Steven told me recently that girls don't find me physically attractive if I keep wearing my tweed blazer which makes me look like an old man (NOT YOUNG!). I told him that I like antiquated material. He whipped out the argument that girls don't like this kind of antique shit because it's not fashionable. I objected because I loved the jacket because I spent $240 on it and I acquired it on discount. I also loved the jacket because it fit me perfectly without having to resort to a tailor. I also broke it in and it feels like an heirloom that I will pass onto my son who will complain that it is probably itchy and ugly, after hearing Steven's gripe. His opinion may be based on his perception and this includes the things that girls told him; he could be relying on the fashion sense that particular girls he knows have told him. From these few girls or many, he could then generalize and say that most girls in general dislike tweed or old fashion, when in reality the hipsters or Chipsters (Asian hipsters) do wear Urban Outfitters rag style clothing. Their material has resemblance to my tweed jacket. Or perhaps Steven was commenting on my blue color. No, I'm pretty sure he was commenting on the entirety of my jacket itself. Keep in mind that Steven looks like a liang jai; in fact he is a liang jai who looks like a star from TVB or a Chinese drama. His hair resembles a Japanese or Korean pop star hairdo and he has been seen walking alongside girls. I take his advice for a day or two because I trust him; he reeks of popular guy status so I listen to him. But because I'm not close to him (we haven't hung out; in fact he refused my one-on-one hangout because he wanted girls to join!) and I don't consider him necessarily a close friend, I don't take his advice to heart. And because I barely see him in the halls I may not even keep him in my mind. It's clear that he could be making assumptions that the girls he likes will not like my style because the girls he likes do not like that style. But those are the girls he knows; they don't know me so it's hard to say whether they enjoy the style on me or not. Then again, if girls hate tweed altogether, they might hate tweed altogether, no matter who rocks it. Always an exception right?
"People like me" who are hipsters are those who frequent thrift stores like Elisabeth. When we went to three stores along Lexington and 23rd, we glimpsed all things used and secondhand. We indulged in antiquated furniture and books because their prices were low and quite a steal! Sometimes I become scared whether the clothing I buy belonged to a dead person. That would be bad luck to wear a deceased person's shirt or sweater. I am not fully superstitious but sometimes my parents urge me to be whenever they say these superstitious things around the dinner table or in random conversations. By stating that I am a chipster, I have typified myself and conformed to hipster culture that I equally have pride in and equally rail against. I seem to have a love-hate relationship with chipsterdom. Probably hypocrisy at its worst. To me, a hipster is someone who is pseudo-intellectual, pretentious, artificial, superficial, and ostentatious. All of these qualifiers describe me on some levels on some days. But if you see it that way, everyone can be a hipster one second or another. That is not the way to look at it. As a social identity, a hipster gravitates towards groups of other hipsters who swim in smart-alec things to say and incredibly pseudo-intelligent phrases, mantras, etc. It is appealing to throw around my hipster identity because I get to be accepted by certain groups, hipster or non-hipster. But this also depends on their ability to notice that I am a hipster, or not.
My self-ascribed and self-determined social identity as a chipster is a love-hate relationship not per se, but in theory: I vacillate between this identity as a literary intellect and philosopher and the identity of a normal person who does not belong to any social group. Clearly this is troublesome because I wield my hipsterness whenever I feel like it. Sometimes I can turn my hipsterness on and at my own liking I can shut it off and completely neutralize it. Some can say that this is role-playing and that all of us role play because as Shakespeare said, "all the world's a stage." There's blendability in being a chipster. When I'm around other hipsters or chipsters, I can be a hipster/chipster and blend it seamlessly, or as I like to think. This perception is never really confirmed or aligned because I don't walk into a crowd and ask them if they consider themselves hipster and if they think I am hipster enough to join them. This is simply ridiculous to even ask because it is only self-serving and maybe even self-fulfilling. So does one become in bad faith if they pretend to be a hipster or simply take on the role of a hipster? Though being a hipster isn't easy because it takes more than just fashion, but the mentality to be a hipster. To assume the role of a hipster when you are really not a hipster would be in bad faith. But what about being a hipster and then assimilating slowly and fully becoming a hipster. But this depends on a continuum scale of genuinity or authenticity. This scale can produce many different levels of hipsterness in order to measure the achieved or failure of being a hipster.
I spoke with Alex after my audition and I found out that we concur that there are few authentic Asian hipster girls than seems on the surface level. On the surface chipster chicks may dress in black or have vintage shit or attend indie band shows, but deep down they are really not as liberal as they designate themselves. Their facades are entirely different; they might really be conservative. Alex believes that hipsterdom allows for them to display uninhibited liberal sides, but secretly they may be conservatively, especially after there are revelations (after sex or after being drunk). These moments reveal the true colors and it seeps past the hipsterish clothing or faded jeans or Clarks. So we both do agree; I was looking for someone to share my opinion that Asian hipster girls are phoneys and that there are only a handful of them that are committed to hipsterdom and to knowing smart shit and understanding it. The rest put on a facade and put on a show for other unsuspecting people. I was also looking for someone to share my opinion so that I may avoid looking for a genuine smart Asian chipster. Either way, there can't really be girls who study that much and be incredibly chipster. I hope that the phenomenon is true: beauty and intellect do not mix. If both mix then you have an incredibly balanced person, and who is really balanced? The counterargument to this would be: at what moments do we see perfection? And why should we search for perfection when we know that's not to be found eternally? Perfection is captured in slight moments.
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