I have moved to ActionJoJo.com!

Hi friends and faithful readers!

After months of dreaming about it, I have finally moved my blog to ActionJoJo.com!  In a short while, this website will be automatically redirected to ActionJoJo.com so please be sure to update your bookmarks, readers, and RSS feeds to stay in touch!  If you have subscribed to this blog, I ask that you subscribe one more time to the new site.  Changes are on the horizon for ActionJoJo and I want you all to stay with me for the ride.  Future posts will always center on the theme of culture and include more great info on the borough of Queens (NYC), my future and past travels, and my new career as a yoga teacher!

The new site has two new posts.  One centered on the annual New York Times Travel Show at the Javits Center…

…and the other, on St. Joseph’s Day (March 19) and the Sicilian traditions associated with this feast day that remain alive in Queens.

Thank you all for your loyal readership!  It means a lot to me to have your support!  See you at ActionJoJo.com.  Now, go out and explore!

Love,
JOJO

The Year of the Dragon

Happy Lunar New Year! I heard a fellow New Yorker once say this interesting observation, “New York City celebrates three New Years: Gregorian, Jewish, and Chinese.”  (By the way, Koreans and Vietnamese also celebrate this Lunar New Year.)  While New Yorkers from other cultures–Tibetans, Bolivians and Peruvians of Incan descent, for example–celebrate their respective new years too, the most prominent ones are these three.  As if to confirm this observation, the Empire State Building was lit red and yellow on Jan 23 to commemorate the arrival of the Year of the Dragon.

Chinese astrology assigns a different animal to each year for 12 years and after the twelfth year, the cycle repeats again.  Similar to the Western zodiac signs, personality traits are attributed to each animal and it is believed that individuals born under each sign exhibit such traits.

My Komodo Dragon Mug from Starbucks

I was born in the Year of the Dragon and an Aries. These two signs are often said to be the cultural parallel of the other since they supposedly share similar traits. Dragons and Aries are often described as leaders, risk takers, and adventurous while also being assertive, judgmental, and quick tempered. I was never one to believe in astrologers nor have I ever had my palm or tarot cards read. Yet somehow, I am strongly drawn to my astrological signs for their seemingly accurate descriptions of my personality.  I like to think that being both signs makes me doubly potent!  I swell with pride at all of my supposed positive traits and feel encouraged to act in these ways in times of uncertainty.  The negative traits serve as excuses to support my bad habits such as my proclivity to start many projects without finishing one.

A new year means a clean slate full of endless possibilities. When I was a child, I always loved the start of the school year in September: the smell of fresh crayons in the box, newly sharpened pencils all the same height, and unwritten composition notebooks waiting to be filled. But by October, I would be bored of them because the luster was gone. As an adult, I still act that way today in many aspects of my life.

Months ago as a bikram yoga teacher trainee, we were required to memorize a dialogue—a script if you will—for each of the 26 postures that we teach in class. A large part of training was spent in posture clinic, where each trainee recites one posture as three fellow trainees demonstrate. This recitation was done in front of 40 fellow trainees and [at least] two teachers who provided feedback at the end of each recited posture. Posture clinic lasted for 6 weeks and it was the part of teacher training I dreaded the most. Every time I went up, my goal was to deliver verbatim dialogue. I needed to be flawless.  I needed to be perfect.  Yet just like everything in life, I never finished reciting the end of each posture:  either I blanked out or never bothered to learn those last few lines.  Teachers often gave me the same feedback:  finish what you started.

I blamed it on my Dragon-Aries personality.  Was it a lack of focus, a lack of desire? Later, a teacher back home suggested that I choose not to finish things because I don’t want my end-product to be judged for fear of not attaining perfection. It was a breakthrough moment for me. This thought never occurred to me but it makes a lot of sense.

Dragon years are considered to be very lucky and are a great time to take huge risks or undergo incredible change.  For people born dragons, 2012 is full of promise and highly fortuitous.  Big changes are coming to ActionJoJo this year that include: a website overhaul; greater and more consistent print and video content creation; and more engagement with both my local and online communities. Heck, world domination is another goal! There, I said it.

I left an office job to create a life of freedom and flexibility to do what I love. However, I need to earn a livelihood to make this new life a sustainable reality. In order for me to achieve these goals, I have to remember to strive for action and not perfection. Heck, my online name should serve as a daily reminder. It will be hard work to overcome my bad habits but I will use my positive Dragon-Aries traits to attempt to trump them.

Welcome, Year of the Dragon! I’ve been waiting for you.

Dragon Meets Dragon in Lima's Chinatown (Peru 2003)

Flower Petal Blooming

Happy New Year friends!

And so it begins again.  A new year.  A new promise.  A new resolution.

Last year, I resolved to write a blog post once a week.  I was doing well for  a few months but eventually that goal became surprisingly unmanageable.  So much of my life changed last year as result of both choice and serendipity.  My husband lost his job about a year ago at this time.  I voluntarily left my comfortable job in September to pursue my dream of becoming self‑employed.  If you described to me my current life at this time last year, I would have labeled you certifiably mad.  Yet life has a beautiful way of unfolding itself at precisely the right time.  What was once a seemingly unimaginable road became the only viable option in the end.

As I started blogging more seriously in early 2011 about my travels, about culture, and about my home – New York City, and more specifically, the borough of Queens – I discovered joy in the act of writing and in the act of sharing what I knew with others.  After a few weeks, I was getting recognition for my work.  In July, I attended my very first conference for travelers and bloggers in Vancouver.  People at the conference encouraged me to do more.  The seed that I once planted years ago about self-employment began to flourish and grow.

When I hopped on that plane to Los Angeles in September, I had no idea what 9 weeks of full-time Bikram yoga teacher certification would be like.  All I knew was the conviction I felt in my heart that I was doing the right thing even if it was unconventional.  Those 9 weeks challenged me physically, mentally, and emotionally.  All of my strengths and weaknesses were made bare for me to face with no place to hide.  As trainees, we were encouraged to “trust the process” even though our hearts screamed out, “F*$K the process!!!”  Breakdowns happened gradually as did the breakthroughs.  By November, I came out a changed person, shedding layers of myself that no longer served me.

In Bikram yoga, the first of the 26 postures is half moon pose where students bend to the right or left creating a crescent shape with their bodies. As a teacher, my job is to remind my students of proper alignment as they hold the posture. In half moon pose, I instruct them to adjust their shoulders so they can “open up their chest like a flower petal blooming.” This tiny adjustment leads to a gradual opening of the upper body where the chest lifts up exposing the heart, the piece of ourselves we shield and protect the most.

Half Moon Pose at LAX: My Love for Yoga & Travel Intersect

Life is like that flower petal blooming. Change happens so incrementally that often we don’t notice it has happened.  Only when we look back and see the distance traversed do we marvel at its occurrence.  So here’s to the accomplishments, the failures, the struggles, and the discoveries of 2011. Together, they form the stepping stones to the unwritten events of 2012. Wherever life leads me this year, I am going to trust the process.

Without judgment and without attachment, I accept that I did not achieve my blogging goal for 2011. Yet once again, I have set a goal that I will write more and blog regularly.

“Never too late, never too old, never too bad, and never too sick, to start from the scratch once again.” ~ Bikram Choudhury