Nothing Good Happens in This Chapter

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That's basically what my Sunday looked like.  Except my crying points were things like, "Everyone in Asia thinks I'm a freak!  Nobody will talk to me! I'm not making any friends! Waah Wahhhhhhhhhh"

I talked to my parents for the first time since arriving here, and let me tell you, I really let the waterworks fly!  What a surprise that was to me, because, as most of you know, I generally don't believe in 'feelings'. So, when it turns out that I have them, well, that's a shocker.  

So I spent most of the day laying in bed with a humongo pile of chocolates, watching The Daily Show on my computer and eating myself into a chocolate coma.  You're probably thinking, Julia how is this any different then 'Monday Night Snack Night'???  And, well, it's not.  Except that I didn't have a Dominoes pizza too. 

After regaining consciousness, I gave myself a little pep talk.  It basically went like this: "Get it together, Julia.  Yes, chocolate covered almonds are delicious.  You didn't have to destroy that 2 pound container of them." Hmm, point taken, Mr. Brain.  

I got up, did some dishes, started the laundry, swept the floor, organized my table, you know all those things you do when you can't find anything else more fun to do.  Then, I decided to do a bit of reading.  (side note: I LOVE my new Kindle -thanks, mom!)  I'm reading The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by Haruki Marukami.  It's basically the story of an unemployed guy who loses his cat. The chapter that I was reading introduced a new character, Lieutenant Mamiya.  This guy's story is that while on a mission for the Japanese military, he was captured by the Mongolian army.  He then was forced to watch as his commander was killed by being skinned alive. And then the Mongolian's took him out into the middle of the desert and forced him to jump into a very deep, dried-up well.  He broke his leg and was injured in other ways, but survived his fall.  However, he was trapped at the bottom of a well in the middle of the desert.  And his only friend was the skeleton of some animal that had died in there!  And at this point in the story I was thinking, "Yeeeaah, I can totally relate!  Being in Heung-deok is just like being trapped at the bottom of a well in the desert!  Except, I'm lucky enough to have a friend that's alive."  

And then I keep reading (I know, right, who READS this stuff! how depressing) and find out that the Lieutenant gets rescued from the well(yay!), taken to a hospital(thank goodness!), and then once healed, sent back to war(wait, what?!).  And THEN, he gets captured again, and spends twelve years as a prisoner of war.  During this time, his family thinks he's died, and so his girlfriend marries someone else.  Then, his parents and his sister die in Hiroshima. Oh, and at some point he lost his left hand.  Okay. So it's not the most uplifting story ever.  But, it did make me feel better about my life.  I wouldn't say that this was schadenfreude, necessarily. It's not like I'm happy these horrible things happened to this guy.  But it sure makes me feel that 'being a little lonely' and 'not understanding what the menu says' seem like pretty minor issues, in the grand scheme of things.

The next chapter in this book is called "Nothing Good Happens in this Chapter".  I really don't know how things in this guys life can get any worse.