姿慧 finally responded to my emails.

It was weird at first when I contacted her right away and she didn't respond to that, nor to subsequent emails. I entertained the possibility that something in my perception was horribly wrong, that she really wasn't thrilled to meet up with me again after all these years.

I was about to chalk up meeting her as another of the big jokes in my life. She did send me a mass emailing, though, so I knew I was on the radar somewhere.

My natural reaction in this sort of dynamic is to let it go. Easy come, easy go. But something just didn't feel right about just letting it go. There was too much unknown, it couldn't be. I wasn't going to let go, I wasn't going to let this one go. Something was telling me this was too important. If this was going to be another joke of a relationship, I wanted to at least know why.

And she finally responded, and I don't know what these feelings are. What are these distant tremors, these resonances of a relationship that have roots somewhere, but never came to be. What is this when I compare them to the people I've actually known, the relationships that actually happened?

Nothing? Fantasy of the unknown?

Putting it that way, it's definitely not a bad thing. Definitely no worse.

I don't know what I want anymore. I don't want anything. We don't even speak a common language. We've never spoken a common language. We've never spoken. That's the common language. Even if I study harder with the motivation of communicating with her, that will be our common language.

My spine is leaking again.

Photostroll, Pentax ZX-5n, Kodak BW400CN:

Xinhai Rd. Actually that's Tingzhou Rd. coming up from an extended underpass, between Xinhai Rd. which is split, and I'm shooting from Roosevelt Road. I think of it as Xinhai Rd. because Tingzhou Rd. keeps going up and becomes the Jianguo Elevated Expressway. Since I'm surface-bound, I stick to surface road designations.

4:59 p.m. - Another shot of people gathering under Roosevelt Rd. while above others cross the Jingmei River. 

FRIDAY, APRIL 27, 2:43 p.m. - Taida campus main boulevard. Long zoom and serious lens foreshortening on display as that boulevard is a good quarter-mile long.

My parents have recently taken to say, "As long as you're happy", and I always have to smirk a little because it's not like they ever ask whether I'm happy or not.

Like in that movie:

"We're not laughing at you, we're laughing with you."
"But I'm not laughing."
I think it was a Todd Solondz film. (I think it actually may have been "Happiness"!)

I ask myself about my own happiness, and I like to answer myself (not in public) that happiness just isn't part of the equation. There are all these elements and factors in my life, but none of them are in furtherance of happiness, I tell myself.

Am I happy? Irrelevant, it doesn't matter. Do I want to be happy? Irrelevant, I don't care. How about unhappiness, am I not unhappy? Am I unhappy?

Why are those harder to answer? Why is it harder to not say "yes" or "no"?

If the answers to the unhappiness questions aren't the same as the happiness questions, then happiness is still an issue.

If the idea of unhappiness is still somewhere bouncing around in the works, then it's bouncing around some idea of happiness. So unless I can definitively answer the questions about unhappiness and declare that unhappiness is also irrelevant, then I still want to be happy.

So, do I want to be happy?

Eh, either way, I can take it or leave it.

Doh!

5:58 p.m. - Shots from my new apartment window. I like to focus on the wings and the aerodynamics. Birds are just so lovely in flight. Not so much in temperament or when they poop on you.

TUESDAY, APRIL 24 - This is also from my new apartment window, telephoto zoom. Maybe they were having an issue with their motorscooter on the bridge that turns into Beixin Road? Pentax ZX-5n, Kodak BW400CN. 

We've had a spate of good weather in Taipei. I went for a ride this morning in the southern hills of Taipei, which are actually east of Hsindian. I had earmarked Zhinan South Road as a road to explore after I rode up to Zhinan Temple last year on a different road.

Since I had never been there before, I didn't know how far it went, or how far up it went. And since I don't do "rides" here because my bike is a second hand commuter mountain bike that weighs a ton and is about to fall apart from the way I ride it, I didn't prepare in any way special except wearing the sole cycling jersey I brought, and leaving the heavy D-lock locked to a pole.

Key to this ride was that before I started climbing, I managed to get the chain into the granny gear, which I wasn't able to do attempting to climb Yangmingshan several weeks ago. I didn't mention that because I failed miserably and abandoned my bike halfway up and hopped on a bus. Oh god, I don't believe I just admitted that.

I didn't bonk. But not being able to use the granny gear on such a heavy a bike made it. . . not worth it. I think the words to signal the abandonment were, "OK, this is just stupid", and I stopped and headed back down to the last bus stop.

Not expecting to go far or high on Zhinan South Road, not preparing, and just taking each bit of road as it came, this climb seems easy in retrospect, but that can't be right. It was definitely steep and it was higher than Zhinan Temple, because I could see it from across the valley.

It's probably just because of my expectations. It also helped that the ride had a definite end in a loop at the top, preventing me from pushing farther. I came no where near reaching my limit. Although there was another road to go longer into more unknown if I ever get a better bike – not doing it on this one again.

Going up, there were parts moving in ways that really didn't look right. The bottom bracket looked wobbly and the left crank looked wobbly independent of that. I'm not a fan of rear suspensions, but a lot of cheapo bikes have them for some unholy reason. And since decent rear suspensions only come on really expensive bikes, I can't imagine rear suspensions on cheapo bikes being a good thing. I kept looking down and imagining the whole thing just coming apart.

Coming down was no better as my front brake felt like it was about to . . . break. Instead of recklessly tearing down the mountain as I usually do and risking losing the brake, I basically rode the rear brake all the way down, never getting fast enough to necessitate braking hard. Yea, that was a little boring. I even let a bus pass me down. Yea, that was a little humiliating.

The area where the climb ended is famous for teahouses and plantations, and is about to get more famous. They're building a cable car with stunning views to go up to Maokong and it's set to go online in July. I swear I can see parts of it from my apartment. I rode by the cable car terminus which is still under construction.

It will be a pity, though, if the huge influx of people adversely affects the tranquility or the character of the mountain for the people who currently use it. While riding up, I passed a lot of older people jogging down, and they would say "早" (good morning) or "加油" (encouragement) to me. It seems to me when the character of a place changes, you lose little touches things like that symbolize.

April 14-20

SATURDAY, APRIL 14, 3:44 p.m. - A classic, "Well, there's your problem!"

SUNDAY, APRIL 15, 11:27 a.m. - Shots from my new apartment window. Those red decorations on the car are tell-tale signs of an Asian wedding. Long zoom.

12:31 p.m. - Shots from my new apartment window. A job I couldn't do.

 Nikon N70, Ilford XP2 Super, ISO 800:

Gathering under Roosevelt Rd., others above crossing the Jingmei River.

Street shooting in Jingmei.

Taipei, Taiwan

Overseas, the news may not have been as visceral as it was back home. The news came through just as news, another shooting, another horrific massacre. It's horrible every time it happens, it's horrible every time hearing about it, but with every senseless shooting, I don't think there's a single American who thinks it'll never happen again.

That means we know it's going to happen again. It's part of our gun culture, it's part of our entertainment culture, it's part of our violence culture.

Then the surprise twist came through, what I wasn't expecting – the shooter was Asian American. Oh shit. Here comes the anti-Asian backlash, here come the comparisons with Pearl Harbor. Model minority? We even do bloody massacres well. Too bad no one is going to notch this up as another benchmark for Asian Americans towards finally being considered "real" Americans.

But even overseas, for me, the visceral part starts sinking in as the news coverage continues, and the stories of the people start coming through, the victims, the families, the funerals. It's not just another news story, just another shooting, when you find one, each, or any of the 33 dead was a person, a story, connected to other people who are suffering in the current moment.

People who aren't coming home, people who will never be seen again, be there again. People who lived through a horrible moment, who died senselessly and undeservedly. People who will have to have their belongings collected and sent home. People who lived with them, people who studied with them, people who knew them.

And now the package the shooter sent to NBC and the decision to air significant portions of it. I think it was the right decision to make the contents public. This act wasn't some big political statement. It wasn't like the Unabomber or Tim McVey. They had a message they wanted to get out, but if they're going to kill people to do it, I don't want to hear the message.

Cho didn't have message. He said things that might sound like a message, that might be in the form of a message, but they are more the mad ravings of a severely sick mind. He was mentally disturbed, maybe even an artist. Believe me, the expression wasn't too far from what I've heard in the Asian American arts community.

And that might be another disturbing point. Cho is me, Cho is us, some Asian Americans, to a certain extent. There are some shared experiences there, parts of our paths where we walked the same footsteps. But then he crossed a line that we don't cross. He snapped.

The reason why I think we should listen to him is because he's a medical case, not a political vigilante. NBC Nightly News had a legal consultant on hand when they aired contents of the package. They should have also had a psychiatric consultant, too, because there's a lot to learn there about him, and about us.

angry asian man described his act as "cowardly and selfish". It's hard to disagree with him (although admittedly I rarely do). I won't say I know any actual part of Cho's mind or thinking, but there are resonances. And getting to the mental breaking point where you know you're going to take your own life is one thing. Then deciding to take as many innocent people out with you is some serious, disturbing shit.

There is a very disturbing connect somewhere in there. Something about the pain and anguish necessary to commit suicide, but also about the rage and anger to decide to massacre people. Having those put together, you get some serious, disturbing shit.

I moved!

Already it looks like the advantages of the new apartment will mostly outweigh the disadvantages, as well as the advantages of the old apartment. I'm giddy, partly because I didn't get much sleep last night. I've been sleeping up here since my old apartment sprung a ceiling leak.

One of the disadvantages of the new apartment is that the windows don't have screens and I slept with the window open a crack. A mosquito started bothering me part way through my sleepless night. No biggie, mosquitos stopped bothering me a long time ago. They don't like the taste of my alcoholic blood.

When I woke up, there were two mosquitos on my wall. I don't know why I did it, but I killed them both. Senseless, sleep deprived, compassionless, like a mafia hitdude. Both squashed bloody, but I didn't even know if it was my blood. Shortly after, a teeny-tiny bite that didn't even itch showed up on my wrist. It was gone even more shortly after.

Killing mosquitos is pretty satisfying, I don't know what the hell was wrong with Noah, but no, stop doing it! Just stop. It's impossible to not kill anything. It's hard to not contribute to killing in the world. But there are some ways that are easy to not kill. Senseless killing of insects is easy not to do. Especially mosquitos for me, since mosquitos don't like the taste of my alcoholic blood.

1:10-1:11 p.m. - Urban Xindian? These are nothing shots, there's nothing remarkable about them and shouldn't be posted at all. But it was a case of riding along through the usual urban cityscape and looking down a road and wondering where that leads. Suddenly there's a lot of green, not-so-straight lines, no traffic-choked roads and things growing! It was not a little surreal.

Little aggregate bits of things that hit me and stick to me through the course of a hall of time that I call a "day" and my psyche shakes, skidding me out of control. Not as bad as spiraling, mind you. Fragile precipice, it's been this way for years. But I'm just talking about yesterday.

The precipice now has the option of being one floor higher, as my landlady gave me the option to move into a freshly vacated studio upstairs. It's smaller, it's older, but it has windows with a view. It's a view of urban Hsindian, but it's a view that sure beats the alley my current window faces, in which sounds from a dozen other apartments echo.

I think of them as family. I never see them, I can't speak to them, but I know they're there. Right now, I hear one of my brothers singing while scrubbing something. He needs voice lessons. He can probably hear the A-mei playing out of my computer.

Upstairs might be more private. Only one hall neighbor, as opposed to three now, one of whom I can hear cough and sneeze clearly because I think there is a gap in the wall between us above the false ceiling. Upstairs is probably much hotter in the Summer. I like heat.

I've gotten comfortable in my current apartment. It's my air. I guess I wouldn't mind giving the upstairs apartment a good scrubbing. Upstairs gives me quicker access to the rooftop area, and the laundry and, unfortunately, the garbage, but the garbage area is all the way in the back, and the apartment is at the front.

I think it's a toin's coss and I'll probably move upstairs. I'll go up and study for a couple hours to get a vibe of the place and then decide. Landlady gave me the keys so I can at least have some place to sleep until the fix is leaked.

3:37-3:38 p.m. - View from the upstairs studio.

Lomo Fisheye 2 version

The worse it gets, the more euphoric I'm forcing myself to be

Back in Taipei. And guess what. It's raining.

I think I've said this before, but having revived the possibility of a suicide attempt or gesture in the near future, Taipei's weather either just about guarantees it or drastically increases the likelihood.

Is that valid? If the weather is such a key motivating factor, just get out of the rain. OK, I will. After the attempt or gesture. I think it's high time for one anyway. It doesn't make any sense. I'm just looking at a bunch of possibilities, and I don't see any of them happening until either an attempt or gesture.

At this point, I just don't care about making sense. So stop.

I've been thinking all weekend about 姿慧. I keep sending mental emissaries traveling back in time through my memory, and every where they end up is after the time I last saw her. She is pre-memory, pre-reality. Wherever my memory lands, there's always a question of what was she doing concurrently during that time period. No idea.

And still, meeting her this time I was tickled pink.

We met at a restaurant in Kaohsiung. I knew she was arriving because she called my aunt, who told her we were on the second floor. I spotted her first. When she saw me, the first thing she said was, "帥哥!" (handsome!). I keep wondering if that was appropriate or not. Either way, it was completely spontaneous. Anyway, I had a cap on because I've buzzed all my hair off.

Kaohsiung, Taiwan

Whew. Whoa. What happens in 24 years?

An infant becomes a true adult in 25 years – in terms of full mental maturation according to auto insurance agencies and Discovery Channel. Careers can end in 24 years. Marriages, certainly. We can go through 3 to 6 Presidential administrations. High school, college, and law school can all be completed in 24 years. I can fail to commit suicide for 24 years. Oy.

So what has happened in the 24 years since I last saw 姿慧? She's a cousin on my father's side, a side of the family that is virtually non-existent as my father makes no mention of them nor seems to have any contact, but probably silently does. As remote and unknown as my father is, memory of him destined for complete oblivion after he dies, his side of the family is that much more distant. But I've met them before when I was a kid, proof that my father wasn't spawned in a test tube. He has a family. He has a niece. Her name is 姿慧.

Unbeknownst to any of us, my aunt here in Kaohsiung, my uncle's second wife, has been friends with 姿慧 for a while, I'm not sure how long. Not even my closest cousins here remember her from when we had all played together as children when me and my brothers came here for one infamous Summer.

I know they don't remember her because just two months ago during the New Years holiday, I asked Gary if he remembered her. There was no reason why he should have, and no reason for me to ask, so I don't know why I did, except just to utter her name.

Then yesterday my aunt furtively came to me and said she wanted to take me to lunch without my uncle, and did I remember 李姿慧? She couldn't have said anything that could have gotten my attention faster. It's a little vague how they know each other, even less vague how who figured out we knew each other. . .

We met yesterday for the first time in 24 years, and that's all that happened. I don't know what the next step will be, or if there will be a next step. There has to be. I imagine her English is as non-existent as my Chinese, but now that I have her contact information, I have to make contact. Her importance to me is mythic. Or mythical. Or mystical. Or totally imagined, take your pick.

Her eyes are older, but they still shine and smile in their dark depths, and a few times we locked gazes past the point where that normally would have gotten uncomfortable. It was subtle, but intense. There is something we both still know after all these years.

She hasn't married. The only family she may have left here is her younger brother, who I wouldn't recognize like I did her, and whose name I didn't remember like I did hers. She hasn't had the privileges I've had, and she has no contact with my father.

I want to be friends, I don't care if we can't speak to each other. I want to be close to her. Her path may not be too very different from my own – one of the reasons she hasn't married, according to my aunt, an unreliable source in that regard. I have a feeling her life hasn't been any easier than mine.

If not, that's fine, too. I would be crushed, but it would be fine. What else would it be? Not fine?

Nikon N70, Ilford XP2 Super, ISO 800:

FRIDAY, APRIL 6 - Major construction. Maybe building a future KMRT station. Robot 85 building in the distance.

APRIL 7 - Gigantic railroad crossing.

Port of Kaohsiung. Shooting northwest towards the northern entry to the port.

Robot 85 building

Kaohsiung, Taiwan

At the end of the recent mental process(ing), which I haven't described since whenever I tried, the thoughts scurried away like cockroaches at the flip of a light switch, I think I'm succeeding in separating myself from my negativity, rendering myself merely even more schizophrenic. Or manic. Schizomanic.

Negative thoughts still come up all the time. Various meditations and mental exercises have lessened them, but they still come. But when they come up, I immediately disassociate myself from them – they're not mine, they're not me. Separate it like it was someone else's thought, and then mentally give my own measured response to it – stop that, that wasn't very nice, now where did thinking that get you?, etc.

I'm in Kaohsiung now for the Lara Croft Tomb Sweeper holiday, but mostly because I had to get away from the incessant rain of Taipei. But since I came, I have to go with my uncle today to sweep my grandparents' tomb. Well, grave. I don't know why they use "tomb", it just makes me think of Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft.

I'm so wrecked, I don't care what happens or goes on. The last time I was here during New Years, I left early when the pitch of family frenzy got too annoying for me. Now I just don't care. Or I'm in desperate need of coffee, my consumption in Taipei having reached a maximum of four (4) cups. That was yesterday.

9:29-9:33 a.m. - Morning photostroll, Port of Kaohsiung.

All black & whites Nikon N70, Ilford XP2 Super, ISO 800.

9:55 a.m. - The old railroads serving the Port of Kaohsiung are being converted into bike paths.

My grandparents' grave is on a plot of land kind of out in the middle of nowhere. Not in a cemetery.

12:38 p.m - My cousin Peter's wife holding Gracie. Sunny looks on while Pie looks down.

I don't romanticize death. I'm not goth.

I remind myself when I'm in horrible pain or feel physically miserable that the psychic trauma of the death experience, the separation of mind and body, might be many times . . . I won't say 'worse' because that sounds like a qualitative judgment, but many times more that. It's not pleasant.

Death is universal. The death process, I believe, is the same in all human beings, if not all living beings. However, I won't go so far as to say that the death experience, including that which occurs below the level of consciousness, is the same. But I don't know what's my inspiration for thinking this.

I remember when one of my pet gerbils died in my hand. It went into death throes, uncontrolled spasms, before life exited. And last month on National Geographic, there was a program on Taiwanese spirituality, with one segment following the death of a man to cancer. He went from functioning, to sickness, to disfunctioning, to loss of awareness, to "dying peacefully" with his family surrounding him.

Yea, I don't know where I'm going with this. I got nothing.

Contemplating the flow of water that is the river of life. Pentax ZX-5n, Kodak BW400CN.

Jingwen St. immediately after crossing the Jingmei River into Taipei. From here I immediately turn left onto the riverside bikeway. Or the reverse going home. Obviously. Nikon N70, Ilford XP2 Super, ISO 800 (roll and camera change? Sounds suspicious, but that's what my records say, and I've doubted my records before and so far I've always been able to confirm them. It's distinctly possible the first pic was shot while coming home, finishing the roll, and then I went out again with the Nikon.).