1200 bookshop

the modern bookshop sells souvenirs t-shirts coffee and food. there are kitschy coasters featuring movies-from-the-year-you-were-born to kitschy notebooks featuring quotes by authors-born-on-your-birthday. 

yet the modern chinese reader is a far more eclectically widely-read animal than the average western-trained reader. perhaps because of the perceived restriction of chinese-ness their books are translated from all manner of languages and cover diverse topics. whereas our bookstores prominently feature rom-coms and self-help books in english and we are hard pressed to locate the translated stuff.

tea break

the makeshift stall just outside the hotel side door supplies ice cream at a buy-one-get-one deal.

best location ever.

life in the fast lane

may day on the pedestrian street in guangzhou is equivalent to to shibuya. the crowds the tobacco smoke the crowds the cosplay and the crowds. on the other had we start early enough that the morning is pleasantly festive and it only becomes a sardine can when we are ready for a nap.

a wedding in the country - katie ffordes (2021)

anodyne and saccharine.

happy ending.

anodyne and saccharine.

despite previous good experience with katie ffordes.

anatomy of a airplane flight

things happen on my solo flight to guangzhou:

• i flop gratefully into my aisle seat (yeah!)
• i stand up to allow my window seat mate in
• a bunch of travelers show their excitement at air travel most vocally
• my seat back is wrenched by a fellow passenger on the way to her own seat
• a random baby starts a yodel. it starts low and reaches high
• somebody's suitcase drops from the overhead bin, fortunately intercepted!!
• my window seat mate starts coughing

• well! well! it looks like the middle seat will be empty!
• the baby lets out intermittent yells
• my window seat mate lets out intermittent coughs
• the vocal bunch settles down and quietens up
• the captain asks us all to get ready for take-off
• i hop up to retrieve my mask from the overhead bin (success!)

• the flight is nice and uneventful
• i am one row from the loo: best location ever!
• i watch food porn on the screen 
• baby is silent until the descent. very thankful. good baby
• seat mate mercifully snores instead of coughs
• we land and i get to test my chinese on google translate

aside: they should stop filming people actually eating food. most explicit and unattractive.

the academy - hilderbrand & cunningham (2025)

this is like mallory towers* made american and current, complete with a mam'selle equivalent and her french exclamations.

likable characters just a little larger than life

more tame than what i think american teens are like

enough tension but not so much i abandon the book

i enjoy this very much!

unfortunately i finish it before i realize the sequel is not out yet (aaaargh) and before my waiting list book** gets available. 

*the enid blyton classic that starts me onto school series

**my father's brain by sandeep jauhar

at the hawker center

some thoughts assail me today as i buy my breakfast:

• i need to stop describing my weekend look as the tau hway-auntie-at-the-market look. she is better groomed and dressed than my weekend self
• she looks super unfriendly. surely she cannot be; she doesn't know me and it is the start of day so it must be RBF
• better check my own default RBF, alter ego an' all