disaster strikes

well, not a full-scale disaster, but the results of the bus ride from hell are in : it seems like at least one person from each group is feeling poorly. in the case of my group, neeraj and i both caught colds from the pollution and the exhaust we were breathing in for twelve hours during the bus ride home. in my case, i think it might be some mild food poisoning plus a cold, because my stomach has been unsettled, but i woke up with a sore throat in the morning - no, actually, in the middle of the night. i drank almost 2 liters of water before i left for studio this morning, but alack, it didn't really help all that much. my throat feels like it's lined with sandpaper (sorry for the lack of creative description here), and i'm totally exhausted. sadly, i wasn't that productive in studio; i was so befuddled that i could only do the automatic part of model- building. on the bright side, construction-wise it's nearly perfect. materials-wise, it's less than desirable, but given the available materials (super-cheap chipboard, styrofoam, and white foam, and some nasty-smelling yellow glue that comes in film canisters, not glue bottles), i think we did well. there's no spray adhesive here, or rubber cement, or glue that doesn't melt foam. ugh. take me home...i guess japan is the place for wonderfully exotic and useful modeling materials.

anyway, i spent the day totally exhausted, wishing the heat would go away. anyone who has had a cold in the summer knows how i'm feeling - having a cold in hot, humid weather makes it even worse. of course, our studio isn't air-conditioned, and the only thing we've got for cooling the air is fans and open windows. really makes you feel kind of stupid as the day wears on, even if you're completely healthy. now i'm drinking gatorade in hopes that i'll get better faster, not because i want to work more, but because i just feel miserable; drinking gatorade is a mixed blessing because it has vitamin c, but tastes like orange juice made from concentrate and dishwater. i keep thinking i'm feeling better, but i seem to always be wrong. bleh. the gist of this post is that i promise i'll post more writing soon; links to photos are forthcoming.

jan comes around periodically and asks, "are you happy"? and honestly, a week ago i would have smiled happily and said "yes" without another thought. this week, cold notwithstanding, i don't know how to answer. i don't want to lie, so instead, today i just avoided giving a real answer and bemoaned the state of my health. jan said he had fever medicine, which would be nice if i could tell if i had a fever - it's too hot to know whether it's from the heat or a real fever. anyway, back to happiness. i have to say that being around two people who treat me like less than a person is really stressful - i really thought my days of being unhappy like that were over; it really gets me down. multiple people have advised me to sit them down and talk to them about it, because if they at least don't change for the time left on our project, they'll at least change in the future. but i just don't have the energy, nor do i have any faith that they will indeed change. that it also confirms my parents' and my fears about remnants of the patriarchal chinese culture really disappoints me, because i expected to find something better.

p.s. it's really quite strange to be able to update this blog, but not be able to see it.
p.p.s. comment, people! anyone can comment, so do it now!