Anxiety Dreams

Happy Leap Day! (I'm going to say that all day today just because I can.)

I'm a little troubled by this trend of anxiety-filled dreams lately. I don't fully remember my dream from last night because I woke up so abruptly, but I remember traveling, worries about security, rushing around in a car/cab, and a sense of urgency. Not much to go on, but I know I woke up stressed.

Yesterday I woke up from yet another dream where I missed so much class and was so unprepared that I was in danger of failing. I didn't know where my final exams were. I didn't know what was on the exams. I was flipping through the book in my dorm room (this was undergrad, not law school like it usually is) after the exam had already started, while simultaneously trying to figure out where the damn exam was. I was running around like a crazy person. These "unprepared for school and fear of failure" dreams always feel so real that I have to remind myself they are not really a memory. So much stress and anxiety.

At some point over the weekend I had a different type of anxiety dream. Someone had pulled all of my teeth as some sort of punishment or intimidation tactic. Somehow I was okay and not a huge bleeding and painful mess. It was like the worst part was just losing my teeth. They gave them back to me, all polished and shiny and clean. I was at the time cleaning out my gums and getting rid of anything stuck in them. Then I tried to get the teeth back into their slots in my gums (like a puzzle) and hoped the gums would regrow around them (can they even do that?).

What does this all mean? Why am I so anxious and not sleeping peacefully? What can I do to sleep peacefully? Certainly not melatonin because last time I took that after a trip I had really vivid and weird dreams bordering on nightmares. I want a happy whimsical dream!

Desayuno

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

Breakfast at our resort was only served at World Cafe, the place where we had gone for our lunch buffet the day before. (You could also order room service if you wanted.) Breakfast was a buffet consisting of several stations: kids station, "American" breakfast food (waffles, french toast, etc.), omelettes and eggs, fruit, cereal, yogurt, sausages and meats (including meat carving), grilled vegetables (tomatoes, etc.), juice machines, fresh juice bar, and in the back, the station which would be our favorite - the Mexican station. There were a lot of options.

A sampling of the buffet stations (clockwise from top left): chilaquiles at the Mexican station, tostadas freshly made at the Mexican station, corner of the fresh juice bar, interesting shapes for waffles, more of the fresh juice bar
We overdid it a little bit for our first breakfast at World Cafe, since we didn't know what was good or what we would like.

Left side - the two halves of my first plate; right side top - the yogurt we both got; right side bottom - A's first plate
For my first plate, I got chilaquiles, refried beans, pico de gallo, a grilled tomato, one piece of hash browns, 2 sausage links, and grilled plantains. A got a smaller portion of chilaquiles, the same sausage links and hash browns, a fried cheese empanada, and some smoked salmon with onions and capers. We both picked up a small container of Yoplait peach yogurt.

The yogurt had a fresh and clean flavor, just like Yoplait yogurt at home, and it didn't taste dramatically different. We found the non-Mexican food to be just okay - the hash browns were the same fried thing we could get at home, the sausages were fine but nothing special, the plantains were a little heavy but fine, the grilled tomato was a grilled tomato, and A found the smoked salmon so salty that I didn't even bother trying it. The Mexican breakfast food, however, was amazingly delicious. The chilaquiles were creamy and like comfort food, and topped with the pico de gallo and mixed with the refried beans, it was so full of flavor and refreshing. It was all so good.

(If you don't know what chilaquiles are, they're lightly fried tortilla pieces topped with salsa, cheese and sour cream, and garnished with raw onions and cilantro.)

Looking at our second plates, you can tell what we liked best:

My plate (left side), A's plate (right side), choco zucaritas cereal that we took back to the room for snack but never ended up eating
I got more chilaquiles, more refried beans and more pico de gallo, with a little bit of fruit for dessert. A got more chilaquiles, more refried beans and more pico de gallo, with papayas and the pork stew (also from the Mexican station). A also got another bowl of papayas after that. Clearly, our favorite items were Mexican breakfast dishes.

We also loved the fresh juice bar:

Gorgeous colors for the juices
We tried a lot of the fresh juices. Two of them were orange - orange/carrot and orange/papaya. Between the 2, we preferred the orange/papaya. But that came in second to what turned out to be our favorite juice from the fresh juice bar - beetroot and orange juice (the reddish purple colored one). The green juice there is celery, cactus, pineapple and orange juice. I didn't try this one but A said it was a little salty and you could definitely taste the celery.

I'm not really a big fan of breakfast, as I've mentioned before. (Unlike me, A likes breakfast.) But until the last full day of our trip, I found myself saying that breakfast at World Cafe might be my favorite meal of the day! I think it's the chilaquiles. I could eat chilaquiles for breakfast everyday.

Next: we explore the resort... and then it pours.

Happy Presidents Day

Happy Presidents Day! (aka the last holiday before the long stretch that leads up to Memorial Day, although in A's case, that was New Years)

I had the day off from work today and I can't say that I made the most of it. I was so much more productive yesterday. Yesterday the day didn't start very early either but I was so energized during the Knicks game against the Mavs that I got a ton of cleaning done. It doesn't look like much but I organized a lot of stuff, went through a bunch of magazines, can finally put my feet on my footstool again, etc. That cleaning energy lasted for the entire Knicks game (which they awesomely won) and for the entire Barcelona soccer game against Valencia (which Messi awesomely dominated with 4 goals). It kept going as I watched the postgame show (in Spanish) and then Harry Potter 5 on ABC Family's Harry Potter Weekend and I think I had so much energy that I couldn't sleep last night at all. I was up until close to 5 am for no good reason, tossing and turning and trying to sleep. I haven't had this much energy in so long and it was such a foreign feeling.

No such luck today. After sleeping so late, I barely got up before noon (thank goodness it wasn't a work day), dealt with a stomachache (why do I always feel crappy on days off?), and then met A for lunch specials at Thai Palate, yet another Thai place on 9th Avenue that we haven't tried before. The lunch specials were fine (nothing extraordinary), but after I came home, caught up on some more TV and did more trip research, it was already the end of the work day! I don't know where the day went. I can't say I spent it productively cleaning like yesterday. I wish I could. I guess I used up all of my energy yesterday!

I am glad I had the day off to rest, even if I didn't spend it getting cleaning done or going to the gym as I had originally intended. Thank you, Presidents!

OXXO

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

Our last stop on our first night in Cancun was the OXXO convenience store. The store is very similar to a 7-Eleven and there was a location right next to our resort. We decided to check it out since we usually visit a grocery store when we go to other countries. We hadn't seen a supermarket on our way to the resort so we figured this might be the closest we got.

We saw lots of snack food, including peanuts in flavors like salt with lemon flavor, Japanese and chili:


The fridge section was full of cheese, including lots of Oaxacan cheese (someday we hope to make it to Oaxaca):


Cookies and cream Oreo cookies? Do we have these here?


I know that in Mexico "bimbo" doesn't have the same meaning that it does here, but it still caught my attention. The little teddy bear is also really cute. There were lots of Bimbo products at the store.


I hadn't seen these marshmallow, coconut and cookie treats before but they looked good. I just looked it up and they have them online from places like Walmart, so I guess we have these here.


In addition to all of the snack foods, drinks and other ingredients to go, there was also a section for cooked food like tacos and tamales.


I love tacos and tamales and the ones in those photos look so good. I didn't see the real ones but A said that the photos looked better than the real thing. Oh well.

We didn't end up buying anything on our visit since we figured we could probably get some of this stuff at home (didn't know about the widespread availability of the sponch at the time but we live near some Mexican grocery stores) and we didn't have any pesos anyway. But we enjoyed our visit!

Next: we become obsessed with chilaquiles!

Oceana para la Cena

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

For our first dinner in Cancun, we picked Oceana, the seafood restaurant at the resort. We were looking forward to some healthy seafood dishes after a long day of traveling. Since we were staying at an all-inclusive resort, we could order anything we wanted without caring about prices. That type of freedom was fantastic.

Oceana Restaurant (the next morning)
The meal started with some bread and butter. The rolls were plain and the butter didn't have any special flavoring, so this wasn't really very exciting.


For her appetizer, M ordered the turbante de salmón ahumado y camarón, preparado con pepino, cilantro y lima, perfumado de miel y mostaza (smoked salmon and shrimp turban, prepared with cucumber, cilantro and lime, perfumed with honey and mustard).


The plate consisted of some salad greens, carrots and cucumbers and a piece of smoked salmon wrapped around what M thought would be shrimp based on the menu description. Instead, what was inside the smoked salmon was more like ceviche.


This was a good appetizer. It had the light and clean flavors that M was looking for and the salmon and ceviche tasted really fresh.

A got the bisquet de langosta, perfumada de cognac y pernod (lobster bisque, perfumed with cognac and pernot).


This was a very rich and flavorful soup. A could definitely taste the lobster that was used to flavor the soup even if there really wasn't much actual lobster. It was surprisingly not creamy even though it was a bisque. It seemed much more tomato-based instead of cream-based, and that was really nice.

For the main course, M got the seafood special - mariscada dreams - camarón, pescado, calamar, callo de hacha y mejillón, parrillados con pesto (shrimp, fish, squid, scallops and mussels, grilled with pesto).


From the menu description, we thought this would be a healthy plate of grilled seafood. A little bit of oil from the pesto, but otherwise just simply grilled. If that's what you thought from the description, the picture should be your first indication that you're wrong. The seafood may have been grilled, but it was also drenched in a ton of butter sauce. So. Much. Butter. It was completely overwhelming. On top of that, M asked when ordering to confirm there was no broccoli in the dish, and it showed up with broccoli. If the broccoli were just grilled or steamed, we could move it with no issue, but with all that butter sauce, there was broccoli floating everywhere. All the butter made this a rather disappointing dish, especially after such a clean appetizer. There was also no pesto that we noticed, but that was less of an issue than the butter.

A got the surf and turf - mar y tierra - filete de res y camarones a la parrilla, servido con salsa de pimiento rojo y salsa de oporto (grilled beef fillet and shrimp, served with red pepper and port sauce).


As always, A ordered his filet rare. It came out much closer to medium rare, which for any other steak would have been okay, but this was filet, and that was disappointing. The sauce tasted a lot like the bisque he had just eaten but infused with some butter. He also got some of the same buttery vegetables that M got with her dish. Overall it was a bit disappointing, but certainly more edible than the buttery mess that M got.

We had a nice and relaxing dinner at Oceana, but the food was just okay. We both agreed that our appetizers were better than the entrees. We decided to skip dessert since we were pretty full after dinner.

Blurry photo of us at Oceana
Since our resort had multiple restaurant options, we planned to try different restaurants every night. Oceana was much too buttery for our liking, so we figured that, even with a longer trip, we would most likely not return for dinner. We hoped the other restaurants would be better (and use less butter)!

After dinner, we took a walk around the resort to get acquainted with the layout (and to help with digestion of all that butter). It was really breezy and still cloudy, but it was nice to be out in the warm night air. Next: we take a detour to a convenience store.

World Cafe

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

Our first meal in Mexico was at World Cafe, the buffet at our resort where they were serving lunch until 5 or so. There were a few different places serving lunch but we figured a buffet would be quickest and unlike the other restaurants, we already knew where it was (passed it on the way to our room).


I was a little wary of the food and drink at lunch since it was my first really "adventurous" meal after the food poisoning incident (the half sandwich and soup I had for breakfast at the airport was relatively tame) and I wasn't sure how my stomach would react to the fruits and vegetables in Mexico. I was even worried about the ice cubes in my iced tea. (I hadn't yet read the resort guide which talked about food safety and how all the water in the resort was purified).

For my first plate, I got an assortment of cooked food, figuring that was safest.


Generally, the food was just okay, but a little too much butter and salt in some dishes. Here's what I got on the first plate:
- fried citrus squid ring (fine but nothing special, reminded me that I don't really love plain fried food)
- sweet and sour pork (pretty good)
- slice of pizza with yellow bell pepper topping (fine but nothing special)
- orange fish (probably the best cooked item on the plate but a little too much butter and salt)
- mahi mahi in lemon sauce (very heavy butter flavor and salty)
- sauteed mushrooms (again, buttery)
- chicken and peppers from kids section (like a fajita, not that salty and pretty good; generally the kids section seemed to be lower in salt)

I got raw vegetables on my second plate, branching out a little as my stomach got more comfortable with the food.


On the second plate I got:
- ensalada mixta (contained tomato, jicama, onion - nice and light)
- corn, peas, grilled chicken (from the make your own salad section)
- chopped salad from kids section (also nice and light)
- chicken in tomato sauce (the piece I tried earlier from A's plate was good but mine was almost inedibly salty)
- chicken in demiglace sauce (buttery, salty, like the other dishes)
- more orange fish and mahi mahi since I figured it would be good to eat more fish at a seaside resort and I hoped it would less buttery and salty the second time (nope)

We didn't take photos of A's plates but we tried a lot of the same things. Overall our conclusion was that the meal was fine, especially since we were hungry, but too much butter and salt for our liking. We hoped that the other meals (both at the buffet and the other restaurants) would be less buttery and less salty.

After lunch, we went back to the room to relax. A passed out from exhaustion and headache, and I sat on the balcony for awhile watching the dolphins and reading the hotel guide and directory before also passing out from exhaustion. When we woke up, it was hours later and already dark outside. Next up: time for dinner!

Delfines

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

We were really excited when we finally arrived at our resort, the Dreams Cancun Resort and Spa. We were finally on vacation! Check-in was really easy (no wait to check in, no wait for our room). Our room was in the pyramid building (there are 2 buildings - pyramid and tower) and we were on the second level.


I loved the turquoise color scheme in the room because those ocean inspired colors are some of my favorites. I couldn't stop taking pictures of the turquoise and white designs. The room was rather spacious, there was a large king sized canopy bed and marble floors, and amazing light (even on a cloudy day) streamed in through the windows. We were really happy with our first look at the room. (Full review of the hotel to come at the end of the recaps.)

After surveying the room, we stepped out onto our balcony.


Two chairs and a mini table, perfect for sitting and relaxing, looking out at the pool and the ocean, and reading a good book. The pyramid building had views of the sea (not our side) or the resort (with views of the sea on the periphery). We were so happy that we got the resort view when we realized that the resort view included these amazing creatures:


Dolphins! Our room faced the lagoon where the Delphinus swimming with dolphins programs took place. We were so excited. Even with our door closed, we could hear the happy dolphins from inside our room. We both love dolphins and being able to see all of their tricks (and their splashing about when they weren't "working") was amazing. The dolphins were one of our favorite parts of the trip.

After we finished getting settled in our room, we gave in to our hunger and headed out to get lunch. Next up: our first meal in Mexico!

Shall We Dance

Today I streamed the 2004 US version of the movie Shall We Dance on Hulu. I've never seen the original Japanese version although I had heard great reviews. It sounded like the remake wasn't nearly as good, but I still wanted to check it out before it expired in ~15 days because I like movies about dance. (Center Stage is one of my favorite movies ever.)

Source
Short conclusion: I thought it was enjoyable (for the most part) but I wouldn't buy it. (Of course, after deciding that, I had to check to make sure I hadn't already bought it in a Black Friday binge, and I hadn't. I might have bought it using my past standards but now I am trying to downsize to just the movies I want to keep.) The strengths were the joy of dance, the dancing itself and some of the acting; the major weakness was the construction and credibility of the story itself. On a 10 scale, I would give this a 6.5.

The basic plot: A lawyer named John Clark (Richard Gere) finds himself unfulfilled and wanting more out of life (I can relate to that in some ways). He seems to be in a rut - the same thing at the firm day after day, a family life that is stable but seems like they are lacking connection, etc. While on the train, John sees a ballroom dance studio where Paulina (Jennifer Lopez) looks longingly out the window. Seeing his feelings mirrored in hers, he decides on a whim to go to the studio. He starts ballroom dancing, keeping it a secret from his wife (Susan Sarandon) and family, even going so far as to compete in ballroom dancing without telling his family. Of course, his wife thinks he's having an affair and hires a private detective. The end of the movie deals with the consequences of keeping the secret and then wraps the whole thing up in a neat little bow. (The movie is almost 8 years old, I'm not really that concerned about spoilers in the plot summary.)

What worked: It's fun watching people dance. It's why I love shows like SYTYCD and Dancing with the Stars. Richard Gere did a great job portraying someone who didn't really have any dance experience, learned some moves, caught the dancing bug, and truly found happiness through dance. His character is truly the star of the show and he did a fantastic job making John seem so charming when he was dancing. The 3 guys learning to dance together and the friendships that developed out of the dancing school were also good. I also liked seeing Chicago.

What didn't work: The story! First, I couldn't understand why John just didn't tell his wife he was dancing. At some point he said he was ashamed of where he was going and why, but I just couldn't understand that. If you love something so much, wouldn't you want to share that with your spouse? Why would dancing be such a terrible thing to confess? Second, how could the late nights and absences from home life get so far that he could be competing in a ballroom dance competition without the topic ever coming up at home? Why doesn't his wife ever ask him where he is night after night when he doesn't come home when he should? Even the private detective asked her if she had just asked him about it. Shouldn't they know where their spouse is? When she knows that he's dancing, why doesn't she confront him and ask him why he hasn't said anything? Was the lack of communication an issue in their marriage? It seemed like it because of this but it also just seemed like an artificial construct to add conflict to the movie. The fact that she wasn't privy to the dancing part of his life set up the major conflict and the ending, and without that conflict there isn't much tension to the story. I did like that the connection between John and Paulina wasn't a romantic one and that they didn't come up with some extramarital affair just for conflict, but the story and the reasons they did come up with were hard for me to believe.

I draw a distinction when I watch movies between the structure and the performance. This was really important in the last few Harry Potter movies where I thought they were wonderfully acted but I had such issues with the story. Here, I thought the acting was good and the performance was really enjoyable. My issues mostly stem from the story, which just wouldn't resonate with me. I can't imagine such a lack of communication and involvement in each other's lives.

I look forward to someday watching the original Japanese version. I wonder how it compares to this version.

Crocodiles?

I could not fall asleep last night.

 

Usually I am so exhausted that I fall asleep about 10 minutes after I unplug from the world (and set my fitbit to sleep mode).  Last night I was tired. I wanted to sleep. I had taken a nap during my usual 4-6 pm window when I can't keep my head up but that didn't seem to be stopping me from sleeping.  I just couldn't stop my mind from racing.  It took me over 45 minutes to finally fall asleep and it wasn't very restful.  I needed the sun lamp this morning to get me back to at least my usual state of tiredness.

 

My mind was racing and it was filled with irrational thoughts.  Maybe not so much irrational thoughts as irrational worries and irrelevant thoughts.  I'm guessing that I was influenced by both this weekend's airing of Idiot Abroad and all the talk about survival instincts in connection with the premiere of the Walking Dead last night (which we didn't even watch yet).  In Idiot Abroad, Karl was up in Alaska and at one point was taken out to an icy body of water where he was left to float about.  Both A and I agreed that, in the quiet and still Alaskan waters, with nothing but mountains and natural beauty around, that must be the most relaxing thing ever.  Great for meditation, great for clearing the mind.  Of course Karl appeared to hate it but we thought we would love it.  As for the Walking Dead piece of it, there have been episodes airing all weekend and a new one last night, so people have been talking about (and it makes you think about) what you would do in a zombie apocalypse.  If the zombie apocalypse is like the one on the show, I have no doubt that I would be in bad shape as far as survival instincts and as A agrees, am not so sure I would even want to be a conscious human being in that world.

 

So what was I thinking about?  I'm not sure how I got there but I was thinking about how relaxing it would be to just jump into a warm rushing stream of blue water in a remote place.  To be free, on vacation somewhere, spontaneous, no research whatsoever, out in nature and the wild, and just going for it. It was an amazing feeling of freedom and being alive.... and then I started thinking about how the water might have crocodiles.  (Maybe this was influenced by the sign we saw in Cancun that the lagoon was a crocodile zone.)  And then I got to thinking about surviving in the rain forest (how would I survive there?).  And snakes.  Big snakes.  Snakes that could wrap themselves around you and kill you.  And how would you outrun a crocodile anyway?  Would zigzagging be enough?  What if there were ten crocodiles zooming at you from all directions?  Surely you'd be a goner then.  And why would I jump into some river?  Who knows what's living in there?  Not just crocodiles but other deadly things.  It's like jumping into the deep part of the ocean.  How do people go scuba diving?  What about sharks?  And dangerous stinging jellyfish like the Irukandji that I read about on Gadling?  You just jump into the ocean and who knows what you're going to find.  That's part of the thrill, I suppose, but if you jump in and there's a shark right there, then what?  How do you escape a shark?  What if it's one of those mean sharks that just likes to bite people? (I think those are tiger sharks but A is the shark expert, not me.)  I guess I would only go scuba diving in a safe place that's popular with other people.  But I can't even scuba, only snorkel.  I wonder if people come across sharks while snorkeling.  What about whales?  I love whales but they're huge and what if you end up in the middle of them by accident?  Deep ocean waters, so many creatures and so much unknown.  Back to surviving.  Where would I want to survive?  A forest in someplace not tropical?  But there's bears.  And on and on and on.

 

The fears themselves are not really that irrational as it's a legitimate concern about safety among crocodiles, snakes, and sharks, and there is a fear of the unknown that is difficult for a usually risk-averse person like me to embrace.  But these are legitimate concerns if you are going to go someplace warm and remote and tropical (or to a forest with bears).  I am in New York City.  In the winter.  With a wind chill in the 20s.  There is no reason to be thinking about crocodiles, snakes or sharks.  There is especially no reason for crocodiles to be keeping me up at night.  So bizarre.  Hopefully tonight is better.

Bienvenidos a Cancun

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

After a few hours in the air, we arrived in Cancun, Mexico!

We expected to go through immigration as soon as we arrived, but instead we were let out right into the middle of the terminal, where we saw a California Pizza Kitchen, Johnny Rockets and Bubba Gump's. It was like we never left the US. We were thankful that we were let out into the terminal first because we really needed to use the bathroom after the long flight (since we napped until the descent and then couldn't get up from our seats). I also changed into shorts. No need for fleece pants in warm Cancun! It felt so good to wear shorts again.

We then set off for immigration, which took some time. It was so different from flying in to a European country and just getting your passport stamped with almost no questions asked. In Mexico, we had to fill out forms, go through immigration and also go through customs. The lines took longer than we expected, but after getting through the strict border control, we were officially in Mexico for the first time!

We're in Mexico!
We had pre-booked our transfer from the airport to the resort, so we met up with the contact person from the company and then took our private van to the hotel. We got a pretty good price (in our opinion) through USA Transfers for a round trip transfer for both of us. The private van was great because we didn't have to stop at other resorts on the way to ours. I do like seeing other resorts (like when we took the walk-in clinic van at Disney) but, with such a short trip, we wanted to get to the resort as soon as possible!

While we waited for our transfer and then while we drove to our hotel, we noticed that the airport seemed to be sponsored by Corona. The air traffic control tower, overpasses... all Corona ads.

An example of the Corona ads everywhere (and yes, it was really overcast)
The ride to our hotel took around 20 minutes. If you've never been to Cancun or Riviera Maya, here's a quick geography guide to the area. Cancun is located on the Yucatan peninsula in the state of Quintana Roo (one of the safe zones according to the new Mexican travel advisory). There is the main area of Cancun itself (downtown) and then a 7-shaped piece of land jutting into the Caribbean Sea (with a lagoon between the 7-shape and the mainland). That 7-shape is the "zona hotelera" (hotel zone) where most of the resorts and tourist areas are. It's very close to the airport and as we drove to our hotel, we saw resort after resort. Our resort, Dreams Cancun, was located at the corner of the 7-shape. If, instead of going north from the airport to Cancun, you went south, you would hit Playa del Carmen and Tulum, home to many (many) other resorts, archaeological sites (Mayan ruins) and other ecological parks. We would have explored more but it was a short trip and our highest priority was pure relaxation.


We took in all the sights on our way to the resort (and I read every sign in Spanish that I could find) and then we finally arrived at Dreams. We were so excited to finally begin our vacation!

Next up: our pretty hotel room at the resort - and dolphins!

Linsanity

For those of you living under a rock for the past 24 or so hours, there's a new athlete sensation gripping the world. Jeremy Lin has taken the NBA by storm, and the impact he has had here in New York pales in comparison to the impact his success has had in the Asian American communities in this country and also across the world. As an Asian American basketball player growing up, I faced enough prejudice of my own as the stereotype is that we're not strong enough, fast enough, quick enough, etc. to hang with everyone else. It didn't matter that I was 6'5" and one of the tallest people in school. My ethnicity made me an anomaly and there were times I questioned internally whether my popularity was based on my skills on the court or the novelty that I was Asian American and actually showed that I belonged.

Even though my real basketball career ended after high school, I always hoped that some day our community would be able to produce a player good enough to succeed on the professional level. I don't want success by an Asian American to be looked on as a surprise solely because of ethnicity, I want success by an Asian American to be looked on merely for the fact that they've succeeded like any other ethnicity. What Jeremy Lin has showed thus far is that he could be the one show that the stigma attached to Asian Americans is one to be broken and forgotten. While I don't expect a sudden flood of Asian American kids breaking into college programs and the NBA, I would like to think that it gives hope to every Asian American boy and girl that this path, one which has been closed to us for so long, might finally be opened and be explored.

I know that enough of our youth has been dissuaded from even looking into this as an option since there are and always have been enough detractors. Hopefully this can all end now.

JFK to CUN

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

Our flight from JFK to Cancun was relatively unexciting (which, for a flight, isn't such a bad thing). We were so exhausted and tried to sleep through as much of the flight as we could. Neither of us slept through the entire flight but we did get in at least an hour each.

Since we were attempting to sleep (or at least rest) for the majority of the flight, we didn't take any pictures. But here's a review of our in-flight experience:

Seating: We opted not to pay for the extra legroom seating for this flight since it wasn't that long. (Actual flight time was around 4 hours.) The seats weren't as cramped as some other domestic airlines but it was still not that comfortable. We had a window seat and middle seat on a full flight. It was very bright and sunny outside during the flight and I hadn't closed the windowshade before falling asleep so I kept waking up drenched in sweat from the heat of the sun. But considering my usual need for sun therapy, I was happy to see sunlight.

Food and drink service: Jetblue still serves free snacks (chips or cookies). You have to pay for the snackboxes (none of which appealed to me as they're all snack food) and there are no other meals onboard. I opted for the sea salt popcorners while A just tried to sleep through snacktime. I'm glad Jetblue carries popcorners, as they are some of my favorite chips. As for drinks, it seems we slept through the drink ordering time. I couldn't understand why the flight attendant for our row, when handing out drinks, chose to pretend I didn't exist when I was trying to get her attention to find out how I could get a drink later. She could have just said that she would get back to me when she finished handing things out. I saw other flight attendants do that on that same flight. Instead it's like I was invisible. Jetblue usually has really good service so I was surprised. It took me at least 10 minutes to flag down another flight attendant to ask about drinks. I would have given up and just tried to nap again but I really wanted some cold apple juice after sitting in the sun.

In-flight entertainment: A big reason why we like Jetblue is the in-seat TV. We love being able to watch or listen to TV while on our trip. It helps the flight go by more quickly. I tried every time I woke up but all of the TV channels said they were searching for a signal. It wasn't because we were out of U.S. range either because we were over the Carolinas a few times when I checked. Maybe they made an announcement when I was sleeping that the TV didn't work, but that was disappointing. The XM radio did work, but I didn't realize that until at least halfway through the flight. I also didn't realize for some time that the movies were free because we were on a flight outside of the 48 contiguous states. I doubt I would have stayed awake through a movie anyway. A watched parts of Dolphin Tale on other people's TVs. But mostly we listened to music and tried to nap.

Other passengers: There were some really rude people on our flight. Made us question whether Cancun was the right vacation destination for us if these are the types of people who go there. Luckily we didn't really encounter anyone like that while at our resort. I know the flight was early in the morning, but there's no excuse to be snapping at other passengers and flight attendants when the poor guy was just trying to figure out a solution so that he could sit with his small child. No one asked them to babysit, so it's unclear why they had such an outrageous reaction to what he was doing. The flight attendants handled this well though, so I was glad.

Generally, the flight was fine. All of the "issues" (getting a drink, no TV channels) were really minor ones. Much better than our last Jetblue flight when my TV wouldn't even turn on. (This time at least with no TV service I could still get the map channel that I love.)

Next up: we arrive in Cancun!

Morning at JFK

Part of a series recapping our 2012 trip to Cancun, Mexico!

Traveling to Cancun got off to a rough start. I was behind on all my tasks after the food poisoning incident, which left me suffering from more than a bit of exhaustion and a really bad stomachache before we left. I didn't get around to packing until a couple of hours before we were supposed to leave for the airport and couldn't find a lot of my stuff due to the cluttered state of our apartment and not knowing where anything is anymore. It was a really uncomfortable process but we eventually got "on the road" about 30-45 minutes later than we planned. After pulling an all-nighter, we were both so tired and cranky.

Luckily, the ride on the E train was smooth. We got seats by the time the train left Manhattan and it was a quick express ride over to Jamaica, Queens where we would catch the AirTrain. Being a bit of a late riser (I really wish I were a morning person), it's always amazing to me how many people are up and about as the sun is just coming up. There were a bunch of people commuting to school and to work and not even 8 am.

We arrived at Terminal 5 for our JetBlue flight and breathed a sigh of relief. The last time we had been there, a summer afternoon on our way to see A's parents, the terminal was packed and it was a chaotic mess. There were travelers from one end of the terminal to the other, circling lines everywhere, security lines so long that you couldn't tell where they led, and very long waits. This time it was peaceful and a breeze.

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We had to check a bag but there were less than 10 people waiting for that. When we got to security, there were 2 people in front of us at the ID check and then only a few people ahead of us at security. This was my first encounter with the full body scanner. It looked like every line had it. I'm not really sure where I stand on those as I haven't given it much thought. But I was dumb and forgot to take off my fitbit which came up in the scanner and so I got an upper body pat down. Oops.

The entire check-in and security process this time took 15 minutes or so, max. Last time we probably stood in one place for 15 minutes without moving. It was that bad. It was so terrible that it made me question if I even wanted to fly JetBlue again out of JFK and it's always been my go-to airline because they have more legroom and individual TVs. I was glad that this visit restored my belief in their efficiency.

Since it was still pretty early and we had lots of time, we grabbed some breakfast. With the stomach pains and food poisoning recovery process, it was not easy for me to pick something. The options at Cibo Express (sandwiches, salads, soups, etc) seemed like the safest choice. While A got some oatmeal (no photo but he said it needed more water), I went with split pea soup with ham and we split a chicken provolone sandwich.


Breakfast wasn't that exciting. Later we rested by our gate (the last gate in the wing), basking in the bright morning sunlight (where I paid my credit card bill that I had forgotten to pay that morning and then wrote this post about hope) and enjoying the free wi-fi in the terminal (which worked well by the gate but not so well by Cibo). We were tired and fading, but managed to hold off on sleeping long enough to board the plane.

Next up: we fly to Cancun!

Back from Cancun

We just got back last night from a fantastic vacation in Cancun, Mexico. It was a great break from the winter doldrums and despite the thunderstorms, we did end up getting some sun to recharge. It was our first time in Mexico and we didn't want to leave!


Our resort was all-inclusive, so it was like a cruise, but on land. We spent most of our time at the resort and will label all the posts with "Dreams Cancun 2012." Can't wait to share our experiences (and hopefully we will make more progress on this than our other recaps - like our honeymoon where we're still in Geneva in our recaps)!

Another New Start

It's bright and sunny outside and I'm hopeful. It feels like a good day for a new start. Usually I look for a new start on the first day of a month or after a new year, but it's been a rough week (bad food poisoning, fever over 103, emotional breakdown, last minute work stress, packing and other assorted little difficulties) and we're finally getting a break (not just hoping for one, but getting a physical one). Let's hope for the best!