From Malaysia to Me(h)ico...

What's the connection you ask? Well, for those of you who might not commit every exciting blog entry I post to your eternal memory, let me remind you... I was at a wedding last summer in Belfast when one of the guests asked me if I was Malaysian...

And now, faithful readers, my seemingly ellusive ethnic identity is causing Irish people from Dublin to Belfast a surprising amount of confusion...

So. I found myself in the foyer of a large Irish bank, setting up with a local photographer. We were faced with the fun task of shooting the board of directors for an annual report that I'm in the midst of designing. (with a camera!) The execs were late (of course) and my job as "art director" (!) was pretty much sorted so the photographer and I were just chatting away waiting for a bunch o' middle aged peeps with expensive clothes and bad teeth to show their lovely faces for the camera. American politics and culture came up (as it does) as well as Irish immigration (and my place in it.) The photographer asked me about my Irish ethnic background (or lack there of). "You don't have any Irish background, sure ya don't?" and then the hillariousnesss, "You're Mexican right?" I thought he was joking and had a laugh only to realise that he was completely serious... Amazing. I'm kinda loving this exotic new background I've got... It's as if they've never seen anyone with brown hair and eyes... I'm a Mexican-Malaysian-Italian-American mutt... haha.

Oh, and Irish of course. I found myself at Finnbarr's G.A.A. Club in Cabra last night (at some guys 40th birthday party) where I met a guy with the most amazing (!) tatoo I have ever, ever seen! ;) He had quite a beer belly and around the belly button was written in orange, white and green in a celticy-cartoony font, "Made in" (curving above the navel) "Ireland" (curving below the navel.) When he found out I live in Dublin, he was like, "Ah, yer half Irish then," before asking me to dance with him to the a cappella version of "Living on a Prayer" being belted out by a guy with a Tina Turner wig who was part of a two man "cover band" with a propensity for Tiffany and Abba covers. God, if only I had a camera.

Cheers, from the land of Mexican-Malaysian foreigners mingling with girls in gold, spandex dresses hanging out with guys with bad tatoos eating cocktail sausages and pints of cider in North Dublin on a Saturday night. Viva la difference!

The Pursuit of Happiness

January pretty much sucks doesn't it? Christmas and the holiday mad-rush, drinking like a fish and eating like an elephant days are over but it's still dark and cold and here in Ireland, there's not a bank holiday in sight until April.

Maybe because I'm sitting here listening to "Breathe Me," by Sia (that song that's played at the end of Six Feet Under when Claire is driving cross country and everybody dies... ;) ) or maybe it's because Tommy's away in Manchester and I have the house to myself, but I'm feeling so very January today... Introspective and slightly moody and thinking about where I've come from and where I'm going and all that.

Life is so quiet these days. I get up, I go to work. My job no longer gives me a heart-attack the way that freelancing in different offices all the time did. I chat with the co-workers, eat some toast, drink some tea, do some design... I bike home, turn on the heat, cook up some dinner, watch a little channel four wrapped up in a blanket on the couch, perhaps a fire in the fireplace, read a little bit of whatever I happen to be into at the moment, turn on the 'lectric blanket and hit the hay. It's so lovely and comfortable in some ways, but it's also so repetitive and boring as well and the Januaryness of it all just sends me into myself... It's like no matter how old I get, there is still an angsty teenage girl inside me, walking around smalltown America in combat boots, listening to her walkman, all heart and no head, and wondering, "Where is my life going to take me?"

I moved halfway across the world to see if I could make it work and Damn, it actually works. I have created a life for myself that is what you could call successful, happy, fun, all kinds of good things but as is the way, life is life wherever you choose to live it. You still have to get up and go to work and do the laundry and pay the bills. I wonder if we're all just a bunch of junkies in a way... looking for the next emotional fix. If things get too tumultuous than of course, we look for the rock but it seems to me that the reverse is just as true. When things get too quiet, too routine, too mundane, we're not as greatful as we probably should be for the lull, we're off looking for the next challenge, the next adventure, the next heartbreak. We're all a little bit addicted to the drama... or maybe that's just me. ;) Perhaps, I just need a vacation but I suspect that it's in my nature to walk around the streets of my own mind like a teenager with a walkman, to feel things both good and bad in a pretty intense way. Maybe that's the blessing of January... the yearly question to the self, "Where is my life taking me now?" ...and do I actually want to go there?

I hope that all of your Januarys are full of warm cups of tea and long naps and cuddles (and maybe some good Indian take-away and a DVD)...it's another year coming for us all bringing who knows what, for better or for worse and all the rest of it. The ride's beginning again... I suppose the trick is making sure to enjoy it.