The Kumkuat Korner

It's relatively easy to say that supermarket in China are just like the ones in the U.S. Heck, I've been to supermarkets in Mexico AND France and its pretty much the same thing there too. While there are a few differences here and there, the basics are still there. Imported produce and also pricier. You go in, find what you need, buy it, leave. Of course 95% of the things that they carry are China brands. They do have things from other countries like Pocky from Japan, and American candies like M&M's, and even Ferrero Rocher and it's expensive. I doubt anyone buys it. The vegetables here are cheap. Most are locally grown and are sold straight from the harvester to the Supermarket. One of the differences about supermarkets here is that no food ever gets thrown out. It may have mold or lost some leaves, or old, but it will get sold...at a lower price too. People actually look out for these old "clearance" produce especially the older generatio

So let me summarize these past TWO(? THREE???) weeks in a few sentences. My parents left then came back from their vacation in Paris, France! I heavily underestimated the amount of hair I'd bring back home from work I heavily underestimated the amount of hair I'd get up my nose....(YUCK!) I disabled my OkCupid account on the basis that I have to stop kidding myself on ever finding Mr. Delicious (a.k.a Mr. Right) on a dating website that most guys use to try to HOOK up... (bleh) I still don't know what I'll BE for Halloween!!!! Yup. Story of my life. Pretty awesome right? On the bright side, I am still awesome. And because I'm in good spirits, here's a picture of what I value the most above all of the things I possess.

Have you ever seen that one movie or read that one book that fills you with so much emotion, you become a wreck by simply the half of the whole thing? The one that makes you feel so wrapped up in the characters, and you grow with them, emotionally attaching yourself to the main character because you feel you understand him... Or her. And then, as you are nearing the end of the story, you are a sobbing mess of emotions so thick you can barely breathe. You feel hot. Your heart pounds in your chest. You feel excitement, sorrow, broken, jealous, angry, content, annoyed, a wild tide of feelings that you can't  .... won't settle on one in particular. You are happy for the ending, but you begin to feel empty because you return, to your body, your own feelings, your own story. You wonder how you would act if it was you in the place of the hero... or villain, or monster. or foe. That feeling that there is something more . An ache in your chest, a sort of hollow

When I was a kid, my summers would be spent in Mexico with my mother's family. I would stay at my grandparents home and we'd spend endless days spending with my aunts and cousins. My mother is the youngest out of six sibling s, you see, and the eldest is my Aunt Sylvia who pretty much lived to her title as the big sister, the ring leader, the head honcho, whatever you want to call it, she was it.  Now my Aunt Gaby, the fourth sibling, always invited the whole family over to her house. It wasn't mandatory for my Aunt to do this big meal for the whole 30 of us (very close aunts, uncles, grandparents, nieces and nephews) since, every weekend my aunts, Sylvia, Lupe, Gaby, and Yasmin, (sometimes my grandma too) would alternate, so the cooking wouldn't fall onto a specific relative, but it was my Aunt Gaby’s house that I remembered the most fondly. My uncle, a tall and kind man of a few words, was a truck driver, and he had more tha