mei goes it alone!

thursday, 15 aug 2024

this week i got back from a short trip to melbourne! it was my first solo trip that wasn't for school purposes, and something i'd wanted to do for a while. i wasn't looking at melbourne specifically, but i saw that my favorite comedian (gianmarco soresi) was doing an australia tour and thought that was as good a reason as any to head over, so i designed my trip around that event.

even though the whole point of this trip was to go off on my own, i was a little sad about it when the time came because i was coming off a huge + fun reunion with my extended family! while i was planning, i don't think i took into account how jarring it would be to go from being surrounded by lots of people you know and (mostly) like to going solo, lol.

back when i was in school, i'd always feel dread before my flights out, spending extra hours packing and staying up late to make it feel like my departure day would take longer to come. i think a similar feeling came over me while packing for this trip... which surprised me, because it was barely a week + something i planned myself and was excited for!! i think the part of me that wants to live independently will always be at war with the part of me that wants to always be near my family.

but a lot of it was probably nerves about flying alone too – once i got on the plane, i felt a lot better, and the excitement started building up again. i ended up having a really good time! i saw some family (some of my fave relatives!), did a bit of shopping, and overall had very full days. here are some highlights:

gianmarco show

i knew gianmarco sometimes did stagedoor/meetups after his shows, so i prepared in advance! his instagram channel for fans is called "backup whales" based on a crowdwork joke and i drew him a little whale sticker and had a few copies printed before my trip. i was hoping to hand some out to other fans when i got there, but i ended up being too shy LOL

the show itself was enjoyable (and mostly composed of material i hadn't heard yet!) and afterwards i got in line to meet him. i messaged him on instagram in advance that i had stickers for him, but also assumed he had an assistant helping him reply to DMs and did not behave as if i expected him to recognize me from a single random DM. i handed him the stickers first thing when it was my turn in line and he seemed delighted by them + gave me a hug! this man is TALL. (there was a guy you could give your phone to for pictures, and he managed to capture the hug yippee)

he took a moment to show them to his girlfriend too before we did pictures, and later he posted it on his instagram story + in the actual backup whales channel with a voice note about it :) i was happy!!

color analysis

do not laugh. i booked a personal color analysis – i've always wanted to do one, and i don't know if there are any where i live, so i took the opportunity while i was alone in melbourne!!!

i booked with a place called colorist x, which seemed like the best one after i scrolled through a few different options. i particularly liked this one because 1) staff was asian (feel like they'd have a better understanding of asian skin and not just default to asian = warm-toned) and 2) they gave you a cute little keychain afterwards with an NFC tag you could scan whenever, so you'd always have your color report on you.

i got up a little later than i planned to, and ran down to the studio (thankfully it was not too far!) in boots i save only for travelling. my Assesser (???) was named carol and she was very nice. we even followed each other on instagram later after talking throughout the session lol.

i found out that i am a light spring which i'm very happy with, since i already gravitate to pastels and light colors! i can also do bright spring, which is a bit more saturated – this intimidates me but i'm more inclined to try it now that i know i can pull it off. i also learned that my least suitable palette is deep winter, which checks out. something i want to do based on the recommendations i got is to try on more warm yellow clothes, since they suited me apparently...

the makeup recommendations were particularly fun. i used to do a lot of peachy, orange makeup when i was in college, but as i got older i felt silly/too old for a style i saw as youthful. (though i'm only in my twenties...) i bought a few products after getting my report and it turns out that It's Literally Fine. Colors Don't Have Ages

skin reveal, i guess?

impromptu date lol

i dislike the apps, but whenever i travel i like to get on them for fun, just to see what kind of people are around. i'm very much a Stranger Danger kind of person so swiping rarely evolves into a meetup, but i ended up having a two-hour phone call with someone i met on bumble – doing phone calls is Also uncharacteristic of me – and i felt comfortable enough during the conversation to agree to a meetup.

it was nice! he was very sweet but (and this is embarrassing to admit) i think i felt early on during the meetup that it was not a match. he was genuinely a good dude, but i was putting my best foot forward, and was unsure if i would ever be my real self (read: a bitch) around someone so sweet... it feels silly not liking someone for being sincere and genuine but i am just insane i guess. so when my being ace turned out to be a dealbreaker for him, i was a little relieved!!! we parted ways amicably and (i hope) both content with how things closed.

although...

it did make me worry for a future instance in which i actually am really interested in someone and have to break the news/explain my convoluted relationship with intimacy to them. oh well! a worry for another time!!!

on a personal note, it was nice to do something i feel is out of character for me and, more selfishly, talk to someone kind and genuinely interested in me... my friends' dating lives feel so much higher stakes and dramatic, so i felt very lucky to have had an experience that was chill, without the overthinking/obsession/regret that romantic/intimate endeavors usually come with lol.

anyway, i generally dislike talk of dating and romance even from Myself, so that's enough out of this section.

mallow day!!

the aforementioned date was supposed to happen on the saturday i was to meet up with mallow, but got bumped up to the friday bc the guy's schedule freed up. i'm quite thankful for the sched change, bc i was so happy to spend my last full day with a neocities friend and would have been mad about having to cut it short for a Just Ok Date!!

THATS RIGHT... i met up with a friend from this side of the internet and it was so so much fun!!!

it was kind of magical how things worked out... mallow was my first ever mutual/friend on neocities, from way back in february 2023 (WOW!!!). they took a break from their site towards the end of that year, but i thought about them often because i was such a fan of their site + art + perspective, and decided to shoot them an email in june just saying hello.

i was surprised when they got back to me so quickly and enthusiastically!!!! i was SO ready to be the only person who was like "augh... so special that the first person i met in this totally new but removed-from-real-life space was someone i really felt i could be friends with..." like maybe it is not that deep for everyone else, you know? so i was a Little emo about the reciprocated enthusiasm T__T <3

they also told me that they had been at the same tswift concert date i attended!!!

mallow: i don't know why i thought you were going to the sydney date

me: i don't know why i thought you lived in new zealand

mallow also said that if i was coming back then they would love to meet up. by that time, i'd already finalized the dates of my trip, so i was happy to tell them that Actually I Would Be Back!! and so we made plans to meet!!!! and WE MET!!!!!

some highlights of our hangout:

they showed up in all dark colors and me all light, which i thought was so fun
i brought a phoenix wright sticker i ordered through a friend (me: oh mallow likes AA more than i do, so i will gift this to them) only for me to pull it out and them to be like "oh! my partner made that" WHAT ARE THE ODDS...
- (the next day, mallow dropped by with said partner who was very lovely and gave me some MORE cute stickers T__T blessed)
mallow brought me to my first sushi train + taught me how to use the tram LOL
we visited the sticky institute at its new location and mallow bought me a little zine about unlikely connections!!!!! augh................
sitting at the shrine of remembrance, talking about horny OCs (theirs) and OC/canons (mine) and flipping through their sketchbook... feel v honored to have had a sketchbook tour Live. sorry to the veterans for insaneposting while sitting on your memorial
- also a tourist came over asking where to find the entrance of the building, so we got up and walked her to it (a break from wilding out)
going through the entire ttpd album track by track and giving our opinions on each song at a cafe + in line for dinner + at the bar. it's so nice to talk to another taylor fan who is the same level of invested in her... not obsessed, not casual, but a secret third thing
spending a good amount of time at readings just looking through books, talking about them, going on tangents to other things the books reminded us of!!! this was particularly fun idk why
dinner at a korean restaurant talking about old fandoms we'd been in!
drinks at a cute bar + more insaneposting somehow?!?!

keanu shrine at the sticky institute.

by the time we parted ways, we'd spent almost 12 hours together which is so crazy!! it was the best way to spend my last full day of my trip and i was so so happy the stars aligned for us to meet (online) and to meet up (for this hangout). i love the internet and i love friends... i hope i see them again!

now that i'm back, i'm feeling the effects of back-to-back trips and the post-enjoyment dip in energy that comes with it. it's taking me longer than i anticipated to recover, but i'm trying to take it in stride and let myself relax before i get back to real life (AKA preparing to study again). augh...

it was so much fun though! i'm so happy i got to meet all the people i did. i came back feeling very good about myself and a bit more sure of what sort of life i'd like to work towards. :)

oh no... the post was already going to end nicely... what's this...

i really like melbourne, and think it's somewhere i'd like to move to (+ know it's quite easy to apply for residence). it's a place i can see myself building a life in. but i'm a little sad about the idea of being far from my family, which is going to be expanding soon. i'd like to be around to enjoy my soon-to-be-born niece with the rest of my family! i also want to spend lots of time with my beloved worm and enjoy being able to do things with my parents as often as i do while i'm single and here... although i suppose the longer i put it off, the more terrified i'll be of leaving, as dogs and parents get older.

i think i'm hesitant to (at least physically) extricate myself from the people i love so dearly – even if i know it is the only way i see myself learning to thrive independently, and even if i know they would only support me and cheer me on – because i'm terrified of what will become scarce or nonexistent when i make that change. leaving home for college was easier when i knew i would come back.

(for this reason, i think it's sometimes enviable when people have less close relationships with their family... like agugughh if i loved you and wanted to be around you less, if i did not gather as much strength from being around u as i do, then maybe it would be easier to up and go!!!)

i've noticed i try to wrap things up quickly and neatly and politely when i post publicly, because – despite having this diary AND a separate blog lol – i feel weird wrangling with my thoughts on the public world wide web. i hesitated to include this section, especially without an "oh well lol!!!!" tacked on the end, bc i'm scared of these thoughts and find it scarier to think someone will read and possibly respond to them. but the thoughts came to me while writing this and it would be more of a hassle to delete them and wait until i sat down with my paper diary to rewrite them in pen, so i'm leaving them up.