risk to heart disease/diabetes, compared to boobs or thighs as is the case in other body types.

Years of track also contributed to my love for food. By that, I do not mean I was a picky eater; I was simply happy whenever I was in the act of filling my stomach, because granted, I was easily hungry, and I easily ate a LOT. I always had balanced meals because Chinks love veggies, and I never was fond of soda except for Mountain Dew. Fast food I ate only occasionally, despite the proximity of that McDonald's near Stuy. I loved candy and especially chocolate. I also had the perpetual craving for instant noodles. But largely, as I mention, I did not pay attention to what I ate; I just ate a lot of pretty much everything. During junior and senior year when I lived by myself in that basement room in Brooklyn, I almost always ate school breakfast and lunch. Dinner I usually bought from that cheap take-out place in Chinatown. At the beginning of senior year, after a combination of Ridwan and other cross-country issues, I quit the team (and running), cold turkey. All my other eating habits stayed the same, however, and I think it was pretty miraculous how I managed to retain my figure for the rest of senior year without much significant change. My march into Overweightdom began the summer before college, when I became reunited with my parents in Ohio.

For my last two years of high school, the parental units had developed the habit of overfeeding me whenever I was home, because, for whatever reason, they believed I must have perpetually starved myself silly whenever I went back to New York. Some time toward the end of summer break, in addition to my then-obvious tummy flab, I noticed the gap between my thighs started to disappear; when I twisted my torso, a line showed up. When my parents took me to buy pants, I moved up to size 7 or even 9 for some cuts. When I moved into dorm life a month or two later (after parents moved to Iowa), the process continued. My parents have started calling me fat by this stage. At one point, when Tomoya was still hitting on me, he told me sans-sarcasm that I was literally a little bigger each time he saw me. When I went back to Stuy for Alumni Day (Thanksgivings break 2007), I intentionally wore a shirt that would hide my tummy for the first time. Winter break, during my only stay in our Iowa home, I found I weighed 152 by then. Contrary to what I previously thought, my weight went up only slowly after this point, through my 2+ years with Jarek. At his Thanksgivings hotpot-turned-cooking-party this past autumn, I was 160. Immediately after I came back from Winter break, I was 175. I began to suspect I gain a significant amount of weight every time I go home, and then lose it naturally when I go back to school from simply eating normally again. Regardless, the regular pants I wore were sizes 11 or 13, depending on cut. Size 13 or 15 is about the last size there is before US women's pant sizes become plus sizes.

My posts in January were most likely coinciding with Jing simply ebbing back down to a pre-winter-break weight. Still, that scale was a big wake-up call. When I was still at home, I became interested in measurements (i.e., bust/waist/hips) for the first time. I found out I was a whopping 40-33-41, although this may not be accurate since I used a wire instead of measuring tape. Boob-wise, these weird masses on my chest were making 36B cups feel uncomfortably tight. If I go by my perfect fit in size-5 pants four years ago, I estimate my waist/hip was something perhaps along the lines of 26-36. I couldn't guess about my chest size because as everyone remembers, I had none back then. I could have been anywhere between 32 and 36 for all I know. My eating preferences had changed significantly since high school by this point; I have had an intolerance for sweets since freshman year, and as little as I liked soda, I like them even less now (even Mountain Dew) and prefer to get some sort of iced tea instead. Chocolate I could only tolerate dark, and in very small amounts, very occasionally. Instant noodles were the only things I still had a soft spot for. Of course, despite all that, I was still eating whatever I want, however much I want - and what I ate was usually healthy. The occasional craving for French fries was the only general 'non-healthy' thing I had.

For the first time, I analyzed what goes in my plate, how much, and when during the day. I'm not a believer of dieting - never was, and never will be. Instead, I drew patterns of my meals: for example, I noticed I'd only have a banana for breakfast, make noodle soup for lunch, and either make noodle soup again or buy food for dinner. All I did at first was simply revising the order a bit (noodles for breakfast, outside food for lunch, and a banana for dinner), and I lost my first ten pounds since those January posts. I stepped on that scale several times a day, and discovered that my morning weight is usually 2 pounds lighter than that the night before, and that immediately after eating, I tend to be 2-3 pounds more, depending on how much water I also drank. I also started keeping a log of my measurements for further insight. When a significant difference was observed, I make a dated entry, like these:

2/16/10
weight - 161.0 (morning)
armpits - 37 1/2
boobs - 38 1/2
under boobs - 32 1/2
waist - 30 1/2
flab - 36
hips - 39
calves - 16 and 1/8

3/3/10
weight - 156.4 (morning)
armpits - 37
boobs - 38 1/4
under boobs - 32 1/2
waist - 30 1/2
flab - 35 3/4
hips - 38 3/4
calves - 16

3/10/10
weight - 153.8 (morning)
armpits - 36
boobs - 37 1/2
under boobs - 31 1/2
waist - 29
flab - 34 3/4
hips - 38
calves - 15 1/4, 15 1/2 (left calf, right calf)

Where 'flab' is the part of my muffintop that protruded the most. Boob sizes were not the most accurate, as, I hope everyone knows, they are supposed to fluctuate, depending on where the woman is in her menstrual cycle. In any case, throughout the above phase, I kept the minus a pound a day rate on 'good days,' and staying largely the same on 'bad days.' It wasn't hard figuring out that 'bad days' almost always coincided with eating out, so pretty quickly I cut restaurants (fast food or not, they all give you giant proportions) out of my budget, unless I'm with friends. Even so, the change in my appetite became obvious in very little time as well. With no original intentions of doing so, I started eating less...because I simply couldn't eat more. Even when I voluntarily eat out nowadays, I end up boxing 1/3 to 1/2 of whatever I order, regardless of where I eat. Also extremely significant was my need to drink almost as much water as I did back in my running days, and a new, almost foreign, strict intolerance for MSG. This not only slashed instant noodles out of my diet, but any Campbell's soups that contained the stuff as well. Note, however, that in no way was I "dieting." I was singing the same old tune of I love eggs, I love carbs, I love fruits/veggies, and I'm okay with or without meats. I was still eating just fries for an entire meal too when I get the urge, except they are now the frozen type that you reheat through baking. In short, I was eating all the stuff I used to eat, except now I have apparently trained my appetite to be something more suitable for a person not running 5 miles a day, every day. A change I probably should have instilled three years earlier but didn't.

After the last above date, Jarek and I had a combined two weeks of Spring break that we took turns spending in Ohio and then the city - which involved a lot of eating out/meeting with friends. Quoted from my log: "My weight rebounded to 158 before I started eating normally again (after getting home). I skipped measurements until I reached a weight below that of the last entry, but now I wish I didn't - it looks like where those pounds were stored and from where they were lost are a little different this time." Stuff of the utmost interest if I were to really make a science out of this. Except, perhaps, that this might apply only to my body, at my current age.

4/4/10
weight - 151.4 (morning)
armpits - 36
boobs - 38
under boobs - 32
waist - 29
flab - 35
hips - 38
calves - 15 1/8, 15 1/4


4/13/10
weight - 147.8 (morning)
armpits - 35 1/2
boobs - 37 1/2
under boobs 31 1/2
waist - 29
flab 34 1/2
hips - 37 1/2
calves - 14 3/4, 15

And this is where I am now. In my mind I have a set goal of stopping at 130-135 just for nostalgia's sake, and then move on to the science of how to maintain it long-term. Of course, I'm still not running (because it's something I won't be able to keep up for the entire rest of my life anyway) or working out in any way, shape, or form, and therefore, even if I reach that weight again, a good chunk of it will be from curves and other meats of the fat variety. Surprisingly, I haven't lost a significant amount of boob; those 36B's simply fit a lot better now. When I use my spare money (that used to go into food) to buy clothes, I find I fit into M again (as I did toward the end of Stuy) as opposed to the L I've become so used to in the past two years. Pants-wise, I now wear those I used to wear freshman year of college when needed, though I no longer agree with the styling in a good chunk of other pairs. I have yet the need to buy new pants thanks to glorious April weathers, though I suspect I'm once again between 7 and 9.

My stomach has shrunk enough such that the same amount of food I used to cook for one meal, I now split between two: 2/3 for breakfast and 1/3 for lunch, with a fruit or two for dinner. This is now the new golden formula for a 1-pound drop by the next sunrise without feeling hungry doing it. It is of utmost interest that if I eat the same amount but all for breakfast, then fruit for lunch and nothing for dinner, I actually lose next to nothing the following day. There is a fine balance between eating just how much is needed and going into starvation mode. The latter simply doesn't work for me. If I'm hungry, and stay prolonged hungry, all I become is very, very pissed, and wonder how the hell do people become anorexic anyway when starvation clearly doesn't work. Love food, eat food, and pity the fact that less can simply fit now.

I do look forward to the day I can finally wear one particular pair of pants again, though...