So after a week or so of horrendous fast talking and staying up late to try and coordinate time zones I think I'm finally done with the paperwork... at least for the visa part. I haven't yet found an air ticket yet.... but that should be simple by comparison.

I think I'm going to take a well deserved break by going to play FF9 (For those in the know it's what I've been doing all week, which explains why I'm not blogging much)

I am extremely tempted at this point to sue the university.

For those who have not been following the long saga that is my life, I have to obtain a university support letter for the internship before I can get a visa to work in Japan. Of course after a week of equivocating, with me calling them every day, the univerisity has finally decided that they cannot sign the letter which has never happened before according to the company in japan.

So i figure 20 million to 50 million ought to be my due recompense for this. I mean, not only are they losing me an internship but the possibility of an extremely lucrative career in Trading or I-banking.

My evidence is there, I have various letters to the university saying that the wording of the letter can be changed, I have a letter stressing the importance of this letter.. and I figure I even have a precedence.. if you can call the guy who sued the postal service for 20 million because his acceptance letter never got to him costing him a college education a precedence.

I even have a punitive damages plea of extreme duress cost to me. After this amount of stress and upsetment, I'm sure my lifespan has been shortened by at least a year with all this worrying. Now all that's left is to find a good lawyer.

So anyone here know a good lawyer based in the USA?

Some 10 or 20 years later as I am lying on my therapist's couch, I can already see the shape of the conversation that would take place.

"So tell me how you can be both extremely conscious of your appearance and at the same time not care at all about your appearenace? Don't you feel that this is a contridiction?" My fictional therapist would ask as I sit on the couch day dreaming about the past 20 or so years and what I would have changed.

"Grow up with my mother." would be my short, to the point and pithy response.

:-p

Don't get me wrong, I'm not exactly complaining about my mother I mean after 22 years you'd think I'd get used to it. And I know all the usual arguements and justifications.. yes she grew up in a time when looks were frightfully important rather than intelligence and therefore priorities on appearance rather than on a career or anything else.

Instead, what this post is really about is this strange realization I've come to, that having people around you that somehow or other make you feel that you're not as pretty as everyone else (whether through outright telling you or just making you feel inadequate in that department)has a twin effect in opposite directions.

What do I mean by this? Well firstly there's the total rebellion effect. The well-no-matter-what-I-do-I-can't-be-pretty-anyway-so-why-should-I-bother-effect. That, of course, speaks for itself.

More surprising is that the opposite is also true. I admit that most of the time the first effect is predominant, I'm usually in jeans and a t-shirt. My mum complains I dress like a boy and when I'm on campus I pretty much don't bother to correct that impression. But occasionally I feel like dressing up. My housemates and I once compared this and I think I am the only one who actually doesn't much mind getting hit on by guys or getting stares from them as i walk down the street in a short skirt. I suspect part of this is that I grew up in an area so safe that I can't imagine any danger happening to me personally, but the other half is that for me that's kind of another kind of rebellion.. proving some imaginary part of my brain that repeats everything my mother says at me, wrong.

So on the one side, you get the no make up, not even colour-coordinated, randomly dressed me, and on the other, this elaborately crafted outfit usually involving some attention-grabbing colour and even more attention-grabbing lack of length of skirt complete with matching socks and makeup that is also me.

I suspect my therapist is going to have a field day.
But then, first she's going to have to contend with all the other (probably more severe)stuff... like how I am going to tell my mum that no, I don't want plastic surgery.

I received my contract and signed it. :-) I have to zap my passport and all those other things and send photos and all but I should be able to send that all out by today. The only problem being the letter from brown which might take longer. Hopefully I can pressure them to get that done faster.

I get paid weekly! That's a good thing because that means I would have the cash to get things done. If I didn't I wouldn't know what to do! :-p

I GOT THE JOB!!!!

Erm. yes I've been pretty quiet about that online. Suffice to say I will be flying back to tokyo within the next two weeks as soon as my visa is done and I'll have a seven to eight week internship in a huge huge bank with their credit trading division. Oh god.. seventy hour or more work weeks. lol. ME working them!!!

Yes so for everyone out there. I won't be home for long so erm.. have lunch with me before I disappear again. For the moment there are tons of little things to accomplish. Like photos for visas, suits, shoes. Things like that.

I'M HOME. and by home I of course mean Singapore. Although recently, and not so recently, I've had my doubts.

Kinda anti-climatic. Now that I'm home I don't really want to or feel like going out. I admit the weather has a great deal to do with that. In addition to the heat, there's the humidity that makes the air heavy and hard to breathe.

Temperature aside though, it seems each time I return there's less and less to do. I don't feel the same need to go out and reaqquaint myself with all the "happening" places down on the town any longer and each time I return it seems I get in touch with fewer friends. The evidence does not look good. I graduate next year and I have no idea where I'll be going after. It seems I don't have ties to maintain at any place almost... but aren't ties what makes us human? As much as we all don't want any responsibilty or don't want any ties to anything that will trap us, I think that those same traps are what keeps us alive. If you have no ties to anyone or anywhere, then what's the point of staying alive?

*sigh* off to take another shower to cool down.

While I was in tokyo i was lucky enough to see the Olympic Torch Relay pass through tokyo by chance... twice. The price of that was getting drenched by rain for an hour.. but as I don't seem to be falling sick yet.. I guess it was worth it.

So I'm still hanging in the middle of nowhere with this whole internship thing. They emailed saying they:ll make a decision soon but I'm already out of the US.

In addition to that, my housemates are seriously irritating the hell out of me. i know they are my best friends but honestly sometimes i just want to scream how the hell can all of you be so bloody immature at them. I still have to live with them next year. But honestly, I hate having to be the mature one and I simply don:t have the energy to yell at them so I usually end up keeping my mouth shut and just letting it be.

Sometimes, I hate my life.

walking on line fence when maybe either side would be the right one. wish i could just do that and choose.