Just your typical prototype

This poll was brought to you by iTunes (and not locking your door when you know you have friends coming over)

What is the most embarrassing song to be caught singing along to?
a) Journey, "Don't Stop Believin'"
b) Dragonforce, "Through the Fire and Flames"
c) Cabaret, "Mein Herr"
d) All of the above, though certainly embarrassing, still play into the whole self-conciously nerdy thing you have going on. The right answer is "Piece of Me" by Britney Spears.
e) Having heard you sing, I can tell you that it's embarrassing no matter what the song.
f) Sorry, but this is really bothering me. Aren't prototypes, by definition, typical?


On planning a trip to Egypt

"I just want to be respectful of the local culture. And buy some new clothes."

Yes, I am finally going to Egypt! I started to make a packing list and then realized that almost everything I own, save for my orange scarf, is not really suitable for Egypt. I'm pretty sure that Russia is the exact opposite of Egypt in terms of cultural climate and climate climate.

Which is kind of funny, since a lot of the stuff I'm reading about Egypt is also stuff that I read about Russia years ago. Specifically:
- beware of pickpockets and don't leave your passport in your hotel room
- don't drink the water and be wary of street food
- don't bother driving and look out when crossing the street because drivers are crazy
- health and safety standards are lower, and fatal transport accidents are not unheard-of
- do not even go anywhere near illegal drugs
- don't take photos of government buildings or military personnel
- you will stand out more and might be harrassed if you have dark skin/light hair (I'll let you figure out which country is which here)
- don't go anywhere with strangers who approach you (find me a country where it IS advisable to do this and I'll cash in my life savings and move there)
- I came to Russia just after Beslan, so even the terrorism warnings sound vaguely familiar to me.

A lot of this turned out to be very good advice, and a lot of it is just common sense. I would say that they are all true, or at least not-untrue. Taken all together, though, it makes Moscow sound a lot scarier than it actually is, so I try and keep that in mind when I read the exact same things about Cairo, or anywhere else I travel, for that matter.

Even worse, before I came to Russia, somebody told me that I could be kidnapped and they would cut off my fingers and send them to my parents one-by-one until they agreed to pay millions of dollars for my release. Hasn't happened yet. The other day somebody told me that foreign women in Egypt can get kidnapped and shipped to brothels in other middle eastern countries never to be heard from again.

Honestly, these stories mostly just make the people telling them sound creepy. These both sound like things that could happen, or even have happened in the past.* But do you tell visitors to America that they might get all serial-killed?

I don't mean to minimize the risks of international travel, especially to a country whose culture is so very far removed from your own, and, yeah, I am a bit nervous. But I do what I can to minimize risks (in this case that means using a reputable travel agency, dressing conservatively, and not going alone**), and I read a lot about any place before I make the decision to visit it. So I ask everybody to please trust my judgement (about travelling -- I certainly won't ask you to trust my judgement about music).


I have changed

Yeah, when did that happen? Still look like a robot in photographs, though:

This was taken at the Polytechnic museum in Moscow last weekend. This is an awesome museum and I cannot believe I did not visit it earlier. It was a robotic tour guide for an exhibition, but I don't know if it was ever actually used.

* The ONLY similar account I found for either scenario in either country was the tourist kidnapping in September, which had a happy ending. Plus, I won't be anywhere near that part of the country.

** I feel really conflicted about these last two concessions. As in, if I can't travel alone and dress however I want without the risk of being harrassed, does the country deserve my tourism dollars at all? I could argue that Egypt is making progress in this area, or that being in the country as a polite, respectful American can only have a good influence on people's attitudes, or even that I have no right to ask this question in the first place. But I really just want to see the pyramids.

No title to tie all these together. I'm not *that* good.

Happy Thanksgiving! Of course I am sick today (this seems to be a Thanksgiving tradition for me).

I don't have much to write about. My teaching hours were reduced when I was promoted, with the consequence that this year has been depressingly devoid of horrifying student conversations, just a couple of mildly amusing ones:

This isn't technically a student conversation, but I'm counting it because I was in character for some reason, and because it was totally wasted on its audience:
Vladimir Petrovich*: You never do anything stupid?
Me: No, never.
V: I think it is okay to do mistakes sometimes.
M: Well, evidently.

Funny student:
Fyodor Pavlovich: Have you found a new boyfriend yet?
Me: It's been two weeks!
F: So, more than one.


I got tagged for a meme, but I don't know seven bloggers to re-tag (and, for the record, it really is bothering me that there aren't seven rules), so I'm just going to tell you seven weird things about myself:

1. I'm allergic to all fruit except citruses. I'm not allergic to cooked fruit at all, and salad dressing makes me less allergic to tomatoes. I haven't tried it on other fruits (and, honestly, have no intention of doing so). I'm less allergic to unripe fruit.

2. When I first came here, I was so self-conscious about my accent that I just wrote notes for everything I wanted at stores and restaurants. I was also self-conscious about my handwriting, so I often asked my boss to write notes for me.

3. I dressed up as a boy for the last Halloween party. I didn't condition my hair for a week, studied the way that guys move, borrowed clothes from a coworker (who was dressing up as me), padded my shoulders and waistline like crazy, gave myself a dreadful moustache using some mascara, and resolved to only drink beer all night. I was very proud of this costume. My coworker told me I looked like Hilary Swank in "Boys Don't Cry." "Is that a compliment?" I asked. "I...guess."

4. I haven't dyed my hair since 2006. I wanted to dye it gray for a while, but exactly nobody thought this was a good idea, and the amount of bleaching it would require made me give up entirely.

5. I eventually learned how to use chopsticks at age 17 because I was at a restaurant where they didn't give me a fork and I was too embarrassed to ask for one. Years later, I was in China and every time I walked into a restaurant people would watch me just to see whether I could eat with chopsticks. It would have been kind of embarrassing if I hadn't been able to.

6. I really really miss swiss orange and mint chocolate chip ice cream. Not together.

7. I think I remember conversations better than most people, to the point that I find myself pretending not to remember stories that I've been told before because it just makes the conversation easier.


* No, these are not real names, just really pretentious aliases. Please do not stalk my students.

How the world can change

Life since my last update has been interesting (Dmitry and I broke up. I do not want to talk about it), but that's not what I'm going to write about. What I'm going to write about is:

1. Obama won the election!!! I kind of wish I had been home for it. But people here are happy, too. A McCain win would have destroyed our credibility, at least here in Russia (and, yes, I do know how that sounds). Some of them are worried that I'm going to go back now. What I was really waiting for was health care, so...maybe?

2. Proposition 8. I...have no words for this. But look here. Second picture, middle sign, awesome. It kind of made me wish that my parents were fundamentalist nutjobs so that I could marry that guy just to prove a point.

And I understand that lots of otherwise good people are opposed to gay marriage, I assume because their churches say so (like mine, though I manage to form my own opinions on this issue despite that) or because they are just uncomfortable with it (that would be the entire population of the country that I choose to live in). It's the voting against it that I have a problem with. That's basically going to the polls and saying "I do not want people who I will never meet and who have no effect on my life to be able to visit each other in the hospital when one of them is seriously ill." Who DOES that?!?

It turns out that I do have some words for this.

3. Talking to my friend, an Evangelical Christian, about Sarah Palin (this was before the election when it was relevant):
O: See, she's one of those scary Christians.
M: Ye...what, what?! You have to explain that because as far as I'm concerned YOU'RE one of those scary Christians!
O: [uses the one issue that I actually, KIND OF, agree with Palin on to illustrate her point]
M: Oh...my. This means that someone out there thinks I'm a scary Christian, too.
O: Yeah, they're called Episcopalians.
M: Ooh...I bet they do.
O: But who thinks Episcopalians are scary?
M: Unitarians!

And then you come full-circle because I imagine that the Sarah Palins of the world find Unitarians scary. Or...it might be more of a line than a circle.

4. I am currently scraping the money together to go visit my brother in Berlin. His blog is updated more often than mine. His post about contractors reminds me of some of the people I work with, except we make a lot less money. But the lifestyle is similar.

5. Points if you know where I got that title from (it ties the whole post together, though 3 is kind of a stretch).

And a towel. Don't forget to bring a towel.

So over at one of the fashion blogs I read, there is a question about what to pack if you're going backpacking for two months. I'm not really what you'd call a backpacker, but I did go on a 6-week vacation this one time when I wasn't really staying in one place and had to carry everything with me.

Anyway, I started to write a response in the comments, but it got kind of long-winded and I didn't want to hijack the thread. So I decided to copy it here instead. Then I added footnotes wherein I talk about myself, as this is my blog and I can do that.

No matter where you go, I strongly recommend a scarf-shawl type thing. It will keep you warm, keep the sun off of you, and allow you to visit any churches with strict dress codes.

If you're going to spend a lot of time in cities: bring lots of sundresses in different lengths. They don't take up much space in your luggage. Depending on the weather or how conservative the place is, you can wear a hoodie or the aforementioned scarf to cover up (also make sure the material is opaque, as that can be embarassing otherwise). What's more, you can hand wash them, they dry quickly, and you don't have to plan an outfit. (If you're not comfortable wearing dresses, though, disregard this paragraph because you shouldn't travel in clothes you're not comfortable in).

For outdoor activities, you'll need pants and shirts (layers are good here), but probably not as many as you think.

As for shoes,
1. don't bother with "nice" shoes. You will never wear them. You'll be walking so much that, even if you do go out in the evening, you'll probably end up choosing comfort over style. It also leaves you with an excuse (and space) to buy shoes there, and who doesn't want that?
2. you should definitely bring sandals, but make sure they are comfortable and have good arch support. Actually, that should be true of all the shoes you bring.
3. Shoes are heavy, so the fewer you can get away with, the better. I only really needed two pairs.*

With regard to maintenance, get a haircut that will look ok when it grows out, and bring some hair ties. Keep your nails short, but bring a nail file so they still look neat. I don't like travelling with nail polish, but if you can't live without it, go for something light, iridescent and quick-drying. I also brought a bar of detergent for hand-washing clothes. I didn't even know they existed until just before I left, but they are very useful.

Finally, if you forget something, or you end up wanting something you didn't pack, you can more than likely buy it there. Then you have something useful with nice memories attached to it.**



* I can't believe I just advised somebody to bring fewer pairs of shoes. Does the fact that I advocated buying more balance it out?

** I bought a lot of clothes when I was travelling, the weirdest being the cordouroy jacket that brings all the boys to the yard. In fact, I wore it today and this really good-looking guy who had travelled a lot around Russia was flirting with me. When I wore it two weeks ago, I went to Moscow and an Italian tourist sang to me (I have no idea what he was singing. Perhaps it was some aria from an opera about an ugly girl with a nice jacket). It's also the jacket that prompted my student to tell me I had "a perfect figure" some months ago. There is NOTHING remarkable about this jacket. I will find a picture.

Perhaps I can make an analogy.
unremarkable cordouroy jacket : European men :: graph paper shirt, conservative haircut, and glasses :

a) European women
b) All women everywhere
c) Stephen Colbert's wife
d) Just you, weirdo

Well, I went to Petrozavodsk, but some boats to Kizhi (specifically, the three I could have taken) were cancelled because the tourist season is winding down. This happens when I travel. It's because I don't sign up for stuff in advance and instead try to figure things out by myself when I get there. Sometimes it doesn't work out. It usually doesn't bother me. For some reason it did this time.

That "some reason" might be:
- I was sick
- my bank collapsed
- the entire American economy might collapse
- my birthday is coming up
- my cell phone stops working for hours at a time for no reason
- when it does work I accidentally send unspeakably creepy text messages
- my camera is dying
- my iPod crashed three times in as many days
- work
- everything else

ANYWAY, Petrozavodsk is a nice city with a really charming waterfront, and I didn't even need a map because, after visiting a lot of Russian cities (seriously, I have visited a lot of Russian cities), I can just draw my own:



I sketched this for a coworker and then decided to add stuff. The middle part says "Lenin St."

I spent most of my time there near the lake. It might be my favorite waterfront in Russia, and that is saying a lot.

So I'd like to go back there and actually see Kizhi. And maybe Valaam (this was highly recommended by the hotel staff, but you need to spend a couple days). But I also feel like there is too much on my list of things to see and places to go and that I am never actually going to be done with it, particularly if I keep failing to cross anything off.

I am going away for the weekend. Back soon!

Misc.

I have a lot of half-written blog posts that I just can't really seem to make into full posts. This is going to seem like a pretty random list of stuff.


Annoying Problem:
Students who think that I'm the only one who can teach them. I wrote about this last year. Except now my title is "Director of Studies" and my contract hours are reduced.

My proposed solution was to give everyone a nifty-sounding title, but this did not really fly with administration.

The reason this bothers me is that, while I am a good teacher, a huge part of my job is training other teachers to become good teachers. When students say that none of our other teachers can teach them, they are basically saying that I am no good at the training part of my job.


Though they might have a point:
I was helping one of the teachers plan his lesson.
A: Okay, so next I would elicit questions from the students.
B, writes "Illicit questions from students."
A: Well, that would be a much more interesting lesson.


Weather:
Every year, I get back to Moscow just in time for some ridiculuously hot weather. And every year I think "well, I might as well enjoy the opportunity to wear all my summer dresses because it gets cold really fast." And a week later every year I think "what happened?!? It was 90 degrees last week and now it's 50-something."

This is my way of saying that it's been a bit cold.


Shopping:
So I was rereading The Luzhin Defense this summer. It's not white stockings and bluish shoes but gray stockings and bluish shoes. I have no idea how I mixed that up. It was pretty easy to fix.

Other than that, I have mostly been window shopping because I am trying to save money. But I did buy a gray hat. Not even Suze Orman could disapprove of this hat.


Swimming:
The first thing to remember is that people don't have swimming pools here because they mostly live in apartments. None of the complexes here have pools, though that might be different elsewhere. The point is, if you want to swim after the weather turns cold, you have to go to the public pool.

Anyway, going to the public pool here is a multi-step process.
1. Go to the doctor (you can do this without an appointment). They want to make sure that you don't have heart problems and that your feet are not fungus-encrusted. If you pass, they write you a health clearance and you pay about $9 to get it stamped.
2. Then you bring your note to the pool, where they enter your name in their database. This is good for 6-12 months, and then you have to get another doctor's note.
3. Make an appointment to swim. There are a number of 45-minute sessions in the morning and evening on weekdays, and all day on Sunday. You can make your appointment for the same day, but you're more likely to get a space if you buy in advance. They print you a ticket with your name and appointment at the admin desk. 4. Take this ticket to the cash desk and pay about $5 to get it stamped.
5. Bring your stamped ticket to the locker room, where they give you a key.
6. Change, shower, swim. Make sure you have a swim cap because they won't let you in the pool without one.

For all I know, public pools have the same procedure everywhere. But I had been putting all this off for a while because I thought it seemed like a lot of steps and I hate swimming anyway.

In fact,
a) It doesn't take as long as it sounds.
b) If the pool is indoors and nobody is looking at you, swimming is actually a lot of fun.
c) You can, however, still hurt your feet. Always stretch first!

In general I'm really liking this swimming-as-exercise business. It's much better for my feet and knees and lungs than running or walking, I don't have to worry about cars like I do with roller-blading, I can swim no matter what the weather, and it might help me do something about my little tyrannosaurus arms. Let's see if I can actually keep it up.

The disadvantages are the cost, the fact that I'm going to need a hair dryer, and the location of the pool (across town). I'm also not really going to give up walking, as that has a psychological benefit. Is there room in my life for one and a half forms of exercise?


For more about Russian bureaucracy:
Read Mikhail Zoshchenko. I hadn't even heard of him until I had already been living in Russia for a year. I find him hilarious, but I don't know if I would have before I came here.


Exciting News:
I'm going to Petrozavodsk in a few weeks!


Solution to Annoying Problem?
Occasionally when I send a text message, I send it to the wrong person. There are two reasons why this might happen.
1. If I'm sending a message about somebody, I might accidentally send it to that person just because they're on my mind.
2. I'm in a hurry and two people are close together alphabetically.

The first is not so bad because I don't send unpleasant thoughts via text message. That's just good sense. It's usually something like "I'm observing Mabel's class today" and then Mabel is like, "Why are you referring to me in the 3rd person?" And then I realize that I've made a mistake.

The second is not really bad, either, because it should be obvious that I've made a mistake. And because, on my old phones, the "formal" (students, administration) list was separate from the "informal" list (colleagues, friends), so even if I made a mistake, it would have the right level of formality. On my current phone, they're all mixed together.

So the other day a text message for a colleague was accidentally sent to a student, and I thought, "great. Now our students are going to think that I'm barely literate," as I use a lot of abbreviations. Not great for my professional image, kind of embarrasing. Probably obvious that I had made a mistake.

Except! The message starts with "Hey, how is KZ?" KZ=Kizhi Island in the context of this message, but that doesn't matter here. What's important is that these are also said student's initials. Which means:
1. I am barely literate
2. I call my students by their initials
3. I refer to them in the third person

Points 2 and 3 make me seem unspeakably creepy!

This is my way of saying that my next phone had better let me make separate phone lists.

No accusations, just friendly crustaceans

So, I made it home in one piece but haven't felt like answering any of the recent Friday Fives. Tomorrow I am going on a cruise to Alaska with my family. This is exciting because I get to go snorkelling for the first time ever.* Also, free food, a giant boat with a swimming pool and library, rainy weather, and opportunities to dress formally.


Coming home gives me an opportunity to see my family and friends, but also to catch up on movies and TV:

I saw Wall-E, which I liked for the first half and then really disliked due to its contempt for its audience (I don't often say this about movies). I also felt that they were putting forward a Lamarckian view of evolution, despite the fact that the society in the movie probably did not involve any natural selection whatsoever. The ending credits actually made up for the rest of the movie, though. First of all, they were nice to look at, but, more importantly, it was sort of like they were saying "but civilization produces some good things too!" Which I appreciated.

Pan's Labyrinth was really good, though it went over my head (here be spoilers):
"I was really shocked that they did that."
"Well, it worked out for her. It's not like she actually died."
"What?"
"Yeah, she got to go to the magical land where her parents were waiting for her."
"..."
"Have I taken this movie too literally? Because it would not be the first time."

Project Runway started on Wednesday. I think I hate Blayne, and not in a love-to-hate way. It's probably good that I'll be going home before the season really takes off.

I watched the entire first season of Mad Men in about three days and came to the conclusion that early-1960s America is like present-day Russia but with better clothes and hair (but not shoes).** I had a whole analysis of why this would be the case (essentially, it's that the characters in the show grew up during the depression, while the characters in Russia grew up during the beginning of the end of the Soviet Union). There is less smoking in Russia, but the amount of drinking is about right in certain circles. I also noticed that the characters on the show do not seem very religious compared to present-day America (which, again, is also true of present-day Russia), but maybe it just hasn't been a topic on the show yet. Anyway, the similarities were kind of creepy.


* I was asked to choose excursions, so the first thing I did is go down the list and cross out everything involving floatplanes, helicopters, and ziplines. Then I chose snorkelling and a tour of an abandoned mine. I only mention this because I'm watching my brother play Super Mario and remembering how much I suck at air worlds but am actually pretty good at underground worlds. I am consistent if nothing else.

** I once had a plan to invent a time machine and travel back to that era to go shopping and also hang out around optometrists' offices and pick up men. The physical impossibility of a) time travel and b) fitting into 1960s clothes did not deter me. This series totally did.

Once this seemed so appealing

My allergies are making me suffer. And as much as I try to tell myself that allergies are just God's way of reminding us that our immune system is working, or that I have it pretty easy compared to all the people with food allergies, I am still feeling pretty sorry for myself.

Here's a Friday Five (more like a Sunday Ten, but whatever) to cheer me up:

Theme: International Travel
1. You have the summer and plenty of money to travel abroad. Where all would you go?
Okay, so this was actually a writing assignment for my Russian class, but we had to make a whole years' worth of plans. This is probably the only assignment I completed within a couple hours of its being assigned. I can't remember the exact plan, though it was something like this:

June - Australia, Tanzania, Zambia

July - Costa Rica, Peru, the Galapagos Islands

August - Kamchatka, Murmansk, Petrozavodsk, Arkhangelsk, maybe St. Petersburg

2. What foods would you be sure you got to eat?
Seeing as I've been to McDonald's in every country I've visited, I have to continue that tradition.

The countries on that list aren't exactly famous for their food. In Australia, I'd be sure to have Chinese and Indian food, both of which are hard to find and pretty expensive in Russia. I would also try kangaroo at least once.

I really know nothing about African food, but I do love ostrich meat, so that's probably what I'd eat.

I also don't know anything about food in Costa Rica or Peru, though in both cases I have heard that there is lots of seafood and it is awesome. So I'd buy a guidebook and eat what it told me to eat. I would also have to try Inca Kola, one of only two local soft drinks to outsell Coca-Cola anywhere in the world.

In Russia, well, I'd eat the same stuff that I do now (mostly cold soup, which sounds a lot sadder than it is).

3. What landmarks would you be sure you got to see?
In Australia, I'd mostly be visiting my friend, who lives near Melbourne, but I would also like to go to Tasmania to see some weird animals, Sydney to see the opera house, and somehow I'd learn to go SCUBA diving and see the Great Barrier Reef.

In Zambia, I would like to see Victoria Falls because they look really beautiful. In Tanzania, I would like to climb Mt. Kilmanjaro. Actually, I'd probably give up after the first day as I am afraid of heights, but it'd be worth a try what with the unlimited budget and all.

In Costa Rica and on the Galapagos islands, I would be all about the weird animals. In Peru, which is probably the place I am most interested in, I would visit lots and lots of archaeological sites. I would visit churches in both Costa Rica and Peru.

Kamchatka has interesting geology, Arkhangelsk and Murmansk are cities that I'm told you don't really need to spend more than a couple days in, and Petrozavodsk has Kizhi island, which is basically a museum of wooden architecture. I'd spend the rest of the time (assuming there is any) in St. Petersburg, visiting the Hermitage and the palaces and fortresses around the city.

4. What airline would you use?
Any one with a decent safety record. Since I'm short and average-weight, there's no reason whatsoever for me to be picky about airlines.

5. Would your knowledge of other languages influence where you went? (i.e. would you be more likely to go to France if you spoke French?)
From the list above, it looks like it would, but that's really just coincidence. Anywhere I went, I'd stick to cities and touristy places, at least until I got more comfortable, which would probably happen fastest in Australia (where I speak the language and look like everyone else) and slowest in Peru (where I don't).

The second set is about travel within the USA.

Theme: USA Road Trip
1. Who would you take with you on a road trip?
Somebody who can drive.

2. What states would you visit?
Good question. I would really like to visit Chicago (again), Boston, Philadelphia, Washington D.C. (again), Atlanta, and New Orleans. Those are cities rather than states. And I would go to Florida because I want to drive on that bridge that connects the Florida keys.

3. What national parks and/or monuments would you go see?
I want to see Carlsbad Caverns and Niagara Falls. I also want to go back to Lassen, Yellowstone, and Denali. This last would be a rather long drive.

4. Las Vegas: Overrated or a Must-See?
I seem like the type of person who would say overrated, but actually I think it's a total must-see.

5. How long would you be gone?
As long as it takes!


So it seems like this Friday Five was pretty much written for me, but actually it makes me kind of sad because I don't have the time, money, or driving ability to do any of this. Yet. I have a student who responds to half of what I say with "you sound like somebody who went from Vladivostok to Moscow by train." This has become my defining characteristic as far as that student is concerned.

What will actually cheer me up: going home in three days!

I'll kill myself if Portugal doesn't win

The Russian team won a soccer match last night. Actually, it's kind of a bigger deal than that. The Russian team, which I'm told was in last place going in, beat the Dutch team in the quarterfinals of the European championship, sending Russia to the semifinals for the first time ever ("ever," by the way, is 17 years). I was watching this in a restaurant with a group of people. Nobody scored for a really long time, then both teams scored at the last minute, so the game went into overtime, during which Russia scored twice, for a 3-1 result. It was pretty exciting. One of my students was actually at the game, which must have been really exciting.

People on the streets last night were crazy, but in a peaceful way. I've been here twice for New Years' and I have never seen such excitement. Everybody was cheering. Some people had fireworks. I saw one guy who had climbed onto one of the WALK/DON'T WALK lights and was just sitting there waving his shirt. Like I said, crazy.

Naturally, I did not bring my camera.


Anyway, I'll do the first Friday Five in a long time (for some reason, I just forgot about it). But first I have a question of my own.

Why didn't anybody *tell* me that Viggo Mortensen was hot!?
a) "It always seemed like stating the obvious."
b) "I did. Several times. You said he needed a haircut."
c) "Did he show up somewhere wearing glasses?"
d) "He's not hot."
e) "If this is about 'Eastern Promises,' I am revoking your visa."


Okay, now on to the (kind of oddly phrased) Friday Five:
1) what is one thing about you that you hate?
One? I'm going to go with my lack of social skills here.

2) what is one thing about you that you love?
Trivia-brain!

3) if you had to change one thing about you what would it be and why?
I would be much, much better at dealing with people. I would never put my foot in my mouth or worry about doing so. I'd make eye contact with people, including but not limited to, attractive males. And I'd be able to manipulate people, but I'd use it for good rather than evil. Like somebody would tell me their problems and instead of saying "you really need to get over that" I could manipulate them into feeling better! And I'd be able to do that bitchy thing where you make fun of somebody but you do so so subtlely that they don't realize it until a few hours later, or they realize it but can't say anything because you're so subtle that they'd just come off as really defensive. That ability is like a hairdryer. I wouldn't ever use it, but it's weird to be a female without it.

4) what is one word that you would use to define yourself?
Polite.

5) imagine what you would look like in a perfect world...what do you look like?
In a perfect world, I wouldn't have to look any different. That said, I'd like to be able to change my appearance at will. I would mostly use this for changing the color of my nails without having to wait for the nail polish to dry.