BREAKFAST

half an avocado

1/4 c raw almonds

green apple

1/2 c sliced mangoes

MID-MORNING SNACK

Tutti-Melon chocolate and taro froyo with toppings of mangoes, longans, walnuts, chocolate peppermint, and mochi

LUNCH

egg sandwich

WATER:  3 liters + innumerable little cups of green tea and other teas

***

Notes:

- Nice day of drawing on location. Location: Palace of Fine Arts and the greater Marina district. Today is when I realized the last gym I went to was around the block, and that area is close to the Union Street shopping area, even closer to where I got a body wrap treatment once, Spa Belle Vie. It was a slimming body wrap right on the day before I fly back to Jakarta *giggles* you know… you wanna look spectacular when you know your boyfriend will be fetching you in the airport now, not your mother or your father or your brothers.

From Quiterly.

Anyway, I’m babbling. It was a nice area to just sketch all day, go for long walks, and people-watching. There are a lot of weird people to watch.

 

 

- And there are a lot of weird people watching us. I don’t know what is it about artists when they’re drawing, but I guess people admire their talents. My classmate shared a story about an old guy approaching her and just straight up and told her about how he fell in love with his wife when she was in art school, and bla bla blah… And then there were also people just taking pictures of my teacher and some of my other classmates while they’re drawing, as if we’re some kind of tourist attraction or something. I guess, in a way, when we draw, we become part of the environment, because we’re engaging with the environment when we draw that environment onto our sketchbook. It makes some sense.

- Just that, in my case, the weird people, or rather, person, was really, really weird. The creepy weird. I mean, there are plenty others throughout the day that are weird, but this one’s worth telling. There was an old Asian guy who passed me by, and I didn’t glance at him because I was drawing a tree. You know how trees are hard to draw. Trees and its branches. Then he sat by the bench beside me, on my left. I still didn’t glance at him. I just kept drawing until the branches are done. I haven’t put in the leaves. But I started to feel his stare. Maybe he’s just one of those weird people watching my friends draw and take pictures of us drawing, or maybe he’s just facing me but had his eyes closed as if he’s meditating, like old people do. I still didn’t glance. A lot of people passed us by already. I had put in some leaves, but it’s almost time. It was close to the time we were supposed to report back to our meeting point after our lunch break. The meeting point was just a few feet away from that bench I was drawing my tree from, on my left hand side. So I take a look to see whether my teacher’s already there or not, and he was. By turning my head left, my eyes automatically went from my teacher at the distance and then to that old guy beside me, and he was just staring at me, not at my drawing. Usually when you caught someone looking at you, they turn the other way. But this guy didn’t. He didn’t even move his pupils. It wasn’t like the admiring stare with the hint of a smile like my boyfriend does all the time (on the first few dates we went, whenever he does that, and that I felt his stare, my cheeks felt super duper hot but ahhhhhhh nevermind.)

From forsaken resources.

It was a whole different level of staring. Once in a while, he adjusted his sitting position, and I just kept drawing my tree. So I still draw my leaves, but I can’t really concentrate anymore. I take a look at him again, and he’s STILL staring. What the? OK this is creepy. OK, OK, calm down. Thank God for iPad. I just took a picture of my tree so that I can continue drawing later, and thank God for my classmate to pass me by just the moment I was about to leave. So I just walked beside her and, yes, it wasn’t just me. When she was passing me by she also noticed that old guy just staring at me the whole time. Like, the eyes are wide open and staring at me in his very own creepy way. That’s just scary.

- I understand it’s a free country. But it’s still rude to stare. Or creepy. Or whatever. I wonder if that’s what a stalker does? Because I’ve been in a worse scenario… Be careful, girls. No matter how independent you are, you have to learn some self-defense moves. It will come useful one day if you learn how to kickass. I don’t know how to kickass, but I’ve got a lifetime of practice to punch and pinch my brothers till they turn blue for days.

- Or at least be smart. Both my elder brothers are gamers. Bro #1 said yes to self-defense. Bro #2 loves to shadow-box. He taught me how to jab properly. He also told me that the 2 weakest parts of a man’s body are the bridge of his nose and, of course, his crotch. Even if you don’t know how to hit hard, you can always target their Achilles’ heel(s).

- And if you happen to be a recreational runner, you’re in luck, because not everybody is fit as you, so just run.

- And… since all these do not relate to my food diary at all, let me just put it all into a nutshell: when you eat mindfully, you’re automatically fit. I’m so happy my boyfriend forgo his usual McDonald’s lunch today and ate steamed fish for dinner!! To me, it’s still better to not eat at all rather than mindlessly munching on that sad hormone-infused, prison-raised chicken. Or beef. Or whatever. (If you haven’t, please read Fast Food Nation. Or at least watch the brutal documentary). He told me his dinner menu happily like a kid earning an A grade for eating healthy! So cute ^^

Muchaluva,
Stace