Living life elsewhere.

So I read over this blog and (a) it is self-indulgent, no way to avoid it I guess (b) I have not written in ages.

Seeing as I don't really think anyone cares and I don't really want to write in here anymore b/c I'd rather keep things to myself, I'll share a random thought I had that has not much to do with anything and then continue with my life.

I've been in Israel for a few months now. Pretty cool, but I still miss America. Do you people who are still there even realize how privileged you are? Let me count the ways:

• All TV websites stream to you
• You have Target, Costco, and other places where things are sold cheap and of normal value
• American products don't cost you 3 times the price
• Your tap water tastes fantastic, and yet you waste money on bottled water
• EVERYTHING IS IN ENGLISH
• Access to phenomenal concerts
• Dollars, and not an inflated currency like the shekel
• Sundays off
• Thanksgiving -- enough said
• People smile & don't push you and have sympathy (at least in L.A.)
• Your public transportation sites have MAPS
• Every street has a street sign SOMEWHERE, even if one has been stolen or vandalized
• Directions consist of street names, not "straight, straight, left, right, keep going"
• The customer's always right

There are things I like about this place, however. Like the fact that I don't feel like an outsider for not celebrating Christmas, b/c instead of Santa and his reindeer and any song about snow or Jesus playing all over, there are Chanukah songs and menorahs everywhere. For once around Christmastime, I'm still proud to be a Jew. I kind of like having Fridays off to prepare for Shabbat, even though I crave the freedom of Sunday. All the buses say "חנוכה שמח", or "Happy Chanukah" right now, and they display appropriate holiday messages throughout. EVERYONE I have EVER known who is my age is in this country right now, so reunions are abound. I barely ever have to worry about kosher food. For once, I can eat lunch at the mall, or even the movie theater! I also like having my independence here, but I guess I'll be getting that in college too. Still, having a large time gap kinda has its benefits. And man, THEY HAVE COFFEE BEAN HERE. I was told it was crappy, but it's not; just a bit more expensive. Funny how they have Coffee Beans in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Singapore, Shanghai, and Sydney, but not the east coast of the United States. I will be a very sad college student. And hey, at least I don't have to start getting used to snow here. It doesn't snow here in Jerusalem, or even in Tel Aviv, my favorite city here. It's so weird: the beach here is 10 degrees Fahrenheit warmer! At home it's 10 degrees colder. So in the middle of December, you can still wear a t-shirt in Tel Aviv. Sweeet. I thought I only had that luxury at home! And also, I at least speak some Hebrew; if I'd gone to Spain or someplace, I'd be royally screwed. Especially since most people do speak English here. I've been told that were I to go to any other foreign country, I would NOT be as lucky.

On another note, it's so strange: I've been living here. Living. I pretty much know my way around, I buy groceries, learn, eat, sleep, hang out, and meet people here. And have a good time. Even though I'm always thinking about home, I kind of want to merge the two lives and just kinda be in both places, even though I'm pretty much exactly halfway around the world. Even though my parents were here not too long ago for a visit, I'm okay with just checking in with them, talking to them once in a while, seeing them a little bit. I like being on my own.

Another random point: I never knew how awesome people could truly be. Everyone in my high school was always the same, and kinda blah. Here, I meet people who truly have their own identities, who love the little things in life, who want to do what they love and don't need to wallow in the superficial forever. They're still from America, but are seriously awesome.

I love life experience.

Bye for a while. =)

Julie and Julia

So I saw Julie & Julia with my friend last Sunday, and even though it was a total mom movie, I loved it because (a) Meryl Streep just lights up the whole screen and (b) I learned some stuff from it:

(1) If your friends suck, then just stop talking to them. End of story. Julie honestly had the bitchiest friends ever, besides one. And I think she should have stuck to her only.

(2) A positive attitude turns EVERYTHING around. Really. Julia Child had the most amazing attitude toward life. So it's no wonder she pretty much won at it.

(3) One person's trash is another's treasure. Well, not trash. Basically, I was in Washington DC a month ago, and I was at the American history building of the Smithsonian. One of the many, many exhibits there was Julia Child's Cambridge kitchen, and I kind of just walked on by, because I'd seen a lot of the museum already and didn't really think it was important. But in the movie, Julie goes specifically to the Smithsonian (she lived in New York) to see the kitchen exhibit. And you see her staring at it in such wonder, and she leaves butter there, and all that stuff. And it just made me think how I kind of walked by this exhibit, and here Julie Powell was in awe of it. How I could have disregarded something that was so special to another. Kind of like how my mom treats the Grammy museum.

I suggest you go see it, if you're female. Hell, if you're male, too. You'll learn good lessons in marriage from that one, that's for sure. Unless you're a commitment-phobe/douchebag. Then you'd probably hate it.

But yeah.

I like learning things. =)

Something that's been bugging me lately

Honestly, I think I am now understanding the way arrogant people I call bloggers work. Which is ironic considering I blog, but I think you get which type of blogger I refer to: the ones who write every detail of their lives, thinking they are important and that everything they say is worthy of the world to read, because of course they're the only intelligent human being on the face of the earth.
Yeah, you and the hundreds of bloggers like you.
Anyway. Tangent.
Here's why I think I understand the mentality:
I watch a show called American Idol. Most people think this shocking since I value music. I think it is fun and good TV and there is nothing wrong with watching it. A lot of people, however, have been shaking their fists at Idol. "This show is rigged!" they say. "The producers do everything, not the judges and the voters! Why, what kind of mask are they trying to put on? Do they think we're idiots? This competition isn't solely based on talent like they say it is! They want the good-looking people!"
Well, no, they didn't think you were idiots before, but I think they do now.
See, I have been watching this show since the end of season 2. I can name you every winner & runner-up & recognize some obscure names some may never have even learned in the first place. I have no valid reason for this. I just really like it. I can also remember that there have been several contestants that said things like, "Well, I finally got through the producers this time to the TV judges", & there has been a disqualification for a contestant who knew people who worked for 19 Entertainment, the production company for Idol. The TV judges have turned away contestants because they didn't have the right look and said so out loud. They are constantly praising people for being "package artists". They say they want "the next American idol", not "the person in America who has the best voice". The show is called American Idol, not America's Best Singer.
Basically? It's not a secret that the producers are involved! Half the world knows this. I thought it was more, but apparently not. See, this is a TV show. Generally, TV shows want interesting people. If they get too many boring people, no one will want to watch it. So they have producers first pick, out of thousands, the people they want to be shown on TV. They pick the talented people they know the judges will love, and they pick the weirdos they know audiences will love to hate and mock. And can you imagine the TV judges going through all of those people in the stadiums?! It would take them WAY more than the 2 days they seem to have! Producers are hired for a reason! They don't just sit on their asses and let the Benjamins roll in. That's the executive producers' job, people! Get with it.
Then, when these people make it to TV, the judges decide if they are going to be marketable artists. Not if they just have talent. If they are marketable. Why do you think Simon Cowell is the judge that makes the most sense? He works in producing and scouting! He knows which people sell, & he makes a killing off the people he picks in England. (Leona Lewis, Il Divo, Escala...) They say it is a "singing competition" sometimes, true, because as far as the top 50, they usually don't have the gimmicks. This year was pretty much the exception with Nick "Norman Gentle" Mitchell and his hilarious antics. But they are still forever looking for the package artist.
Once the placement of the contestants is entirely in the voters' hands, however, it is most definitely not rigged. Here are several examples (which I am NOT being bitter about for those of you who think this part is the focus, which it is not at all):

1. Taylor Hicks won season 5. What producers actually wanted him to win, honestly? Chris Daughtry was a shoo-in. If not him, then Katherine McPhee, who actually made it to the finals. But, nope! The Soul Patrol (aka his diehard fans) called in and crowned him king. And where is he now? Performing for fat housewives across the country in intimate shows after being dropped from a record label. Winner material? I think not.
   
2. Sanjaya Malakar made it to 7th place. The whole country was up in arms. All the viewers wanted him OUT!... except for his fans who voted like maniacs! They're to blame for his placement, NOT the producers. Are the producers to blame for his placement into the top 24? Possibly. But the top 7?! I don't really think so...
3. Simon Cowell did not like Kelly Clarkson, and he could pull some strings for SURE in the 1st season, since he was half the reason the show was brought to this country. He was a Tamyra Gray fan, as was most of the nation. While I did not watch season 1, every person I have spoken to that watched it (which is A LOT, let me tell you) told me that Tamyra being eliminated was beyond shocking. If the producers had any pull that far along, they would have made sure Tamyra won the whole thing.
4. Michael Johns? 8th place?! Are you kidding? TV Guide had already written him up as being around for Neil Diamond who mentored the top 5, and they are solid partners with Idol. Clearly, if it had been up to the producers, he would have stuck around much longer.
5. Do you realize how much they pimped out Adam Lambert?! How desperately they wanted America to just dial their hearts out for him? And yet, Kris Allen's little girls & wholesome-loving housewives beat them out with their determined nature. I really don't think Kris would have won if the producers had anything to do with it.
   

So basically, it is what they say, and people don't realize it. There is no rigging of votes as far as we know; just a selection of people for television that they tell us about in the beginning! There's no mystery!
But these "bloggers", these arrogant people who think they're sooo smart, they ignore all the other claims and focus on the couple times Simon Cowell says "singing competition" and then pounce on the show, and then call themselves the only people in the nation with eyes. They focus on what they can pride themselves on to make them feel better, just like your average school bully does.
& here's my favorite part: they can all do something about it, you know. When David Archuleta is safe the night he flubs his lyrics, they could actually pick up the phone & vote for David Cook's "Eleanor Rigby" or Carly Smithson's "Come Together". If they want Adam Lambert to win so badly, they can dial his number and vote for him like they're supposed to. It's like when they whine about Bush so much and yet didn't vote because they wanted to stand up to the establishment (because their one non-vote counts as such a burn among the millions). Why whine about something that was almost totally in your control? Right, because you're not supposed to be watching Idol in the first place because it's just sooooo lame even though you secretly adore it. Right, arrogant people of America? Right?
I'm just sick of it. People need to stop being like hormonal females by twisting everything around to make themselves happy and look at the facts! It doesn't make anything better. Just let it be.

Some of the things I want to do in life

• Travel the world with a backpack and some money
• See a sunset on the beach
• Write a song that becomes my own personal favorite and makes it to #1 on the charts
• See a sunrise on the beach
• Walk a marathon
• Fall in love
• Learn to play the drums
• Be a great mother
• Buy a Nikon D80
• Edit a music video
• Have a discussion with Jason Mraz
• Help the less fortunate
• Lose 10 pounds
• Find true friendship
• Go stargazing
• Stay up for 48 hours
• Take a 10-hour walk around Washington, DC
• Own a house
• Be the best person I can be
  

Tell me how I'm supposed to breathe with no air

Everything bothers my mother, and so she's always fixing everything in my life.
But if she keeps fixing everything, how am I supposed to make my own decisions and do anything on my own starting, oh, NEXT MONTH?
With no independence, how am I supposed to be independent?

City Hug?

I was walking to my friend's house today and looked out at my surroundings and thought about how I was leaving in just one month to travel across the globe and won't be back until April. I took in the houses, the lawns, the clear blue sky, the perfect weather, the palm trees, and slowly spread my arms as wide as a could. Then I slowly brought my arms back in toward my body and just squeezed them tight.
In other words, I gave Los Angeles a figurative hug.
I love it here and I'm going to frakking miss it.
I really wish I could just envelope the entire 4,000+ square miles of it with a hug. Being born and raised in such a city is a blessing, and no matter how many weirdos and psychopaths and corrupt freaks do in fact live here, my life and little universe here included so many more wonderful people and places and things that I just don't want to leave it behind. I want to either bring some good schooling systems here or take L.A. with me.
But I have to move on.
I'm going to miss all my friends who are staying here while the education crumbles.
I'm going to miss my family being there for me all the time, even when I totally can't stand them.
I'm going to miss my favorite places.
I'm going to miss good coffee at Coffee Bean.
I'm going to miss the perfect weather and palm trees.
I'm going to miss the English language.
I'm going to miss walking around Beverly Hills.
I'm going to miss going to television tapings and movie premieres.
I'm going to miss randomly seeing celebrities.
I'm going to miss all the nice people at Bath & Body Works.
I'm going to miss the fact that it takes two hours just to drive outside of the county.
I'm going to miss all the happy people here.
I'm going to miss theme parks and rollercoasters.
I'm going to miss all the people who thought they were getting a land of phoniness and false hope and instead got wonderful friends and dreams come true.
Los Angeles, consider yourself hugged. Because I'm going to miss this overhated wonderful heap of a city. Even if I'll be back in under a year.
I love it too much.

Seeming vs. Being

I decided that I'm either going to be in advertising or marry someone who is. (I'd prefer the latter. No musician likes resorting to jingles.)
Why?
Well, when little kids see the commercials for My Little Pony and Play-Doh and Barbie and whatever the hell else is out there, they hear their stupid claims and just WANT them more than anything. I don't want to raise these kids.
I want to raise the kids that have used those toys and can testify to the B.S., that can make their own decisions; even that young. I'll teach them sooner and they'll get it before they're caught up in the adolescent whirlwind of materialism.
See, if the family is in advertising, I assume we'd get the endorsed product for free or at least heavily discounted or something like that. So the kids will play with it, make what they want of it, and then watch Mommy or (hopefully) Daddy's glorified commercial. They will totally realized the difference and won't always believe in the overkill praises on TV about a pink plastic pony.
Because, frankly, this causes a lot of problems. And it's not just commercial products that are shopped around. It's ideals, opinions, and standards. I want to help in creating a future generation that is trained not in certain "built-in" opinions, but rather in thinking for itself from the very start.
Now, I know you're supposed to shelter your kids in a certain way, but this doesn't mean you can't teach them decision-making early on. Believe me, it's a good thing. Otherwise, you'll end up like me: choked by a control freak with siblings who love battling for power and don't think for themselves.
Yeah.

Music

I once heard someone I knew describing why she likes absolutely loves the band The Fray. She said:

Their songs have meaning, you know? Like it actually came from somewhere and they experienced it!

She said this as if this were a novel concept in the world of music, and that this is what makes them totally unique in the large world of musicians. Funny, I've been listening to lots of music that came from somewhere; is this part of a new wave?
Unfortunately, all we have these days in the way of popular music is the neverending cycle of "Love you so and never wanna let you go" songs. Or those horrid breakup songs which we all know have no emotions behind them, because really, you have to be some kind of douchebag to write a song to your significant other about how you no longer want to date them so that they don't know how you really feel until the song is on the radio. Everyone thinks Miley Cyrus's "The Climb" is just so damn deep, and that "Fall For You" by Secondhand Serenade is just so touching. "The Climb" took a bunch of studio writers to help Ms. Cyrus write, and it was a product of a movie, so it's all fake; and "Fall For You" portrays hardly any emotion, if you listen to it. It's nice, but it's not what people think it is.
I think that music these days has been severely diluted. To find someone like Jason Mraz or John Mayer is almost rare now. To wedge oneself in the music industry is all too easy: look good, sing decently, be very friendly, and you're in. The funny part is that looking good is the most rigorous part. Take a look at Cassie. All looks? I do think so. It's especially a hint when the songs are spelled in text message language.
My favorite is "Soulja Boy"'s song that all the kids dance to and is really freaking disgusting. I won't deny it, I know the dance, and it can be fun. But in the song, "Soulja Boy" is rapping about how pissed he is that his girlfriend didn't give him any last night, and so he's so blue-balled about it that he's going to rub one out and make sure the ensuing fluid lands all over her while she's sleeping. And the kid was 16 when he recorded it. Corruption? I think so. But that's another issue.
The point is that music can be used so well to portray emotion, to touch people, to express what words can't dare to do, to take the artist and listeners to another world where everything is what they want it to be. And yet, it's being further and further reduced into a tool for enjoyment, and a mood enhancer, like a drug. People will play music because they're sad and want to be happy again. In this function, it is no more than an antidepressant. Others will play music so they can dance. In this function, it is no more than Ecstasy. Some will just play it as background noise. In this function... wait, this makes it have no function.
I remember when I was younger, I thought that this was what it was. How when JoJo was 13 years old when her single "Leave (Get Out)" was on the radio, and a bunch of critics went up in arms because, first of all, it's another breakup song, and second of all, she was just too young to sing about such things. How I was her age and thought, It's just a song; who really cares? Because this is what I had gathered that music was. Entertainment. Who cares where it came from? It's just a nice sound.
I have since discovered that music does have genres for nice sounds: Ambience. Techno. Dance.
But then there are those other genres that we primarily use as expression and inspiration for others: Rock. Easy listening. Pop. Rhythm & Blues. Soul. Jazz. Funk.
Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. I think I'm being a little bit pompous here, since I'm so young and haven't even experienced much in the way of music. But it just frustrates me a great deal to see such a wonderful art be brought down to such a low sometimes.

The fakeness of human beings

As my high school years come to a close, everyone sits around a metaphorical bonfire and goes, "Awww, look at how close we became over the years! We're all friends now!"
And then there's me and my friends, as well as those who kind of don't have any, who just sit on the side and go, "What about us?"
And there's still the same cattiness going on that has been going on since we were preteens, and it will always be going on, since we have all known each other since we were preteens. And yet, some feel the need to pretend it's all Kumbayah and wonderful, when it's not.
Why? Why do people feel like they have to kid themselves? Why can't we just go on being cordial and then move on with our comfortable cliques? Why do they have to make this Declaration of Mutual Friendship that makes people who are clearly excluded feel extremely awkward?
It has never made sense to me and never will. I mean, it's one thing to just not say anything and exclude others; but to vocally pretend that it's all great when it's not is just mind-boggling. And I'm not one to always think things are wrong, mind you. I love optimism and whatnot. But there is no good to be seen in this declaration, especially when one girl in particular constantly treats me like the annoying younger sibling her parent makes her drag around all day and pretend she's friends with.
Being phony has always confused me and will never cease to do so.