hmm, God you're funny

 Today's clothes cravings:

cute trousers very suitable for work~
I'm really in need of buying some work clothes.
and luckily, Zara is going on Summer Sale!! Oh yes you read that right. This is finally happening. I feel like this time Lady Luck is really giving me a break 'cause why else does she have to put summer sale at the same time I need work clothes, right? 
Without shame I must admit, there's only two times of the year when I could afford to buy stuff from them, that being Christmas and Summer Sales. Normally, I would browse an infinite amount of time every-time I go to Zara (making boyfriend want to shoot himself in the foot), flipping madly through all the racks in hopes to find a lucky break somewhere, bring a bunch of stuff to try on stuff just for kicks, and come out holding an imaginary shopping bag.
But NOW, it's finally that glorious time of the year!! I can finally go there and come out with not air, but actual stuff!! I'm so excited I serious feel like there should be a holiday for this, I want to throw confetti all over my room.
Okay~ haha, maybe that's too extreme. But you get what I mean, right? If you feel similar, I hope to see you there, let's have fun at the sale together soon!

On a less lucky note however, today I found out I might be teaching senior high-school kids (boo).

It's great that God decided to let me go to Japan and I have ever so grateful about that. But, sometimes it seems like he likes to play a bit of a game. You see, when I ask him for something, he gives me the furthest possible thing from it.
First I told him I wanted to be in Kansai, because the temperature is much warmer! you can wear all the cute clothes, and also I wanted to listen to people speak Kansai dialect. I thought that was not much of a request 'cause honestly Kansai is such a huge part of Japan, it's so big, that God could've just randomly waved his hand around that area and I would've ended up there. But lo and behold, he put me in Kanto, where it's cold and the exact opposite direction.

Then I told him I wanted to teach elementary school kids. I have the most experience with them, and you have to admit, although they can be annoying as hell, they are most times cute and innocent, with hissy-fits that don't even last more than ten minutes then it's back to all smiles. Besides, it is a lot lighter in terms of workload to teach elementary school 'cause you have a textbook to go by (that means more time to browse the shops and have fun!) But maybe God thinks that's not fun, 'cause he decided to make me teach senior high-school instead, something that I have no experience with, and the kids are not even anywhere close to elementary kids age.

Now, I want to wish for an all-girl school, 'cause girls are so much more obedient and easy to teach. And that's honestly not too bad of a request, 'cause Japanese schools are often either all-boy or all-girl, and even if I get in a mixed-school that's not so bad either. But now I'm afraid he's just gonna go ahead and put me in an all-boy school, which would be my worst nightmare! Thinking of all their loud voices and shit thrown all over the classroom is making me have a headache.

so, maybe I should just wish for an all-boy school, so I can get the opposite? I'm gonna behave extra good so hopefully Lady luck can be on my side again!

packing doom

Hi dears, sorry I've been neglecting this blog. I've encountered some major life changes in the past month. I said a few blog posts before that I was going to work in Toronto, but long story short, it turns out that I'm going to go work in Japan (for a year) in the upcoming fall. I've always wanted to go work in Japan so I'm super excited, but even I have to admit it will take some time to mentally adjust to it so I'm going through this over and over in my head.

On a lighter note, here's today's clothes craving:

i love one-pieces, they're great for summer and you can just forget about matching skirts or tops, just throw on the OP and you're set. perfect for lazy people like me. but sadly, it is already sold out on w closet 's website. I've been eyeing and drooling at a lot of stuff on site for a while lately, but stupid Canada Post has to be unreliable and go on strike. Anyway, I hope I can find a similar one in Japan.

When people go live in a different place, the first thing they think about is how to get there in one piece without loosing any body parts, and the next thing is what they are going to bring. Packing hasn't started since I still don't know what province I'm going to yet. I'm allowed to bring two suitcases totalling 40 kg in weight. Looking at my closet and roomful of stuff, a realization sneakily came to my mind: this may very well possibly be the hardest thing I'd ever have to do in my life.
I have vowed to bring as little stuff as possible. But oh God why me t_t. almost 30 pairs of shoes, has to somehow be cut down to 10, or maybe even less. I truly hope that when the time comes, the God of prioritization and willpower will be on my side!

Cheapness Spectrum

Recently, I encountered something called the "cheapness spectrum".  Cheapness, in terms of spending habits, is a relative thing, and it can be formed on a spectrum that goes from least cheap to most cheap, like this: Free-minded spending, reasonable-spending, thrift, cheap, dirt cheap, and cheap-ass cheap.

A free-minded spender would be someone who spends money mostly for convenience, doesn't think about the amount they're spending and whether the product was worth it. A free-minded spender would very likely go in to a store and grab whatever they needed, pay, and leave. (I used to be like this a long, long time ago. looking at my life now, I'm not sure how i feel about the change -3-)

The biggest difference between reasonable-spending and thrift is that, the reasonable-spender would buy things from department stores, they would think about the price and the worth but will most likely still pay the full price for something they truly loved or really needed. Thrift people do this way less, and they like thrift-stores like Value Village and Salvation Army. This is understandable, why settle for the full price when it might go on sale later, or you could find something similarly attractive for less? And another difference is that, thrift people like the word "Sale", very much.

Now, let's get down to the nitty gritty and talk about cheap. You might be wondering why there are so many different kinds of cheap, aren't all cheap people just cheap? During my 24 years of living with Asians and encountering all sorts of cheap, let me assure you there are differences. If a thrift person goes shopping for a hundred times, once he will buy something he loves despite a too-high price, a cheap person would do that only once in three hundred shopping trips. The cheap person may consider sale prices, but they would not instantly drop their cash just 'cause a shirt went down from $70 to $35, if they see a red tag that says "additional 30% on top of sales", then maybe. If there's another tag that says "special day, everything 50% off on top of the additional 30% on top of sales", even better. A cheap person is way more likely to bargain (even if the seller didn't post any signs that says 'reasonable-offers accepted' or whatever), they do it, 'cause why not?
Also, don't wanna sound racist but, eight out of ten cheap people are Asians.

Now here's dirt-cheap (Are you still reading this? Geez you must be really cheap~ ) How do I sum up dirt-cheap.... hmm, I guess you could say, cheap people are everywhere, but dirt cheap people can only be found dwelling in a few unexpected corners. Places such as gotten-from-lying-to-the-government-about-income government houses. These people have gotten so cheap to the point they abandoned some of their morals. These people have spent every single second of their lives thinking about how to get the most out of their money. It's actually kind of painful to live with them if you're not one of them, 'cause that's all they ever talk about. I once went out to eat fried chicken with a dirt-cheap family, and they sat down in this tiny KFC getting into a fiery argument on whether they want ten drumsticks with two dollars, or seven chicken thighs with three dollars. Then they came up with a bunch of other theories about how they could save money if they bought this one combo of just chicken thighs with another one with just drumsticks or whatever. What seemed like an infinite amount of time had past. I don't even remember how everything worked out, but only that after coming out of KFC smelling like I worked there for a whole day.

It might be hard to believe, but there is a level that's even beyond dirt-cheap, and that's cheap-ass cheap. In a way, you could say that cheap-ass and dirt-cheap are equally cheap. If dirt-cheap people cheated for their cheap, then cheap-ass people worked for their cheap. Cheap-ass cheap people are life-style cheaps. They pretty much do everything and anything that's even remotely possibly done by themselves, by themselves. They mill their own rice, grow their own weed (the medicinal kind. only the dirt-cheaps grow the other kind [so they can sell it]), make their own fabric, knit their own socks, built their own bed, and sometimes even their own house. They don't care if they're dead-tired from worked an entire day or night. Basically to them, money is more important than health.

OK. I think I wrote everything I wanted to about this cheap spectrum. Man, why'd I spend so much time doing this? Is anybody even reading? Anyways.... I'm sure we all have diff opinions on what we define as cheap so, if you're super bored and 无聊, you could make your own spectrum! You could send me your spectrum and we could put them together and even write a book about this: "The Science of Cheap".
On this spectrum, I fall mostly under thrift, with occasional drifts to cheap, where do you fall?