For better or for worse: the fourth decade of life:

Another rotation around the sun and for a second there, I was a bit worried about turning 30. I wish I could tell you that I was worried about something existential or even political, but I was worried that I was going to wake up at 30 then immediately stop tolerating gluten and my body would instantaneously sag.  I am happy to report that I am still eating carbs and 9.8m/s² hasn’t quite gotten me yet. Other than my vanity, I still have those other thoughts too: Am I living it right? Have I achieved what I have wanted to achieve in my career so far? How many licks does it take to get to the centre of a Tootsie Roll Pop?

A new decade calls from some reflection, which should hopefully demonstrate some kind of depth or growth if we’re lucky. Other than hair growth for the fact in the last ten years I’ve gone from bald to hair halfway down my back and every length in between. But hey – not a single strand of grey. Now I know I’m tempting fate.

To say that I am entirely a better person now than in my early twenties would be downright wrong. Sure, I was narcissistic, whiny, and horrible at saving money – I’m a millennial, so I am still all those things. I thought I’d pick out a few places where I feel I’ve improved and others that could use some work.    

Better

At being a partner

Recently, a memory on Facebook was recirculated that was a picture of me, eight of my Asian friends and my white boyfriend in University. I hadn’t thought about him in a long while. I like that the photo still exists; permanence is a funny thing because nothing ever really dies on the internet. It made me remember how terrible we were for each other and how I feel I’ve grown as an actual partner rather than as a girlfriend.

Being an adult is hard, the internet reminds us of this all the time. I didn’t have that much practice being a girlfriend in my twenties, and now I’m becoming a wife. They’re just labels, I think, +/- some jewelry if that's your thing. However, I feel confident and comfortable making up the rules with my to-be husband and how we’ll shape our lives together. He also gets to be a white man in photos with many Chinese people; some things do not change.

At understanding parts of the world

For a hefty portion of my life I had only lived in Canada. To a lot of the outside world, quite an idyllic little bubble. And I relished that bubble. I recently interviewed a candidate for London Business School and when prompted to discuss the candidate’s international experience, I thought back to my own interview when still in this candidate’s shoes. I really didn’t have any international experience minus having travelled bits of Asia and Europe. At that time, I had not yet passed the equator. Would I even have put myself through to LBS if I interviewed 25-year-old me?

Having the privilege to move to other countries is one I have really cherished in the past few years. This includes the distinct privilege of administrative paper work of visa application processes, opening a bank account and obtaining a tax number. To me, you only really move to a country if you are hassled and inconvenienced in the most administrative of ways. 

Paperwork aside, moving out your home country gives a better view about how the rest of the world works (or sometimes doesn’t). When you’re a traveller (which is still infinitely better than being a tourist) you get to go home and be happy in your bubble. Once you move somewhere that bubble bursts, you start all over again and you learn to roll with the new normal. But it’s fun, I promise. On the days I am not doing paperwork.  

At not giving a fuck

When I was in my early twenties, it was my goal to be in the Saturday Style section of The Globe and Mail (Canada’s National Newspaper). They often covered “society” events and charity galas, taking photos of Canadian socialites (an oxymoron to be sure, however I do not believe I have access to the Real Housewives of Toronto from my current geographic location to confirm with certainty). I once took a sick day from work, rented a car and drove to buy a new dress for a literary gala that I was volunteering at, not even attending. I wonder if Margaret Atwood noticed. The point to take away from that is the dress has still served me well and my career has not suffered. At the same time, I never achieved my goal. 

These days if I’ve already left the shower and forgotten to shave my legs, I’ll wear a skirt to work anyway. I feel like perhaps the frumpiness of being settled is hitting me. Those bikini waxes were never for me; I lied to myself all through my twenties. We all did/do. Now I feel as if I’m just shy of mom jeans, if way-cool hipster women weren’t wearing mom jeans. I don’t even know what’s uncool enough anymore. But I do have elastic waist dress pants for work and they are heaven. It’s all downhill from here, and I don’t give a fuck.

Worse

At being a friend

I’ve heard this one before – as one gets older it becomes somewhat uncommon to make new friends and sometimes it seems hard to stay in touch with people who live in same city as you. A friend of mine (see, I still have them!) sent me this New Yorker article that seems to perfectly sum up “adulting”. 

I used to be a really good friend. The kind that would set up scavenger hunts on university campus for your birthday, send you care packages, and write you postcards from all over the world. Now I don’t even write on people’s Facebook walls for their birthdays (obviously, the ultimate slight). Am I shittier person for it? Probably.

But all I can say in my defence is that I think about you sometimes. I’m not just always thinking about myself. And I have one of those private smiles - you know the kind. It’s the kind where a person walking in the opposite direction can see you’re thinking warmly about a distant memory. I love seeing those kinds of smiles on someone else’s face when I walking somewhere. I wonder what the person is thinking about. Been in a while since I’ve seen one though, since no one walks in Johannesburg. 

In a way, I hope you are also going through a time where you also feel you can sometimes be a crappy friend too; that way we can both feel bad. Schadenfreude is a wonderful feeling, isn’t it? I am a shit person after all.  

As a writer

It has been said that to become a better writer, one must be a better reader. And I am actually trying to get better at that. I haven’t read for pleasure since undergrad, I felt bad cheating on my textbooks with books I actually wanted to read. In my now quieter (devoid of posh galas) life I really cherish the opportunity losing myself in a book. To add my list of things I do while walking (eating is my #1 complementary skill) reading is another favourite. And I know I said I didn’t walk anymore, but I do have one half hour walk from work to my gymnastics club on Thursday evenings, (small, flat) nose firmly buried in a novel.

What I have been is especially horrible to my writing. I have bemoaned how infrequently I write this blog before, but still haven’t pushed myself to get better. More recently, I’ve been writing reports for work. Using Microsoft Word in the workplace has been foreign to me for quite some time now. Past passive voice is no one’s friend, however. Worse still, I am a child of the “PowerPoint as answer to all life’s questions” generation so I’ve spent countless hours writing and re-writing headlines and eliminating articles to fit into two lines. Corporate templates are corporate templates - and not to be fucked with. To an extent, I am all for concise communication; what is more, I am all for expressiveness. 

I still use too many adverbs to be considered any kind of highbrow writer. Still, I find them endlessly useful. Grammar nerds will see what I did there.

At still giving too many fucks

As staunchly as I would like to proclaim that I’m a self-actualized being whose needs are all met (including WiFi), that would be a lie. I am still riddled with my insecurities and short-comings (perceived and actual). I spend a lot of time trying to figure out if I’m normal (or basic, should you be so inclined) and how to combat being utterly ordinary. Now that I’m getting married, how soon until I have (a) child(ren) and live some kind of suburban nightmare? When in my twenties, the reality of anything so horrible was so foreign, I never prepared myself for it at all. My life would be to rent in a city centre somewhere, blow all of my rat race money on travel and then die. Now I have no idea. 

I don’t have Instagram, but doesn’t all that shit just cross post to Facebook, anyway? And yes, the juniors in my office do tell me that only old people use Facebook. There I am anyway constantly scrolling to see how other people are veneering their lives quite literally with filters. We are all trying to cover up our own inadequacies.

I suppose this means lots to work on in my thirties. Ways to move forward and some ways to move back. Hopefully my writing isn’t so infrequent that the next time I check in I am 40.

[Note: The Lynn Johnston comic used without permission as the title photo for this entry is the comic for my birthday 13 March 2017. Not knowing what the comic was when I wrote this, I feel it fits thematically. 

For those unfamiliar with the comic - For Better or For Worse is a comic strip by Lynn Johnston that ran originally from 1979 to 2008 chronicling the lives of a Canadian family, The Pattersons, and their friends. The story is set in the fictitious Toronto-area suburban town of Milborough, Ontario. Now running as reruns, For Better or For Worse is still seen in over 2,000 newspapers throughout Canada, the United States and about 20 other countries.]

You can [always] go home again

A little over three years ago I wrote that home is where the heart is, and now my own heart is once again on the move. I cried when I left Toronto then, heading into a world of what felt like the complete unknown. Fast forward two years and I cried at Heathrow when I was flying back. Talk about a fickle heart. Perhaps it’s because of how much time I’ve been spending at airports over the past year, but I think I may be immune to crying in airports now.

This time leaving feels a lot more bittersweet. I am reuniting with my fiancé after not living in the same country, continent, or hemisphere for over 2 years. Plus, I made him fly all the way to Toronto and back again because he has a better status level than I do and it means I can carry more bags with me. And it really helps me feel like I am not doing this on my own. I am not on my own when I opt to leave my very well paying job and hightail it to a place that is not incredibly familiar and just a smidge stabbier than where I live now. I do love a good adventure, but I love paying down my student debt even more.

I didn’t plan to come back home so soon after graduation. The original plan was to stay in London, but life knows better sometimes than to let you plan. I hadn’t intended to meet my future husband, in spite of what people say about women getting an MBA more so for getting an MRS. I wasn’t able to move to South Africa where he had relocated after finishing his degree a year earlier than I. I made the decision (discussing with my partner) that I’d move back to Toronto for a year, aggressively make headway on my loan and we would reassess our situation.

I would go on to tell wannabe consultants that I went to school abroad because I wanted to launch an international career, and they would look at me confused as to why I was working back in North America. And they were right. I am not ready to make one place my home just yet. I still yearn for the adventure and the excitement of exploring new places and learning how the rest of the world goes round. I know how lucky I am to have a partner who I can do that with. If I don’t have one place to call home yet, I am so glad to have one person who I do call home. One step at a time, I suppose.

Toronto and Canada are wonderful places to be from and to be; I hope my constant wanderlust does not leave anyone thinking otherwise. Many of my favourite humans are from here (there?) and who I am is because of where I have come from. For my own selfish growth and next phase of life, I want to build new perspectives and keep pushing my boundaries outside of my comforts.

This could be a long rant about the arduous application process and how immigration really is the plight of the rich (versus being a refugee, let’s be clear). Really, I wanted to take some time and say thank you to those who let me back into (or new to) your lives this past year only to have me scamper away again, who knows how long this time.

To me, modern friendship knows no physical bounds. We are connecting through the magic of the internet right now! I am so grateful to those who know that out of sight sometimes does not mean out of mind. But more importantly, physical distance does not degrade the value a person has in the other’s heart. We all grow, and we all change, some more than others. Thank you to those who continue to be on the ride with me and allowing me to cheer you on from afar. True friendship is picking up right where you left off – whenever and wherever – because these connections exceed even that of the internet.   

I look at my own departure as well as the departure of others as an opportunity. You’ll always know someone wherever you go in the world, and that to me is exciting. The whole world is just that much smaller when you’ve got a friend. So if you find yourself down in South Africa in the next little while, be sure to catch me while you can.

See you on the internet. I'll be right here.

Running through The Six in a towel - You'll have to speak up

Last Friday, I was walking in the subterranean tunnel system beneath the belly of Toronto’s financial district (known to the local mole people as the PATH) to obtain my overpriced lunchbox of spiralized zucchini, massaged kale, garlic-free basil pesto and added tempeh for the extra douchebag touch, on one of my last tender young days of being a gentle 28. [Complete sidebar: Microsoft Word knows the word douchebag but does not accept the word spiralized – I salute you, Bill]

I am not a very good PATH mole, my career didn’t grow up with the wont of vitamin D supplementation, and only being at the office one day a week these days doesn’t help. I really only know how to get from my desk to my massaged kale (only through massage was it elevated to a superfood from buffet garnish) back to my desk again.

In spite of seemingly never going outside and walking bowlegged as a result of rickets, the PATH is full of bright young things with pressed suits, brightly coloured socks, and even brighter shined shoes with that glint of arrogance that only youth and not graduating in a financial crisis can give you.

Procured lunchbox in hand, I turn on my heel and begin the perilous walk dodging these shiny moles as they meander towards their chosen grazing holes. And I think to myself: “these guys do absolutely nothing for me.” Eureka! This is it! That is the exact moment that I realize – I’m grown.

Mind you, I didn’t jump out of the bath a la Archimedes, but if I have to explain how I arrive at all the titles of my blog posts, I’ll realize how unfunny I’ve been the entire time. If you’ve been a part of this blog for the past 6.5 years, you may notice some recurring themes: one being a penchant for men in suits. Perhaps it is the full immersion into mole culture which has given me immunity. I had to be around it completely to be repulsed by it. Kind of like how working at Wendy’s in high school taught me humility and killed any desire to ever eat there.

Turning 29 means I am now immune to seemingly confident men in their protective designer suit amour deflecting sincerity with perceived charm and oozing self-importance. Kind of like how when I turned 19 I learned to vaccinate myself against guitar playing pseudo-sensitive types. I am sure that at 30 I will have the same feeling I had at 20 when I congratulate myself on – once again – escaping teenage pregnancy.

Never mind that my life partner wears a suit almost daily and also plays the guitar, nah, we can wrap this adult thing up – I got this.  

Truth be told, 29 came in as kind of a whisper, much less of a bang – even if it’s supposed to be the birthday I celebrate for a few decades to come. People say I really have to celebrate 30 next year, but really what is another journey around the sun? And what exactly is the purpose of celebrating survival?

It’s obvious I had nothing to do with my birth. I was just going with the flow, minding my own business, until I emerged into the world on March 13, 1987. And thankfully through scientific progress of sanitation, vaccinations and other modern medicines I stay alive a lot longer than previous generations. If you think about it, survival isn’t that grounded in my personal success or abilities at all.  

I grew up in the self-esteem generation, though when I look up the term the last time it was used was about 2013 so I’m even behind on the hip terms to explain the narcissist predilection of my generation. Growing up you were taught you were special and everyone gets a participation award, and not to mention, body image issues.

My preference is celebrating actual achievements. For example, I dragged my boyfriend to my MBA graduation (he opted to skip his) and made him sit through a long and drawn out ceremony on his birthday just to see me walk across a stage and shake a man’s hand. Because I spent 60,000 quid on that walk so I am damn well going to do it. It’s great that he also cares little for pomp and circumstance for middling achievements. He’s French, after all.

Barring any actual achievements, because hey – life is hard, I believe in celebrating the everyday. At least that’s what I tell the people at the liquor store who ask me if I’m celebrating when I buy champagne on a Tuesday. People see birthdays a socially acceptable time to reach out to someone you’ve lost touch with; I don’t see why you can’t do that anytime. We are so affronted by people reconnecting with us, it’s a shame.

In short, I am over my birthday. Sure, there are milestones in life, but there’s so much more to life than putting pressure on one arbitrary day versus another. By extension, this is how I feel about St. Patrick’s Day, bachelorette parties, New Year’s Eve and other “obligatory” high pressure celebration days. Celebrate, all day, every day because you want to and focus on building a life worth toasting.

[Author’s Note: The Six (The 6) is what cool people call Toronto. I’m trying to be cool. Is it working?] 

Epiphany - Three Wise Men

Epiphany is the 12th day of Christmas; no one remembers what your true love gives to you on the 12th day of Christmas because no one really knows beyond 5 gold rings. (Spoiler: it's 12 pipers piping, hence the photo above.) It is also the day when three wise men visited the Christ child and brought him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. An epiphany is also a moment of sudden revelation or insight. And because I love a good double entendre (who doesn’t?) and I like things that come in threes (again, who doesn’t?) I thought I’d take some time to write about three wise men who have appeared in my life. I will caveat by saying that “wise” is a subjective term, as is the use of the term “men”.

And if you’re scrolling down to read a heartfelt homage to my grandfather or reasons why we should all be the change we want to see in the world like Gandhi, you must be new here. This rarely cared for blog is reserved for talking about boys, absolutely no makeup tips, and occasionally pretending I’m growing up. In keeping with stayed traditions, I present three stories of men/boys/manboys that I have met along my way who have imparted some kind of wisdom – never directly – but led me to my own epiphany.

In one interpretation of the gifts brought by the three wise men, gold is seen as a valuable, frankincense is a perfume, and myrrh is an anointing oil. Loosy Goosy as that may be, I am going to try to stick with that as a guiding theme and as a clever device to structure these vignettes chronologically. Aren’t I clever?

(Oh, and no names here have been changed, nor has permission been requested, but these are just my completely one-sided musings on my interactions with each wise man.)

Scott(?) – Gold

I think his name was Scott, it was 2007 and I met him once, and I’m not sure we were ever Facebook friends and that was a time you’d add everyone you’d ever met on Facebook. And 2007 was also the time I was reeling from my first heartbreak. You know the one: where you get really drunk in a hazing ritual in the creepy basement of your university house and weep uncontrollably in front of your ex-boyfriend (hmm just me then?). The first cut being the deepest, you think that you’ll never move on and it won’t stop hurting.

Scott and I met on a car ride from Kingston to Ottawa when I was instructed to drive the classical guitar major (more useful than a gym major?) who was playing at a reception I was attending. We didn’t really speak on the way up as he sat somewhere in the back of the van I drove, but on the way back to Kingston that night, all the other carpoolers were asleep in the back and he rode shotgun and we chatted the entire way back. I can’t recall any of the content of what we talked about, but I do remember feeling that, yes, it was possible to meet someone new, even if I had no romantic intentions towards this person at all and that not everyone in the world is going to reject me just because my ex-boyfriend did.

And now every time I strike up a really great conversation with a stranger at a party or on a plane (when I’m not being an irate business traveller), it reminds that conversation is not solely transactional and that connecting with people is something I enjoy and am good at. Back in '07 I think I had bored everyone I know around me overanalyzing my defunct relationship and being mopey all the time. So talking with someone who doesn’t know you at all means you talk less about your relationship issues. It's so freeing because you allow yourself to talk about something else, anything else. That was a valuable lesson. Thanks Scott or whatever your name is, wherever you may be.

Paul – Frankincense

Fast forward five years, a good chunk of that you can catch up on in my previous entries, and Paul is someone I’ve written about before. I could never say anything ill about him, I only ever spent time with him for a weekend (I swear I do have more than just fleeting encounters with individuals) so perhaps you could say I didn’t know him well enough. But in some way, he influenced me to move to London. That’s why he’s perfume – my encounter with him enhanced a part of me. I warned you these were stretches.

To be honest, I am not exactly sure when I decided to apply to London for business school. I was really more concerned about where I wanted to live and ended up only applying to schools in London and New York. And even though things with Paul had faded away well before my applications were due there was this distinct part of me that did wonder what it might be like if we reconnected while I lived there, as he lived in Essex. I did live in the UK for two years, and I am pretty sure I never went to Essex once.

I still have his contact number from when we were texting in Turkey (Google keeps it all!), and WhatsApp loads all your contacts to show you who also has WhatsApp and being the creep I am, I can see that his status of “Available” hasn’t changed in 2011 so I am assuming he has had the same number. All that to say that his WhatsApp display photo is of a baby girl. Maybe it did work out with woman he started seeing and decided to break it off with me who lived all the way in Canada. I’ll never know – he honestly doesn’t have Facebook.
                              
Secretly (or not so as I announce it to the internet here), I have an email drafted to Paul in my Gmail that has sat there for over two years now with only a subject of “Hello from much closer by” that I never wrote any body text. I think about deleting it sometimes, but it’s like this relic that sits there and reminds me of how I was feeling at that exact moment (lonely and curious) and reminds me how perhaps stopping our impulses that stem from loneliness may lead to better things. Two days after I drafted that email I met the man that I’m quite likely to grow old with. We hope to, at least.

Dave – Myrrh

I met Dave over weekend in 2013, and yes I know I said that I do know people for more than fleeting encounters, but Dave has more similar parallels to Paul as well – I too learned to stop. Myrrh is associated with ancient burial rituals and Dave was a turning point for me, I was going to bury some old bad habits and start fresh. I wanted to stop chasing awful men and leave the destructive half of my twenties behind.

I did that cliché thing: I loved like I had never been hurt and I was genuinely happy. I wanted my friends to meet him; I wanted to hold his hand. These were two things that gave me anxiety before. I felt this one going somewhere good and somewhere far; as fate would have it, we were both separately moving to London to pursue individual dreams and when does that ever happen?

Fate had the last laugh, because it turns out he wanted something (or someone) completely different. I had never been figuratively punched in the gut so hard. Why hadn’t I outgrown this? Wasting my time with a man(boy) who didn’t want what I wanted. Why was I so blindsided? Hindsight being what it is, I don’t remember my raw emotional reaction accurately anymore. But the best possible thing happened to me after the breakup: I moved across the ocean and got to start all over again. No one knew me and I could be whoever I wanted to be.

Being in business school is definitely three steps back, it would been have incredibly easy to get caught up in old habits. I showed up in London with a complete “don’t touch me” look, which is great for making friends. Does it sound awful to say that Dave was like a good practice boyfriend? Maybe a Good Luck Chuck kind of situation? That’s the first and last time I will ever reference Dane Cook. More so, I learned what I needed from a partner. Besides a man isn’t what I was looking for out of my graduate education - I went for an MBA, not an MRS - but he is a very nice cherry on top.

Not that you were wondering, but just in case, I did run into Dave once while I was in London. It’s a great story (to me), ask me about it and I’ll tell it to you.


Overall, these are just three stories that I thought fit together in a nice thematic way. Not because they’re men that I liked, lusted after, and loved respectively – but I think you really can learn something that you’ll carry with you for a long time from people, regardless of gender, that you know for only a few hours, a weekend or a few months. They don’t need to be someone you’ve known your whole life, someone who is especially close to you, or even someone you respect all that much. But to all the people who I have learned something from, I am thankful that I’ve come across you in my wanderings in the world so far. And I look forward to as many wise persons as they come. 

You know nothing, Sarah Chan

Oh hi! I sometimes keep a blog. This blog had its humble beginnings as a way to keep my mental capacities afloat while being unemployed in 2009 after finishing my undergraduate degree in nothing special and a contract job for a non-profit. Ick. Then it evolved into a girl about town in her early 20s and what disasters existed in the dating world. Saucy. And now, an astonishing six years later I find myself both employed and in a wonderful relationship, so what do I have to blog/whine about now? I have gone from home-schooled jungle freak to shiny Plastic to most hated person in the world to actual human being. (Wait, I’m not Cady Heron)

In a short time span I have heard two people in their thirties say that they’ve seen it all. I don’t believe it for an instant. The more I see of the world, the more ignorant I feel, as ironic as that may be. I can’t claim I know one country extremely well, which perhaps is the hard part of being from the second largest country in the world. I can’t even say I know Vatican City well, having been there just once. 

Perhaps what I’ve learned in the past two years is how little in fact I do know. One friend wanted to sketch out class by class what we’ve learned in the MBA, I’m pretty sure a lot of my pages would just have the drawings of crickets on them to represent the sound going through my mind should I also engage in that exercise. If only I had the skill to draw crickets. Sure I wax on a little bit about EBITDA and distressed debt, but contrary to what some people I know believe, that’s not very interesting.

So here’s what I actually did learn and you can figure out if the tuition was worth it. I will accept payback period as an answer.   

I like team sports

Growing up I played a lot of individual sports; I’m not entirely sure why, maybe you’d have to ask my mom. I grew up as a runner, a swimmer, a gymanst (explains the wide shoulders) and I even played doubles badminton for a year, only to be moved to singles the following year (get your Asian jokes out of the way now). I liked the idea of being in control of my own outcome: the pressure was mine; the win was mine.

I chose to play touch rugby at LBS because I wanted to do something with just women. I came from a very female dominated field so entering an extremely testosterone-filled classroom made me want to seek better bonds with females and I needed an outlet for all that pent up physical aggression from listening to vacuous comments in class.

There’s something about the moment when your entire team storms the field after you’ve won. It’s your win, even if it’s not all yours. Catching an awkward lob pass from a link, swearing your arms aren’t actually that long, and blowing past a defender to put the ball down over the line for a try is a feeling of sheer joy because it not only helps you, it helps a whole bunch of other people too. Yeah, yeah, I know, all the feels. 

I’ve met an amazing group of women who show the same tenacity on the field as they do in life. We spend most of our time together in gym kit, so I forget that they clean up so nice sometimes. Plus, we win stuff together. And I like winning, that hasn’t changed.

I can live with less

Maybe for my next degree I’m going to try not to be one of the poorest people in the school, but there was no such luck this time around. One person actually said to me in first year: “Why haven’t I seen you around in a while? Haven’t you been on any of the treks?” Unfortunately for me, a few hundred pounds on a weekend is indeed a lot to spend so I missed out Ireland, Portugal, Greece, Ibiza, Russia, India, etc. Plus, I had to save money for rugby tours, duh.

I said goodbye to monthly Dermologica facials and getting someone else to groom my eyebrows, and somehow my face is still intact and I have manage to keep two eyebrows. Perhaps it was the former extravagances that led to less money to spend while living in one of the most expensive cities in the world. There was no more popping into shops on the walk home from work, the only thing on my walk home in first year was Church Street Market and I’ll tell you those racks of turtlenecks that fell off an M&S truck somewhere started to look really appealing after having not bought anything in a while. Though, I will admit a Preen, an Erdem, an Issa and some Stella McCartney did wander into my belongings along the way, because these are London sample sales and I’m not a monster.

I spent my last semester couch surfing and living out of one suitcase. I now do laundry where I mix all the colours, put it on cold, and hope for the best.  A lot of people said it was bold to keep moving around; it wasn’t really that hard, more than anything it taught me how what wonderful and supportive friends I have. Reopening suitcases that I had stored in someone’s flat was like Christmas Day, so wonderful to have variety again!

I can’t have it all

Don’t get mad, but I haven’t read Lean In. I just haven’t gotten around to it, so I hope the next few sentences don’t invoke the ire of pitchforks from some. I am reminded by the wise words of Abraham J. Simpson who said: “I used to be with it, but then they changed what it was.” And that’s how I feel. I’m not sure what “it” is that I want to have or what “all” really means. But what I have realised is that I don’t get to write my entire story myself. My partner is a huge part of my life and our choices affect each other. As well my parents are getting older and so am I. Is this what growing up is?

I used to be afraid that I couldn’t be happy. That I would always be chasing the next carrot, climbing the next ladder in order to keep striving for something. Now, I think my life might be a bit more ordinary than I initially thought. Because even if you climb the entire ladder, plenty of people still don’t care who you are or what you do. Only you can figure out your own issues and be truly happy, but if you let them, there are plenty of people to help you along the way.

Perhaps I didn’t need to go to business school to find this all out, it’s certainly not an experience I’d recommend to everyone, but I’m sure as hell glad that I did. Tens of thousands of pounds well spent. 

The Listening Chair - Power of Threes

I hadn’t been to a concert in a long time, and over the summer I had the good fortune to go see Imogen Heap play the Roundhouse in Camden. You know who she is, she did that song that they used in The OC. Since then she wrote a song called The Listening Chair where she set up a listening chair to find out from people what song still needed to be written. She heard from people of all ages wanting to hear about all different kinds of topics and in the end she decided to write a 5 minute song with one minute representing seven years of her life so far.

Let’s call it inspiration versus blatantly ripping off an idea (as I am giving credit where it is due) that I want to write about periods of my life that also fit (and could give clues to) my type-A pattern-loving self.

3²

One of the joys of being born in March, other than being a Pisces, means that you get to experience both grades at the same age (sorry latter half of the year). A very distinct memory I have of the fourth grade was one day the entire class had to take a survey about pop music and what everyone’s favourite song was. For some reason the song that sticks out in my memory is Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Deep Blue Something. Odd since at that time I knew nothing of Truman Capote, Audrey Hepburn or the robin egg blue box at that time. More of what I remember is being ratted out by the kid who sat next to me (couldn’t tell you his name) because I wasn’t participating in the poll, but instead was reading a book (also escapes me what book).

Come fifth grade, I had moved to a new school where they had classes for kids who were intellectually gifted. What is that, you ask? Well, it’s where they put kids who were so bored in class they read extra books to pass the time. And it is here where I found my absolute best friend and constant companion in life: sarcasm. We’ve been together so long, I don’t know where I end and sarcasm begins. My mother had to go to a parent-teacher conference because (and I didn’t even know I was doing it) I was rolling my eyes at my teacher. Poker face, to this day, is still not something I possess.

3 x 2 x 3

Common to some Canadian university experiences, I moved out into a student house with a bunch of people I didn’t really know and had one of those textbook bad experiences: hoarding toilet paper, sink full of dishes, passive aggressive notes – it’s a wonder I actually detest living alone to this day. You’d think I’d be scarred from that. Eighteen was also a magical time where I would actually get up at 7 am without a trace of a hangover. Those were some days.

I’ll never forget my last day of being eighteen. The drinking age is nineteen where I lived, so it was the last day with my fake ID. Somehow I got the only non-racist bouncer who in fact did not think that all Asians looked the same and wouldn't let me in. No matter, the next bar thought Janice Lui and I looked exactly the same. I got called home before last call that night because our house (dysfunctional as it was) was broken into sometime between pre-drinking and pre-last call. I was devastated. My parents bounced in the next morning visiting from the homestead, a three-hour drive away that I considered a safe distance, armed with a birthday cake and couldn’t process when I announced that the house had been broken into and my laptop had been stolen.

Dad: Why wasn’t your computer with you?

Newly minted nineteen-year-old: I was at a bar!

Dad: So?

3³

Exponentially older than the girl who got called out for reading in class, in a stark contrast I don’t read books for pleasure much anymore. That’s actually something I stopped doing around eighteen, as I decided that I couldn’t read fun books if I wouldn’t read my boring textbooks. I don’t think eighteen-year-old me fathomed what twenty-seven year old me would be like. When I was about nine, I thought twenty six was the ideal age to get married. Sorry kid.

But no expectations lead to openness and possibility. I also never thought I’d live in London or Johannesburg, so I guess instead of being in two grades I can live in two cities while the same age – that works for me. It’s been a life quite ordinary thus far, I’ve never won any super special prizes or been in the papers, but all I can do is do the best with what I’m given. I for sure can’t tell you what 3⁴ looks like nor can I tell you what 3 x 2 x 3 x 2 is going to look like either, but whatever happens, I’ll keep listening.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly - I finished one year of my MBA and all I got was…

I’ve been taking quick surveys (under 30 seconds, one question – promise!) recently on whether or not people think I’m a negative person. It has been on more than one occasion that someone tells me I look really happy and I need to remind them just because I’m wearing a jarringly bright outfit that it doesn’t equate to me being idyllic and fancy-free. On the contrary, just because I offer a less than glowing appraisal of something (which some people call complaining) doesn’t mean I hate everything. I’m not the kind of person who needs the “optimism bias” to get out of bed every day. If it’s going to be a mediocre day, so be it. Not everything is “epic” or the “Best. Night/Meal/Poop. Ever.” It makes me question whether anything you actually do/eat/shit is remotely above pedestrian, but I suppose that’s the trick isn’t it? No one wants you to know how dull their life really is. I could have titled this “Good, Better, Best”, but that sounds too positive and I’m just here to keep shit real, yo.

The Good

Try as I might not to sound like a Lululemon catchphrase, I do really enjoy alliteration and subheadings, so The Good of these past ten months can be best broken down into Live, Laugh, and Love. Don’t worry about me turning into some kind of spiritual yogi, I can’t afford yoga anymore.

Live

My whole life has changed, whether I (or anyone else) like it or not – and most days, I really do like it. I feel like I’m on the most expensive vacation of my life, and pending a sweet full-time job upon graduation, it feels like it’s already worth it. Mostly because it has opened me up to so many people and opportunities beyond what I even imagined coming in. I have noticed the way I think about things now is very different; it’s completely subjective if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. But I did this Buzzfeed quiz and I’m “a bit smug and judgmental sometimes, but [I’m] not a total jerk.” The tribe has spoken.

I know my life right now is very bizarre, and there’s a part of me that’s terrified to go back to work and sit at a desk for at least 8 hours a day and forego my occasional mid-afternoon naps or going to the gym at any hour. But the other part of me is just longing to return to productivity (maybe minus the sedentary part), because even one week of idleness truly feels like the vacation of fools. I will never be able to stay at home, sorry (not sorry).  

Laugh

If there’s one thing that’s still the same about me, is that I don’t take anything all that seriously. I can only laugh at my own stupidity, and somehow (unsurprisingly) that’s been plenty. Back in September my face made a very close friend with a traffic pole on a London sidewalk. That will teach me to drink a lot of gin, walk home, and look something up on my phone at the same time. I got myself a great shiner – my first black eye, and it was self-inflicted. I was actually able to hide it really well with my bangs (fringe), but I was super worried because there were two things I have been banking on for this MBA: my beautiful face and my even more beautiful brain. And a head injury is a sure-fire way to ruin both.

Come November, with a healed eye but not much more common sense, a fuzzy night ensued that could only be called Santa Pub Crawl which - long story, short - resulted in an elf costume and falling off a pole in a club (con gusto).  Drinking (and subsequent pole-related incidents) leads to many bruises. I am happy to report that I am 199 days without a pole-related injury, and am always laughing at myself.   

Love

Here’s a fun one. I came to this MBA, like some, a bit broken. I didn’t quite start this year where I thought I would be. I spectated a lot of shenanigans when I first arrived (and still do!) and I was not ready to take part in any of it. And they say that’s when something is most likely to happen, when you’re least looking for it. The LBS MBA is terrible on relationships: be it long-distance, local, engaged, or married – it can be a battlefield. Perhaps because of the absolute vicious, high-school-esque rumour mill that exists. Statistically speaking, if I’ve heard it from two different people, it’s a fact, right? (I promise, this segment does belong in The Good section) But it is possible to have a private life and nurture something wonderful. This is definitely the most public I’ve been about my relationship, ever. Thanks to all six readers!

I know what a blessing it is to have the support of someone who has gone through, and therefore understands and accepts, the recruiting process, the study group, the constant partying, et cetera and someone who I (used to be able to) see daily in the middle of the day. On the massive plus side, should this work out, I get to tell potential future offspring that mommy and daddy met at a bar.

The Bad

Diversity

Hey, didn’t you sign up for one of the most diverse schools ever? Yes, and in fact, people are often impressed that other Canadians are here too. But we are, and that’s my actual worry. Someone recently asked me who my most exotic close friend at school was, and after being Canadian about it and recoiling at such a culturally insensitive term, I really started to think about it. Aside from being ridiculously good-looking (as my number one criteria for all relationships), most of my friends skew quite Western. And I’m a bit disappointed in that. 

I am the first to admit that it is a blend of my personality and how I make friends as well as the “natural” skew of how nationalities tend to split themselves up. The Latins tend to stick with the Latins, same with the Koreans, and those elusive Scandinavians, as examples. This results in me getting put in various WhatsApp groups that I never asked to be in, which I know I can remove myself from, and will (eventually) stop complaining about – but the China WhatsApp group never came knocking, you know?

Dreams

I am reminded of The Simpsons episode where Bart’s class goes to visit the box factory and Bart tries to daydream another possibility and can’t. I may have lost you there (and you may have lost some of my respect for not being a fan of The Simpsons), but that episode also gives us this amazing clip. My general point is that instead of working for the pharmaceutical company, I will be working at the pharmaceutical company. It’s so uncreative, I don’t even know what to say.

We were all told at the beginning of the year that being a triple jumper is hard (that’s when you want to change your location, industry, and role all in one go), but that was after we had already paid the big money deposit. Obviously when they are trying to lure you in, they make it sound like you’ll be able to shit gold by the time you finish here, what with their fancy employment reports and shiny statistics. I am then reminded by the wise words of modern Canadian lyricist, Drake (a.k.a. the wheelchair kid from Degrassi): “You hate the fact that you bought the dream and they sold you one.”

Maybe that was a bit negative. But this is just my summer, it's not a death sentence. Although, I am in the Mississauga of London – I can’t escape the suburbs if I tried. I’m actually not sure what I want to recruit for come full-time, nor do I really know where in the world I want to be. If I came to the MBA looking for answers, I seem to be better at coming up with more questions.  

The Ugly

Maturity

Someone told me I was their favourite “sneaky baby” – an endearing term for someone who acts like a curmudgeon but keeps getting carded at the grocery store for buying £5 wine. We should start a WhatsApp group. I feel like my aging has expedited since starting the MBA. A tender 27 going on 40. Once my dad asked me on Skype if I had put something under my eyes because they looked so dark. Perhaps I should be doing the opposite and covering that shit up.

Do I love a great piece of gossip? Hell yes. But will I go around betraying your trust and being malicious? No, because that’s definitely not how my parents raised me. Do I worry too much about what other people think about me? Still yes, but I am slowly working on that one. What that really entails is actually being a decent human being instead of worrying that everyone will find out what a shitty human being you really are.

I am often incredulous at the mentality (and ensuing behaviour) that I’ve become akin to. It is as if upon re-entering an “academic” setting, we all forget that we are approaching thirty, are thirty, or are over thirty and are all supposed to be fully functioning members of society. Ah, the leaders of the future – today!  

Mediocrity

I have it under good authority that my English is going to shit. I’m not going to say it’s from speaking to non-native English speakers (but maybe?), but also because I’ve really stopped proofreading anything I write. I am convinced that anything we write is marked purely based on a rubric, which evidently does not include grammar. Plus, the number of egregious errors I find on my exam papers is beyond horrendous, so it makes me feel like I don’t have to put the effort in either. Yeah, yeah – I know I should rise above and be as mature as self-proclaimed above, but whinging is just more fun sometimes.

Conclusion: still not sure if I’m negative – but what I am sure of, is that this first year has been a whirlwind. I got sucked into the belly of beast around the middle of March and have only now re-emerged into some semblance of normalcy, sorry if you haven’t heard from me in a bit. I still wouldn’t trade it for anything, though. Nor do I believe the sky is falling down because a new class is coming in. I don’t want first year to last forever, because every chapter has its time and I am very much looking forward to the next. See? So positive.