Who am I?

I am Rebekka Lien.

I am a human, with frailties and weaknesses, I cry and laugh as easy as circumstances come.

I can sit on a tree and read and be perfectly content in the solitary.

Or I can dance and sing with hundreds of people and feel like one of them.

I tell corny jokes, eat street foods, and have the modesty of a Taiwanese.

I learn to obey elders and fake it sometimes like them too.

Yet, I have the discipline of a German. The drive of a salesperson or a CEO.

I have boundaries and can easily say I have to go home. I don’t give into peer pressure cuz I know who I am.

I can talk loud and be charismatic like Americans, for I am American in spirit.

I can hang with the hippies and talk about art, politics, and religion. I can sit with conservatives too.

Of course I am human, so I am prejudice and hold false stereotypes.

But I cherish each culture and find joy in their customs and, well food. I love fiestas and mexican food, salsa and horchata.

I like to dress in saris and watch Indian films, I bob my head to hip hop and electro.

I  can slip on a suit and high heels and walk into a corporate office, negotiating some deals.

There’s nothing I cannot be if I put my differences aside and assimilate like I can.

Start a dance floor in France’s beer garden, sleep in train stations and airports but also the nicest hotels.

Respect them older folks, but have the youthful spirit of an activist, cry like a weeping widow or backpack like the homeless.

Empathize with the studying nerds, Asian cliques, the drop-outs,

the hoodlums, the immigrants, the drunkards, the pot heads, the dealers, the graying and orthodox,

the fashion snobs, the Indian gurus, the clubbers, the sheltered and innocent, the children who likes dolls and drawing,

I like em too.

I can negotiate deals in offices or yell in the night markets of Beijing, I am no diplomat but I can act like one.

I’m not a robot or a machine, I can write love letters like some Nicholas Sparks addict or shop like a housewife.

I don’t need a lot to enjoy myself cuz I can pick up my cello or a notebook and start playing or writing.

But I also know to treat myself, get massages, drink lattes, pedicure and manicure, and visit a museum.

I love my friends, but I can also be by myself or meet strangers.

If I could, I would want to ride an elephant in an African robe, cook Middle Eastern food, appear on Vogue, show in Paris, open many stores in Tokyo, Berlin, London, have beautiful kids, a husband, a garden and a fair trade business, some dogs and animals, a barn.

But for now, I can say- I’m perfectly content where I am

because I am still who I am.

I am Rebekka Lien.

Random food from China

How many things do we judge through the lens of our cultures? How many things do we judge a person by? We judge them based on the food they eat, the clothes they wear, the things they hold important. Such as for some education, for some relaxation, for some eating, for some the way they use their money. We seem to judge people not knowing that is how they grew up. We judge through the lens of our own upbringing and culture. For Asians, they look at those cultures that do not value education, security, and money and think “well we are better because we know how to save money”. There is some truth to saving money being good. However, Asian don’t understand how to enjoy life to the fullest. They think enjoying life might be eating together or just having nice cars and houses. However, they know not how to party, how to dance, how to live in the moment. They are always planning for the future, for retirement, for their children’s education. They know not how to take risks.

This of course is me judging my own culture, or part of my culture, for which I have grown very foreign to. Sometimes I just don’t understand why culturally Asian people have to judge how others spend their money- is that their business? NO. Or whose kid is doing what….it is none of our business really!

Change, traveling changes you: especially when you are met with discomfort-

1. June 26- July 20 Beijing, China- the toilets stink so much you’re about to throw up, ladies scream at you, no one waits in line because there’s no such thing, so they push you to get into subways, there’s smell of BO everywhere, ladies raise their arms with sprouting black hair, people spit in swimming pools, buses, on your shoes, wherever they can, residue of toilet exist everywhere.

2. July 20 – August 11– Hunan, China- fever in 43 degrees celsius, no AC, mosquitoes biting your butt, squatting in crap holes with mosquitoes trying to bite you, getting heat rashes all over your neck and arms, itching like crazy, not being able to sleep due to heat, fetching buckets of water to shower next to a pig pen.

3. August 11- 18 Shanghai, China- sleeping on the same small bed as a mere girl stranger, at night she grinds her teeth and smacks you with her arm, you are left with only a few inches of sleeping space, general asian discomfort of peer pressure, you dont want to go to ktv at night but you are peer pressured to, no AC in 40 degrees celsius.

4. August 18– September 9 Taipei, Taiwan- you enter the apartment, there’s dirt all over the floor, the couches have fleas on them, your bedroom you find out have fleas, you are bitten and allergic, mosquitoes fly over you and bite you, cockroaches hunt your dreams, you start killing them, but they start flying, there’s food bugs crawling over beer bottles, you scrub the floor all over but choke in disgust. Life in Taipei for me.

5. September 9- 14 Taichung, Taiwan- no major discomforts, just cockroaches. If anything can be worse.

6. September 14- 18 Chaiyi- stay at a hostel, freaked out at night, see shadows, and finally the second to last day find out at night the owners go home and you are left at the hostel alone at night. Getting tired of living alone, traveling from place to place with one backpack. Tired of not being able to wash my clothes, smell like dung and sweat.

7. September 18- 23 Kaoshiung- not really any discomfort. Except, looking for my own washing machine. Get to meet up with friends.

8. September 24-25, 28-29 Hong Kong- discomfort with angry aggressive, controlling devil wears prada woman. Cannot stand how she thinks I am a child and I don’t understand anything, especially womanly manners like folding my bedsheets and putting away my sneakers in the right manner. Oh Lord. Feel suppressed and suppressed.

9. September 26-27 Shenzhen, China – still am feeling suppressed by the controlling authoritative woman. Learning to submit but still in turmoil. I can have the nicest hotel, but if I have some crazy person boss me around, I will go crazy. This is the worse discomfort, more than sleeping in 43 degrees celsius weather or sleeping with cockroaches for that matter.

8. September 29- October 14 Back to Taipei- find out there’s rats biting the walls of the apartment. Fleas seem to get used to me. Bugs still bug me. That’s why they are named bugs. I start getting tired of people walking so slow. The subways beep and the people still walk slow, while I’m hurrying to get on.

So I just watched Eat Pray Sleep…I mean Love and it was pretty good, made me cry actually. Had to whip out the tissues.

I wrote this on my ipod-

Love is something that grows us

Not one that stunts our growth

It’s not that we don’t believe in love

It’s unforgiveness and bitterness

and fear that we don’t believe

Ultimately

Love does not exist within another person

Love is an inward transformation

that grows and does not depend on another human being

there is no victim or criminal in a relationship

the only criminal is yourself

the only victim is yourself

you have the choice to be whoever you want to be

IT’s all in your heart

the ultimate source of love is God for He is love

I am starting to think true happiness is an on-going process. Not a stagnant moment. It exists in the moment but passes into the future.

Walking with makeup undone, dawn hitting me on the face

Pimples and late nights, or no nights

Goodbyes and hellos, I am a little girl

Facing the real world, brighter and clearer, choices and fatigued

Running in my mind, you and I, the future or none

Family like a heavy burden, the weight of a house on my shoulder, invisible yet so visible

Money flooding, responsibilities increased, shoulder tense and wanting none of it

It is life, let me trust you before I let go, let me trust you before I jump

Into this deep abyss, canyons of doubt and fear

punishment looming closely, tying me down, walls white as snow

It’s these late nights, I think of you and I, where we are supposed to be. It’s these late nights, yet I realize

though a grown woman, yet still a girl facing the real world.

It’s these late nights, hair undone and I stare at a computer screen

fan streaming down my toes, that I realize I’m just a little girl.

“And it won’t take a miracle darling just keep it real
This world can make us cynical darling I know how it feels
You took it too hard to set on the screen
Oh but love is not displaying a part into very scripted scenes.”- ron sexsmith

So many things I want to do but don’t know which one to choose first.

Must pace myself so I don’t over burden myself.

Just when I’m getting used to living alone, I am returning to Los Angeles.

Story of a Young Girl

A young girl sits in the apartment, walls peeling, empty beer bottles

her heart empty

venom spewing full force as she jumps on the couch and screams

GO F*** OFF! She doesn’t understand why life is so sh**ty but she tries to pray

through tears and screaming and burning the papers

representing a sacred ritual, burning her hate

burning her past, burning the hatred that lingers, squeezing all love out

It’s just another day on the earth

that something like this happens, silent ways people express their pain

She screams in the air – “God you better make my life better than all the sh*t my family went through”

The walls crumble, her computer cracks and somehow she sees a glowing light

this is where she wants to be – flower beds where she can release all care and sleep

Isaiah 55

Invitation to the Thirsty

¹ “Come, all you who are thirsty,
come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without cost.

² Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.

³ Give ear and come to me;
hear me, that your soul may live.
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
my faithful love promised to David.

⁴ See, I have made him a witness to the peoples,
a leader and commander of the peoples.

⁵ Surely you will summon nations you know not,
and nations that do not know you will hasten to you,
because of the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel,
for he has endowed you with splendor.”

⁶ Seek the LORD while he may be found;
call on him while he is near.

⁷ Let the wicked forsake his way
and the evil man his thoughts.
Let him turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on him,
and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

⁸ “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the LORD.

⁹ “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.

¹⁰ As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

¹¹ so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

¹² You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.

¹³ Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree,
and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the LORD’s renown,
for an everlasting sign,
which will not be destroyed.”

I have a confession. I’ve been throwing my trash day by day at the subway station. Guilty!

I’m never home when the trash truck comes, so that’s the only way to throw out trash.

since I watched The Town yesterday, my process of throwing out trash was very robber/movie-esque.

I walked into the bathroom nonchalantly with my “shopping” bag. I went into the bathroom, opened the lid and squished it in. I opened the door and who do I see, “the cleaning lady”! gasp.

I see her walk in, I run to the sink and wash my hands and walk so fast I stumble into an old man. I pass the ticket booth and walk downstairs to wait for my MRT. My heart is racing! “They’re going to tap my shoulders and throw the trash in my face!” or openly humiliate me by chasing after me with my bag of trash. I can just sense it coming.

With my THE TOWN enthusiasm, I decide to blend in with the people, I sneak behind a tower. Making sure the cameras are not on me. The MRT comes and I jump in. Swiftly the MRT leaves and I’m safe.

Thus, my confession. I apologize to Taiwan for leaving my trash in the MRT trash cans. I am a true foreigner I confess.