December

Well i haven't written here for over two months. Easily the most exciting and unexpected thing thats ever happened to me happened to me last month. Its insane how fast things can happen.

So the past month I haven't really been concentrating on my Chinese studies, as I was learning more Japanese from my girlfriend Eri. But now she's back in Japan until February, and I'm meaning to start up my studies now that my 102 class is over. I decided to go to Hangzhou instead of Beijing. I was going to apply to both but I ended up being lazy and just applying to Zhejiang university. I decided that smaller, less crowded and more nature wins over better dialect and probably better schools in Beijing. Of course I have no idea what Hangzhou is really like. Apparently theres less Americans/europeans there which is probably cool. its kind of daunting when I think about going there by myself, not knowing anyone. it will definatley be wierd and scary at first.

I also applied to UC Berkely and UC santa cruz. ive started seriously doubting doing asian studies too. ive been thinking about UCSC's agro-ecology program. but i dont know if that would be at all interesting to me. but even if asian studies is really interesting its way too impractical and random. i mean the language part is cool, but if i find myself studying obscure chinese history and really archaic stuff ill just think its so pointless and a waste of time. so, im still undecided, and my options are still open. even though wouldnt have the pre-requesites for agro-ecology, i may be willing to just move up to santa cruz and go to thier community college until i satisfy them. i dont really know though, and i have some time to decide, so well see.

stuff

Well I certainly haven't been writing at all regularly as I had planned.

Last night I randomly happened to meet up with a bunch of China trip people, it was great as I wasn't even expecting it and there were some people I hadn't seen since the reunion in January. We figured out that about a year ago we climbed mount Tai Shan. It got me thinking about the trip alot and how different it will be when I go back to China, without the whole group of CC students around.

Oh yeah, Withnail and I is the best movie I've seen in a while. It has some really memorable quotes like:

"why has my head gone numb? I demand to have some BOOZE!"
and
"we want the finest wines available to humanity, we want them here, and we want them NOW!"

Poetry

Well, here they are, in all their glory. I tried to reproduce only the ones that caught some kind of poetic splendor, and isolate them from all the clutter (math, random notes, etc.)

The imagery in this one is pretty powerful. Note the emphasis on Theator, which is also misspelled.

"Yam
Play
Theator

Sprout"

This one ends powerfully.

"Flu
Virus
Free: Phone
Cable- 50$/m
Elec
Water
Trash


POG"

"fall
equinox

Where the *?# are we?

Culturally
Deprived
Spin-off"

Sometimes the things my parents try to explain to English learners is just plain absurd. I mean, come on, culturally deprived spin-off? thats hard to explain to someone fluent in English!

"gorgeous
ranch

lunch

rv
recreation
vehicle

Theme park"


"grid rocked
corner pub
oooed
ahhhed"

Sometimes the words are so different it is mind-boggling to think of how the conversation even progressed so randomly, and the poems are a true testament to the wandering nature of human conversation.

"limb
batch

McDonalds
Solvang
Subjunctive

Abreviated

arrested
handcuffs"

"Persimmon
starve
con artist
criminal"

"Lincorn
Lincoln

beet

brussle sprout"

"itch
itchy

scratchy

booby trap
Amma
Ammachi"

"Anchovy
sleeping bag
back pack

hang out

succinct

talame (crossed out)
tamale


Rite-Aid"

"Leek

cram
clam
>intensive"

interesting alliteration:

"Knick-Knack
Knife
Knight
Know
Knee

-Quinoa-
Keen-wa"

"Sardine
Wood or Metal
Shop

theory"

"FRUIT

_VEGETABLE
_ALERGIC

Would you like
to go to a
movie theater?

WAKATTA= understand
Takkyu - Ping Pong"

Some are very simple, but are strikingly beautiful in this simplicity.

"Freud
Dragon Ball"

"stab
stabbed"

"sticky


nap

sunburn"

"Forwarded
Forwarded"

"Color
Colour

Michiko"

This one may be my favorite:

"procrastinator
light rain
cancer
script!
hiragana
katakana"

I also like this one:

"rent control
incident
forage
parasite"

And the new ones, pretty good so far.

"Cheese

Jet Lag
plum
cereal
toast"

"Parade

Fog

Plum"

"fire man

Omelet

Camping

tofu
factory"

I think I should publish this.

New student

Well a new home stay student has arrived for the Fall semester, Ji Zhe, from China. We got a Chinese student this time so I can practice my Chinese. He's pretty nice and friendly, he's always wanting to help with dinner and the dishes and stuff. He even tried to help me work on tiling the bathroom. I think this is because we decided to lower the price to the amount they usually pay with a shared room even though he is not sharing it, because the main point of having him is so I can practice, not so we can make money. So he's pretty grateful, probably. He's different from the Japanese students in a lot of ways. One thing thats really funny is that we had to get a new notepad for writing down words that come up in conversation that he doesn't know the meaning of. We did this with the previous home stay students who didn't know English well and it makes hilariously random "poetry" because the words are written out of context and by themselves. For example, the latest gem we made was:

"PLUM,
PARADE,
Lecithin,
Flax
seed"

See what I mean? its genius. You could never make this stuff up. So I'm going to post some of the better ones from our previous home stay students and the latest from Ji Zhe in the next post.

Time to start a new journal

Its been a long time since I kept any kind of journal. The first journal that I kept regularly was in highschool, which is full of naive rants and hopeless angst-- both hilarious and depressing at the same time. The last journal I kept was during my study abroad to China and Vietnam and the travels afterwards. The last entry that I wrote was in the Singapore airport, on my way home from a trip to five countries and countless experiences that have completely changed me and defined my current goals. I wrote, "I have many reflections about returning home... HOME! Thats going to me strange."

Well I have been home for a while now and its anything but strange. The monotony of being here is really starting to get to me, especially now that summer school is over and I'm just doing random boring work around the house (helping my Dad tile the bathroom). Every once in a while my mind floats off to a Chinese university, a Vietnamese street or a Thai beach...

What inspired me to start this, and hopefully write in it occasionally, was starting to do the hour hike near my house which I have done 3 out of the 4 past days. It really gets me thinking creatively and positively, whereas sitting around the house all day tends to get me narrowed in on little problems and complaints. When I get up above the canyon in the chaparral and breeze its kind of like "zooming out" and all those little thoughts and problems fade away. I think I'll start doing it almost everyday, since I really should exercise more and because it always puts me in a good mood.

I definitely feel like I learned alot of Chinese by taking 101 at City College this summer. The class was kind of lame in alot of ways but I really don't care, as long as I'm learning. Not only am I interested in the language but I've also made it a large part of my academic path by deciding to major in Asian studies. Plus I'm planning to go to Beijing this spring for a semester to study Chinese, so I'm pretty inspired to learn as much as I can now. One thing I'm happy about is that the characters are actually alot easier than I thought. I've probably learned almost 200 by now. The result is that I look at the characters completely differently. It reminds me of in Peter Hesslers "River Town" ( a highly recommended read) when he starts learning Chinese. The characters have transformed from just random dashes, lines and dots with no meaning whatsoever to something a little more familiar. Even though I can't recognize very many individual characters when I look at a random piece of writing in Chinese, I recognize alot of the components-- a tree, a dagger, a person, a heart, a sun, a child, and so on. Its almost like learning how to read again, except this time its a pictographic system rather than a phonetic one. In other words, its not just learning a different alphabet, but a completely different way of expressing written language (as well as spoken since its tonal).

Well thats all for now.