a few questions for you! + life updates

what advice would you give your 23-year-old self? what's the strangest thing that's happened to you this year? what's a folktale you were told growing up? what's a word you've been thinking about?

I’m turning 23 today, which according to the internet means I’ve lived 25% of the average lifespan of an Asian-American female in the USA. Every year I’ve asked for thought-gifts on questions I can’t get out of my head. My questions this year: What is the strangest/most surreal thing that has happened to you (this year, or ever)? I’ve been entirely immersed in magical realism and surrealist fiction this year, and curious especially about sensory details and the haptic/auratic experience of the surreal. My friend told me about waking up the morning after she learned she was six months…

related reading

• 23 thoughts for turning 23 - by Cindy Zhang - cindo thinks!cindo.substack.com
• 40 questions to ask yourself every yearstephango.com
• 99 Additional Bits of Unsolicited Advicekk.org
• tall childinsecuretea.substack.com
• 2025: A life built from the daysjzhao.xyz
• How to Make the Most of Your 20ssubstack.com
• How to Make the Most of Your 20ssubstack.com
• 23 Truths I Wish I Knew at 23substack.com
• The annual post: 2023 editioneliqian.substack.com
• round the sunsubstack.com
• 23 thoughts for turning 23cindo.substack.com
• 25% Loadedyoungmoney.co