Update! Read all about it.

I notice that I'm the kind of blogger who pauses and stops writing for a long time for a variety of reasons. Then, I somehow get inspired and I pick it up again. So here I am. Back. Almost one and half years later. Lots have happened since March 08.

Celebrated my 10 year college reunion. The weekend was amazing and it made me realize how much I missed my 4 years at school.

Barack was elected president! Woot! I still love me some Hillary and was disappointed when she lost to Obama. Nevertheless, I'm happy with how things turned out.

I became an official TripVlogger for a travelsite called TripFilms and I'll be posting some of the videos I made for them on our trip to Hong Kong. We owe them videos on the Philippines so I'll be posting those soon too. In the meantime, you can check out my videos at Tripfilms here.

MoJo and I went to Hong Kong for New Year 2009 and then on to the Philippines for two weeks to visit my family.

I started practicing Bikram yoga in mid-March and I am an official Bikram junkie!!! I was inspired to try it because of the inspiring healing story of the creator of this yoga, Bikram Choudhury. He crushed his knee in a weightlifting accident as a young adult and Western doctors proclaimed he would never walk again. He proved them wrong. This practice has healed countless people physically, mentally, & emotionally including myself.

I had arthroscopic surgery back in 1991 and my knee was never the same. I always likened my knee to a shattered vase pieced together. Over the years, it would lock out, feel tight, feel like there were air bubbles in. I didn't have any strength in it nor flexibility. In March 09, I was leaning heavily on a banister to go down stairs because my knee didn't feel strong enough. I've been an active person despite working out at the gym, running, power walking, hiring a trainer. But over the years, my knee just weakened. Besides the knee, I had other joint/muscle issues: I pulled my back out several times, the tendons in my shoulder were starting to fray causing severe paine, my wrists hurt (I thought I had carpel tunnel), my ankles were starting to hurt. In fact, you can read me blog about it back in 2005. I felt like I was a 30 year old living in a 60 year old body. It was depressing to say the least. One acupuncturist friend who treated me told me that my body has a tendency to produce high levels of acid (caused mainly by stress, anger, and the food I eat) that is causing my joint pain/injury. She recommended that I sweat the acid out. Enter Bikram yoga and the inspiring story of healing by Bikram himself. I made a commitment to practicing 5-6 days a week and after 5 months I am so happy to say that all my joint paint has virtually disappeared. I say virtually because my knee pain has decreased tremendously and is on its way to healing fully. I feel like I've been given a new body with my regular practice. In addition to all the physical benefits (did I mention that I've lost weight), emotionally and mentally I'm also a different person. I am happier, more centered and at peace, and most importantly, I've been able to manage the stress in my daily life so well. Things that would make me fly off the handle before, don't bother me anymore. It's been an amazing and transformative experience. But I had to earn it. Healing on any level is not passive; it is an active engagement of your mind, body, and spirit. It takes commitment, hard work, discipline, and yes, sometimes pain to achieve breakthroughs. There's a time and place for medicine. Yes. However, I feel our society has become so dependent on pills to solve our issues when in fact pills just treat the symptom (and create more problems with side effects) and don't target the cause.

And most recently, we just came back from vacation. We went on a 9-day cruise to the Caribbean. Let's just say I'm not running to sign up for my next cruise. It was good to spend time with MoJo's family and not have to work for 9 days. The best part was sitting on a deck chair, facing the horizon and reading a book. Other than that, I can do without the overconsumption of food, alcohol, and goods. I'll stick to off-the-beaten path traveling unless it's a cruise to the Galapagos or the South Pacific!

Blame it on the Commute

I just discovered why I am always late in submitting my papers in graduate school. I had my eureka moment on the subway coming home. It's the travel time! When I was an undergrad at MHC, the walk time to my professor's office mailbox was easily calculated. No forseeable delay, no acts of God, no transportation to deal with, just my good old two legs. These days, I have to schlep on the train to drop off my paper and I'm blaming the NYC MTA, the slow walking peeps on the sidewalk especially since now's the season to tote incredibly large shopping bags, the traffic lights, you name it!

My train painstakingly took far longer to get into the city than usual as it crawled slowly through the tunnel underneath the East River. I arrived 2 minutes after 5pm at the NYU Anthro Department building and it was already locked. It's the Friday before Christmas -- who was I kidding that somebody would somehow still be there.

Nonetheless, I'm a free woman...for now. Went and had myself a Sapporo with my sushi at Enju after I dropped off my paper. MoJo has already gone home for the holidays. And my classmates, well, no one took me up on my offer to celebrate the handing in of our papers with drinks.

My focus now turns to Christmas and finally to Maui. But first, sleep.

The Red Pegasus Connection

Last night was the last class of my anthro course on comparative diasporas at NYU. It's been a great class and I must admit that I've taken a liking to my NYU classmates for than my Columbia ones. Don't get me wrong. I think Columbia students are totally fine but a bit more conservative than I care for. My NYU classmates had a bit more flare, a bit more hipness, a bit more of that "it" that makes one interesting. Two were doing film projects, while others had really cool former lives before graduate school. Of course, it may have a lot to do with the positionality of the universities themselves which affect the type of students it attracts.

Wouldn't you know after a semester of sitting with these folks, I chatted up with a woman who I find out went to Mount Holyoke! We couldn't believe our ears and stared at each other in amazement for several seconds (You see, I was such a big proponent always being cognizant of a gender analysis on all our assigned readings, which I attributed to my women's college background). She graduated in 2002, which meant that when I graduated in 1998, my class passed on to her class our color (red) and our animal (the pegasus). This tradition, like many at MHC, means to connect women of various classes and generations. And in this case, it did! It never ceases to amaze how MHC women are everywhere and how are varied backgrounds and interests get transcended by the mere fact that we all share a common experience of having attended MHC. A network of 33,000 women around the world is indeed a powerful thing!

Unable to linger after class, I had hopped in a cab and zipped down to SoHo for the holiday party hosted by the architectural firm that MoJo consults for. Giorgione Restaurant had your typical SoHo feel: loft-like with an industrial bent yet warm and most certainly hip. I finally got to meet the people that he talks about and I think his colleagues, particularly his boss, were quite curious about me. By the end of the night, I think we managed to both get to know each other a bit better. If by chance you go, the food there is very good. I had the seabass wrapped in parchment -- it was light, fresh, and delicious.