no one asked: pieces i can't stop wearing, books i recommend and the pressure to post about current events

14: what i'm re-wearing, not buying and saying no to...

Re-wearing…

The St. Agni Square Neck Top.

It’s been my go-to warm weather top when I want to look chic and put together while trying my hardest to not sweat in 90 degree weather. I recently took it with me to New York, wore it in sweltering heat in Paris over the summer, and on a gallery date in Los Angeles with a friend. I almost always wear it with the Vince trousers I swear by and the affordable (and very comfortable!) Everlane flats that have also made it into my shoe rotation.

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Reading…

Cantoras by Carolina De Robertis, a book I highly recommend and one I was so kindly gifted by the Knopf team from Penguin Random House. It’s a really beautiful novel, filled with so much important history about the dictatorship in 1970s Uruguay and celebrates female friendship, queer love and chosen family. I loved getting to know each character and shed tears of both sadness and joy while reading this book. I think it would make such a good movie or tv show adaptation — especially because we need more stories like this to be read and watched.

I finished it during my time in New York, keeping it with me everywhere I went and quickly finished it while riding public transportation or while waiting for a friend for our coffee date.

More of what I’m reading here: If Cats Disappeared from the World by Genki Kawamura, The Farm by Joanne Ramos (a good read always but especially now as October is Filipino American History Month!), and Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

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Eating…

Home-cooked Vietnamese and Filipino dishes in a chic New York loft over a candlelit table. Earlier this month, Xin Mời and Seen Library came together in celebration of our cultures by sharing our food and our stories with friends, old and new.

The books curated were written by Filipino and Vietnamese authors — books that we don’t always find in the mainstream. Books that touch on themes shared by both cultures — familial expectations and pressures, the search for identity, and the realities of the American Dream. Books that make us feel seen. You can see some of the books shared here.

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What I’m not spending my money on…

Alcoholic beverages. I think I mentioned this one before but briefly. But it’s on my mind again because I recently had a night out (dinner at Gem Wine and drinks at Reception Bar) with a few friends and really saw the difference between my bill and theirs just because I hadn’t opted in on the drinks. And yes — I’m that annoying person at the table who insists that we not split the bill equally if I’m the only one not drinking. I thought about how often my friends and I go out each week or month and know that those costs really add up.

In a Huffington Post article, it says: “So how much is drinking actually costing you? If you have three drinks a day, five days a week, at an average of $10 a pop, you’re spending $150 a week, $650 a month or $7,800 a year just on alcohol ― not including any additional costs, like server tips or taking a taxi instead of driving. Even if you drink only on weekends, at two drinks per day you are spending about $2,500 a year…

Prefer wine at home? …The cost of a bottle of white wine averages $14.41, while an average bottle of red wine costs $15.66. If you drink one each per week for a year, that’s more than $1,563.”

The article then goes on to share the hidden and indirect costs of drinking, too.

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Saying yes to…