O is for online dating

I've been trying online dating off and on since 2009. I finally decided to quit last year, disabling my OkCupid account and removing my profile from Match.com, reminding myself that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results (a quote famously attributed to Albert Einstein).

I don't have any good reason for signing up on OkC again, which I did three weeks ago, about a year since I'd bowed out of the scene. Totally new profile, this time with a profile picture that actually shows my face clearly, instead of the previous one which gave a side profile view. But it seems to be working differently for me this time around--then again I'm a different person now and at a different place in my life... and I'm approaching this online dating thing differently now.

In hindsight, I think one can't log into one of these sites with the expectation or even hope that you're going to find your soulmate. I'm not saying it can't happen, just that it's rare. I can only speak for myself: I invested too much hope in it, then got frustrated and discouraged when it didn't work. When a guy stopped writing, I'd wonder why and second-guess myself: Was it something I'd said? Did he not like something about me? Should I have presented myself differently? But at the same time, I was constantly judging them: Were we compatible? Did he have the qualities I want in a partner? Could I live with a guy who was like this?

I think it's an unhealthy way to approach a potential relationship. It's like not being interested in the guys for their own sake, but only as a means to an end. Everything said and done has some ulterior motive; you don't want to know who he is, you just want to know if he ticks all the checkboxes on your list and fits the nice little box labelled "significant other". You can't enjoy the friendship or connection that's developing, because you're always jumping ahead inside your brain and evaluating and analysing.

I also discovered that when you want so much for something to happen, you risk losing yourself. You want the guys to respond favourably to you, so you're full of anxiety. You overreact to what they do or don't say. You read too much into the silences--how long they take to reply emails. You second-guess what you write in reply. It's... exhausting.

This time around, I'm a great deal more relaxed about the whole thing. I feel more centred inside and I'm enjoying the connections I'm making, without attaching a great deal of expectation to them. I can be myself, be honest, without being haunted by the debilitating fear that I might be inadvertently destroying my chances with someone by doing so. Unsurprisingly, it's been a much more rewarding experience so far!

N is for new definitions

A guy recently told me that he admires what I'm doing because "teaching is a noble profession". And I know this is a common perception, but I can't for the life of me figure out why teaching would be any more noble than, say, being a doctor or a nurse. They help people too, don't they? What about customer service representatives and sales assistants? Or receptionists and tour guides? Or... you know where I'm going with this.

But even more than that, I feel like a fraud when people say this to me, because I don't think of what I do as anything noble or particularly admirable. My main goal was to do as the proverb says: "Find a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life." I wouldn't be teaching if I did not enjoy it, so my choice is entirely self-serving!

I sometimes feel that we need new definitions. So what if teachers are "moulding the next generation"? We need mechanics and plumbers just as much as we need teachers. It's just like how some people snigger at geeks for being awkward and "uncool", but what happens when your computer gives you the Blue Screen of Death? Or your hard disk crashes and you lose all your data? Or your printer just won't print? Whom do you call in a blind panic? Why, precisely those IT geeks you were so disdainful of.

I feel that everyone has a role to play and we all need each other. Why hold up some professions over others? Is my office cleaner's job any less noble than mine because she vacuums our floors, empties our wastepaper baskets and scrubs the restrooms? Her work is more demanding than mine, yet she is one of those I privately term 'the invisible ones', people often overlooked or taken for granted. People who quietly do their jobs with dedication, but are rarely recognised for it or even thanked. Yet we rely on them in so many unconscious ways.

The polarisation that comes with stereotypes is equally bad. At a conference early this week, I was listening to one of the presentations when it suddenly struck me how unfair we have been to a certain ethnic group in our country. This ethnic group is often considered lazy or incompetent, but at the conference I met so many teachers of this ethnicity who clearly worked hard at their job and were good, dedicated teachers, seeking to improve their skills and discover the best ways to help their students. I came away with a new respect for them, and a reminder to myself never to take stereotypes at face value.

One's job, one's skin colour... these things do not define who we are inside. My job is part of my story, as is my ethnicity... but they are not the ONLY stories, and may even be the least important ones.

Two lightbulb moments in as many days

Was writing an email to someone, talking about my work, when I wrote this:

There's always so much to do, and I'm always looking for areas and ways to improve my teaching. It has to be something that is useful and practical, which will benefit the students. I think that's why I like teaching so much -- I'm continually challenged to innovate, so I'm constantly learning. There's no one batch of students quite like the other. They have different needs and a one-size-fits-all approach would never work.

It was a lightbulb moment.

Writing never challenged me that much; it comes easily, maybe too easily. It was fun in the sense that I was constantly meeting different people, and I did learn both about them and from them, but it was so touch and go: a single interview and I was unlikely to ever meet them again. There was no continuity and no challenge to better myself, to hone my craft. Newspaper writing style is pretty standard, and no one gave me feedback, suggested ways of improving my writing, or even talked with me about interview techniques, beyond the very basic stuff.

Teaching gives me both continuity and challenge. I see my students every day for a period of 10 weeks, and I'm trying new things all the time, thinking up new ways to convey various concepts to the students, experimenting to see if there's something I can do to spark greater understanding or retention. I taught one subject for four years before my boss moved me on to another, but even after teaching the same thing sixteen times (four semesters a year), I was still not satisfied and had plans in the pipeline to change certain approaches or try certain activities in the classroom. 

 

There's no chance of being bored or remaining static. I'm constantly innovating, and it's exhilarating. 

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       Each time I resigned myself to never hearing from him again, he would write.
       "Are these dates?" my friends would ask.
       "They're datelike," I would answer, referring to Jonathan as my imaginary boyfriend, my insignificant other, my friend without benefits.
       [...]
       Thirteen months of suboptimal dating passed. Several times I announced I couldn't see him anymore because I had feelings for him that weren't reciprocated. That went nowhere. If he looked (in my opinion) stricken, I would take it back.
       Finally, we had words, harsh ones, via email. He said I made him nervous, that I wasn't his girlfriend, that I was deluding myself. I asked him not to reply to my hotheaded rant of an answer.
--Elinor Lipman, Taking a break for friendship

This, I could identify with. I've been there, wanting too much, maybe even pushing too hard, so I know how it is. You have to read to the end to know how her story went; needless to say, it does have a happy ending, and it made me smile.

But more than that, it gave me another lightbulb moment: For years, people have been telling me love will come when I'm not looking. I used to scoff and say, "How could I not look?" But now I think this refers to your state of being. That you're in a place where you're calm, relaxed, heart-whole, able to be yourself and to accept things as they are, to enjoy the now without continually getting ahead of yourself or anxiously second-guessing yourself.

You need to let go, let go of that dream, of that hope, so that with it you also let go of that anxiety which winds itself around you and constricts you and causes you to do and say things which you would ordinarily not do or say, to the point where you scarcely recognise yourself any longer. You need to stop trying so hard to make it happen and just be. That's the best version of you, the one who's comfortable in her own skin.

So it's not that love will come when you're not looking, but it's that you should not grasp your dreams too tightly in your hands, for you'll end up strangling love.

Great books that could have been

SO frustrating when the synopsis sounds great but reviews show the execution didn't live up to the promise. *sobs*

POV angst

Been catching up on my reading over the year-end break. Why is it that so many new writers like to use first-person POV? And there seems to be a new fad of switching POV too, so that every chapter or segment needs a header to tell you whose head you're in now. JUST USE THIRD-PERSON OMNISCIENT FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!

Bead stores in Kuala Lumpur: a review

I've just gotten into making my own jewellery. I spent today walking up and down Petaling Street, Jln Tun HS Lee and Jln Sultan because I did a google search and discovered that there are a few bead wholesalers in that area. I have to say it was a somewhat disappointing experience. Prices are okay but the selection of beads, spacers and links/connectors is dismal.

I went to Zen Chu on Petaling Street, Glister Fashion and Beading DIY on Jln Tun HS Lee, and Macy's on Jln Sultan. There used to be another store, Wan Fatt, but it has now closed down.

Zen Chu had lampwork glass beads, which the other places didn't have. However, it didn't have a wide variety (for silver foil ones, the 12mm flat round beads were only available in one colour, but they had ovals in a variety of colours. No squares, cubes, rounds, or hearts). Most of the lampwork glass beads have inlaid flowers, if you like that sort of thing. They also had cat's eye beads, which the others didn't have. Their selection of charms, spacers, beadcaps and links/connecters is limited (a lot of Pandora beads/charms, though, if you're into that, and sliding charms for flat bracelets).

Lampwork glass beads from Zen Chu

Glister Fashion had shell beads, which the others didn't have, and by this I mean the rhombus type of shell beads, like so:

Image is, obviously, from Pandahall.com

They also had porcelain beads, which again the others didn't have -- although they didn't have very many of those. And they sold chain off spools, more types of chain than the other two places (Zen Chu only seemed to have pre-cut chain, not bought off a spool). Another plus point: they have gold-filled findings if you are looking for those, and CRIMP PLIERS -- I had despaired of finding those in Malaysia! -- and wigjig thingies under the Artistic Wire brand, if you are into working with wire. They have quite a lot of metal beads (spacers, etc.) but I didn't look at those closely because it was the first shop I visited and I didn't think the prices were all that cheap. I planned to go back, but by the time I had finished at Zen Chu (the last shop I visited), it was 6pm and Glister had closed.

Beading DIY mainly focuses on pearls and gemstones. They have all kinds of semi-precious stones. I bought red coral (dyed) beads in three sizes, lapis lazuli beads, black line agate faceted oval beads (15x20mm), hematite oval twist beads (10x15mm), mookaite beads, and a strand each of turquoise, tiger eye, red coral, amethyst, citrine and lapis lazuli chips. Total cost came up to RM195. They had a very limited amount of metal beads and findings.

Some of the loot from Beading DIY

All three had the usual glass crystal bicones, faceted glass rondelles and faceted round glass beads, and both Zen Chu and Glister had faux pearls -- Glister also had real ones. In fact, both Zen Chu and Glister also had a few semi-precious stones, but I didn't look closely at the price. In Glister it was because I didn't actually intend to buy gemstones to begin with (I know you are laughing); in Zen Chu it was because I had already bought so many in Beading DIY!

Macy's only has plastic beads. Even their supposedly wooden beads are labelled "Wood plastic beads". They are the place to go to for seed beads, though. They have seed beads in all the colours and sizes you could want. Unfortunately, most of the packets aren't clearly labelled, so you will have to guess the size by looking at the beads. They have hardly any charms, metal beads or findings.

BUT they have E-6000, an adhesive which many jewellery makers swear by (I discovered this through Google). E-6000 is used to glue cabochons onto (into?) bezels and attach other jewellery parts together which otherwise can't be fastened securely, and it is reknowned to have amazing bonding power -- a stone affixed with E-6000 will never fall out of its setting. At least, that's what a lot of jewellery designers have said; they swear by it.

Problems: In all three places, labelling of the items was very poor. When I started jewellery-making about a month ago, I bought all my stuff online. The very first place I went to was local website beading.my, which sells all the basics and a lot more besides. What I like about beading.my is that everything is clearly labelled. If it's silver-plated, they tell you it's silver-plated. If it's silver-filled, they tell you it's silver-filled. They even tell you whether it's silver-plated brass, silver-plated iron, or silver-plated pewter. They give you all the necessary measurements, including the size of the bead hole. I always know exactly what I'm getting.

In all the above brick-and-mortar shops, nowhere could I find such detailed information about the beads and findings I was looking at. I had no clue what materials they were made of, or what sizes they were. In Zen Chu, the headpins and eyepins were labelled by length but not by gauge. The guy said you have to look at the pricing, and if two packets are the same length but different price, then the more expensive one is a lower gauge (thicker). But I still wouldn't know what the diameter is. This is important, as all you need is for the headpin to be just 0.1mm thicker and it may not be able to go through certain beads because their holes are so small. That has happened to me before. On beading.my I know exactly how thick my headpins are going to be, which helps a lot.

If beading.my is so great, why did I check these stores out? Why not just stick with beading.my? Well, for one thing, it's good to have alternatives :)   And while beading.my does have a variety of metal beads and charms, I feel it is limited in terms of bead caps and spacers. Plus, the variety of glass beads is moderate; for example, Czech glass beads are mainly available only in two shapes: faceted rounds or superduos. Unfaceted Czech rounds are only available in 4mm. "Chinese crystals" (faceted glass) are mainly available only in rondelle, round and tear-drop shapes -- at the time of writing, only four colours are available in 6x4mm ovals. They don't have cat's eye beads or crackle glass beads; neither do they have shell or mother-of-pearl items.

Basically, I want a greater variety of beads, especially different shapes and sizes, to make my jewellery more interesting. I've been poking around on Pandahall.com (based in China) and on that site they offer a huge variety of beads in all kinds of shapes and sizes, made from all kinds of different materials. I ordered a bunch of stuff from them and shipping cost one-quarter of the total amount I paid, but it was worth it. They sell in bulk, so you'll get stuff in huge quantities, but they have "mixed products" lots where they offer the same item in a mix of colours, so although you get 20 strands of, say, 6x4mm faceted rondelles, you get them in maybe 9 colours. It's a great way to build up your stock.

**(Having said that, I ordered hematite from them, and now I have a whole bunch! If you are looking for some hematite, please check out my offer at the bottom of this post.)

This, THIS is why you need beads in different shapes and sizes. Necklace by Teryn Ashley; see her tutorial over at Vintage Romance Style.

Don't get me wrong, I love beading.my and will probably continue to use them as my main supplier of findings, especially for all the basics, plus connectors/links and charms. They deliver very promptly, usually within two days of placing my order and making payment. Convenient and professional -- what more could you ask for?

Overall, I'm quite disappointed by the lack of variety of beads and spacers and bead caps in the stores I visited today. Also, all of them sold only ordinary monofilament thread (similar to nylon fishing line) which I had read is not suitable for beading -- especially bead weaving, and also stringing crystals, which have sharp edges and would easily fray the thread. However, I've read that there's a new type of bonded nylon thread which is better (stronger) than monofilament, and also used for fishing. The recommended brand is Firewire -- I got it from a fishing tackle store in Taman Mayang Jaya in PJ, but you can also get it on beading.my. The fishing store only had it in smoke (dark grey) or moss green, and it was RM45.10 (6lb test, 114m spool). Beading.my offers it in clear for RM35, 50m spool. I guess if you're making things just for fun, it's okay to use monofilament thread, but I'm a believer in using good quality materials. To me, if a thing is worth doing, it's worth doing right. Plus, I might eventually want to sell my creations :p  I can't sell things not made with quality materials!

Apart from bonded or fused nylon thread, you can also use beading wire for stringing beads. This is also available on beading.my. Beading wire, so google tells me, consists of strands of wire woven together and covered by nylon, thus ensuring the "thread" is tough and lasting. It's wire but it's very flexible and can still be knotted like a thread. You're recommended to use 19-strand beading wire because 7-strand can be a bit stiff (good for chokers, I hear). Apparently, the more strands it has, the more flexible it will be.

Other stores. I didn't manage to go to K&K Crystal Sdn Bhd, which is located in GM Plaza along Lorong Haji Taib 5 (near Chow Kit), or Syarikat Bunga Reben, either on Jln TAR or or Plaza City One along Jln Munshi Abdullah. Those will have to wait for another day.
 
 
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By the way, if anybody needs hematite, I have 15 strands of oval twists 8x5mm (51pcs/strand) and 10 strands of drops 8x16mm (26pcs/strand). I'll probably never finish it all within my lifetime, so I'll be happy to trade or something. Contact me on gmail - wilfulsunflower.

A picture of the drops and oval twists. I love the twists because it's such an unusual shape, and the drops are awesome for earrings or necklaces.

Never-ending

Here's how it goes: you buy more stuff, then you need to buy more stuff to organise your new stuff.