Mixed Race (혼혈, 混血)

This morning I was sitting at the Little Tokyo library in Los Angeles reading a magazine article about Naomi Osaka, the newest sensation in the tennis world (and apparently in Japan) after winning the U.S. Open last year and the recently completed Australian Open and realized the cosmic significance of what I was doing: reading about a half-black, half-Japanese (father is black, mother is Japanese but took a Japanese last name to help her better assimilate into Japanese culture growing up, which is in itself a reflection on Japanese culture) tennis sensation while sitting in a library that is half-black, half-Japanese in its constituency: it contains Japanese books and built near a Japanese American population, but also near a large homeless population that unfortunately consists of a large African American population. Both Naomi Osaka and the library are examples of races being able to co-exist within one body, whether it's a human body or an intellectual gathering place kind of body. The homeless population at the library kind of makes the place smell and the bathrooms unusable, and there will be occasional burps and weird noises, but all in all these homeless are the tame homeless who are there to use the computer and find some place to hang out for awhile, and that''s not too different then what Japanese are there for: have somewhere to gain intellectual knowledge, sit for awhile in peace, listen to the piano recital going on in the conference room next to the library. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday morning.

Osaka's rise in popularity (suddenly EVERYONE in Japan knows her and she's constantly on the news) isn't that surprising: it's a country that's starved for sports stars, and human beings naturally gravitate more towards liking sports stars and entertainers more than politicians, world leaders, etc. You could tell from the Japanese women's soccer team winning the World Cup in 2011 how important sports can be for the country as a sort of pride, that we're not just a wimpy Asian country that produces smart but unathletic people. I think Asian countries and people (myself included) feel a source of pride from Asian sports stars, fighting stereotypes and being a rarity out of all the sports stars in the world. I was privately holding out hope that I would be the Asian representative in dodgeball, but my lease on dodgeball life is growing short and I'm near retirement, if not semi-retirement. In many ways it's better that Osaka is half black and half Japanese, because the native Japanese can claim her as one of her own, but also embrace that Haitian father-side of her and understand other cultures, not just use her as a source of cultural dominance of a pure-bred Japanese (like Osaka's male counterpart, Kei Nishikori). Osaka understands Japanese but only answers in English, which also plays to the "I'm kind of Japanese, but I'm not totally one of you guys, but that's OK, everyone's a little different." Osaka is also a great sports star and role model have for the coming decade, as personally I think Serena Williams's dominance has grown a little stale and she's not the best role model (getting upset at the refs, throwing tantrums, etc.), and Osaka is like a new wave of fresh air.

I think people, including me, are fascinated by half (mixed) people not only by their physical features, but by their personalities and behavior. Just learned today at the library also: Kamala Harris, senator from California and newest Democrat entry into the 2020 Presidential race, is also a half: African American and Indian. I think it's a good reminder that no matter which race we are, we can embrace other races, embrace their differences even though those differences might be negative. At least understand, don't just dismiss as "those people" are weird. Whenever someone says so-and-so race is this way or that way, I go back to one of my golden rules that "there are good people in every race or group, and there are bad people in every race." There are like 1.5 billion Chinese people, some of those people are bound to be good, some are bound to be bad.


Fantasize on,

Robert Yan

Recovery (回復, 复苏, 회복)

The human body is an amazing thing. It's capable of jumping high, running fast, lifting a lot, contorting itself in various ways, fighting disease, breaking down food, excreting waste, and thinking hundreds of thoughts at the same time. With all those functions though, comes a need to recover. I neglected that fact in high school and college when I thought I could just get 4 or 5 hours of sleep the next day and be fine, but eventually your body needs to recover, and sleep is the best way to recover. Your body craves it, your body needs it to function, and at this moment MJ is sleeping next to me while her body tries to recover from consecutive weeks of hard work without much sleep.

Recovery is important in all facets of life. The U.S. stock market just had a massive recovery from its December 24 lows of last year (Red Christmas Eve that almost seemed like a flash crash), and it was reflective of most recoveries: it tries to get back to normal as soon as possible, and it's our decision-making brain's job to let it as much time as needed to do so.

I always liked Wolverine and Claire Bennet (from Heroes), superheroes who had the quick recovery (regenerative abilities is the fancy term) powers, because I felt I had a similar power: I could heal pretty quickly from cuts, bruises, etc. They would hurt the day of, but then gradually fade away without issue each time. I just counted my blessings and accepted it, but now I realize it's because I probably got some good sleep the nights those injuries happened and my body fully recovered by the time I woke up. It is really cool to see living things recover, especially the human body. Unfortunately, most living things don't have as good of regenerative abilities as humans: flowers can't regrow their petals, etc. Even for humans the regenerative abilities are limited, it's not like humans can regrow a finger, limbs, etc. But for those things that do regrow, its remarkable. It's amazing that dead skin can regrown into new skin fairly quickly, that acne that was really gross and disgusting a few days ago can drop out due to the formation of new skin; it's cool that hair grows up (at least for now for me), I actually like the feeling of shaving every week and feeling the hair grow from scratch, it's like growing a new lawn every week or so.

By the way, for those people who have acne, I got tons of advice before from doctors, my parents, friends, TV commercials, online websites, etc., etc., but I feel like I need to share my one recovery pill: water. Drink lots of water. Water seems to be a recovery device already to help avoid dehydration, cramping, etc., but it keeps the skin hydrated and pores from getting clogged, is my theory. If the human body is a well-oiled machine that regenerates constantly, water, I feel like, is the oil. And add oil! 加油! 

It's unfortunate that some people try to cheat the recovery process in order to engender their athletic performance (through steroids, testerone, etc.) I prefer the natural, organic process of letting one's body do the work on its own. It works miracles.

I need to recover after a hectic Chinese New Year's! Ate a lot of food with my parents and cousins who came from China with her 7-year-old daughter! I'm not one to gush about how cute children are, I've worked at a summer camp with tons of kids 4 to 10 years old (arguably in the "cute zones") so I don't get impressed as easily, but my niece is definitely very very cute. She laughs a lot, which helps, doesn't cry (as far as I can tell), imitates adults, thinks adults are cool, says funny things, and is willing to jump around and socialize with adults. That's a dream kid package (she has some small flaws like being bossy, but those can slide when she's really cute). And yea, she's a cute kid. Definitely a kid that can make people hardened against having kids change their minds and hope to have a kid like her.
But anyway, need to recover form the Chinese New Year diet of dumplings, duck, fish, red bean soop, Korean BBQ ribs (somehow has turned into a Yan family dinner tradition). The problem with the Chinese is there are too many foods to eat! Especially with the winter-like temps in L.A. recently, I haven't been able to get rid of the water weight. If only the body can also "recover" back to the weight that I want to be! Actually, that is a thing, the body loses weight while sleeping, and if I don't get enough sleep I gain wet. True fact. That's why MMA fighters weigh in in the morning at their lowest weight and why I weigh myself right after waking up, cuz that's the most favorable time.


Fantasize on,

Robert Yan

Sudden Change (급전, 急変, 突变)

Life has a funny way of lulling you into a false sense of stability, and then drastically changing into a different reality. We learned about this in 6th grade science class: the idea of entropy, a lack of order and unpredictability, basically that a clean room with everything in order will naturally shift to disorder. (Marie Kondo, with her new Netflix series "Tidying Up," might hate to hear that, but it's true: I think many humans like me tend to like randomness, disorder in their lives. Obviously there's some benefits to predictability like having a family that's consistently there to support you (I realize how lucky I am to have grown up in a 2-parent household) and steady paycheck, steady stream of income, steady roof over one's head) but I've realized that maybe I like disorder more than others (I think MJ would agree, given how I organize my clothes: NO SYSTEM!) 

When I was a kid (and even now), I had a weird way of taking exams, or at least multiple choice exams with lots of questions like the SAT: I would start at No. 1 on the test, finish it and go on to No. 2, but then after the first 2 or 3, I'd tend to go to No. 11, or to the 2nd page of questions, basically skipping around to different questions. I couldn't really explain why I did this other than I was curious to see what the rest of the test was, etc., but now I realize it might just be my mind not wanting to have such order. Just like how I live my life, sometimes I like a little disorder in ordering my test questions. When I look at fantasy baseball players, I don't go in order, I like to skip a round to different parts of the rankings from the Top 10 to maybe like the 50-60 range, or skip from looking at closers to second basemen. It's weird, but I think disorder is like a kind of sugary snack for my brain: I know it's not the best for me, but it feels stimulating for a second, and it doesn't kill me, so I do it. 

As a contract attorney, my work life is prone to disorder. I sometimes work exclusively at home, I sometimes work in downtown LA where I live with a nice walk to work (by the way, I mix up the ways I get home too, not taking one path all the time), I sometimes travel to faraway cities to do jobs, I sometimes don't do any jobs. Recently I started a new job in Mid-city L.A., near LACMA, and it is TOUGH to get to. Its not really close to any one highway, it takes a lot of local roads to drive there, and it doesn't have a subway stop until the purple line gets extended to LACMA.......in 5 years or so. So it's been tough commuting an hour each way to and from work and then actually doing the work, which is different: new desk, new elevators, new computer, new location, new scenic view all around L.A., new bosses I have to report to. A lot of new stimulus and a lot of disorder which I try to organize. I think that's why I like dodgeball too: A LOT of disorder that I revel in, trying to keep track of each ball and who is doing what. It might be why sometimes I get a craving to drive through traffic.........nah, I hate traffic. As I'm writing this (in a kind of disorderly, rambling kind of way) I kind of realize that's how I think: I create disorder to try to find some order within disorder. Kind of a paradox, and maybe I'm giving myself too much credit. 

Anyway, having so much disorder does cause sudden changes, and I've had to adopt to sudden change in my life a lot the last few years. I used to be on a project that lasted almost 2 years where every day I would go to the same office and see the same people and do the same thing over and over again, a lot of repetition and predictability, but now I have a lot of randomness.......and I kind of like it and thrive on it. It might drive MJ crazy though. It is amazing sometimes to look back and think, "wow, just 2 weeks ago I was doing something completely different (for example, staying at home learning Korean every day and reading To Kill a Mockingbird). Or just 2 years ago I was freezing my butt off in Chicago while MJ was able to go to the Art Institute of Chicago as one of its esteemed members. How life changes so quickly! But maybe that is life, the entropy of life, the science of life....to change quickly. Maybe life is just one of those pinball machines and we're the balls that get put into motion and bounce around in no particular order. Sudden changes are an essential part of life, and it's part of what makes what our life experience is. So I'll try to enjoy it........at least until I get sick and tired of sitting on the bus stopping to pick up passengers every 0.3 miles.......how do people bear it? 

Fantasize on, 

Robert Yan 

Tip (팁, チップ, 小费)

I think I've gone on a rant about tipping before, but it's become such a social problem that I feel it's worth hammering home the point even more: Tipping has gone overboard in America! I understand giving a few bucks for good service and in appreciation of a server's hard work, but when it becomes the societal norm and there's no incentive to provide the good service anymore, it becomes a detriment to society.

Any basic economics class would tell you, people react to incentives. So when you take away the incentive, people don't work as hard anymore! That's precisely what's happened to tipping in America, where on several occasions I see waiters chasing down customers because they didn't leave a big enough tip (even at a Korean restaurant!) as if it's a duty or an obligation. If tipping has become an obligation, it's become a tax, and a tax on eating out. I already think that eating out is pretty expensive and "taxing" on the wallet as it is (the price of ingredients gets jacked up, pay for the building, the cooks, and the dish-washing, etc.) but then you add a 18-20% tax on top of it? That really disincentives me to go to a sit-down restaurant. And yes, nowadays in L.A. it's become standard to tip at least 18% (many restaurants offer that as the standard tip portion). It's really become ludicrous: the tips go to the waiters, who I would argue don't do as much as the cooks, the dishwashers, and many of the restaurants' other personnel. (I do understand that at some places the waiters do have to give a portion of their tips to the busboys, other staff, etc.). The waiters will counter that their pay is mostly coming from tips, which is unfortunate, but as my friend Jibraun once said, "when did that become my problem? I didn't force you to become a waiter." It's also the restaurants taking advantage of the situation by offering dirt low wages to service staff with the promise that they get tips. It's really a whole chain of people taking advantage of others and having their hands in the next guys' pocket. The healthcare industry, the legal industry, the real estate industry, all of it is just taking a percentage off the top. Sigh. 

Recently I went to Las Vegas (again!) and witnessed a couple hitting one of those progressive jackpots (yes, apparently people do win those) for like $200,000+. A LOT of money and they seemed really stoked, more than just the average $10 blackjack table. Others around them started wondering what they'd do with the money, but then the dealers immediately talked about one thing: "How much do you think that couple tipped their dealer?" One dealer offered a story that someone who had won $50,000 or something tipped 5 grand, or 10% or something. My initial instinct was, "WHAT????" Tipping a dealer $20,000? For what? Doing her job? Flipping the cards over off a pre-shuffled deck?  For getting just as lucky as the couple who won the jackpot to be working at that exact table that night? But what made me kind of upset was how entitled the dealers seemed to that tip, like it was expected that the couple should give a tip, and that anything less would be met with disappointment and maybe even anger. "How DARE they not tip $20,000 of their $200,000 winnings?" was kind of the attitude that I felt. First of all, that couple is going to be taxed profusely off their jackpot winning, like lottery winnings: more taxes than income taxes, they'd be lucky to walk away with half of that $200k. The tip they would give would be tax-free to the dealer. (Sure tips are supposedly taxable, but how many people don't report their cash tips?) In the end, though, it was the entitlement that got me. Tips should be to encourage good service and make a waiter grateful, but now the pendulum has swung so that NOT tipping the appropriate amount would be considered an insult? Seems like too lofty of an expectation. 

Tipping is another example of an even bigger problem Americans have, IMO. Overspending; not being fiscally responsible. It's a consumer culture, and America's consistently top-ranked economy in the world is based on people spending and taking money out of their pockets and putting it into the economy, but some of the financial decisions people make really baffle me. A guy who's struggling to make ends meet living with his mom spends $50 on a random dodgeball jersey. Flying into Vegas for a Vegas for a weekend of fun on the Strip at lofty prices despite making median income at home (those trips are more for high society, and you can take buses/ rideshare to Vegas/ stay off the Strip for much cheaper!) People taking Uber or Lyft everywhere, which don't seem like much per trip, but if you're taking Uber 5 times a night to get to the next bar and then home, it adds up! And tipping! It all comes back to my primary concern that a person only has one income (or two if they're really hard-working) but like a thousand places to spend that income on! It would really behoove people, I think, to take a financial education course senior year of high school, right before going into the big bad world where everyone wants to get a hand in your pocket. From what I see amongst my peers and fellow adults, a lot of them would do well to take that course. 

Fantasize on, 

Robert Yan 

Niece (조카딸, 姪, 侄女)

In Chinese, there are different words for a cousins and relatives from different sides of the family (mom's side or father's side), and its all very complicated, but I believe Japanese and Korean has simplified by making all of them the same name. Yay for simplification!
For the first time in 3 years, my niece from China visited me, and while I was impressed with her ability to speak so well, know English, do math, know how to ice skate, etc., I gotta say that she wasn't THAT much different from October 2015 when she came last. Fun fact, apparently: kids don't age that much from age 4 to 7. HUGE change from newborn to 1 year old, HUGE change from 8 years old to 11 years old I think (puberty starts to hit, etc.), but 4 to 7, face still looks the same, biggest change is probably teeth changing and brain growing. Physical appearance though: still got their baby smiles so that parents can enjoy it for awhile before......gasp.........the TEENAGE years. (Oh my god, looking back at the horror of those years).

Just as kids can't choose their parents (a fact I was keenly aware of back when I was a rebellious teenager and felt that way), parents can't choose their children. I never considered that when I was a kid; I guess I assumed that parents knew what they were getting into and could predict the qualities and almost exactly what the kid would look like if they decided to have a child. The truth is, parents probably don't have that much control. People are on different sides of the debate about nature v. nurture, I'm predictably kind of moderate in between and I believe it's a combination, but I do believe the basic package you get as a kid is based on nature. Whether it's a healthy baby, how the baby looks, and even some personality factors (short temper, cries a lot, LOW energy) are kind of just luck, not what the parent can control through raising the baby, good parenting, etc. Well, I guess the parent can control selectively one half of the genes of the baby (by selecting a good partner), but that's probably out of one's hands after the baby is born. It is kind of a big gamble to have a child and hope that the kid turns out OK no matter how good or successful or attractive the parents are,

My cousin and her husband definitely got lucky. My niece is well-behaved and listens to directions yet seems smart and has a very bright smile and laughs a lot. Really heart-warming kid that brightens up a whole family and I'm sure makes the grandparents (and even the great-grandparent, my grandpa) feel young again. Truly a blessing. I also understand why people adore nieces and nephews so much now (especially when they're in the golden ages 4-10). They look cute, do funny things, think everything adults do is awesome, look up to parents, make adults feel important that they're teaching them things, and best of all, they're not MY kids, so if I get tired of the whole playing with kids thing I can drop them off to their real parents who have no choice but to take them back. A great deal, it is, to be Uncle Robert.

Escape Room (逃生室, 탈출실, 脱出部屋)

It goes against my principle of "I'm in my 30's now, I can't fool around too much," but my friends and I had a great time at an escape room this past weekend. An escape room, for those who haven't had the pleasure of experiencing one, is a game where you and a group of your friends (or just random strangers) get locked into a room and try to escape from it using clues, solving puzzles, and looking for hidden pieces. For people who are fighting wars and truly trying to escape from their environments, it may seem like a waste of time (and when I think of it in that depressing way I do feel a bit uneasy), but it can be quite a lot of fun! Apparently the escape room phenomenon has caught on in various areas of the world, too, because the big Asian countries seem to have it too, with their own unique names for them. (Luckily all similar to the concept of "breaking out" or "escaping with your life," so not too difficult of a concept). The escape rooms are like puzzles or riddles or things you just need to figure out, the ones I've done don't need players to be super smart or knowledgeable like for trivia, just to use the information given in front of you and try to piece things together, like noticing different pieces hidden/laid out in a room and piecing together a puzzle.

In my life I've done 4 escape rooms, and they've progressively been getting better because I've been more selective about the ones I do. Anybody can create an escape room, it just takes some imagination, (and I'm not talking about the Ariel Castro kidnapper kind) materials, and good theme to draw people in, but some seem to be done hastily, without much variety,

Signs of a good escape room:
1.) Have a good theme to the room: not just a story of "Oh you go locked into the room, you need to escape!" It has to be like Greek-themed, or lunar space mission-themed, or you're in a magical kingdom and you need to bring life back to the kingdom, something that can be used in the puzzles.

2.) More than just one section of a room. Just being stuck in one room isn't as fun as "unlocking" new rooms as you go along. The most recent one we did involved starting in a really cramped room, having to figure out how to get out of there, then emerging into another larger room, and then discovering new layers upon layers of that, even rooms that we didn't even know existed! Adds to the mystery.

3.) Token economy- at our core humans are just seeking rewards and like rats in a maze, so we like it when we get something cool for our efforts. So lots of effects should happen when we solve something, like a magic sound, explosions, advancement in the story line, etc.

4.) hints: inevitably people get stuck. (you want the room to be challenging so people don't solve it too easily and feel unsatisfied, but not too challenging so as to be hopelessly stuck in the same spot). I tend towards liking harder rooms to really stretch your abilities, but then obviously have an operator or some sort of person helping in case you really just can't get it. The good escape rooms have a cool way to get a hint, like "feeding the oracle" or something to really get in the mood.

5.) Costumes!- it's all about that picture evidencing you went to an escape room. MJ and I did one with Harry Potter-looking costumes on and wands, and it'll be a shared memory for a while.

6.) Sometimes it's on the players themselves- gotta work together and don't just solve everything by oneself! Try to share with the group all the hints, and when you think you're about to do something, let everybody join in on the fun! And get everyone involved in a big group if a few people don't seem like they're getting it and don't feel like they're contributing. That's kind of the idea of going with friends and having considerate friends who try to allow for the full experience. Cuz for the really good escape rooms, I'm not doing it just to solve puzzles and get through mazes, I'm also doing it to observe the process of the escape room, the story develop and the thinking that went behind it.

7.) I'm not that there to escape! If I've escaped too early, that means I didn't use up the full time, and it was too easy! The ideal scenario is for us to get through almost everything, be just on the verge of getting out, and get stuck on the last clue before time runs out. Getting only halfway is just embarrassing, and just missing out means we used the full time and get the full experience, plus we could see the finish line and see what we needed to do.

Fantasize on,

RobertYan 

To Kill a Mockingbird (앵무새 죽이기, 杀死一只知更鸟, アラバマ物語)

There are some books that almost EVERY American teenager reads while going through the school system, and although they're not as sexy or talked about than popular movies, it'd still be hard to find someone who hasn't heard of the classic Harper Lee novel "To Kill a Mockingbird." The American classic novel has become so popular that it's been translated into various languages for distribution in various countries, including into Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. While Korean and Chinese translate the title literally, "to kill a mockingbird," Japanese inverts it to "Alabama Tale," which isn't wrong and does give the setting of the book, but why? For marketing purposes? For some reason I couldn't recall why the book was called "To Kill a Mockingbird," but upon re-reading the book again recently it became crystal clear, and showed I didn't really read books very well back in high school, or at least didn't have a good understanding of the significance of books.

Asian languages will, by the way, translate American book and movie titles into weird titles, and they can often be pretty interesting.

Why I read books back in high school, I was more interested in a good plot, good dialogue between characters, and character development.......I got immersed into the lives of the characters. (this is still pretty much my appeal for reading any fiction book). I didn't see the many allegories, metaphors, social commentary, and historical background so present in classic books like To Kill a Mockingbird. Heck, for me to the takeaway from Hamlet was "Prince's father dies, prince goes kind of crazy, prince avenges his father, but goes kind of crazy and everyone dies at the end." That's why I liked the Redwall series as a kid, it was what kept me going reading a book instead of just turning to Sparknotes or a plot summary like some of my classmates did.

I just recently read a manga version of To Kill a Mockingbird, and it was a really enjoyable 2 hours to go through the whole book and rehash a lot of memories of reading. The adventures of Jeb and Scout, the dignity of Atticus, the unjust racial atmosphere in Alabama in the early 1900's, the empathetic feeling of having nothing to do in the summer, the public spectacle of a court trial, all came flooding back to me like I was back in 2002 again, when I first read the book. I hate to say it for book purists out there, but I think the manga animated version would improve any classic book and put the words into pictures and make the reader keep flipping the pages. I think of all the classic literature books of 200 to 300 pages and sometimes more and wonder how kids or adults nowadays can get through them......you have to be a really dedicated scholar or bibliophile (lover of books) to traverse through them all, nowadays with all the media and distractions that we have around us.

And yes, I finally was able to understand what mockingbird had to do with the book. I'm not sure if people know that a mockingbird just flies around not harming anyone and sings for society? And that it's a sin to kill a mockingbird? When I go to a zoo or somewhere where there's animals I don't necessarily look for a mockingbird. But I guess that's the genius of the metaphor or the mockingbird itself: we don't pay attention to it, and it doesn't seek attention, but it provides a great service for society nonetheless.

Fantasize on,

Robert Yan