everything i read this month

 📖the making of a counterculture cook - alice waters

📍manhattan

In 1999, I move from Vietnam to a suburb of California in July, turned five and started kindergarten that September. That amongst other things including sharing one bedroom and mattress with my family of four--in a house occupied with my extended family of aunts, uncles, newborn cousins--made for a tumultuous time in my life.

It's no wonder then that this entire summer I spent reading books from voices of the diasporas around the world. For immigrants, both our imagined community and actual community (family) are core to our existence. In these stories: maternal sacrifice and resilience, found families, the escape from choicelessness and dissatisfaction--literally if you're a first generation anything these stories will click almost uncomfortably close to home and realize this is why I am the way I am. (spoiler alert in these reviews)

somewhere in brooklyn

 📖leavers - lisa ko 

📍dumbo, brooklyn

Hi, and welcome to my blog which I'm writing in Brooklyn on a Saturday evening.

I planned to leave Manhattan on July 27th on a short one hour plane ride to Montreal, away from the summer rain that made subway rides more hell-ish than usual. But of course, because Mercury was in retrograde what was supposed to be Montreal ended up being Jess' living room, where I turned up at 12AM that night.

I planned to write letters to Leslie--we would orchestrate a site along with other grand schemes we concocted over a spontaneous Rich Table dinner. We'd call it 8 hours apart because that was the time difference between Nairobi and New York City, and we'd talk about how different these places were from the 626, where we both grew up, or San Francisco where we met. I wrote one letter and shortly forgot about it.

At 23, nothing ever goes as planned I guess.

Now I'm here, in DUMBO, my home in between homes. Overlooking an Instagram hotspot and so close to the bridge that I mix up the sound of my airconditioning turning on and the trains running across East River. Today marks month 2 of being in New York.

Things That Haven't Changed:

• I'm still restless and aggressively trying to convince friends from around the world to take trips around the world with me
• I still don't call my parents enough
• I still cry while reading books about the immigrant experience in public places
• I still walk really slow
• When I walk north and see the Empire State Building, I still stop and try to take a picture of it

Things That Have Changed:

• I can no longer stand walking for more than 15 minutes to get ANYWHERE, when I used to consider 30 minute bus rides a thing of convenience. 
• I no longer find New York's humidity unbearable 
• I don't like eating avocados, because the New York avocados just aren't as good as the California ones 

So this is an attempt to document me. Me in New York, the city of my adolescent dreams (I think if you told 12 year old me that I'd be living in New York, she would cry), what changes and what stays the same. In addition, I'll post pictures of what I spend money on, the books I read and love or hate, and gossip about everyone I know. Hopefully this goes as plan.