A sweet hello

Two years ago I shared my thoughts regularly on WordPress, I thought I’d give it a try this summer once again. This time even more personal as I intend to share more glimpses of my daily life, which is not (in any way) more interesting than anyone else’s. This summer I’ve taken up a 9 to 5 job at a governmental owned company’s Customer Service department. At the end of a workday, I either meet up with a friend for a coffee, go home and make some dinner or hangout with my boyfriend. Between those things, I also try to find slots for an hour or two at the gym. So there’s really nothing spectacular with my life at this moment. 

So you see when you confirm your daily life to be dull and regular, there’s one thing you need to hold on to in order to not be depressed; making the most of the little things. My boyfriend turned 30 this weekend and was away with his friends on a trip he planned a long time ago before we met, so we’ve decided to celebrate his birthday this friday instead. To make it special and memorable, I’ve planned a few things ahead. All he knows is that we’re going to do something, that the two of us is going to spend some time together. I cannot wait for his reactions once he finds out what I have in storage for him. 4h Cruising with dinner onboard with additional perks such as presents and cake (in which parts of the presents are personally made by myself). The big 3-0 hit him harder than he anticipated himself, so my mission is to make him feel younger and less closer to 30. Hopefully this cold and rainy weather will have its turn by friday night, so that neither of us catches a cold or something of that kind.

I must say it’s quite the event of the week! Not that I’m not looking forward to meet all my girlfriends on Wednesday night, but celebrating his 30th birthday is somewhat a milestone in life and it will also be the very first birthday the two of us will celebrate together. I never thought being in love with someone who’s a bit older than you will work out as smoothly as it has between the two of us. *Knock on wood* I’m only 22 and yet I feel closer to him than I have ever done to previous boyfriends…Perhaps it’s the fact that he’s significantly older that makes us closer. I don’t think I’ve met someone who hasn’t reacted over the age difference between us. Sure I get that eight years can be a lot, and I would be lying if I didn’t say that I haven’t taken that in consideration as well when we first dated. However, somehow I feel that he’s no more than two or three years older than me when I’m with him. Feels great! 

With this said, I bid you all good evening!

Dislocation

A couple of days ago I dislocated my left shoulder whilst doing sit-ups(!) Let me just assure you guys that that was exactly my reaction. The dislocation of my shoulder is not a very shocking accident, just a year ago the exactly same thing happened, and only a month ago I twisted my shoulder. So basically, ‘shoulder-accidents’ is something I seem to be dealing with on a daily basis…There is no need to go to the physiotherapist when you already know what kind of rehab exercises she will assign you…and there is definitely no need to get an X-ray since I clearly feel that all my bones are in the right places…Hah!

Although it hurt as hell, I am not sorry it happened. I believe everything happens for a reason, right?? And after about four days of nursing this injury I have come to realize a few things I sure would not have, if it was not because of this accident; it is not just my shoulder, but I am dislocated! In my previous post I said I still have no clue of what I want to do for a living, and the only reason I started this blog was to try to find the tools to define me; Michelle Xie…

I have at last figured out that I am dislocated. Very dislocated and far from even be able to define myself with a written paragraph. Today I have found enough tools to create me to sum it up into two sentences; is it a sad and depressing thing, or should I just embrace these two sentences?? I have decided to go with the second choice. I have after all, a life time to find the tools to create the person I want to become. Someday I will even be lucky enough to find someone who will be willing to help me create me and vice versa. So why rush?? Just like the healing of my shoulder cannot be rushed, defining yourself is certainly something you should not rush. If you rush it, you might just risk to dislocate yourself again before you even know it. As they say; time heals almost everything, so give time, some time.

Alive at last

It has been way too long since I last updated my blog with posts or even checked it out! I must admit that I sort of forgot about it…oopps! Not intentionally obviously, I’ve had a lot going on since May. Uni drained me and work caught me. I guess this is just the way life is, for everyone… I will not make any promises about keeping my blog updated, but what I will promise is that once I do post something it will be worth the wait. 

In less than 50 days I will go on a life changing journey all the way to India, Thailand, China and hopefully a few more places in Asia. I will spend my time overseas as a charity worker in India, as a tourist in Thailand and as a student in China. All in all, I will be abroad for seven months! Life changing journey indeed! 

And why do I do this?? Why do not I stay in Uni and choose a major, get a bachelor degree and even a masters degree?? Well, first of all I need to choose a major, and I am already stuck at that point. I still do not know what I want to do, professionally. I have played with the thought of being a teacher; working with children is one of the best thing in this world. Children are not vicious, they speak their mind and they are not complicated. They are what we all (always) call the future, and they still have a lot to learn and grow into. I would love to work with children, however will I challenge myself hard enough if I settle for teaching?? Or should I perhaps work with PR, communication and marketing; work with grown ups and really challenge myself?? Hate to break it to you, but I really have no idea! 

That is why going to India is sort of like a personal experiment; I will work as a teacher in a little village outside Kochi in Kerala, India. The age range of all the children in the school is rather wide (4-15) if not even more! I have not read my teacher’s field manual yet…I will be working in India for a total amount of eight weeks. I will start with six weeks from November 2nd until December 15th, that is because the children have Christmas holiday until January 12th. During those four weeks of holiday I plan to first travel around in India; Goa, Mumbai, New Delhi and of course the Taj Mahal. When it gets close to Christmas I plan to go to Phuket, Thailand and celebrate it with a friend of mine who is also going to be overseas. Once in Thailand all I plan to do is hang out at the beach learning how to surf and scuba dive and just relax. I am pretty sure I will need some days of relaxing at the beach after six weeks of hard work with enthusiastic children! I also would love to go to Vietnam and explore what once used to be Saigon (currently Ho Chi Minh City) and Hanoi, since I am partly vietnamese. And of course I would like to pay my friend a visit in Singapore and in Hong Kong. So after four weeks of travelling around in Asia, I will go back to India for two more weeks of work, before I continue the rest of my journey as a student in Beijing, China for four months! 

So here is the brief itinerary of my life changing journey I am about to go on. I hope that at least one person enjoyed reading this…

Sakura trees

Another beautiful day today, don’t you think?? The Sakura trees(which is shown as my header) have finally bloomed and it’s looking amazing as always. I just finished a class at uni and it was also the very first since my exam last Friday. One more exam and I’m off to London for an entire week with my brother and cousin; a lot of shopping and eating dim-sum in Chinatown, mohaha. It’s literally a shame that we don’t have it here in Sweden!

What I really wanted to share wasn’t my plans for the summer, good god no. How boring wouldn’t that be, right?! No I just wanted to share some thoughts in the spirit of the arrival of the Sakura trees, so here it is.

As the spring comes(which is basically defined when the Sakura trees blossoms) the entire city awakes. It’s as if we’ve been living in our separate dimensions and suddenly when the sun comes, all of us rush into the parks of the city, fighting for a nice spot for some sunbathing. It’s quite ironic. The men walk around topless, the women with short shorts and white transparent tops(okay it might as well be another colour) however you get the point, right?? And love, oh there’s so much love going on! Not that I’m not okay with it, I love that people are loving. My point is that it gets so extremely obvious; those two are in a steady and romantic relationship, that girl and boy are on their first or second date and this couple are in the honeymoon phase. It really gets so very obvious. My question is where have you guys been all winter?! I would love to see this kind of love-action during the winter as well. Best part is that it looks so beautiful and natural when the couples sit by the Sakura trees, can you picture it?! I would personally like that too if you ask me, but on the other hand who wouldn’t…

Bbb!!

Wonderful day is it not?? The sun is shining and the birds are singing hah!

So my exam is finally over and I’m pretty confident that I did good; praying for a B. Kidding, I’m not even that religious! Anyhow I would really like a B on this exam…badly! At this right moment I’m on the metro on my way to dad’s shop to help him out(sort of like working) however I’m sure by the time I finish this post I’ll already be at the shop. Regardless all I wanted to was pay my blog a visit. It’s been a while since and I’m truthfully sorry for this, but since my exam’s over and the next isn’t until June 1st, I have plenty of time to blog and read blogs! And of course not to forget soaking the sun with a cold beer(!) and ice cream. Second thought. Mixing beer and ice cream is perhaps not the greatest idea, so let’s just say soaking the sun and eat ice cream!

Ice cream is way better than beer! Don’t you think?? Believe me when I say I’ve tried to learn how to drink beer but it doesn’t seem to work out…

Honest attempt to just be inspiring…

A couple of days ago I read an article about nurturing creative thinking which was extremely inspiring. The author Puccio talked about the essence of being creative, letting the heart rule, going big, suspending disbelief and never giving up. I just couldn’t help feeling slightly touched by this. I know I’m such a softy! Nevertheless one usually never run into this kind of things unless it’s a line from a cheezy Hollywood production, right?? This is an actual person who publishes it and urges us to do so, not because it’s the right thing to do in life and all that bullshit, but because it’s nurturing for our creative self from a scientific point of view. You didn’t see that coming now did you?? After reading this article I had this crazy idea of using this as an explanation/excuse for living my life just the way I want to; dream big, live big, be big and most of all give much, without second guessing, ever. This is all so much easier said than done. Now, I bet you’ve heard this phrase before, hah. 

Regardless, I honestly hope that I’ll have the opportunity to have a big life. No matter how difficult life is, how many lemon it serves you, I hope I’ll always have the strength to try to make lemonade out of it. I urge you to do the same!

Pointless

I’m strikingly glad today. Don’t you just love the feeling of waking up on the right side and you’re practically invincible. Nothing can get to you. Now this is probably because of my medication, I have these super efficient allergy pills which work like sleeping pills as well. Imagine how great I’m sleeping at nights! Haha. No matter what the reason is, I’m still happy for waking up and be full of energy to do just about anything. I cannot remember if I mentioned a deadline on Thursday, regardless of that I finished my report yesterday. All that’s left is some editing of misspellings and formalia. I’ve spent my entire day at the library catching up some reading, my plan is to start revising for my exam as soon as possible. It is in fact only nine days left! A slight panic attack is in order, haha.

Right now my mind is so full of information it’s practically a challenge to even sit straight up, not to mention blogging! But since I’m on the train on my way home and don’t really have anything else to do, why not write a post right?? Even if it turned out to be a useless and most of all pointless post, it’s sort of better than nothing at all, no??

Since I’m suppose to actually be full of energy and invincible isn’t it suspicious of me to say that my mind is so full I can’t even sit up straight?? All I meant was I’m happy but a little bit tired after all that reading, however you caught that perhaps…

Sticking around

I have a lot of catching up to do! It’s been over a week since I last posted anything and it’s not because of lack of inspiration. On the contrary I’ve had plenty of ideas and thoughts I’d love to share, however I haven’t had time to actually sit down and write a decent post. This upcoming Thursday is the deadline for my assignment and so I have been running around trying to get all the data done and organize everything around it. I still have the report left to finish so all my spare time have been directed to this. Not to mention my college applications for the next semester!

I’d love to say that I will do better from now on, but that would be a lie. After my deadline I have just about a week left before I have an exam. So I will literally be living in the library or study hall at campus trying to knock some information into my brain. What I can promise is that in two weeks my schedule will not be as stressful again and that’s when I can dedicate my spare time for blogging and reading other inspiring and funny blogs!

I think what I really want to say is asking you (well at least the few of you who’s’ actually bothering to read this blog) to stick around. A lot of things is happening in my life right now and I don’t seem to have it structured up. I have to prioritize school otherwise I’ll probably not get a good grade…Is it silly of me to think like this?? If someone were to consider it silly, feel free to tell me so. I’ll still think good grades are important.

When we’re still in the topic of sticking around. I recently made a friend whom I really like and I hope that this friend will stick around for a long long time. Don’t you just love the feeling of making new friends?? I remember when I was younger about ten years old and started at a new school, making friends wasn’t difficult, all you had to do was ask if you could join the girls playing in the school yard. When I started High School twelve of my classmates from Middle School were once again my classmates. All in all I haven’t really made many new friends this past ten years. I guess this is sort of where it starts isn’t it? Now, when we’re out of High School and runs off to Uni or work. This is the time when you make a lot of new friends. Because, what are the odds for your classmates of nine years to go to the same University as you do or work at the same place?? Our paths have gone separate ways and will probably never really unite again. Sure it will cross each other, be we’ll never go the same way as we did in school.

Nevertheless true friends, strong friendships will always survive no matter how different ones path is. You’ll always stick around!

My true friend S whom I’ve known since I was twelve! She lives in Cannes at the moment but we are sticking around by being pen pals!

Happy Easter

Happy Easter you all! Are you guys enjoying yourself with delicious food and easter-cakes?? Or are you just simply having a pleasant time with your family and friends?? Either way, which is more or less the same thing, I wish you all a happy day. I’ve enjoyed myself hanging out with my friends all day long yesterday and last night I spent it at a friends house catching up the last six months. While talking about all sorts of things I realized one thing which made me particularly glad; we are so much more than we think we are.

Michelle and I, I know her name’s Michelle too! Anyways back to my story haha; so the two of us came to the conclusion that we are capable of more than what we think we are, more than what we were taught to be. Back in school, when we were teenagers and poured of hormones we were taught to know our place, we were students and students we should remain. We were to-be-dancers and that we should remain. So now when we’re out of High School we’re freshly graduated, we’re unexperienced dancers and that we shall remain, or at least that’s how it feels like it. Nevertheless there’s so much more to it than just dancing. We can and we are capable to do whatever we put our mind to. That’s how I would like to think. We are so much more than just dancers without a contract, so much more than ‘a high school failure’, there are great things we could experience who doesn’t even have to involve dance. Go to uni, go to work, backpacking in Central America or East- and South Asia, make new friends, meet someone and fall in love. You name it!

All in all, what I’m trying to say is that we are all capable of so much more than what we were taught to do. So don’t just limit yourself only because it’s comfortable and easy for now. And never settle with any less than you’re worth of. We, you can do anything if you put your mind to it and don’t listen to people who’s actively trying to suppress you. Break free from the safety zone and face the things you’re lost in. I promise you, with a little help and luck we’ll all get by just fine in life!

Tonight I’ll continue my ‘easter holiday celebration’ at my Grandmother’s place with my family and cousins, they’ve been on a cruise and will be coming back some time tonight…

The photo was taken in -95  of me and my baby brother A

Spring oh spring for life

Did you know that spring means run in Swedish?? I bet you didn’t! Like I mentioned in my previous post I usually don’t post anything when my mind’s blank. Unfortunately these past couple of days has been those kind of days. But not tonight, lucky you, or actually it’s lucky me!

Spring is as you all perhaps know the time of the year when everything comes alive. I’ve observed all sorts of things and have come to a rather surprising conclusion, okay my conclusion was perhaps not that surprising, but it was slightly breathtaking; not only do the birds starts singing and flowers blooming, but the ‘city pulse’ (at least in Stockholm) changes, I’m not claiming that we’re less stressed out, however there is an obvious change. Maybe we’re more polite and kinder? I don’t know for sure, but there’s something in the air! Nevertheless, wether it’s the increased amount of sun hours per day or the fact that people get nicer when they get rid of all the heavy winter coats, it’s really nice!

I can only speak for myself, but around spring time I usually get so very excited about everything. Not that there’s a reason to be super excited, but I still find everything my friends and family do and say so extremely great and “wow”. I’d like to have spring all year round! No, I’m just kidding…There’s a reason till why there’s summer, autumn and winter as well, right?? Personally my favorite time of the year is probably (well I suppose you’ve all guessed it by now) spring-time. Oh how wonderful it is! Imagine sitting by the lake, soaking the sun with a beer/coffee in your hand and a great novel in the other. It’s not too hot nor too cold, it’s perfect. It’s as if I’m trying to promote a product, I’ll stop it right away.

If there’s anything that’s missing, it’s the Sakura-trees. I think it’s still a couple of weeks more to go, and when those starts blooming…wow you should see the King’s Garden in Stockholm. It’s simply a heaven of pink flowers on earth!