packing up to leave from Jinan

I finished exams a few days ago and found out I passed them all about a day after that. Then I hung out with friends for a while. And now I’m packing up.

I have one of those classic love/hate relationships with this kind of packing up. Like most people, I like the idea of sorting through everything because it makes me feel all glossy and spring-clean-ey, and also like most people I like the idea of going somewhere different (especially Phuket). But I get about an hour through and then I’m always totally confronted by how many things I seem to have collected and I get worried that I’m a freaky bowerbird hoarder – that’s just normal, right? Like, today I threw out my red Cons because there were just TOO many holes in them and I have approximately a million more pairs back home, but it hurt me! I walked in those four HOURS to get them that wonderfully worn - it was like throwing away a child. A CHILD. That’s what it was like. And having to recycle my old exercise books from the last semester? HUNDREDS OF HOURS WENT INTO THOSE BOOKS. I mean, I flip through the pages and just look at all that revision, all that hard work, and it just flops onto the ‘throw out’ pile. It’s a strange sad thing. A strange sad thing indeed.

This thought process happens for a lot of different things and in the end I always just keep too much anyway. I like things. I happen to define myself a lot by the things I own and I’m not exactly sure whether that’s a good thing or not. I don’t think it’s necessarily materialistic to simply value your possessions and the role they play in enriching your life. And half the time half of what I pack is books anyways. So yeah. I think it’s okay.

Also, I got the last batch of 35mm film developed too, so over the next few days I’ll post those photos up. I’m going to be in Beijing for 4 days before I get the plane to Phuket.