What to do, what to do...

[uisceros]

Random bit of 2am rambling before I go running. Outside. At night. (I'm distinctly odd like that)

Kpop groups debut in Japan all the time. Even newer groups actively seek to go to Japan. It's the next level of popularity. But what about the Chinese speaking world? I don't get it (and I'm not going to get into politics here). If I were an artist in Korea, I'd want to debut in China (HK and Macau included), Taiwan or Singapore. Simply because the Chinese speaking world is huge. You've got 1.3 billion people in China alone. That's a hell of a lot of people you can sell albums to.

I don't know, and now I'm tired of thinking about it. Chinese has been in my head a lot lately. Incidentally I've been seriously thinking about going back to Taiwan. Or even trying China, or Singapore. I've even thought about going to Korea (but half of me thinks that would be a horrible idea, because I cannot understand Korean in the least).

I'm still up in the air about grad school. It's insane expensive, and I'm not sure it's what I want right now. It's too bad that program is like my holy grail (Biohazardous Threat Agents & Emerging Infectious Diseases)! Plus it has the option to do a joint degree and get an MD. Getting to be called "doctor" without a PhD is nice. But that's beside the point. The point is, if I go to the Georgetown program for 2 years, I'll be almost $100,000 in the hole. That is NOT appealing. *cries a bit*

I should go back to my alma mater and try to get info at the career center. I could use a bit of help applying for programs, especially since I've been out of college almost 3 years now.

Other options: applying for governmental jobs overseas, which I am still looking into...

Now, off to run!


I was going through some of my stuff from Asia, and realized that I have a buttload of cell phone straps. I love them, and just kept buying them. They just seem so very Asian to me (cell phone straps have not caught on in the US). I have, at last count, 30 of them. And 6 Asian keychains (in Taiwan, I had two keys... And six keychains). I only have three straps on on my phone right now though. Two Big Bang, one nice bean (usually they're the green bean ones, but mine is totally cool, and is a BLACK bean).

Random cell phone strap breakdown by where they came from:
Korea - 10 (8 of them are Big Bang related)
Japan - 3
Taiwan - 15
USA - 2 (I bought them at a Japanese import shop)

This is not new though. I collect game keychains like these. I have an ungodly number of them somewhere. Me and tiny-things-you-carry-attached-to-stuff are a perfect match. Apparently.

Comments

[biases.livejournal.com]

I can't comment one way or the other on your education problems - I spent 7 years (on and off, I worked full time for more than 2 of those) getting my bachelor, and now I'm mucking around with my graduate studies so that I can finally get the qualification I need to teach, and UGH SO OVER UNI. I guess you need to weigh up what you want to do now, do you want to travel at this point in your life, or do you want to study so that you have a better job sooner? Will that course always be there?

$100K is a LOT of money, but I imagine with that qualification you'll be working in a pretty high-paying job, so it's something you can pay off (...eventually).

Personally, I'm planning on going to Korea to teach English next year or the year after, because travelling to live in another country feels like it should be something to be done while you're young. That's not to say that you can't do it when you're older, I just think that working while travelling is easier to do when you're younger and single (and not worrying about a family). Plus the experience will help me in the classroom down the track.

I've been no help, but the decision will always be yours. I think you need to know where you are now before you can decide where to go later - what is your passion at this time? Where will you feel happiest?

*hugs* Good luck!

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

It's hard to figure out. I want so badly to travel, but at the same time, how will I support myself? It's like this never ending cycle of confusion. Stupid life is hard to figure out...

Goodness I hope so. Course, I DO want to work for the government, and that's not on the top of the highest paying jobs.

I've really thought a lot about going to Korea to teach, actually. Three problems though: I'm not a good teacher (you should hear me try to explain things, but I suppose it doesn't much matter in Asian schools, where the curriculum and lesson plans are already planned out for you), I would fail constantly with the language (course, I failed constantly with Mandarin too, but at least I had something to fail with), and I'd be alone (I'm very shy, being alone would be very hard for me). But in general, I completely agree with you, I think travel and adventure is best done when you don't have all the crazy responsibilities of later years.

You've helped! It helps just to get any feedback. The problem is I don't even know what I want to do. Ever since I was very young, there's been a very loud voice inside me telling me to travel, run away, do everything you can. But I'm also hugely pragmatic, and I know I need a master's degree. I honestly have no idea. And thinking about it just makes me stressed. Eh. Seriously, life is hard. I want to be 5 again.

Thanks!

[littlemoxygirl.livejournal.com]

If you were looking for a Chinese-speaking environment, Singapore's not really that kinda place. I'm from Singapore & the language that people use the most is English. Singapore's pretty (won't say very) Westernised, so, easing into the culture here probably (I think) isn't too hard :)

Oh & if you need help translating the simplified Chinese Big Bang article, I could help you, since we learn simplified Chinese here in Singapore. You can send me a scan of the article, but I can only get back to you with the translation next Thursday (have exams this week) :)