A Karmic Lychee @ rah-kun.net

A thought struck me today, as one might strike a person who believes a great deal both in karma and in the value of contemplating the nature of one’s existence. The thought was this: why has the last five months of my life sucked?* So it occurred to me that, perhaps, these last five months was a way by which the great Galactic Cash n’ Carry would clean me out for the (potentially) awesome time I’m about to have come next Wednesday. I’ve always managed to live along a razor thin balance along the shit-to-sweet ratio, so why would the next 7.5+ months of international, loan-evading travel be any different? It makes sense, though – 5 months of complete, abject boredom and social solitary confinement ought to leave my slate fairly primed for what I hope to be the most awesome (at least) 7.5 months of my life to date. Without these last five months of ennui, I’d be a ticking karmic time-bomb; the kind of which only the best morbid drinking songs are sung. The only suitable karmic refinancing I would be eligible for post-facto would be a coincidental piano dropped from the 13th story window of a high rise at the precise moment my foot fell upon the crud-packed void between two paces of sidewalk (the crack, if you will, for the less dramatically inclined – it’s late and I get wordy when I’m tired). I could be full of it, for all I know, as it might turn out that all the great decisions of the universe are decided by a flatulent hamster running around the inside of a dirty cosmic frying pan.

…

Tired.

Either way – I think I’m mostly looking for some kind of rationale for the intense** feeling of okayness I get when I feel about the coming few months. I sense bewilderment and wonder on my horizon – not a dash-my-brains-out-on-the-sidewalk mindfuck of a rollercoaster, but something more along the lines of a semi-psychedelic walkabout. Narrated by George Takei. And Shatner on the days that I break international banking law.

This, of course, contrasted with the last couple weeks worth of pre-preparation. The hardest part about getting set for this trip is getting my finances in order. With little in the way of savings and having had no means of attaining a decent bank-padding before I leave until only just recently, I’ve been in somewhat of a panic to get my financial affairs in order. Being the kind of guy who works best focusing on one single sphere of tasks***, I had been pretty okay with just putting my finances on autopilot for my dad to sort out while I focused on the vague direction my life would saunter off in after college. Coming out of college, I focused all my… focus on said finances: I insisted on doing my own taxes this year (though I didn’t really need to and despite my parents’ ironic moaning about me doing something for myself), I went through every single bit of paper my dad hoarded concerning my student loans, compiled said information (about 12% of the entire stack of paper was actually at all useful), and set up the requisite accounts and contact info online with my lenders, etc. All that good stuff. What this boils down to, though, is that I now have a handy spreadsheet (excel = magic), that, regardless of how I array things, fiddle with numbers, or organize, spits out an ungodly large sum for “monthly due.” The worst part is that the number is solid, so any attempts by me to “correct” it are, in actuality, pathetic attempts to rewrite reality in such a way that it might suit my needs better.

My need, of course, being the evaporation of all my debt and record of my debt both unnoticed and with no questions asked.

Don’t get me wrong though, I have no regrets on this end. I actually feel like my education was worth the inordinate debt I have. Had I stayed at NYU, I never would have been able to justify the expense of my education. Anyways, the long term issue will be the tight squeeze been the size of my monthly loan payments and the ends of my means out in China on my salary there. That’s just something I’m going to have to live with, however I work it out. The more immediate problem is that of sending my cash there (China) back to here (the States) by a sane, rational method rather than one that would involve me packing RMB up my nose and shooting magical USD out my ass. Indeed, that seems to be the limitation of the methods of overseas fund transfers that I’ve found so far. I’ve heard rumors that sending money from China to the US will run me about 60 dollars per transaction. Furthermore, banks in the states charge about 15 – 20 bucks per incoming wire, so… that’s 80 dollars, or as I like to think of it: a fuck-off sized chunk of change. Had I the savings, I’d just leave a nest egg here and let the loan companies siphon it off as they please and, if need be, send over larger, one-off wires where the fees and surcharges wouldn’t hurt as badly. The easy way out is to just defer the bunch and deal with it later. The only downside there is that I’ll actually be making money, which means that, in the future, should I ever not be making money, I would have already used up my deferral for a matter of convenience, thereby screwing myself in the midst of a matter of survival. So there’s consolidation and graduated payments, etc etc. We’ll see how these things go.

Once I’ve got this money thing sorted out, I’ll be pretty much set. Laptop’s been sanitized, I’ve got 4 new GB of RAM for it en-route. My desktop is sold, just waiting for the payment on that to ship it out. Substituting has padded my savings comfortably, which should help me cover the costs of getting myself situated and trained**** once I’m out in China. I go into New York for my visa this coming Tuesday. All I need to do after is get a travel adapter and to pack.

Either way, I’m cutting this short. Slowly losing consciousness is making this less and less coherent.

——
*Speaking relatively, of course. At no point in the last five months was I harangued by a bike gang, set on fire, subject to homelessness, nor heinously ill (not counting that three day tango with a Marlboro Stomach Ick).
** Intense for me, that is.
*** Like “Plan” rather than reading a book. Or “Culinary School” rather than making an omelet.
**** Fear not, I get reimbursed for my TEFL certification fees at the end of the contract. It’s a policy that makes sense to me – if you don’t fulfill your contract, then the company doesn’t get a return on their investment to train you, and it’s less messy to hold the cash in escrow rather than to try to draw it out of a delinquent later on.