Summer Blues

Alright, let’s do this. Hello May, June, July, where did you go? Well, May was seriously just buckling down and doing not all that much. I hosted a board game night at my house, saw the one old friend I basically have left here once or twice, and then got my shit together and ready to head out in June. But not before a quickie weekend trip to Los Angeles to meet up with some friends who were driving down from San Francisco.

The highlight was clearly going to the newly opened Harry Potter World at Universal Studios, but exploring  East LA was fun too. My friends AirBnBed a spot in Silver Lake and from there we set off on food adventures. With my friend cruise directoring the whole thing, it was very easy to just show up and eat. Throughout the whole trip we talked about how much appeal East LA had to us as a place to move to. Short answer: with the rise of Uber, and much less driving, it’s a lot!

For the full PotterWorld review and some more talk about (potentially) living in Los Angeles, listen to episode one of my forthcoming podcast with newish friend extraordinaire, Margot. Oh wait, I haven’t built that podcast yet. But I’m gonna get on it when I get the chance. I even bought a fancy new microphone to have better sound quality. So yeah, new podcast, arriving soon!

Teaser: I’m Ravenclaw.

Heading into June, I packed up everything into my standard suitcase and duffle bag and headed off to New York. Originally I was hoping to move in with my old roommate in Fort Greene but that plan didn’t come together so after some Craigslist and Facebook Group searching, I found a sublet in Stuy Town, on 18th Street and Avenue C. (I went through my week-by-week in New York on the other blog, so I’ll skim through most of it here. Just the highlights!)

Oh, before I got over to New York, I stopped by Indiana for two nights, to see my uncle and talk some business stuff. Get business stuff cleared up mostly. I had been there four years before, when I was just starting to work seriously with the company again. The experience this time was understandably different, and I didn’t 100% need to go, but it was good to stop by. Also, Obama was in town for a speech too, so the whole town was riled up, in a good and bad way. Put it this way, I’d never spoken to so many non-Obama people before. Eye opening. We all live in our bubbles eh?

The two big things I was in New York for was my friend’s wedding in late June and the bachelor party two weeks prior. I popped in the night before the bachelor party and then cruised over to my first burlesque show for the coed festivities.

My ex was there, and I made it even more awkward by not just stepping up right away and saying hello. So basically throughout the entire night — and the wedding itself — we just ignored each other. While this might have been fine on both parts, it seemed like not the right thing to do. Even a cordial “hi” would probably have been adult. Lesson learned: Just get the awkwardness out of the way early so that it fades. Instead I just let it linger. Seeing as last time we spoke we were literally fighting, maybe ignoring each other was the best. Anyways… Beautiful wedding, and I got to be a groomsman for the second time. Plus I wore a tux for the first time ever!

Most of early June was sucked up by the NBA Playoffs, which made me get out of the house — in search of a television — and also to see random friends here and there. My main go-to hang out buddy was my friend from Taiwan, as he had also just moved to New York from Taiwan. With our flexible schedules, we wandered around a lot, hitting up random Chinese food places to rate them, and getting boba.

I also got to visit JMZ and Jenn’s new house out in Brooklyn. It’s very homey, just like their old spot, and they’ve got a boatload of work to do to the backyard, the studio, and the basement. I can’t imagine ever owning a house where I have to do any improvements. I mean, can you? I can barely install a shower head. But JMZ and Jenn are well equipped for the job. A big highlight of June was seeing their upstairs neighbor’s performance of Eclipsed on Broadway. A reminder of the type of stuff that I can’t get elsewhere.

However, something was wrong as soon as I settled into New York. The streets were chaotic, dirty, and people bugged me all around. I thought the feeling would fade but it really didn’t. By the end of June, I was already plotting to get out of New York, cutting short my summer stay. But you already know that. (Since I’m backdating this and now on an entirely different continent.)

By July 4th, I knew I was heading out at the end of the month. So I made efforts to cram in as much as possible before I left. And in a shocker, I headed to the beach twice. After never going to any beach in New York before. The first time was to Long Beach, where my friend and I spent hours on the sand, sitting on beach chairs, chatting away, and never even getting in the water. The second time, my friend who had acquired a car to go with her parking spot — a super backwards move that makes sense only in Manhattan — wanted to get out for the weekend so we headed to Fire Island and spent a wonderful day lounging on the beach.

Both times made strong arguments for adding “beach” to further New York agendas. But only if you have someone to drive you there. No way I can stomach sitting on a train to the beach and back. Sorry,  I still prefer my beach less than ten minutes away.

Other July highlights: a five hour karaoke night that was just epic in energy, song selection, and personnel; going to watch Wicked for the fifth time; pulling a major favor from my friend to jam seven of us into her eighteen-seat restaurant, and then my first experience with Sleep No More. And then the night before I left, I had one of those New York nights I missed so much but didn’t really find much of this summer. It wasn’t even an all nighter or anything, but started off with a group dinner with friends and then spun out into some walking around, followed by grouping up different people at a bar/restaurant for fun conversation, and all the while adding/losing people — including my friend who just landed from Taiwan. The night ended around one in the morning, with a late night Flushing run scratched due to weather and fatigue, but it left me with the sense that the magic wasn’t gone. (I mean, is it ever gone in New York? Never completely right?)

Anyway, what is that called? A whiff of a memory? A glimpse of promise? Whatever it was, I was on a plane eighteen hours later, on my way to Brazil.

The Catch Up

Whoa, it’s May already! And not one single blog entry from your second-favorite intermittent blogger! How will anyone know what I’m up to, or what I’ve been doing, or what I’ve been thinking or where I’ve been?! The easy answer is, “Nobody cares!” The easier answer is, “I’ve been in Taiwan!” The easiest answer is, “I haven’t been doing anything, or thinking, or going anywhere!” That last bit isn’t true actually. I’ve been places. As you’ll see.

So, life update 2016, five months in, this is where we stand... I’m back in the United States. Good old U-S-A. To be honest, it’s jarring here sometimes, and I’m not 100% sure I want to be here. But the first week back was glorious. I reveled in driving to the grocery store. I loved Costco. I was so over Taiwan that my last few months were spent basically holed up in my mom’s apartment, emerging mainly to eat. So it was wonderful to feel bathed in American convenience and choices. And suburban lifestyle ain't bad for a second.

Somewhere along the way I stopped staying up super late at night and going out to clubs three times a week. In fact, I could probably count the number of times I went “out” in 2016 on one hand. Partially it was because I was having some back problems so uninterrupted sleeping was an adventure, but mostly because Taiwan was feeling too same old, same old.

I basically had a handful of people I was trying to see on a regular basis and that was it. Taiwan was over for me. It was super fun while it lasted but I felt dull inside and intellectually/creatively uninspired. Taipei is a wonderful city but bursting with vivacity it is not.

It was a good run for me though. November 2014 till March 2016. That’s a year and four months, minus maybe two months for when I was in the U.S. in August and November 2015. That’s the longest I’ve stayed put in one place since 2012-3. Back then it was a year and three months in New York. What’s funny is that I’m basically headed right back to New York, maybe even sliding back into my old apartment, with my ex-roommate. So, if things work out, hello roomie (again), hello New York (again), and hello Fort Greene (again).

In the meantime, I’ve been buckled down in San Diego for most of April, since returning in late March from Taiwan and immediately attending a friend’s fabulous Indian wedding in Arizona. Most of my tasks here have involved super cleaning my room — my mom is demanding it all be boxed up — and I finished that task a week ago. The Junk Fairy, the name of the father-son hauling company, came by to grab all my trash and now the rest of my possessions are in sixteen small boxes in the garage. I had thought my room was pretty clean before — since my mom was constantly making us clean things out when we came home — but apparently my room still had a ton of shit in it. Good bye heavy books, good bye old clothes, good bye irreplaceable sentimental items, DVDs, shelves full of toys, and other assorted crap. I didn’t quite go full on Kondo but I definitely decluttered the hell out of my room.

Note: I am approaching thirty-eight and still have a room at my mom’s house. That should probably change. It's far past a cautionary tale at this point. There are rumors that I’ll be trying to find a more permanent solution to my perpetual housing situation, but for now those are just rumors. I have felt a shift in myself though. Like I need a home base. Or at least a place to settle down. I may not have to stay there all the time, but when I need to go someplace I should go there/here. Sort of like Avengers Tower or something. Of course I would then need to get a job, to get some Stark money. And you know, grow up. I wonder what my credit rating is like...

In other news, I’m an uncle! Little Greta has bonded our family together like never before and with nothing else to speak about we can always just show each other photos of Greta. She is pretty much the cutest baby in the world, and I say that not even as her parent but as a slightly biased third party. I mean, objectively speaking, she’s pretty damn cute. Where else are you going to find a quarter-Persian, quarter-German-ish, half-Chinese baby?

I’ve only met her once, at the Arizona wedding, and she cried her little heart out each time because I’m terrible with babies. But I’m getting better. AMR and George are moving back to San Diego in the fall so Great will be raised on a pseudo-ranch with animals and wood shops and then when she comes of (teenage) age I will swoop into her life and teach her all things My So Called Life and well, My So Called Life.

People keep saying that I’ll get to be the cool uncle but Greta already has a cool uncle (AMR’s brother) and so I’ll have to think of another role for me to play. Maybe if I just write a book with her in it that will do. Of course, I'll have to write another book again. In the next thirteen years or so. That should be enough time right?

I’ve been trying to to rethink my writing career. As in, relaunch it. Jump start? Get it off ice? I can't even think in English anymore. Basically it's been ten years since my first book came out and I've not much to show for it, and so I’m gonna have a new name and everything to start over. Related, I’m overdue on a book proposal to Lilly, which I said I would finish before I left for the Philippines. A month and a half later, vacation tan faded and still no proposal. Old dog, same tricks.

Oh yeah, I went to the Philippines in March. Boracay to be exact. You can read all about it here. And also in January my friend came over from Maryland to take us on a road trip up the eastern coast of Taiwan. I’m sure I’ll post about that too. Actually Taiwan has been full of visitors for me. My New York friend also came out for a long weekend or so in January, and then in February my Bay Area friend hopped over from Japan to do writing retreat for two weeks. I’ll let you guess how much writing we did. The good news is that I got her working on her My So Called Life life spreadsheet. So that’s something.

And now I sit in my (fast) wifi hole and watch the NBA playoffs while trying to organize my life. The only due date on this year is late June, when I'm a groomsmen at a wedding, and other than that I'm a free agent. My heart is in Brazil, figuratively, but I'm not ready to go there yet. I feel the need for New York's energy and culture, something I've basically been empty on for the past year. And then what happens? I don't know. My plans have always been arbitrary, my goals non-existent, like I said I would be leaving Taiwan when so-and-so left. And now it's left. So what now?

Hi Greta!

Ways and Means: Jan - Mar 2016

Here we go, another Ways and Means, you know you love it! With my time in Taiwan ending, I thought it would be good to go over my last few months there, which perfectly spanned January through March. I got back to the U.S. on March 29th and then jetted off to Phoenix for a wedding, but mostly these numbers reflect my time in Taiwan. Teaser: I am living beyond my means, as usual!

January wasn’t too bad, I reset my variable budget, pushing it up to $1,750 a month. Of course, I still went over, but it wasn’t tooooo bad, compared to what was to come. For January I was just 15% over the proposed budget. I was right on target for food, shopping, and miscellaneous, and even under in play! Of course, food was way over by $300+. Couldn’t be helped though. With just a few months left in Taiwan, I had to eat everything.

The most expensive meal of the month wasn’t even a full meal, just a Japanese yakiniku place that we wandered into on a rainy night. With nothing else open, we popped into Da-Wan 大腕燒肉專門店, not really knowing what it was. And although the prices were relatively high, we decided to just make a night of it and ordered some delicious meats. It was, in a word: superb. The menu was a rolled up piece of leather and your own server grilled each of the meats while explaining what everything was. Delicious! Plus, the grilled corn was probably the best corn I’ve had in years. While it wasn’t a full meal, and made a dent in the wallet, you gotta live a little right?

Also, January was the month that I started using Uber in Taiwan. Despite previously questioning why there was a need for Uber in a city filled with cheap taxis, I became an Uber convert because it was much much cheaper. Like each ride was 70% of a taxi, at least. And sometimes 50% of the normal fare for longer hauls. Despite getting charged a small foreign fee for each Uber ride (I only had a foreign credit card), the cost of taking an Uber was still much lower than taxi-ing everywhere. Needless to say, I Uber-ed a lot. Aside from that, January was simple, with just the usual expenditures and a shopping spree at Forever 21 to start the month.

Oh, another reason January was so low was that we spent a week road tripping through the Eastern coast of Taiwan, visiting Taitung, Green Island, and Hualien. That trip — under the Annual tab — cost about $400 including hotels, scooter rental, ferry tickets, and gas. My friend paid for the rental car, so that was very nice. Overall, January was a rousing success!

And actually, February was much the same, minus a trip to keep my numbers even more honest. For February I was even on transportation, shopping, and play, while slightly under in miscellaneous. Was this a miracle, was my budgeting working?!? Well, not quite. I still got up to 120% for the month, mostly with another food overage in excess of $300+.

This time the high mark was this fantastic hot pot place that was frankly worth every penny. From the decor to the service to the food, Elixir Health Pot 無老鍋 was so good. Unfortunately I never got to go back but I sure would recommend it! Taking out that $100 dinner (for three I might add), the rest of my meals averaged $14 for the month. So yeah, that’s how cheap Taiwan is. That’s basically eating whatever I wanted when I wanted, including pricier fare such as Korean BBQ, dim sum, Italian spots, and iyazakas.

My friend told me that the purchasing power of Taiwan was basically 1:3, which seems about right. For what you’d get here in the United States for $3, you can expect to pay $1. Not bad eh?

February also saw me go visit the hospital / clinic a few times, for acupuncture and a massage. I began having serious back problems in January and thought maybe some holistic medicine would help. Since I don’t have Taiwanese insurance, an acupuncture session at the local hospital cost $60 — compared to just $3 if you have insurance — and that’s comparable to U.S. prices. The full body massage, done by blind people under Taipei Main MRT, was about half that. I hate massages so this was an abnormal expense for me, but I had to find out what was going on with my back. Note: I wish I had gone to a dentist in Taiwan to see how much that was, I think it was maybe $20 for a cleaning, even without insurance. Now you know why everyone goes back to Taiwan to get their medical cards: it’s super cheap.

Oh right, and what is a month without a shopping extravaganza at Forever 21? I dropped $250 there, between me and some gifts, and it was a fantastic time. My wardrobe thanks me! Overall for the month I spent approximately 120% of my budget.

And then there’s March. It was ugly, like 155% ugly. That doesn’t even include a week long trip to the Philippines, which cost roughly $2,200 total. I’ll break that down later. As usual, food was $300+ over, which means I should really change my food budget obviously.

The big back breaker was shopping, which I went way over by like 200% almost. Some of that was buying stuff for vacation: swimsuits, a suitcase that would serve double duty for my trip back to the States, and then stuff I wanted to bring back home such as glasses, contacts, and spare t-shirts. The biggest expense in the shopping category was $180 for new tattoos. And as we know, tattoos are priceless so it was money well worth spending. Also, I was stupid and left my laptop charger back in Taiwan so had to money up $85 for a new laptop charger. Can’t live without the laptop right? Actually, despite March seeming so high over-budget, it was mostly just shopping.

So let’s look at our trip to Boracay. First, never fly Air Asia, it was a mess. Due to trying to book their flights and scheduling for the ferry to Boracay, I basically had to purchase totally new tickets twice, there and back. Let’s just say that their idea of timeliness for a flight was anywhere from three to eight hours delayed. Or the flight was cancelled altogether. I ended up spending a night at the Manila airport, and had to rebook to fly back out at 7AM. In all, flights from Taipei to Boracay, a mere 900 miles away (SD to SF is 450 miles) took literally a whole day plus $1,200+ dollars. The whole reason we chose to go to the Philippines was because the flights were cheaper than to Thailand, but instead we ended up paying about the same, if not more. Lesson learned: Don’t go to the Philippines.

The good news is that once we got to Boracay things were super cheap. Like $400 for five nights at a comfortable hotel, $200 for food and a similar amount for play, and then about an extra $100 in transportation and shopping costs. Boracay was lovely by the way, but full of tourists. It’s definitely got some of the most beautiful beaches in the world but the hassle of getting over there nearby ruined the trip.

Overall, Jan - Mar 2016 ended up looking like this:

• Food: $3,050
• Shopping: $2,000
• Transportation: $1,350
• Play: $1,000
• Misc: $400
• Annual: $2,900

Plus about $900 in fixed expenses per month and we’re looking at an average of $4,450 per month spent in the first three months of 2016. Ouch. I believe that works out to a $69k lifestyle, and was significantly higher than how I lived in 2015. Time to start cutting back! Or make more money I guess…

Ways and Means: Jul 2015 - Dec 2015

Here we go, the budget report for 2015, including fresh new analysis! You’ll recall the first half of 2015 I said I was on pace to live a $41.5k lifestyle? Well, I ruined that pace majorly by having a some fat months near the back half of the year. Namely September and December, where I spent a lot of time hopping around and racked up variable bills of over $2,400+ each month. Whoops. Not to mention two other months when I was around $2k each. For the first half of 2015, I didn’t even eclipse $1,750 in a single month. What happened?!

• Jul: $1,700
• Aug: $1,960
• Sep: $2,870
• Oct: $1,670
• Nov: $2,050
• Dec: $2,400

Well, for August I was back in the States and apparently went on a shopping spree. Forever 21, Costco, Target, H&M, Sun Diego, it reads like a list of my favorite stores. (Plus I went to see the ophthalmologist, which really should go under Annual shouldn’t it?) Guess what November was? More shopping! I hit Forever 21 in Korea, did some additional shopping at the all-night malls there, and spent on some physical copies of books because sometimes you just need that paper. Also, I got a tattoo, which didn’t help financial matters. Note: Tattoos in Taiwan are not really that much cheaper than back home, if anything they are more expensive.

And I can’t even talk about September and December except to say that when I’m on the go, Transportation and Food categories swing way high. Like way high. My Jul - Dec five category breakdown went like this:

• Food: $4,830
• Shopping: $2,760
• Play: $2,570
• Transportation: $2,540
• Misc: $400

Overall my Jul - Dec variable expenses worked out to about $2,100 a month, an increase of +$600 from the first six months of 2015. Add in fixed expenses of about $875 a month and I was at $2,975. That’s about a $47.5 lifestyle. Not bad! Oh wait, I forgot about annual expenses...

I had budgeted out $7,000 for annual expenses, most of it for “vacation” meaning airplane flights, but I ended up dishing out only $5,750 on annual stuff. With the big caveat being that my new laptop and one set of flights home were paid by work. So that saved a few thousand dollars, as you can imagine.

Most of the actual annual expenditures then, was for a huge set of flights in November where I went Taiwan to Korea to Taiwan to San Diego to New York and then finally back to Taiwan. And let’s not even talk about the change fee I ate on my December flight when I somehow messed up the date and basically missed my flight. Oops!

Other than that, my annual expenses was just one road trip to Yilan and two visa runs to Hong Kong. Still, despite coming under projections, that’s $480 a month for annual expenses. Add that into $2,975 and we’re at $3,450 per month for the back half of 2015, or $55k a year, a huge jump up from the first six months where I was at the aforementioned $41.5k pace. Whoops.

In sum, my total variable expenses for the year averaged out to $1,800, then $850 for fixed per month, plus $480 each for annual expenses. Grand total: $3,130 per month spent in 2015, or $37.5k total. That’s about a $50k lifestyle. For comparison’s sake, last year those numbers were $39k total spent and a roughly $52k lifestyle. In sum, did I save money by living in Taiwan for a year? Fucks no! Not only did I go go over budget, I went over by $8,500+ this year, a slight increase from last year. Sure, I gave myself a raise but that only kicked in from September on.

How can this be you ask? I don't know. Also, George and Ameer asked a very prudent question to me the other day: "How can you constantly be going over budget yet still have money?" Great question, I'll hope to answer that after I do some analysis.

So what's the plan moving forward? For one, I'd like to see what happens if I stay put somewhere. Will not flying around internationally help expenses? Will not participating in fast fashion hurt my wardrobe but help my wallet? Should I explore the adult world of having savings? All things to be answered in 2016. Stay tuned folks, another year of Budget Club is in the books!

That Can Only Mean One Thing

Halloween coincided with both Taiwan’s Gay Pride Parade and well, Halloween. Also something else was going on so it was like Taipei was filled with people that night. We started off going to a murder mystery party — I was JJ Scoop, a tabloid journalist, how fitting — and then we hopped to Xinyi district to a bar or two before settling in at Chess for one of the first proper nights I’d been out since being back.

Actually, I found myself there the next night too, for a bboy battle after-party, which was the same party I’d attended last year on this weekend. It may seem silly to point to one night to sort of the start of it all, but this was kind of it. My friend from Chess texted me at like 11PM and said that there was a party that I would probably like and even though I had been kind of tired, I popped over and then stayed there till 4AM, dancing the night away.

It was then that I met two guys I would become pretty good friends with, and also met my eventual hip hop instructor. Basically the party was so good that I kept going back to Chess over and over, hoping for that high again. While it never quite got that good again, it’s hard to deny that it was the catalyst for a lot of my Taipei social life. I literally used to go there like every Wednesday and a lot on Friday and Saturday. For the people who frequent Chess, it’s basically like Cheers and you see the same people over and over. Most of it is due to the fact that it’s the only place that consistently plays hip hop, and the crowd is also mostly ABCs and foreigners (but not “those” kind of expats) so there’s always dancing going on.

• Into The Knight: OTS Chess Club (2013)
• Thousandth Girl: Taipei Nightlife Guide 2015

Actually I was out of Taiwan mid-November, and it seemed like a rush the last two weeks. I got out to the golf course for C’s early birthday event, and while I hadn’t golfed in about fifteen years, I felt I represented myself well with about a +100 handicap. Seriously, it was whiff after whiff and dirt chunk after dirt chunk. The caddies there are overly helpful and they kind of shoo you off the hole as fast as possible to get the next group on. A little anxiety inducing actually.

There were a couple more late nights / early mornings and then it was time to prep to leave again. This time I was going to pack as light as possible, because I was only gone for three weeks, but my mom had also insisted that I box up all my stuff in Taiwan. Oh! Right before my last day in TPE, we went to get tattoos in Ximen. Getting three tattoos took all day but we waited around while we each took turns getting carved up. D1 got a compass on her upper leg, D2 got a Jimi Hendrix lyric, and I got an outline of Taiwan filled with Taiwan-y designs. And then J and I headed off to Korea!

A&J used to live in Taipei but left us maybe June-ish. They were the center of one group of my Taiwan friends and with them gone, we are all still friends but without the central connection, like a friend donut. A is the retail manager for a large fashion brand and so he had to move to a bigger market, and of course J went with him. They were my perfect married couple, with A around for basketball and guy stuff, and J for (some) Shida and writing. Plus they hosted our Game of Thrones nights!

Their place in Seoul was super nice and I did my best to wake up for day time activities. Korea was a little chilly and thank goodness I got a thicker jacket aside from my denim one. One night J and I went to Dongdaemun, which is this shopping area that houses huge malls that are open until 5AM. The shopping in Korea seemed fantastic, even just the little amount I touched. Everyone is so much better dressed than in Taiwan and I can immediately see why Korean fashion influences so much of the rest of Asia (not to mention the U.S.). I got a few very necessary items and next time back I’m totally gonna take the subway and eat some street food!

While in Korea, I found out D was called back to her native Brazil, totally unexpectedly. She was originally going to go back in February but her parents said for her to come home now. After some initial panic and much sadness — my whole plan had been to leave Taiwan when D left — I changed my airplane ticket to fly back to Taiwan and spend the last few days hanging out with her. Originally I was supposed to go direct from Korea to San Diego, but in my mind we would like never see each other again so we had to hang out now!

So I headed back to TPE for three days, kind of helped her pack, and basically just soaked in our last few times together. It also sort of marked the end of my time here, at least in my mind. Sure, I’d be right back and sure there was still lots of people and things in Taiwan, but having spent a year hanging out and all that, it was like the vacation was over. I don’t know what I’m gonna do moving forward but with the arbitrary mid-February date off the table, I need to turn my attentions to what happens in 2016?!

"Ever since I left the city you…"