I went through all of my past posts on this account ( even from when I was swtaznxtc90...also it was really, really painfulyy embarrassing at points haha) and was at first disappointed in the tone I've taken up but then became glad for it. I used to write in a prose, but I know that part of that was because I had more of an issue saying things in a direct manner out of fear of being found out or offending someone.

But I still like the same stuff!

I think most of it, probably 80% of it, is just that I don't really have anything to be prosey about right now. My mind is busy with trying to establish a secure future and to figure out how to travel back and forth between states in order to keep afloat both careers. At this point I won't call them jobs anymore because they are both accelerating much quicker than I expected, but just as fast as I had hoped for. I'm glad for it, regardless of how tired out I am some days both mentally and physically. Also, my heart has changed. I'm more sure of my decisions concerning the heart, and my feelings. They used to be so inexplicably intense because of what was causing them, the anger and hurt that would flood over, but recently they've calmed and have evened out (not really a good thing, but not bad either).

Well, I privated a past entry because it was too revealing (haha maybe it wouldn't be if i wrote it in prose! )

But this video is still something I think should be watched:

(http://www.youtube.com/embed/LEMrKxZLZWQ)

If you read my last entry, you'll know what I had added as a message/caption to this. I like this, I think that there is much truth to this and how many relationships start, but like most of these feel good stories, it focuses on the chase, the easy part. But what about afterwards, how do two flawed and easily angeerd, fragile human beings wade through their own sea of crap that they  can't help but emanate?

I do believe in love at first sight and the idea of the red string. But at the same time, I tihink many have been deluded.

The more important thing I want to address is a blog written by Charles. (click his name). A lot of you may already know him. 

But just take a read, I think he speaks loud enough that I don't have to elaborate anymore on the subject. I so admire his courage to speak on such a subject even when it is maybe at many times considered a faux pas for a man to be so fervent about women's rights, especailly since i'ts in such a respectful manner.

My most recent modeling work. I was so honored to shoot for the cover of Shore Life magazine shot by Angie Myers, Makeup by Elizabeth Johnson Hymas, styling by Marc of M.Randall & Co

I have a few pages inside the magazine in a fashion editorial spread but those will come later!

 

 

I keep thinking about my paths I'm taking right now and am constantly shaken. I've chosen to work at the research place while also modeling professionally now since I'm out of school. But each time someone talks to me about grad school or whatever classes they're in I feel envious, I want it all... 

A very good friend of mine is currently in aerospace engineering at a great school, and just got word that he will be a TA for an engineering class and is also receiving a stipend on top of waived tuition. I admire his faith and hard working ethics so much, and his wisdom to invest the money accruing some amount of loans in order to secure a future.  I think the fact that he is doing so well and pursued a graduate study in something he likes inspired me, made me really happy but I also felt a little useless. I know I tell people that it is never too late, but as always, it's hard to take your own words seriously in your own life, especially when we are all so naturally anxious and weak to some degree.

It's more than just envy and greed though, it's the feeling of never being good enough and knowing that after the blow that I dealt my parents by switching out of engineering in to math/english, not choosing (at least not right now) to even try for med school/law school, I have become estranged. 

My friend in the grad school was there since the beginning of my transformation, even before I decided to switch out and break out of what they had tried to mold me in to. He saw without hearing my words my struggle, maybe that's why I feel a little bit of pain because I'd want to live up to his expectations as well, or imagined expectations (since he probably doesn't really hold the same expectations as my parents... but I can imagine). 

II don't know what I'm trying to say really, but I know I need to calm down. I know ti's good to dream big, but I have never known how to be practical, and chased everything. Even now, I have a job, I'm still searching for the sake of searching even though I really like where I've been employed (not  talking about the modeling agency though I am so grateful and shocked still by that and it was great to have someone there who understood my wavering and unsure/lack of confidence in myself and encouraged me to pursue it ). This type of greed and need to fulfill some type of subconscious self deploring can and has made me end up with almost nothing that is mine. And that I'm inspired by him as a person, grateful actually that his type of person exists, his kindness and generosity and acceptance of the world. He knows the world, went through so much poverty and hardship, yet remained so compassionate and just...kind and giving. He's definitely not your every day romance/story book American hero in uniform, but he is a hero to many in another sense. 

EDIT/ADDENDUM:

I speak of how he has achieved in academic success. But I think the thingt aht actually inspires me is the combination of his humility/humbleness, purity, kindness, compassion, generosity, faith, selflessness, especially given his circumstances growing up.

He knew love and kindness, and what it looks like.

And that's like a lot of you, my friends/readers/pretty much all of you. Your smiles, your ability to overcome and skip the loss of control in which anger is made a permanent rock in your heart. 

I don't write this, actually I dont think I ever do, I just think this to myself. But you're all so inspiring and make me happy in different ways, even the ones that I haven't kept in touch with, evne the ones that you think I don't remember.

 

I'm sure in my decisions, I've finally started to do choose a path for me not my parents

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anyway I recently shot again with a photographer Charles Martin 

   

 It's the something that's off that his emotions manifest in that are captured. 

cept for the first one, that was just normal shot. 

I find it amusing how I look like completely different ages in all the pictures...well, maybe just the first two

 Charles is pretty much wonderful at his craft. I'm so thankful that I got to work with him and designer Tu-Anh Nguyen back in 2008

Moonshine remix:

 

treasure...cuz baby squirrel youza sexy muthafu***

 

also, I"ve officially joined the smart phone ranks and can do the picture taking whatever sthat ya'll do! w00t. 

 

 

so HAI GAIZ!!! 

 

 

I always thought it was funny how even though I developed apps on iOS for research purposes I was pretty much the last in line to get a phone that was intelligent. 

or more nearing intelligent than the not so good with advanced UI phones before NOW I CAN GET PICTURES GUYZ YAY

 its' a weekend night...pretty early, like 1130 PM and I'm sitting here on my laptop watching stuff on youtube. Sometimes...I just gotta relax haha. 

I'll just go search for bubble tea after church on Sunday

Most recent shoot, Konjo Kalonji photography; Sarah Oyetubo styling; Jesse Alan hair; Christina Spencer makeup 

Konjo + Oye cousins, some of my favorites to work with

I had this silverish paint on me 

And then a faux bob with white splatter 

 

took look all icyyy

 

So post grad has been eventful, more updates later, currently coding for the time-being and continuing my other hobbies/career paths. 

I do miss school, I always knew I would after graduating, but I plan to keep going. Always room for more. 

It's not just the freedom, but the opportunity to learn that I miss. Sure going to work can teach you a lot but its' so very rare to have the opportunity to sit in a classroom lead by a scholar (whether you agree with the professor's ideas or not is a separate issue, which is also to your advantage- opportunity to challenge!).

Now it's time to find out what I actually want, and not want everything at the same time, or perhaps fear being nothing. I keep telling myself at least I have an education/degree, a job,  modeling contract, family/friends/loved ones, God, necessities, but I can't figure out what it is that I will come to do for the world, though I do have ideas of what I'm supposed to do or have been doing and I think that bites my heart every morning. Perhaps I'm too fickle, maybe I become too flimsy sometimes. 

I used to try to convince myself that the sole reason why I don't want people asking what I' mdoing is because I don't want people to pry, or because I have to maintain a rather low profile of my life outside of modeling, but slowly I vocalize to myself during prayer that it's also because I don't know yet either. Until I can make more than a living and at the same time give my parents/siblings enough money to pay off mortgages and my school loans, I don't know what I'll settle for. But at least I'm taking steps to do so.

 

 

 

Graduation speeches almost always make me a little bit uneasy. Not the speeches by the older professionals who are invited, but the student speakers. Their diversity and high grade point average is very appealing and inspiring, but they deliver a rather elitist message that is all just for good feeling and hand claps.

The most commonly delivered message goes something like "we had so many finals, so many parties, so much stress, coffee, and finals, and ...finals, and friends and tests and...we just finished finals, while the rest of the world is off with their lives, we are just still studying"

It's not like the entire rest of the world is happily sleeping while we students pull all nighters. It's not like we all party our life away only to accrue all our work and dump it all in the very last minute to complete.

It's not as if the rest of the world is not struggling to sleep, to rest, to relieve their own anxiety. 

However, this year, I heard a great commencement speech. I can't remember her name now, but her motto (message..whatever you want to call it) was to always give back, alaywas appreciate. Nothing about how students have it so hard, when we really don't. We are given a blessing in the form of education and a scholarly environment, surrounded by peers who are striving as well.

After the main commencement (and the individual college ones! But that's not related to the aforementioned) I saw loved ones and my great friends who came to graduation, some with flowers (you guys are awesome). My parents had been rather accepting on the outside of my academic choices, aka my not having stuck with engineeirng and pursuing a different route. Thank you to all my friends who came out to graduation it means a lot that you made the time even though some of you lived far, were at doctors appointments, had to dip out of another graduation, thank you to you all. and thank you to all who said congratulations and all the support and happiness, both you who came to graduation and you who couldn't come 

To all of you who knew of my struggle, and were physically literally by my side, on the phone, in your prayers ( i know who all of you are as well...even the ones i told in passing), thank you, seriously thank you for being there even when I was a bit unbearable. 

I rarely ever reach a point where I feel like I'm goingt o lose all control, but this time what I learned was to let go. I can't always be in control or manipulate a situation

I still wish I could tell them about my fashiony stuff though, but I don't feel as if the time is right.

So on that note, I was recently published in a small magazine Editorial 

heah 

pages 75 to 79

and have a small picture in marie claire magazine with my friend Brooke Kao she s the one holding the orange purse, on the left page with the biggest picture like she deserves to have.

 

 

 

and happy birthday to the amazing @lovelybish

 

 

 

 College has passed, and I feel thankful for what I've become and chosen to continue to be and surround myself with, yet I've never been more unstructured. I have a job right now that my parents are happy with, but I still feel uncertain. I feel as if I was made for more and am scared that I truly did squander my time/talents away on something that my parents warned me not to pursue, yet I still am... 

As sturgeon reminds me frequently, "one day at a time. do what you need to get done on that day, and worry of nothing else"

I was never good at that, just waiting. I grasped at everything, every opportunity even if it didn't interest me. I'd go for all the programming positions for companies I wasn't really interested in working with and said yes to offers before I considered others. I'm afraid to have nothing, yet in the end I'll end up with nothing for wanting everything. Greed will eat us away

sometimes you just have to wait... 

Have very happy holidays, those of you who can enjoy it. For those of you who can't and are hurting, I hope and pray you heal soon. Don't callous your heart 

 

 

I can't remember very many good dreams. Actually, I can't even remember one... not even one. Most of the good ones I tell people are not dreams, but rather day dreams, ones that I can control, turn fantasies in to temporary reality. It's during the times of half slumber and momentary, full on consciousness that I can manipulate things in to happiness.

I've heard of lucid dreaming and the idea of taking control of the dream, like an adventure. Problem is, I know I'm dreaming. I think I'm more awake in these nightmares, or just normal dreams as they are so frequent and expected now, than I am when I walk around or day dream. I don't think my heart has raced harder than in these dreams, my fears exploited by myself or some other evil force attempting to make my heart erupt. 

There was a period in elementary school when I thought of death so often, from buried anger and the need to escape abuse. 

But in high school, these started to change, and the dreams became more violent. I dreamed of being the killer instead of being killed. 

In  college, they evolved to murder scenes, mass murders, or murderer chasing me. Sometimes I'd die, sometimes I'd be shot or punched, feeling the physical effects linger a few minutes after I can shake myself up out of the paralysis. It's frustrating though, because I always know I"m dreaming. I always know that I'm part of a mass genocide, or am being cut in to pieces, or am watching bodies decay in front of me. It's strange, it's as if I'm for some reason being forced to watch these things since I was little. 

It's not like I've ever SEEN that much violence, except in video games. But even mortal kombat didn't really show as much as I dream up. Maybe it's the medical videos on youtube? Surgeries and gruesome things that I've long before accepted as just carbon and oxygen and other molecules linked together. It's an image of death which is the only reason why it would bother our consiousness. 

I remember in college I had a period where I got absolutely no sleep. It wasn't even just two, three, four days of no sleep, it extended to nine which had me obivuosly in the hospital with a severe infection from my throat and lungs. Thank God my friend was nearby my house that night and drove me to the hospital, since my parents thought I was being overdramatic.  Of course, I had to pull more all nighters since I skipped a week of class recovering/being hospitalized. 

During that time, I had thought that one of my dreams took place in real life. It was the only time I could not differentiate between reality and slumber, since my mind was losing its touch with reality, severed by the lack of sleep. The dream was just death, demise, despair. A friend died, and a family murdered. Yet I woke up on my bed. And it all seemed normal..it seemed as if I was there.

Of course, I realized a few weeks later after I was able to recall everything that had happened during my zombie-like state, that it was in fact a very, very real feeling dream. And I had complete control, but it was the first time I did not realize it was just a dream. Everything was real, every smell, every stomach lurching image, every tear.

Recently, my dreams have taken on a more haunting turn. I think I've become acclimated to death and torture, to despair and defeat, to not being able to be in control, that the dreams have in fact been more and  more reali, involving experiences in my life. One was a tree in front of my house that was only recently cut down (IRL). But instead of being made up of wood and bark and branches, it was constructed from bodies, from groping, dripping, twisting body parts. Arms, fingers, legs, torsos, all squished together and moaning for recovery, for an end. It had to do with my dad, we were shaded within the house form the looming tree blood/hair/head (instead of branches and leaves). The windows were smeared with blood, but it was normal for us. I felt little shock, more internal, learned fear and imprisonment.

It's strange, these feelings seem so normal now, as if I have lost my drive to escape and have accepted ....well, accepted something. Violence perhaps.

The most recent happened last night (12.6.2012). It was the end of our orchestra rehearsal and we had to drop off our instruments so that they could be transported for the next day's performance at a museum (this part was pretty real, since that actually happened in April at my GSO concert). A cellist and I missed the cart that wheeled the instruments in to their compartments, so we intruded in to the auditorium during a performance and I saw a door cracked open, about to be closed but stopped it with my foot and asked the man if he was in charge of stowing away our instruments. He smiled, a smile that made my stomach hurt, and told us to follow him. 

You know when you play one of those video games and you have to follow someone but they seem for some reason to run quicker than your characfter can move, and you just know something is going to happen? This guy was like a bullet.

The cellist and I went through the door he did and frost covered us, we saw stairs covered in ice, and saw two doors. He let a woman in one, then locked the door, and walked toward us, beckoning us to go with him to the closed door.

It was completely iced over, and it was then he turned a bit blue, like death blue. The room smelled like formaldehyde and rotting flesh. I think my brain was so shocked that I could not quite perceive the scent. He took our instruments and started freezing them over, flash freeze, so that the wood wouldn't melt and that they could be frozen in time. It was eerie, and strange. He then wanted to give us a tour, and

I'll speed things up

He pushed us in to a carved out portion of the ice and proceeded to freeze us over, but i moved as much as i could to create friction then the ice melted

but it wasn't just the ice over us that melted, ALL the ice started to melt. It was so perfectly frozen in the room that any exorbitant amount of heat would break the atmosphere and crack the ice. Suddenly body parts started oozing out of the pores of the ice, fingers falling out, entrails, eyeballs, heads, hair, full bodies, all blue purple and bruised from the cold. 

And I can't even classify this as a nightmare, the mudslide of broken, distorited bodies, because it didn't make me fearful. It just made me quiet, and accepting.

It's strange how my reactions in my dreams have changed, from waking up in sweat to now a silent surrender to these thoughts

I don't think it affects the way I treat people, I obviously havfe not been going around cutting people up or freezing people nor do I have any remote intention or need or conscious desire to at all whatsoever...but I just keep wondering where these images come from

I know their origins and from what they manifest. But I refuse to think that it's something telling me to just accept the abuse, violence, hurt, torturous feelings, and physical ills that I have to keep quiet from the public.

 

I think I"ll try to get back to posting normal soon, this is for a future reference sort of thing. 

 

 (some rambles)

Resilience, honesty, humility, and humbleness got him so far. My favorite thing about him was pure honesty (and the fact that he never cursed, the worst would be "crap"). We usually think of honesty as just actions matching words, but his honesty was so much more than that. His intentions were purely honest, and there was no secret hidden beneath the layers of his consciousness to betray his true feelings or motives. He was a terrible, absolutely terrible sweet-talker, but his purity was enough to attract people to him- he never said things just because he knew someone wanted to hear it. 

Some found it surprising and false, but it was a reality only because his heart was clean. He possessed no betraying thoughts.

But what was the best, the most alluring about him was not just his honesty or his aversion to cursing/swearing, his kindness and soft/unconditional love, it was his humility. He honestly would never take credit for achievement or thrive in his charity work, or say "I feel so proud." What he would say would be "I thank God for this opportunity," "Want to go eat now?" "I hope that that kid finds more food tonight..." or nothing at all. With him, there was no need for words. His expression revealed all, his timidity and natural smile was enough.

Recently I've been meeting more and more people like this, (including my brother during our car rides on our breaks!), people who have very little pride. It's so refreshing, so incredibly renewing, especially in the current state I'm in which for some reason makes me curse so much more. 

I guess I'll speak of my brother, since if I talk of someone else then I'll have to talk about everyone haha (but I think I will one day anyways). In his first year of college he joined the corp cadets...rather ambivalently. After much deliberation, fighting with my parents, he decided to join. Throughout the semester (which isn't even over yet) he'd text me saying he wanted to drop, how it was so stressful, how he didn't fit in, but he'd also text me "don't listen to me when I complain. I'm not dropping."

I think the way that my siblings and I were raised gave us this resilience, especially for my siblings. The amount of daily/hourly abuse and irrational anger sustained created an optimistic view for us, I guess as a result of needing to survive. And for my brother, this proved true throughout his childhood, throughout his fatty stage when everyone teased him and taunted him, and now through one of the most physically trying times of his life. He had a gigantic smile on his face when he was young and now its imprinted in his heart. 

Usually, the response I'll get from people who involve themselves in an organization similar to the Corp Cadets, and even on the website itself, many testimonials speak of how proud they are of themselves, or how proud they want to be of themselves. I was worried for a bit that this would be my brother's main goal, but I should have never doubted him. 

He told me one day that he disliked the people who were out to gain a sense of pride, or to be honored, to do something simply just for themselves and then to be able to say that they served and helped. His purity trends in my family, beginning with my parents, where charity is not something to brag about or even to gloat about, nor is it something to boost self esteem or pride. He told me this is why he sometimes felt as if he did not fit in- he did not understand this focus of the self. 

And I could not have been happier with him. He never stands with an immense amount of pride speaking of his weekly volunteering at the homeless shelter when people ask him what he does on the weekends, nor does he stand with so much pride while speaking of the corp cadets, nor does he expect to/want to stand at graduation feeling the same type of self pride. To me, he exemplifies the image of humbleness, much like the aforementioned man I spoke of at the top, and thus the image of success. He has never considered his work to be for just himself, but rather for the world and most importantly his family. Even though he went through and is still sort of going through the stage a bit, underneath was still honest and unselfish heart. It's from his unselfish ways that he achieved so much of what he has, from his lack of pride stemming from his lack of selfishness that he succeeded and has been so well loved. He's like an onion..peel away the layers.. HHAA  

I constantly hear people saying 'I'm so proud of myself" (not in the joking way when it is 6 AM and we FINALLY figure out our matlab/jquery code...) or say to me "you should feel so proud of yourself, YOU did this" and I grimace a little bit inside.  

 

 

Recently on facebook a lot of my newsfeed has been dominated by  this picture

 

While most of the comments left on the picture's page  are very sympathetic, understanding, pointing out that the picture is only of boys and that there are not girls, even proactive, some have been ones that call "bullshit" on education, demean the value of education, and talk about how academic education is irrelevant to life. 

"the value of education differs from one country to another.. over there education is a new life, over here education is bullshit, u study shit u don't like just to make money you don't deserve to buy things u don't want"

 

"I think the point people are trying to make is that while education in itself is beautiful, most of the current curriculum is totally irrelevent to life. We learn about some fictional character from history yet we never learn how to cope with the ups and downs of life. We have highly intelligent kids killing thenselves over exam results. This is the folly of our system, so the content of the lessons are whats important. Without any knowledge of the lesson plan how can anyone comment on this particular photo? They could be learning anything..."

Those are some examples that were left in response, and reflect many of my peers' opinions. Now, they do have some merit. The first one is pretty right about how our society functions, but it is poorly thought out. The value of education is completely demeaned and diminished. The fictional characters we learn about are exactly manifestations of real life people and real life situations that are plopped in to the author's work of art in order for us to learn. (One of the subjects I'm studying is English/literature, this is one of those things that we have to constantly argue). Yes, we might worry way too much about GPA and be judged by some unmbers, but those numbers are proof of SOMETHING. I mean, ther e is a huge difference between a 4.0 and a 3.5. 

You know those memes that circulate around with teens (I'm assuming teens since they're still talking about algebra) hold up a sign asking how factorization will help them in life/if they will ever need to know factorization to buy groceries or something related to that?

 

I hope you never took those comments seriously.

 

Not only should the obvious be discussed, how we have comfortably temperature adjusted buildings and chairs and technology to facilitate the process of becoming educated, whereas the students in some other countries sit on the ground, the fact that the idea that education and "current curriculum" is irrelevant to life is absurd.

Perhaps you will not have to stand in the grocery line and factorize your bill or how many carrots you should buy to offset the amount of onions you will buy for your recipe that requires x amount of onions in y amount of time. And maybe you won't really need to calculate the amount of gas you'll need to travel x miles when gas is y$, but you will need an environment that trains your mind. Regardless of what information you apply directly to life and how much of academia you are able to realize is based on memorization, being immersed in an intellectual environment where your brain is appreciated over whatever other part of your body (in most cases...of course there are those cases of perverted female and male teachers). Isn't that what people keep asking for? to be known for their intellect rather than their boob size, their muscles, their hair color? 

The idea that route memorization is irrelevant and useless is incredibly harmful to the individual who holds this idea. How else would you have learned to play violin? to walk the streets of NYC? To know what 12*12 is? Did you actually just sit there and add up 12 12s? No. You know from memorization of the basic fundamentals that 12*12=144. Regardless of your profession, this activity, especially at a young age, will help your brain and its development. Its practical application is used more in academia for those who choose to pursue a higher degree (bachelors, phd, masters etc) and apply these themes and memorized facts to creating your iPad, programming your phone, curing your disease, coming up with a new way to eliminate harmful elements in the air, traveling to space. 

Imagine yourself at a school that did not challenge you and instituted fun all day long. Where would your challenge and conquest come in? Do you actually want to be limited to subjects that you are familiar and comfortable with? If you have the chance to go to school in such a comfortable environment, then go. If social issues occur, like sexism, racism, any other bigotry, address them. Don't start saying things like education is unimportant. If you had the oportunity to go to school, or will have the opportunity, appreciate it. If you didn't, that's ok too, you weren't placed in the same position as people who did have the opportunity...As long as you aren't saying things like education is useless, you'll still be incredibly valuable. 

Sure, not all people who pursue higher education are well rounded people or even nice, but you can focus on those people all you want, and disregard those who have pursued education and done great things for the entire world. Even though Bill Gates dropped out of college, he got in to HARVARD of all schools. How else would he have had the means and connections, support to pursue his entire kingdom of technology? How would he have gotten there without the academic challenges that shaped his mind as he was growing up?

The idea that it is different form country to country is true to some extent, and more obvious. But it is the same in every country. Education, for the very huge part of our lives, is a way to freedom and a new life. The path that education and academia will take you on is going to open up doors. If you went to class then decided all the things you learned were useless, you either didn't understand or were unable to appreciate the phase of life you were in. 

Think of the people in poverty. If you just do a google search, you will see articles about how African Americans/black people are as a whole closer to the poorer end of the economic hierarchy. This is such an unfair statistic as it provides NO explanation. Why would they be on the lower side? Is it really because they are naturally born stupid? Perhaps with lower economic means you can try to argue that their foods are not as healthy and are all processed, cheaper foods. But then why is it that the same families who buy these crappy foods and are, say perhaps Asians and caucasians/white people, many of you reading this, are not on the lower end of the spectrum economically? For people who speak of this country to country idea, it really is not. One HUGE reason why they are still on the lower end is because of the culture of slavery that stripped their means of money among the other things such as their own humanity. You know those fictional characters that you may have had the treat to read about? The ones who boarded slave ships or dealt with racial struggles in America? Those were to show you how education is a path to a sort of freedom and hence money. Of course, there was still the ethnic aesthetic barring them from attaining the same level of achievement, but it helped (not that the racial prejudice is eradicated at all today ) Education in America, then, is still a pathway to a new life as it is in other countries. (this is another thing that proves education to be important...to tear down these racial divides and horrendous stereotypes. there is much more that i didn't even touch about the histories of racialism and the standings of each ethnic group)

 And parents, don't blame the school system so much. Blame your kid for not trying, blame yourself for not pushing them. As much as they may hate you for taking their "fun" away (toys ipad tv whatever), push them (just don't hit them or abuse them because then you WILL have to take their hate and you'll deserve it). If there's no discipline to start with their lives will be miserable and their minds will be narrow.

You only get so many brain cells and are put on a slow decline in your ability to acquire new information and skills as you grow older, as your brain changes. Use it well in your youth, whatever age you may be in now. Dont squander it and say things like education is useless, its' not important to my life, as some sort of excuse. Become interdisciplinary in an environment where scholars, whether they are completely right or completely wrong, can challenge you and guide you. It's not always the books in front of you that will teach you, it's the people in school whatever school you may be in. 

This isn't to say that youwill never be bored or feel bored, since we're all pretty human and get distracted. But if your entire philosophy stems from the idea that education is useless and irrelevant, the institution of school is useless, or if it stems from a fear of accepting the fact that you were just not good enough to understand the content instead of admitting or trying again, then that's where the issue starts

 If you were given the opportunity, take it. If not, then you are given an opportunity in another way. 

So a friend of mine recently got a temporary awesome camera that I cannot describe to you because I have no idea how to describe cameras (like lens and all that).

UPDATE FROM JUSTIN: He says it's a Canon 5d Mark III with the Canon 24-70mm f2.8 mark II

But we did a short shoot most of the time (actually like 75% of the 2 hours) was used to find a location. After wandering we finally settled on a location that was closer to home rather than an outdoor park, also because it was cold as heck.

Justin Chen's pre edited pictures... actually, just 8 out of the over 100 snaps we got. Burst rounds ftw

final products will be revealed at a later date as more come out. This was easy to do since I didn't thave to jump or twist my lower half of my body

Since I screwed up my left foot, which hasn't healed for like a month for some reason (probably because I hurt it a few more times minorly afterwards), I've been unfortunately turning down shoots because I can't really move too well. 

And for convenience sake, my friend Justin, who is also in my math class, lives so close that we can afford to just take quick pictures every now and then.

 

SO HERE:

(also I wanted to show off my tiger swim suit from black milk  and my freaking awesome rings that go on the top of my finger instead of at the knuckles)

 

 

 

theme for this was RAWRRR teehee

and then the whole entire outfit 

 

 

 

 

 

Muscle memory- ability of muscles reiterate a previously, magnanimously (but laboriously, of course) recited movement. 

Like   playing violin, somehow hammering in the deftness of your fingers to almost stammer over the strings when mimicking the bumblebees (thank you Korsakov for this brilliance). Or when pressing the keys to a  softer song, Claire de Lune-yet still it's like traversing the world- the dramatic towering everst mountain, to the soft city romance of Paris, to the trickling brookside, all encompassed in one song, all expressed through black and white keys laid out before the fingers. 

Fingers are not the only ones that can remember. The heart I believe is one of the most keen on muscle memory, take a journey of its own. It can remember to hurt, and clench tight, it can remember anguish, and whither; or remember the passion, and race, course. It can remember how to be elated, and become festooned with stamps, words, images of those points in time. 

You can train it, you know, to feel something, almost permanently. It gets stuck, it's an organ that is tethered not just to our brains, but to our experiences, to the people we meet, to the world around us. As much as we sometimes try to control it, to hide it from the world, everything and every experience seems to latch on tight and shake it.

if you train it to feel fear, feel disgust, feel anguish, these strong emotions soon take over and envelop the heart on cue. Perhaps at the mention of your name, an object that refers back to a memory, a relatable story. But most times, it doesn't even need a cue. After youv'e spent enough time nurturing a person's heart to feel fear and anguish, after you've left your stamp on it long enough and at a constant rate, and you leave it in that state with no mention of fixing it, no attempt to even try to relinquish it from those claws scratching at it, anguish suffocating the bloodlines to the body, the heart tends to stay that way, for the most part, for about 23 hours of the day. 

And the brain leaves the world.

What powerful things they are, the muscles. And it's as if they are even connected to the soul. The harder the muscles are clenched, the more painful the soul becomes, the more it diminishes, the less light is shed. 

I've recited the cries, the pain, the words, the palpitations, the jumps of the muscles in my heart too many times through. And it is still a wonder to you why it has stayed that way.

But I always find myself reversing the damage of the proprioceptors and rewinding the record, the solemn music that seems to drench over and over the blood.

(I wonder, if the iron can become defunct...)

Amazing thing about it is that the muscle is in your own memory, and to overpower this, you train your brain to push through the forest of myofibrils, and the heart starts contracting to different tunes, different emotions. I'll conjure up an episode of us laughing, or make up a memory. Though it never existed, it's the manifestation of my hopes combined with a version of you that I encountered only in my solitude, and a version of you that occasionally defeated my worst enemy. 

And from there is born the songs in my head that once made me calm, once made me able to put aside whatever shadows chewed away at my sanity, and just imagine...and be fine. I  make my heart play those songs, until they became loud enough to put anguish aside and...

then i realize, that those are all lies soliciting my reality, my imagination overcome by the need to rid my heart of its own memory. 

 

Well, I guess temporary dreams are better than none. 

 

but, but wait... resuscitation. yes, because, eventually, after all these black fibers grip the heart, it'lll just stop. It'll give out, and become just meat. Electrical impulses, compression, break loose the hold, uncover the first learned memory, the first learned beating, the first rhythm that you made me feel, and repeat. There's that sliver of hope, for the heart has now clawed through to the brain enough to keep you permanently intact even in my consciousness, subconsciousness, my occipital lobe rewired to change everything in to you; my entihornal coaxing hippocampus to place you in memories that never existed; limbic system lingering on your entire being. Why? simply because it's waiting. It, being a communion of heart and mind, for some reason, it sees through the diseased heart, the organ that can only seem to remember your torment, trained to annihilation. It's awaiting revival, 

 reawaken, recharge 

reverberate. 

now if only that could hold long enough for me to breathe 

 

_______________________________________________________________

I think this was the format I had some time ago, like a year or more ago. Some prose to keep people guessing, thinking. and then whatever on the bottom underneath that line. 

I wrote a lot about forbidden love, temptresses and tempters, drifting away, but this time I thought it was time for hopeful, a desperate hope, necessary to stay alive. What a tormenting need. Soo....a question that I've been getting a lot when I write stuff like this: is this real? is it what's going on in my life? And answer is, sometimes it is, sometimes it's not. haha but seriously, I do write from personal experience or what I can make in to reality from my imagination. I imagine emotions, from both personal experience and from friends' stories. I try to make sense of everything and write it in a way that might make somoene feel the same way. And if I can affect one mind one heart, that means that I've succeeded. Anyways on a public forum, I'll say that you'll have to know me better than just a blogger if you wanna know what's real and what's not, esp with my love life. But, you should never believe what you read one the internet.

HEEHEE. ^.^ 

behind the scenes shoot for photographer Angie Myers for her expose in maryland dec  7 lasting through the entire month. Male model vinson huynh, makeup artist elizabeth johnson, stlyist stara. Interpretation of Samson and Delilah 

MAN LOOK AT MY MUSCLES. -.-

 

Some friends are going to New york soon, I am le jealous  

 

I was looking through my pictures on my laptop and these made me :D:D

last NYC trip this summer . most uncomfortable flat crappy 15 dollar sandals ever.

Not really, I just need to not wear flat shoes when walking that much. 

music:

 

passion pit moth wings

dancing in the moonlighttt

 

too amazing. talk show host radiohead. i like driving to this

 

soft synth- songi'll never get sick of yay!

 

Posting this to let you all see what a bamboo flute sounds like ! This is my first woodwind instrument. I got this at the end of summer, and haven't really picked it up much, so I have no idea what notes correspond to what fingering. So...if you want to hear ACTUAL bamboo flute music that you can sleep to, youtube it haha. 

I actually just made this video. I had another one I was going to post, but I can't find that one... also I have to play a little quietly since the walls are so thin people outside of my suite can hear certain sounds (not sure which sounds, since I dont think we're ever really that loud, but it's been reported that they can hear things, or perhaps they're krazy). 

 

 

 

 

erik the flute maker 

Still holds that burnt wood smell, very strong oaky scent. Deliciously aromatic  

 

Next up, saving for the egyptian flute. Those are I think by far my favorite. Such deep sounds...