Saw Su Ba (monk) in my dream last night. She smiled at me and called out my name. She passed away a few years ago. Although, the last time I saw her was 19 years ago, her kind-hearted descriptions remained in my mind forever. When I was five, spent about a year at the temple and it was the happiest experienced ever. There was Su Ba (“grandma” monk), Su Co (“auntie” monk), chi My Chau (“sister” monk) and me (just a lucky regular 5 years old kid). Chi My Chau was adopted to the temple after her parents abandoned her because of her disability. According to the Vietnamese theory, it was a curse if the child was borned abnormal. The parents must killed or gave up the child. However, Chi My Chau was the kindest and sweetest individual I’ve known all my life. Although she was limping when she walks, she was always taking care of me and was never too busy to spend time with me.

Each morning, Chi My Chau and I watered the garden then we would helped Su Co sweep and clean the temple. After that, we would pick out vegetables to prepare lunch. Vegetarian dishes were always delightful. I loved the fried rice that was made from white rice and vegetable oil. Plain and simple but delicious. They used to teased me how easy I was to raised, all I need was the fried rice. After an afternoon nap, it was play time. Chi My Chau taught me how to make all kinds of neat stuff such as kites, birds, propellers, etc. from coconut leaves and papers. Flying kites was my favorite hobby. Chi My Chau made beautiful kites.

After play time, we would gathered into Su Ba room for Bible lessons. After that, all of us gathered around the temple to pray. I was in charge of hitting the gong. It was my favorite task because whenever I hit that gong, everyone bowed, specially big occasions when there was alot of peple. Of course, I couldn’t hit it all the time. I had to follow Su Ba’s prayer and knew when to hit the gong. Following the prayer, it was dinner time. My favorite time was after dinner where Su Co would tell fantasy stories on how the Buddha used his/her powers to help people. After storytime, Chi Chau and I walked around the temple to insert incense.

That was my daily routine at the temple. It was the most peaceful life I ever had. I was surrounded by love and spirit. It was like living in heaven and I was protected from the outside world. When I was six, my parents came picked me up because it was time for me to go home and go to school. I could remember vividly the teardrops from Chi My Chau eyes as we said goodbye. We were a bonded family and I didn’t want to leave. They were my temple family members that I will never forget. My life after the temple was a disaster. The real world was full of evil, hate, and temptation. Without their guidance and direction I was lost and became a little monster (another interesting story). I could never go back to that life because the real world has rotten me. I have no place after this life for me. I have no Jesus or Buddha in me, not even God.

Now back in Poughkeepsie. Had a quality time with the family. Came home Friday night, my mom made goi cuon (spring roll), pho (Vietnamese noodle), and sinh to sau rieng (durian smoothie). Damn I was stuffed to death. Saturday, took my mom and my aunt to Philly for grocery shopping. We stopped at Joy Tsin Lau for tim sum (tea lunch). Never have enough of shrimp dumplings. At the asian supermarket, I bumped into my uncle. Man, he was bling blingin’ with gold chain, diamond ring, and a Rolex. On top of that, he’s pushing a brand new 2003 Lex LX. Damn it! He should have lent me some of his dough so I can pay off my student loans.

We bought heo quay (Chinese roast pork) for dinner. My head started to spin after munching away the pork skins. Too much fatty gets me dizzy as hell but I couldn’t help myself. After dinner, I spent some time with my cutie Sammie. We watched Mulan together. It was probably the fifth time I watched that animated film. The storyline is so sweet. The music is fantastic. Of course, the illustrations and animations are amazing.

On Sunday afternoon, hang out with the fellaz. It was unbelievable. We picked up some tacos and chalupas at Taco Bell for lunch. After finished eating them at my boy’s crib, everyone was fighting for the bathroom. Damn, I’ll never eat at Taco Bell again. The foods were bangin’ but they just come right back out. That’s pretty much sumed up my weekend.

While surfing around, I was drawn into Asian Abuse. Growing up as asian kids, we all have been abused by our parents one way or the other. Some experienced it physically, mentally or even both. Don’t give me wrong, I love my mother to death but growing up with her was not easy at all. She would not let anyone put his/her hands on me even my own father; however, she put a lot of pressure on me mentally. My father was not around so she raised my sister and I on her own. She put lots of hope on my shoulder. She wanted me to accomplished what she didn’t get a chance to do. She would sacrifice anything in order for me to get an education. She made me feel guilty if I didn’t do good in school. I felt extremely depressed when she compared me with my cousins. She would always said, “Look at your cousins, one makes 60 thousands a year, one makes 80 thousands a year and you can’t even get a good grade.” Mom, did you know that I was hurt inside when you said, “Look at so and so, they listen to their parents. I am so unfortunate to have a son that not only don’t listen but also talk back to me.” I just wanted to expressed how I feel mom. There was no such thing as communication. Parents talk, kids listen, and that’s it. Until this day, she still treats me as a 12 years old kid but she finally understands and accepts me the way that I am and not someone like my cousins or the good kids who always listened to their parents. Our relationship is much better now then the way it used to be. I know that you will always love me and want what is best for me so you didn’t do all that stuff intentionally to hurt me. So I don’t blame you mom and I will always love you.

Haven’t heard from my aunt from Virginia for a while. She called me last night complimented on D3studio.net. I was flattered that she was inspired by my work and wanted to create a site for herself. She asked me to help her get started. I was so excited that one of my family member read my site. To be honest, I did not expect any readers to this site. The purpose of this blog was to put down my thoughts, inspiration, frustration, and most important of all, to improve my English skills. Being out of school over a year, I haven’t written any papers or essays, and my English is just getting worse and worse. It’s not like my English was good to begin with. There are tons of grammatical errors all over the site although I try to clean up as much as possible. I remembered back in the days when I first started designed my first site. I had a mentor from Upward Bound Program that would read my stuff and emailed back with grammatical corrections. Sort of of like going to a writing center to have an English professor proofreads your paper but it was better because the corrections came right on my computer and I didn’t have to go anywhere. Thanks Mrs. Tien! I never had a chance to take you out to eat. You were a great mentor. Please email me if you stop by my site. I really missed you and would like to keep in touch with you.

Spent my Friday evening and Saturday morning working on the nfsahc site. I was planning to go back to Lancaster to see my family but decided to stay at the last minute after recieved an email from my client. I was waiting for the contents for almost two weeks. I am very excited about this project because my client is very flexible and trusted me completely with the design aspects although we never met before. This project was refered from my past client (lfee). We only communicate through emails. I am pleased to established a trusting relationship with my clients. It makes my job much easier and the outcome is much smoothier. Ok, enough about work. let’s move on to something else.

My car was having a bad day yesterday. She was ticketed from Vassar. What the hell? I work for them and they ticketed my baby for parking violation. They expect me to walk to work or something. I will call off work next time if I can’t find a parking space for my baby. While parked her on the street infront of my apartment, some dumbass motherfucker hit her on the driver side mirror and drove off. Came out today and noticed the mirror was crooked and cracked. According to the Vietnamese superstition, something bad will happened if your mirror is cracked or broken. Since my whole life is a drama, will see what would be worse going to happened to me.

Finally got my lazy ass to the grocery store today after eating hot dogs and rice for the past three days. I am telling ya, ain’t nuttin’ better than burnt hot dogs dipped in Vietnamese spicy sauce with half cooked rice and finish off the meal with some Alize. Because of lacking of sleep for the past couple of days, I was passed the fuck out this afternoon after drinking Alize. It was a good deep four hours nap. After grocery shopping, I stopped by Barnes and Noble to check out some new books. Couldn’t control myself, I ordered a large Caramel Frappacino. Damn it was heaven but I will be up all night with all that caffeine. It’s all good though cuz I got three movies from Vassar library: Chinatown, Psycho and Platoon. Yeah! I am a classic freak.