crunch time

Hmm, youtube is ruining my life! I can't help but watch random things instead of doing work that really, really needs to be done. I've got zero will power :/

Went for the Cambodian New Year celebrations this weekend when I should have been hard at work. Eh, oh well. It was good. Had some awesome food, saw some traditional performances and got to get to know some ppl a little better. The dances were alright but I have to admit, I'm not a big fan of Cambodian social dancing.... I dunno, the moves and music throw me off and I end up looking like a huge dork, well, a bigger dork than usual, on the dance floor. Not to mention my tendency to trip over little old Cambodian ladies who are gracefully getting their groove on. lol. I'm a right disaster on any Cambodian dance floor.

I can't believe how fast this sem has flown past. I've got less than a month to catch up on homework I've fallen terribly behind on, write my papers and take my exams. Then it's a whirlwind of packing up, flights and too short stays in some of my fav cities seeing some of my fav people. And Hugh Jackman. Yup, Charl n I have a sister's day out in SF planned and Hugh Jackman singing broadway is the perfect way to end the night :) I'm psyched to catch up with people in SF and KL and see + make new friends in Phnom Penh. I've never been but I've been promised a good time and great hidden food places :D It's Cambodia round two: The Phnom Penh edition and I'm hoping to be more on top of updates (meaning I'll finish the Siem Reap series after school is done...only like a year late, whatev :p) while traipsing all over the world. We'll see.

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yay....err, not quite...

Just got a small grant. Yay.

I think I might have to give it back because of the FLAS. Boo.

It's like telling someone Santa isn't real on Christmas day.

It makes me sad. Seriously, if I earned it, why can't I keep it? Some merit award this is.

Bah humbug.

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AAAHHHHH!!!! I GOT IT!!!

OMG!

I got both the summer 2011 AND the 2011-2012 academic FLAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AAAAHAHHHHHHHHH!!!!

This is AWESOME!!

I'm FULLY FUNDED for the next year starting this summer!

OMG. I totally need background music for how awesome life is right now! Seriously. Coincidentally, I've got Parisan fruit tarts and cheeseballs in the works right now. Gimme 20 mins and I'll be stuffing my face in JUBILATION! :D

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee *runs around squealing in joy and flapping arms*

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Life is awesome when real peopleand activities are involved :D

School's been going well and Spring Break was a glorious week of doing absolutely nothing. Kinda like a normal week except I got to sleep in until  9am or 10am! I'm not sure what it is but there's something about Hawaii (or my schedule) where sleeping in until 8am is as good as it gets. Meh.

Anyway, I'm enjoying this semester (as packed as it is) a lot. I think it might have to do with my extracurriculars and finally socializing. This human interaction thing is great!

I really like my sewing class. Lol. I feel like an old grandma for saying that but it's pretty awesome to make something :) I'm almost done with the skirt I'm making. I might put up a pic if it turns out alright. The funny thing is, I was skyping Charl (first time in 3 yrs!) and when I showed her the material she totally called me out on the fact that my almost finished skirt....... is remarkably similar to my sheet set from Ikea that's on her bed. Urm. Coincidence? Lol. I swear it is! The fabric just happened to be the best looking one on sale so I got it. But it's a little depressing that my skirt could have had a separate life as a set of drapes or sheets. But hey, that's the fashion trend these days :)

The real saving grace, however, is the dance class I'm taking. Actually, I'm taking two. Lindy Hop is great and I'm impressed by how many guys can dance decently at the mixer after class (although partner dancing is, for me, a fairly awkward/uncomfortable thing to do and I'm slowly learning to get comfortable with it) but my true passion apparently lies with Pole Dancing.....for fitness.

Yup. That's right. Who would have thought that I'd find my calling in Pole Dance? Not me, for sure. The dancing thing takes a little effort but I totally rock the pole stuff though. =D I love the girls in my classes, the workout (esp core) is kickass AND fun, and I have to fight the urge to swing around every pole I see nowadays. Stop sign poles and the poles on buses/trains are especially tempting since they're about the right size. Lol. Seriously, if that's not love/passion, I don't know what is.

Most of my friends here who know are amused (or I guess bemused? if they don't know me so well) but whatever. So far, the common reaction is to ask if I'm preparing for an alternative career if this grad school thing doesn't work out. Personally, I think it's hilarious. And it's probably the best back up plan I could have in the case of a tanking academic career. Seriously. Those girls in Vegas totally have like two houses, a fleet of cars and all their loans paid off in a few years. I'm totally set if I have to do this school thing sans scholarship! (although, the scholarship would prolly be the better option than dancing in Sin City so y'all betta keep those fingers and toes crossed for me to get the academic FLAS). Hmm, on second thought, those girls have to strip too (we don't...if we don't want too. it is a fitness class after all)......I dunno....my dignity vs. being set for life......sigh, I suppose dignity wins hands down since I can always  fall back on the time honored tradition of marrying rich. lol.

So yeah, dancing with a pole :D and I guess my new (belated) addiction to Glee have gotten me into a rather upbeat mood these last few weeks. Life is awesome!

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sun, sand and surf...... it must be SPRING BREAK!!

Hana'uma Bay

Spring break is finally here! And it's really gotten off to a good start :D

I received a preliminary notice that says I'm very likely to get that scholarship for my summer intensive language program (although I've never had a preliminary notice given before. It's like a weird limbo; did I get it or not? This maybe, possibly, perhaps thing is really messing with me) AND I've been shortlisted for the academic year scholarship!! I'm crossing my fingers and hoping that announcing it here won't jinx it. Y'all betta cross yo fingers (and toes!) too cos this scholarship means $30k that'll cover my fees and living costs! I also got an acceptance letter for concurrent enrollment in a historic preservation certificate program through the Department of American Studies :) To top it all off, I finally made it out of Honolulu for a great day of hiking and snorkeling at the beach. The weeks leading up to spring break were kinda stressful since midterms and papers and proposals were due so it was really nice to unwind. Now THIS is the real Hawaiian paradise everyone keeps dreaming of, not that horribly crowded touristy crap at Waikiki.

The eastern-most point of O'ahu

Windward side of O'ahu

 With jenny and Josie on the Makapu'u trail. We saw 5 whales swim by!!

The lighthouse has the largest lens in all of America.....I think...

Is it sad that I've been here almost 7 months now and this is the second time I've hit the beach and the first time I've had to break out the bathing suit/actually get into the water? I obviously need to appreciate paradise more.

Great snorkeling at Hana'uma Bay

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the things i do for family....

 A couple weeks late, and somewhat bad timing (midterms anyone??) but Happy Belated CNY guys!!

It took HOURS, a crap load of butter (like a lot), baking late into the night (seriously, my housemates thought I was crazy) and sweatshop-like conditions (you have not seen my kitchen) = 200++ pineapple tarts. Did I mention I made two different types of tarts?? I had to sacrifice precious homework time (okay lah, in my schedule it's homework time, in reality it's surfing the web aimlessly time) so Charlynne, you betta appreciate this!!! If you ever wanted to know what a labor of love looked like, this is it! Pineapple tarts!

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ohhhhhh KARMA!

Man, this week has been pretty malang (in the broadest sense of the word) for me and some of my highschool friends. This bad luck we attribute to karma for making fun of certain people continuously. (It's prolly not karma at all but we like to have a scapegoat for our chronic unluckiness in life and love. We're trying to rehabilitate ourselves and be better people (I swear!!) but we can't help it when they make it soooooo easy. It's an issue of will power - we just don't have enough and can't resist.

Anyway, the karma manifests in different ways for us - some hilarious, some oddly painful and some, downright depressing. lol. It's gotten to be an ongoing phenomena that messes with our lives so much that we've started keeping a weekly score. Whomever "suffers" the worst karma "wins." I think this week's collective total is:

Jon managed to sustain an injury a day. No seriously, he got hurt at least once a day....which is kinda funny cos he's such a wuss about it.

Timun got an infection (I have no idea where and I don't really want to know) and had to work overtime then had to go for some company treasure hunt at 6am in the morning. I'll throw in her working CNY too just cos that kind of suckyness carries over.

Our resident KPC (kay po/ busybody) experienced an allergic reaction after eating expired (!!) abalone. (Seriously, wtf expired abalone?!?!)  Then she caught a cold and fever.

I grated my knuckle (yes, just one) while making lemon cream then proceeded to slice that same finger on the lid of a can while making hummus. Both were bleeders that did not help my culinary endeavors meaning that it took me twice as long to make food and i had to starve for like 3 hours longer than I should have.Then today, I get a creepy fb message from a fairly creepy highschool acquaintance I just added (only cos my other highschool friends added him. shit. should have just left him hanging with the rest of the creepers on the friend request page. and no, that's not mean at all. if they're still in limbo, they can't re-request after you ignore the first one. hah! take that facebook!).

That totally fulfilled the weekly quota of "random creepy message/friending from random creepy guy." Yeah, I have a weekly quota. Because apparently, the only guys who are ballsy enough to inquire about my availability are the ones nobody wants! wtf. seriously, fml. i need to work on this single thing. Especially since I have managed to fall down that magical rabbit hole to end up in a state where it seems like wearing a shirt is optional and people like to randomly strip. In fact, I'm pretty sure you can judge the distance to the beach (or if you're on the right bus heading to the beach) by how much (or little) people are wearing.

Anyway, if I manage to contract tetanus then I win hands down because that would be pretty tragic. If not, then I think KPC deserves to win this week's round cos seriously, EXPIRED ABALONE. 'Nuff said.

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Just keep nodding, maybe they'll go away...

If I'm getting loads of unsolicited advice, does it mean I'm finally making friends amongst the seniors in the department?? I dunno if that's a good thing or not. lol. I guess it's more amusing than not.

I just had like three people tell me that I'm doing too much and that I should cut back. And all I really told them was how many classes I'm taking. They tell me I need to drop something but really, I'm five weeks into the semester and I don't think that it's an option. The only reason I'm taking the extra classes in the first place is cos the professors aren't gonna teach them again any time soon or at all. Do I really need the two extra classes? No. Will they be super useful for what I do? Hell yeah. So that's that. It's nice that they care but I wish they'd do it in less of a holier-than-thou way. Yeah, they're seniors in the department and they mean well but when they hand out the advice, some of them tend to make me feel like I'm that one special kid who eats paste and boogers in the back of the class and they need to edumacate me cos they know it's going to melt my brain or something. One of them was like "if your advisor were here she wouldn't let you do this". lol. What are we? 5? Seriously, I'm taking extra classes, not doing crack and smoking joints. I'm aware of my limits and I may be pushing them but then again I've done worse and I'll (theoretically) have a summer to recover.

Yeah, i guess my body is hinting at stress (carb and salt cravings!! although, that could totally mean something else...like a rare and tragic disease or whatever. eh.) but honestly, apart from the perpetual tiredness and bloody early starts, it feels great to be busy and doing things :)

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cravings

normally, cravings = pregnant......yeah, not happening any time soon.

according to google (yea, i googled it), carb and salt cravings = stress and exhaustion. who knew??


btw, Happy CNY!!! i was too tired/didn't have time to bake any CNY goodies in time for CNY but I'm determined to have my pineapple tarts and cornflake cookies soon. like this week. even if it means blowing off the 103 (yes, 103!! O.o) readings i've fallen behind on reading. that sense of accomplishment i felt for buying all the damn books and downloading/printing all the readings apparently doesn't extend to actually doing them. lol. it seems my slacker ways are still going strong. dang.

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success! fridge space, come back to mama!!

how sad is it that my fridge space is a priority in my life?? (over school work and a social life......)

how much sadder is it that it took me a week and a half to get it back??

hahaha

honestly though, i had like 3 or 4 passive aggressive ideas right off the bat (useful but not a long term solution).....it was the plotting of the "accidental non-confrontational confrontation" and trying to catch my housemate when she was home that took so long. why do i make my life a gazillion times harder than it actually is??

classes are taking off; i'm actually going to spring for ALL my books tomorrow (yes, all of them)....I think this is the first time in my college career I've ever bought all the books for every class I'm taking. I feel absurdly proud of myself for being so responsible.....haha... if buying them a week and a half into the sem (after faking my first assignments) is responsible. Maybe a better word is accomplished. I'm not sure why I'm bragging about feeling accomplished when I haven't bought them yet.....perhaps it's so I don't start crying over how insanely expensive they are when I actually have to pay...

bioarch: $130+$30+$22; historic preservation: $50+$30+$35+$42; cambodian: $50; etc, etc, etc

feeling like a good student: priceless

lol

maybe my "studious asian" gene is kicking in? I really hope it is. I think I might need it.

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this one's ticking me off

So that new housemate, you know, the one I've had something to complain about pretty much every day since I got back from winter break? Yeah well....apparently, annoying the crap out of me with painfully weird courtship behavior on the front porch and her creepy/evil laugh and by co-opting various bits of my personal crockery (and having the cheek to not allow me the chance to steal it back) isn't enough. I just found out that she's co-opted my fridge space as well! Bugger. I hate having to figure out how to smack someone down in an unassuming way so that the natural order of the house (in my mind at least) is restored without any hurt feelings. How do you (nicely) tell someone that "yes, I've finally figured out that you've been using my fridge space for the last three weeks while I've been gone and yes, it's nice and clean and organized because I make a point to keep it that way so take your stuff and take a hike cos I want my space back. And by the way, clean up the mess you've made of my formerly pristine fridge!" ?? Lol. OCD much? Gah! I hate any type of real confrontation (cos the imagined confrontation scenarios in my mind are always way more awesome :D ) but I think being all passive aggressive about this is not going to work :/ boo. This is gonna take some brain power. meh.

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oh god.

hysterical housemate and creepy laughing housemate are apparently one and the same.

and she's flirting and laughing outside my window right now. 

why?? whyyyyy??

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be careful what you ask for

So, I wanted something to keep me busy this semester and man, I shouldn't have even thought about it.

If last semester was a breeze where I lazed around and baked/went grocery shopping a lot (A LOT. seriously), I'm now....

Overcommitted

OMG. How the heck did that happen??

My little plan for 3 classes, a dance class/hobby and an internship has become 5 classes, an internship, a part-time job, 3 extracurriculars and a editorial position I forgot I had. oops. (maybe, just maybe, I might have been a little excited about the new year and new start (read: gone a little overboard with the whole "my life is stagnant and I should grab life by the balls" resolution thingy)

Also, I apparently have to hang out at my newly given office (yay office space!!) at least 10 hours a week in order to keep it (boo. can you tell i like the idea of it more than actually having it??)......I dunno if it's worth it.....it's got four people squished in, looks like a harem decided to throw up on the walls (to complement the 50s decor, of course) and kinda smells like an ashram. lol. On the other hand, it may come in handy since I've now got 9 (yes, NINE) housemates and I foresee a lack of peace and quiet. Why? Nothing super big or anything (apart from having 10 girls in one tiny house) but the two new girls on my floor are pretty noisy: one of them likes to have very long, very loud eastern european hysterics on the phone (I could hear her from outside the house) and another likes to giggle in that high-pitched-haunted-house/chucky kinda way. Seriously gives me the heebie jeebies.... especially when she laughs at night.... I've never been more thankful for the annoying streetlights and the lack of curtains if it means my room isn't pitch black when she randomly laughs. lol. it's funny and creepy at the same time.

Well, this semester is shaping up to be a super busy one (can't believe I'm only two days in and already dreading how stressed out I'll be) but I think it'll be fun.Wish me luck!

p.s: I still owe the last two weeks of Cambodia and the highlights of life in the aloha state. I promise they will come. soon. with pictures even.

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Second time around

5+ hour flight, 2+ hours in 3 different buses and I'm "home."

Aloha Hawaii, we meet again. Let's try this once more. I promise not to be a surly Hawaii-hatin' douche this time around.

Flight was infinitely better this time - I wasn't freezing and the 7 screaming babies from the last flight were not there. Awesome. I did disembark with the mother of all migraines but I figured it was dehydration and hunger. Managed to provide entertainment for my section of the plane when I played musical overhead compartments as I tried to find space for my luggage. One nice old man was kind enough to point out an empty space in one of the closed compartments. Why the heck do people close the damn things if they are not full?!? Idiots. Also, the entire Boise State basketball team was right there..... watching my little asian self struggle to put heavy bags overhead. Okay, I'm not that short but I still have to lift my admittedly heavy luggage over my head and these guys are all like 6 ft ++.....a little help would have been great. I hope UH beats your asses in today's game. lol.

Also, why is it that the 11 min car ride to my place is a 2 hour bus ride with at least 2 transfers? I'm already missing having a car.

Best part of the day? Getting to my place and realizing that my landlords had found another tenant for the house. On my floor. And as RA, I had to spend the rest of the day dealing with it. Apparently they cleared the storage room out and are going to rent it to these two little asian kids from Macau. What this means is that I have to share the bathroom/kitchenette with 5 other people GIRLS now. I guess that means I'm going to be showering a lot less now or at ridiculous times of the day. Ugh. I kinda really like my showers. A lot. oh well. At least these girls are nice.

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not ded. really.

like the title says, i'm not dead. just really really busy. I don't mind school all that much but grad school definitely has different expectations. I've seriously never worked this hard on assignments/school in my life (and i'm a slacker compared to some of my peers here :/ ) I've actually been writing on the blog but not posting since I haven't gotten around to editing and honestly, you don't want to read any of the crap i spew without at least one edit. lol. The things I say and think when I don't use my (occasionally useless) filter.....well, I think Ron summed it up nicely on fb a few weeks back "I love Charm, she is so sane and yet insane. She's the quiet girl who's having kinky sex..." hahaha....gawd, this cracks me up so much and has stuck with me since Van told me about it.....mostly because it's so true and is pretty astute coming from someone who only knows me moderately well. it kinda makes me wonder what other ppl think of me....hmmm. who knows. anyway, long story short:

not ded yet. will post once grad school takes a break from kicking my ass over the hols. I hate finals. fml.

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