Interests:Playing games, reading, cycling, hiking(whenever possible), hanging out.
Expertise:Eating, belittling people(but only if your name is Krysta or Kyoko), driving people here and there, general sarcasm, laziness, cramming for exams, game playing.
Occupation:Student Industry:Education/Research
I've discovered the art of power napping, which has led to my
developing distinctly vampiric sleep patterns. On the other hand, I
find that studying really late at night gives me a real sense of
tranquility. I also remember things better, which strikes me as odd.
Anybody out there have a biological reason for this?
Yesterday was a really enlightening day in general, as my previous
entry can attest. Then, I came across this old bookmark among all my
other old bookmarks that caused me to visit a part of my writing
history that I had entirely forgotten.
My first fall quarter here at De Anza, I had a writing class taught by
Luis Limcolioc. It was a really great class and we knew this right from
the get go. Luis' immortal first words to us:
"I'm here to tell you that everything
you learned in high school about writing is now useless. You should
just forget it. When you were learning all that stuff about how you
should have an intro, 3 body paragraphs, and a conclusion, your
teachers knew it would be useless. They lied to you, as they lied to
generations of students before you. Now, I don't know why the school
system is set up like this, but now I have to come in and teach you
this new way. And I can promise you that this new method will be harder
and more confusing than anything that you have ever learned, but if you learn it, you will be a better writer."
With an introduction like that, how can you go wrong?
Now, the really sad part of this story is that my writing did in fact,
at least in my mind, vastly improve. I started to write what I felt,
and I was writing more persuasively and with more fluidity than at
any other point in my life. Once I passed that class, however, I forgot
what it was like to be so good at that aspect of my life. Of course,
this meant that my writing started to suck.
Now, however, I have another goal to aspire towards: the improvement of
my writing skills! Behold, a link to the essay in question:
It's been a while since I last wrote an entry. I am heartened, however,
to see that I am not the only one who has returned to the flock. Will
has returned after a 7 month(!) hiatus. Let the Xanga Renaissance begin!
As I write this, it is, as you
can see by looking at the time stamp,
around 3 AM. I have class in 5 hours, which means that I have to be
awake in a little under 4 hours time. So obviously, there has to be a
damn good reason why I'm writing this entry. And there is. Something
big. Big in the sense that it makes much of my current life pale in
significance to this.
I am now residing in a new apartment. The distance from the door of my
old apartment to the door of this new one is about 10 feet. For that 10
feet, my parents are paying an extra $150.00 a month+utilities. My
payment for this extra 10 feet? My sanity for the past year.
Now, you are forgiven if you find yourself wondering what exactly I am
babbling about. Many people move to new apartments every so often, and
their move is not accompanied by long entries into Weblogs that they
had thus far neglected. However, I believe that my case is somewhat
different. Allow me to explain.
For the past year, I have
lived in conditions that can only be
described as being absolutely contrary to every fibre of my being. It's
not that over the past year my life style can be described as being one
of abject material poverty. I have had all the food, shelter and
creature comforts that I can expect from having the love (and the
money) of my parents behind me. No, my friends, I have not been
physically mistreated in any way by anybody who loves me. What has
afflicted me is instead a slow, steady, and almost insurmountable
descent into complete and total apathy. Put simply, I really didn't
give a shit.
APATHY:
Lack of interest or concern, especially regarding matters of general importance or appeal; indifference.
Lack of emotion or feeling; impassiveness.
This isn't to
say that I've been doing badly at school, because I haven't. Nor do I
mean to imply that I've been depressed, because that would be a lie.
Instead, I've turned into a fantastic example of how to do the most, in
the best possible way, without knowing why, and without caring that I
didn't know. I've been "going through the motions" with every aspect of
my life. When I say every aspect of my life, I include my schoolwork,
my aspirations for my future, my friends, my family, and myself. I can
honestly say that I lost sight of what made me likeable, even tolerable
to others and to myself.
In the process of doing so, I've lost all respect for myself. The worst
part about all this is that I let it happen over such a long period of
time and I did nothing to stop it. For some years now, I have prided
myself on my ability to fix something if I percieve a problem.
Objectivity, decisiveness, and willpower have been my watchwords since
I left high school. When I entered De Anza, I pledged myself that I
would always live up to my own expectations. The last year has seen the
death of that dream. It has seen my objectivity replaced by pettiness,
my decisiveness pushed aside by apathy, and my willpower overgrown with
sloth. I have taken every chance to destroy my self confidence by only
seeing my faults. I have allowed the bridges between myself and what is
important to me to fall into a state of disrepair. In the place of all
that I once held to be good about myself, there has been a growing
space. What I intended to do with this gap in my personality is not
something I can understand.
Today, as I moved into my new aparment, I recieved the epiphanies
described above. Why did it happen as I moved into a new place of
residence? I don't know. Maybe, somewhere in my mind, the mental block
that I had placed on myself in my old apartment removed itself as I
moved physically. It has taken me the better part of 4 hours to collect
all of the resulting happiness and coalesce it into the following basic
points:
I will no longer allow myself to be less than the sum of my expectations.
I will no longer allow myself to treat others impassively.
I will no longer allow myself to be treated impassively.
I think that the nicest feeling that I ever had occured just a few
hours ago, when I once again found the joy that I once had in just doing things.
It's hella early, and I have now officially NOT slept in . . . a very long time.
Man, finals are tough, but I'm just truckin' on. I just have to get through one more week of this shit, and all will be well.
All I know is that I'm here for my future. Not that I've stopped having
fun or anything, but it helps to have some reason for having scheduled
torture on a daily basis(class).
I would also like to have a very special shoutout to Sean Loh, who I
neglected to mention in my previous post. Now, I just want to take some
time to detail all of the awesome aspects of this particular friend of
mine. I believe the easiest way to do it is in list format:
(1) He always has a cool haircut. I swear, he was born into this world with perma-gelled spiked hair. That's just plain awesome.
(2) He's a comp-sci. major at Berekeley(which means he's super smart),
and he looks like a normal human being(which automatically puts him
above 90% of male Berkeley students). Seriously though, he's a pretty
handsome guy, and I say that in the LEAST homo-erotic way possible.
(3) He plays videogames, watches anime, reads manga, and knows how to
have a good time in general(like, without the videogames, anime, and
the manga).
(4) Can make any sound effect ever created by man, provided he has some
knowledge of the source material. Seriously. If he makes a sound like a
lightsaber, people start looking for the Jedi.
(5) He never talks smack about people. Thats just terrible . . . TERRIBLY AWESOME!
(6) He's one of the nicest people you can meet. Ever. No "ifs", "ands", or "buts".
(7) He can eat enough food to supply a medium-sized country for a
decade, yet he never gains weight. In fact, he's got a pretty athletic
figure.
(8) Ladies, did I mention he's single?
So there you go. If any of you single ladies out there are interested,
check out his extremely wierd, food-obsessed, Xanga at "haloh".
Peace out.
BTW, if this post looks wierd, please keep in mind that I've been awake for close to 24hrs. Being awake is my kryptonite.
After a break of nearly a year, I have returned to Xanga.
I don't really know why I'm back writing on this weblog. If I had to
give a specific reason, I would say that I'm just overflowing with stuff
to say, and I have fewer people to say it to nowadays. So here goes.
Being in Davis is like being in a Borders bookstore. Except that I'll
be here for another two years. I have to say however, that De Anza
prepared me not at ALL to going to Davis. I'm not saying that there is
a giant leap in intellect/logic required or anything, but simply that
things are really different. Back in San Jose, you have someone making
sure that your meals are ready on time, that you're laundry is done,
that you don't miss class, that you don't sleep late on school days,
etc, etc. Here I have to do that all by myself, and that changes things
in very subtle, yet disquieting ways. After getting through all these
chores and finishing with my studies I find that I have very little
time left for myself.
What exactly do I mean? Well, there were a lot of times during my stay
at De Anza that I used to be able to just take a nap, or read a book or
play some games or something. I'm still able to do that nowadays, but
just on a vastly smaller scale and I would argue that I'm just not as
effective as a student as I could be given that I have all this
additional crap to do. Just being able to take a break somehow
refresehes body and soul, at least in my opinion.
Another thing that could be contibuting to this feeling of just utter un-preparedness(is this a real word? )
is the fact that I'm really slow to make friends. It took me a while at
De Anza and its only gonna take longer at Davis since I'm not involved
in clubs or anything. I just don't feel like making the huge effort
that is required for me to be outgoing .
I don't want people to get the impression that I'm deeply depressed or
anything. I just wish that I could get back some of the drive that I
lost in the transition to UC Davis. On the other hand, I suppose thats
sorta like saying that you've being going along in your car only to
discover that your car lost its engine somewhere along the way and you
didn't notice it.
On a happier note, I'm glad that I still hang out with Yuichi, Matt,
Will, Krysta, and Betty(on occasion). It really pleases me. All of the
people listed above are like my "One Ring"(as in from "Lord of the
Rings"). Every time I hang out with them, I feel like I've got no
worries in the world, and that everything can only get better.
I don't know what I can do to change my attitude, but I'll see.
)
is the fact that I'm really slow to make friends. It took me a while at
De Anza and its only gonna take longer at Davis since I'm not involved
in clubs or anything. I just don't feel like making the huge effort
that is required for me to be outgoing 
.