I doubt anyone even read that hideously long Chicago recap, but hey! I'll need it to remember all the fine details someday. And now I shall continue.

Sunday, July 20, 2008

Bright and early, Sarah and I set off for Northwestern, which, though only 14 miles away, takes quite a while to get to. We were one of the only ones on the train, except for a couple (and I use that term solely numerically), who, as soon as they got on the train with their cart full of the same, neon-coloured shopping bags and their ragged jeans and bad accents, epitomized the words, "white trash." And that comes from Sarah, because I don't really know what "white trash" looks like. The girl was extremely skinny and extremely pale, with a shirt that kept riding up above her belly button and a tattoo on her neck. The guy was dressed in holey flannel and looked distinctly in need of a bath and a shave. They spent the entire time arguing, and the man kept addressing the woman in a completely patronizing tone, such as when she told him something, he would always YELL, "WELL WHY DIDN'T YOU SAY THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE?" and "WELL I WAS DOING IT, WOMAN!"
I thought, listening to them (and it's not eavesdropping if they're so loud you can't help hearing them), "Wow... that must be the world's most unhappy marriage," until after they got off the train and Sarah, the expert people watcher, informed me that she guessed they were siblings. I hate watching people. They start to annoy me after a while, which is probably a bad thing if I want to be a writer. But she observed that their relationship wasn't "chosen," and when they got off the train arguing about money, and he said, "FINE. Then I'LL PAY FOR IT, DAMN IT!" they couldn't have been married. Apparently, I wouldn't understand because I don't have a big brother.

Anyway, we finally got to Northwestern, or thought we did. At least, we got to Evanston. Walking out of the station, we saw a guy talking into a nearby pay phone, and as we approached, I froze.
"Je suis allé à la bibliothèque," and other things he said, but that was enough. I couldn't move. I had to stand there and listen to his glorious conversation!! Sarah had to DRAG me and KICK me to get me to keep walking. We turned right, as our directions said, and we were supposed to walk three blocks and see it. We walked three blocks, and I started to doubt where we were, but we saw a busy intersection ahead. But being the genius that I am, we turned around and walked the other way, and ended up going 2.54 miles around (thanks to Sarah's IPhone GPS) to that busy intersection ahead.... Smart. At least we walked by the French guy again.

By the time we found the campus, we were in love. It was BEAUTIFUL. Gorgeous architecture, trees and flowers galore. I know it doesn't look like that in the winter when students are actually there and suffering the snow, but for a lot of that visit, I felt like regretting my decision not to go there. But that's okay! The University of Chicago banished that the next day. I loved NU for all the hidden little places to sit, surrounded by flowers and foliage, in the shadow of some great edifice of knowledge. We visited Medill, o glorious school, and sat outside the building on a little bench shaded by little trees for quite some time. The curious thing about NU is that out of the five miles we walked, we never once saw any place for food, even though I did get a Slurpee. :) I also wanted to see the lake, so we followed the sound of seagulls and the crashing of the waves to the sand, where people were taking sailing class! It was ridiculous. It didn't look like a school. For a moment, what my life could have been flashed before my eyes--rooming with Danielle, going to a huge school with lots of football games and crazy frats, possibly writing for the best college newspaper in the country... but I'm sure it'll be amazing at Amherst too. :)

We met up with my mother and walked to Due, the restaurant famous for its deep-dish pizza. And it was DELICIOUS!! While we were waiting to get a seat, we sat outside of the restaurant, facing the street, and who does my mom see across the street, holding hands with yet another Asian woman? One of her ex-boyfriends. The mean one who made me miss piano lesson once. After a few brief words with him, my mom sat back down again, and the first thing she said to us was, "Pfft. Look how ugly she is."
I was flabbergasted and berated my mother, but Sarah laughed so hard and said between giggles, "Wow. That is CLASSIC woman. 'I'm prettier than her.' Look who's missing out."
After the delicious pizza served by the dorkily cute waiter who my mom mistakenly thought looked like Jude Law (EW. Do not insult Jude Law), we strolled casually back down Michigan Avenue, window shopping at the ridiculously priced designer clothing, all the way back to.. you guessed it.. Millennium Park! That night they had a tribute to Buddy Guy, a jazz musician I'd never heard of, and I totally thought of Mr. Sawaya. However, the highlight of the concert was all the drunk people dancing. There was this one lady who I thought looked like Ms. Lambert, dressed in a purple tanktop and shorts, who was just letting loose. She looked like she'd had some training though, because all her steps were measured and looked somewhat professional. But she basically wandered from person to person, looking for a partner or just dancing on her own, until she finally met... him. An old, corpulent man with an extremely red face whose feet she stepped on. It was hilarious watching them. Then there was the couple that didn't seem to realize that they were in public. They were dancing like it was foreplay (but not freak dancing) and started making out and touching each other before thousands of eyes, completely oblivious. And then the guy started twitching his arm and doing all these crazy moves that looked utterly ridiculous as the woman made sounds that I can only guess were of approval.
But my favourite pair was the skinny, at the least metro guy with his tight-fitting clothes and his beer in one hand. His friend was sitting in front of where he was standing dancing (Sarah insists they were gay), paying attention to the concert, so he was lonely. Yet he danced with his beer for quite some time, swaying to the alcohol, until the largest black woman I have ever seen in my life--I'm not being mean, but she had to be 400 pounds, a woman who could have eaten that guy in one bite, came along and started dancing with him. He eagerly accepted, and they made the oddest, but somehow grotesquely cutest couple ever. And they even hugged when the song ended!!!
Sarah and I sat there SHRIEKING with laughter and taking pictures of all of them. Sadly, most of them didn't come out well because it was so dark. Moral of the story: NEVER GET DRUNK IN PUBLIC and then start DANCING.

Ahh! Two more days to go. Alright. I can do this. Sleepy time though!

TWO HOURS TILL YOGIN'S COMING HOME!!!!!!!! :) :D :D :D :D

First thing's first: YOGIN'S COMING HOME TOMORROW NIGHT!!!! :) :) :) :)
I'm so excited!! I was looking at pictures of us today and I actually pet the monitor where his face was. Haha. I'm lame. :)

Second of all, McFly's new album is AMAZING!! I only wish I could get my hands on it. Grah. Yet another reason to live in Britain. They gave it out for free!

And now I shall begin my extremely extensive summary of my recent trip to Chicago. LOADS of fun, but it also made me realize that it is a rare beauty to be able to spend a long period of time in constant company of another person. We set out Thursday morning for Santa Ana to pick up Sarah and then go to John Wayne Airport. My father lectured me thoroughly on keeping my temper and not yelling at my mother, if only for my friend's sake. Sarah's whole family (minus Andrew, who was at work) came out to see her off. Sarah's mom gave her money to my mom because she didn't want Sarah to lose it or spend it all on the first day, which annoyed Sarah and made me laugh, though I knew it wasn't a good idea to give all that money to my mother. (Yogin!! Remind me to tell you about this!) After lots of hugs and kisses (the Springfields didn't want their baby girl to go), we all piled into the car and went to the airport for what was only Sarah's second flight ever. And the first one doesn't really count, because it was for 30 minutes. We passed the time waiting for the flight flipping through Sarah's "Vogue" and critiquing all the models and their dress. Every time there was an Asian model, my mom and I exclaimed, "ASIAN!!! ASIAN!!!", usually followed by some comment about how ugly she was. Seriously, white people think the weirdest looking Asians are pretty. Anyway, there was this blonde, very matronly looking woman in her mid-50s sitting next to me absorbed in her sudoku, and every time any one of us said, "Asian!!" she would look over and glare with a look that seemed to say, "Asians? Pfft. Despicable folk!" To her statement, I have only one response, "I wonder who invented that sudoku you're so engrossed in?" It was the final death knell when she started interrogating us on what zone we were in for the plane to tell us when to board, when no one had asked her and we knew perfectly well when to board.

Once we did board, our seats weren't together, and sadly, no one would trade with us because they didn't want to sit in the middle seat, and so we had to sit about three rows apart opposite of one another. The woman who sat on my right was the skinniest woman I've ever seen! She was definitely up there in her years, but she had the look of one trying extremely hard to preserve her looks, and her inordinately long, manicured nails that prevented her from accurately using the touch screen of the plane television struck me every time she lifted her hand. That, and the fact that she never smiled during the entire flight when I was forced to speak to her to use the restroom. They had a trivia game on the plane, in which all passengers could compete against one another in 20-question-long games on a variety of subjects, from sports to music to history to general knowledge. Before long, I was absorbed in the game, and I am proud to say, won all five games I played in a row! :) They had each person's seat number listed on the rankings, and I soon realized that the man who sat next to Sarah and had refused to switch seats with me was my main rival. Once I won the first game, he turned around and saw who it was, gave me a thumbs up and a sportmanslike smile, and nudged Sarah to tell her about her friend's victory. I heard him say, "Your friend must be really smart!"
"No. She's not. At all. She just thinks she is," Sarah drawled, enunciating every syllable and glancing teasingly back at me to ensure I heard her. I stuck my tongue out at her, being the mature creature I am, and resumed the game. Both Sarah and her other neighbour, a middle-aged woman, joined in the game, and before long, all three of them in the row were working together to beat me, pitting all of their knowledge against mine. AND THEY LOST! HAH! I could hear them yell when I got a question wrong and they got it right, or implore unbelievingly, "HOW did she know that?" It was very nice for my ego. :D I really failed at the "music" and "movies and TV" sections though, because they were all from the 70s and I don't pay much attention anyway. By the third game, Sarah's neighbour thumbs up and smile had turned into a glare, responded to with a smirk. :P
Sarah felt bad sitting next to that guy because he was a hardcore Christian minister from Hope University or some other Christian establishment and Sarah knew the answers to all the trashy, sexual movies and would inadvertently curse when making a mistake. That, and because the man was so large that he spilled over onto Sarah's seat and she had to scoot all the way to the edge of her seat.

After a layover in Atlanta, a city I detest if only because of the many layovers I've had there, we boarded the second leg of our journey only to discover that we had been upgraded to first class!!!! In the innumerable flights I've taken, I've never been first class, and it was only Sarah's second trip and we were upgraded! Still, I'm not complaining. We sat in the very first row of the plane, and promised that we'd be very quiet so as not to get thrown out of first class. The moment we sat down, the flight attendant, a pale, tall man with grey hair, kind eyes, and heavy smile lines, asked us what we would like to drink, a shock to both of us. And there was already bottled water on the extremely wide armrest (so we didn't have to fight for it) waiting for us! It had to be heaven!!! The flight attendant, who happens to be the nicest person ever, could tell we'd never ridden first class before, and kept helping us put back our tray tables (mine got stuck..) and fussed over us with good-natured laughter and no condescension. And when the real drinks came, they were in GLASS cups! Forget plastic!! We were amazed... and he wouldn't stop refilling them. I felt like I was going to burst. What a difference first class was from coach! On the first flight, Sarah had taken both cookies and crackers, and the flight attendant had glared at her, but on this flight, we hesitatingly picked out one snack item each from the basket placed in front of us, and the flight attendant shook the basket and asked, "What? You don't want more? Take more!!" After glancing at each other in shock and laughter from the memory of the first flight, we eagerly picked out another snack item each. We're so silly. :) And he kept asking us if we wanted more.. we've been pampered. We arrived in Chicago late at night and headed to the airport hotel to stay for the first night before moving into the nice hotel downtown.

After a ride that consisted of taking two shuttles and then the metro for an hour, we arrived at the Merchandise Mart (luggage in tow) to help my mom set up for her show. Three pairs of hands are definitely better than one, which my mom discovered as we helped her, even given my predisposition for dropping things and my inability to lift even remotely heavy objects. Lunch was McDonalds, which started the "MCFLURRY" obsession that lasted throughout the whole trip. Basically, Chicago is filled with McDonald's, and Sarah and I developed an unhealthy love for McFlurries and iced coffee. We would go around chanting.. or at least I would. But more on that later. My mom's show neighbours sold the prettiest products and had the prettiest booth ever. They had to, given the amount of time they spent OBSESSING over each detail. There were three of them, and every five minutes we would hear one of them ask, "Does this rabbit look too hidden here?" and the other two would rush over and they would then debate it for the next 10 minutes before finally deciding to add a touch of grass there. They were CRAZY.

And now begins my first epic story of the trip. My mom had ordered 10 quilts from her previous show in Atlanta and had them shipped, for some mysterious reason, to Chicago instead of to home. Thus, as the three of us trekked from the Merchandise Mart to our hotel downtown, we had, in addition to our purses and suitcases (my mom and I each had one, and Sarah had two), one large garbage bag and one large cardboard box. My mom put Sarah's suitcase on top of hers and rolled it, Sarah carried her suitcase and the garbage bag in each hand, and I "tried" to balance the box on top of my very small rolling suitcase. As you can see, "balance" was in that last sentence, and so obviously, this would not work out well. We had all sorts of difficulties, in addition to looking like homeless people, just getting onto the metro, and then, of all the things that could happen, I couldn't get off the train in time and watched my mom and Sarah's horrified faces through the window of the train as it pulled to the next stop. Well, they were worrying for nothing, because I would simply take it to the next stop and take it back. However, that did not take into account my baggage (HAH! PUN!). Having already lost control of it many times, I realized in horror that I would have to carry them down a flight of stairs, across the platform, and then up another flight of stairs to get on the train. In the short distance between getting off the train and getting to the first flight of stairs, I dropped the box four times, and every single person, from the people behind the steel walls of the train to the people standing on the platform, stared and gawped at me, but not a single person reached out to help. I dropped all of it right in front of a group of five, healthy-looking, bored guys, and they LAUGHED instead of trying to help. Thoroughly fed up with my mother and her quilt-happy idiocy, as well as the chivalry (or lack thereof) in Chicago, I was halfway down the first flight of stairs, with my suitcase in one hand and the box balanced precariously in the other, when it all tumbled. From the distance, a young Indian guy came running, asking most distressedly if I was alright and then volunteering to help me, and before I could even try to be polite and refuse, picked up the box and went down the stairs. When I got to the bottom as well, he asked me where I was going next and that he would happily help me to wherever it was I was going. Extremely touched and thanking Krishna, I thanked him profusely, but told him that I could manage the next flight of stairs on my own. But basically, that guy made my day. :) When I finally made it back to meeting Sarah and my mom, I told them what happened, with the emphatic claim that Indian guys are the best. :) :) Sarah rolled her eyes, of course, and my mom said, "It's the spirit of Yogin come to help you from India!" :D

We checked into our luscious hotel around 3:30 in the afternoon, and after resting our feet and collapsing on the extremely soft bed, set out to explore. First stop: the Art Institute of Chicago, conveniently located two blocks away from the Palmer House Hilton. I must say that after the five days in Chicago, I am a self-proclaimed EXPERT of the El metro system and also a seasoned walker of the streets between Millennium Park and the Water Tower. Wabash, State, Madison, Monroe, Adams, Michigan, LaSalle--bring it on! :)
Anyway, since no one knows what I'm talking about, I shall get back to the story. The Art Institute, free on Fridays after 5:30, was MAGNIFICENT! All those glorious works of art to fawn over. What I found slightly ironic was that you could take pictures to your heart's content (as long as there's no flash) in the art galleries, but could not photograph the photography gallery. Sarah and I wandered from painting to painting, photographing and fawning, and Sarah had to find something wrong with every single painting to spoil it for me. "Look at how thin his fingers are in contrast to the rest of him!" My favourite was this one where this woman was calmly reading a book, and in the very back of the painting, behind a wall, was this dark, creepy Roman-esque soldier's hand floating menacingly. It was creepy. Sarah enjoyed it profusely.
Next door to the Art Institute is Millennium Park, where, once I finally got my fill of European art, we went to enjoy the free concert. And when I say free concert, I don't mean the lame concerts in the park every Wednesday a la Chino Hills, I mean full orchestra with a pianist and classy singers. We came too late to squeeze into the seats, so we sat on the steps and listened to the music and people-watched, which, when you're with my mom and Sarah, is the worst possible thing. They are the two people who would die on a desert island simply because there were no people to watch and criticize. They. NEVER. STOP. "Look at her red hair!" "WHAT is she wearing?" "OMG THE OLD MAN'S PLAID PANTS!" And when Sarah hears a piece of someone's conversation as they're walking by, she repeats it in even greater exaggeration. "HOW many are you buying? OH MY GOSH!!!" :P I love you Sarah!

At the end of the concert, people started leaving (naturally), as they didn't seem to realize there was an encore, so we made our way down to the seats and relaxed while listening to the tribute to George Gershwin. I was taking a picture of some random thing, when, all of a sudden, this guy turns around and asks, "Do you want me to take a picture of you?"
I gaped wordlessly at him for a moment, completely uncomprehending why this strange white guy with a pudgy noes and glasses was speaking to me and asking for my picture.
"What?" was all I could stammer out.
"Well I just thought that since you had your camera out and the three of you are looking so nice and you can't take a picture of yourselves, that I could do it for you," he said so quickly I had to break out of my incomprehensive stare to follow him. Sarah and I looked at each other, then looked back at him, and looked at each other again, until my mom, in her unwavering exuberance, said, "Sure!"
I felt my camera being handed to him, and smiled for the picture, which actually turned out quite nicely. As my camera was handed back to me, he said, "Now you have to take our picture," patting his friend, who had thus far not turned around, on the back.
"What?" I stammered once again. Wow. I was feeling intelligent.
The heretofore silent friend now turned around. He was, like his friend, in his twenties, but he was much better-looking, but still not actually very good-looking, with very large, bright eyes, and he was Indian. What is with me and Indians? Anyway, the two of them now insisted that we take their picture.
"Why?" Again with the one-worded answers. Brilliant, Elaine.
"Well, we took your picture, so naturally, you should take ours too."
"What is she gonna do with your picture?" Sarah interjected.
"You can email it or Facebook it to me or something! Whatever you prefer! I'll give you my email or something," the white one, who's name was Eugene I later learned, fired off rapidly.
After much persuasion on their part and my mother's, who, for some reason had taken their side, I snapped a photo of them, and then expected to be left alone. Not to happen. They interrogated us about where we were from, and the moment "Southern California" left our lips, came the wave of expectations that the SoCal stereotype brings. "Does it really look like that?" "You guys are so spoiled and rich," etc etc. They told us that they had met as pre-med freshmen and Eugene was a year from graduating from med school and was doing rotations and the Indian (who refused to tell me his name, quite frustratingly) was already a doctor. The conversation ranged from casual topics such as our lives to theology to pharmaceutical companies. It really was extremely bizarre. At one point, the Indian, with his eyes glowing and many elaborate gestures, sitting very straight up, told us, "Every single holy book is written by man, and since man is inherently flawed, aren't all those scriptures flawed? And thus, there is no religion that can be 'true'."
Hmm... atheistic tendencies in an Indian. How strange. I asked why God didn't just write his holy book himself instead of imparting it to Mohammed or Joseph Smith or whoever else, and that led into other questions.
After about an hour's conversation, we finally left and headed back to our hotel, with Sarah telling me how big of an idiot I am. We explored the awesome hotel, from its ridiculously soft and plush sofas on every single floor and the old-fashioned, spiral staircases throughout the building.

Saturday

The next morning, my mom left for her show early, and Sarah and I slept in till later than we expected. When we finally made it out, we walked around, passing the Chicago Theatre and seeing the theatre at which "Wicked" was playing. Sarah had to restrain me from worshipping.. and then went inside the Marshall Field's-now Macy's store. I went there last time, but oh my gosh. The effect doesn't lessen. All eleven stories of it all designed like a Roman cathedral, with stucco and fresco and gold molding and marble. I'm sure you've seen the pictures on Facebook, but we basically went floor after floor and photographed and fawned (haha like at the Art Institute--this is becoming a habit.) When we finally had our full of all eleven stories, we took the bus to the TRIBUNE TOWER!!!!!! After paying homage to the great Chicago Tribune and wishing we could work in that illustrious tower, we went inside, which I had never been, and felt awed by the sense of holiness and quiet within that only seems to come with cathedrals. Then we read all the inscriptions on the walls about the freedom of the press and felt imbued with the righteousness of free-speaking, truth-bearing journalists. We continued on, making for the Water Tower, which is one of the few buildings not burned down by the Great Chicago Fire. Along the way and at the Water Tower, which is gorgeous, we saw four separate couples getting married. Sarah just about fainted with delight, and went around STALKING them with her iPhone camera. "OMG LOOK AT HER DRESS!" "SHE HAS NINE BRIDESMAIDS!!!" "OMG HOW PRETTY!!!" Seriously. *rolls eyes* I'm sure they enjoyed all those people staring at them. One of the brides at the Water Tower really was a bitch though. I must say, even if it was her wedding day. It's a public venue, but she basically thought she had the right to keep everyone else out, and yes, everyone's going to give you your way because it's your wedding, but you really ought to have some manners. We were standing in the gorgeous hallway right at the entrance, and they came over to take their wedding photographs there, and she basically gave everyone there an icy stare, even though we were already getting out of the way. We made for the front steps of the church (which occupies the Water Tower) to be out of her way, and right when Sarah was posing for a picture, the bride and groom come and stand there, looking as if they need to get across. So I stop taking the picture and say, "Oh go ahead!"
"Actually," the blonde bride says in a matter-of-fact attitude, "We need to be there," pointing at where Sarah was standing and looking at me like I was vermin that needed to be squashed. We hurriedly got out of their way, but I really wanted to tell her that, "Bitch. I have a right to take as many photos here as I want. You don't own it and that's what you get for having your wedding at a tourist hotspot in the middle of Downtown Chicago."
But that's okay. She looked mean. Elaine wouldn't last in a fight.

Across the street from the Water Tower is the Hancock Observatory, which is where we were headed. It's the place where you go up to the 94th floor and look down on all of Chicago. However, when we tried to press the elevator button for "observatory," it wouldn't stay (a problem we had throughout Chicago, where we discovered that elevators don't go to each floor. At our hotel, for example, there were elevators for floors 1-7, then 8-11, 16-21, and then 12-15.. so ridiculous), and so we were transported up to the extremely fancy restaurant where we couldn't afford anything. We looked around for a moment, along with the Italian couple that were very comfortable with PDA in a crowded elevator. We finally discovered that you have to go to a different location to get to the observatory, but when we got there, $15 was too much for one person to go take pictures on something that wasn't as beautiful as the Eiffel Tower.

At a loss as to what to do next, I gazed at my handy-dandy map that had saved us on so many occasions, and LO!!! THE NEWBERRY LIBRARY!!! I must explain that Sarah and I are very dedicated, obsessed fans of "The Time Traveler's Wife," a book that she introduced me to. If you are unfamiliar (and thus a heathen), the protagonist of the novel, Henry, is a librarian at the Newberry, and the library features very prominently in the novel, which is set completely in Chicago and lauded for its detailed accuracy to the city. Basically, Sarah and I are completely obsessed and in love with Henry. So we make it to the Newberry Library after much trepidation on my part of having misread the map, and !!!!! The only thing that was still open was the bookstore, and what did I buy there? MY OWN COPY OF "THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE!!!" It was FATE. We then settled down in the park right next to the Newberry, which happened to be the nicest park in America I've ever seen. (Second only to the one in Paris whose peace Kathleen and I disturbed.) It had a fountain in the middle, with benches and flowers encircling, and on every bench was seated at least one person quietly reading. Sarah and I loved it because it was like a little haven in the middle of this busy city, where everything was peaceful and you could totally even forget where you were. That was probably the nicest neighbourhood in the city, because you could find the city on your doorstep yet be completely separate from it as well.

After exorbitant but delicious Ghiradelli's ice cream that I devoured with no regard to the consequences to my shirt or napkins, we spent 10 minutes staring at the wrong bus stop sign trying to figure out which direction Navy Pier was. Sarah, in a flash of ingenuity, figured out that since Navy Pier was on Lake Michigan, it had to be east because that is the most eastern point of Chicago! So we were on the wrong side of the street to catch the right bus! And I realized just now, like at this moment of writing, that I could have told us that from looking at our map..

Navy Pier really wasn't that exhilarating, and we were really tired, so after walking the length of it and seeing the lake, we took the bus back to Millennium Park. However, this wasn't before Sarah begged me to go watch "The Dark Knight" with her at "AMC," which we pronounced not as individual letters, but "AMC." And to this day, I still can't say "AMC." I always say "AMPK." It's terrible. Grr. I will persevere. At Millennium Park, we met up with my mom and went to the next night's free concert, which again, was a tribute to Gershwin. And we arrived at the park at the exact same stage in the concert. It was our mini-tradition in Chicago. Go to the Millennium Park concert every night at the same time. :D That, and take pictures of the cute Asian security guard there who just got cuter every night, according to Sarah. I just thought he was cute throughout haha. We loitered and then went back to our hotel and watched "Sex in the City" (which I was subjected to by the two fanatics) and "Will & Grace," which I love. Yay!

Since it is now 2 AM, I will summarize more on the morrow!
YOGIN'S COMING HOME IN 18 HOURS!!!!!!!! YAYYYYYY!!!!!!

Despite being utter brain dead and jetlagged, I feel I must rant in the heat of passion. CNN's dominant story's headline is: "Black and single: Is marriage really for white people?"

There's nothing wrong with that (other than the fact that Oracle never uses questions, but that's okay), but this: WHY is it that the general population of America, or at least the news media, assumes that there are only two "types" of people, or only two races: If it's not black, it's white, or vice versa. If 45% of black women have never been married, marriage is for white people. Not for Asians, Hispanics, Native Americans, Pacific Islanders, or any other type of people. I love Barack Obama, but he is part of this division of America on one racial line: that of black and white. That there is a "Black America" and a "White America" and that they two, however different, add together to form "America" as a whole.

I'm back from Chicago, as you all probably know by now. I promised myself I'd write a full and detailed description of all the occurrences with the help of all my lovely photographs. But right now, jetlag has really caught up with me.. *yawn*

"The House of Mirth" is really an exquisite novel. I am currently completely in love with Lawrence Selden and also inextricably entwined in Lily Bart's plight. The sense of catharsis and the longing, the need for more after I read lovely literature is incomparable to anything else. Must obsess!!

I miss Yogin.

I'm leaving for Chicago tomorrow morning and I'll be back on Tuesday, but I'm going to try to squeeze in a recap here so I don't get extremely behind.

After waging war and doing bloody battle with my father, Kathleen and I boarded the bus to Union Station from Pomona. We spent the ride as the only two people on the entire vessel speaking, and speaking very loudly, I'm sure. Everyone was staring at us. What else are you supposed to do to entertain yourself??? I'm sure that's what Sarah and I will be like (but even louder, since it's Sarah in place of Kathleen) tomorrow on the plane. Andy was there to pick us up, and about 30 seconds after we got into the car, I knew it couldn't go well. We pulled up to pay for parking, and Andy was about 8 feet away from the booth, and the guy was like, "So far away???" And as we pulled away, Andy, apparently, did not know that there was as CURB, and we went all the way up the curb and then a huge drop. This, I'm afraid to say, was only the beginning of our driving woe. We went in circles through Chinatown, up hills populated by Asians, amongst many other random places in our search for 10 WEST!!!!! Every time we saw a sign for the 10, we started SCREAMING collectively, and by the time we actually found it, we were HYSTERICAL. As Andy would put it, curse one-way streets and no U-turn laws!
We eventually made our way to Santa Monica Pier and Third Street Promenade. We ate at the Crepe Cafe, where we had... guess... CREPES!! THEY WERE AMAZING!! NUTELLA!!!! HEAVENLY!!! I had panini for the first time, as well. The one thing we did on this trip was eat. Really. All the money we spent was on food and transporation.

The beach is really beautiful and tranquil at night, and it was hauntingly beautiful to stare into the depths of the black water with nothing but the moon and the lights from the pier reflected in it. We tried to take jumping pictures, and I failed every single time, even "mooning" a child while I was at it.. However, Andy and I, who were both wearing shoes as opposed to flip-flops, realized, as we left the beach for the pier, that our feet were completely covered in sand and would thus be unfit to be covered by footwear again. We found a foot-washing faucet nearby, but after washing our feet, we had no towel to dry them, and there was still a long distance before the sand faded away. Andy hobbled over as he could, but me? How did I get to the pavement? KATHLEEN CARRIED ME.



Whee that's what best friends are for. :)
On Third Street, there were lots of street acts, and Kathleen was utterly mesmerized by the breakdancers and we stood there gaping at them for a really long time. Oh! I almost forgot. There was this South Asian man on the pier doing juggling and balancing tricks and he REFUSED to do his grand finale act without collecting a dollar for each person standing there. Seriously. It's not going to work. Just do it first so we think you actually deserve it. Stop being so Asian!! Though I do feel sorry for all those street performers, especially the little kids.

Of course, no day is complete without Starbucks, and we ducked into that coffee haven with our energy sapped. However, the highlight of this part of the excursion had to be Kathleen's little nom de plume. She likes to have "Starbucks names," such as "Hoshi" and "Sheniqua," just to make life difficult for the barista. This time, her "name" of choice was... CHAGUSTO. WHO WOULD NAME THEIR CHILD CHAGUSTO?!?! This was only exacerbated by the fact that, after laughing for five minutes about it, I realized that it could be a part of, "Mucho gusto!" as "MUCHO CHAGUSTO!!" or even "MU-CHAGUSTO!" :D :D :D

We eventually found our way back to Andy's place (after much traffic that Andy was kind enough to liken to constipation). Andy's room is GIGANTIC for a college room!!! Well, he is in a frat house, but still!!! HUGE! Kathleen was so mad.. She complained, "Mine is a third this size and there's three people instead of one!" We stole a mattress from the empty, neighbouring room, and sat down to watch "Little Miss Sunshine," which is adorable, by the way! Then, Kathleen collapsed on the mattress on the floor, Andy on his bed, and me on the airbed on the other side of the room, breaking the promise to my dad that we would sleep in a separate room. SHH!!

After enduring Andy's bipolar shower (SCALDING HOT and then LUKEWARM), we set off for the day's adventures, which began with the most-dreaded (on Kathleen's part) tour of USC. I personally really liked the library's architecture, but Kathleen spent the entire time comparing it to UCLA and protesting all the red and gold things around. Even the parking signs were in red and gold... It was rather ridiculous, as was the USC wear part of the student store.

With that done, we hopped on a bus and made for Rodeo Drive. By the way, NEVER take public transportation with me. I will fall on you. At one point, I had my head on Andy's shoulder, and Andy got up without me realizing it, and I fell over right when the bus lurched, and I ended up on the floor on Andy's foot, with the entire bus staring at me. It was lovely. Since Andy has been working with IHOP and thus staring at pictures of their scrumptious promotional pancakes, we just HAD to eat brunch at IHOP. That was probably the most food I've had in a long, long time...
At Rodeo Drive, we marveled at all the expensive things we can't afford, and gaped unbelievingly at the DJ in the Guess store. They actually had a DJ for their store! How ridiculous is that!! Radio just not good enough for them, eh?
Andy then introduced us to Sprinkles' cupcakes, which are REALLY GOOD, but ridiculously overpriced and probably not worth it. However, the three of readily devoured a red velvet cupcake, despite having eaten our weight in pancakes and chicken at IHOP only an hour previously.

We headed over to Hollywood and Highland on the Metro. I did not even know LA had one... but it's actually pretty good. Kathleen was all excited because it reminded her of France. Seriously, the only thing she remembers about/loved about France was the Metro.. she gets so excited about it.. We engaged in a little pole dancing while on the Metro (ANDY), and then stepped off the train to be greeted by huge crowds swarming around the footprints of famous people and others dressed up as famous characters. We wandered through the footprints and then the mall (where I saw Saumil), and I got my picture with the blow-up WALL-E, even though Kathleen didn't know that was what I wanted. THey had a sign for "WALL-E" and then above it, a HUGE inflatable WALL-E. I freaked out and made Kathleen take a picture of me with it.
Twenty minutes later, she asked me, "Okay. Of all the WALL-E signs out there, why did you have to take a picture with it now?"
"UMM. HELLO. LOOK AT THE HUGE INFLATABLE THING."
"OHHHHHHHHHHHHH!! Is THAT what you wanted a picture of???"
Sigh. Good thing Andy was there to take the picture instead.

By this time, we were exhausted, even after Starbucks and water, and after wandering through Forever 21 where Andy found the cutest vest, we went back to USC and collapsed for about an hour before heading to Little Tokyo. We had sushi and tempura ice cream (which is a fascinating phenomenon) and looked through all the extremely Asian gadgets before settling down in chairs to just talk. We played the, "Who would you marry, shag, and kill" game where someone lists three people and you have to choose. It was difficult. And painful. OH. And we had to tell Kathleen about EIGHT TIMES who Patrick Dempsey was. Every time we mentioned him, which was quite frequent for some reason, Kathleen would be like, "OH! Oh wait... who is Patrick Dempsey again???" Sigh...

Andy drove us back to Union Station, where we boarded the bus, seated next to the world's most talkative old man and across from two rather good-looking skater guys. However, after a brief conversation with them, we decided that they were too uneducated to be spoken to, given the elitists we are, and we spent the rest of the time listening to and fawning over Gregory Lemarchal, whose name Kathleen butchered as "LAY-MARK-CALL." Alright. No, I have not taken French, but even I know that it's not supposed to be pronounced like that!!!!

All in all, it was an EXQUISITE trip. :)

I have so much to recap!!! This is so unusual. I'm still backlogged on the Getty trip with Sarah and Ana, and now I have to recap my two days in LA with Andy and Kathleen, basketball, and the dinner party with the whole group minus Yogin.

I've noticed that with both Yogin and Royston gone, my blog is readerless. Sadness. I APPRECIATE YOU EVEN MORE NOW!

I think I'll write about basketball first, since it's the shortest. I ran two miles at the gym yesterday while waiting for Matthew to show up, and I had given up waiting for him and was about to pass out and walked towards the exit when I practically bumped into him walking in. Seeing how sweaty and tired I was, we decided to go play basketball with everyone and then he could come back to run. There were probably more people on the court than ever before. We played five-on-five--some combination of Matthew, me, Connie, Jo, Jessica, Sam, Jeff, Ryan, Kevin, and Iffy. Iffy is CRAZILY GOOD... it still hurts where she hit me... owww... she's so hilarious too. "Are YOU trying to guard me now?"
"No..."
"Don't worry! I won't hurt you! Come here!"

Matthew was introduced to and fell in love with Samuel, the older of the Australian brothers. He's like, "I WANT TO TAKE THAT KID UNDER MY WING!!! He's only THIRTEEN!! He looks 16!!! Damn. That kid has potential.. RAW POTENTIAL. He's only 13 and he's already hot. He's gonna get so many girls. He's REALLY good at basketball, he has an accent, he's hot, and he looks like Tim Cahill."
"Hey! You leave Sam alone. He's a really nice boy," I retorted.
"Yeah, yeah, and he's nice. Damn. That kid.."
Yes. That would be Matthew in love.

Onto my next recap. Highlights/moments of the Sarah birthday trip to the Getty:
-Sarah got an iPhone!!!!
-The Getty has the most beautiful flowers in the world.
-MONET!!!!!!!! I kept them all waiting.. sorry!
-Having iPod wars with Ana... she and I both had iPods and Sarah sat in the middle on the car ride home and had one headphone in each ear and we competed for her attention towards our own music. I ultimately won through... JUANES!!
-On the way there, we witnessed a huge car accident that stopped the whole freeway. As we approached the wreck, we saw the coroner's car and knew it couldn't be good, but nothing prepared me for seeing that foot sticking out from under the tarp. The person had apparently run his car completely into the concrete bridge... the top of the car had ripped off and was completely shattered and the rest of the body was stuck in the mud.. It left this utterly cold, dead feeling in my stomach and my whole body shook. No one should just die like that...
-Forgetting the morbid thoughts, Andrew Springfield isn't as scary once you spend time with him. I actually saw him smile a couple times.. it was amazing..
-We went to a piano concert at the LACMA.. it was really good and he played a lot of songs I had played or was very familiar with, which was a bonus. I loved hearing his interpretation of the Beethoven sonata... Then, Chapman University's music director and Vicki's future boss came out to play a duet with the main pianist... that guy is the funniest person I've ever seen on the piano. He made a ridiculous amount of faces, shrugged his shoulders, swayed, and looked like he was going to fall out throughout the whole piece. The three of us spent the whole time, despite the utter beauty of Debussy's piece!
-Other highlight of the concert was seeing Andrew completely out.. head leaned back on the chair, mouth wide open, probably snoring..
-Quesadillas are really good, actually.
-"Zoolander" is a really stupid and ridiculous movie.

I had a very traumatizing moment last night. I was reading Liverpool news and it featured this new, young Spanish forward we bought, Daniel Pacheco. I went to his biography to find out more about him and saw hiw birthday: May 1, 1991.
1991.

That was the first time in my life that a footballer, granted, one in the reserves and a youth player, but a footballer who played for Liverpool, was YOUNGER than me. It's so scary. I'm getting so old. Michael Owen had his peak at age 18, scoring all those goals for England and Liverpool. AHH!!! This marks a watershed moment!!

Wow. My last three posts have all been about basketball. I should recap more.

Last Friday, also known as the 4th of July, Yogin, Darshan, and I went to Jay's house to celebrate his birthday (which is actually today--Happy birthday Jay!) and the 4th of July. Yogin came to pick me up in the morning, and after some modeling sessions (haha), we drove out to the temple to go get Darshan. Except, Yogin's parents were at temple too, so Yogin LEFT ME ON THE DESOLATE STREET CORNER NEAR THE CHINO PENITENTIARY while he went to get Darshan!! WHAT KIND OF A BOYFRIEND DOES THAT?!?! Everyone was staring at me as they drove by.. I swear I did not look like a hooker!!! But I'm sure I did!! Because it wasn't even a busy street corner where I could be potentially walking somewhere. All there was was the open road, a few houses, and the FREAKIN PENITENTIARY. GRAH. I was yelling at Yogin on the phone, "IF ANYONE HONKS AT ME, I WILL KILL YOU!!!"

By the time we FINALLY got Elaine off the street corner, we drove to Corona, stopping by Starbucks and Taco Bell to finish off Jay's presents. It was kinda funny because Jay was also at the grocery store, and we walked into the Albertson's where the Starbucks was located and thought, "Hmm.. we hope he's not here too." Fortunately, he was at Vons and then Stater Brothers. Woot! Go Stater Brothers for having what he wanted because Albertson's was next on the list!
On the way there, Jay called, and we decided to mock him and his tendency for getting lost by telling him we were lost. "WHICH direction of the 91 do we take? Huh Jay? Huh???" It was fun. Unfortunately, riding in Yogin's car also meant that I had to put up with his terrible taste in music..

ANYWAY, we, the two Kotharis, the two Shahas (Jay and his sister), and I, played Monopoly (instead of Taboo.. hmph), which didn't really go well thanks to the Kotharis and their ridiculous competitiveness. I kept telling people whenever someone landed on their property and had to pay them even if they didn't realize it (namely Jay and Sneha.. mostly Jay) and Darshan and Yogin were upset as a result, because apparently, if you're not paying attention, you don't deserve the money. Pfft. Yogin has about 40% of an excuse for being angry for other reasons, but Darshan doesn't. Bad sports. And then they got mad at each other and Yogin whipped him with his keychain. Bah. Bad Kotharis. Oh! And Yogin and Sneha and Jay had this phone-stealing thing and we all ended up in a huge pile, with me on the bottom and Yogin's foot on my windpipe. It was lovely. Poor Elaine is so abused.

We gave up playing after a bit and made for the park where the fireworks were supposed to be. Well, after a bit of sitting outside pouting and talking out our issues (and singing 'IF YOU'RE HAPPY AND YOU KNOW IT, CLAP YOUR HANDS!' on the part of me and Darshan). Jay and Yogin talked out their problems while Darshan and I walked ahead of them and Darshan analyzed their lives for me... totally unnecessary, but highly amusing. I was also heavily abused while going there... the three of them pushed me off a hill AND tickled me half to death! We met up with Shibani and her sister.. uhh.. Shalini (?? spelling) at the park. They're basically two other Indian friends of theirs.. Shibani being the really pretty, slutty older one and Shalini being the really annoying younger one. We played on the swings for a bit, and then the rest of them decided to go back to the house (WITHOUT US), so Yogin and I swinged for a bit more and then headed back. That was a very, very nice part of the day. :)

Once back in the house, I played "Clair de Lune" for Jay for his birthday amongst other songs and then Jay tried to make dinner without hurting himself. The pasta was good nevertheless, and after playing with TUCKER!!! (SO CUTE! SO PRECIOUS! SO HYPER!!) who is Jay's golden retriever puppy, we all settled down on the couch to watch some strange Indian movie called "Welcome." Needless to say, since JAY didn't get me "Dil Chahta Hai" OR "Hum Tum" OR anything else with Saif Ali Khan or at least was a ROMANCE, I didn't like it. Hmph.

After the fireworks, which were beautiful, and ice cream, which was delicious, we left because Yogin's mom started yelling at him. Sadness.



Yayyy :) :)

Then on Sunday, it was Sarah's birthday!! I got up early (EW) and drove to Santa Ana for breakfast with the family. Many pieces of French toast and strawberries later, we started opening presents, which I think, was the best moment of Sarah's life. For someone who's never had an iPod or a phone, she got the new IPHONE!! And the purse she always wanted and really fancy sunglasses! Woot! The screams resounding from the Springfield residence will haunt the neighbours of years to come, I'm sure. After Sarah finally got over it (not really and texted Ana and me a billion times), we all packed into the car (we being the entire Springfield family, Ana, and me) and headed towards the Getty!
Let me just say now: THE GETTY IS AMAZING!!!!! SO AMAZING!!!!! I took SO many pictures of just FLOWERS (as I'm sure you've seen on Facebook) AND.. I GOT TO SEE MY FAVOURITE MONET!!!!!! I stood there and stared for about ten minutes straight while Ana and Sarah stared at me staring. I made all of them wait for me as I MARVELED. It was AMAZING!!!
I'll write more tomorrow.. it's like 2 am..

I have discovered the source of ignorant racism today! (I know.. definitely something to be excited about.) I was playing basketball as we do every day with Connie and Jo (less people today). We first played with Samuel and Jeff, two Australian brothers temporarily here. We play with them almost every day and they're really nice and sweet and REALLY GOOD. Jeff's crazily-high shot that somehow always goes in and Samuel's LONG ARMS and GINOBILI SHOT! Yay and their accents. :)

ANYWAY, we had played around three games and we were all really tired, just lounging around the court making random Pokemon noises interspersed with "WAAAAALLL-EEEEE" when three little white boys come along. They were all short and stocky, probably around 12 years old, but they didn't think they were that young, strutting about like they owned the place. We challenged each other and they claimed Kevin, the only guy playing with us, who was the tallest of us all. So it was four boys vs 3.5 girls (Shannon doesn't know how to play basketball and was merely a figurine on the court.) At first, we didn't really take it seriously; Connie didn't even play defense and we didn't really run. But within a minute of the game, they claimed the score was 4-1, even though they had made two baskets, max. We gave it to them, but soon their imperious, arrogant air was too much. I mean seriously, the kid threw it completely out of bounds and then claimed that he hadn't "checked" the ball. Ew. So we started trying just a tad bit more (meaning Connie started driving) and we were soon leading comfortably.
At this point, head white boy (AKA: black shirt) decided it was time to get dirty (even more so). As I shot the ball, I hear a cry of, "AH! KUNG FU!" and then sounds reminiscent of American imitations of Chinese..
Connie asked them, "Was that a racial slur? Because we don't appreciate that.."
Yes, Connie sometimes mumbles and slurs her words together (haha pun), but the response was completely unwarranted and unnecessary, "Rachalle schlur? what's a rachalle schlur??" Do you speak English? Hah. hah. hah. I'm a stupid little boy.
Luckily, we finished the game off pretty quickly then. Wow. I've never been that determined to beat someone before. Stupid children. I can't believe they said all those things. They were the rudest, most racist, competitive, ball-hogging children I've ever met. And then there were other children around their age SMOKING behind a tree. Sigh. The youth of this world... sigh.

Bonsoir! Piano playing is amazing, just to let you all know, as is basketball playing. Yesterday, Connie, Lauren, and I (girls) played these two brothers and Ryan (boys). Lots of fun. The older brother was the young Manu Ginobili.. left-handed, long-armed, and could do the craziest reverse layup. But we still won. :)

This past Saturday I went to see "WAAAAALLLLLLL-EEEEEEEEEEEE" with Yogin, Kathleen, and Andy. OMG! SO CUTE!!!!! SOOOOOO CUTEEEEE!!!!! If you haven't seen it, go see it! Connie and I are obsessed. We walk around the basketball court and bid each other farewell using, "WAAAAALLL-EEEEEE" and "EVAAAAAAAAA?"
"No.. EVEEEEEE"
".. EEEEEEVAA?"
:) I love you Connie!!! CORN! :D :D
But yea, we all loved it. Most adorable movie ever. Then, after Yogin and I got lost (hehe), we met up with Andy and Kathleen at Fiore for frozen yogurt. (Yogin had to leave though.. sadness). Alright. I don't see what all the fuss is. It wasn't that amazing. I'd take Starbucks any day. But it was still fun catching up with my awesome good friends. Sure, Andy and Yogin ABUSED me at my mom's house earlier in the day, but sitting there, it was just.. comfortable. The topics flowed easily from... interior decor to sex to college life as we munched on our chocolate chips mixed with strawberries and frozen yogurt. :)