Always Get The Right Line Ready

Many years ago once I remember telling one of my college friends Yang that she and I had almost the same height. Yang felt hilarious but also slightly annoyed and said, 'Can't believe you say that! Don't you aware that your line of vision was going up when you're talking to me?!'

My explanation and theory to Yang then was maybe it's because most of time in my life I have to lift my chin with different angles when I talk to people. Since it is too often and I've got used to it, I stop feeling others are actually that much taller than I am.

I almost forgot about my crap theory until this afternoon Hannah, who I am sure is at least 5cm shorter than I am, said, 'After not seeing you for years, you are still petite and have the same height with me.'

Hannah and I were college schoolmates. Even though we usually found it interesting and relaxing talking to each other, we seldom hung out together then. After losing contact since our graduation, the connection was built again via facebook.

But not like those 'only-want-to-be-a-muted-voyeur' friends, Hannah sent me a message and asked me if I want to have a cup of coffee with her shortly after I clicked the 'accept' button.

Not hard to tell that Hannah brought me to a famous and popular afternoon tea shop. Layers of people were surrounding the small patio outside of the shop as if we were waiting to see a brilliant street performer playing ten oranges with his hands and spitting out flame at the same time. According to the waiting number we got, I estimated an hour of waiting was inevitable.

Queuing for at least an hour to get a cup of coffee and a piece of cake or some sandwiches while it was chilly and had some thin liquid threads falling from the sky?! Come on! It's crazy.

While I was planning how to make Hannah understand that patience is never my virtue and persuade her that the coffee and the cake next door would be as good as well, a waitress came out and said, 'Excuse me. If there are two guests who don't mind to sit at the counter, you may go inside right now. Anyone? Please raise your hand to let me know.'

I know I should ask Hannah first, but I just couldn't help to instantly stand on my tiptoe and put my right palm as high as possible above my head after the waitress closed her mouth. Maybe Hannah felt the threats from my eyes when I asked her. She smiled and said she doesn't mind before the waitress decided to let us in.

Honestly I don't understand why most of people preferred waiting for an hour than enjoying their time with their friends at the moment while also be able to monitor that their sandwich will be spread with enough butter and be put in decent amount of smoked chicken.

The afternoon was a bit like Hannah's press conference about her wonderful three-months trip in America. But I didn't feel annoyed at all. In fact, I often feel fascinated about people's self-help journey. I can understand that it's what may happen when you discovered and experienced the unexpected scenery or enlightenment from the expedition - you may have no time to swallow your spit and want to share the joy and excitement with others about what you've encountered.

I asked Hannah a question which I was asked frequently when people knew about my trip to the UK and Japan in 2007 - Did anything dangerous happen? Have you felt scared during your travel?

Hannah gave me the same answer that I offered to the people - 'No. I seldom felt afraid. Think it's because I prepared the information I need in advance. Or maybe I was just lucky.'

While I was just going to identify myself with her, Hannah continued and shared her friend's story with me.

Once on a very crowded tube in New york, Hannah's Taiwanese friend was sure that there was a palm sticking on her butt. She turned her head and stared at the man with a firm and serious voice, and said, "Do not touch me." But the guy wore a evil smile and answered with an obscene look, 'Why not?' Then it ended up with Hannah's friend getting off the tube at the next stop embarrassingly.

Hannah and I both felt lucky that none of this kind of thing happened to us. But think even if it does happen, I have my line ready. My advice for Hannah was - Never hesitate to start with the F word and make sure that everyone there knows that his name is wanker.

To Ignore Or Not To Ignore

I am not being too serious about it or taking it too far. I am just trying to value having such a clear and very straightforward chance to decide who can or can not walk into my life.

People may use Facebook for many different purposes. For me, it's all about sharing my PRIVATE life. Maybe I am self-obsessed. But just think it's equally rude for people to be a peeping Tom, make themselves at home in my life but NEVER even try to say hi after I accepted their 'friend' request.

I know there is privacy setting and there is also a button called "delete" in friends list. Trust me, I think some people may have found themselves getting lost on their way to my home now (if they try to.) But there are still some peeping Toms who swear never going to talk to me hiding in my friends list.

This evening I saw a new friend request on my Facebook. It's not at all a stranger. But since I can count with a single hand about how many sincere "Happy birthday!" I have received from the person during the past recent years, I can only assume that this 'friend' will not have the time and the energy to leave a comment when he sees the five-year-old me in my red bikini.

Problems must be solved from the root. Therefore, this time, about my pompous friends list, I decided to take action at the very beginning rather than grumbling and trimming it later.

Sorry! ("Ignore" button clicked.)

The Life-Changing Ten Months

The draft of this entry has been deleted and rewritten many times since I started this blog. Cos just thinking about the still vivid past and the disorientated future often make my fingers spend most their time being in a trance on the keyboard.

From junior high school to university, can't explain how my compass and my eyesight worked. The direction and the sign of my future were always clear to me - no professional or technical school, but high school, and then university and will definitely not choose English as my major.

None of my parents' opinions were involved at all. Not that I totally ignored their opinions. It's just I never really felt I would need them to tell me which way to go. It's like my everyday walk from home to school. On the way, attention and time could easily be distracted and wasted, but the crucial turn was just hard to be missed. It was as simple and nature as that. And the future even became more specific when I was at uni - to become a lawyer, just like most of my law school friends.

But after uni, the compass was somehow lost. And also, soon I suffered from one of the downsides of getting older - gradually deteriorating eyesight. Things became vague and it even got worse when I started my first and only full-time job I have had so far.

In 2005, I had my second job interview after only graduated from uni in a very short time. I remember I was trapped in a fancy library for about three hours to finish a paper test and for another 40 minutes for an interview. Finally, I left the impressive building with a free, cold and skinny chicken sandwich as lunch and an offer to work as a paralegal from next Monday.

It never occurred to the smug that it would turn out to be the longest and the darkest ten months of her life.

If people want to quickly get a picture of our life in the law firm. I will highly recommend the film, The Devil Wears Prada. For the people who haven't watched it, especially guys, I can assure you that it's not another chick flick. It's a documentary or a mental war film based on a true story!

Not sure it's the devil in my office acting on the silver screen, or simply just one of the many other devils in this world. One thing for sure about the common feature of the devils is a harsh tone and an icy look. And conventionally, even with the mahogany door firmly closed, it can still be loud and clear when the devil is yelling at someone in her office.

Moreover, under the devil's ruling, the clock ticked with a different sound. Time flies one hour a unit in the office to meet the format of the timesheet. Every entry of the timesheet must also accompany an equivalent work product. For example, 1079-01 0.2 Telephone conference with the officer of Patent Office about the patent application. It means I spent 12 minutes discussing a patent application for Client No. 1079-01. And the equivalent work product will be a short telephone conference report recording the conversation about it. This is how we charged our big company and celebrity clients with an hourly-rate bill. By how many chargeable hours we can provide from our own timesheet, it proves our value to the law firm.

There were times I worried about having an easy working day, since it would be difficult to fill the timesheet and come out with evidence to show how much I am worth.

In the law firm, 'freedom is slavery' is really being believed, since you will have your freedom once you become one of the senior partners. So, before achieving that, we have to endure being watched. By the devil. Through the timesheet.

Think people will still never get to imagine how tense our life could be, even when I share the private fact that Kevin, a junior lawyer, once shown me he got two coin-big areas on the back of his head that had no hair and I had already got my period missing for three months with no medical explanation then.

You may raise a question by now : why didn't you just quit if it's that stressful and painful? The answer is plain by looking at the past from now - cos I wasn't permitted. Not because of my supervisor, but myself.

In my generation, we are not only branded as "Generation Y" but also called "The Strawberry Generation" in Taiwan. The latter especially means an irresponsible generation that can't stand with pressure and will easily run away from challenges.

Turning in a resignation somehow meant to me was to admit my own failure and the rest of synonyms, to admit I was heavily knocked down with no teeth left in my mouth. Not to mention I would also be misunderstood and associated with the bad name that I always despise. Besides, it just wasn't that easy when you discovered and tried to face that the life was totally different from what you had pictured at uni. Hence, that's one of the reasons why I took an entrance exam to study for a master degree - to justify my resignation.

Luckily, I passed the exam and successfully got rid of the devil. But my dim future started to haunt me since then. To light the way to my future, I understand I need to be honest with myself and carefully listen to what I really want from my soul. But the process of it is like to consciously operate for myself.

It feels like I have to cut through every layer of my own skins, tissue and then bravely deep down to my bones to find out which cell or nerve goes wrong to blur my vision and also make me come up with so many questions : why can't I just like those 'normal' people who think some things will still be the same when you do it at the age of sixty after retire with my pension? And why can't I just accept that it will be a shortcut to things I want as long as I suffer for a relatively short time? Why am I being so serious about this? Why can't I be quiet not to ask so many questions? Why... Why.... And why.....?

While still being at the early stage of the operation, I think it is still too early to claim my breakup with law. The only two preliminary discoveries are : (1) Law firm will be the last choice of my future working place. (2) I am really not a pushover. I need MORE convincing answers than others about the questions above.