feeling a little blah

Yesterday I realized that it had been about 5 days since I'd had an actual conversation with another human being. (sorry Miko, cats don't count). (And IM conversations don't count either. It's just not the same.) I was traveling alone in Korea over the weekend, and then there's really no one to talk to at work. (Sarah was out of town this week at a conference for returning JETs) When you live alone in a foreign country, there's a very real possibility of going insane from lack of human contact.

But I tried to solve that problem by calling my Mom today. (I miss my Mommy!) And last night I invited Katsuya over to watch TV with me, which makes it a lot less lonely in my apt. I guess we're sorta dating now, but in a casual way. Which is just fine with me. I don't want anything serious right now that would cause emotional messiness when I leave in 2 months. It's just nice to have some companionship for now. And he actually does speak pretty good English. On our 3rd date he all of a sudden starting speaking English. Maybe he just started to feel more comfortable. Which is great because ever since I got back from my trip to the US I've sorta stopped speaking Japanese. I just don't really care anymore about improving in Japanese and it can be so frustrating that I've given up trying for now. I just speak enough to survive here.

I've been craving something holy lately. I have this urge to go to a dark Gothic cathedral or a mountain temple with monks chanting. I meditated the other day, which is something I don't do enough (or at all really). I used to meditate once a week with my favorite English teacher in high school (random, I know, but we were both into Buddhism and started this club that really only had us as regular members) and it's sad how I just don't do it anymore. Especially considering how much free time I have here. And how I know about how meditation is good for depression etc. As a quick fix I bought two books by the Dalai Lama, while I was at the Seoul airport. I know it wasn't logical since they were expensive and now I have to ship them home, but I just felt that I NEEDED them. I bought "The Art of Happiness" and "The Path to Tranquility". Both are great so far. When I finish maybe I'll write a more thorough analysis.

I feel like I should go somewhere this weekend, but I'm feeling a bit apathetic. It's expensive, rainy season is about to start, and I'm just TIRED of traveling alone. It gets so lonely staying in crappy hotel rooms by myself. Plus there's nowhere I'm DYING to go to that could be done in a weekend. The places I really want to go to right now are a little farther away. New York. France. Italy. Switzerland. Greece. I'm just so bored of Asia! All these cities are beginning to seem the same. So I'm starting to daydream about my next trip to Europe. Or more importantly, moving HOME.

My new happy thing for this week is peanut butter in ice-cream. With some chocolate sauce and sprinkles. Mmmmmm. I recommend it.