Some Mundane Things: Unlucky Days

I just resolved to write more about my mundane days because at the end, it’s really what makes up most of our lives. There’s a phrase from a Vogue HK interview that struck me, when cartoonist Kaitlin Chan reflected “I wish I paid more attention to the textures and the feeling of being alive on the most boring and mundane days.” 

I felt guilt for not always journalling my day.  However, I realized I found ways to document these days in other art forms – an instagram post, a story, a snarky tweet, a message to a friend, or a more tedious process of editing reels.  But today I have more time, so here goes:

• Some weeks ago, excited to use my new Zwillig thermo, I almost killed myself. I was in our workplace kitchen trying to open my thermo but I just couldn’t twist the lid off. So I placed it on the side while I washed my hands. Then boom! The lid blew upwards  hitting the ceiling. My hearty, homemade cream soup with perogies spilled on the floor. Had I stayed in front of my thermo, I would have had that lid hit my jaw or head. Ah, ignorance of science kills. No wonder adults always told me not to cover my lunchbox while it was piping hot. Luckily I was feeling greedy the night before and also made scrambled eggs and corned beef. So I still had a homemade lunch. Two managers came by to check up on me (the blast was loud) and I had building services help clean up.
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• A couple of days ago, I was on the third floor with my coworker when I saw a cute cat figurine. It was perched on top of its flimsy box packaging. When I took the box, the cat slid off and broke. It broke right by its neck. It was a maneki neko (lucky cat) I checked the price on the packaging, luckily it was slashed to 50% off (because things at work are so expensive, oh my god, it was still $40) I informed the guys upstairs what happened and they were very chill, just telling me to damage it out. Thank god things like that don’t get docked off our paychecks! One guy commented how ironic it was that the lucky cat broke. They scared me about 7 years of bad luck. I’ve already gone through a decade of depression, seven years of bad luck? Psshh piece of cake.________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
• When I woke up today I felt my left side of the face was a bit heavier and didn’t think anything of it. I rolled off my bed, wrote the dreams I remembered and went to the bathroom to get ready for work. When I saw myself in the mirror I let out a half gasp, half scream which sounded more like a croak. I had turned into a frog! Jokes. I called my sister and she asked me if I was sick because my voice was croaky. I showed her my face. A puffier left cheek and swollen left eye. My sister’s mouth formed into an O. “I can’t go to work like this! People only see my eyes and it’s swollen. What is this?!”  I went to see my brother-in-law (who’s a doctor.) Okay more like, “psst, ali dani.”He took a look at my eye and said “Aha man ka nanglili?!” My sister laughed and I rolled my eyes. So I had to call in sick today because gi bujinggit ko. But how do you say that in English? I wish I could just say I couldn’t come to work kay gi bujinggit ko. Personally I think bujinggit sounds more tragic than saying ‘sty’ but also, sty sounds so gross to me. I like bujinggit better. The word bujinggit sounds much more playful. Yes, it’s awful that your eyes are red and swollen but it implies that you’ve done something mischievous and so a mischievous spirit/ imp decided to play tricks on you. Whilst ‘sty’ doesn’t have anything. The words I associate it with is ‘pig sty’ and it’s not a nice sound._________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Gi kulam ko? Is there someone who doesn’t like me? But why?! Chos. Or maybe I made too much fun of Sto. Niño within a span of one week. Quota na. He’s usually on my side but sometimes, I like to test the divine. Despite the title, I don’t feel unlucky and I really don’t internalize these things. They’re just good to remember.