Thursday. Here we are at the coffee shop. I am finally sitting inside today. We agreed it was better in case that crazy Aussie guy comes back.
I received some very exciting news yesterday: I was accepted into the Irish Studies program in Galway this summer. Yes, yes, I know, it’s very exciting, but this is only Part 1. I still have another application out for a full-year program I am completing right now. The real celebration will come if and when I finally get my Letter to Hogwarts!
The summer program is only for a month. That’s not going to be enough time for me. I need at least a full year. I decided to start researching Masters programs again and found some good options. I’ve realized that I just want to get it done already. I feel like I’m not going to be able to get ahead in my career until I get my Masters Degree. I’ve always wanted one, I just… had some rejections and a few opportunities that didn’t quite work out.
Maybe this one will work out since I’m already in! That’s what I’m hoping for. Then I can magically find a place to live (which I hear is very hard in Ireland right now) and not move anywhere again for a full year, or longer. I’ll just study and work in a coffee shop and learn Irish and write.
I can always come back to Hong Kong to if I want to. The door is now open to me forever because I’ve already lived here. I’m in da Club. I can come back any time. Ideally, next time I would like to be more prepared on a professional level. It’s really hard to get started here on my own. I just feel so lost all the time. School is a better option. I need the structure.
All of this being said, I am excited to go to Ireland. I’m gonna take courses on Irish History, Irish Society, and Irish Language. I’m excited to add another language to my ever-growing repertoire. Hopefully I’ll be much better at it than I am at Thai or Cantonese. Lol, I know, I know. Hey, I know the basics of getting around town! It’s not that bad! But I could also be trying harder, lol. Personally, I think I’m better at Hindi than both of those combined, but I was also in a relationship with an Indian man for a year, so…
Right now I’m trying to find a good spot to write my application essays in. This coffee shop is too loud. The library is too intense. The rooftop I was chillin’ on is too casual. My home studio works okay, but I do get a bit claustrophobic if I stay in there for too long. I can’t imagine trying to live here during Covid. I can’t even last 12 hours in there before popping over to 7/11. I would have lost my goddamn mind.
I’ve been doing some research on living in Ireland. It looks like it has the exact same problems literally everywhere else in the world does: high cost of living, housing shortage, stagnant low wages. Grand.
I have started looking at the housing situation. It’s definitely bad, but it’s not Hong Kong bad. Once you deal with the harsh, unforgivable realities of the Hong Kong housing market, everything else looks like a piece of cake in comparison.
Well, I’m dealing with the exact same issue here in Hong Kong, as I was before in the USA. It is what it is. It’s really about what I make of the opportunity in the end. If all else fails, I can always give up on life and go waste away in Thailand forever, lol.
There is no winning anywhere in this world right now. Everyone everywhere is drowning. There is no hope for the future. Might as well try to learn about my family heritage while I’m on my way out, I guess. It’s what my grandmother and father would want.
I always felt like I tried so hard to make something out of living in South Dakota. I traveled, I learn about Native American history and culture, I started this blog, I wrote so many stories, I followed around Mad Dog, took a lot of classes online, became a yoga teacher. In the end, it just wasn’t the right place for me. The people there are so, so, so toxic. I am grateful every day I left that world behind forever. I never, ever have to go back there ever again.
Ugh, I am feeling overwhelmed right now. I need to take a break. I am trying to do research online but everyone is SO NEGATIVE ALL THE TIME. The housing market sucks. The job market sucks. Everything sucks everywhere.
Like, yes, we know, the world sucks. Everything sucks. It is what it is!
Well, it’s fine. My ancestors survived crossing the ocean to come to America just to be treated like shit and discriminated against and denied jobs and housing. Somehow they still made it work. I’m sure I can survive one year in a dilapidated Irish boarding house by the seaside in Ireland proper.
I’ve got it pretty good compared to my ancestors, so, whatever. At least I don’t have to work down by the docks or toil away in the factories or camp out in the woods for weeks at a time to avoid getting caught by the feds for illegal rum-running between the US and Canada during prohibition. That’s a true story, btw!
Maybe I’ll just find myself one of these big strapping Irish lads with lots of property he inherited from his grandmother and make him some tea and then cozy up by him next to the fire place on a rainy, windy, foggy day after the car breaks down in the mud and he comes home drenched from head to toe and shivering cold. Then I will enchant him by whispering the magic words every Irishman wants to hear directly into his ear: “I know the recipe for my great-great-grandmother’s traditional Irish stew.”
It’ll be just like in the movies! 😀
Yeah, that doesn’t sound so bad to me…
Housing crisis, schmousing crisis. Reality cannot interfere with my romcom fantasy dream life!
Except for when it inevitably does…
Whatever, don’t interrupt me while I’m fantasizing! I have an award-winning romance series to pen. Everyone loves hot Irish guys in cozy sweaters, okay?! These are just facts!
Alright, well, I am going to quit reading all of this negativity on reddit and finish my essays. It goes…
161 years ago, my family looked around the famine-ridden nation of Ireland and said, “Fuck this shit, we’re going to America!”
Now, six generations later, their totally disillusioned American descendant is getting right back on that boat and saying, “Fuck this shit, I’m going back to Ireland!”
*sings*
It’s the circleeeeeeee, the circle of liiiiiife!
*ba dum*