Yikes I just came out of Star Wars and I've missed Rose and I have no plans for tonight which is really scary. Will make up a post then get out of here. Star Wars had too much action in it, not enough movie magic. The look on Annakin's face just as the mask was about to come on wasn't one to miss, that was the best part of the whole movie. It's a shame Queen Amidala had to die and they split up the babies. Yeah and it was awful how she died anyway after he joined the dark side to save her, and he also ended up mauled and gross and stuck inside the suit. I don't know if these movies would survive on their own. The script stinks and the story feels like it's being rushed towards the setting of the first three movies.

I wanna be back in Taiwan again then I'd feel more inspired to blog. "I love my scooter" and "rehearsal was a hoot" and the other things I did gave me shit to write about. Teaching, going to the Pig Pen, having scooter accidents... oh the good old days.

There are Korean characters on this keyboard but no bopomofo as yet.

I heard from three people I knew in Taiwan all in the space of a couple of days. An email from the guy in Nanjing, four months after I'm actually in China. Thanks for that!

Mel gave me her birthday present to me today, it's a pink parka and I love it.

I might go see another movie or something.

Disgruntled,

Liz  ¶ 19:16 0 Comments

  You know when you're about to throw up from drinking but you try to relax and fall asleep anyway even though you know you won't rest until you do? It happened to me once again on Wednesday night. Out Rose's bedroom window onto the roof, and it hasn't rained since. We had drinks up the road, spoke to the usual losers, Rose confirmed that I attract morons. Like Shane at the Sly Fox etc. Is it the hair? The glasses? Plan A is to doll myself up a bit more, to look "more intimidating" which would be in line with the theory that guys don't approach the good-looking ones... whoever said I was good looking though, oh no I'm just horrible ugly but I have a vagina so losers think they have a chance. OK i"m not liking the tone of this post so it's time to go to work now!  ¶ 12:36 0 Comments

  I'm half- way through my 32 hour working week. Work isn't bad, it gets really really quiet and I am left standing around with nothing to do. So, everytime I find myself in this position, I make yet another free coffee for myself. This job has its perks. Boom-tish! All the food gets chucked out at the end of the night so most of the chicken wings go to the bin via my mouth which is quite fun. I take a piece out, take one bite out of it, then chuck it in the bin. And voila, there's my free dinner. I even closed up and left half an hour early but still signed out at 9:30. This is the bludgiest job imaginable, totally unlike the cafe with the psycho boss who may or may not have been on speed or something.  ¶ 12:40 0 Comments

  My Birthday!

Well, I'm finally 21. Don't feel any different, but over a few beers at the Sly Fox and became quietly philosophical about my life until now. I have managed to live overseas, learn Chinese, find god, fall in love, and have a psychosis all by the age of 21. Hai bu cuo I'd say.

So anyway my weekend started with carrot sheppard's pie at Rose's on Friday followed by the Sly Fox where I left my phone and felt like my life was a disaster from that time on until I bought a new phone last night. I sang The Rose by Bette Midler karaoke. A KTV veteran, I told them that it was my first time.

This guy who was cracking onto me by telling me about how he had an abusive childhood who was also a moron was really annoying so when he went to the toilet we bolted and that's when I left my beloved phone on the table. When we went back it was gone and that's when I couldn't live with the pain so I stayed at Rose's and fagged out her kitchen window some more. She lets me smoke in the kitchen so I don't have to go outside. She's the best!

The next morning I made phone calls at a PUBLIC PHONE which is so below me, oh my god. Then I went home and had nothing to do, even though it was my birthday, so I chain smoked a little then went to bed. I was supposed to go to Rose's at 4 but I frickin slept in till like five or something but because my watched died and said it was six ten, I practically ran to her house coz I thought time was running out especially because I had to meet my half-sister at Central at eight. Deary-oh.

Rose made a cake for me with M&M's on it and gave me a set of red wine glasses so she doesn't have to wash her own glasses when she comes to my house hehe. Oh by the way, my half-sister confirmed that the place was filthy, so that makes pretty much everyone that's been over that thinks it's a Celebration of Filth.

Ok then we met my sister at the station where we discovered that I had lost one of my new earrings that my father gave me. So that made a hat-trick of disasters kind of.

Dinner was great, I shared a $140 seafood platter with Kate and in the end everyone shouted me Thankyou thankyou thankyou. Why is lobster so expensive? What's the deal? It's not THAT nice. There was a photographer who took photos of us, Mum saw them and asked if I had put on weight, ouch man.

The next day Kate and Mark and I hung around Newtown and saw what is apparently the most erotic film ever released, called 9 Songs. It's got real sex in it, and you can pretty much see everything. I had been under the impression that an erect penis was what drew the line between R and X rated films but I was very very very (about three times in fact) wrong.

We had coffee twice, and went to a sushi train place. It was a great day. Mark and Kate got on like a house on fire. After the movie we walked to Broadway where I bought a new phone. Then we went to a backpacker's bar to spend our last few dollars on drinks. Kate said goodbye and Mark and I stayed on to have more drinks and I finally got home and about nine thirty.  ¶ 12:29 0 Comments

  I hear Mandarin everywhere I go.

On Monday and Tuesday I sat through sixteen hours of class-room training for the Shell job. It was awfully boring, about 28 of us sat at a u-shaped desk and listened to the trainer read shit out and totally love himself. It was as if the honour of delivering common sense to the masses was, for two days, exclusively his. He would make pauses to allow us time to comprehend the genuine depth of the words that came out of his mouth, the tone of his voice indicating that no-one else had thought of it before he had. He expected that the whole world would suddenly become alot clearer after listening to the gems of utter wisdom he offered to us and let me tell you, he fucking enjoyed every minute of it.

As for me, I couldn't stop wriggling around and finding things to do such as drinking water and pouring some more, eating all the lollies on the table, going out for a smoke, going to the toilet, copying the Fly Buys logo onto my notepad in blue fluorescent marker, and conjuring up ways to describe the trainer. Worse more, I was wedged in between two complete morons, whose heads I wanted to snatch away and stuff brains into. I felt like I was stuck in a cage, the bars of which, surrounding me, were made of moronic substance.

Yesterday I tried to sort out my application for credit for what I studied in Taiwan. It requires course outlines of every subject you took. Tunghai has no course outlines, they've never heard of them, and I've got the niggling feeling that this is what is going to happen all because Tunghai has no course outlines: My application gets rejected, I get no credit, and I spend a whole extra YEAR at uni. All because Tunghai has no course outlines. Fuck them. Oh I'm in the mood to swear darling.

I started my first shift at Shell at 5:30 this morning. Went and told Quack Quack that I couldn't work there anymore. He seemed too busy too care. I don't know how I feel about that. I wanted him to go "Oh no, why you don't wanna work here?" or something like he did last time. This time he just said "OK."

Indignant "Huh!"  ¶ 14:16 0 Comments

  I am the Mandarin Stalker

Yesterday I worked at the quack quack cafe and intended on taking my wages and forgetting him but I still have to work tomorrow aswell. It's such hell, he runs me around like a remote control car, tells me to do one thing, then tells me off for doing it and tells me to do something else. "Why the hell are you washing those teapots?" he'll scream. "Go and wipe the tables." I wasn't conscientious enough with the tables, so as punishment he asked me to go and clean every one of them all over again.

I wondered about his childhood. Did he grow up around a bunch of arseholes? Have all his previous bosses been like that and set him a bad example?

Training for the Shell job starts on Monday thank goodness. It's in Parramatta.

I wore a short skirt today for the first time since whenever the last time I shaved my legs was, and I got a couple of "how's it going"s around the place. I also bought a new skirt, pair of pants, and jacket. You little beauty.

I'm going climbing tonight then meeting Mark.

I've been wanting to practise my Chinese all the time now. Whenever I hear a conversation going on in Mandarin my heart skips a beat and I have to come nearer to have a listen. I have turned into the Mandarin Stalker. At work with my Vietnamese boss, I look at his Asian face and am overcome with the urge to speak to him in Chinese. People are speaking Mandarin everywhere I turn, oh!

My boss and I have a low-respect relationship. He insults me, and I tell him to relax and smile a little, and that I don't understand anything he says.


Chapter 2 of best-selling novel

It turned out her brainwaves were completely normal, which unfortunately means she could no longer compare herself to the likes of Virginia Woolf or anyone with funny brain waves or bipolar disorder who was a famous brilliant novelist or such. Temporarily dismayed, she went home to prepare for New Year's Eve, to be spent in the city with her best friend Johannes.

It was too dark to see the face of the lone man she started talking to on the park steps. After she popped her second E, she was in love with this dark-faced man, neither handsome nor ugly. Johannes was busy talking on the phone walking circles around the steps and she was already getting on to the man by 3 or 4am.

But the sun came up and before the explosive discovery of the man's face she first noticed the homeless man in neatly pressed clothes laying on his side on the grass, staring right up her skirt as she lay on her back with her feet on the lower step. She was wearing black undies, so she decided it didn't matter. Let him have his New Year's morning treat.

As for the explosive discovery of the man's face, it was hidiously ugly, no joke, and he was missing a few teeth. What was this man doing in the park alone on New Year's Eve? Was he homeless himself? He talked about the park bums seeming to know too much not to be one himself. Suspicious. Johannes hadn't seen his face until the sun came up either but he was polite about it when they discussed it later. "He was so ugly," he said politely, trying not to say, "he was so UGLY!" instead. She was impressed by the remarkable show of restraint on his behalf. Did she get on to a bum?  ¶ 16:44 0 Comments

  Last Wednesday when I was supposed to go back to the quack quack job, I didn't because I had just lined up the Shell job. This morning he rang and asked me to come in so I went in under the impression that he must be desperate for someone. Then he gave me the "I've got plenty of other staff" routine and I just wanted to laugh in his face.

I taught him a bit of English too. He was getting his bring vs take and come vs go mixed up. He'd say "Come in the kitchen" and I'd be thinking "but you're not in the kitchen" etc etc. I figure if he's got the nerve to constantly insult me, he won't mind a small taste of his own medecine. He is capable of smiling which was a pleasant surprise.

OH GUESS WHAT
I applied for a public service job which required a lengthy application form including questions about leadership and team work. I'm hoping to get by on the stunning photo alone. There was a question about the last time I was innovative when solving a problem and I really could not recall the last time even though I swear I've been innovative in the past, so I wrote about how I arranged my new room like no other occupant has arranged it before, using the cupboard to store clothes to leave space for a small study desk. I hope they don't think I'm not taking it seriously, coz I just paid $11 for a transcript to send as part of the application so I don't want to get automatically disqualified for being a dick.

That's all my news. I came home from Tamworth and the first thing I did was buy a new packet of cigarettes so so much for rehab. Ah never mind. Well, do mind. I don't plan on smoking for the rest of my life, but alas, I hear everyone say, that's what they all say.

I'm going to yoga again tonight.   ¶ 15:33 0 Comments

  I'm now undertaking a four-day rehab program for pack-a-day smokers, a.k.a. a stay in the country with my reformed-smoker smoking nazi father. I started out making excuses for disappearing outside but I felt bad so I said "by the way, I brought my cigarettes" and laughed nervously hoping I would appeal to his softer side. He shook his head and said "I don't approve" and sounded very serious about it. This morning he bought me some beautiful jewellery for my twenty-first birthday coming up in two weeks and the last thing I want to do is piss him off. Then he said I picked a good-weekend to quit and I sure did, except I snuck away five minutes ago pretending to follow the sheep down into the paddock. Woe is me.

Tomorrow we're going to see a movie and Sunday we're driving back down to Sydney.  ¶ 13:48 0 Comments

  Hi I'm in an internet cafe with Mark at the moment, he's trying to do nasty technical stuff and I'm bored waiting. I went job-hunting yesterday. The first place I walked into I was given a 2 hour "trial" during which I worked for free. Then I was given two hours real work and got paid all of $22 to stick in my wallet. I hated the guy. He had a thick accent and everything that came out of his mouth sounded like the quack quack of a duck and I hated every minute of being quacked orders that were intelligible as the quack of a duck is to a human being.

He said to come back on Wednesday but I decided I didn't care how broke I was, I just couldn't learn to speak Quack. So this morning I set off again with 9 crispy clean copies of my resume. I started at the cafe inside a service station, the place I worked before I went to Taiwan. I loved that job, loved my boss, they loved me, everyone loved each other generally. So anyway, Lady Luck paid me a most pleasant visit and my old boss was there, still there, and said it was like an angel had just walked in because they needed someone and I have the added bonus of already having worked there and being available all the time.

So there go my dire financial concerns. Whoo hoo, money money money in a rich man's world, uh-huh, huh huh huh, all the things I could do.

Mark just asked if I ever thought life was pointless. "Are you depressed?" I asked him. Nah, he said. But you know what, I have experienced the feeling that life is just boring and nothing is interesting anymore. He said it's coz we don't have to struggle anymore. Look at me, spending hours of my life typing up this blog that a friend introduced me to nearly a year ago. Why do I do it? To practise writing? Better my communication skills? Something to do? The thrill of having your own day-to-day diary digitally immortalised? Yes I think that's it. If we can't be famous and become immortal, why not write a blog. Will this blog still be in cyberspace 100 years from now? How's it going to end up? Just floating around laying dormant long after I've stopped writing? What does Blogger have in store for the potential millions of blogs that are going to be around?

Mark still hasn't finished what he's doing and I'm hungry. He came over todayand we watched an episode of The Prisoner. It was filmed at a hotel in Northern Wales.  ¶ 22:00 0 Comments

  Hello all five of you, I just moved to Sydney FINALLY. I'm sharing a house in Enmore/Newtown with two guys who are 25 and 26. They are quite nice. It's a ten minute walk to King St and a ten minute bus trip down to uni. Last night I slept at my sister's and then we drove to Dad's this morning, and he brought me and my bed over. It's a small room but it has a cute little wardrobe which is actually postioned under the stairs where I've put all my clothes. The kitchen's a bit of a mess but that's cool. So yeah. This is a list of all the places I've ever lived:

Epping
Point Clare
Glebe
Dong Bie
Tunghai Dorms Building 30
Tunghai Old Dorms (and let's not forget the glorious two months of 11pm curfews and psycho roommates!)
Nan-tun
Various hostels in China
Point Clare again  ¶ 15:41 0 Comments