Thursday, July 16, 2009
Stroll
It was a really hot day today. Really really hot.Till mom reminded me in her email that Taipei is currently 35-36 degrees and has been that way since 2 months ago. How did I manage to grow up in that country for 15 years of my life?!
Compared to the frazzle of running around all day running errands and carrying my 10kg-worth of laundry back and forth between home and coin laundry (still, a nicely heated and fluffy towel/sheet makes all the sweat worthwhile), I much enjoyed the nice little stroll home from the station after a long day coming to an end.
A mid-summer night walk beats it all.
Popping in 溝口肇's music with my earphones, I took my time to walk. I walked past the 24-hr RH, the Doutor that I only occasionally visit ('cuz the smoke always drives me out of the door within 40 min), the bakery where I like to get a freshly baked mellon-pan, the Korean obento-ya that I recently started to frequent more after a long day of working, the supermarket that (thank god) opens till 11pm, the yoga club that I haven't visited for almost a month.
Then the Taiwanese dinning place - not necessarily a hole-in-the-wall place but certainly a ma and pop store - where I too have become one of the 常連さん. Perhaps due to the heat, the two pans of door were slid half open tonight, and the small, 10-person country was almost full. I could see A-san busy fixing someone and O-san quickly filling up a pitcher of nama-biru. I could also see the little haze created by M-san's chain cigarette smoke and heard bits and pieces of laughter from someone trying to tell a funny story. I decided not to stop by for a quick 挨拶; with such a nice summer night breeze out, I'd rather leave the party undisturbed inside.
Out of the blue, I thought about my friends from Penn - T my then little brother and M now his wife; J helping A fold up her laundry like what real bro's and sis's would do; my Argentine roommate J who gave me my very first salsa lesson; A my first Thai roommate whom I'd never seen an angry thought crossing her mind. The Sept showers that blew my umbrella away and wetted all my freshly purchased textbooks; the snowstorm night trekking through half a campus trying to make it to b-study; many many 10:20am rushing down locust walk with only half of my Japanese vocab list memorized; and many many more late-night study time with coffee from X at S study hall.
How did those bits and pieces of memory suddenly appeared in mind? I'm not sure. But knowing that I can somehow recall them with crystal clear images years later offers nothing but sweet comfort.
Perhaps one day, I will be talking a walk somewhere, on a cool summer night, with some warm summer breeze blowing and roadside scenes entertaining to watch. Then, I'll think of tonight, this night when I walked down this little 商店街 in west Tokyo and past a one-bar-large TW restaurant, and realize how much I've been blessed by God to have travelled this far. Despite loneliness sometimes, yes, and despite the unknown certainty of where the next stop may be.
I looked at my songlist on the iPhone - 「ふたり」, the song name reads. A really really song.
梅ちゃん at 12:19:00 AM
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Equipping
At school, I was given the greatest time and wildest space to think, to ponder, to contemplate, to wrestle, to write, to listen to my own voice and the voice of others. I wrote a lot, reflected a lot, struggled a lot, but remained hopeful despite periodic restlessness and constant questioning of the meaning of it all.Now in Tokyo, I've thrown into the world of reality - both work for a future career and work for the present daily living; stress of dealing with a foreign language and living like a foreigner in a gigantic city; the physical challenge of pushing through walls of people on any given platform or roaming across half a city at any given time of the day; the encountering of people beyond school walls and handling of the most guarded, less transparent, further convoluted human relationships. I got to see a lot, experienced a lot, shocked and surprised and rebuked if not offended a lot more. In the end, I come back to a house of darkness with a beat-up body that is too tired to write up much.
But the mind never stops running.
I hope this is just the process of finding a better place between ideals and reality, between what is to be hoped for and what is to be practical for. To find that exact shade of color between the blacks and whites.
I feel like the real battle has yet to begin. But I hope that at least I am more and more equipped when the real battle comes.
梅ちゃん at 1:54:00 AM
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
Makes me wanna sing ...
永遠にともにコブクロ
心が今とても 穏やかなのは この日を迎えられた意味を
何よりも尊く感じているから
特別な事など何もない ただ いつもより少し
シャンとした服を着てるだけ 君はとても綺麗だよ
何かといつも忙しく まだまだ想い出は多くないけど
やっとここから踏み出せる未来
始まりの鐘が 今 この街に響き渡る
共に歩き 共に探し 共に笑い 共に誓い
共に感じ 共に選び 共に泣き 共に背負い
共に抱き 共に迷い 共に築き 共に願い
そんな日々を描きながら…
気付かぬ間に二人 似たもの同士 仕草も笑い顔も
そこに生まれくる命には 何よりも尊い 二つの光を
ぶつかり合う時も来るさ 綺麗な事ばかりじゃないだろうから
全てを君と越えてゆくと決めた
始まりの鐘の音を いつまでも忘れない
偶然という名の運命 そんな出逢いだからこそ
何気ない瞬間を 今日からは かけがえのない瞬間に
共に歩き 共に探し 共に笑い 共に誓い
共に感じ 共に選び 共に泣き 共に背負い
共に抱き 共に迷い 共に築き 共に願い
ささやかな幸せが 木漏れ日のように
やわらかに降り注ぐ そんな日々を描きながら…
いつの日も どんなときも
梅ちゃん at 12:24:00 AM
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Tail end of June Madness
An old Chinese song once sings the loneliness and emptiness that one feels after glamor and applause received. As all busyness of June madness finally enters its tail end, both relief and a tint sense of void settle their way in.Life goes through such an interesting cycle - sometimes it's nothing more than months of mundane rhythm and work routine yet suddenly disrupted by events and surprises, whether long-waited or unexpected, good or bad. While work increased its load by folds this month visitors from abroad also come on board one after another. A message left on facebook by a Thai friend met during junior-year abroad in Kyoto suddenly lent me a chance to sip wine and nibble finger food on top of marunouchi building. Part of the conversation went like this - "No, I'm not dating and I'm seriously considering freezing my eggs ..." "You what? Freeze what?" "Yah, my eggs. But of course, they are VERY EXPENSIVE." 5 years ago had gone by since I saw her last.
Then another out-of-town guest who once was my 4th-year Japanese classmate also showed up out of the blue and announced that he is going to start his Ph.D. degree. "Ph.D.? Geez, when I first met you you were merely a frosh in college and now you're entering academia like me while my title/status has remained the same. " Is it he who has grown or just that I have not progressed much further?
Sometimes you don't see the effect of the elapse of time on you until you see the effect of that onto others. I continue to discover new wedding/bridal shower/baby shower news not via email or mail but via updates on facebook. I see myself having a second of confusion when spotting a familiar yet unfamiliar name on facebook, only to realize a second later that it was the change of last name (of course always on the woman's end ever) that puzzled me. Or I receive occasional updates/newsletters in email and that grayish/black a ultrasound picture of a hard-to-figure image shocked me at first to realize I am seeing a new life in front of me, via the computer screen.
2 weeks ago I was sitting in the theater watching 「60歳のラブレター」and one scene could not leave me for days. After a disastrous dinner at home with her date and his teenage daughter, the female novelist protagonist sat on her garden patio overlooking the Tokyo city in glimmering night lights and just chain smoked. Then, she went inside, lay on the couch, put on her headphones, and just went into deep thinking, with 2 bottles of red beside her.
「私はモテないんです ... 仕事ができるから」, she said, to her prospective date, a medical doctor whose wife passed away years ago.
But to me, she is メチャクチャモテる. A woman whose intellect, sensibility, and humor could jump onto pages and transform themselves to beautiful words and phrases that move the hearts of millions.
But do those things need to come at the expense of personal happiness? Or does a woman's intellect and sensibility have to be a thing to be afraid of than adored? A soul that wrestles with the hardness of life yet yields not an inch to such hardness something of trouble than treasure?
The upside of all is that all 3 couplehood end on a good note at the end. In reality, though, how many stories could end on a good note before it's too late?
梅ちゃん at 12:40:00 PM
Saturday, May 09, 2009
Gotta Believe
This oldie from the late 90's just flew from this random iTunes radio station, and I found myself caught in a sudden, contemplative if not slightly melancholic mood.(and yes, it's more than just b/c I just came back from emptying a bottle of red with 2 friends who encouraged me to finish my last 10 meters of the 100-meter dash ... only God knows why I even got myself into the race in the first place)
That night at A's house. Was it the 2nd semester of junior year or our first semseter of senior year? Anyhow, it was one of those Friday nights when A's grandma cooked us, once again, another delicious meal (of course, including our best time favorite and one of her specialities - 紅燒黃魚) and the grandma herself had emptied 3 shots of 紹興 while going over glorious years of her youth back in ... was it China? or 浙江 more specifically?
Yes, it was after all such Friday night dinner routine at A's with her lovely grandma (and occasionally with her shy but L.H. Wang-like younger brother who was just a middle-schooler then but is about to get married in a few months ...) that the 4 of us - nicely showered and changed into our PJ's - start the late-night DVD watch (oh wait, maybe it was still back in the VHS era? how come I can't remember that particular fact anymore?).
And when our lovely, youthful dreams, hopes, and aspirations started to fill our heads with such colorful bubbles of snapshots of the future that we were SO confident that once this stage of life is over, there is BOUND to be a more glorious future ahead.
That somewhere down the road, one of us will be living in an exciting city like NYC.
Or that one of us will meet a G. Clooney-like "the one" and receives showers of blessings from the rest of the 3 at the age of 26 perhaps but certainly no later than 28.
Or that one of us will become that successful working women plus working mom plus working wife who accidentally has the gracefulness of M. Pfeiffer.
Or that just all of us will end up having all of the 3 things above.
Yeah, we were so happily and amazingly and enviously - from the current perspective - confident.
More than a decade later -
Yes, one of us is living in an exciting metropolis like NYC except that this metropolis is even greater and grander in both scale and glamour (and perhaps for its sheer busyness) that it sometimes does more work of drawning one than elevating one.
Yes, one of us has met a steady BF though not necessarily with the looks of G. Clooney nor does she know if he could yet be that Mr. One.
Yes, two of us has successfully received their doctoral/MBA degree respecitvely and started a career that will mostly likely take off nicely in the soon future. But no motherly/wifely status yet. Not even close.
And no, nobody has gotten "all of the above".
But I somehow hope (or wish?) that that happy confidence still remains in some of us, if not all.
That's one of the things that I've managed to cling tight to my heart tonight while emptying this bottle of red and going on to a second Gin Lime with my pals.
Sometimes - I've just gotta believe that something new - and hopefully great - WILL happen the next day. Not the day after, the next week, or the week after. But tomorrow. Tomorrow.
I've gotta believe.
Like the way I used to.
梅ちゃん at 10:46:00 PM
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Do as the Nomad Does
Most of the time, it's a blessing. But sometimes, it feels like a curse.A deadly one.
This whole thing about being "cosmopolitan" or a "global villager" or "a transnational nomad."
B/c unless you are meeting another cosmopolitan, another global villager, another transnational nomad, most of the time you find yourself trapped in one of the 2 following situations:
1) You are stepping on other people's toes in a foreign land, because your brain-full and heart-full of wonderful experiences with border-crossing or global roaming start giving you the illusion that you could make alternative suggestions to others b/c you've seen things done in a different way. But after opening up your big mouth trying to make such suggestions with enthusiasm and excitement, you find others tossing you a cold stare, shrugging indifferently, or simply avoiding eye contact with an evident frown on top. "When in Rome, do as the Romans do," others say.
So you shut up.
You have to. 'Cuz you are just a beginner in face of a brand new culture that has been in place for hundreds if not thousands of years.
2) You are stepping on your own toes in your own home country, because, again, your brain-full and heart-full of wonderful experiences with border-crossing or global roaming start giving you the illusion that you could make alternative suggestions to others b/c you've seen things done in a different way. But after opening up your big mouth trying to make such suggestions with enthusiasm and excitement, you too find others giving you a weird look, carrying on their own activities, or simply looking straight into your eyes and say - in a tongue that is familiar to you and considered your mother tongue - "Where are your roots, kid? To whom do you pay your loyalty?" they question.
So again, you shut up.
As if all the years of being away and missing a certain aspects of the common educational or upbringing experience with the rest of your fellow countrymen have rendered you incapable of speaking or judging or uttering a personal opinion.
In either situation, you find yourself always playing the role of a guest, the language student, the quiet listener, the humble learner. You ask too many questions but nobody ever asks you a question. You are always playing catch-up while others sit around comfortably with their circle of friends, families, established communities and well-acquired cultural customs and habits.
But you are more than a language student, a quiet listener, a humble learner. You are who you are and you could be just as vocal and opinionated and well adapted with all sorts of habits/customs like anyone else.
Except that, because there is no physical country or one particular linguistic tradition that defines who you are - people don't need to apply for a passport and get a visa sticker and purchase a long-distance flight ticket to get to WHERE YOU ARE, they forget that, sometimes, the same rule - "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" - applies.
That is - when talking to a transnational nomad, do expect him/her to make alternative suggestions and ask a lot of "why" questions or speak in a mixed accent. Because where the nomad is coming from - though that place isn't called Rome or whatever city/country you name it on this planet - that too is nomad's everyday life, just as valid as the everyday life that you are most familiar with.
The nomad comes to meet others at their country or territory. But since one can't technical go to where the nomad physically belongs - b/c a nomad has no physical home or that physical space can no longer be defined by a particular colored surface area on a map - one could treat such an encounter as traveling to where the nomad is from (wherever that may be).
So that the same rule - "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" - should apply.
"When meeting a nomad, do as the nomad does".
You see now how hard that could be?
梅ちゃん at 12:53:00 AM
Monday, March 09, 2009
Theory of Compromise - What Do You Say?
One of those nights last month when I was home in Taipei, when I was up reading late in the evening, a quote from 龍應台's 「孩子你慢慢來」shook me hard:「没有经歷過生養過程的女性主義者們 - 請問，關於女性，你們到底能告訴我什麼？」(= "To all you feminist theorists out there- please tell me, without having gone through childbirth and childcare, what can you tell me about being a woman?"; disclaimer: paraphrase from mere memory, subject not to precision examination).
Then there's the picture of Long herself standing in front of a full wall of books on feminism, her back facing the viewer/the photographer. It looks like a picture taken at a bookstore by someone without her consciousness (prob. her husband then).
Tonight, reading another literary critic's comments/analyses/criticisms on someone's poetry, I want to ask a very similar question - "To all you literary critic out there- please tell me, without having engaged any creative writings, what can you tell me about literature, creativity or literary consciousness?"
Sigh.
Regardless of how a feminist may analyze or criticize or go off to embark whatever ground-breaking theory on femininity/feminism out there, at the end of the day, I wonder if she could really shake off the sense of fatigue - both physically and emotionally if not mentally - and weariness if not sheer pain that she feels when the next period visits. Or after coming home after a whole day of whatever dazzling public lectures/conference roundtable discussions, she could literally go back to a dark and human-less (maybe not animal-less 'cuz more likely she'd have a cat/dog/hamster/goldfish as company) home, and be the first one - and the only one - to switch on the light.
Yet how many women would endure a loveless partner or stay in an obligation-bound marriage simply for the sake of not being that first - and last - person to switch on that light when the dusk falls, room grows empty, and yet another lone night awaits ahead?
Many. Many many many, I believe.
Life is never about the ideal but often a compromise among many compromises. The compromises in turn make that one and only ideal, or passion, or dream shine like a bright star in the darkest hours, one that gives one motivation, hope, or another reason to go on.
Yet it's ideal only because too many compromises have been made and need to be made.
Without darkness, the star would never seem to be shining as bright; with everything ideal turning out real, we would not find a reason to continue to strive forward.
Hopefully, most of the times, it's a compromise closer to ideal.
Theorists and critics - what can you tell me about making "compromises"? The fact that I cannot stop my next period from coming and not wanting to go home and be the first one to switch on that light yet do have a brain that has the capacity of reasoning and logic, ambitions to bring out some positive change to the world, pride to succeed, awareness and ability to be independent, but also - yes, BUT ALSO - a heart that melts away when I see a mom and a daughter - literally jumping and skipping and beaming in smiles and excitement - waiting in line at the bakery for a celebration cake for hina-matsuri celebration?
And when my biological clock IS ticking everyday, and the number of healthy and viable eggs for producing a next generation of physically healthy and mentally sounding (and socially constructive from the viewpoint of the country) is literally depleting as we speak?
(yes, adoption is a viable and good option that I am fully aware of, thank you very much. but I also would like to keep my options open.)
What do you say, my theorists and critics?
梅ちゃん at 12:48:00 AM
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Cease, cease all Q's
I suppose one can not - and should not - look back to the past and ask the question, how life could have been different or might have turned out if one had decided to stay or not to leave. Because at the end of the day, the very present place and state of mind where one finds him/herself in is, in every way, shaped and determined by the core of that question - the fact is, one has left and decided not to stay and to move on to something different.So though nostalgia is inevitable, one can only mentally lives through nostalgia but not physically. 'Cuz physically, it would no longer be nostalgia but reality.
And the reality, again, has forever been changed by that decision to leave, to not stay, and to go on to the next stage or take that next step towards a different state of being life.
For whatever there is to lose, there must be something to gain. I've lost a past but have gained the present - for better or for worse - which then will lead to a future, for better or for worse. A different future, of course, than a future that "could have" been had I chosen otherwise. But then, had I decided not to leave, would life not become forever living in the past as the present would not differ much from the old and the familiar and thus, ultimately, look no more than just a more current version of the past?
"Nomad Philosophizing" - Where is "the next" going to be? And when? she asks.
Or perhaps a true nomad would simply cease all questions and simply be. Because the present is already in constant flux, and such flux has already, in some ways, determined the future.
But she can't stop, cannot cease asking. With an incontrollable urge to keep asking and keep searching, she uncontrollably takes off and leave.
The future is already embedded in the present, she tells herself, so rest in peace, my soul, and cease all questions, at least for awhile.
Trying.
Trying hard.
Trying really really hard.
At least for awhile.
梅ちゃん at 3:04:00 AM
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
35 million vs. 1/35 million
“May-yi wishes every night that the next day does not come. (as well as the train rides and cold, sleepy, zombie-like faces during those train rides).“I can't believe that's what I just wrote as my latest status on facebook.
I think it's a clear sign for one thing - I've had enough of Tokyo.
Tokyo oh Tokyo ... The city that I once wished I could trade anything for (i.e. during those miserable, winter nights in Cambridge trying to cram yet another 50-page academic jargons in my head), even just for a day, a night, an hour or a second. All those hours sitting in my Cambridge apartment, looking out into the gloomy, grey sky outside (or looking at the endless blue exam books yet to be graded or pages of small print yet to be consumed - powerlessly yet tearlessly), reminiscing about that day of transit from Taipei to Tokyo (or was it the other way around?), volunteering myself to get on the next flight out in order to win a free round-trip ticket within Asia and a free night stay near Narita Airport.
Of course, the bigger lure than a free round-trip ticket was simply a 2 or 3-hour quick visit to Shinjuku and a delicious meal in an izakaya with friends sandwiched b/t two 2-hour train rides back and forth b/t Narita and Tokyo.
67 km - that's the distance b/t Narita and Tokyo. "Insane!", I thought, the first time when I saw that on a freeway signboard to Narita.
And you consider that the closest int'l airport serving a city of 35 million people?
Is it the figure "67 km" more daunting or "35 million"?
That's how Tokyo - or Japan, one may say - begins to crack one's mind.
萧红 Xiao Hong/Hsiao Hung (given that I've been reading too much about her lately) once had a short, 4-month stay in Tokyo as a temporary getaway from troubles back home. In one of her letters to her husband 萧军, she wrote the following:
「這裡短時間住住則可，把日語學學，長了是熬不住的。若留學，這裡我也不贊成。日本比我們中國還病態，還乾苦（枯），這裡沒有健康的靈魂，不是生活。中國人的靈魂在全世界中說起來，就是病態的靈魂。到了日本，日本比我們更病態。既是中國人，就更不應該來到日本留學，他們人民的生活，一點自由也沒有。一天到晚，連一點聲音也聽不到，所有的住宅都像空著，而且沒有住人的樣子。一天到晚歌聲是沒有的，哭笑聲也都沒有。夜裡從窗子往外看去，家屋就都黑了，燈光也都被關於板窗裡面。日本人民的生活，真是可憐，只有工作，工作得和鬼一樣，所以他們的生活完全是陰森的。中國人有一種民族的病態，我們想改正它還來不及，再到這個地方和日本人學習，這是一種病態上再加上病態。我說的不是日本沒有可學的，所差的只是他的不健康處也正是我們的不健康處。為著健康起見，好處也只得丟開了。」
一針見血。The unnerving thing is - this was written almost 80 years ago. 80 years later, I found this passage still speaks loudly of what's going on in nowadays Japan.
Except maybe the part that says, 「一天到晚歌聲是沒有的」, b/c one certainly can find enough drunken salarimen exploding their lungs off in a karaoke box. But Xiao Hong is still half-correct there - at the end of the day, the singing is "contained" in a "box" - a karaoke box - not outdoor, not in a park, in an office, in an elevator, or even the public bath.
What the heck is going on with this place?
「我說的不是日本沒有可學的」- Agreed, b/c every time I walk through a office building+shopping plaza+5-star hotel+service apartment complex like Midtown or take an elevator up another mind-blowing architectural beauty like the Mitsui building or catch the right train safely on the dot or bring home a cake considerately packaged in a state of "immobility" so that every fruit on top stands perfectly in place and every artistic embellishment stays perfect intact aside, I can't help but PRAISE this country for all its incomprehensible dedication to perfection, punctuality, meticulous detail, and relentless pursuit for quality.
On the other hand -「為著健康起見，好處也只得丟開了」- Now, this is where things start to get personal and when one begins to fall into a dilemma b/t saying, "agreed," and "agreed, but ..." (e.g., "agreed, but there is a way out ..."; "agreed, but it's not always true ..."; "agreed, but I'm a foreigner so I don't always have to abide to the same rule ..."
(more and more, the very last "agreed, but ..." just doesn't seem to be working anymore).
A few weeks ago, during many of my flea-market-like MRT rides in Taipei - thanks to the non-stop, cacophony of a thousand different ring tones next to me, in front of me, a few meters away from me, also thanks to people's mind-not-your-neighbor type of festive talkativeness (maybe attributed by 9 consecutive national holidays??) - I was missing Tokyo S-OOOO B-A-D.
Missed was the insane silence in even some of the most insanely packed trains during rush hour Tokyo, the silence that allows one to get through the schedule of the day in head before heading out to another long work day.
Missed too was the contagious mind-not-your-neighbor's-business attitude that pervades in the air, allowing one to maintain some kind of privacy or concentration on whatever that's at hand.
Further missed was the clean public bathrooms, warm toilet seats, dry sink area ('cuz people have the etiquette of not mindlessly shaking washed hands in the air but applying handkerchieves), and the considerate design of a makeup area where ladies don't have to fight over the same mirror with those who are doing their washing business when doing some powder/lipstick retouch.
MIssed most, perhaps, was the unfailing good taste of almost any restaurant/cafe/beer house/one-counter bar. No pre-made pasta, microwave-prepped stew, overly refrigerated cheese cakes, water downed wine, or beer with ice. Nor grouchy serving staff.
Yet, third week into coming back to Tokyo, on a jam packed, 10pm train ride home, a new thought hit me - I'd trade anything for a genuine smile from the heart (even if it's flirtatious), a quick exchange of a few words (who cares if it's just about the weather), or a sudden crack of a good laugh (b/c both acknowledge each other's suffering from hay fever!) when two human beings cross their eyes.
But I almost forget - in this country, people don't cross their eyes or exchange glances despite how close of a distance they find themselves against other human beings. Because that, too, seems to be an inconceivable skill of everyday survival that all Japanese have learned to master, well to the level of perfection.
In a city of 35 million people. And me, one among the 35 million.
Which one is more daunting - 35 million or 1/35 million?
梅ちゃん at 12:41:00 AM
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
南國的家
回到台灣幾天之後一位東京的好友來訪。為盡地主之誼，帶她走訪公館淡水師大夜市西門町外加101展望台。一日，走到台大門口，我倆都被那蔚藍的天空和底下相稱極為優雅的椰子樹所吸引，在台大的大門口拍起了相片。透過數位相機看著高大的椰樹搖曳在湛藍的天空下，不知為何我突然想起篇篇有關日人如何為了滿足他們對於台灣這個所謂「南國」的想像，而在當年的「帝國大學」中種下椰子樹之舉之學術文章。無論這所謂的南國想像是否成了後人爭論殖民或後殖民的一個證據，老實說，在20度出頭的溫暖冬陽下，誰能不會為那一棵棵隨風搖曳的椰子樹感到一絲絲的感動呢？畢竟該是個冰天雪地，臘梅盛開的寒冬啊。
（學術，有時就是這麼的無聊。 ）
然而，從零度上下的東京回到這個所謂「家鄉」的我，又如何能免不了像當年的日人一樣，開始對台灣有著些許的「南國」想像呢？ 畢竟，從每天電車無時無刻不擠爆，上班族身著清一色黑色西裝，暗色呢絨外套，排格式羊絨圍巾，晚餐時間平均在九點半以後才開始的忙碌東京生活回來的我，看到台大師大附近各個咖啡酒館悠閑散坐著的台北年輕人們，實在是迷惘了。
咦，where goes the 3pm housewife-gang?
經濟不是挺不景氣地？
特別是當公車給我「尖峰時間12-15分鐘一班；離峰時間20-30分鐘一班」的時候，然後處處的公厠堂而皇之地被小學時代掃除時間就日日使用的傳統型掃把拖把和抹布給霸佔的時候。
還是在殘障人士專用的那一間哩！輪椅如何能推的進去呢？我很納悶。
更別論女性厠所中馬桶坐墊永遠是沒有掀下來的。明明就沒有男生在使用啊。
因為女生也沒有在使用。包括我自己。
還有當碰到賣著各式各樣比利時啤酒的時尚咖啡館的服務人員和我說：「換桌的話要自己搬盤碗喔！」，然後在我正色抗議並解釋「若是客人自己端咖啡蛋糕茶水時不小心打翻了或是濺到鄰桌客人的時候，要麻煩收拾的還不是貴咖啡館嗎？」的時候，正眼都不瞧我一眼，冷冷地對我說，「那我們的規定就是這樣啊〜」的服務小姐。
（還有在扯謊說店主今天就是不在，而她看起來就像是店主的時候 ...）
10年以前，那個才從高中畢業，帶著滿滿的興奮和不安要離家到地球的另一端去求學的我，難道就沒有碰過如此的服務人員，不掀下去的馬桶坐墊，堆滿了掃把拖把和抹布的公厠，和等了20多分鐘還是不來的公車嗎？
當然有。
特別是當年還沒有專賣比利時啤酒的時尚咖啡館，到哪兒都一刷可通的悠遊卡，及半數以上提供卷筒紙並開始注重芳香劑的公厠。
可是，當年的我，好像鮮少為了如此芝麻綠豆的小事冒火。更無所謂「南國想像」的情懷。
是我自己變了，還是家鄉變了？
曾幾何時自己的家鄉成了一個地處南方的悠哉小島，凡是「不要太計較」（媽媽如是安慰著 ...）日子就可以過的不錯的天堂，而自己變成一個從北國而來，啥事都抱著副正經八百，幾乎吹毛求疵態度的過客？
在一個該是屬於自身最隱秘的空間裡，我感覺到的，是無限的尷尬。尷尬的不只是那沒有掀下來的馬桶蓋（should I even mention 那就擺在眼前，一個個沒有卷好的女性生理用品？），還有自己在看到如此場面時，說不出的愕然。
當然，絕大多數的時候，我完成在那隱密空間裡該發生的活動，然後理好衣物，當做甚麼都沒發生似地離開，繼續我時尚的消費，和友人鋪天蓋的談論，或是享譽全球的美食的品嘗。
可是，在那個最隱秘的地方和最私密的時候，我感覺到的，仍舊是滿臉通紅的尷尬。
（今天在另一高級公厠，隔壁那位每十天必須做一次臉的太太，足足地在那隱秘空間裡講了5分鐘電話 ... 還將話筒那端兒男性友人的回應用 speaker phone 與全公厠之女性同胞分享！）
在這個所謂（南國）的家。
「想像」，總讓許多不美好的事變的美好，也讓許多本無法容忍的地方，變得可愛。
可我似乎對這個南國的家，還是少了一點想像。
梅ちゃん at 2:22:00 AM