12 april 2016

i quit social media for a while and i guess i quit this blog too. i won’t say sorry for it because I am trying not to feel guilty and apologetic about every small thing. i needed some time to forget things and find other things. that’s very vague. this whole post is going to be stupid. i don’t have anything meaningful to say but i wanted to reassure people that i still exist and i am doing well. that’s it, really.

i’m currently in a cafe in paris, killing time until i head over to the train station to go back to london. i travelled a little bit the past two weeks. i drank a lot of wine and ate a lot of good bread. here are some observations / things that happened: 

• florence is the color yellow,
• sitting in the sistine chapel surrounded by korean tourists, thinking, i am american in london but korean in italy. thinking, then what the hell am i in america? in korea? 
• thinking, what the hell? what the hell?  
• receiving free rosemary, thyme, and olive oil in the southern coast of italy,
• telling men who say ni hao to me on the streets in naples to fuck off fuck off fuck off
• we caught an old man masturbating in a public bath in budapest and when we told an authority figure, he did nothing. next time: ask a woman. next time: make a scene. next time: too tired for a next time—
• while passing through security to see saint chapelle, a security guard told me and alex and that we were cute in korean. i wasn’t offended that time. 
• stumbling into a jazz bar because we accidentally went the wrong way and there was a middle-aged man who looked like one of our professors and he played the double bass so skillfully. i ruined the moment a little by thinking about motor neurons but other than that the music was magic i swear 
• i really love alex and i want to be friends with her for a long time after college. i don’t know if admitting this here cheapens the sentiment but i do mean it sincerely 
• i do not love london but i miss it nevertheless, which is, well, peculiar. london still makes me want to hide in my room sometimes but here is one thing for sure: the thames is the most disgusting and stunning river in the world. the bridges in london are the best in the word. i will defend this to the death.

i felt pretty desolate about how society teaches men to be men so i called my brother two nights ago and talked about nothing in particular and felt better. i thought about the word entitlement. i thought about how bitter i was over the fact that most men do not care about sexual assault and gender harassment and domestic violence the way women do. i thought about how feeling that way does nothing. i thought about myself a lot: my race, my gender, my beliefs, my tongue. admitting this doesn’t make me less egocentric, i know, but i hope this makes me more honest, which is something i would like to be. 

the past three months, i ignored many emails. i ignored claremont. i read works by zadie smith and susan sontag. i fucked up here and there and then forgave myself for being human and fucking up occasionally/often. i learned things about myself that i didn’t expect: i enjoy eggplants, i am not made for cities, i am not as mature as i think i am, i like cooking food for friends, i can live without america, i don’t want to live without america. 

earlier this morning, i talked to kian for 13 minutes and now realized how much i missed claremont. i miss having breakfast in the dining halls, i miss working in the third floor of lincoln, i miss running into my aamp mentees and oababies around campus, i miss saying hi to people i am not quite friends with but like to imagine we could be one day even though we do not have much time together left. i miss all the communities i have been blessed to be a part of and california sunlight and feeling inspired and loved by so many. i miss learning and unlearning despite all the sleepless nights and stressful weeks. i even miss useless meetings and repetitive conversations at snack. i even miss kian, just a little. (okay, a lot.) 

i don’t stay nostalgic for long and i don’t get sad when i’m this way, don’t worry. (also: why is being sad so socially unacceptable? people don’t have to be fine all the time–looking at you, claremont)  i’m doing well. a little sick actually but it’ll pass. i like where i am and i hope you like wherever you are too. 

한국어

한국어

쿠바에 와서 확실히 설움을 겪고 있는 것들 중에 하나는 내 모국어를 할 수 없다는 것이다.  한달에 한 두번 꼴로 마주치는 관광객과 몇 마디 나누기도 하지만은, 대체적으로는 쿠바에서는 한국인이라고는 눈 씻고 찾아봐도 없다. 한국어를 할 대상은 내 자신에게 하는 혼잣말 이외에는 전혀 없다.

미국에 있을 때는 그래도 뉴스도 읽고, 웹툰도 보고, 친구들에게 이메일이나 카톡도 보내고 하면서 한국어를 그래도 매일같이 쓴다. 부모님과 통화도 하고, 심지어는 대학교에 다니는 다른 한인들과 대화도 하면서 말이다. 하지만은 쿠바에서는 인터넷 쓰기가 번거롭고 비싸서 네이버에 들어갈 시간도 별로 없고, 국제전화 값도 쿠바로는 분당 800원에 육박하여서 부모님과 통화도 일주일에 15분이 그만이다. 세계인구의 사분의 일이나 차지하고 쿠바와 같은 공산국가로써 수교가 밀접한 중국인들도 보기가 여간 어려운 것이 아닌데, 오랫동안 6*25 사변으로 반공의식이 강한 대한민국에서 쿠바에 가기는 더하겠는가.

실로 말하기는 창피하지만은 쿠바에 와서 눈물을 흘린적들은 죄다 내 모어를 하지 못함에서 우러났다. 그 누군가에게도 내 감정을 가장 제대로 표현할수 있는 언어로 소통을 할 수 없다는 것에 많이 답답해 한다. 한번은 그렇게 슬퍼하던 중 문뜩 중학교 때 읽었던 김춘수의 “꽃” 이라는 시가 떠올랐다. 갑자기 “내가 그의 이름을 불러 주었을 때 // 그는 나에게로 와서 // 꽃이 되었다” 라는 구절이 생각나서 나도 누군가 내 이름 석자, 최원혁을 불러주면 나도 그에게로 꽃이 될 것 같다는 생각이 들었다.

결국에는 얼마 지나지 않아 시 전체를 찾기로 하였다. 그래서 찾은 시를 여기에 옮겨쓴다.

꽃

김춘수

내가 그의 이름을 불러 주기전에는

그는 다만

하나의 몸짓에 지나지 않았다.

내가 그의 이름을 불러 주었을 때

그는 나에게로 와서

꽃이 되었다.

내가 그의 이름을 불러준 것처럼

나의 이 빛깔과 향기에 알맞는

누가 나의 이름을 불러다오. 그에게로 가서

나도 그의 꽃이 되고 싶다.

우리들은 모두 무엇이 되고 싶다.

너는 나에게 나는 너에게

잊혀지지 않는 하나의 눈짓이 되고 싶다.

중학교 때 이 시를 읽었을 때는 별 감흥없이 읽었던 기억이 난다. 허나 먼 나라에서 이 시를 읽기 시작하자 온 몸에 전율이 퍼지기 시작하였다. 어릴적에는 아무런 생각 없이 읽었던 시를 드디어 이해하게 된 것이다. 시를 낭독하면서 “나의 빛깔과 향기에 알맞는 // 누가 나의 이름을 불러다오” 라는 구절에 다다르자 창피하게 눈물이 볼가 위로 주르륵 흘러내렸다. 나한테도 내 빛깔과 향기에 맞는 이름이 있는데, 그 이름을 누군가 나에게 불러 주었으면 말이다! 하지만 내 곁에는 이 수많은 사람들 중에서 내 심정을 헤아릴 수 있는 사람들이 없다는 점에서 더욱 더 마음이 아려왔다.

하지만 결국에는 눈물은 머금고 살아야했다. 무엇을 하겠는가? 이런 일을 있길 각오하고 쿠바에 온 이상 최대한 여기서만 누릴 수 있는 색다른 경험들을 하면서 살기로 하였다. 다른 미국 교환학생과도 스페인어로 이야기를 하고, 학교 쿠바인 친구들이나 길거리 사람들과도 스페인어로 대화하면서 제 2 외국어 실력이나 쌓기로 하였다.

그리하여서 3월 초에는 다른 몇몇 얘들이랑 쿠바의 저 반대편에 있는 산티아고 데 쿠바라는 도시에 가고 되었다. 버스를 타면은 거의 하루가 다 지나갈 정도로 먼 곳이라서 조그마한 쿠바 국내선 여객기를 타고 산티아고에 갔었다. 닷새 동안이나 묵으면서 옛 구리 광산이나 카페 농장도 가 보고, 여러 박물관도 들러보고, 쿠바에서 널리 믿는 산테리아라는 종교의 신부도 만나서 이야기 하는 등 관광질을 하고 다녔다. 하루는 식중독에서 걸려서 방에서 설사만 하기도 했지만은, 대체적으로 여행을 잘 끝마치고 아바나에 돌아가려고 공항으로 갔다.

공항에는 좀 일찍 도착하게 되었어서 대기실에서 비행기를 기다렸다. 심심풀이로 노래를 듣기 시작했는데, 이 노래 저 노래 듣다가 옥상달빛의 “수고했어 오늘도”라는 노래가 나왔다. 예전에는 별 감흥 없이 들었던 노래였었어서 별 생각 없이 듣기 시작하였다. 허나, 노래를 듣기 시작하면서 “작게 열어둔 문틈 사이로 슬픔보다도 더 큰 외로움이 다가와. 수고했어 오늘도 수고했어 오늘도. 아무도 너의 슬픔에 관심 없데도 나는 너를 응원해. 수고했어 오늘도” 라는 구절을 나오자, 갑자기 울컥하였다. 매일같이 한국어를 못하는 서러움을 이해해주는 사람 없이 지내는데, 그런 나를 보고 응원한다고 하니 노래가 나를 부드럽게 달래는 듯 하였다. 그 후렴으로 메아리처럼 “수고했어 오늘도. 수고했어 오늘도”가 귓가에서 반복하자 결국에는 참지 못하고 그 공항 대기실에서 눈물을 쏟아댔다. 아무도 안 보이게 휴지를 돌돌 말아서 볼가를 닦기 시작하였으나, 결국에는 나를 위로하는 듯한 그 목소리를 듣고 있으니 전부 닦기란 무리였다.
이렇게 쿠바에 있으면서 예전에 다른 나라에 가면 이렇게 사는 거구나 하는 생각이 든다. 처음으로 다른 나라에 이민을 간 사람들은 아무도 자기의 언어를 공유하지 않은 땅에서 가져간 두손만으로 삶을 개척해 나가야 됬다니 얼마나 힘들었을까 싶다. 아무도 자기를 알아주지 않는 곳에서 힘겹게 살아하였다니, 지금은 그들에 대해서 옛보다 더욱 더 많이 존경하게 된다. 쿠바에서 나는 그래도 스페인어도 기본회화는 하고, 영어로 마음껏 소통할 수 있는 사람들도 있고, 물질적으로는 유복하게 사는데 그렇지 않았던 그런 사람들은 얼마나 노고를 겪었을까 싶다.

쿠바에 들어올 때는 이민가방 하나밖에 못 들고 오는지라 책들도 많이 챙겨오지 못했다. 가져온 국사책까지도 이제 마저 읽은지라 요즘은 차들에 붙은 에너지소비 효율등급 딱지나 읽고 다닌다. 어떻게인지는 모르겠지만 쿠바에서는 상상하지 않았던 다량의 한국 차들이 도로 위로 쌩쌩 달린다. 현대, 기아차들은 물론이고 옛날 대우, 심지어는 한국 내에서도 잘 안 팔리는 쌍용차들이 쿠바에 있다. 한국 외에서는 한 번도 본 적이 없는 차종들이 지나가자 너무 친근해서 가까이 보면은 결국에는 백이면 백 실제로 모차를 모는 사람들은 쿠바인들이다. 너무나도 이상한 감정이다. 너무나도 한국적인 차들안에서 너무나도 한국적이지 않은 사람들이 그 차들을 몰고 있다니!

전체적으로 봐서는 쿠바에서는 여러가지 경험을 많이하고 생각도 많이하고 사람으로써 많이 성장하는 나에게는 중요한 시기이지만, 쿠바에서는 절대로 장기간 살 수 없을 것 같다. 여기 사람들의 텁텁함, 도시 내에서도 풍기는 시골의 친근함, 그리고 가난 속에서도 행복과 평화를 잊지 않는 나라는 분명 무척이나 그리워하게 될 것이다. 허나 내 언어로 대화를 나누어 줄 수 있는 사람이 없는 이 나라에서는 결코 정신적으로나 감성적으로 완벽하게 만족할 수 없다는 것을 안다. 약간 실망스럽기도 하지만은 쿠바에 옴으로써 또 다시 나한테 내 문화와 언어가 얼마나 중요한지 또 한번 일깨워주는 좋은 시기인 것 같다.

The Best Day of the Semester So Far

I haven’t felt truly productive in a long time. And feeling productive is one of my favorite states of being. So yesterday was, by default, the best day of the semester so far. It was also one of the oddest days; I felt such a wide range of feelings in such a short span of time that it felt like several days in one. I think I might be feeling such a strong need to record this particular day because I usually feel pretty ho-hum here. If my emotional state were displayed on those heartbeat monitors, I would appear to be dead–I just rarely feel any extreme emotions, it feels. Anyway, it would be nice to document a day in my life here.

I woke up at 6:50 a.m. It felt too early. I walked to an old Byzantine church, where I had to attend a liturgy for class. Spring is here, and the air felt crisp and clear. Also, Greeks don’t go to work until 10 or 11 a.m., so the streets were pretty empty. It was so nice to hear nothingness.

I entered the church. It was dimly lit, perfectly warm, and smelled of incense. I always feel so self-conscious in Orthodox churches. Every inch of the inside is covered in frescoes of saints, Jesus, Virgin Mary, martyrs–all of them so holy and stern. And the churches are so beautiful, ornate, and lavish. So I sat behind a shelf and hid myself from the priest.

After half an hour of chanting, the priest walked around swinging the censer, a special incense-burner, and blessed the people there–aka me and two others. He went up to the two others and swung smoke in their faces and I sat there panicking (I’m not really sure why), but he ignored me. I was relieved but also sad that he didn’t want to bless me.

Then I left and walked to the Acropolis Museum, my favorite museum (I guess that’s not saying much since I’ve only visited one other). I love it, though. I would like to get married here someday. It’s so peaceful and aesthetically pleasing. I looked at one statue–literally one statue–for half an hour, just circling around it over and over and looking at every little detail in the marble.

Then I had bus troubles. I got on the bus in the wrong direction. I finally got to the National Archaeological Museum and stared at another statue for half an hour, getting in the way of multiple British tour groups. I’m probably in a billion of their pictures now. All of them will get home, sharing their holiday pictures over crumpets or whatever and will realize that the same Asian girl is in everyone’s pictures. Sorry.

Then I had more bus troubles. I was standing at the bus stop, but all my buses kept driving past without a second look! I brushed it off, but half an hour later, I was starting to get angry. Then I realized my actual bus stop was 50 meters down the street. Who does that? And I have literally no excuse because I’ve waited at the correct bus stop twice in the past week.

I finally got back home, and I went to the gym and showered, and I felt radiant. I had pseudo-Mexican food for lunch from the cafeteria, had a very fun coffee date with a friend, and then decided to go shopping!

I was in such a great mood walking over. I had my earphones in and was listening to Real Estate’s The Bend, my favorite song from their 2014 album. I think I was literally smiling, I was in such a great mood. While texting, I almost bumped into an older man. Whatever. I keep going on my merry way, but he starts talking to me. Do you speak Greek? Where are you from? Blah blah. He seemed friendly, so I talked to him. Besides, we were walking the same way. But then he says, “Do you want to go get coffee with me?” Um. no. I literally have a coffee in my hand. Then, “That’s okay! We should just enjoy each other’s company.” I should have known. When I kept refusing, he looked at me like he literally could not comprehend why I would not want to go on a date with him. Um. Maybe cause you’re like 50 years old and creepy af? Men are literally the worst. I hate them.

Anyways, I stomped over to go shopping, but instead of shopping, I got into a fight with a friend. Ex-friend? Demoted friend? Anyways, it doesn’t matter at this point. I was just really, really angry after and still kind of am. But then I bought some cute shirts. Stress shopping is a thing.

I then went to church again. This time, the priest blessed me with olive oil. The entire congregation lined up, and he dipped this huge Q-tip into the blessed oil and put dots of it on our foreheads, cheeks, chins, and both the backs and palms of our hands. He was so kind looking, like Santa Claus. I was literally #blessed and I felt so good. I brought some home on an actual q-tip so I could bless the rest of my family with it (I didn’t steal it, churches actually leave the bowl of oil outside so people can take it home! And they ring bells so the whole neighborhood knows they can come get it as well. Isn’t that so cool?)

Anyways, I then cooked dinner with friends and went to school and made some progress on work before sleeping! This was a milestone day in my study abroad trip. For some reason, it feels like the end of one era and the start of another. Like I will look back on this semester ten years from now and remember this day. Sorry if this is a bit mundane. I just feel this really strong conviction to write a post about it.

 

Access

Access is the name of the game here in Cuba.

As mentioned before, the average wage of a Cuban is a paltry sum of $30/month. While many local items in Cuba are cheap, the prices of internationally industrial items like electronics, gas, or shoes are more or less equivalent to global standards and out of reach for standard Cubans. If you’re making less than $400 a year, when are you going to be able to save up and buy a $600 laptop? Consequently, a lot of economic class differences end up coming from family remittances – those who have family members in Miami sending them money and clothes do much better than those who do not, regardless of their actual occupation in Cuba.

For a country with a population of 11 million, Cuba has a large number of émigrés in the United States, estimated at about an entire million mostly centered in Florida. This causes for a strong remittance culture between the Cuban-Americans and their family members who stayed in Cuba, considering that an hour of minimum wage work in the States is nearly two weeks of salary in Cuba. In 2012, family remittances from the United States to Cuba of $5.1 billion dollars was the highest source of Cuba’s national income, topping the $4.9 billion earned by the top four leading economic sectors of Cuba: tourism, nickel, pharmaceuticals, and sugar. When I flew in from Miami to Havana, the plane was nearly full with Cuban-Americans bringing computers, wide-screen LCD televisions, or even air-conditioning units. Things normally out of the reach of standard Cubans.
Domestically, Cubans enjoy far less economic privilege than foreigners, and often “artsy,” “hipster,” or “fancy” places will cater to foreigners who can afford it. Even the Fábrica del Arte Cubano, an art gallery and bar in one, is often a third full of foreigners from various North American and European countries, since most Cubans can’t pay the entrance fee of $2 often. The only mall I’ve found in Havana was full of tourists, despite being on one of the biggest, most central streets in Havana. They were playing Maroon 5 and trying to enlist of a mood of a US mall, and quickly made itself apparent that it wasn’t a mall intended for Cubans with its $45 shoes.

This small mall actually reminded me of what I’d read previously about the DDR – the Communist East Germany before the fall of the Soviet Bloc. The socialist state often only offered one brand of a product, i.e. shampoo, cereal, cream, etc. and the people had to purchase them equally and humbly under the ideology that required equality. However, the DDR often had “tourist shops” with luxury items such as designer-brand perfumes or imported electronics, realistically only sold to tourists for extra revenue. The people of the DDR themselves could not buy the “luxury goods” offered by the state. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Cuba reminds me a lot of this system of tourist luxury shops in the now defunct DDR. Although nowadays more and more entrepreneurs are appearing across the country, still generally the only people who can purchase high-end rum or cigars are tourists in for a view. The so-called high-end products that Cuba produces are not for itself.

I surely feel a bit strange being in Cuba as a foreigner with such different capital resources. When the professor in my economy class took out a ten-dollar bill for demonstration purposes, the entire class went wild because that wasn’t a sum of money they see. Yet, a ten-dollar bill was sitting right there in my pocket. The fact that many people can’t afford to eat the $0.50 pizzas that are for me are literally pocket change make me almost in some sense guilty. Am I taking advantage of the socialist country with the benefits I have amassed in a capitalist society? Am I wielding my access and privilege as a weapon? Am I increasing the wealth disparity between the people who work in tourism/foreigner-catering industry and those who do not? I hope I am not, but I feel like I know that I am.

Barack

The President of the United States of America, Barack Obama, visited Havana, Cuba as the first head of the U.S. since President Calvin Coolidge visited this nation 88 years ago. Historic moment, if you will. Symbolic moment for a new era of Cuban-United States relations, if you will.

How strange his visit was! He had a meeting with the Cuban head of state Raúl Castro one day, but the next day proceeded to meet with Cuban dissenters who challenge the government and aim to topple the socialist regime in Cuba. To me, that seemed strange – almost disrespectful, in a way. Obama was invited into a country by the state, but then proceeded to meet and encourage people who want to remove the current government?

In spite of Obama’s challenge for Raúl to attend a press conference, and his outspoken critique of the Cuban government during his speech at the Gran Teatro Nacional, Cuba took all measures to paralyze their country in order to protect President Obama. How strange it was to take the entire capital city of Havana out of function in order to protect the head of a country that has been actively trying to invade them for the last 57 years, and still encourages the youth to do away with the Castro’s! A country that still enacts an economic blockade against Cuba and only a month ago fined a French company millions of dollars for trading with Cuba then trying to trade with the United States! How strange it is.

Havana was greatly out of function the three days President Obama visited. Since Obama travelled through the major roads of Havana, the central commercial area that surrounds those big roads suspended their services for the week. If you can’t cross the street, and cars can’t run on the road, who’s going to come to the stores? The bookstores were closed, the pizzerias were closed, and even the street merchants were nowhere to be found. Security surrounded to street refraining people from getting on the road, and mostly the crowd that formed whenever Obama’s cars whizzed by the road were just people who were trying to go about their own lives but could not due to the closed roads.

The University of Havana didn’t have classes all Monday and Tuesday Obama was here! I went to the University only to find the school devoid of students. The teachers for my salsa class also cancelled class, as they couldn’t find reliable ways to get to the dance classroom. Seeing Obama’s cars, even close by, got a little bit tiring after I saw it six times and actually became fairly inconvenient when I actually needed to cross the street. A máquina ride from Old Havana to Vedado, where I live, took twice as long because roads were closed, and the cumulative effect of traffic that was halted for ten minutes caused a jam. The city perimeter shut down as well; throughout the three days Obama was here, no buses could come into Havana. If you went to a beach on Sunday morning, too bad for you, you’re not coming back into the city until Wednesday.

I also have much to say about Obama’s lackluster and disappointing speech he gave in Havana, but perhaps this is not the place.

04: unedited and delayed reflections

Hello Interweb world! I am pathetic for not posting on this blog in the past month, although I really, really saw myself posting frequently during this Spring semester abroad. I apologize. I honestly have no excuses. I could have just designated time to sit down and really think about what to write, and write, but  alas – I didn’t.

(I usually get really self-conscious about the organization of my written thoughts, but I’m just going to dump everything on this page – dump all my cider/wine infused thoughts after my first weekend spent outside of Budapest // I know no one is reading this, so who really cares?)

I’ve been in Budapest for (almost) 2 months!! You know how I know? (Apart from opening calendar.google.com and checking the date) It’s cause I have to look at that date on my monthly public transportation card and I’m forced to be aware of it’s expiration date, which is March 18, 2016 in case you were wondering. It’s coming up, which means in 3 days, I have to fumble with the touchscreen on one of those purple public transportation ticket machines to get another ticket that’ll expire on April 18. And then May 18. …..

Time is going by too quickly. I really don’t want to leave Budapest at the end of May. And if I really reflect on this resistance, it’s because of the people I’ve met here. Which people, you may inquire? Well, I do love people so I suppose I’ll elaborate.

(Some of) The people at AIT: I’m extremely lucky to have awesome companions on this program. It’s funny, because I’m enrolled in this computer science program as a math major, and still somehow avoided taking any coding classes this semester. If you want to know my schedule:

Ah, sorry I got distracted. I’ve met awesome people on this program!!! Wow, even right now, in front of me is Ruth, the awesome girl from Grinnell who I met too late, Nhu who’s cooking us fried rice, and Dalia (who I met through Safae, my awesome roommate)). In addition, there’s Annie, Marina, Zoe, Anh, Clara (of course),… but the point is, it’s so amazing to me that we can all hang out with each other, go to each others’ apartments, cook with each other, be open with each other, and not be super in your face about entrepreneurship/start-up-y things. I’ve made awesome memories with these people and I never would have met them if it hadn’t been for this program in Hungary.

(Pisti!!!!! & Bende, lol) My time in Hungary has been super precious because of Pisti. I’m not going to go into too much detail, because it would be too distracting. But we went to Gyor, Prague, and Vienna this past weekend and it was awesome.

The biggest triggers of my reflection have been having visitors. So Melis came over a couple of weeks ago, and I had to really think about what I wanted to show her in Budapest. And I had been in Budapest < 1 month, so I frantically flipped through my short stack of Budapest memories and realized I hadn’t been doing all the “touristy” things in Budapest / iconic / glamorous things. And following this panic, I came to the conclusion that what matters to me the most are people. I really don’t give a shit about fancy restaurants, beautiful pictures (yeah I actually don’t really take pictures anymore because I’m vlogging most of the time), landscapes…. well, landscapes are awesome and our Earth is beautiful, but I do get some sort of “high” from being around people.

And then Emma and Kristen came. And then that began my categorization of travellers: there’s:

1. The Touristy/Insta Traveller.
2. The “I want to know how a REAL (insert location here) lives”
3. The Foodie.
4. The Person Who Researches the Area and Finds a Legit Reason For Visiting The Place (apart from the usual)
5. The Cafe / Chill Traveller. (Me)
6. Other (because I haven’t solidified by categories yet)

And I realized that I HATE being that person who just goes to a city for a day with a checklist, but on the other hand, it’s impossible to truly get to know a city and it’s people unless you’re there for a couple of weeks. So I think I have to resort to the touristy shit (with the awareness that I am doing this touristy shit), or not travel at all.

 

I’m in traveller purgatory.

Sigh. I’ve lost my train of thought. I just want to say – I love Budapest, the people I’ve met here, the food (lol I’ve never loved Pisti – I mean pizza – this much), and PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION. The 4-6 is my lifeline. I live off of Jászai mari ter. Hit me up.

Okay, peace. Also watch my vlogs. https://youtu.be/DCyqfJl-fLY

I’ve been drinking some alcoholz

Máquinas

My main mode of transportation here are máquinas (machines), also known as almendras (almonds), collective taxis that are often sixty, seventy year old Buick or Chrysler American cars. Since buses come infrequently and are always so packed, the people who can afford it will often times take máquinas instead for a more reliable and comfortable mode of transportation. Subsequently, máquina fares are much higher, charging 50 cents per person instead of the 1.5 cents for a bus.

Even though they offer much more pleasant experiences than a bus, the máquinas are far from any luxurious or even standard mode of transportation in the States. Most cars have broken exhaust pipes and spit out black trails of smoke, while shaking profusely even when running on well-paved roads. Often times the cars will have no glass on the windows anymore. Although most drivers will fit six people in one car, on busy days they might cram in one or even two more passengers leaving little space to sit.

There are some kinks that come with these old cars, though. The doors are often falling apart, so you have to close them softly. Many times people will close the doors too soft though, and have to close it again in order for it to actually shut properly. One silly satisfaction is from closing máquina doors properly: closing the door softly but just hard enough to hear the click sound of a proper shut. Too soft and the driver will yell abierta (open), and too hard and the driver will yell suave (smoothly) and a bunch of other tirades about closing the door too hard.

Hailing a máquina is much similar to hailing a cab in the States. Since máquinas only run on fixed routes, you need to go to a big street and try to hail one by raising your arm by 45 degrees whenever you see a 60-year old looking car. When a máquina comes, you ask it if it goes through a certain route or place. For instance, I’ll ask the drivers “Tercera,” asking them if they drive up 3^rd street, or ask “Capitolio” if they pass by the Cuban Capitol building. Since the máquinas have various routes, the drivers have invented hand-signals to notify which route they drive on. On a street nearby, Línea, where I catch most of my máquinas, shaking an open palm back and forth means it’s going straight and merges onto 31^st street, while a fist with a thumb to the right means it’s turning at 10^th street to go up 3^rd street. It’s eventually quite simple but a frustratingly complicated concept at first: when I first got to Cuba and hailed drivers who had already signaled to go straight and asked them if they turn, the drivers just angrily drove away at the fact that I just wasted their time.

Other than the máquinas, I do take the buses sometimes, although mostly only when I’m at the first stop and can actually get a seat on the bus. Trying to get on a bus in the middle of the route, especially during the day, can be excruciating. You have to push though people packed in like sardines just to get in, and do the same to get out. Meanwhile, everybody will be pushing each other to get off or approach the door, and during peak hours many people who board the bus don’t pay because the fare collector just realistically can’t get to them. However, most Cubans can only afford to take these buses, and I always feel incredibly fortunate enough to afford my máquina rides.

Emma’s Miscellany

I loved the style of Harry’s last post. So I’m stealing it. Enjoy these miscellaneous observations, actually more about my own experience than Paris itself.

-Paris is filthy. I had not realized this until I went to Vienna and Salzburg, which are very clean cities. The buildings are dirty, the metros are smelly, there is lots of dog poop (it’s only relatively recent that leaving your dog’s shit lying around is illegal, and many people have not fully adopted the principle). For a city full of beautiful people, buildings, and foods, the city itself is clearly highly populated. I think it contributes to the charm – Paris feels like a home that someone (many someones) has lived in and loved.

-English is a wonderful language. One of my good friends here is a linguistics major, so I now have some official terms for this realization: English is what we call  a productive language. This is most evident in swearing, something I am quite fond of. In French, you are more or less limited to two words with which to swear. In English, you can turn almost any noun into a verb, or any word into a swear, and people will understand you and even get a new complexity of meaning from your newly-created word. French is much more rigid and much more complicated – the severity of l’Académie française is famous, and although there are LOTS of words stolen from English, and a lot more casual word-creation in spoken French, in general, the language is much as it always has been.

-Learning a second language can eradicate the first. My reflexes of politeness are all in French. I am developing a bizarre Franglish when I speak English, and, as you may have noticed, I say bizarre a LOT more now – it’s more common than “étrange,” which also means “weird.” I’m becoming annoyed that there are words that do not in exist in English that simply should. I am no longer good at any language. Oops.

-If you have grown up in America, you are loud. Somehow people in France have more highly-developed eardrums than Americans, because they talk so quietly and I hear nothing. I laugh loudly, I talk loudly, I exist loudly. At least when I speak French I’m not being the worst kind of American tourist (although, alas, when I speak English I am very much upholding the stereotype).

-A Nutella crêpe should cost between 2.50 and 3.50. An espresso should not be more than 2.4 euro (and that’s pretty pricey). Do not buy anything, ever, on the Champs-Elysées.

-Mexican food is not, and never will be, the same here – just give up and wait to be back in Southern California. I’m still trying to convince myself to stop looking for Mexican food. There is one (1) Chipotle in this city, and that is far from the pinnacle of achievement in Mexican cuisine.

-A baguette is always worth it. It’s one euro. Go for it.

Miscellaneous Observations I

Here I list some miscellaneous thoughts that have no home.

 

– I still can’t eat food in my bed, or even my room without feeling like I’m doing something wrong. The ant population in Claremont has really trained me.

– The tap water’s not potable here, so I have to drink boiled water or buy bottled water each time. There’s often also no warm water in the showers, and when there is it’s only there for a few minutes.

– People used to take toilet papers from public bathrooms so much that nowadays there’s no toilet paper within the bathrooms. Instead, a person sits in front of the bathrooms and dispenses toilet paper to people going in the bathroom, and receives tip for the service.

– Winking is a widespread form of greeting here. It can carry a variety of meaning ranging from good morning to catcalling, but is often used to mean hello or welcome. I’ve been winked at by total strangers on the street, all the time by my Cuban friends, and even a couple of times by my history professor.

– Parks are all over in Havana. They’re never quite big, and often just the size of half a football field, but they’re everywhere. You’ll find one every five blocks. Perhaps the frequency of parks shows the impossibility of purchasing land, especially from the government?

– I habitually still try to reach for seat belts when I get on cars, even though I well know by now that there’s no such thing on 60 year-old beat up machines. Seat belts are a true rarity to see, and I’ve only ever seen a single one in my eight weeks here in Cuba.

– How is ice cream so cheap here? Ten scoops of ice cream is cheaper than a single can of soda. Five scoops of ice cream each with different flavors and two cookies cost less than 20 cents. How is that possible? After all, I guess Cuba is the land of sugar.

– Although it has diminished considerably recently, tobacco has also been a main product of Cuba, and it shows. Everybody smokes cigarettes here, and nobody bats an eye on some middle school girls sitting on a curb and passing around a cigarette. Cigarettes are even called habanos here, referring to time when Havana used to the main producer of tobacco.

– Smoking here exclusively refers to tobacco in Cuba, since smoking marijuana can equate to ten years of merciless prison-time. Since it’s an island, smuggling it in is nigh impossible, and I’ve never heard of anybody smoking weed in Cuba. Henceforth, when I go to parties, the familiar weed smell that accompanies the smell of alcohol is replaced with the dense smoke of cigarettes here.

 

UCL: education systems

I realized I haven’t posted anything to describe my experience so far, aside from my initial reactions and a few videos on the places I’ve been to so far. So this week, I’ll try to post every day on a new topic. Up first, UCL vs. Pomona, teaching models and education systems.

I am going to admit a bad thing: I am not academically engaged at all. The rotating lecturers and less class time, from 20 hours a week with additional time doing research or working with the AARC, to only 8 hours of class a week, are the biggest factors. This translates to each lecturer trying to cram as much information as possible into the fifty-minute lecture. For each lecture, there’s no course work except suggested readings from a few journal articles, reviews, and textbooks. These textbooks are all in one place, at the science library, a great space to sit next to cute people, but overall stuffy, smelly, and science-y. But library aside, the hard thing about this is that each lecturer uses different textbooks, so if one lecturer suggests two textbooks, the next lecturer will suggest another two, making it difficult since the resources are not neatly compiled into one or two places.

it’s actually a great place to work if you like stress and silence

Their system emphasizes the idea of independent learning and finding answers on your own, and while it’s ideologically sound, in practice it feels like lectures can be disjointed, repetitive, and as a whole, not well structured. Still, it makes sense since there are so many more students and not as many resources, and I guess this is what it feels like to be a large university. It’s actually nice to have less lab time, or practicals. There are only two to three practicals for the entire term for each neuroscience class, and because I’ve had two labs a week at Pomona for the past three years, the practicals are not comparable at all. In addition to lectures and practicals, there are also tutorials, which are like journal clubs, except you are graded on participation and it becomes an aggressive fight to see who will answer the most questions. I struggle the most with tutorials since the other UCL students have already taken two years of only neuroscience classes and seem to have good prior knowledge whereas I have only taken Neuro 101, which was more than a year ago. After high school, students specialize quickly, either with choosing their degree and only taking courses within that subject or with picking technical schools like medical, business, or engineering schools, meaning that they enter medical school right after high school and don’t have to go through general education requirements and the crisis of choosing a balanced schedule.

Thankfully, I’m not only taking neuroscience classes and my other two classes are easy. In fact, my favorite class is a London archaeology class since all we do is walk around old parts of London, and the professor is a cute old man who points out old city walls in car parks and grumbles at how nothing is preserved properly.

Overall, I’m much more appreciative and thankful of the amount of resources that Pomona offers. Of course, there’s a large difference in what we have to pay, since tuition at UCL is only 9000 pounds a year, which translates to $13,500, but doesn’t include room and board, compared to our $60,000+ with everything included. For that price, UCL is also considered one of the top schools in the UK, right after Cambridge and Oxford, and its biosciences/biomedical science programs are the best in Europe. So, while I feel like I may not be academically challenged right now, it’s probably because there’s no pressure for it, but once exam season comes around in about a month, I’ll start seeing why UCL is a tough school. With all that said, I’m glad I chose UCL, and I’m thankful for the opportunity to study here, even if it is only for one term.