Blaugust 18: I am bathing

I don't often bathe, because I grew up just taking quick showers and being told not to waste time or water in the bathroom LOL. I just saw people on tv and movies do it and thought it must be the ultimate decadence.

The few times I did take a bath, it was always at my cousins' apartment. I always had fun going over there as a kid cuz they got to things that I saw people do on TV: make pancakes, play Nintendo 64, hang out at their neighbor's house, chat on AIM, and yeah, take an hour just steaming in the bathtub. I don't have a subject for this blog post LOL i guess I am just talking about feeling like I learned about the world by watching TV and movies, rather than actually experiencing it? Or just yapping about MEMORIESSSSS¹⁾

I actually learned English as a second language! My family spoke Cantonese, and didn't really speak that much English. I guess I just learned from watching cartoons on TV, and going to non-chinese school. Spongebob did a lot of heavy lifting for my generation I tell you what… I also vividly remember Cyber Six and Power Rangers being part of my learning repetoire.

My first language is very rusty now, very conversational, illiterate, and likely to get made fun of by old Chinese grannies. As such, my Cantonese continues to rust because I am too scared to speak it around fluent speakers.

When I was a kid, one time I was ordering steamed buns by myself. My parent/guardian probably thought it'd be funny to make a kid do that, and force them to learn people skills. I stuttered and the cashier was like “cmon get on with it”. And that broke my little brain forever and made me want to never speak again LMAO.

It also didn't feel great that if I made mistakes while speaking, my parents would make fun of me instead of teaching me the proper grammar or vocab or whatever. Don't make fun of your kids! At least if they're a mentally deficient squib like me.

I still always feel bad whenever people talk shit about monolinguals. And I feel bad when people are like “its so easy to learn languages, just pick it up!”. I wish I could speak Chinese better! It's just barely good enough to give broken directions to the bus stop to random ladies who stop me in San Francisco.

I am not good at learning languages in general, whether its Chinese or Spanish or Javascript LMAO. Memorization makes my brain empty. I always got yelled at as a kid (and as a working adult :p) for forgetting things right in the moment I needed to remember. Oh well, that is the life of undiagnosed (???).

I can recall a couple of brain breaking moments that made me shut up forever as a kid?

1. I was in an elementary school summer program daycare thing. I remember people correcting me that it wasn't Summer School, cuz that was for making up your grades. I was very loud and obnoxious and talked a lot about random shit. Some kid named Victor with glasses and a bowlcut turned to me and said “you know no one thinks you're funny right?”. And no one else said anything. So that meant he was right. And then for the rest of middle school and high school I shut up and didn't talk to anyone. Thanks Victor! Hope you're having a great day!
2. In Chinese School, which was after Elementary school, I vividly recall kids getting called to the front of the class and hit with a wooden back scratcher on the back and ass. Now this is quite the common punishment amongst Chinese parents, but just cuz it's common, doesn't mean you ever get used to being beat. Whether its by your parents or by your teachers in public as a weird public humiliation ritual. Especially if you are a weird frail brain in a jar like me. I'm sure that contributed to me dropping out of Chinese achool and having negatice IQ.
3. a positive one! My grandpa used to pick me up from elementary school, and walk with me to the corner McDonalds for a snack before my parents picked me up. Since he didn't speak English, I would have to order for us even thouh I was like 4 ft tall. So I felt good that I could be ~independent~ and get borger and fries for both of us. And I guess that built my confidence in speaking English a lot more. Since no one was yelling at me or beating my ass or making fun of me, and in fact had a net positive outcome of me and my grandpa having hamburgers.

TL;DR: i got beat and humiliated into being stupid and not talking good.

Now as an adult, I am a little better at public speaking. Some people say I can be funny while doing customer service small talk. I'm still not one to start conversations though. I'd rather just wait for someone else to say something that initializes conversation and doesn't make me feel like I am talking out loud and annoying people. And I'm still shit and memorizing Chinese characters.

My daughter Jill is screaming at me while I am in this tub. She hates that she cannot see me over the bathtub edge. Blooby is also barking. I am hungry a little. I guess that is my cue to get out of the tub before I shrivel into a raisin.

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