On being "Girly and Purty"

I have, by the grand old age of twenty, pretty much established at this point in time that I am not in any way physically attractive. I mean, yes, there is one individual who will relentlessly say otherwise, but one man's opinion as opposed to others isn't exactly going to cut it. Even parents would call their ugly mess of a child beautiful, after all. Oh well, not everyone is born with mindblowingly hot faces.

I happened to cross paths with a group of boys today, who, if I wasn't being delusional, seemed to point and snicker at a short little girl with glasses wearing a blue and gray striped shirt, jeans, a thick long brown jacket, worn out beige backpack, and white Nike sneakers with pink stripes. AKA me.

I can hear fashion gurus wringing their hands in horror. I admit the color coordination of my attire is pretty horrible. But I also tend to not give a damn on what I'm wearing if I'm busy with school. Damn it, all you need to do is take care of basic hygiene and not be naked to class. I'm studying for exams here! Who's thinking of makeup and jewelry and fashion-conscious clothes when you have stuff to do?! (Also, my laundry wasn't dry yet so I had no other shirts to wear.)

Although I have heard much worse from boys in my lifetime, being a human being with basic social cues, I of course was much irked at such a reaction. Yes, I know  I'm not pretty, you'll probably never "tap that". Can we please move on? You're in college and should be acting more maturely than this.

But alas, I meet the same guys again as I go and print my Psych homework. As I swing the computer lab door open, my eyes meet theirs, and a look of recognition comes to them. They huddle and quiet down. I'm not sure if they know that I can understand them, but I look pretty Korean, so that should be a giveaway already.

(Again, I realize I may be super paranoid and they might not actually be talking about me, but seeing how they laughed at me in the afternoon, the probability is there.)

The guys start talking, leaving out the subject of the sentence (probably because I was in earshot)

"Good enough for you?" says one guy.

"I told you, I'm not settling for anything less than Shin Min-ah!" proclaims the other guy.

"But you're not good enough for Shin Min-ah." Another guy says with a snicker.

"Hey!"

By the way, this is the lovely Shin Min-ah.

(I think she'd say no to college guys, as she's much older and it would be creepy.)

Eh.

Guys want hot girls, nothing's new, end of story. But shoot me if it didn't sting a little.

Perhaps I should have gone straight up tomboy, not giving a damn about such girly matters as beauty and just be proud and manlier than other guys. I already have the voice and an affinity for action to set me off in that route. Also, I'm already "manlier" than my boyfriend in some ways (he knows more fashion brands than I do, for starters.)

I also like testosterone-fueled shows like TTGL. Whee explosions!

But alas, being born a heterosexual girl with a fragment of girliness, I do care. I may do kendo and rave over the manliness of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, but I will fawn over pretty dresses and makeup on another day. And no matter what people say, my face is not something that will magically transform into that of a supermodel if I look at myself in the mirror and talk to myself enough. That's freaking brainwashing, not real life.

So while I detest having to be jeered at by several immature strangers on a college campus, I also don't feel like throwing away makeup and tearing off dresses in rebellion. There are better things to do in life.

So the take-away lesson of today's incident is:

AT LEAST ANIMALS REALLY LIKE ME.

...

*goes to a corner and sighs*

The World is Big

And we are insignificant specks compared to others. Sometimes we think we're brilliant people, though, and it takes something to occur to humble you and realize that oh, hey, I'm not a big shot after all.

See, it was my grand project to create a blog that explains stuff going on in Korea, maybe comment on several current events or two, receive questions from other users about Korea so that I can answer them. I was foolish enough to think that there wouldn't be any blogs that already did that - at least, any EXTENSIVE, PROMINENT blogs.

Ask a Korean is already such a blog, and damn it, his posts are extremely well written.

You can see in some topics that he really did the research, citing multiple sources and providing extensive background information to the extent that I would not have done, while delivering it all with a witty and objective writing style. Well, damn. It was more than my measly beginnings of a blog could ever have offered, seriously.

And thus, my little beginnings of the Other Blog started to look very informal and stupid in comparison.

And I am now left with a sort of helplessness as I look at my newly-hatched project, shamed before it even had a chance to blossom. What to do?

The quickest, easiest way would be to nip the bud, terminate the embarrassing project and pretend it never existed. Unfortunately, my pride does not settle for quits.

I could, perhaps, amass information to the extent as Ask a Korean and end up as a mediocre (and unintentional) imitation of his blog. But not only is that unoriginal, this guy knows what he does and delivers it good enough. He's a friggin attorney for crying out loud.

Or, I could try to somehow diffentiate the blog somehow, take a slight change in its direction, and see how it goes. While this option seems the most appealing, there is the obvious question of: then how should I go about with my Other Blog?

Oy.

(Edit: Upon realizing that I would not have the time or effort to keep updating my Other Blog in a consistent manner, and realizing that my entries sucked a lot more than I realized, I deleted the Other Blog.)