As some of you know already,

I’m back in the mother country finally.

but I wasted no time in jumping right back into my old lifestyle,

hitting up gigs in less than 24 hrs after my return.

The first (real) gig since April 2008 was The Horrors at Johnny Brenda’s.

rest is here (mediocre hahaha)

I’ve seen them before on their first U.S. tour, dressed impeccably, flaunting their awe-inspiring gravity-defying hairdos, just being mesmerizing in general.

This time around though, their gig was more subdued, quite fitting with the dreamy overall mood of their excellent sophomore effort, Primary Colors. It was quite inspiring nonetheless.

I’ve never been to Johnny Brenda’s before and assumed the area(Girard) was pretty dangerous but I was surprised to see so many hipsters on my way to the venue from the subway station 2 blocks away. Apparently Fishtown is the new hipster HQ in Philly haha.

It looks like I’ll be doing a lot more Philly gigging in future because now I have a kind of an obligation haha..and the crowd is so much better than NY crowd…actually, I think any crowd is better than NY crowd at gigs, ha.

Just a little schedule update:

Currently in Arequipa Peru,

heading to Cañon de Colca via an overnight bus,

11th : molest some condors in one of the deepest canyons in the world , return to Arequipa in the afternoon/evening,

hop on another night bus to an oasis town(Ica) up north,

12th: visit Ica and the oasis nearby,

hop on another night bus to Lima

13th, 14th: Spend the day around Lima sightseeing,

squeeze in last minute shopping craze somewhere

15th early morning(more like 14th night): Hop on a flight and adios South America!

15th early morning-mid-day: 8 Hour layover in Mexico City so recommend me things to do! (and to buy HAHA)

15th late night: arrive in NY, head straight to Philly by train(ahhh)

16th: sleep, post pics, sleep, lose 18908 lbs.

16th: The Horrors at Johnny Brendas (where the hell is Fishtown)

17th: …And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead at the church!!! (I am already dying in awe)

and and and

on the 24th Sam Roberts Band is playing at Gramercy Theatre which is right by my alma mater(in NY) so YES! YES! YES!

oh and in between, on that Sunday Im going to an Oxfam event in Central Park so catch me somewhere in between. Yes? and join me at any of these gigs(or all if you love me) and I will pretend I am 17 again and dance my 4 inch heels away. YES! YES! YES!

 p.s. I will try to squeeze in a shower or two and maybe a haircut so dont you worry.

I haven´t thought about this for such a long time and don´t exactly know what triggered this awkward memory to surface.

When we were little there were many exciting things to look at in front of school/afterschool activity places. They used to sell snacks, toys, pictures of celebrity, occassionally baby chicks (and ducks once, one of which much to my parents´dismay I had brought home), etc. My mother started to work again around the time I started elementary school/we had moved back to a big city so having nothing to do at home, we just hung out there, not particularly to buy anything but just to look at them.

We were new in the area and it was one of those days that we went into this stationary/toy store. He was looking at one of Dragon Ball-Z figurines that were  so popular in those days. I was on the other side, behind a shelf that divided the store into two narrow sections, looking at some¨notebook page supporter¨(a hard piece of thin board to put underneath a paper to write on-so you don´t get the imprints of the previous page) with princess characters.

After a bit of looking, we left the store and came back to the flat. There, pulling it out of his jacket, he showed me the figurine. He said that he had bought it when I had been on the other side with his saved allowance. We played; I with my dolls and He with his figurine and other toys.

A few days later, we were back in the store, doing the same old thing all over again. Back in those days, monotony didn´t bother me at all. Back in the flat, he presented yet another figurine. Then the following time yet another one. I don´t exactly remember how many there were but more or less three I think.

It was another day, the same old routine, the same old looking at random useless things that used to mean so much to little kids back in those days. As we walked out, the lady owner came out the door and called us over. Then she asked him to open his khaki-brown jumper. I can still remember all the details of that jacket.

There it was,

yet another figurine.

I just remember standing there still.

Or did I apologize to the lady? I don´t remember.

I just remember looking at her yelling at him and his looking like a complete stranger. We didn´t say a word on the way back to the flat and never talked about it. I was five then and I guess that´s when it started to change everything.

My dear Brangelina,

You are breaking the world´s (ok at least in a tiny corner of Bolivia) heart by staying unmarried,

leading a heathen  lifestyle. What would the young youth of La Paz learn from this corrupted example you have set for them?

Here´s to making an honest woman out of Angie in near future.

and my dear Bolivians,

you almost got me with this and had me google up ¨brangelina wedding,¨ damn you and your wicked sense of humor

As a child growing up in a monolingual setting,

I wanted to master as many languages as possible for no particular reason at first.

Maybe it had to do with the fact that all these presidential candidates(back in the 90´s the same 3-4 people kept on running over and over again)

spoke something like five languages and I thought it was a swell skill to have.

Then I started to read Shakespeare in translation and wished to master the language so that I could read it in its original glory.

By the time I was in mid-teen, I wanted to learn more about other cultures and that motivated picking up other languages as well.

Many people assume that I probably grew up in a multicultural/lingual setting but on the contrary, I spent most of my first 12 years in a homogenous country.

It´s only in the last 11 years, I´ve picked up other languages. (h0wever vulgar they might be hahaha)

When I first came to South America almost 2 years ago on a short visit,

I was interested in hearing what this hostel owner had to say about Peru´s history but couldn´t understand many details.

It´s always an amazing experience to converse with the locals to get a better understanding of their culture, seeing it from their pespective.

Despite all that trying, I was quite upset at many people today.

Funny how people can still get to me even after all this traveling.

After fuming at many for being so hostile to me, I sat down to have my usual share of fruit salad parfait,

and this lady in front of me smiled at me and started to talk to me, asking the usual questions and then something a bit unusual:  How do you find Bolivians? usually people ask me about how I feel about the city or the country in general.

I was in a brutally honest mood  I suppose, so I smirked and told her that many were very nasty. I told her that people seemed friendly amongst one another but towards foreigners(discovering upon conversing with other backpackers) people are quite hostile, and just want to con us as much as possible. The whole ¨innocent country/small town people¨ concept was non-existant.

She sat there with a grim look on her face and as we were sitting in an uncomfortably close distance,

I thought I should have just kept it to myself instead of unloading all this upon this poor stranger who was just trying to be friendly.

After a bit of silence, she started to talk though.

She told me that it´s a shame that I only saw that side of the Bolivians. With the current Evo Morales´faction(finally someone standing against his communist(not to mention racist) regime) people have become embittered and more closed as the things have gotten worse. They have suffered in the hands of Conquistadores and their descendents so now with government telling them, ´more power to the natives,´ everyone is more cautious and guarded against foreigners. People used to share what little they had and be friendly to one another but it´s hard to expect that sort of thing nowadays.

I was surprised to hear this from her as everyone seems to be touting Evo Morales as the national hero, his being the first president of the native origins. She mentioned how many things are worse than what it had been before the regime and now the government leaning dangerously close to communism(Venezuela is one of Bolivia´s biggest allies): Free healthcare for all the nationals are being told on the news when in reality, everyone has to pay to be attended; people are getting locked up for pointing out the wrong; lands are being nationalized  and apparently the law regarding presidency term used to be limited to running for every other terms but now there is no limit.

Yet people are failing to acknowledge this dawning idea of communism because the government isn´t saying the word. Government is lending out money to the poor but where does the money come from? From the social security retirement funds which will cause problems indubitably in future.

she told me that she actively tries to participate by spreading words over the internet and in person. She teared up saying that it´s tragic to see her beautiful country getting damaged.

The truth is,

communism, as an idea is a beautiful, noble concept. Everyone is equal, free of class , work according to their ability and receive equal social security system.

I can´t believe that there are still people who believe this will ever work out,

I laugh at all these young people from capitalist countries who idolize communism because they just really don´t get it.

As I have mentioned before, three of my grandparents were from North Korea and my maternal grandparents had to flee down to south during the war.

It sickens me to see their so-called leader living in a grandiose luxury while his people were dying of starvation, even resorting to cannibalism. Children are brainwashed to report their parents if they were to speak badly of their ¨national leader father.¨ Beautiful girls are picked out from the young age to be trained as Kim Jung Il and his close parties´personal entertainment (many ending up being their consorts and mistresses)

So you think North Korea is just a really corrupt example of the commusim? You think people in Cuba are all so satisfied and  that´s why they are hungry for tourists´money and it´s always the visitors who end up buying everything and sharing? If everything was working out in order and so swell, why are people wanting more?

because the system doesn´t work, how can you have all this freedom one day and have everything taken away in the name of public good and expect everyone to obey? You really think the person next to you is going to work as hard as you do and eat just as much as you do and be really that equal? 

Before you idolize an idealistic system, please see it in a realistic light. Not everyone is as nice as we want them to be.

After having much discussion on Bolivia and communism, she left with her niece(who was told to take notes on communism haha), apologizing for ¨interrupting¨ my eating but I thanked her that people like her make me happy.

On a lighter note, I just came back from a process of devolution,

behold,

a bipedal homo sapien following the footsteps of a quadrupedal dinosaur:

Hello all,

after a few months-long hiatus,

I´m back in Bolivia for a few weeks,

the land of llama steaks and generous donors of my bowel movements. 

As with most developing countries, here you can get all kinds of glorious bootleg products.

Sonia earphones? Check.

D & C shirt? Check.

Puna sneakers? Check.

My recent favorite has to be the bootleg DVDs with multiple movies/episodes on them. (take that 1 movie per DVD U.S.A.!)

You will see hundreds of venders everywhere from streets to parks, and there are even people selling them from their portable trays. (still,I must say it doesn´t beat the Chinese lady who sells a shopping cart full of porn DVDs at 2 a.m. in LES bars in NY)

but still, down here,

not only can you get your paws on a fine collection of Mel Gibson movies (classic)- fair enough, I have a box-set of Audrey Hepburn collection back in the states,

but you can also get a super collection of your favorite pig movies.

Not feeling the swine goodness? fret not, we have everything in store for you; what about a good old ape collection?

Not much of an animal lover?

How about a feel good collection of Revolution and Death? (oh hey Tom)

I´m currently in Cochabamba and loving it! I really liked La Paz  but CBBA is getting close to becoming my favorite Bolivian city with its (relatively) low altitude.

now let me go have some more quality ¨Krak´s ¨

and a ginormous US$1.10 parfait.

p.s. I´m returning to NY for about 2-3 weeks on the 15th of September. Although I already have 1080980 projects lined up(including new podcast episodes of Audiophile Anonymous), I would love to see you guys, it´s about time! 

I am now settled (temporarily) in Coquimbo, in northern Chile where I am volunteering at a local art school(score!) until the end of August.

I had a concert thrown in my honor yesterday haha and was introduced on stage in front of the entire school as the band was setting up.

of course, being me, I´ve had very awkward/offensive/non-p.c. moments already such as when my co-teacher hosted a little Q and A session in front of the class and asked me,

¨Can you tell us why you are Asiatic?¨

or today when another student teacher had a picture of feather and asked

Q: ¨Who wore this?¨

A: ¨Indians!¨

oh and one student went ¨ching chong¨ as I walked by. damn.

but other than that most are really friendly and I´ll be taking art/piano + guitar lessons(and maybe dance lessons) when my cast comes off next Monday(is it normal to hurt even when the cast is coming off in less than a week?)

(holding ¨Rafaela Hau¨´s  X-Ray, whoever that is)

I managed to beautifully snap a metacarpal bone and fracture another a few days ago.
I fell down a (embarrassingly short) ladder and for once my non-existing reflex decided to kick in and somehow,
I injured myself in the process.

Initially I thought I have sprained my fingers(I could move them) so I sat there writhing and giggling in pain
while the lodging owner lady sat there with me,
offering her medical wisdom to relieve my pain: massaging her saliva on the back of my hand and advising me to pull my fingers(when I couldn´t, she offered to do it herself but I declined), and crack my knuckles.

I was still in pain when I saw this in the radiography room but I couldn´t miss the photo-op (it´s almost as culturally-confusing as the time I saw an Iranian film dubbed in French)

The general practician-ok, so I know I´m brain-washed/biased by my family of medical professions but I HATE GPs, I have no respect for their ¨broad, general medical knowledge¨-initially missed the clearly broken bone and only saw it when I informed him of the major source of the pain.

anyways,
at this point it´s more of a discomfort/inconvenience( I still have to make 4 stops before staying for the volunteer program) than pain.
Although I was about to scream my head off at the frustrating experience of packing this morning,
I´m still amazed as its my first bone-breaking experience(not counting my nasal septum).
3 weeks left…

The latest(well actually it´s been around for awhile) trend in K-Pop(that´s Korean Pop for you non-Asianphiles) is catchy dance songs with relatively easy, cute, if not somewhat silly choregraphy. Guilty pleasure, silly fun whatever you may call it, it´s incredibly successful in Korea.

I remember growing up in Korea,
it was popular to memorize the choreography to the latest hit song and dance in front of people during the school outings or events(dear god)

I think starting late 2007 it became massively popular to dance along to the hit songs and one of the most successful group has been Wonder Girls, thanks to JYP management´s genius choreography team(and catchy beats to accompany them´); there are numerous parodies of fans ranging from High School boys to Kindergarten teacher, dancing to their hit singles, ¨Tell Me,¨ ¨So Hot¨ and ¨Nobody¨

Youtube is featuring this insanely cute ukele version of Nobody. The singers/players are sooo adorable in their full dorky glory haha:

the original:

(lol I can´t believe I used to dance to JYP´s Honey in the beginning of the video)

The song that kind of started the whole trend:
Wonder Girls´Tell Me:

Wonder Girls´ So Hot:

also, their ¨rival¨ Girls´Generation(aka SNSD)´s last single ¨Gee¨ featured (for my taste, way too) cute melody and choreography that was quite popular as well:

Another singer that had quite popular songs in this department is Son Dam Bi aka OMG-WANT-HER-BODY:
Crazy:

(although I speculate that the choreography wasn´t as popular as it required a chair haha)

and personal favorite, Saturday Night:

the catchy tune in its full 80´s glory(although I assume some of the choreography was based on the movie ¨Saturday Night Fever¨), the 1st minute of the video is quite amazing, it reminds me of a Wong Kar Wai film.

I´ve been complaining about the lack of electronics, (or rather working electronics-my mp3/video player and laptop broke down in addition to the brief breakdown of my DSLR),

but fortunately I´ve been lucky to have books(thanks to Bolivia´s abundant book exchange places) to keep me entertained during the long awful bus rides(too bad they turn off lights around 8 pm) and lonely nights in my rooms. 

I´ve always been an avid reader,

in fact my sight got ruined because I kept on reading in dark with dim lights after my parents had turned off the lights in my room to put me to sleep.

While I was living in New York, I had to read a lot mainly due to my Literature in Translation minor but I enjoyed every bit and also read 1-2 books on my own.

The truth is,

even nowadays, I´d rather be reading alone in my room than have empty conversations with the fellow travelers(there´s only so much of ¨where are you from?/Where have you been to?¨ chat one can take)

During the last month and a half, I´ve been especially productive in terms of reading(6 books of 300-650 page-length) and most have been excellent.

The one book that had me quite enraged (a rare occassion) was ¨Not Without My Daughter¨ by Betty Mahmoody which is a non-fiction about an American woman and her daughter being kept captive against their will in Iran by her Iranian husband and his family. Her husband physically abuses her and her daughter and takes away their freedom. She finally succeeds in escaping to Turkey and to the U.S.A. ultimately.

The reason I picked up the book from an exchange place was because I remembered seeing the movie based on the book a long time ago when I was a kid. Although I didn´t remember the entire movie, I remembered thinking that Iran was an awful place to live and that I was glad to be a Christian. That was a very long time ago.

While I do sympathize the author and her daughter-what they had to go through was truly awful-she had a very close-minded attitude against Iranian culture from the beginning.  The way she describes it is ignorant, condescending and just offensive. The Persian culture belongs to one of the ancient civilizations of the world yet she writes about it only in negative light, making people seem barbaric, uneducated and unjust. The book has such an unbalanced view of Iran, it´s down right repulsive.

Apparently there´s a Finnish documentary made in 2002 called ¨Without My Daughter¨ getting the husband, Dr. Mahmoody´s side of the story. I´ll try to watch it once I get back to the states or if I ever get to fix my computer before then. It would be interesting to know both sides of the story.

Right now I´m currently reading Isabel Allende´s De Amor y  De Sombra (Of Love and Shadow) which is about two young people in the midst of oppressive military dictatorship(if I´m not mistaking, I´m quite sure it´s set in Buenos Aires/Argentina during the Dirty War but it also might be set in Chile during the dictatorship of Pinochet mainly due to the author´s connection to Salvador Allende). I´m only have less than 50 pages to go and it´s pretty good so far. ::edit:: the description fits with the Chilean dictatorship.

Any books to recommend me? I´m on goodreads in case you want to know my preference.