Went Semi-Viral on Red Note

6:17 AM (of Tuesday, March 25th, 2025)

Today is Monday, March 24th, 2025, and it was a regular work day today. This weekend I was with my cousins mainly, there was around 10 of us. We just hung out at one of my cousin's home and walked around DC. I've known my cousins for 20+ years, I've lived with some for a while, saw all of them for a few weeks every year while growing up, and they are pretty much the same from how I've always known them, just adult versions of their past selves. It's funny how it's possible to infer how life will play out for people based on their personality, actions, temperament, appearance. Maybe it's just me, but I think a lot of how we will turn out is predictable.

Most of us will turn out to be average, mediocre, or absolute nobody's. Everyone has high expectations of us, especially when we're young, but only a tiny amount of us will do something exceptional. My basic criteria for someone being a "somebody" that stands out, is that they have a Wikipedia page on them. I've had this criteria since I was in high school, always wanting to be someone significant enough to have a Wikipedia page on them. It may never come true, even with all my effort at accomplishing something, I may go down as someone that basically never existed at all.

My cousins are cool but a little behind on a lot of things. We watched a rerun of the 2008 Beijing Olympics opening ceremony, and they were cracking jokes about how all the Chinese were under slave labor and made to obey the CCP which is why they were so obedient in the opening ceremony. They would make comments like that, not knowing that the Chinese probably have more freedoms than us Americans, and they are also ahead of America in pretty much every industry. My cousins also needlessly eat animals and during dinners had plates laid out in animal body parts. Since I mostly hang out with other vegans and we don't buy or eat any animal parts nor lay them out on tables, observing such behavior just seemed so barbaric, backwards, and behind to me.

It was fun socializing with them though. Some of my cousins are married, some of my cousins brought their partners or girlfriends. It was fun hanging out and just having fun, everyone's living their own separate lives, going through university or working, doing their own thing.

I'm pretty unique amongst my cousins in that I speak Tagalog or Filipino fluently, I'm the only one who can, except for another cousin who arrived here recently from the Philippines, while everyone else was born here and only knows English. Some of my cousins are mixed white/Filipino as well. Also, except for my mom, I'm the only one in my family who looks Chinese/Asian, everyone else looks Filipino or White/Filipino mixed. I think the appearance is distinctive, none of them would be able to pass as Chinese/Japanese/Korean/Vietnamese while it seems like I am able to.

9:04 AM (of Tuesday, March 25th, 2025)

I went semi-viral on Red Note today, Monday, March 24th, 2025, posting about my appearance. The last time I checked, a few hours ago, I had 99+ notifications on everything. The post has around 25k views the last time I checked. The post has hundreds of likes and comments, all in the span of a few hours.

In the post, I basically asked "Can I pass off as Chinese?" and I posted a selfie of myself. The comments were mainly "yes", or "you're not Chinese?" or "you are Japanese/Korean/Vietnamese" or "you look South East Asian." No one guessed Philippines, but it does fall under South East Asian. They also posted questions and riddles that only Chinese would know, such as "How does the jade wine glass cost?" and similar comments like that. I answered I don't know.

I didn't get any "you are handsome" comments. None. So I'm not handsome right now, but hopefully I can be. There were a few "You look sleepy" or "Are you tired?" even some "you are ugly" comments too. Ouch. If you are handsome or attractive, people will post it, regardless of anything. I hope I can get comments like that some day, but right now, nothing. Maybe 10 years ago I could have gotten positive comments like that. It sucks getting older.

In a previous post though, which I have now made private, I asked "Am I considered handsome in China?" and people were just very blunt in their replies. Unlike this viral post, they didn't post that I was ugly, but they were posting things like "If you are not handsome where you are, how can you handsome be in China?" which is sort of similar. One person did say they thought I was good looking though, just one person, and it was a girl. So that was one positive thing. But the blunt replies did make me want to make it private so I did, they just hurt too much.

Anyway, I worked today, exercised, and went to Wal-Mart with my dad to buy a charger for my laptop, because I left mine at my cousin's place. For once in a long time, my arms are actually sore. Maybe it's due to the cold? I don't really know, but my arms are sore after working them out a bunch today. Is it fine to continue to exercise them while sore? I don't know because soreness is something I rarely encounter. I looked it up, and it should be fine, but also that rest is best.

Anyway, that was my day today.