be young, be free

Today, walking down the stairway to a train station, I saw a crowd and heard music and yelping. I peeked through the crowd, and there was a bunch of young people of different colors singing and dancing to musical numbers.

They were a group from the US called The Young Americans. I stopped to watch for a few minutes--and ended up staying for half an hour till the end of the performance. I was captured by their energy. Oh, how joyful they were, their voices, their smiles and dancing so powerful!

Joy is contagious.Though the majority of the polite Japanese audience stood still except occasional clapping and picture/video taking on their phones, there were lips curled into smiles, eyes twinkling and giggles as happy as the musical numbers the performers were singing.

And then, there was a sudden urge, to dance, to sing, to laugh and speak English, a language I've somehow been helplessly in love with. I didn't do any of them, but the sentiment was so strong it made me a little teary-eyed as I stood in the crowd, the sound of English words so familiar in my ears.

The performance ended in great applause, and slowly, people began scattering away. I started walking toward the ticket gate, too, and then it occurred to me that it was an urge to let go, to be free. The young performers dancing, enjoying every moment with hope and joy, that sense of being in the present, that's what I was longing for. In an attempt to readjust to my own culture which so far felt rather restricting, I hadn't had that feeling of freedom since I'd come back.

For a moment, I missed California terribly, but then, I decided it wasn't the matter of where. Wherever you are, you can feel whatever you want--hope, joy, you name it--and it's all up to you to create where you want to be, whether that means refusing some restrictions of your own culture if necessary to protect self or bursting into dancing and singing in the middle of a foreign train station building, hooking the busy commuters and spreading joy even just briefly.

Maybe not briefly. The train ride home was a happy one.

Thank you, Young Americans!

eavesdropping

On the bus from work, I encountered four teen girls in soccer uniforms. They were loud and obnoxious, well, at least one of them was. They were all bilinguals, they said. Two spoke Spanish, one Japanese, and the other Korean as their first language. The most obnoxious one keep yelling, "ARIGATO! ARIGATO!"

When the Japanese speaking girl got off the bus (The obnoxious girl: "Bye! ARIGATO!" The Japanese speaking girl: "Doitashimashite...bye!"), the obnoxious girl turned to the Korean speaking one and started questioning her.

"So, Katie, have you kissed a boy?"
Katie mumbled.
"You are lying! Have you had boyfriends?"
Katie said something.
"Really? When? How many?"
"I don't know. I just don't keep counts!" I heard Katie say a bit desperately.
"You don't keep counts? Hah." The obnoxious girl added triumphantly, "I've had boyfriends."

And then they went on to discussing other things like what names cute boys have (they thought every cute boy was named Lucas) and what teachers they had in middle school, invading the whole space with their conversation like a radio show, without caring about if other passengers could hear what they were saying. Or maybe they wanted us to hear, to listen, because their world as it is is full of things that greatly matter to anyone. That confidence, that certainty, that obnoxiousness, I don't have anymore. Ah how I miss being one of them!

why muni rides are fun

I was on the muni the other day. The car was pretty empty, only with a few passengers including me. A young guy with a beard was sitting about six feet away, facing my way, with his earphones on, looking down at the book he held and then around at the other passengers. I turned my eyes away, down on my book. He didn't look dangerous, but could possibly fit in the category of "weird people" who you see wandering around on the streets of San Francisco. They do no harm, but they sometimes talk to you, and if you don't want to be talked to, you better look away.

So I was reading my book, getting into it, almost forgetting about him, then after a few stops he suddenly said very loudly, "Excuse me?"

I looked up hoping he wasn't talking to me, but there was nobody else near him and he was staring straight at me, his earphones now in his right hand. I noticed his ipod, or some other kind of MP3 player, was shiny green-blue. I also noticed that his eyes looked sane, which made me feel relieved despite that I was still a bit uneasy because of the volume of his voice.

Frowning a little, he asked, "What's the capital of Colorado?"

He kept looking at me expectantly. It was my turn to frown, because I didn't know. The question was in fact so unexpected it took me a while to understand it. I shook my head indicating I didn't know.

"What's the capital of Colorado?" he said again looking away from me, toward the back of the car. A guy's voice answered, "Boulder."

"Huh?" the guy said.
"It's probably Boulder."
"Yeah, that's what I thought, but I wasn't sure."

He put his earphones back on and started scribbling in his book.

After coming home, I googled. It was Denver.