First, welcome to the new decade! It's supposed to be a wonderful, joyous occasion, but I'm left with a hollow feeling in my gut right now. Two reasons.
Just got back from an amazing cruise vacation to the Caribbeans with family and family friends. There were some familiar faces there, like Alice Zhang from TJ. Go figure. Apparently our moms are both part of this Chinese organization based in the tri-area region (DC, MD, and VA). Byran and his family were obviously there too. We also met up with some other people, Julie and Amanda. Over the course of a 8 days, we would all grow close and bond together in ways that I didn't know was possible. That was a gross over-exaggeration for dramatic effect.
First couple days (12/25 – 12/26) were on the water, as in there was nothing but water as far as the eye could see. We were onboard the Carnival Liberty embarking for the St. Maarten island of Northern Antilles. First day, we were kinda testing the water of the cruise (pardon the pun), and we tried out the various activities like the "18-20 year old meet and greet". Yea, we snuck in. Turned out to be pretty lame, although the real 18 year olds seemed to be enjoying themselves. But that was when we were first introduced to the abomination known as Matt. Actually, I didn't think he was as bad as others (ahem, Byran) made him out to be. We also checked out the Welcome Show, which kinda sucked, much to my chagrin, cause I vouched for it. Alice never trusted my recommendations again after that.
We tried the hot tub too the second day, and had a nice conversation about pick-up lines, courtesy of Byran. Some of the more memorable ones include "You seem so sweet. Can I have a sample?" and "Can I have a raisin? How about a date?" The other ones were too cheesy or stupid to be recalled.
Both days were pretty chill and relaxing, as we all got to sleep in late, though Alice was spritely and decided to do yoga at 8am one day. Byran and I never woke up early enough for breakfast.
3rd day – we finally touched land in St. Maarten. Byran and I just layed out on the beach the entire day. It was partially a European style (nude) beach, so we saw a lot of right-old droopy knockers and dangly peckers around. It was pretty gross. However, every so often, a hot topless chick would wander by in front of us with great boobs, and that made it all worth it. Besides that, the water was great, food was alright (had a burger and fries), and the beach was great. 7/10
4th day – touched down in St. Thomas. Spent the day on an island tour with our family. Went to Drake's point first, which had a gorgeous overlook to the bay and Magen's beach, then we actually went down to Magen's beach. It was supposedly one of the top 10 beaches in the world according to National Geographic, but it really wasn't that special. Just a regular beach. Again, Byran and I layed out for a couple hours. At this point I'm developing a nice sunburn, especially around my right armpit.
5th day – San Juan – went on a 2 hour bike tour with Byran, cause we woke up too late to go see the rainforest El Yunque with the cool kids. But the bike tour was pretty awesome. Our tour guide was a feisty Spanish woman who had the legs of a 20 year old. She said she bikes and runs everyday. We saw some of the forts around Old San Juan, including San Cristobal. I took some Christian rock album cover pictures with Byran, which was perfect, cause of the slightly gloomy feel of the clouds and crashing waves of the Atlantic Ocean. We also had the best lunch ever. We ate at the Punto de Visto restaurant right by the port. I had some steak burrito variation called the chucaquirritos, and Byran had chicken burritos basically. But it was om-nom-delicious. I want more.
6th day – Grand Turk – last day, so I wanted to spend it with the girls, but Alice and Amanda already went and booked a tour for Gibbs Cay beach to see sting rays with their families. Ay ya. So Byran, Julie, and I just hung out in Governor's beach and then Pillary beach, where we snorkeled and then ate onion rings. They tasted so good after such a physically exhausting activity. Snorkeling kinda sucked – the water was too murky for us to really see any coral/fish.
Last day – we were back at sea. Had the New Years Eve party on the last day. It was frekin awesome. Someone proposed. We drank champagne, we partied, we clubbed, we danced, we lived it up.
Now, given how amazing the experience was, it's kind of a shock to be back, which is half the reason I'm depressed.
Another more overbearing reason is cause of a girl.
I met Nancy, possibly the most amazing/cute/amazinglycute girl I had ever seen in my life two weeks ago, a week before embarking on my cruise trip. We hit it off pretty well. We met at the Grand Central club In Adam's Morgan, and had a great time just chatting, sipping, and dancing a little. I got her number at the end of the night, and proceeded to call her up a couple days later. Anyways, we went on a couple dates and had a wonderful time (at least I thought), but she was also distracted by seeing her friends for the last time cause her parents moved to Texas, and her friends were going their separate ways. I made the mistake of caring more about this girl than she did about me. It was probably bad timing – I've been pretty emotionally lacking for the past several months after starting work at NIH. There were just absolutely ZERO girls that I could see myself dating there. So I'm guessing this deprivation was basically, slowly and subconsciously, brewing inside of me, priming me to jump at the chance of seeing a decent looking Asian girl. This may have been the reason I fell so hard for Nancy. I don't know. It might be because of this, or it might be because she is actually that amazing and perfect to me. Everything about her just felt so RIGHT. We had some great conversations in the back of my car, albeit over only a couple of days. But hey, it worked in Sleepless in Seattle and Dear John, so why not in real life as well? I miss her like crazy right now, and I think about her probably every other second. It's affecting everything I do, and I feel like I can't feel happy again unless I see her. But that doesn't seem likely at all given that she lives in Socal and will be in Norcal next year, and I'm frekin stuck here on the east coast. My only shot would be to get an interview at USC or UC-Irvine. She hasn't responded to any of my emails or messages, and I am scared that she just wants to forget about me. God, I wish I knew how she feels about me right now, and I wish I could make this work. Should I give it a shot?
