It’s almost been three months in San Francisco and it’s starting to slow down and feel more like home. The last few weeks have been less adventurous and crazy, although one of the biggest highlights is:

I SURFED UNDER THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE!

BOOYEAH!

That was probably the only real thing on my bucket list here. In that sense, I’ve gone so crazy about surfing, that I haven’t been on a single weekend trip or day trip for that matter because all I want to do at the weekends is surf as much as I can. It also makes it impossible for me to plan anything.

Besides, me trying to figure out what I want to do in life, it's been an uneventful month. For the first time in my life, I have the time and mental space to think about what I want to do in life. It sounds cheesy, but I spent the last 8 years studying, working many different kinds of jobs, travelling, joining random entrepreneurship competitions, founding a non-profit and whatnot. I didn’t have time to think about life decisions.

That said, I have occasionally doubted whether or not it was the right choice to come here. In my dad's words: "Fay, you've already been poor (aka. a student) for 8 years and you finally graduated, and now you want to go on another internship for zero monies? Why don't you get a job?" He's right, I definitely did not need the internship, but what I did need was the paid intermezzo.

When I said yes to the internship, I knew that it was going to be financially challenging and maybe not my dream job, but the whole idea was for me to come here, learn about another culture and not dive into the first thing that came my way.

Although I was a little lost for a while, I feel like I’m finding some sense of direction again. Of all the times people have said “follow your heart” or “do what feels right for you” or “use your inner compass”, I’m slowly starting to understand what they mean. Read more about my attempt to make some big life decisions and the opportunity cost in this post.

So what have I been up to this last month?

Getting a lot more active outside of surfing. I got a 30 days for $30 yoga pass at The Center, so I’ve been going there 2-3 times a week. I finally picked up running again and have been starting uphill interval training and attempting to run up to twin peaks at a 300m elevation over 2 miles.
Saw Alt-J live in the Fox Theater in Oakland, the most incredible concert venue I have ever seen, and also an amazing concert. It was formerly a movie theatre from 1928 to 1970 and was refurbished in the 2000s. Not only was the architecture stunning, sound quality and light effects were also on point!
I started volunteering for SF Climate Week with Marcella and Morgan in an attempt to get more into the sustainability scene here.
I had a brief run-in with a heavily dressed BART police gang this morning. I unintentionally didn’t check into the metro properly this morning at the BART so when I tried to get out and the doors didn’t open, so I clumsily climbed over (with my bike) because I didn’t know how else to get out. Apparently, you’re not allowed to do that, but I panicked.