Just because you want one.

I'm miffed that Gwen Stefani is performing in Singapore on August 14th & that I'm flying home on August 12th. Not that I'm dying to see her or anything, but it could've been fun..oh well, on with my boring life.

I ate at a Burger King for lunch today. I meticulously ate every single fry in an attempt to prolong my return to the office, haha. I definitely wasn't that hungry. I'm just so bored. As usual I sat all alone and people-watched. Ugh, the people sitting around me with all their friends must've thought I looked so weird. No one else was alone, only me. Just eating reallly slowly and staring at everyone in utter silence. Hahaha.
I am such a dork.

While being alone has its advantages, it's definitely starting to become weary. The strangest things make me acutely aware of how lonely I am. I'll hear a song from my childhood and want to go back. I heard Janet Jackson's Miss You Much during lunch and thought it highly ironic that it made me miss being a little kid...much! lol! (Whoa. Did I really just do that? Okay.) I'll see someone trip and I'll want to laugh loudly, but there's no one for me to laugh with! Stupid things like that make me self-conscious of my loneliness.

Also, being alone all the time has turned my casual hobby of people-watching into a full-blown obsession. But it's not even that fun, because I always end up depressing myself while wondering about other people's lives, haha. I start off looking at someone and thinking about them but then inevitably my thoughts turn to myself and go off on tangents indirectly related to the person I was looking at, who is long gone by the time I finish my original thought.

I'll look at some business-executive-type man and wonder how he got where he is in his career. I think about the long hours and endless dedication and ambition. I don't see any of that in myself and it worries me because I'd like to have a nice life. I mean I'd like to be able to do what I really want but that only comes when you've worked to get it. I'm not even done with my undergraduate degree and I feel burned out. I stare at these executive-types and just wish I could absorb whatever quality it is that enabled them to succeed. I sometimes feel that I work so hard and get so little from it, how long could I possibly endure such a situation? I feel like I have no passion for a career. I have no tangible goals...

Or maybe I'll see a pregnant woman walking to lunch and wonder if she's sad that her life is changing so permanently. I immediately wonder if she'll suffer from post-partum depression. (Granted that could just be because I read Brooke Shield's book on the flight over here, but whatever, haha.) I think that's half the reason I want to adopt an older kid. I've always been terrified at the thought of being pregnant...of the physical changes, of the emotional changes, of bringing up a child all the way from infant to adult. I don't want that responsibility. I guess that's pretty normal at 19. But I get the feeling that I'll never want it. No...actually I hope I'll never want it. My actual fear is that I'll forget I even have a fear of having a child and I'll end up a depressed mother with my 19 year old self in my head saying, "I told you not to!! I knew this would happen!"

Or I'll see a caucasian person and relentlessly stare them down, listening intently to anything they say, trying to read their accent. Usually, they end up being Australian or European. I've only heard an American accent once, in the MRT. Some hippy backpackers were talking about going home to the US. In my mind I was like, "Turn around! Look at me! Talk to me!! Be my friend, I'm American!!" Haha. The funny thing is I don't stand out as a foreigner to anyone. But I feel SO out of place! It's the oddest feeling. There is a large population of Indians here and people probably assume I'm native to India or Singapore. Until they hear me speak. It's pretty funny actually...someone will start to talk to me and you can instantly tell they're searching their mind try to place my accent. I always say the same thing. "I'm not from Singapore. I'm from the States. I'm just here doing an internship and visiting family." Their reply is always the same as well. "...Why are you here?" I know they mean, "why did you decide to come to Singapore specifically," but it sounds so accusatory and redundant that I almost find it humourous. And then I never really know what to say at that point because I've just told them exactly why I'm here.

This happens a lot with taxi drivers as well. Take the pepper crab/hell dude from a few days ago, for instance. I got in the cab and he was like, "Isn't it early for you to be going home on a Friday night?" Was he for real? Was that....a pick up line? I looked at my watch. It was 11:15 PM. Early. Indeed. But I was obviously still in my work clothes and I wanted to get home and change...maybe he couldn't tell. Anyway, I just smiled and told him where I needed to go and he was like, "...Let's see, how do I get there from here?" I was all...shit...it's your job, Sherlock, not mine. I didn't say that out loud, of course. I just gave him a blank look and stupidly repeated the directions, like it would magically make sense the second time around. After about ten seconds of just staring at each other I said the usual, "I'm not from Singapore..." bit. He was like, "Don't worry, you can show me the way once we get closer." Oh shit, I thought. I really can't, but whatever. So we're driving and out of nowhere he's like, do you like spicy food? I'm like..yea sure. So he rattled off a list of his favorite spicy foods in Singapore, the only one I understood/remembered is the pepper crab. Then after a few minutes of silence he's like, are people racist towards Asians where you live? Haha, for a moment I seriously got worried that I some how offended him inadvertently. "...uhh, well I currently live in Georgia, which is in the south and I guess people are more conservative there but--" He cut me off, "I had a friend from Holland who married a Chinese woman and brought her to back to Holland and all the women there gave her dirty looks like 'You people are stealing all our men!'" Pepper crab/hell dude laughed enthusiastically. After a long silence he asked, "Are you Muslim or Hindi or something?" I guess that was a fair question..."Well, my family is Hindu, but I'm an atheist." "Oh, so you're a freethinker." He sounded disappointed. I figured he had been planning on recommending some awesome temples to me or something and I had ruined his big chance. There was a pause and I felt like I should say something so I said weakly, "...but, I mean, temples are cool." "No, no," Pepper crab/hell dude shook his head, "You don't believe in hell." I looked at him, "...no, I don't." I really had no clue where he was headed with the religion thing. We came to a red light and he turned around in his seat to face me and said, "I was just wondering if you believed in hell because there's an exhibit where they tell you what happens to people who commit different types of sins." He was looking directly at me as he said all this, haha, it would have been really quite unnerving were he not kind of attractive. "You know, people who lie are hung from a hook in their tongue. People who waste water are forced to stand in knee-deep water with spikes coming up from the floor..." He went on, still staring at me the whole time. I just tried to smile and nod, and not look nervous or confused. Thankfully the light turned green and he turned around. We drove the rest of the way in relative silence until we came closer to my destination and I thought he missed the turn to my street. I sat there for a few seconds, wondering if I should speak up. "Uhh...I think the turn is on the other side..." I said, trying my hardest to sound casual and nonchalant. Pepper crab/hell dude smiled at me through the rear view mirror and said, "You have a really good sense of direction." I think he immediately realized I was just trying to make sure he hadn't missed the turn (was I that obvious? haha). It turned out my street was further up the road than I thought, but I wasn't even embarrassed because I was just relieved to confirm that pepper crab/hell dude knew where he was going after all.

Such is my lonely life in Singapore.

I know this is hella long, but I'm not going to cut it.