#also weird gender energy??? /pos
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oooh awesome!!! same here, it's so good :D
just watched inside out 2 and really recommend!! not as good as 1 but it's still great :D
#artsy's moot sillies#inside out would be EVEN BETTER if everyone's emotions looked different (from a concept perspective not a design one)#< agree 100%!! just a bit more difference was needed methinks#I fucking hate that weird little weasle anxiety bITCH#< GASP. watch your fucking mouth /jk#i'm sorry anxiety is best girl imo.................... i love her sm#i'm a fan of the clearly neurodivergent anxious ones who fuck everything up without meaning to haha#also weird gender energy??? /pos#saying it now she is NOT cis haha. somewhere on the nb or fluid spectrum imho (thinking nb or genderfae?). i have headcanons galore#but fair enough if you don't like her! tho i am deeply disappointed in you for this heinous crime /jk#may carnivorous cabbages devour you til you perish /silly#and I'm not an INSIDE OUT shipper obviously because it's inside out but I love the throuple energy fear anger and disgust bring to the film#< i KNEW there was smth poly they were bringing to the team lmao#also i 100% see joy and sadness as being QPPs (or maybe girlfriends)! not in the fandom enough to ship much but they're so cute together <3#fear and anxiety should be besties. and this is basically canon and i love that for them#I lone enui I have a LOT of enui I'm bored all the time#< I LOVE HER TOO#wish she got more screen time bc she was like. literally just there as a plot device with the phone? which really saddens me#literally they could have given the phone to envy and written her out and almost nothing would actually change :(#same issue i had with encanto actually. too many characters that COULD be so interesting if they were ACTUALLY GIVEN TIME#if there's an inside out 3 they better focus on her more. maybe nostalgia too (tho she might remain as a joke character lol)#and envy felt........ half-baked? she got screen time sure but. idk something was missing. forgot she existed half the time :(#but i still loved it!! gotta rewatch 1 at some point - literally haven't seen it since it came out in#.............2015?????????#i feel OLD and i'm not even that old oh stars /hj#grey hairs incoming /jk
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Hobie Brown is a lot more like Percy Jackson than Peter Parker is
Grew up a troubled but good kid breaking cycles
Trans femme with gender fuckery in a way that comes across as masc to normies
Chillaxed and super kind and goofy and loves cute/kiddy shit and people but also has a rbf,the biggest street cred in his whole franchise and is a supreme edgecase
Audhd with no masking game and definitely bptsd too
The oldest and most experienced hero in the main cast so he takes on the Team Dad mantle and believes he's not good enough to be a role model because trauma gave him self-loathing yet cocky ahh combo
The Ramones fan(Hobie's playlist has their songs + Percy gifted Nico a shirt of them)
Blue-coded
Owns a pet supernatural dog(Spidermutt + Mrs O'Leary)
Deadbeat birth dad
Goes by a nickname instead of his full name and has a common black surname
Terrible singing voice
That weird trauma response where you take people giving you sympathy for the extremely horrific circumstances you went through as pity and get mad('Yeah,what of it?' in reaction to being reminded of his Canon Event)
Correctly framed as the coolest ever in-universe(Percy specifically to defy neurodivergent stereotypes)
6'something,guitarist hands and described as so attractive it shocks other characters
Born and raised where punk started(England and New York)
Psychologically incapable of being posers or selling out(Hobie's canonically afropunk personified and Percy's canonically immune to wanting power or authority)
The comics Spiderband is a cooler version of Steve Rogers(Karl/Jason),a snarky black girl genius(Riri/Annabeth),a #relatable /pos gnc brown girl(Kamala/Piper)and a biracial red-coded rowdy tomboy(Mattea/Clarisse)
'I'm not a hero because calling yourself a hero makes you self-mythologizing','I was this cool the whole time','It's a metaphor for capitalism','I don't believe in comedy-just kidding!','Kid's an anarchist,taking a crap on the establishment,i salute you','Oh boy!Humbling reality Spiderman has arrived','Just don't enlist until you know what war you're fighting in' and 'It's propaganda bro'
*Authority figure irritatedly tells him he's not helping defuse the situation* 'Good(Said with a troublemaker smirk)'is Percy's interactions with the gods all the way to The Lightning Thief
Loves the sea enough to live in it(Hobie's houseboat)
Black and darkskin with a multietchnic background(Hobie is jamaican-ugandan-english and Percy is black monoracial but with american,dominican AND greek heritage)
Percy's not a 'bumbling idiot' but a professional insigator
Hobie making reverse racism real on George's ass before forcing him to leave Gwen a comforting note from him and a gift Watch he diy'd/Percy sending The Olympians Medusa's head after slaying her and writing a note to include saying 'with best regards'
These panels
And these caps
Big Percy Energy™️
#gwen stacy fan percy is real.also i think hobie has a gummy sharks addiction and plays papa louie games and them wicks used to be dreads#bluepunk#hobie brown#hobie appreciation#percy jackson#perseo jackson#hobie is jamaican#hobie is ugandan#black percy#latino percy#autistic hobie brown#autistic percy jackson#transmasc hobie brown#unlabeled hobie brown#transfem percy jackson#bigender percy jackson#seapunk lover hobie#punk!percy#team dad hobie#team parent percy jackson#mama's boy hobie#atsv#spiderman#spiderband originals#pjo#hoo#tods#💌#summerposting
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2 reqs in one, hope that’s ok (also sorry for any typos or weird stuff in advance, sending this half asleep and kinda blurry)
Level 2 or 3 for both, if ur only gonna do one pls do the first
Sourced from Jean Grey and Morph respectively (both from XMen)
Tyyyy
Lvl 3: jean grey
Name(s): Jean, Mary, Margaret, Francis, Leslie, Noel, Angel, Isabelle
Pronoun(s): she/her, it/its, fire/fires, flame/flames, burn/burns, pho/phoenix, dar/dars, star/stars, voi/void
Age: 23-25
Species: mutant
Gender(s): mutantgender, phoenixgender, darkgender, ragebodiment
Orientation(s): heterosexual, heteromantic
Source: X-Men
Role(s): hunter-protector (type of protector who hunts down persecutors/harmful alters to try and get them to stop harmful behavior)
Sign-off: 🔥, 🌑, or ❌
Personality: can be withdrawn and awkward but usually is outwardly high-energy, controlled, protective, strong-willed
Likes: nature, being alone/being with close friends, fronting
Dislikes: fire, being controlled, being told what to do, being in the innerworld/headspace
Front Triggers (pos and neg): death, harmful behaviors, fire
Picrew:
Lvl 3: morph
Name(s): Morph, Kevin, Ezra, Danar, Riker, Kitt, Malcolm, Sual, Galen, Gaius, Helo
Pronoun(s): it/its, voi/voids, un/uns/unself, eni/enis/eniself, eso/esos/esoself, abyss/abyss/abysself, abstra/abstras/ abstraself
Age: age slider
Species: mutant/shapeshifter
Gender(s): genderfluid
Orientation(s): aromantic, pansexual
Source: X-Men
Role(s): persecutor/shiftling/depersonalization holder
Sign-off: ❌, ⚫, or ⚪
Personality: when grounded, very high-energy, however, often very dissociated and depersonalized, an out of it person, socially awkward
Likes: sun, his friends, really bad jokes, puzzles
Dislikes: the dark, the idea of being a ghost or a zombie, mirrors
Front Triggers (pos and neg): depersonalization
Picrew:
#build a headmate#headmate pack#alter creation#build an alter#headmate creation#build a system#pro radq#pro transid#alter pack#bah
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Hiya I’m here for the redacted matchups thing? If you’re still doing it that is (“^^)
A breakdown abt me is I have I’m an friendly introvert which has allowed me to deceive a lot of people into thinking I’m extroverted- I’m not I actually need very long hours of recharge after social outings. I’m an infp and I’ve been described to have “black/ginger cat energy” (tsundere and bites people according to some)
For the questions
- currently there’s been 2 songs stuck in my head. Into my arms by the Maine- there was this one specific part that’s goes she had the most amazing…smile. Bet you didn’t expect it she made me change my ways… and the lyric play was really cute. It was sung as if intending to say smthg sexual but he just went ‘smile’ instead and ties it in with how the listener prolly didn’t expect him to say that either implying that she “changed” him. It’s funnier considering later on he comments abt how she had “legs that went on for days” it gives a “I’m more well versed and mature now but at the end of the day im still a Man (/pos)” I found it really cute. Oh and Cupid is so dumb from Cupid by fifty fifty cause mood
- I love ytb essays! I watch movie critiques or essays on certain animes I watch and why they’re great/sht. Oh also shanspeares stuff
- i had a childhood friend called Casper. He was this “protector” kinda friend that would hang out with me talk to me.
- asmr. (no surprise) aside from sleep aids I actually dabble more into traditional tapping scratching or pampering soft spoken stuff when the insomnia hits.
- there is a character from Rick riordans magnus chase series, their name is Alex fierro. I had a very weird relationship with gender?? Aesthetics?? You could say? When I was young. I just had a lot of moment where I didn’t really like my long/short hair or jsut how I looked too fem/masc. Alex (other than being a total badass and child of mischief) was gender-fluid and I looked up to them a lot so ye.
- oh that’s hard I like a lot of them ;-;. I guess the highest I can possibly think of rn is inversion’s more than a promise and right here. I just love the deep conversations asher and David and Damien and Huxley had amidst all that chaos. And how they were there for each other. The voice acting was chef kiss and I was crying.
- …Sam. I used to i really did but now he and darling feel more like characters is ship than me being darlin being with him
- heroes of Olympus and book of life
- Huxley. He is so friend shaped.
- onigiri, ramen and a drink! (Could range from boba to juice to jsut coffee)
- a playlist that seems like it’s for long distance relationship but it’s really abt being in love with someone fictional and being really hurt they’re “far away”. And few other dedicated/inspired by characters I like. There’s one for denki kaminari I really enjoy and it’s just songs with the general “you’re way out of my league yet I still got you how tf-?” Vibe
I’m so sorry for talking so much.
Oh, this is easy. I’ve thought actively about the parallels between BNHA and Redacted characters, and Asher Talbot is the Denki Kaminari who’d love a black/ginger cat partner.
First things first, I like your music taste for him; you seem to like really fun music that brings you joy, and I think Asher would always vibe with it, you know? I can easily see him singing along with “Into My Arms” while y’all are riding along in the car and giving you this cheeky grin when that verse comes on. He feels charming, clever, and cute singing it even though he didn’t write it, but goddammit, he is really cute though.
Another fun thing is that I think you’d both like a lot of the same things! Asher definitely strikes me as having been a Percy Jackson/Magnus Chase kid, playing Camp Half-Blood campers with the other Shaw kids, deciding who would be in whose cabin. Asher’s one of the Redacted bois who I can see as an anime fan- BNHA, One Piece, Naruto definitely but not ashamed to watch a little shoujo, a little Horimiya perhaps.
Song:
Angels danced the day that you were born/ Oh I'm so sure/ They celebrated when you arrived/ You're so bright/ I swear you swallowed the Sun/ And I am so in awe/ Just basking in your light
One, this song is super cute and romantic and singable. It’s a sweet, little bop; I highly recommend it. Two, it’s a song about Tamaki Amajiki being in love with Mirio, an introvert in love with their comfort, sunshine, golden retriever extrovert. It works beautifully.
Runner-Ups:
You know who definitely watches anime and would love anime-related video essays? Guy, and he knows the obscure shit- anything but horror. Now, hear me out- the Casper thing would be a really cute basis for a relationship with Regulus if he weren’t insane, I’m just saying-
Note: Have you heard the song “When Someone’s In Love With Me” by Jacob Oman? It’s literally a love song that sounds like it’s pining over a ex, but it’s actually about fictional characters setting your standards too high, it’s really good. Also, you could never talk too much. Let your words be heard; they’re lovely ❣️
Read this post and send me an ask if you’d like a match-up of your own! 💌
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Oh!! Qsmp time hehe!! My fav pov is maxo! I think people don't know enough about him cause I've seen some weird takes on twt specifically but I think he's one of the most interesting characters with such cool lore!!
I have the hc that he's an android even before he got onto the island but that's another can of worms
What's your fav POV?
OMG! Im so happy to see someone answer :DD
Unfortunately i dont watch Maxo that much, i think he streams mostly in Spanish(??) so that's kind of barrier for me :((. But after situation with furry cult i wanted to read about his lore more! Also if you want to tell me more about it i would be more than happy!!!
This headcanon with android sounds sick!! /pos.
I know what i'll be reading later haha
In case of my favorite pov... Its honestly very hard to say? I mean, i enjoy watching a few of them but because of different reasons. But lately i think i was watching almost every Fits stream, i love his chill vibe, his energy and how he talks about Ramon! (I love Ramon so much, i cosplayed him on some kind of convention).
I find Slimes lore kinda sad, im screaming while talking about it but unfortunately i mostly read about it. I must admit that i HATE watching any kinds of vods, i dont mind the length when its live stream but when its a vod --- oh god--- Unfortunately Slime and some other creators are live very late at night for me and im just unable to stay up for that long. That's also a reason why i watch Fit that much, he streams at evening.
Speaking of late streams - Quackity/ElQuackity lore makes me shiver and i just love how he starts with these happy, relaxed vibes and ends them without a word after showing us something jawdropping. But i also just like listening to his voice so--- (gender haha. But for the same reason i watch Cellbit, even if i dont understand that much :'33)
I must be honest that i wasnt there from the beginning of the qsmp so im mostly watching those creators who are more talked about??
But yeah, there are also some that i'm reading about because im just unable to watch their povs (because of various reasons). Wiki is very useful in these situations!
But that's also why im more than happy to hear more from you all!! Id love to learn more about your favorite creators, povs :33
Pls dont eat me
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I posted 4,776 times in 2022
That's 855 more posts than 2021!
219 posts created (5%)
4,557 posts reblogged (95%)
Blogs I reblogged the most:
@harperhug
@youhavenoideahowmuchihatethis
@akindplace
@indieninja92
@vaspider
I tagged 2,962 of my posts in 2022
Only 38% of my posts had no tags
#itv endeavour - 258 posts
#fanart - 250 posts
#gifs - 234 posts
#endeavour morse - 221 posts
#art - 152 posts
#dracula - 145 posts
#dracula daily - 143 posts
#roger allam - 138 posts
#endeavour - 131 posts
#bucky barnes - 130 posts
Longest Tag: 133 characters
#but there are some superb works in all of the fandoms i've read extensively (the witcher mcu/stucky endeavour discworld etc.)
My Top Posts in 2022:
#5
How to tell a theatre reviewer doesn't know as much about Shakespeare as they'd like you to think:-
- they say a production of "Richard III" is too funny
- they say a production of "Cymbeline" is too weird
- they say a production of "Coriolanus" is too gay
- they say anything bad ever about Jade Anouka's Shakespearean acting (NB if they do this it also means they are almost certainly a massive bigot)
- they criticise a production of "Macbeth" for being too straightforward and as-written
- they criticise a production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" for not being straightforward and as-written "enough"
- they criticise any production of any play for having too much: politics, queerness, transness, singing, dancing, sexual innuendo, proto-feminism
- they criticise racially-diverse, disability -inclusive, and gender-flipped casting (this also usually means they're a terrible person)
- they think it's an actively good thing if Rosalind in "As You Like It" is still really feminine when dressed as Ganymede
- they think they're being really cool and subversive by not liking Shakespeare
- they think they're being really awesome and arty by not liking anything being written now
216 notes - Posted August 21, 2022
#4
Happy Hobbit Day!
Today being the birthday of Frodo and Bilbo Baggins (September 22nd, that is).
Here are some suggestions for things to do to celebrate:-
- eat mushrooms
- and/or po-ta-toes
- and/or fisheseseses
- have two breakfasts
- be generally lovely and compassionate, but never in awe of anyone
- drink beer (alcoholic or non-alcoholic as you prefer)
- have fun times with people you love, even when things look rough
- go on a little walk somewhere green that makes you happy
- wear a good weskit (waistcoat)
- go on an adventure, and embrace being considered a bit weird :-D
220 notes - Posted September 22, 2022
#3
For those new Sandman fans who haven’t read the comics: Gault is an original character for the show! Replacing two others who did something similar for very different reasons.
And of all the changes made (not that there are many, tbh!), this is my favourite. I love Gault so so so much I can’t even describe it. She is beautiful and glorious and magnificent and she deserves the world. <3
232 notes - Posted August 8, 2022
#2
SEEING FROM HIS VIOLENT DEMEANOUR THAT HE WAS ENGLISH
[may not stop laughing about this all day]
234 notes - Posted August 12, 2022
My #1 post of 2022
People can be very down here on those who only leave kudos rather than a comment on AO3. And just. I love comments, don’t get me wrong. They fill me with joy!
But getting those emails that something I wrote weeks or months or years ago has got a new kudos or two still absolutely delights me. Please don’t underestimate how wonderful and heartening that is.
Similarly, reblogs here on tumblr are the *best* and are how things get noticed and spread given the way tumblr works, but that doesn’t mean I don’t notice or am not very pleased when some thoughts or a ficlet I wrote here gets a heart too.
I know how much energy it takes sometimes to leave a comment or to reblog something. Far too much, sometimes. Far, far too much. And knowing that my efforts are appreciated even with just a click of a button... still special and good. And sometimes I’m worried that all the “don’t like, reblog!” posts on here discourage people from doing that because they feel like it’s worse to like but not reblog than to not react at all, and... no. No, really no.
To conclude: comments and reblogs are the best. But kudos and likes are still good and encouraging things! If you want to show appreciation for something I’ve written or made? Then a) thank you, how lovely of you! <3, b) please don’t be put off doing it in a way that actually works for you. <3
609 notes - Posted September 21, 2022
Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →
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ok ok ok daemons are such an interesting thing to me bc they're not a separate person. your daemon is YOU. but it isn't just your soul or your conscience or your subconscious it's the bit of opposite of you that exists in all humans given form. hence the animal shape and the fact that all* daemons are the opposite gender from their respective person. HDM actually never clarifies completely how they work/what they are, but it does establish some key facts that this Fic plays with which i Love.
daemons have a maximum distance they can be from their person. for humans that max distance is pretty low
daemons know inherently that they're part of somebody they don't have to be told that
touching other people's daemons is really fucking weird. like. imagine touching somebody's soul with your bare hands. or reaching into their braincase. yeah it's fucking weird and physically uncomfortable for both parties
that being said daemons can and will touch other daemons all the time bc they're on the same plane of existence and that's normal.
daemon severance is akin to a lobotomy. like you can do it but a) it releases a lot of very explosive energy and is therefore dangerous; b) if you do it on children the daemon becomes basically an animal and the child is just kind of an empty husk and both of them die soon after; c) if you do it to an adult it's basically a giant lobotomy. straight up
you can't take daemons into the land of the dead. normally living people don't go into the land of the dead, and daemons are the most alive part of you, so dying kills them instantly (they dissolve into gold dust). HDM has an example wherein lyra goes into the land of the dead and pan is literally pulled away from her. they both survive but it fundamentally changes them into more of a witchlike, wherein pan can go very very far away from lyra safely. (this also happens to will, but people from non-daemon worlds don't have exterior daemons†)
this Fic plays with this stuff particularly about vash and nai and it fits so damn well. it posits that vash IS nai's daemon, which makes him already break two rules: same gender and not critter. it also posits that he's way more independent to the point that he doesn't even realize he's a daemon. in fact neither of them do at first but then nai gets it and causes the big fall bc everyone won't stop fucking with his daemon, which if they were human would have Not Happened. it ALSO posits that vash separated himself from nai which is simply INSANE to think of Until you remember that plants are much more powerful than humans. it's literally the same as how a cube is to a line they're a whole pair of dimensions higher why shouldn't their daemons be whole human-level people on their own??
what's really killing me is NONE of the main crew have figured it out as of ch4 even tho literally their daemons are all snuggling vash ALL the TIME just like they do with each other and it doesn't feel weird to them bc it's daemon/daemon interaction as opposed to daemon/person interaction which-- AHHHHHHHHHHH. and bc he separated himself from nai but only partially (much like a witch) he clings to other daemons, literally withering without them, and also possibly acts as a daemon for bulbed plants (hence his ability to heal them) which drives me BATTY!!!!! /POS
*- independent plants in this au seem to all have same gender daemons unlike literally everyone else in hdm. hdm doesn't include nonbinary/trans characters so there's no stated explanation of how daemon gender would correspond to that unfortunately. whatever you think works works imo
†- everyone has the part of their being that makes them alive + a person. if you're from a world without daemons you can be taught to see your daemon, but not everyone does that or knows to do that. also in some cases your daemon simply shows up upon entering a world with daemons. the exact reasoning of what determines that is also not stated in canon
AAHAHAHHHHHHAHHAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH i found a trigun fic that's a daemon AU, as in from his dark materials, and it immediately was like what if independents' daemons are actually in the form of other independents. and nai is vash's daemon. btw a daemon is like, a physical and separate manifestation of like the glue between your heart/mind/soul/body, and also a secondary subconscious brought to the surface. pre-puberty they change form, and solidify into one form during puberty. they're typically animals but this fic is literally driving me up the wall and im barely a third into the first chapter i'll link it later
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King Hong Kong
6/25
My first experience in Hong Kong when I landed at 2am was a reminder of the privilege I had in Seoul by having Ben by my side. As soon as I hopped in the taxi, I tried showing the driver the number to call for my contact at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, who I was told to call so they could give directions to the driver. But he didn’t speak English. The person at the airport spoke some English, and she tried to communicate to him whatever she thought I was saying, but he didn’t call and just gestured me to get in the car, which was a cherry red, little sedan with the driver’s seat on the right instead of the left. It being 3am by this point, after customs and bags and all, I just went for it and hoped things would work out.
The drive went fine, other than some pretty torrential tropical downpour about halfway through. Luckily that stopped when we arrived to the college campus. However, what didn’t stop was the confusion. The security guard at the gate couldn’t quite figure out what I was saying, though she also spoke some English, and started going back and forth with the driver in Chinese. I kept waiting for him to say something along the lines of “OK” and drive through the gate, but instead they just keep bantering. It was hard for me to tell if they were arguing or just baffled, but finally, after rapidly flipping through my mini Chinese dictionary for some words, I decided to try to speak up again. I showed the security guard the map on the phone showing where the dorm was, and then the name of the place. She took my phone, studied it, dragged the map around, and then said something to the taxi driver which seemed like enough to convince him it was time to enter.
We drove up a huge hill, and wandered around in the car for a while before finding my dorm. But the driver was super patient, stopping at multiple buildings to look at the sign before we found the right one. He never yelled at or got frustrated with me, and I really appreciated that kindness, especially because it was 4am at that point.
So lesson here is that traveling without knowing a language and without anyone else who does sucks. I felt really bad for being so ignorant and causing so much confusion for people, and also really helpless to contribute to the solution. It definitely convinced me that for me, traveling in the future will need to entail some language work or some good local friends at all times.
Anyway, after like 3 hours of sleep, the program started this morning. I don’t wanna go too much into detail, mostly cause there’s not too many interesting things and I’m sleepy. But one thing is that the campus here, and the landscape in general, is beautiful. Grassy, craggy hills on all sides, the ocean spreading out around us, the city lit up at night yellow and green and red and white. It’s very humid and hot, like shirt-immediately-sticks-to-your-back kind of weather. And I’ve already met some really cool people, including a woman named Kim who worked as an energy journalist for 6 years, a professor and dragonboat racer named Laila from the Philippines, and a woman from Amsterdam named Lotte who had also been to Buenos Aires and was down to chat about dumpster diving.
There’s def a lot of opportunity here to get to know some cool cats. Just gotta stay awake enough to do it.
<3 Scaht
New Words (these are just how they sound and how I spell them in my head, and doesn’t include tone marks, so be wary)
xie xie- thank you
Ni hao ma-hello
Zaijian-goodbye
Xizao jian- bathroom
Dianhua- call (phone)
Qing- please
Shouju-receipt
Zai zher- here
6/26
Is being a tourist inherently exploitative? Are places that are touristy inherently inauthentic?
These are some of the thoughts that were running through my mind today as we made our way through some pretty tourist trap kind of places. First was the big Buddha, nestled high in Hong Kong’s hills at the Po Lin Monastery. The Buddha was immense and beautiful as we drove in a our bus around the winding edge of mountains thick with green vegetation and looking out over the bay. But when we got off the bus at the top, the first thing I saw was a shop selling keychains. Turns out the monastery has become a little tourist town, with shops, cheap snack stands and even a Buddhist monk restaurant that we ate at. It all culminated in a crowded, 10-15 flight stair climb up to the Buddha where, surprise!, there’s another snack stand and a little museum about the statue’s creation.
Anyway, it felt kinda weird to be at this supposedly holy site under the looming shadow of the Buddha, and by surrounded by selfie-takers and crying babies. But on the flipside, those tourist attractions develop in the first place because of tourists like me looking for adventure and entertainment. And not just Westerners; I saw tourists from all over Asia and Latin America as well.
The second question becomes: are touristy places inherently “inauthentic”? Is this Buddha less meaningful because lots of tourists come to it, as opposed to a Buddha hidden away somewhere? If it’s still meaningful to the monks at Po Lin and to the many Buddhists who come see it (I did see many people stopping to pray or honor the Buddha), I wonder if it matters that they’re benefitting commercially off of it as well. I wonder what the Buddha’s teaching would say about that.
<3 Scaht
New Words (these are just how they sound and how I spell them in my head, and doesn’t include tone marks, so be wary)
Ma la- Peppercorn spicy
Shir la-Wet spicy (aka it will make you sweat)
Ji Dan Zai- Egg waffle (delicious street food dessert made with waffle batter, coconut and herbs)
6/28
Vicky is this cool woman on my trip from China. She’s a couple years younger than me and is from Shenzhen, the city we’re going to next. I had a really cool convo with her today on the bus, which started when she asked me what my thoughts were about LGBTQ people.
I told her I just saw them as people, and she agreed. She told me how she has some gay friends, and how she was open minded to the idea of exploring her sexual identity in the future. We also talked about how most people in China just don’t talk about it if they’re gay, and how when she talked about the concept of homosexuality with her mom, her mom got really scared that her daughter would be gay and that would hurt the way people looked at her.
I also told her about how I started painting my nails and how my Mom had reacted to it with a lot of questions and comments that felt pretty judgmental, to the point where I got kinda made and said to her “Don’t tell me what the fuck to do with my body.” I was surprised at my reaction, maybe because I was sort of unsure why I was painting my nails in the first place. I know I like the way it looks, and I know it was a fun bonding thing with me and Megana. But I guess I wasn’t totally clear on whether I was exploring my gender identity in some ways through it. But I think it did definitely make me feel like I was embracing a more feminine part of myself and that I was taking a risk that felt kinda liberating. So when my mom started responding with that judgment, it both frustrated me that she would judge people like that at all and made me feel personally judged, which hurt.
I think it’d be super easy to be like “well, I’m out of college, guess I’m done with that.” But I don’t think that’s what I want. If it’s something I enjoy, why not keep doing it? There doesn’t need to be a super deep justification for it; it just makes me feel happy and pretty and free. And if I conform, I’m not being true to myself and playing into the dominant masculine narrative. Fuck dat.
So thanks Viki for asking some questions and opening the doors for some enlightening cross-cultural convos. Can’t wait to get some more in as we go.
<3 Scaht
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