That Thing You Didn't Know About New Moms' Bodies...

I revived myself.

So I have long been in awe of Kate Middleton because she has stellar, if upper-class, fashion sense. I fully admit to shedding a tear or two when the birth announcement was made, and beaming when watching video of Kate, William, and Baby Cambridge's first appearance together. A lot of online news outlets have already pointed out how wonderful it was that Kate chose that polka-dot dress for the reveal, like she was carrying on Diana's legacy. And I like that (and I love that dress, omigod), but what I loved more was how the dress hugged the shape of her post-baby bump.

http://dailymail.co.uk

There is huge pressure in our society for new mothers to immediately get back in shape after giving birth. Crazy supermodels and other Hollywood celebrities constantly show up in the tabloid news cycles sporting perfect bodies mere months after birth. Meanwhile, I can clearly recall being in middle school and watching my mom, a petite woman with biceps bigger than mine, trying to work out the soft pooch at her belly, left over from when she gave birth to my youngest brother...eight years prior. With Hollywoodized images affixed in our minds as what the ideal new mother should look like, I imagine legions of mothers battling self-esteem issues and self-disgust for not looking like those perfect pictures, while their Average-Joe husbands hang out in kitschy sports bars, adding more beer to their rotund bellies and bemoaning why their once-attractive wives have now become dumplings.

I have no doubt that Kate Middleton will get back into her old shape in no time, she just seems like that sort of person, but I admire how she was unafraid to pick a dress that showed the parts of post-birth that most celebrities would never dare reveal and, in fact, many of us may have never before seen in the media. Kate will never be a "normal woman," but right now, she's an international face going through normal-woman parts of life, and I think she made such a brave and role-model-worthy decision to show us the beautiful truth about post-partum women's bodies.

I promise a book-related post next. :)

Calling Old and New Veronica Mars Fans

We interrupt your regularly scheduled day with the best news since Veronica Mars was a TV show. Which is that THERE WILL SOON BE A VERONICA MARS MOVIE! Sorry for the caps. I just--I'm having trouble expressing myself, I am so excited. I love this show to pieces. The snappy dialogue, the chemistry between the characters, the just-a-little-bit-unbelievable noir element. Arguably my favorite show of all time. I talk it up to everyone.

A Veronica Mars movie has been in the talks for years, ever since the show was canceled. Now, however, with the glorious help of Kickstarter, it's going to happen! It's going to be funded by fans! There will be lots of rewards to reap, not least of which will be the ability to reunite this cast together on the big screen.

In case you're not yet convinced that this will be the best thing you'll spend your money on this month, watch this video, and please tell me I'm not the only one who squealed with everyone's appearance:

Rob Thomas, the TV show's creator, set a very modest Kickstarter goal of two million dollars. Well, that goal was easily met the first day, which means that the movie is for sure going to happen, with shooting this summer and a limited theatrical release next spring. And the donations continue to pour in. More donations means a bigger and better movie! There are also generous heapings of rewards and bonuses to all those who donate. Go check out Veronica Mars and this hugely worthy Kickstarter project!

For more about the Veronica Mars movie Kickstarter project and to donate, click here.

Confessions of China Living

I wish someone had told me, before I moved to Shanghai last year, to be careful to not let China make me a meaner person. I had thought that I had adjusted well. I had learned the width of the narrowest opening between two people that I could weave through on a crowded city street. I learned to accept the smaller dimensions of personal space here, but not give it up for the obnoxious, privileged young Shanghainese women who will cut you in line. I learned not to cross at crosswalks and how to judge the likelihood of a car hitting me by its distance from and the speed at which it is going. I accepted the fact that horns were going to blare at 3am, and have even begun to be able to sleep without earplugs.

I learned to survive, but I mistook my accumulated survival skills as signs of my emerging cosmopolitanism. This is what it is to be an urbanite! I thought. I am tough-skinned, competent, and worldly!

But in actuality, I was slammed by the thrice-as-forceful wave of post-graduate life, city life, and Chinese life all at once. I can't separate the three, can't ever figure out whether my feelings and frustrations are the natural reactions of a newly minted independent adult, those of a space-and-quiet-loving girl whose prior contact with cities up till now had been day trips into New York and Philly, or the result of coming to a Chinese city.

I no longer want to deny it, no longer want to cover it up with euphemisms. China is impatient and judgmental and unforgiving, and in my struggle to survive here, I've absorbed a lot of that into myself.

It's easy to internalize a lot of frustration in China. That's what happens to a society led by a government that doesn't allow freedom of speech. It only takes one bus ride in Shanghai to get a pretty thorough gist of what makes me angry here. As the bus pulls to the curb, middle-aged men and single-minded young mothers push shuffling old women out of the way to be the first onto the bus. The bus drivers slams the doors shut as soon as you step on board, barely avoiding catching the back of your shirt in its wheezy path. Slouching young men with artfully arranged bangs sit in the courtesy seats and bury their heads in their iPhones or iPads, determinedly ignoring the thin-wristed, white-haired little old ladies who cling to the side of their seats and struggle to stand upright as the bus driver lurches in and out of traffic with his hand permanently pressed against the horn. The man desperately missing his sixteenth cigarette of the day on his short bus journey groans and shudders and jerks his head and hacks up a thick gob of spit into the single, tiny, overflowing trash can. Oh, traffic lights? A mere suggestion. The thing that counts down the seconds until your light turns green? Obviously an indication that traffic is supposed to go when there are still 4 seconds left of the red light to go. If you get to your stop and the bus is crowded, which is often, it becomes a game of push and shove, see how many people you can bang with your overstuffed purse on your way to reach the door. The concept of letting people off the public transport vehicle before new passengers board? A mere concept, rarely put into practice.

A trip on Shanghai's public transportation illustrates the selfishness and inconsideration of a nation that adopted capitalism while still held in the thrall of communism. Knowing this, everything in China becomes suspect. The smiling, well-made-up waitress who serves you at dinner may be secretly resenting your white-collar job and accompanying salary. You buy a cheap watery beer for 40RMB at a pub that tries to evoke European legacies and feel guilty that your one beer could feed for one whole day one of the many beggars, often deformed or missing limbs from factory accidents, who sit in the streets. You become suspicious of every price given to you at the local market, wondering if the seller isn't trying to gyp you out of a few more yuan despite his already reasonably low price. Silence does not indicate contentment, but rather decades of pent-up frustration at inequality and corruption.

No community is perfect, but I never thought that I'd lose so many of the things I used to like about myself--listening skills, objectivity, concentrated kindness--so quickly, in this environment. It took almost a year's worth of unhappiness and regretful meanness on my part for me to realize that I don't like much of who I've become. So, starting now, I will strive to be more aware of when I'm being mean, and to resist the easy temptation of sliding into meanness. I will also write more about China, my travels, and my thoughts here. I haven't written as much about my life abroad as I had expected to mostly because I'm really unhappy with many things about it. But if writing about it will be my catharsis, then I'm going to. I'm going to put the truth out there, because I'm still an American citizen, I'm still a reluctant leader of humanity, and the truth cannot be denied.

Jamie the Perpetual Page-Turner's Wedding

Earlier this month I went back to the States to attend my friend Jamie's wedding. As most of you know, Jamie blogs at both The Broke and the Bookish and The Perpetual Page-Turner. We started meeting up for bookish events and conversations at IHOP when I was still at Swat. I can't imagine how she runs two blogs, organized her wedding pretty much singlehandedly, and still has the time and energy to remain one of the sweetest, nicest, and most considerate people I know, but that's what she did and that's what she is.

The wedding took place at the First Baptist Church in Doylestown, PA. You could totally tell Jamie planned every detail, from the yellow flower decorations to Vitamin String Quartet playing as the bridal party walked down the aisle.

I took many pics but my camera has been moody ever since I mashed an orange into it last Christmas (there's really no more story to it than that), so unfortunately lots of these pictures aren't as clear as I would have liked. But look closely, and you'll see some beautiful expressions that would make even the most stone-hearted sigh and swoon...

He liked it so he put a ring on it.

First kiss as husband and wife! *CUE THUNDEROUS APPLAUSE AND SQUEALS*

They walked out to Hall & Oates' "You Make My Dreams." What more perfect song could they have picked? How could anyone not love that song?

I love the way they look at each other here.

The reception was subtly bookish. Check out the table decorations!

Jamie even gave us (us being me and April of Good Books and Good Wine, plus a whole table of British male soccer coaches) the quote from Paper Towns by John Green!

April of Good Books and Good Wine, Jamie, and me, representing the bloggers. (We missed you, other bloggers!) I apologize for the awkward arms: I can never get myself to actually do the sorority girl hip thing.

It was, hands down, the best wedding I've ever been to. The music freshened up centuries-old wedding traditions and got everyone smiling and dancing; the reception offerings (literary table decorations! A Photobooth!! Open bar!!!) were thoughtful; and the atmosphere was just genuinely fun, and loving, and real. Jamie outdid herself with all her planning, and I'm so, so happy I got to be there for her special day.

Some Wanderlove of My Own

I didn't realize how difficult it would be to get back into daily routine--which includes blogging--after almost a month of traveling and vacation! Sorry I've been so absent lately. On the other hand, I've had some brilliant experiences and discovered new places that I love and would like to revisit in the future.

At the end of February I went on a company retreat to Malaysia. We stayed mostly in Kuala Lumpur, which was a lovely city, not just because of the weather, which was consistently sunny and warm (a far cry from cold Shanghai), but because the people were friendly and the food was delicious.

The weather was like this:

--and I visited a Kinokuniya Bookstore, which is basically book heaven for book lovers, because it's huge and has pretty much any book you can think of on its shelves somewhere. AND because it fully integrated YA literature into literature at large, and there were lots of placards around the store recommending YA lit as "your next great read."

RESPECK!

The Petronas Towers were so, so, breathtakingly beautiful:

They reminded of plants, taking root on our earth and unfurling towards the impeccable sky. I didn't get to see much of Malaysia as I was only there for a few days, but I will definitely return.

A few days after Malaysia, I left for vacation to Taiwan. My family is from Taiwan, but this was the first time I had a sizable say in where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do. Being there simply reinforced to me the fact that Taiwan is an incredible, lush, friendly, wonderful place that I could seriously consider calling home.

My favorite place on the trip was probably the Pingxi district, a short train ride outside Taipei, which is like a slice of the 1800s in the middle of the 21st century.

In the town of Shifen, the train track slips in between old houses, and during the times when the train is not passing by, people will stand on the tracks to release "sky-lanterns" that they can buy and paint their wishes on.

These are scenes that seem to come right out of stories and dreams.

Incredible, isn't it?

There's more, so much more:

Storm clouds moving in to the city of Hualien.

Riding bikes along abandoned railroad tracks in the East Rift Valley past rice paddies.

Attending the weekly Saturday night local music performance in Dulan.

Looking off from the paragliding launch site on the high terrace overlooking the pastoral town of Luye.

And, as always, braving the crowds at night markets to enjoy the ubiquitous good Taiwanese street food.

It was a wonderful trip and it was really hard to return back to "normal" life. Needless to say, I will be going back to Taiwan as soon as I can. This tiny island is truly incredible in what it has to offer in terms of scenery, culture, food, and people. I'll stop short of being a salesperson for Taiwan vacations but seriously, you should try to go if you have the chance!

These two places in the past month have really awakened the wanderlust in me. Hopefully I'll get to explore more places in the future while I'm still hanging around Asia. South Korea, Thailand, Philippines, New Zealand, and Australia, I'm looking at you!

An Open Letter to Politics Etc.

Dear World--or, I guess, more specifically, the US government and other political systems like it--please explain something to me. Explain to me why it is in humanity's best interest to support our most unhealthy habits at the expense of peace, intellectualism, and empathy. Explain to me why professions such as teaching and information services make astronomically less than professions such as professional athletics, corporate law, and I-banking. I fully admit to being ignorant of most things related to economics, capitalism, politics, and finance, but please explain to me why these three professions--one of mentally or physically abusing another human being for the sake of entertainment, one of helping rich people spend large amounts of money fighting one another, and one of playing with fake money--make so much in terms of salary when one in seven American households are not getting enough to eat.

I used to think that, much like what Jefferson said, there are some certain "truths" about being a human being that everyone can agree on, regardless of your upbringing or college major or career. The right to be happy through means that do not cause others pain or unhappiness. Shelter. Food. Good health. Not screwing other people over. Choice. But the more I see of the world, and the more people I interact with it, the more I fear that these basic truths and rights of humanity must, instead, be taught, and learned, and can all too easily be cast aside for other values.

With the recent U.S. debt talk, I'm already cringing in dread at the budget cuts that will be implemented. Want a bet that educational, reading, and library programs will continue to take hits to their budgets? And meanwhile the rich just keep getting richer. Professional athletes are still getting paid eight figures a year. Apple has more money than the US.

Please explain to me how decreasing funding for intellectual endeavors serves to benefit the world in the long term.

Sure, I'm a reader, and thus my opinion is biased. But I honestly do think that the world needs readers. Literacy is not just about opening a book and understanding characters and plots. It's about searching for answers within a vast array of data. It's about making new connections between old material. It's about reading between the lines. It's about critical thinking.

And somehow, despite all the propositions that the government has made, support for intellectualism--and thus support for progress (I know, I know, I go on about this all the time)--continues to fall by the wayside in favor of supporting mindless consumerism and short-term satisfaction. I don't intend for this to be a "back in the good ole days" rant, but in light of the boundless advances we have made in technology and the like, I admit to being quite surprised and disappointed by the simultaneous lack of progress that society and humankind have undergone.

I have long since believed that influence should be based on merit and not merely on ambition. I just don't know how to implement this change in the world. Who knows what the world could have been like--could still could be like--if we artsy, intellectual, bleeding-heart types call the shots?

I feel a little guilty that most artsy, intellectual, bleeding-heart types would so rather not play the stupid political games that occur in the government or corporate world. We're the ones with the good ideas and (necessarily) dramatic suggestions for improvement, but there's a reason, I guess, that politicians and CEOs are at the top of our societal hegemony food chain. However, despite the power of societal influences, maybe if we remember that we, as individuals, are the ones who shaped society in the first place, and if we all rose up and really demanded societal reform with every fiber of our will and resources, then maybe society can change for the betterment of all. Maybe leaders, then, would be chosen by the example they provide and not merely by their title.

So then what can and should we artsy, intellectual, bleeding-heart types do? The self- and socially-appointed bigwigs won't take us seriously. Our resources are being cut by the day. Our souls are being consumed by the corporation demon. One day we'll go to bed and realize that our daily routine has been reduced to working a white- or blue-collar 9-to-5, coming home, eating a silent dinner with the family, and zoning out in front of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila until our minds have been zapped enough for us to be okay with falling asleep having accomplished exactly the same things that we have done for the past 20 years of our lives. How will we ever escape this downward spiral?

Guess we'll just continue to write earth-shattering, heart-wringing, life-changing books.

What is love, anyway?

I'll be 22 in the spring. Don't worry, this is NOT a post about me complaining about my relationship status. Related thoughts, though, just can't help occurring when you're a twenty-something-year-old female with female friends. Topics like marriage (ahhhhhhhhhh) just seem to inevitably crop up. The scary thing is, some of my friends want to get married around 25. Allowing a year for the engagement, that gives us less than three years to meet someone, get to know them, realize you want to spend forever with them, AND convince them/find out that they feel the same way about you.

I get tired just thinking about it.

The truth is, I have so little experience in the romance department that I have no freaking clue what I'm doing or what to do. This past week I've made some pretty big self-discoveries regarding what kind of guys I fall for, what I'm looking for relationship-wise, the difference between a casual crush of mine and a serious one, and so on. But I still feel like I'm, I dunno, Lewis & Clark or someone like them, plunging down an utterly unknown river, swollen with spring runoff, with only a flimsy low-grade plastic paddle in my hand to fend off alligators and loose logs.

Usually when I need help I often look towards books first, but lately that's just been frustrating, because books always seem to, well, romanticize romance. Somehow, some way, things work out, usually with this big, swoony scene at the end where the guy confesses his love to the girl or the girl admits to the guy that he was right about her, and they kiss and everyone's happy, the end. And how about all those books that have enviously smooth "getting to know you" romantic progressions, eh? The first encounter goes well, the love interest continues to approach the MC, there is no doubt in either of their minds that they like each other. When in real life (or my life, at least) it usually goes: initial encounter goes well, subsequent encounters are much more ambiguous (does he/she like me as just a friend, or as more than one? or do I not even cross his/her mind at all?), until eventually you are suffocated by a plague of uncertainty and confusion.

Where is the doubt in YA romances? Where is the ambiguity of interactions? Why is there a sad lack of examples that could give me any sort of insight into the way "real" romances progress, at least in my opinion?

I know, I know, I know that in telling a story--whether it be entirely fictional or your own real-life tale--one tends to emphasize the good points and deemphasize the bad. And as a reader we are also relatively passive observers with the benefit of an outsider's perspective to the very things that so confuse us when we're actually participating in them. You know how in movies there might be this big misunderstanding scene where neither character says what they truly mean to one another, only they don't know that, so they both think that what the other is saying is how they're really feeling, and then they turn away and the camera shows them making a miserable face at how much it just killed them to lie to the other person like that? Yeah. We're the audience, so we get the benefit of this camera view and get to see the true feelings that the other character doesn't see.

I want to be that "me" audience member for my own life. Maybe then I'd be able to figure some things out.

Or maybe I simply watch too many of those kinds of movies.

I used to be more worried that I'd end up alone. Now, I'm not so worried about that, but I do wonder often what it is I should look for in whoever I end up with. How will I know when I have found the right one? If the one that I can see myself with forever has some serious flaws that usually break relationships, how much should I excuse them for those? I hope I don't settle for anyone less than the one who is right for me--note that I say "right for me" and not "perfect"--but I worry that I may not recognize him when I find him.

It's also becoming clearer and clearer to me that I don't want to waste time with relationships that I don't think have a chance of lasting. It may sound harsh, or too cynical, but I believe that I can tell pretty early on in my acquaintance with someone whether or not I feel like a hypothetical relationship between the two of us has a possibility of lasting. That's one of the big things I realized last week: that I may be attracted to a number of people, but that doesn't mean I necessarily want to date them. I'd rather be contentedly single than be in a casual relationship for the sake of, I dunno, having something to do on the weekends or whatnot. I'm not actively looking for The One, nor am I unhappy that I'm not with him yet. I approach things very pragmatically, but believe deep down that eventually, sooner or later, but most likely later, and maybe even a lot later, I will find him. I've watched too many Disney movies and read too many romances to not believe in the idea that maybe, just maybe, I will find someone who likes all of me, who can challenge me intellectually, and who can inspire me to try to make each day the best I've ever lived.

It seems that so many authors and bloggers I know are either happily married or otherwise in wonderful relationships that seemed to have had fairy-tale beginnings, or courtships, or whatever. Can I ask you if that was really how it went, though? Did you have moments of doubt and uncertainty as to whether or not your partner was the right person for you? How did you know that he/she was The One? Who initiated the relationship? Did your own love story unfold like a standard YA romance, or did it have its tough moments, stuff that never gets told in the stories? Are the romances you write into your stories reflective of your real-life experiences, or are they more wish fulfillment? Where, I guess, does the inspiration for those fictional romances come from?

I wanted to save these questions for closer to Valentine's Day, maybe even make a feature out of it (who knows? I could still do it?) but they have been weighing me down for quite some time now so I thought I'd just put it out here.

Peace, love, and happiness, as always.

"Some of What We Know About Happiness"

I attended a wonderful lecture yesterday by one of my school's most well-known professors, the psychologist Dr. Barry Schwartz. His most famous concept is the theory of the "paradox of choice," which basically says that having more choices may not necessarily be the best thing for your mental state, which I'm sure I've mentioned once or twice in blog posts here.

Anyway, this week is Gratitude Week at my school, so Barry Schwartz gave a lecture called "Some of What We Know About Happiness." Sounds like something you'd want to know about, right? I thought it was wonderful, and so I'm sharing with you my notes on the lecture--with my thoughts in parentheses and direct quotes in, well, quotes--so that maybe you can take something away from it as well!

"Some of What We Know About Happiness" by Dr. Barry Schwartz

www.personaldevelopment-courses.com

1. How is happiness measured?

• Ask people!
• Around the world, people are most happy about family, but not on a daily basis; rather, they like the abstract idea of family (This made me laugh, but it is SO TRUE)
• People are least happy about commuting: "So if you had to choose between a mansion an hour away from work, or a hovel right at your work's doorstep... you should choose the hovel."
• People are bad at predicting what makes them happy, thus they make bad choices. They also seem to be impervious to instruction, so they continue making bad choices.
• On a larger scale, can you measure something like gross national happiness, sort of like gross national product? "Well, if governments had to choose between measuring something really important in vague, imperfect terms, and precisely measuring something not so important, they will always choose to thoroughly and precisely measure the unimportant thing." (Again, LOL)

2. What makes people happy?

• Money. Come on, let's be honest. But there is a "threshold of subsistence" beyond which more money does not make a difference on one's happiness. Rich countries are happier than poor countries, and rich people within each country are happier than poor people, but increasing the wealth of a rich country doesn't make the people happier.
• Meaningful, engaging, intelligent, controllable work that contributes to the improvement of others' lives
• Close relationships
• Marriage, not just cohabitation: "Marriage does make people happier. It makes people much happier for a few years, and then it only makes people slightly happier." (LOL)
• Security: physical, emotional, financial
• Democracy
• However, inequality seems to matter surprisingly little
• Having norms of ethical conduct
• If an experience has a good high point (climax) and a good end, people will generally be inclined to think well of it and do it again.

3. What is happiness good for?

• It feels good, of course!
• Health: happy people live longer - "So it's better to smoke a pack of cigarettes a day than be happy than to not smoke and be unhappy."
• Work productivity: happiness broadens cognitive outlook, increases creativity
• The myth of the suffering artist is FALSE: "The French are not that happy. Their happiness is kind of the equivalent of everyone in that country having gone through a divorce. We don't know yet why this is the case. Maybe they really buy into the whole 'suffering artist' myth. Like, if we Americans believe in it, the French believe in it 5 times as much."
• Improves social relations: people would rather be friends with happy people

4. How can you be happier?

• Change your genes--"And by that I don't mean jeans" *points at his pants*--there have been studies that suggest that happiness may be hereditary
• Pay more attention to what's good in experience and less on what's bad
• Gratitude is a habit that should be developed
• Focus on the little things, make it a daily routine to write down things you are grateful for, and eventually this will become habitual
• Writing (not talking or thinking) narratives about bad/tragic experiences decreases its impact on your psyche; write in a way that helps you try to comprehend the experience
• Lower your expectations: learn to be satisfied with less than perfection

"So if you lower your expectations, write about your bad experiences, and make it a habit to be grateful, you'll live forever." The end!

(Most of the direct quotes were said facetiously, of course.)