1 month

Once again, my usual forewords before I start my entry are "I have been away for a while"... or something similar.

I have been busy, away and ignored. It feels like I was missed during the welcome week but other than that, I was ignored. And to be brutally honest, I actually felt ok with it. I can't ask people to remember me all the time because I am now no longer there. There are new people coming in everyday, it's just too selfish of me.

Oh well, let's talk about something else.

A month ago, I had the weirdest birthday of my own. Errr.... that's about it really hahaha.

But I do have to admit, I have now understood why it's hard for people to miss out on seeing each other when they are working. I used to say even though we are tired, we still have time. And it's not that we don't care about other people, we simply don't have much time and efforts like we used to. I hardly go on facebook anymore to check on people. I hardly random facebook chat with other people to ask how they have been. I hardly touch my phone during the weekend. And things like that. My social circle gets bigger everyday, but the true circle perhaps gets a lot smaller. Then it goes to the extent that there's only one I would like to see at the end of my hard day... ;)

Take care you all!

Throw

I was planning to write this entry one or two weeks ago. I just couldn't put it into words and I still can't.

About two weeks ago, my Exeter student account was deactivated, which is rather an obvious thing because I am no longer a student there. Then a week later, my Exeter staff account went on the same path with the same reason.

I couldn't put these two events into words because they were just too much at that time. It felt like you knew you would be killed you just didn't know when. The day the accounts were blocked, I was in a great shock. I have been checking them for almost 5 years, it has been something I have done every single day and at least twice a day. Yet after that, things levelled out.

Sometimes, people don't throw things they no longer use because there are certain connections or memories attached to those. But then again, we can't bring everything from our past with us on our journey. There are more memories to be made and a few tangible things we need to let go. The mail accounts is one of those things. And most importantly, they are already there in my mind, a memory that nothing can ever replace it. Exeter has been and will always have a place in me wherever I go, a place I call home.

Price

A few people who are considerably older than me would view this as kids' thoughts or immature ideas and illusions. Or perhaps, they just didn't live their lives the way we do now and they were not in the culture we have experienced. 

Everyone that knows me well, would know the more I am controlled and affected by other people, the sooner I will break through regardless of family, love or friendship. I have been trained, well enough to be more than capable of living on my own. I am not quite certain whether it is a good thing or not, yet surely, it is to certain cases. 

I am not here to judge or instruct one to live his/her own life. The way I live mine, admittedly, is not perfect either. 

Initiation is a word that does not mean much when standing alone. Putting it into the UK culture and everyone knows it's booze time when you join a society, and obviously the pressure to down as much booze as you could from your peers. Peer pressure is the killer. Sometimes, what one does or how one reacts merely depends on what others in that small circle, which people may name "close friends", would think, despite how independent one claims to be. And that's no one's fault. People are insecure creatures, that they still want to have certain people to grab when they are at their most vulnerable state. Yet letting that lead you to a superficial social network then ultimately fake life, is a bit "weird", as the slightest and most inoffensive word I could think of.

Then family comes. Culture and power hierarchy starts to creep in. That is when one does not care about what other lower "class" or "level" may react, he/she does it because he/she is at the higher up class or level on the chain. Experience is forever (mostly), we make mistakes and we fix it and that becomes our own experience. But sometimes, applying one's experience to another is the stupidest idea of all time, let alone the time gap. 

These are my observations for the past few days. 

The way I chose to live mine does not have much space for these two, peer pressure and family control/culture. Freedom is certainly there, but the price may be huge. Though, it's what I am willing to pay.

How long wil I love you?

Today was just another ordinary day, I woke up early and headed off to work. I was reading on a case about a corporation established in the UK, and it hit me with a bit of rain outside the windows. I stopped, looked around, and drifted. I read a blog of a close friend about the UK, a deep and nostalgic entry that inspired me to write this, rather a similar story with a different view. 

I started my journey like no others. It was something I would never have thought about in a million years, in my wildest imagination. I had a chance to go, then lost it, and tried everything I could to grab it back and I succeeded. I thought, it might be, perhaps meant to be. Indeed it was. 

I felt like home the second I landed. 6 hours on the coach after a 24-hour flight was nothing. People would think I'm lying when I say I was not excited, yet I really was not. I was calm, enjoying every single bit of that greenfield along the road heading towards the South West of England, and was in peace. 

The next 6 years were marvellous. I might not have travelled as much as I wanted or had time to try certain things. But I also did what no one else had never done before. I was completely in peace and in control. I know I did have some hard moments (who didn't?!), I had days when I had to fake my smiles and keep moving, but never a day I thought of leaving. I knew then and I know now, I was living in the best place on earth and nothing could come in and kick me out. It was a good run, or shall I say "an era!". 

Life got in the way. The moment I realised I had to go back, it felt something like a ticking bomb. Certainly, I was not trying hard enough as I should have; I got distracted with the work that I truly love.

My friend, she left when everyone but her place was telling her to stay. It was a rather opposite situation for me. All my stuff I brought 6 years ago with me started to break down one by one. It even felt like they were shouting at me, "we have had enough of this!". Well, they did have a point. No one wears a pair of house flipflop for 6 years like me. They must have been tired of my feet!

Then I left. 

I couldn't say a word when I moved out of my room, the place I had been for 4 years. I hardly said a word on my way to the coach station on my probably last cab trip, to take my probably last coach, to the place I may never see again, London Heathrow Airport. 

Right at this moment when I'm typing this entry, it has been 6 months exactly to every second. 

Life starts at the end of your comfort zone. I guess, nothing can describe what I have been going through better. I now started another chapter of my life in a country I don't want to live and deal with stuff that I don't like everyday. Now, fake smiles are really fake smiles with no genuine reason to cheer up other people around me, or to ensure them not to worry. Fake smiles now, are just a thing I do because I hardly smile again.

Yet, I understand what my friend's place wanted when it said nothing to her and what my stuff said to me. My stuff couldn't bear another moment at that room. It's time to grow up, time to move on, and leaving does not mean I will never come back. I will come back, better, older but with the same heart. 

And to that special friend of mine, it said nothing perhaps because it knew you would come back one day. Sometimes, we, human are funny. The more others say to us, the more we want to do the opposite. And sometimes, some say nothing when you want to leave because they love you much enough and (hope) they know you well enough to know you will be back. 

                                          One of my very first moments in Exeter April 2009

Ps: to answer the title of this entry, you are always my home and I love you with every bit of my heart, you foggy island!

...Đẹp - part 3

Định bụng là sẽ ngồi viết blog hôm nay, mà đùng 1 phát dây cáp biển internet gì gì đó bị đứt nên load có cái trang để viết mà load mấy trăm năm ko xong.

Nếu như những ai biết tôi, có thể sẽ thấy đc trước đây tôi đã viết 2 bài có liên quan đến từ "đẹp", đó là "người đẹp" và "bạn đẹp - part 2". Tôi chưa biết từ trước từ "đẹp" lần này sẽ là từ gì, hay chỉ đơn thuẩn là 1 từ "đẹp" để diễn tả hết những gì tôi muốn tả. 

Tôi ko giỏi văn để có thể viết đc những câu nói đọng lòng người đọc, nhưng tôi nhớ khá nhiều, đặc biệt là những gì đã trở thành 1 phần ko thể thiếu của bản thân mình. 

Tôi nhớ tui đã từng lang thang góc nước hoa trong Debenhams chỉ để phân bua là gift for him thì bạn kia nên mua gì và gift for her thì tôi sẽ mua gì. Để rồi rốt cuộc chả ai mua gì. Nhưng những gì đọng lại của khỏang thời gian đó là 1 buổi chiều mưa chủ nhật, khi tôi đang quay phim trong culture week; tôi đã lẻn việc chỉ để chạy ra ngòai bờ biển ngồi ăn 1 ly kem và nhìn hoàng hôn lẫn nói dăm ba câu. 

Bẵng đi một thời gian, nhiều thứ đã thay đổi. Nhưng vẫn còn đó những lần gặp gỡ, và thường bắt đầu lẫn kết thúc về 1 chuyện mà con người ta ai cũng làm, "ăn". Tôi và bạn này thích đồ ăn, thích ăn, và thích ăn cùng nhau để bất cứ người phục vụ nào khi thấy tụi tôi chắc cũng vui vì ăn nhiều thì trả tiền nhiều thôi. 

Tôi nhớ thật nhiều, vui có và buồn cũng có. Tôi nhớ cảm giác trống vắng một ngày cuối tháng 6 cách đây 2 năm, ngồi trên chiếc xe coach vù đi mà tôi chỉ có thể nghĩ về cảm giác lần đầu tôi ngồi xe coach một ngày giữa tháng 9 khi mới lót tót sang Anh. Tôi đã nói, khép lại 1 chương trong chuyến hành trình dài. 

Nhớ cho nhiều vào rồi thì tôi biết, tôi hiểu bản thân mình nhiều hơn và nhìn thấy nhiều điều hơn. 

Con người ta sợ, không dám làm để rồi luôn hòai nuối tiếc. Điều chúng ta ko làm luôn luôn là điều đẹp hơn. Nhưng đẹp hơn làm gì nếu như mình không có đc. Và nói thẳng ra, hãy làm đi vì biết đâu điều bạn đang làm đấy là điều đẹp nhất từng xảy ra với bạn. 

Người đẹp mà biết mình đẹp và tự tin mình đẹp, hãy mãi đẹp. Điều đẹp mình tin là đẹp, sẽ luôn đẹp. Và tôi vẫn sẽ luôn ở bên cạnh, sẵn sàng nhảy bất kì chuyến train hay đi bất kì chuyến bus nào để đc gặp cái đẹp đó, dù rằng bây giờ thì có vẻ dễ dàng hơn với môtô xe máy ViệtNam.

Chỉ là một bài viết bâng quơ một ngày thứ 4, 1 tuần trước, có những thứ vẫn luôn đẹp.

A step you can't take back

I haven't written much if not at all for the past 3 months since my last entry. And I have struggled to find time to write this entry. Title has been changed, and so has the content. I was planning to write something for the first day I started my job in Vietnam, then it was procrastinated to the first week, and now 14 days into the job. 

The job is okay, a bit repetitive but at an acceptable level. Most importantly, I didn't expect much hence there was not much at all to be disappointed. It's not that I don't want to work or don't like the job, I guess I have learnt there's nothing good about expectation. Now, it's either you want it and you make it happen or you don't want it enough. 

Above was all I wanted to write for the past 2 weeks. Now, there are a hell lot more...

Gradweek commenced today, and for the first time in my life since I have been at Exeter, I'm not there. It hit me the second time to realise I have graduated from my BA for almost 2 years and from my MSc for almost 6 months. Time flies and we all have to move on. Yet I know, there is something that will always be there. Plymouth, Exeter, UK, my love for the country and the city, my habits when I lived there; those will never go away. 

I took a step that I couldn't take back. Guess what, I feel complete now. I see everything I have to work for, and I will come back, I promise!

Exeter throw back

It struck me last night that I have been back for more than 2 months now. I haven't written much but I have improved my facebook updates almost back to my "uni time" facebook. I could see a lot have changed, to all of you and to me.

First stop, to those of you who know me, I'm no longer in a relationship. It was a hard turn but it was something we both had to do at least for the time being. Mind you before you you jump to any conclusions, it was not because of the distance. The distance for a short while sometimes is all you need.

Secondly, job hunting has eventually progressed. It was not that I didn't seek for much, it was just they process a little slower, far slower than in Devon.

And the last but not least, I had a VN friend visit from Exeter from HN to HCM for the past couples of days. I must say, it felt like uni all over again, apart from we are now old enough to not do that many silly things...

It has been exactly 4 weeks right to this very moment since I arrived in Vietnam, had dinner and threw myself into my bed crashing like a baby. I still remember that was the first time ever I did such things as I always unpack first despite how tired I am.

4 weeks, I still have not got used to being here. The people are different, the ways we deal with things are different and my life is different. Though I guess things really start this way, at the end of my comfort zone back in the UK. No matter how hard life could have got if I'd managed to stay in the UK looking for a job, at least I still speak the language. I'm an alien here to say the least but I will make it through.

Vietnam, a new chapter

Phew, I can't believe that the last time I published a blog post was over 3 months ago. I guess the idea of leaving the UK and moving back to Vietnam has taken a toll on me.

Anyway, I just want to update to those who sometimes still read my blog that I'm still alive and properly up and running today. Life here has been rather awkward to say the least, yet there are still some good bits about it that I have hold on to. At the end of the day, I have to be here at least for couples of months until I get a job elsewhere.