Inanity

What's up with me? What's up with you?

So far, I've been hermit'ing it up, not unlike most other 6th years at SFU at the end of the semester. God. 6 years.

What's this "poke" thing on Facebook. I just logged in, and all these people have "poked" me. What do I do? Poke them back? Won't this just turn into an everlasting poke circle? I'm not sure. So I just poked my brother. We'll see what happens.

I made the best cookies ever the other day.
Best Cookies Ever

And then I ate some. Since I live alone, the other dozen went into a tupperware container with a piece of bread in it. Apparently it keeps them soft. Now I can fatten myself up each day for up to a week!

God it's cold. There's so much snow everywhere. But what am I gonna do, play in it? I can throw snowballs at myself. That's fun.

I sure can't wait till this semester is over. Next week is my birthday. It's the first day of finals, too. I think it's gonna suck a lot.

Hey I just spent $400 on new retainers. Isn't that great? They'll have springs on them so my face will hurt for the next few months.

I think I've become a bitter old lady. wtf.

Found a Place!

So, the ctrl-S twitch I developed apparently published this post pre-emptively. Thanks BetaBlogger.

Anyhoo, I'm quite enjoying these photos of the pad I'll be moving into in January. It's actually "chez proprietaire", which basically means homestay but without the free meals. The lady seems cool, she's lived in Tunisia, France and Germany and has had all sorts of international students stay at her place.

My Room-to-Be: I totally dig the carpet, and the fact it's so bright from natural light.

View from Bedroom Window: The location rocks. It's right across from the market, the kind where they offer to let you taste their melons before buying. This is the north-facing view I'd get while working at my desk.

Le Salon: Interesting style choice, but cozy quand meme. In the corner is hiding a LiveBox, the wifi/router/modem from France Telecom. Yay internets!



Cute 'n Sunny Cuisine: How charming! If I get really motivée I could just cross the street for some croissants and have a nice breakfast back here.



And the place is a 5 min walk from school, and super near chez Kenzo. Yippee!

Boil-Water Advisory

It's all over the papers. Torrential downpours have overwhelmed Vancouver's water treatment systems, and now it's unsafe to drink tap water, and even brush your teeth in it.

But the worst consequence of Vancouver's boil-water advisory? Consider the encounter this morning in my 10:30am class:

Paul: "Hey guys."
Ben: "Oh hey...hey! Where did you get that??"
Me: "Yeah, where'd you get that?! You can't get that anywhere!"

Paul calmly puts his cup down with a smug smile.
"I had to go all over campus, and I really should've been studying for my midterm today, but finally I found it: the like, one place selling coffee."

Dirty water has closed down Vancouver coffee shops. Can't get much worse than that.

Vancouver's so beautiful... when it's NOT RAINING

Why won't it just stop raining? I mean, for longer than 5 hours, punks. *shakes fist at sky* It's depressing and dark and *grumble*projects-tests*grumble*... I guess it makes it easier to stay at home and work.

The only thing holding me together right now is CBC Radio 2.

Les faux pas

Andy recently sent me a Wikipedia link on faux pas. I'm not really sure, but does this stem from the differently-spelled french phrase "Il ne faut pas" (one shouldn't)?

Anyway, as a mutt of varying cultures (I like to call myself an ABCFC: American-Born Chinese-Filipino-Canadian) who's also spent some time in France, I sought to seek out whether I really have been avoiding those "shouldn'ts" correctly.

Canada

"Canadians are extremely polite when it comes to mild physical faux pas such as stepping on feet or bumping into others. Often both parties will briefly apologise, including the person who was bumped."

Maybe that's why the world thinks Canada is so nice. We're all sorry, ALL THE TIME.

"Not waiting at the end of a queue for your turn ("cutting in line") is considered extremely rude. This applies in all areas of public interaction."

Sure, this is true in a lot of places, but see, Canadians are very rule-following. Like, there's NO WAY we'd try slipping into the grocery store "Less Than 15 Items" line with 16 items. No freaking way.

"Failing to hold a door open for another person is seen as very impolite, especially when doing so would require no special effort."

Sometimes strangers going through the door before you will wait up to 5 seconds while you make your way to the door. I think that's because a door swinging back towards you requires twice as much force to open. And that's just too much.

"The common American custom of responding to a thank-you with "uh-huh" is very disconcerting for Canadians. In Canada, "uh-huh" is a colloquial way to respond to a yes or no question; in any other context it is a sarcastic response."

I always get that when I go cross-border shopping in Washington. You know, I'd go to try on some jeans, and the lady comes to open the door for me.

Me: "Thanks!"
American change-room lady: "Uh huh!"
Me: *face contorts as I enter the changeroom*

Uncool.

The Philippines
At church, I'm often surrounded by first or second generation Filipinos. What I think is polite becomes offensive.

It is impolite to refuse an offer of hospitality if you are a guest in someone's home.

This is hard for polite canadians (even harder for Japanese, I'd imagine) who don't want to "bother" people. But if you're around Filipinos, don't ever say no.

They will try to make you stay for dinner, give you packages of dried mangoes before you go home, offer a ride, or even give you a trinket/piece of clothing that they don't need anymore but think you might appreciate. EVEN IF YOU DON'T WANT IT, TAKE IT SLASH EAT IT. They'll be happy, and you can donate it to Big Brothers afterwards. If you don't accept their offer, you get called "hiya" a filipino word that basically indicates "shame" (from the Culture of the Philippines)

France

"For both sexes, shaking hands with a woman in a casual context introduces distance."

However, guys shake hands with other guys all the time. My first day at school, I shook hands with all the new classmates I met. I wonder if they thought I was guy.

Sick and Tired

I'm in a pretty pitiful state.

Tonight when I got home, I got out of the car, pulled out my key chain, and attempted to lock my car with the garage door opener. I finally figured it out after a few clicks.

I thought that was bad, and took the elevator up to my floor, shaking my head with disgust. I then reached the heavy wooden door of my apartment, and proceeded to wonder why it wasn't unlocking.

Oh, I realized as I looked down at the key fob in my hand, because pressing the unlock button on the car key doesn't apply to house doors.

...yeah.