This recession ROCKS!

I just lost my day job, my awesome rad day job that paid me decent money for 20 hours a week so I could take that money and the rest of the week and pour it into building my company. I love my 2 bosses dearly. They are on the verge of closing up shop permanently after 20+ years and I am sad for them.

I am now looking for a job. These are the things I am qualified/looking for:

--part time or freelance
--telecommuting also cool
--admin stuff
--teaching English and any fashion related studies
--design, illustration, construction work, graphic stuff
--being my fabulous self
--make ridiculously delicious Korean food for events

Of course I will be looking for things on my own but any help is most appreciated.

Thanks!

shelley pepper is sick

she is recovering from meningitis. she is still at the hospital but will be going home in a few days. please go visit her at the hospital, or email her or call her or visit her at her house when she gets home. she's not contagious unless you french kiss her and she's not really up for that right now anyway. ;P

recovering from being near death is horrible, but recovering alone is worse. she misses cole a lot but can't spend a lot of time with him right now and that's making her sad too. you can help by cheering her up!

email me if you need her contact info.


p.s. i took the above photo at cheeky's wedding.

the way we were

Dammit, I love tribe. I hope it doesn't die but I'm afraid it will and soon. I met some really awesome people on tribe, as well as some not so awesome. I got laid a lot from tribe. I met my husband on tribe. I've snagged temp jobs off tribe listings when I first moved to SF and was jobhunting. I've gone to some cool parties and learned a lot about things I didn't even know existed.

This fall will mark 5 years I've been on tribe. I've come a long way since that poor, barely-out -of-college, invalid, overworked soul up to her eyeballs in debt and tiredness who jumped on tribe only because some kid she once boinked made her join and the doctor-ordered bedrest made her bored out her skull. (Fuck. Who was that girl?)

All these million private messages, private flirtations, public scandals, ridiculous games, fun times and imagined dramas. I wish I could go to amazon.com and order a book holding the archives of the past 5 years of my doings and undoings on tribe.

Yes, I'm preemptively mourning its loss in a rather pathetic way but I can't help it. I get sappy. I'm not sure if a lot people know this about me but I am. I can be wonderfully, horrifically sappy. Go ahead, mock me, but I know deep inside, you'll mourn a little too. I mean, after all, you're still here, logged in, and reading tribe blog posts, aren't you? ;)

hello????

hello...ello..llo...o...o..

are y'all afraid tribe will die if you post something? i thought y'all were itching to jump back on? or am i in some specific corner of tribe where no one is posting?

hello! how are you!? is there anybody out there?

acting my age

I took some me-time/fam-time this past weekend. I spent a little time being a kid in her 20s, which is what I am. Sometimes people forget that. Mostly, I forget that.

I drove down to L.A. on Wednesday. I’m really lucky in that Assaf gets along with my family and I get along with all the in-laws I’ve met so far. It wasn't always this way. Just before I left, my dad asked us if we were going to come down for Christmas and Assaf said “sure” without sarcasm.

(None of my family members have met any of my in-laws. I would need a note-taker at my side at all times to document the hilarity if and when that were to happen. Loud, short-tempered, blunt and yet excessively polite around strangers Koreans meet quieter but still chattychatty Israeli Jews with Polish manners. Are you laughing yet? Who wants to sign up to be that fly on the wall?)

My dad’s new girlfriend is a very good cook so the husband and I had some really great home-cooked meals. She packed a spare ice chest full of jars of kimchee and various Korean pickled veggies and freezer bags of marinated beef for us to take home. I’m a decent cook but she’s got mad skills.

My dad also prepared this Korean ground bean and powder honey stuff for me. Apparently you dissolve a spoonful in milk to drink and it’s good to treat thinning hair. My dad’s already seen some regrowth and his friend’s lashes scrape his glasses now. My dad knows my already fine hair tends to fall out when I stress out so he bought me a lot of this stuff. I also got his excellent fruit smoothie recipe. Oh, and his aviators. Hee. "Dad, we look so much alike, I'm sure they'll look good on me...lookitthat! Who thinks they look better on me? Family vote!"

Speaking of hair, I stopped by this beauty shop on Larchmont, after stopping by my favorite sushi place for lunch, and *finally* got myself a bottle of Klorane’s dry shampoo. This stuff is amazing! I have thin, fine hair that gets greasy quickly. I shower around 7:30am every day and often looks just-barely-not-quite-disgusting by 7:30pm and of course it goes downhill from there. It’s a white spray but the color disappears against my dark brown hair once you comb it through.

On Saturday, I finally got to meet the infamous Charlie that Tara and Frances have been talking about so much. Fun guy. His nickname for Assaf is "Chatty Cathy". He'd be in the middle of telling some anecdote and burst out with, "Hey man! Stop talking so much! I can't get a word in edgewise around you!" heeheehee...

Both my brother, James, and my cousin, Mike (Grace's kid brother), who is practically another brother to me are deep in college prep mode–the former to start, the latter to transfer. We had some long talks and it was good to get my mind off of my own crap and feel sorta useful at the same time. It was also good to remind myself of how lucky I am to a. know what I want to do with my life and b. be past college. I mean, college was great but the roller coaster of uncertainty, cockiness, fear, and carelessness can only be ridden for so long.

Now I'm back in Oakland, still trying to figure out this ZHI mess I've gotten myself into. Fun stuff. I find it hysterical that random strangers hunt me down on the interwebs and ask me for career advice. HA!

thankyouthankyouthankyou!!!

dear robyn, promise, jennif, jae unnee, and marc
you are TEH AWESOMEST and i luff you all.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxo,
Z

dear emily,
your slice o' pie is still in my fridge.
xoxo
Z

dear jrat,
thanks for liking my food.
xoxo
Z

dear nina,
thanks for the cute text!
xoxo
Z


(i have rad friends and the world should know.)

cutting helpers

dear really cool people who offered to help me make press kits,

it appears that the majority of helpers are available on monday, which is good cuz i just remembered i'm heading down to l.a. wednesday night.

Monday, August 18
doors open 7pm, come whenever, leave whenever
if you don't have my address, please email me at zoe at zoehong dot com
promise, call me and i will come fetch you
robyn, mebbe i will come fetch you too if logistics work out

dinner will be served and there will be pie and aloe juice

thanks a million billion jillion! loveloveLOVE!
xoxo
Z

China Olympic ceremony star mimed

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-...7556058.stm

A pretty girl who won national fame after singing at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games was only miming.

Wearing a red dress and pigtails, Lin Miaoke charmed a worldwide audience with a rendition of "Ode to the Motherland". But the singer was Yang Peiyi, who was not allowed to appear because she is not as "flawless" as nine-year-old Lin. The show's musical director said Lin was used because it was in the best interests of the country.

Speaking on Beijing Radio station, musical director Chen Qigang said the organisers needed a girl with both a good image and a good voice. They faced a dilemma because although Lin was prettier, seven-year-old Yang had the better voice, Mr Chen said.

"After several tests, we decided to put Lin Miaoke on the live picture, while using Yang Peiyi's voice," he told the radio station.

"The reason for this is that we must put our country's interest first," he added.

"The girl appearing on the picture must be flawless in terms of her facial expression and the great feeling she can give to people."

Singer Lin, who is being called the "smiling angel", has already become a media celebrity because of her performance.

She told state-run China Daily that she felt "beautiful" in the red dress she wore during the performance.

Her dad told the newspaper that she already had fans all over the country.

According to Chinese news reports, Yang said she did not regret the decision, saying she was satisfied to have had her voice featured in the opening ceremony.




i'm spreading this story around like hot pepper flakes in my kitchen--anywhere possible.

i hate that story so much i can taste bile in my throat. i hate the stupid "for the country's best interests" line, i hate the stupid vapid "cute" girl who is all proud of her fake fans and i hate the subservient attitude shoved down the "ugly" girl's throat all her life that allows her to accept this treatment. for the good of the country??? you join the military for your country. you pay your taxes for your country. you vote for the good of your country. it's ludicrous.

"honey, you're just not that cute. you must sing this song absolutely perfectly and allow someone cuter than you to take the credit. it's for the good of the country."

of course, judging from what i know of the chinese government, the "ugly" girl is most likely unhappy but under a lot of pressure to pretend to be happy.

once i overheard relatives having the following conversation:

"the oldest, she's very smart."
"yes, very smart. she could go to a top school"
"it's good she's smart because she most likely can't get married"
"it's a shame she's so fat, since her face is actually nicer than the younger one's"
"it'll be fine, she will do well on her own. husbands are such nuisances anyways" *a round of laughs*

that undertone tone of being smart as a backup in case a girl isn't cute enough to land a man. come to think of it, i married at a younger age than any of my girl-cousins. hrm. never noticed that before.




anyway, i'm done rambling for today. i think.