Cotton-Pickin' Days 1.0

Changes are afoot in this part of the world. Today, I share with you one change in my external appearance.





ETA: I'm away from home using a computer without a photo editor which made it impossible to resize the photos properly before uploading them to my ScrapBook online photo album (hence the slow loading). Luckily, I found a great free online image editor that took care of business.

Today I had the chance to practice my assertiveness skills. While waiting in line to order lunch at a local bakery/cafe, the man in front of me had his phone plastered to his ear. When the staff asked for sandwich orders, I looked at him to ask if he had ordered yet but phone yakker was so engrossed in his conversation that I was unable to catch his eye. After waiting a few moments to see if he would do so, I stepped forward to place my order.

The standard procedure at this bakery is to place your order to the side where they make the sandwiches, then continue waiting in line until you reach the register where you repeat your order to the cashier so s/he can ring you up. Phone yakker had clearly never been to this bakery before and didn't know how to behave.

As soon as I tried to tell the staff what sandwiches we wanted, he got off the phone and said very rudely, "Why are you getting your sandwiches before us?" (Who "us" was I didn't know since phone yakker was the only customer in front of me. I can only assume that he felt such importance that he thinks of himself as being worth more than one person.)

I replied, "You were busy talking on the phone and weren't paying attention."

At that moment, one of the sandwich makers quickly said, "I've got your order, sir."

Phone yakker had no proper response especially when he realized all he had left to do was to pay while I was still waiting for my sandwiches to be prepared. He never looked me in the eye nor apologized for his behavior.

Did he think he could get away with intimidating me? I may be younger, shorter (shorter than him, but not so short on average since I'm 5'7"), female, and Asian, but I am certainly no pushover. I know how to be assertive and stand up for my rights.

Assertiveness is the ability to communicate opinions, thoughts, needs, and feelings in a direct, honest, and appropriate manner. Assertiveness involves standing up for your rights in a manner that does not offend others or deny the rights of others. When you are assertive you have more control over your life. You also make it less likely that other people will take advantage of you.

If he had wanted to continue the "conversation," I would have gladly pointed out his lack of manners. All without the need to be aggressive - violating the rights and feelings of other people including phone yakker. Too bad he doesn't have a clue what the difference is between assertiveness and aggressiveness.

If I were ever asked in a job interview about my strengths and weaknesses, one of the strengths I would talk about would be my ability to make decisions.

When it comes to my personal life, I can say without a doubt that all the decisions I've made have been right for me at that moment in time. When faced with a decision, I always have a strong gut feeling that tells me what to do. I may feel a twinge of regret sometimes, but most often, I am able to go forward and carry out my plans.

I think I live up to what Paul Wolfowitz*, current head of the World Bank, believes a good decision maker should be. In the July/August issue of The Atlantic (yes, I'm still making my way through it), he said this about decision-making:

I think someone once said that decision-making is usually trying to choose the least crappy of the various alternatives. It does seem to me that so many things we have to decide are fifty-five--forty-five decisions, or sixty--forty decisions. Arrogance is one of the worst failings in a senior decision-maker. I really admire people like President Bush and Harry Truman, who were good at it. Dean Acheson said about Truman that he was free of that most crippling of emotions, regret. Once he made a decision, he moved on. And I think that's what characterizes really good decision-makers.

There is this sort of intellectual notion that there is such a thing as perfect knowledge, and you wait to get perfect knowledge before you make a decision. In the first place, even if there were perfect knowledge, it would be too late by the time you got it. And secondly, there is no such thing. Accepting the imperfection of knowledge is a very important part of being a great decision-maker.

Are you a good decision maker?

*I'm not exactly a fan, but I did find his interview interesting.

Week 2, Day 5 of School Without Mama

Two different Stephens were at school today. During the first hour, Stephen Crier-Screamer was in attendance. During the second hour, Stephen Happy-Spaz took the first Stephen's place. The teachers were dumbfounded.

Like baggyk, lizardek, and qadira, the teachers think our current schedule of four days out and three days in school per week is unbalanced. So this week, Stephen will go to school on Friday and next week, he will go Monday through Friday (as opposed to the Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday schedule I had planned). Then we'll be in California for a while and he won't return to school until the start of the second term in November. It's not ideal, but hopefully we'll see more of Stephen Happy-Spaz than Stephen Crier-Screamer as time goes on.

As for me, I've gained an extra four hours for a total of ten hours free per week. Not quite sure what I'm going to do with myself. On days like today when I didn't have anything planned with friends, I shopped for groceries, wrote four blog posts, made some jello for Stephen, and generally felt at loose ends. Never knew I could get so much done in just a couple of hours.

Once we return from our month-long holiday, I'll have to buckle down. Perhaps I'll start consulting again and take the plunge into other freelance writing opportunities. I feel queasy just thinking about it.

Cottontimer Stay-At-Home-Mom will have to invite Cottontimer Kickass-Wage Earner over for breakfast soon.

During the two hours Stephen was in school this morning, I went over to Ben Thanh Market to buy the animal figures I'd promised him. After finding some that were acceptable even if not completely satisfactory (as is usually the case when shopping in Vietnam), I got sucked into a stall that was crammed full of hair accessories.

There was a little old lady sitting on a plastic stool just 6 inches off the ground selling a few combs and curlers in between the licensed stalls. While I shopped and chatted with the salesgirl, the little old lady kept staring at me and smiling. Then she tried to talk to me, but I had to shake my head regretfully since I can't understand a word of Vietnamese.

The salesgirl translated for me, "She says you have a very lucky face."

Ahhh. Of course. Old Asian ladies always love my pale round face with its chubby cheeks and perpetual smile (despite my crankiness, I am a very smiley girl). According to the World of Feng Shui, these are the nine wealth features of the face:

1. Look after your forehead and keep it clear of blemishes, spots and unsightly pimples. Use artificial aids to ensure a smooth forehead. [Are they talking about face lift tape?]


2. The middle space above the nose and between the eyes should be clear and luminous because it symbolises a life of affluence and influence.


3. The rounder and fleshier the nose looks, the better is the wealth luck indicated. The Chinese always regard a big nose with some indulgence, no matter how out of place they look in the overall face. This is because the nose is the repository of money fortune and it indicates wealth from many different sources.


4. Directly below the nose at the tip of the lips is the phoenix pearl. It looks rounded and is protruding, bringing good fortune to both men and women. [Stephen definitely inherited this from me]


5. Irrespective of its size, the mouth must never appear dry, since this indicates loss of luck. As long as the mouth is always moist, it indicates money luck.


6. To be auspicious, the chin should be protruding and prominent.


7. The eyes should shine and be slightly moist. Their shape, size or colouring don't matter as much as their vitality.


8. Cheekbones should always have flesh and never look bony since this would indicate excessive yang. For cheekbones to appear balanced they must look good enough to pinch! [This is my best feature!]


9. When your ears are well formed and proportionate, they indicate good fortune and wisdom.

I don't know if my face has all nine wealth features, but I do think I've had an extremely fortunate life. And I'm happy that this freckly moon face is able to make an old lady smile with the glow of good fortune.

Which of these wealth features do you have?

Not since I was working full-time have I had a day this bad. It started with a lot of complaining (both Stephen and me) and crying (just Stephen). Then, we find out that our trip to California has to be postponed (nothing serious). Because the trip is postponed, I made a last minute decision to start Stephen at school today.

We trooped over to school where we got the paperwork we needed and visited the nursery class Stephen will be in. About 10 kids between the ages of 2 1/2 and 4 were sitting nicely on little chairs around a big table; the older ones were tracing the shapes printed on the paper with a pencil, the slightly younger ones were coloring in the shapes, and the youngest ones were scribbling.

When Stephen was invited to join in, he opted to jump around instead. It's understandable that he'd want to explore, but I'd never been worried about his ability to focus until just then. If a lot of sitting is required in school, I don't know how he will adapt to this sudden "loss of freedom" as the school's head of early childhood education put it.

In any case, Stephen seemed intrigued by the school environment - books, numbers and other decorations on the wall, and Bob the Builder coloring sheets. A couple of his playdate friends are in the same class and they were very eager to play with him. Even so, he wanted to leave after a short while and asked for waffles and a strawberry smoothie. I figured it would be a last fling before we started school for real tomorrow, so we hopped in the taxi and spent an hour lounging at a local expat hang-out.

I've been trying to psych him up for school tomorrow (he'll go for a couple of hours in the morning on weekdays), but it's a hard sell. I can't say I'm all that excited myself especially after seeing the younger children (ages 1-2) crying their eyes out in the play area, which is probably unavoidable during these early days of the school year. Tomorrow, I'd like to turn him over to the teacher's care and just stay on the fringes of the classroom if not stay outside within line of sight, but not interfering or intruding. I dread this transition period and worry it will take weeks.

Other things that are contributing to this bad day:

• Stephen won't leave me alone for more than a few minutes. I hope it isn't anxiety over school.


• Marv isn't home.


• Someone edited me without my consent (have to be vague in order to stay out of trouble).


• Irrational worries over how my Genetics and Public Health Blog is being perceived, especially with regard to ads.


• The irony of writing a noodle post after just proclaiming that I didn't like to write them. But I really need to vent and there's no one else here...but you (and daynema - thank you for listening)!

School is in the air. My friend, Krissy, at SpeckBlog just went back to school yesterday. And Jean and dragonfly1867 have been talking about studying and the desire to go back to school. Stephen will start in October. As for me? You couldn't pay me to go back to school.

From the age of five until just before my 26th birthday, I was in school continuously with no one-year break as an exchange student or for overseas studies; no extended time away from school except for summers to work and sorta chill out. Even the jobs I've had since my freshman year of high school weren't jobs with other kids, maybe at a fast food restaurant, goofing off. I was always finding ways to promote myself along the career path.

By the time I finished my PhD, I'd had enough of sitting in on boring lectures, taking notes in five different colors, reading and sleeping with five-pound textbooks, puzzling over genetics and statistics homework assignments, working on group projects, writing papers, and studying for both oral and written exams. There are people who have more degrees than me and who've been in school longer than me, but I've done more than the average and I've had enough.

I'm impressed that moms like Krissy, Jean, and dragonfly1867 have the stamina to attend classes, think about applying for degree programs, and study Japanese independently (that's what each of them is doing respectively). I just couldn't do it myself.

Now I'm all about learning random odds and ends from here, there, and everywhere. I'm still learning but not in a disciplined manner. Every day I drink from the gushing firehose that is the genomic revolution. At the same time, you might find me poring over astronomy websites one day boning up on the planets for Stephen. Another week, I might be reading up on the tensions across the Taiwan Strait. Yesterday, I was researching the alpha mom phenomenon.

I'm still learning and the neurons are still firing. I'm just not doing it to someone else's rules. I appreciate all the formal schooling I've had. It's what taught me to be critical, analytical, and organized. But now that I'm done with school, I'm really done.

Googlism for: 33

• 33 is out


• 33 is a high temperature


• 33 is released


• 33 is past; this page is left here for those with a historical interest


• 33 is a challenging object for the small telescope because of its great size and rather low surface brightness


• 33 is in the mail


• 33 is a high


• 33 is the ultimate combination of playability and aesthetics


• 33 is expressed in neurons and mutations in unc


• 33 is currently being


• 33 is on the corner


• 33 is the most influential of all numbers


• 33 is being built


• 33 is me in less than 3 hours

The first time you interacted with me, whether it was the first time you read something I wrote maybe in one of my blogs or the first time we met in person, what did you think of me?

mwana_isimu said that she thinks of me as being "energetic" and "feisty". I'd also hope "sincere" comes to mind too.

Trying to give people a positive impression isn't always so easy when all they see are words on a computer screen. My credentials, background, and intentions are all over the Genetics and Public Health Blog and they're in a few places here at Cotton-Pickin' Days if you look for them. But does it convince you that I mean no harm and only want to help?

Michelle T. Sterling, founder of Global Image Group, says we are evaluated within the first three seconds of a new encounter.

• If you appear to be of comparable business or social level, you are considered suitable for further interaction.


• If you appear to be of higher business or social status, you are admired and cultivated as a valuable contact.


• If you appear to be of lower business or social standing, you are tolerated but kept at arm's length.

While Sterling is talking about face-to-face meetings, I think this probably applies to online interactions as well. I had a couple encounters this week that left me wondering about the kind of first (or later) impressions people have of me. In one incident, I disagreed strongly with what someone said about parenting and probably made everyone think I was an extreme psycho. The other incident, I reached out with only good intentions, but the way the person reacted made me wonder why she didn't trust me at the very start.

This isn't an issue of self-esteem or self-worth. It's more like self-evaluation. In the first situation, I shouldn't have flipped out just because someone said things that I vehemently disagree with or are just flat out wrong. In the second situation, I was probably too obsequious. In both cases, I should have let some things slide off like water off a duck's back instead of obsessing about it for days.

What kind of first impression do you think you make? And is there anything you'd like to change?

Cooking is not my favorite thing to do. (Three guesses as to what my current favorite activity is.) I've been slacking off lately because it's so easy to get food delivered in Ho Chi Minh City and the variety has been improving - from Vietnamese pho (noodle soup) to California burritoes to Indian tandoori. It's easier to satisfy our cravings now without having to make our own pizza dough and tortillas like I did when we first moved to Vietnam.

Aside from the nutritional aspects of eating home-cooked meals vs. restaurant meals, there's also the emotional aspect. Food prepared at home not only nourishes the body, but also nourishes the soul because (hopefully) the person preparing it for you in your own kitchen is doing it with love and care. Wasn't the movie Like Water For Chocolate based on this premise?

My mom likes to cook and there are some dishes she makes that never taste as good to me when made by other people. For example,

• Chinese steamed buns with meat or red bean paste filling


• Fried chicken


• Spring rolls


• Macaroni casserole


• Chinese stir-fried vermicelli


• Chinese stewed beef with hard-boiled eggs


• Agar jelly


• Zucchini bread


• Sweet glutinous rice porridge

It would be nice if Stephen had some favorite foods that only I can make just the way he likes it. If you were to ask him now, this is what he might have on his list.

• Cereal with milk


• Grilled cheese sandwich


• Strawberry grilled toast


• Pancakes


• Steamed rice


• Spaghetti


• Lasagne


• Minestrone soup


• Broccoli


• Macaroni casserole


• Brownies

Doesn't look very sophisticated or interesting, does it? Time to dig out the dusty cookbooks and get inspired, no matter how reluctantly.

ETA: Since a few of you asked, Stephen's list consists of mostly Western food because that's what Marv prefers and I seem to be better at cooking Western food as well.

Grade whoring was never my thing while I was in school. I can only recall doing it a couple of times.

Once was in high school physiology when I was short of an A by six points and cried my eyes out because the teacher had said at the beginning of the school year that he never bumped anyone up - "What you get is what you deserve." Well, he did and an A was what I deserved!

The other time was in college when I took a med school microbiology class. Med school classes had a grading curve that I didn't understand and even though I had scores of extra credit, I still ended up with a B at the end of class. (I guess the extra credit was actually factored into the curve so I didn't make it into the A range.) I was applying to grad school at the time and needed every fraction of a decimal point I could get in my GPA, so I wrote an e-mail explaining my situation and begging for my grade to be changed (the report card had already been issued). Thankfully, the professor obliged.

In my experience, grades mean even more to people who are high achievers and used to getting top grades. At Ivy League school, Cornell University, many students choose their courses based on level of difficulty.

In 1997 Cornell University began posting median grades for every course online, so that students could put their own grades in a larger perspective. (After all, an A in "Physics for Poets" is presumably less impressive than an A in "Physics for Physicists.") The university's theory--which reveals an astonishing naiveté about human nature--was that this would encourage students to choose more-challenging courses. Instead, according to a paper published early this year by two Cornell economists, the policy provided a case study in how to pump up GPAs. Armed with accurate, official grading information, students used it to pick easy classes and avoid difficult ones: once-hidden guts were now readily identified, enrollment in them ballooned, and since the new policy was instituted the overall rate of grade inflation--already a subject of concern at Cornell, as in the academic world in general--has more than doubled.

~The Atlantic Monthly; June 2005; Primary Sources (subscription only)

I never went quite as far as these kids and always chose classes based on my ultimate goal - to learn the methods of disease control and prevention. But, one of the reasons I gave up on going to med school was because chemistry and physics were too hard, so I simply didn't take them. My grades in those courses wouldn't have been good enough to get me in.

Grade inflation is rampant across every level of education in the U.S. All students think they deserve an A regardless of how they compare to others. And maybe they do. They deserve to get A's in the classes where they have the strongest ability; not A's in every single class they take.

Sadly, grades are a big part of success whether represented by letter grades in school or scores on job evaluations. No matter how much we want to think that everyone is equal and has the ability to succeed, it's just not true. We all have different abilities that will hopefully find a venue where they can be recognized.

The romanization of my Chinese given name, like most Taiwanese names based on Wade-Giles, has a hyphen between the two characters, connecting both to form my English first name. So when I got married, there was no way I was going to hyphenate my last name because I would have become H-H L-T, which looks totally ridiculous.

I used to spell my name out and say "hyphen" when I got to it, but I found that many people didn't know what I meant. For several years now, I've said "dash" instead, even though it's grammatically incorrect.

In Eats, Shoots & Leaves (which is still boring despite its snarky tone), Lynne Truss writes,

...I have heard that people with double-barrelled names are simply unable to get the concept across these days, because so few people on the other end of a telephone know what a hyphen is. As a consequence they receive credit cards printed with the name "Anthony Armstrong, Jones", "AnthonyAmrstrong'Jones", or even "Anthony Armstrong Hyphen".

It's no wonder hyphenated marital names are on the decline. (USA Today, May 30, 2005)

"People don't do hyphenation because others ignore it," says Laurie Scheuble, a senior lecturer in sociology at Penn State University. "People will just choose one of your last names."

Combining Marv's last name with mine actually makes a legitimate Anglicized name, but that was never under serious consideration. My sister made her maiden name into her middle name, which was clever because we didn't adopt English names after becoming American citizens. I've become a "situational last-name user" who uses my maiden name at work and in other situations uses the last name that belongs to both Marv and Stephen. It works out fine, but I'm still stuck with the hyphen in my first name.

What do you think people should do with their last names when they get married?

"He married an Armani. Now I've become America's low-priced Kmart department store," said Taiwanese actress Chen Chen, whose weight has more than doubled since she married composer-director Liu Chia-chang in 1977.

When I married Marv in 1994, I was J.Crew. Now I've become Hanna Andersson.


Then and Now

What clothing line were you 10 years ago and what are you now?

In a conversation today with elyrie, I mentioned that my life is nothing like what I expected 10+ years ago when I graduated from college. I guess the first clue that I was going to have a somewhat unconventional life was marrying Marv only a week out of school then leaving for the East Coast to live separately from him for the next four years. Then, instead of continuing with my career after graduation, I joined Marv in Asia and dropped out of research soon after. When most people hear my story, they usually say, "It's ok as long as you're happy and have no regrets." But what's life without regrets?

I've been lucky to have had a life of choices. To eat this or to eat that? To wear this or to wear that? To go to this top-ranked school or another? To take this job that pays less but is less demanding or take that job with the opposite situation? To marry this fantastic man or to have an equally fantastic life without him? To have children and gain in love, but lose in sanity or to refrain and enjoy the status quo?

Every time I made a choice, I created a regret. I regret all the times I made my sister cry because I was so mean. I regret ever getting involved with that guy. I regret not taking my studies seriously enough, and wasting my parents' investment in my music lessons and tuition. I regret not continuing on in medical research despite the opportunities and grants my grad school gave me. I regret wasting a part of my potential.

The trouble is that we can't have it all. Everyone likes to think so but everyone's deluded. And even if we did have it all, it wouldn't be what we expected. People and situations change. I've changed so much I wonder if I'd recognize my 20-year-old self if I bumped into her on the street.

The best we can do is to make our choices and live with them. If we don't choose well, we'll most likely get to choose again. That is, if we're lucky. And plenty of people aren't.

In No Regrets, Dr. Hamilton Beazley wrote:

Regrets are inevitable in life, because each decision represents a road not taken. We cannot know what that road would have brought us. Likewise, the big events of our life send us down certain roads that deny us other roads we might have preferred. No one escapes regrets. Some people, however, let them go shortly after they occur and re-focus their lives on the present. Others hold onto the regret and sink into the past.

My grip has loosened on many of my regrets, has yours?

Last night, we went to a housewarming party in the Phu My Hung District of Ho Chi Minh City also known as Saigon South. On the way there, we went through districts where people were sitting on the stoop hanging out doing nothing despite the heavy traffic and exhaust fumes on the main road. They weren't doing anything but sitting - no TV, no radio, no book, no magazine, no newspaper, no food, no nothing. Isn't that boring?

Maybe it's because I have a short attention span, but I've never been able to sit and do nothing. I used to practice piano with the TV on; write my homework with the radio blaring; and attend class with a book propped up under my desk. Needless to say, I could have done any of those things better if I had just concentrated on each without other distractions.

This inability to concentrate on just one thing at a time extends to my time on the computer. Aside from having other software programs running, I usually have at least five IE browser windows open. While one or more pages are loading, I'm reading a few paragraphs in another window or two. When I get tired of reading, I'll turn to another open window and type a comment or continue writing an e-mail or blog entry. Then I'll get an idea in my head and have to look it up on Google in yet another browser window. I've crashed the computer countless times when it couldn't handle having another window open.

Maybe my headache today is telling me that I need some downtime to refresh and rejuvenate. Or else it won't be only the computer that crashes next time.

How many browser windows do you have open in your life?

NB: Learning Meditation looks like a good place to start.

Stephen and I trying on various hair doodads.

My hair hasn't been this long in years. I'm a short-hair girl at heart. If I could have it my way, I'd get it chopped off and have it no longer than the nape of my neck. But everyone tells me I look better with long hair.

This time, I'm keeping it long only because Master Stephen won't allow me to go to the hair dresser's. He doesn't want me to go out without him but he doesn't want to go with me either. I'm too tired to fight him on this just yet.

Instead, I've resorted to putting my hair up in a clip every single day which is essential for comfort in this hot, humid weather. I can't say I haven't been having fun buying all the pretty hair clips



Maybe having enough hair to put up isn't so bad after all. If only I didn't look like such a school marm with my hair up.

My definition of opinionated:

Informed, well-read, and analytical. Able to synthesize a variety of different points of view to formulate unique and original opinion.

Dictionary.com's definition of opinionated:

Holding stubbornly and often unreasonably to one's own opinions. Obstinate in your opinions.

And all this time I thought it was a compliment. Guess I should stop trying to be so opinionated....

In a fit of anger, I slammed the refrigerator door. HARD. The glass jars clinked against each other, but nothing too serious seemed to have happened.

When I reopened the refrigerator door, the top tray clattered onto the floor, a jar of salsa balanced on the edge, and a jar of strawberry jam smashed onto the tile beneath.

When I finished picking up shards and chips of glass from the floor with wet towels, I had only a small cut on my knee. And luckily, Stephen was only frightened, not hurt.

I should have known that clot of strawberry jam on the floor mixed with glass splinters portended what was to come today.

Not an original idea, but fun to do.
( Edited on May 25, 2004 )