I love learning and teaching, novelty, affection, and debauchery. My ideal life would balance intellectual pursuits, hedonistic escapes, and humanitarian activism.

I want to have great big adventures interspersed with snuggling and talking it all over!

...

I'm currently a project manager at a local tech company. Past livelihoods include: scientist (published in cognitive neuroscience and psycholinguistics), massage therapist, vendor of snapple at raves, nurse's aide to patients with Alzheimer's disease, and tutor to underprivileged youth (teaching physics in Spanish, aw yeah).

I love to travel! I've combined work and play to visit nine countries on four continents in the past year. I love discovering the small everyday details: how people greet each other, the typical breakfast, the organization of items in a supermarket, what people wear. Some of my favorite places include Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Montreal, the South Island of New Zealand, and the former Yugoslavia. Places I really want to go: Bahia (Brazil), Alaska, South Africa, Goa (India), Bangkok.

Other interests: photography, dancing, hiking, skiing, massage, geology, and reading. Things I've done a little and want to do more: kung fu, wind surfing, rollerblading, snorkeling (I need to upgrade to scuba soon), and track days (car racing).

In general, I'm trying to make the world a better place. I like experience and knowledge for their own sake, but especially in the service of improving the human condition. I'm particularly interested in maximizing the ratio of improvement to investment, finding the opportunities for tipping points à la Malcolm Gladwell.

Catalyzing: Things seem to happen faster when I'm around.

Dancing: Dancing is happiness, and I'm not picky about the style. I've enjoyed every style of dance I've tried, including latin (salsa, merengue, lambada, etc), other social dances (blues, waltz, swing, etc), hip hop, modern, belly dance, eastern european folk, general club dancing, the stuff I did at raves, etc, etc.

Teaching and communication in general: I have a knack for cutting through the cruft, finding the essence of an issue, and coming up with the frame that clarifies it. If I understand it, I can make others understand it too.

Learning and asking good questions: I'm quick. :)

Massage: I'm a fifth generation massage therapist, certified and all! My grandmother, her mother, her mother's mother -- all were the massage therapists in their village in Macedonia. I wish I had asked my grandma how massage fit into village life before she passed away. In retrospect, it doesn't seem to go with the cows, farming, dirt lifestyle.

Languages: Ask me about my very miscellaneous knowledge of Armenian, Swahili, Nahuatl, and others. :)

Also: making people feel comfortable, solving problems, finding connections, cuddling, getting excited by small things, niceties, getting past the niceties, going deep, reading people, teaching others to read people, being too silly, being too earnest, hosting parties, portrait photography.

My big smile and even bigger personality.

Consider this a list of representative examples, since it's neither complete nor up-to-date.

BOOKS: Petit Prince, 1984, Zen and the Art, Unbearable Lightness, Lolita, The Illuminatus! Trilogy, Wrinkle In Time, Egalia's Daughters, Catch 22, Tipping Point, Wisdom of Crowds. AUTHORS: Stephenson, James Ellroy, Atwood, Neruda, Palahniuk, Woolf, Barrett Browning, García Márquez, Asimov, Plath, Ezra Pound.

MOVIES: Kill Bill, Southpark, The Seven Samurai, Austin Powers, Hedwig, Apocalypse Now, Fight Club, Holy Grail, Adaptation, But I'm a Cheerleader, 12 Monkies, and of course, OFFICE SPACE. :) DIRECTORS: John Waters, Woody Allen, the Coen Bros, Fellini, Almodóvar, David Lynch, Kevin Smith, François Ozon & especially Kusturica.

MUSIC: Gotan Project, M.I.A., Tom Waits, Manu Chao, Portishead, Bregovic, Balasevic, Stephen Merritt, Si*Sé, Sarah McLachlan, Ozomatli, Dave Brubeck, The Cure, Jamiroquai, Björk, Cibo Matto, Patsy Cline, Norah Jones, Fabulosos Cadillacs, Erykah Badu, Mo' Horizons, Molotov, Bach, Zorn. Genres for DANCING: hip hop, house, salsa, samba, bossa nova, swing, ska, reggaeton, reggae, drum n bass, etc.

Food: I enjoy cuisines of all kinds, especially ethnic variations on home cookin'.

The material list:
- a web browser
- a digital camera
- walking shoes
- warm-ish bodies of water (the Adriatic, if I'm being picky)
- summer fruits (berries, peaches, cherries, mangos, yum)
- lotion (mmm soft skin)

The highfalutin list (as poached from my self summary):
- learning
- teaching
- novelty
- affection
- debauchery
- profound relationships

How to make the world a better place. How to make the people I care about happy and comfortable and how to help them grow. How to do the same for myself. Where to strike the balance between comfort and growth, since they're often incompatible.

On a related note, I think a lot about whether it's possible to have a relationship in which I feel *both* very challenged and very safe.

Hosting guests from out of town (I seem to get a lot of them), dancing, checking out a new restaurant, cooking at home, dancing, watching a movie, reading, dancing, playing Rock Band with friends (I'm rockin' the drums), dancing...

I recently ended a long-term relationship because I wanted to have children in the next five years, and he (after a lot of thinking) still couldn't decide whether he ever wants kids.

On an unrelated note, I used to have Mexican residency, and the government there believed I was a housewife in Hermosillo, Sonora. (I wasn't.)

...you have a full and multifaceted life, you question yourself and you'll challenge me. Being three or more of the following is virtually a necessity:
a) brilliant
b) unusual
c) exceptionally compassionate
d) insatiably curious
e) fucking awesome

And as I mentioned in the section above, I'd like to have kids in the next five years. I make no assumptions about whether my next serious relationship will lead to children, but I'd like the option to exist. :)

For this reason, I'd *strongly* prefer someone in the vicinity of my age. I don't have strict age requirements, but the farther we are in age, the more amazingly compatible we'd have to be in every other way for me to be interested. I'll likely ignore messages from anyone younger than ~27 or older than ~37 unless the message stuns me with its awesomeness.

If possible, please contact me directly at nimblecurve@gmail.com -- I prefer the user interface there! Please do mention your okcupid username though, otherwise I have no way of stalking you back. :)