Yesterday, as pretty much all the days hanging out with jb have been down here, was hella fun. We went to get a murland traditional feast meal thing, steamed crabs. Jesus christo, I ate more crab than I have ever eaten before. I actually got to the point where if I had eaten anymore, I might honestly have barfed.

before we ate

But goddamn was it good. Pricey, but good. And old bay is the strangest flavour I have ever had in my life, but it ain’t bad. It actually grows on yu, like mold. Or a girlfriend with a really high voice. But honestly, I had a lot of fun eating a lot of crabs… though I kinda wish I went to the restaurant dirty dick’s… because apparently their motto is “I got my crabs at dirty dicks.”

after we ate

But it was in the drive over to harris’ and back that got me really thinking. You gotta remember, I was already hopped up on benadryl at the time, so I wanted to crash out… but jb turned the music up, bumped the hard rock, opened te windows and proved to me that it could actually be awesome to drive. You gotta understand, I hate, hate, hate cars. I don’t like driving. I hate the concept of it. but I will admit, there is a visceral joy in driving fast down the highway with your radio blasting the right music. What a goddamn great experience. One of many so far, and hopefully one of many more.

so pretty, my camera does no justice

Afterwards we went back to annapolis to kick it and drink, as per usual. I really don’t have much to say about this segment of the night, except that naptown folks are hella friend. Also, drink jim weed. It’s this awersome sauce sweet tea flavoured vodka. If we had it up north, I would honestly be drunk 99% of the time, it’s that good. And if you stop down here, stop by Dock Street Bar, which is a hella excellent crab cake establishment with friendly bartenders.

Now, as I’m writing this from the baltimore zen center, I felt like I should shout them out. My friend jb is one of the teachers here and it’s a great place. Welcoming, homey and offering a variety of classes from meditation to martial arts. If you’re interested in buddhist zen meditation or to learn martial arts, you should check them out.

zen jb

Finally, I am going to be in DC over this 4th of july weekend and am telling yall, that if you’re in the area to hit me up. Especially if you know anyone in nashville cuz I know no one in that city at all… but definitely want someone to show me around all the honkytonks or whatever.

find all my odd-yssey pictures so far here… http://www.facebook.com/vinh.hua?ref=profile#/album.php?aid=2071973&id=34604166

See you on the road.

masters of the universe

Life is like cat allergies, it could always be worse.

there’s a coupla things i wanted to discuss, ‘specially since i’m suffering from insomnia. it’s the perfect time to address them.

first off, my decision to hitchhike at least part of my route. obviously there’s the money issue, but it’s more than that. one of the big reasons that i set out on doing this whole thing was because i really am fascinated with the country and want to see it, want to experience it, meeting people, hearing their stories, seeing strange sights… and hey, what better way than hitchhiking? i’m not going to hitchhike the whole thing because i’m depending on a lot of kindly people to house me and wanta keep to some sort of schedule for them, but when it’s hostels or national parks or bus stations that i’m sleeping in, why not hitchhike?

sometimes i feel like this country is divided into a bunch of smaller countries. in some ways that was the entire point in the federal system. but (and this sounds cheesy as hell) we are all ostensibly tied together, one people. as such, i want to experience that in a really fundamental way.

that and i figure i’ll get better food by hitchhiking than by traveling by bus.

“i know you’re wise beyond your years, but do you ever get the fear / that your perfect verse’s just a lie, you tell yourself to get by.” – postal service –clark gable

secondly, more grandiosely, whatever that means, i wanted to discuss why i write this. primarily, (and yes, i know i’m doing lots of mini-lists tonight) it’s an exploration, a process through which i get down thoughts and allow myself to explore them in a format that requires at least some modicum of analysis. on another level, it’s a practice of writing, of putting together sentences, even if they aren’t poetry or academic work. it’s a practice that keeps my mind sharp and my writing skills eloquent (or so i’d like to think). and of course, on some level, like all writing, it’s masturbatory. the process of petty immortalisation, especially in this paradoxically ephemeral and eternal medium. and hell, it is fundamentally pretentious to feel that your writing has a value that others can recognize, that others would wish to engage with, that you have some part of the truth in you, that your overuse of the word ‘that’ is a stylistic quirk rather than the failings of an insufficiently erudite mind.

in the end though… what matters is that this gives me some satisfaction to do. it allows me to examine parts of myself that too often lie unexamined. and until the moment i stop gaining utility from the blog i’ll keep writing and hope that you’ll keep reading.

in keeping with that… i just wanted to tell all of you to stay tuned to this page for updates on my odd-yssey. i’m going to be posting a rough schedule of where i’ll be and when. also, i’m going to try to update the blog everyday or whenever i get internet access in order to a) keep you all assured that i am happily alive and b) so that i can have a thorough journal of my experiences.

but once again i am putting the call out, if i am goin to be anywhere near your neck of the woods, throw me an email or sommat and i will meet up with you. if you have a couch or a spare room or know someone who does or know a nearby hostel, get at me. more than that, i just want to see you, see new faces in new places and experience the diversity that a change in geography can bring.

life is the momentary blip of light in the dark expanse of eternity.

honestly, i wish i could sing, not only for karaoke (which always is a consideration), but so that i could sing songs like steve earle and mcgowan and tom watts do. goddamn. ballads and stories about real folks, truth that touches the heart.

*edit and aside* if any of yall know where i can find vietnamese folk, like old tyme vietnamese ballads, please send ‘em my way. ive heard some from my dad and some stuff that was on paris by night and such, but i need to hear more. in all seriousness, most vietnamese pop drives me nuts. too disco-ey… but i want to get in touch with those old ballady folksy roots that ive known very little.

i know i’ve been remiss with posting, my only excuse is that i was working on my thesis and finishing up college. congrats to me on graduating.

but along with that comes big big decisions about the trajectory of my life, my vision for the future and my development as a human being, a citizen and an artist.

so what else to do but take an odd-yssey ‘cross the continental united states? imma be hitchhiking, busing and generally trekking all o’er the place. i feel like there’s so much of this country that i haven’t seen and this will give me both an excuse and an opportunity to be a tourist all over the place. i’ll be able to perform at different joints and poetry venues wherever i can find ‘em, train at jiu jitsu places from coast to coast and even get a touch of culture and cuisine by eating local and visiting museums and honkytonks. more importantly than that, i’ll get to meet and get to know hella people from all walks of life, i’ll get to write, really allow myself to throw myself into art without the distractions of the city.

and most of all, i’ll get to maybe wrestle an alligator.

i’ll be blogging the trip the entire way, committing myself to at least one blog post a day, no matter how large or small. i’ll be leaving towards the end of june and taking a month to trek ‘cross the country to the apia spoken word and poetry summit, which yall should attend if you possibly can.

but as a part of that… if you have couch space or an idea of places to go or recommendations or advice or words of wisdom, please, please send ‘em my way. if you know someone who’d be willing to host or show me ’round their neck of the woods, please holler at ‘em for me. also, if you have any experience with couchsurfing.org, i’d love to hear from you.

and watch out for a viet am poet boy with a big backpack round where you live in the months of july and august.

i’ll be posting more in the next few days about the tirp and more writing, it feels damn nice to have time to write again.

but for now, more trip planning and xbox 360 .

life is a journey, no wonder so many folks are lost.

dude, weschler’s currywurst is fucking bomb. because my plans had fallen through last night… yes i got ditched… i hit up my local watering establishments for some late night alcohol and food.

how was i ’sposed to know i would find my new favorite watering hole? massive, amazing german beers poured by a hella efficient, friendly staff. currywurst, which i will officially say is one of my favorite foods ever. a wild boar sausage that was literally to die for.

alcohol and pork. how the hell do you go wrong with that?

but yes, i just needed to make a quick shoutout to the place before i got into the poem of the day. i hella recommend that folks should roll through there whenever they’re in the east village. and hey, since i live near there, you should hit me up, if’n i’m not already inside.

oh yeah, i won my slam last night. made a pretty penny. i’ll be back next month, alcohol money is worth slamming for.

but let me say again, this posting schedule is kicking my ass. i never realized how difficult it’d be to turn out a poem a day. jeebus. but yes, onto the poem’s intro. this piece comes from the fact that i really do have goddamn weird dreams, that are, to me anyways, completely believable while i’m in them. so i really will wake up thinking i was the bodyguard to the president and ate a bullet for him, or that i dived into a computer and rode on top of the fail whale.

awkward i know.

april 4th.
dream fail

i dreamt one time
the earth was invaded
by polkadotted unicorn space pirates
and the key to saving the world
was saving the stripper

one night, i thought i was superman
the asian dude who failed in math
and gave up the violin discovering
his gift for rescuing fair maidens
and cats stuck up in trees

the time you hadta carry me home,
drunk, i saw us as intergalactic ballerinas
our pirouettes encompassing
star systems, our soubresauts
like sun flares

when i passed out
at that party, i saw myself
as leonidas at the springs
holding off a legion
of fratboys with nothing but a braut

i woke up this morning
after having dreamt
we were still in love

turned to see you
next to me in bed, the assurance
in some deep part of myself
that all was right with the world

and realized how much
i hated dreaming

whoa, two blog posts from vinh back to back. something must be up. vinh must finally be getting his shit together… or maybe vinh has finally realized that blogging is a great way to procrastinate.

i guess i gotta say something about the superbowl, it’s mandatory considering what day it is. so let me simply say that it was a damned enjoyable game to watch… even with the refs halfway determining the game at points.

now with that out of the way… i figure i’m going to share with you exactly the music that i was listening to when i wrote the post, i’m going to be doing this from now on. so if you can, turn your browsers to vienna teng’s myspace. her crooning will hopefully put you in some semblance of the same emotional space that i’m in. it’ll be one of our little communions. don’t tell your significant other.

i wanta wax poetic on nakedness for a minute. yes, i subtly reminded you i’m a poet, i’m dope. but seriously.

we all build personas and barriers to protect ourselves from the world. great big heaping walls that prevent us from making connections, these preconceptions like durian shells to protect the soft inner core and the seed of human beauty that is in each of us. and by beauty to say, that sometimes viciously sublime and trascendentally ugly piece of ourselves that makes us truly human, as more than an animal, that connects us to the greater, for better or for worse.

we do it because we’re afraid, for a shitload of reasons, be it that we believe it to be ugly or not worth it, or because it’s tender from having burned before or whatever it maybe. i think the reasons are too multifaceted, too myriad to be listed in a boy’s blog.

i do it too, hella. i swagger. i have my hipster pretensions.

but i think that what allows us to keep moving the concept of humanity along, what allows us to connect with both others and ourselves is the effort to make ourselves naked.

but vinh, you say, it’s just a matter of taking your clothes off right? or maybe gently stripping off those we’re trying to connect with, peeling them like onions. don’t you know how to unlatch a bra?

it’s never that simple. human beings never are. if we do become reduced to such simplicity, we’ve become sheeple. or enlightened. one or the other.

i think, i hope, i pray, that i’m moving down that path to connecting with yall by ruminating so much, through my writing, through my performance. but hell, it may be one of my pretensions. i think i’ll make an effort to post more poems here, not polished finished pieces, but snippets and bits, those things from my day or from whatever i’ve read or whatever.

let me strip down for you.

…

are you blind yet? dude, i’m not that ugly, am i?

————————————————————————-

so i’ve started working earnestly on the introspective musicology. thanks for the great response. i should be putting ish out there sooner than later.

but along the lines of my recent ruminations and my exploration of identity in general, i have another project, for which i have no catchy title yet.

it will come to me, i promise.

but as always, i need your help. especially if you’re an asian american woman. if you are, i ask that you send me, completely anonymously if you want, a few experiences that make you quintessentially you, no matter how you define it. i want formative memories and your thoughts on them, those life changing events that have become such a fundamental part of your character that, without them, you would not be who you presently are.

i know this can be a touchy subject, so if you want, please email me anonymously. or with your name, however you feel.

be as detailed or as vague as you feel that you need to be, but realize that i need to have some idea of what you’re talking about.

email experiences to vinh [at] vinh-hua [dot] com

the idea for this project came out of a discussion about what makes human beings who and what they are, whether certain experiences really do shape our lifepaths, and how big of an effect these actually have.

since i’ve been writing lots of two types of poems, either love poems or introspective ones, i figured it was time for a change, to explore identity once again outside of myself. that’s what the introspective musicology does. i intend for this project to do it another way, and hopefully with a more particular subject, it’ll be more enlightening. furthermore, “love poem to a vietnamese woman’ is still one of my favorite of my pieces, and it was an exploration of the identity of vietnamese women. i think it’ll be a challenge to do a series of poems that explore a larger subject, a ‘love poem to asian women (as an ideal)’ in effect.

and yo son, maybe i will finally understand asian women.

… probably not, but you knew i hadta make that joke for form’s sake if nothing else.
————————————————–

random, but i made soup for the first time today. not stew, not curry, but actual soup, with noodles. i threw together a bunch of ingredients and it came out tasting pretty damned good.

to give this context, i’ve always been afraid of making soup, because it’s so easy to make it either uneatable or pretty much nothing but hot water. you gotta remember, i live in a single room occupancy with no kitchen, so i got me some ghetto tools.

but through hella swagger, it worked out. maybe this is a metaphor for life?

or i could just be reaching.

which reminds me, i need to buy a digital camera, anyone got an idea what i should be buying?

and lastly, sad to say, but the chapbook will be on hold for the next bit as i try to face my writing again, reflect on it and see how much it wass affected by the bad time i was having this fall. but i intend to continue working with geoff kim, maybe even working on a picture book, which is an idea i’ve had in my head for awhile now.

oh, and i think i’m going to start a band.

*edit* I am thinking about writing some vietnamese poems and songs, but since my grasp of the language is not nearly good enough, i was hoping someone could help me with grammar and vocab and spelling ad just the general vagaries of writing in a language with which i have the ability of a four year old.

peace and love till next we meet.

so i wanted to explain why i’ve been so quiet recently. up until this weekend, when i went back to boston to get checked, i had a chance of having cancer. that was obviously a damper on life. a rather large one.

it’s a great weight on my shoulders to find out i don’t have cancer. like you wouldn’t believe. going home and seeing friends and getting to roll with friends and participate in things that are so nicely comfortable was also sweet like nothing else. i couldn’t do it everyday though. i can only do boston in small doses.

just to remark on things i haven’t remarked on… thanks everyone who came out for my birthday which happened recently. it reminded me how truly blessed i am to have beautiful people in my life who always have my back… especially when i’m drunk and not cognizant of what is a stair and what is a person.

congrats to team ronin athletics for kicking ass at GQ. hopefully, i’ll be on the mats with you guys soon.

and finally… i’m embarking on a new artistic project that i’m hoping everyone out there can help me with.

introspective musicology: the soundtrack to our lives. we all have them, some strange mixture of karaoke classics, queen-level ballads, heart thumping hip hop and head banging metal. the purpose of IM is exploring how one relates to these soundtracks, how an artist can understand another, not through interaction, but through those tracks that the individual feels is significant to their lives. it is an examination to symbolic meaning, as well as how individual pieces can create a collective whole.

as such, the artist wishes for those who can to make a mixtape which the subject feels is an appropiate soundtrack to their life at that point in time. the mixtape should be no more than 15 songs and should encompass the entirety of the individual’s character, history and being, however the subject wishes that to be defined.

thanks yall. send me your mixtapes!!