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Note: these are not done yet, and are still being written up by me, I just desperately need to reorganize them into a coherent stream of thoughts for a complete blog writeup section. Thank you for bearing with me on this little adventure of mine.
Hey, New York. I got back from seeing you not too long ago, and I guess I'm still infatuated.
I assume there's nothing much I could say about you that ten, a hundred million other people haven't already said throughout the course of God knows how many decades already that you've existed. But I guess I'll throw in my towel and give you my tidbit of how I feel about you. I... The moment I landed at JFK and I stepped outside, I got transported back to me about 10 years ago, landing right at your doorstep and feeling in complete awe. And I sent a photo to my parents, reminding them of that moment 10 years ago that I'd met you for the first time and just getting completely and utterly absorbed by your energy. And I guess when I arrived at your doorstep about 10 years ago, I didn't have a really good concept of what I was heading into when it comes to life in the U.S. And there wasn't a really good description of what I was entering into anyway at the moment that I fell right into your arms. Because the view from JFK... uh, airport was not a very beautiful one. It was a wall of concrete and cement and very well-designed architecture of a singular parking lot and a system of, uh, arrivals and departures, I guess, drop off and pickup. And right at that moment, I was, if I had to be honest, I was lost. I was really lost. I didn't really know what my life would have looked like a whole decade later. I'm now talking to you again after the fact, living at a completely different city, at a completely different corner of this vast country. And reporting back to you about all of my findings. About ten decades into getting to know your neighbors and getting to know I guess, what you represent and how you operate. And to me, you, New York, represent a gigantic love, a gigantic and unwavering love that I have for this country as a whole. And I don't know how, I don't know who would have expressed it as effectively and as romantically as you do. And so this is my testament to my love for you and my testament to my love to the U.S. as a whole. And because you have made me rediscover that and reimagine that during my very short four-day trip. And I have you a lot to thank because you were my first and my last as of now destination that I found myself at during my journey in the U.S. And it's a little bizarre trying to think about it like in that way because I got to rediscover the love for the U.S. and I guess the love for you, New York, throughout this trip being a... This country is so much... a melting pot, a conglomerate of a gigantic and vast and never-ending diverse group of peoples from across the world. And it is a testament to the ingenuity that people could come up with when you put many, many peoples with a plural S together trying to find their bearings in life together in a city and in a neighborhood that is vast but also very small in land area. The because it already has such a rich history of being the first port of entry of pretty much all of the kinds of people in the world when they get admitted to the U.S. and when they land at the U.S., me being one of them, it represents a... I don't want to call it romantic, but it really is. It really is a romantic imagination of what the u.s could be and this is i know i'm repeating myself right now but it is he it represents the melting pot characteristic of the u.s so effectively and i could just step outside and be like hey i am i know that i'm lost right now wherever i am in life and i know that i have 8 million other people coexisting with me who are also at the same amount of loss and indecisiveness that I have in life, but it is okay because I am lost within a loose support network of other people who also are not knowing what they're doing with their life and trying to keep up with the fast and fast paced cutthroat kind of pacing of life there. And yeah, I appreciate that a lot about you. You're very fast. You're very fast moving. You're very fast living. You're very fast to burn in and out of trends. You're very fast to critique the flaws and the downsides of other people, but you're also fast to gloss over them. You're fast to forgive people. You're fast to jump to help your neighbors who don't really understand or know what they're doing. You know that you're composed of such a network of diverse people that it's not really worth it to just push each other down just to try and get a leg up. And the network of communities and sub-communities that you've already formed within the interconnectedness of the five boroughs within you is impressive. It is utterly impressive. And I have no other words to explain that and describe that other than that warm and punchy feeling that I have in my guts today. and in my heart, and in my lungs, as soon as I step out into the vastness of you. And I'm in awe. You've left me with so many words, but also no words at all. No word could ever describe what your power truly holds. I guess your significance truly holds. And I know for a fact that so many people have already romanticized you and what you mean to them and what you mean to the importance of this world. Because you are arguably the most important city in the whole world. I will have to give my two cents and throw my hat into the ring. That is... I know I bring something to the table when it comes to giving my input towards you. I know that you have a lot that I desire within this stage of my life, which is very fast moving. I could never catch my breath. I very oftentimes finding myself running out of things to do whenever I guess I'm having a creative thirst of energy. I very oftentimes find myself within a rut of, you know, already running out of things to do in my city of Austin, Texas. But I know that that's not true because Austin, even though it's about an eighth, a ninth of a population of New York, and with a very, very, very, very young history compared to New York, it still already has such a vast culture and knowledge and potential exchange. And I know that. And there's so much more that I could be extracting from it. But for some reason, it is so much more apparent and it feels so much more like New York wears it on its sleeve. it wears diversity on a sleeve and it wears the cultured history of it on a sleeve. And it's so remarkably impressive how it finesses that exchange. It, it's the melting pot where people come to, I guess, advance to their next stage of their life. It is where people come to, uh, when they're taking refuge in a lot of people's cultures. It is the birthplace of a lot of genres of music that I've grown up with and loved so dearly. And it's the representation of what I've been Living for. And fighting for. In terms of the spirit of the US. And I know that spirit is dying. And I do not. I do not give up on that whatsoever. Even though. Technically it is not my country. I still fight for. It's ideals. I still fight for what it stands for. And I still believe in it wholeheartedly. Theoretically. It is a framework. That is incompatible. incredibly remarkable and is a framework that everyone in the entire globe strives to replicate but fails miserably and and it's and I I guess this trip is a reminder is a stark reminder of me to keep continuing to fight for that to keep embracing it as part of my DNA and From where I came from, Saigon, Vietnam, that is a city that really... I've always been a big city kid. And this is a testament to me fitting into that cultured, diverse, and vast urban environment. Fast-moving urban environment. I... The moment I landed in JFK, the feeling in my chest screams, I'm home, baby. I'm home. And my jaw was dropped for God knows how long as I was riding even the subway to go to my hotel. And I had a whole four hours of me taking my camera out and saying hi to the entire city of Manhattan. I couldn't cover a lot of it within the course of four hours just because of how densely packed everything is within Manhattan. But it is still me having a first date, brief conversation with the city. And I've learned a lot about it. I learned that it is embracing capitalism unapologetically, which I partially agree with and partially disagree with in terms of its execution. I learned that it is a diverse hodgepodge of cultures and peoples and personalities and lifestyles and... colors and whatnot all together and it does it in both a haphazard way but also in a very orderly way. It organizes itself into regions and areas and neighborhoods and people identify with it so strongly and people have a sense of A community around the areas that they have identified with. And it is impressive. I learned from it a lot. And I don't know how I would be able to apply to it. How I would even begin to apply it to Austin. Going back home. But it's a lesson to be had for sure. It has awakened my... creative spirits and it's given me a little bit of a like a creative booster that hopefully i'll be able to use to carry on in terms of all of my creative endeavors and uh yeah i have all of that i have new york to think because the way that it represents my hometown the way that it represents how it was brought up and um how much my family wanted me to be over here and how much it represents the entire journey that I've been through is like, like that is remarkable. I will never take that for granted. And it has taught me so, so much within the course of four days, I'm exhausted. I am sick. I am tired. I am Very burnt out, but I'm very creatively satisfied and thank you New York even though you don't really know what you did even though a myriad of other people have already told you the same thing and a myriad of other people have felt the same way but taken you for granted and never expressed it I'm here to tell you that you've changed my life. And I know that that's a big confession, and it's even a cheesy one at that, given that I've only had about four days of experience with you. But I will always have you to appreciate. You've reminded me to continue fighting for what I love, And live my life unapologetically. And... Do the things that I love unapologetically. And... Keep fighting for... What this country stands for. Theoretically. This country is... Way too strong... For... Any of these outside influences. Or any temporary... Uh... toxic regime that it has been subjected to. It's a testament to this country's fabric with the free speech and free journalism that I've been able to practice pretty much every day. The reason how I'm able to embrace the things that I've been embracing unapologetically is because of the unique DNA of this country. And I know that for a fact. I was trying to seek that out coming back to Vietnam for five years. And I couldn't. I got really close. But it still really isn't there. It is not the same. And that's a testament to how strong and how unique this country is. There's a world. There's a neighborhood. There's a people for you. everywhere you go and no matter who you are. And that is so much this country. And I know that it's still, that identity is hurting and it's hurting a lot and it's calling for help and is screaming for help. I don't know how to help it in the most effective way because of all the things that has been going on. And, And in order to keep helping it, I need to preserve my safety and my freedom here. And that has to take precedence over all of my creative endeavors. And I can't, because I can't do that if I were to be, you know, deported, say. Yeah, so I really need to remind myself that This country is worth fighting for. This country is worth loving. Even though it's not mine, it represents a beacon of hope. I didn't even see the Statue of Liberty this time, but I know that that oomph feeling in my lungs means something. It means something in the way that people dress so differently and so diversely. People talk in so many different languages. People hang so many different flags. People, uh, look so differently from one another, but everyone flows in the same heartbeat and the same vein, uh, same veins of blood. That is the heart of the city and the productiveness of the city and is remarkable. And that is replicated, I guess, pretty much in nowhere else except for New York. And, uh, Long story short, I don't want to yap around going on and on with the same points again, but I will be paying you another revisit, New York. You've completely captured me in your infatuation, and you're going to take so long to decode, and I love it. I appreciate it a lot. You represented a vision that a lot of people have aimed for but failed. I admire you a lot. And please keep doing what you're doing. You're experiencing a revival of who you are thanks to the current administration. And it is very apparent, talking to the people that are around the city, and I could only look forward to what you're going to look like within the next five years, ten years. I would hope to be a part of your fast-flowing heartbeat one day, but that is a very distant dream of mine that will probably... not be realized anytime soon. But one could only hope and dream as a little kid. I was like a kid at a candy store when I was in the vastness of you. And I appreciate you a lot for showing me what that means and what that feels like intuitively. So I could use that fuel to fuel my journey's for years to come and you've already done that for the past decade and i thank you for that and i will have more updates to you coming soon i hope to bring what i bring to the table in austin to you and contribute to that vision of a a a beautiful people and uh Yeah, I would love to be part of it. I would love to be part of that evolving story sometime soon. And thanks for being willing to hear me out on that, to let me be part of that, still be open to that conversation. So yeah, I hope you don't mind that. And I will talk to you soon with a lot of love.