Home

Sleepless: I just don’t feel drowsy at all and lie awake all night for days. Clueless: Maybe it’s the tea you drank, or you staring at the computer screen for too long, or your anxiety. Wait, just blame the pandemic. Sleepless: I stopped tea or coffee last month. Zero caffeine … Continue reading Sleepless Vs. Clueless →

I have this long running unofficial “feud” with two assistants in the local Barnes & Noble. Once they even sent a temp they hired–a college student of Asian descent–to ask me “can I help you”, the polite greeting with the purpose of driving me away from a display table of … Continue reading Love As A Way To Live Our Lives →

That’s me, trying to get to the store to buy the carrot cake dessert hummus–the best healthy food invention in my opinion– but made a wrong turn. And you know if you make a wrong turn in a town like Edison, it will take you twenty minutes to correct it. … Continue reading Saturday Morning Idiot →

“What are you doing? Drinking tea from a bowl? That’s … unbelievable.” “What are you doing? You eat your ice cream with hot tea?” This was many years ago when I was a graduate student. I had two roommates. Since I can’t give away too many details, let’s just say … Continue reading Tea For Positivi-Tea →

M gets most of the information about his family member from the social media. M’s son and his girlfriend work in a city several hundred miles away from here. For some reasons, M and his wife had some unpleasant verbal exchange with their son a while ago. The next thing … Continue reading Social Media Family →

Every time I go to Menlo Park Mall, I would visit my favorite item, to see, to touch, to feel its perfection. It’s hanging proudly in Nordstrom, an expensive store. A silk long sleeved pajamas with matching silk pants, which I can’t afford. It’s been there for quite a while, … Continue reading From The Humble Worms →

This is what you do when you aspire to read a lot but in reality you are a slow reader–make an ambitious plan to make yourself feel good and then turn a blind eye to your inability to finish your plan. This is me. It’s like continuously imagining yourself being … Continue reading March TBR →

When the lockdown first started in March, last year, there’s a big rush to buy rice. I thought it’s a little ridiculous, but I still went out and came back with more supply of rice that could be consumed in one year–I didn’t want to see myself left out from … Continue reading Stories Of Rice →

Read before you think. Somebody said this, but I don’t remember who. I don’t think it is achievable. For many of us, we think and make decisions long before we read something about it since we have little time to read every day. Sometimes it is a delay of ten … Continue reading Before You Think →

Remember Hurricane Sandy eight and half years ago? It happened at the end of October. As a typical procrastinator, I’m usually very busy in the last several days of the month. A lot of things were due and I was in half panic mode. Guess what, Sandy hit us hard … Continue reading A Procrastinator →

H went for an interview to get a contractor job and came back a little distraught. It’s a disaster, according to him. I helped him prepare–revising his resume and brushing up his English etc. Well, English is not his first language and the interview is rather important to him. He … Continue reading Over-Preparation →

My friend M called last night from the West Coast that she was being contact traced and had to go for a virus test. It’s all because one business meeting she had, during which they didn’t wear mask and their talk was very long. M has been very careful indeed, … Continue reading She Will Survive →

When Jun Choi was running his mayoral campaign for Edison, New Jersey in 2005, many Asians I knew didn’t vote for him, not because they had anything against his candidacy, but rather due to the fact that they were content with the way things were and saw no need to … Continue reading Politics In Small Town →

Let’s just call him Wai, which is not his real name, and I’ve changed several details so that nobody can recognize him even if they read this blog. However the story is true. I’ve always felt that at least half of my friends are mad, and I think my friends … Continue reading My Unbelievable Friend →

of Taiwan died last week and I just want to tell his story since he is a quirky character. However I have to start with Arjin and her husband, who run a small cell phone store and travel agency in one of the strip malls in Edison. I don’t know … Continue reading The God Of Gamblers →

She was very young, in her twenties, walking right in front of me, pushing a shopping cart full of daily essentials. Suddenly she turned around, looking past me, and said, “Where are you?” I looked around likewise and saw her husband, loitering in a little distance, with two kids in … Continue reading Love Is A Mess →

These are some of the weird things I witness during the winter. People wear sandals barefooted. I know it is indoors, but still it is winter. Now it almost becomes a trend to be barefooted. Too bad my feet are not pretty and I tend to hide them in socks … Continue reading Weird Winter →

We all know those famous witch-hunts in Europe and North America, but there were witch-hunts in Asia too. As far as human absurdity is concerned, no continent is immune. And I am about to describe one of these concerning a pair of star crossed lovers. I promise there’s no gory … Continue reading Leave The Lovers Alone →

Prehistocial man P and H are roasting several big sweet potatoes on a camp fire. Soon it is done. The aroma is irresistible; the skin is charcoaled and broken here and there with tasty sweet texture exposed. It’s a bet. P would circle the tribal ground twice while H is … Continue reading The Argument →