Al's Crib

Do You Know What This Is?

2011-11-21T17:08:00.000-08:00

Do you know what this is?

Here's a hint.....

You're right...

It's where I'll be teaching English next semester!!

Changzhou, China! If anyone knows how to pronounce that, I'll take you out to lunch. I might do it anyway just because I'm feeling so good! =D I'm super excited to go out, it's too bad that they didn't include the date I'll leave because I wanna know how long I'll need to wait!

Adam's Genealogy

2011-10-19T12:59:00.001-07:00

All right, so in my Asian Studies class we learned about the Jomon people, an ancient people of Japan. In class, we learned that archaeologists estimated the Jomon to have lived around 15,000 BC.

I saw that date and I wondered how that would fit in with the Bible and whether or not 15,000 years have passed since the time of Adam. So I did a little genealogy work for Adam and his descendants.

I started with the basis that the year 0 would be the year of Adam's creation. Reading the lineage from the earlier chapters of Genesis, I was able to find out how long each of Adam's descendants lived, starting from Adam on down to Noah. I found out what age they all had their respective sons and from that was able to figure out around what year they all were born and died. Taking all that into account, this is what I came up with:

But when I got to Noah, I found what I thought to be a contradiction in the story of the flood. I was reading in Genesis 8:13 where it says "And it came to pass that in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the face of the earth".

I read that and thought that can't be right, Noah wasn't even born until 1256, so how could the flood have come and gone in the year 600? Then I read Genesis 9:28, which says:"And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years"

If you look at the chart I made, Noah lived to be 950 years old. He lived 350 years after the flood had passed. 950 - 350 = 600. Noah was 600 years old when the flood came, so when the verse says that the flood dried up in the 601st year, it was referring to the 601st year of Noah's life.

There was another really interesting thing I found. If you look at the chart, Noah was born in 1256, and when he was 600 the flood came and wiped out all life on the face of the earth in the year 1856, which happens to be the same year that Methuselah died.

I never answered my question regarding the Jomon people, but I did gain a really comforting reassurance of the consistency of the Bible and how that reflects on all the scriptures' testament of truth in all things.

Toughest. Interview. EVER

2011-10-18T14:19:00.001-07:00

Job interviews, temple recommend interviews, interviews to get accepted into school programs, all other interviews I've ever had don't even compare to the one I had last week.

My Chinese teacher interviewed each of the students in my class to test our speaking ability and how well we've learned the material so far. As if that wasn't nerve-wracking enough, she decided that we'd have to record the interview and then watch it and point out what we did wrong. Man, talk about a self-esteem killer!

It actually wasn't though =) I think I'm a little too hard on myself sometimes because when I watched the interview I was actually surprised at how well I did. There were enough mistakes to write the paper, but for the most part I thought I did pretty well (especially considering how nervous I was! Good thing the camera was far away so you can't see my nervous-sweat pit stains)

It's a 10 minute long interview, but if anyone's ever wondered what it's like to see their little brother talk in Chinese with a native, here it is!

Sanitary Island

2011-03-08T15:59:00.000-08:00

For anyone who still thinks that Hawai'i is part of America in terms of culture, climate or even cleanliness, I have this to show you.

This is partly because my roommate was a pig and would leave half-eaten plates of food lying around but it's also partly because bugs just seem to spontaneously erupt out of every orifice in my house. I came home one evening after work, was about to plop myself down on my bed and then realized that if I did, I would be killing hundreds of innocents.

*note: this is only a one-foot section of my mattress. I couldn't fit the
entire bed in the picture.

Another fun little surprise happened to me on Sunday morning. I have a bad habit of leaving my shoes outside. In Utah this is good because it keeps you from tracking in mud or snow or whatever. But in Hawai'i if you do this then your leaving your shoes out in a muggy swampland that will turn your shoes into the home for heaven knows how many different animals.

Sunday morning I picked up my church shoes and was about to put them on when this little cutie popped out:

I don't care what people say--I seriously don't think Hawai'i is part of America.

Story Time

2011-02-25T19:29:00.001-08:00

So this semester I volunteered to stay an extra two hours at work each day, so we can push the "Ambassador Groups" to and from their banquets. (I'm pretty sure "Ambassador" at the PCC means "person who's too lazy to walk") but it's nice and relaxed, and I'm especially glad that I made this choice. Why? I'll tell you with a story...

Once upon a time there were 4 fair maidens:
Jihye, Seugli, Jihee and Bomin.

These three were on a journey from the faraway kingdom of South Korea.
They'd been asked by the wizard of their academy, "Dr. Jin" to travel to Polynesia to learn about the different forms of curative magic to bring back to their land,
and to also, "just hang out and enjoy yourselves".

Part of their journey led them where a humble workingman
by the name of Sir Alex Nielson spent
most of his days, ferrying the rich men and women of the world to exotic new islands
in their search for paradise.

The beautiful maidens boarded the vessel of the young pusher and commanded him to guide them to their
elaborate banquet. As he diligently ushered them to their island village, they spoke amongst
themselves of the adventures they'd had, chronicling their experiences with pictures
and stories.

One of the maidens, the one very learned in the tongue
of Sir Alex, who was known as Jihee Yoo turned and spoke to their guide:
"Your island is very beautiful, more than our home back in Korea."
To which, their laborer replied:
"Korea? Nu annyongasiyo, narang kis hale,"
meaning "You're from Korea? Well hello, pretty ladies."

All of the beautiful maidens were smitten by this phrase. They expressed their
pleasure through loud giggles and blushing.
They were pleased and therefore decided to include Alex in their adventures.
They began to speak with him, insisting that images of them in his
presence be captured and preserved for ages to come. So he invited
them to assist him in the transporting of their ship, and the brave Bomin stood on the
bow of the machine, with staff in hand.

"Fear not, fine Lady," Sir Alex assured her. "Everything is perfectly safe while I'm here".

After getting to know their servant, and he the beautiful maidens,
few more pleasantries were allowed to pass as the destination had all too soon been reached.
They all bade farewell, grateful for having had the chance to have met each other and subsequently departed, forever.

Or so they thought...

The following week as Sir Alex was performing his noble duties to the dukes and lords of the isles, a familiar ship docked the harbor called "Canoe Landing 2". As their captain was
ending his speech regarding the isles and their marvels, a familiar face peered out from
amidst the group.

It was Lady Jihee!

Sir Alex stood, unsure of whether or not his eyes could be trusted, but as plainly
as the petals of a rose are a magnificent red, it was truly her. She and her party exited the
vessel and approached Sir Alex. After exchanging greetings, they reveled in each
other's company, grateful to be able to see the other again.

It can be seen that everybody was filled with joy at the reunion.

They warned Sir Alex that the day of their departure would soon be at hand,
for the wizard of their kingdom was summoning them to return
to their land to finish their apprenticeship. They explained
how they had but a week left in the land of Hawai'i and inquired of Alex
whether he would be pleased by the invitation to attend the
"Carnival Before Time".

He gracefully accepted the offer, and come the passing of two nights, he was prepared
and eager once again be reunited with these fine damsels. He rode the
back of a slow-moving brute called "thebus" for hours on end,
anticipating the moment he would arrive at the enchanted carnival.

Finally he arrived and was greeted by the beautiful maidens. They took a depiction
of the outside of the enchanted grounds, but as no magic nor magical
devices were permitted within the grounds of the festival, nothing was
to be seen by foreigners within the walls.

However, within the walls were wonders and dangers like only few have seen.
There were sleazy vagabonds and merchants selling wares out of
poorly constructed tents at alarmingly ridiculous prices. There were
poisons disguised as foods being sold from the same areas. Sir Alex
was advised by the damsels to avoid these, for they were obviously sources
of dark magic and trickery, meant to lure in an unknowing fool and strip him of all
his valuables. The prize, that which they were
there for were the various spells that would swing you around in the air,
drag you along on a track and cause you to experience
adrenaline and a rush such as one never has before.

If the description provided is lacking, then I would compare it to something with which most are familiar: a similar event that happens annually in the magical land of
Springville, Utah during the Art City Days

After they experienced all the joys that the $10 gold pieces could gain them, they
all left towards the mystical fortress of Ala Moana, where thousands of people
came each day to make trade with the merchants.

It was here where the group dined on a food very delicious to the taste,
known only as a "Sno Cone".

The evening was waning and they knew soon that they would all have to depart once again,
this time forever. So they all bid farewell, but the one to which
Sir Alex had given preference asked him to accompany her for a stroll.
They did, along the moonlit beach of Waikiki and she told him of the fantastical
experiences she had accumulated during her time on his island. She thanked him for
the evening and asked him to watch the moon with her for a moment, as it
was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

As had he...

The two embraced and she returned to her quarters, and he waited
for the foul beast thebus to return to take him back to his cottage in the mountains.

And that is the story of the best evening Sir Alex
has spent with any maiden.

Long Overdue

2011-02-25T19:22:00.000-08:00

I know this update is long overdue, and although I'd like to have an excuse like I'm too busy with work or classes or something, I don't. Don't get me wrong, I am busy, but not too busy as to keep from me from updating. The honest answer is I'm boring, and when something happens I don't usually have my camera on me. With a month left I'm going to make an effort though. So I'll fill you in on what's happened.

About two weeks ago BYUH had what we call "Food Fest", which is really just an excuse to eat as much ethnic food as you can. They claim it's to celebrate the cultural diversity on the campus, but we know that's not true. Unfortunately, I was only able to go for the last half-hour when things were winding down because I got off of work so late. Also unfortunately, I only had my camera phone, so this pictures will have to suffice.

Japanese club. They weren't selling food. They were selling glances at
their cute servers. Ow!

Maybe I've told you about Bubble Drink. If I haven't, it's pretty much
coconut milk with rose petals. Those black lumps in the bottom, those are the
flower petals and they feel disgusting when you swallow.

Finally a picture of me, sorry it's so bad. This is Lepi and me,
Lepi's my new supervisor at work, so ignore the fact that
he's trying to kiss me or else he can make my work experience a real nightmare.

Food fest was really fun, I ate my weight in Micronesian food and partied all night long!

The Observer

2011-01-18T21:43:00.000-08:00

This is a double post. But first, a quick excuse as to why I haven't posted in so long. I needed an SD card reader to upload my pictures. Mom and Dad were amazing enough to send me one, but unfortunately it was the wrong size. I went to Honolulu yesterday and bought one though, so here we are! First I'll show you some long overdue pictures of my (newish) house.

Important note: literally nothing you see in this picture is mine.
It's all my roommate's.
What a pig.

In this picture however, (you guessed it!) the Chinese
flashcards are mine and everything in at desk space
are mine. Nothing else.

Who needs their bike indoors?

The box my fan is on is covered in a garbage bag because it got
covered in mold. Like almost everything I own.

Now onto the second part of my post. I went to Waikiki for the first time and I didn't bother taking any pictures of myself (sorry). Instead, I decided to people watch, and here are some of the things I saw:

Ala Moana parking lot. I've never seen an elevated palm tree before

One of these seems a little out of place...

So many yachts....

While I walked around just observing the people around me, I received an epiphany: there is absolutely wrong with acting like a tourist. Tourists are simply people who aren't afraid to show that they appreciate where they are and that they're making the best of it. I want to act like a tourist every day for the rest of my time here, to experience everything that I can and appreciate it for all it's worth. I'm so glad I made this trip and I plan to make many more like it and fully soak up all the beauty that this island has to offer.

One last thought. I've been learning who I am and embracing that person, and as part of that I've been developing my hobbies, no matter how silly or ridiculous. So I invite anyone who cares to visit my Webcomic, "Serious Stuff" at:
www.itisnothingtolaughabout.blogspot.com

I love you all! I miss you and hope everyone's loving life as much as I am!

Amazing

2010-12-15T00:43:00.000-08:00

I wish I knew how to post the video itself but I just had to share this with everyone. I was in the computer lab and I felt overwhelmed because of my finals. I started procrastinating until I gave up and began watching youtube videos and I can't tell you how glad I am that I did because otherwise I wouldn't have found this video. When I watched it I cried, I felt so embarrassed for letting a few silly tests determine how I felt about myself and make me feel like I'm limited in any way because I'm not. None of us are. I'm so grateful for people like this man.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciYk-UwqFKA&feature=related

President Monson at the PCC

2010-11-20T13:47:00.001-08:00

Yesterday was absolutely incredible! At work at the canoe landing everyone started gathering towards the middle path area and after a few minutes this army of people started marching through. There were all sorts of people--people in suits, tour guides, security guards, even some of the performers at the PCC wearing their grass skirts and carrying clubs. Then trailing behind them were these three golf carts, two of which were carrying some more security people and then the third held, wearing a Hawaiian lei and a casual Hawaiian button-up, President Monson. He drove right past the canoe landing and he couldn't have been more than 10 feet away from me.

Later that evening, my friend Yu Shui and I went to the night show. The night show itself was incredible, but it's what happened afterward that really stuck with me. I could tell you about it, but I think I'll just show it.

I only wish that my iPod had some kind of zooming function because I would've loved for everyone to see President Monson. After the cast finished singing to him, he stood up, bowed to them in gratitude and then he and a lot of the other general authorities that were accompanying him started to leave. It was such an amazing thing to witness, I feel so blessed that I had the chance to see it, and I'm so glad I had my iPod so I could record it and show you guys!

The Ladies go Crazy for a Man With an Infection

2010-11-19T09:09:00.000-08:00

Meh

2010-11-18T19:07:00.001-08:00

Just got sick of the "spooky" theme, especially since Halloween is long past.

Spooky Powerpoint (Listen to the Playlist!)

2010-11-11T21:52:00.000-08:00

I just thought that this was fun. For my English class I was doing a presentation on the book "We", the book that both "1984" and "Brave New World" are heavily based off of. What I took pride in about this particular presentation though, is that I took one of the most mundane forms of information display and made it genuinely creepy. I figured everyone deserved a chance to see what I came up with. Be sure to his play on the playlist though, because the music is 50% of the mood.

Chinese system

2010-11-09T22:20:00.000-08:00

I'm pretty sure everyone at this point has been harassed by me testing out my Chinese system on them. If I haven't, the premise is simple: I'm trying to create a system to teach Americans how to read and write characters. I've come up with all sorts of crazy, complicated and elaborate methods until tonight, I hit a breakthrough. I've been making it way too confusing, way too hard. So I did away with all mathematical appearing equations and I decided to do it the simplest way I could think.

I number each radical (smaller characters that make up the whole character) in order that they're written, and before each radical I write in parenthesis where you write it in relation to the previous radical (i.e. down, right, left, etc.). It's actually simple enough that I won't even need to give you the obligatory 10 minute introduction before I ask you to try the system out. In fact, it's simple enough a this point that I'm going to ask everyone reading this post to try it out. So grab a pen and paper!

First, I want you to write the word "Cat". The radicals are:

Animal

Grass

Field

So just follow the instructions.
Draw:
1. Animal
2. (right; up) Grass
3. (down) Field

And no peeking! Draw out how you think the character looks before looking at the answer and see how close you were. Hopefully what you wrote looks something like this:

The next one is the character for "love". The radicals are:

Claw

Over

One

Slash

Draw:
1. Claw
2. (down) Over
3. (down) One
4. (passing through #3) Slash
5. (touching right side of #4) Again

And the end result should be:

One more! This one's the hardest, so if anyone gets pretty close to the actual character I'm going to feel a lot more confident in my system. This is the character for "joy". The radicals are:

Short Thread

White

One

Line

Eight

Draw:
1. Short thread
2. (right; leave space) Short thread
3. (in between #1 & #2) White
4. (down) One
5. (passing through #4) Line
6. (straddling #5) Eight

and the character for joy is:

I really would love it if everyone would give it a shot and let me know if this is an effective method. Try it out, leave me a comment and rate yourself from 1 to 5, 5 meaning that with my instruction you drew the character perfectly and 1 meaning that my system needs work, your character looked nothing like the real character. So please do this everyone, I'd really appreciate it! Thanks a lot!

Angels

2010-10-26T23:23:00.001-07:00

I have the absolute best mother and father in the world, and I don't deserve them. Today I picked up my moped from the shop and it broke down midway back to Laie, so I called mom and dad and they were so sweet and so patient with me the entire time. I was a nasty old grump when I was on the phone with them and to be absolutely honest I had no excuse to be, especially since they were being so generous and caring toward me during the entire situation. I think I even hung up on mom once because I was so flustered and impatient and I just didn't want to say anything horribly disrespectful to her.

Mom and dad are always looking out for me. Before I came to Hawaii I thought I had a good grasp on what it would be like to live out on my own. I figured if I can secure a job, I'm set. I'll pay my own rent, buy my food, get a moped and everything will just be a breeze from then on out. Well my incredible parents have been there to swoop in and save me each time I ran into trouble and realized what a naive child I'd been, and they've done so without any thought for thanks, without asking me to pay them back over any period of time, but simply because they love me.

I think that's why I was in such a bad mood when I called them up today. They're always there for me and I wish I could be self-reliant enough that they didn't have to be. I was so frustrated that when I finally felt like I was getting a handle on things, something happened and I was helpless on my own. I just want so badly to be able to say, "you've already done so much for me, thank you. Because of your help I'm finally able to make it on my own." I want more than anything to do something for them after they've done so much for me. Now, in retrospect I think my effort to save mom and dad an extra $80 in the expense for towing my moped back to town was good-natured, but obviously can't even begin to make up for all that they've done for me.

Mom and dad, I'm sorry for my attitude today. I was just being stubborn, I wanted to be a grown up, but now I understand that no matter what stage of life I'm in, I'll always be your little boy, and I'm so grateful for that. I love you two so much, thank you for everything that you've ever done for me and the only way I can think of to repay you is to do the exact same thing for my family when I'm in your position.

Kim Chee =(

2010-10-23T21:39:00.000-07:00

So I told you about kim chee and how it would make you upset if you ate it, but I neglected to let you know what it is...

Mice? Cockroaches? Not here

2010-10-22T02:40:00.000-07:00

My Place! Finally!!

2010-10-18T18:41:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the delay everyone, but finally here's what my place is like:

That's my place!! Hope you like it!

вулканович

2010-10-12T15:41:00.000-07:00

Guess what I found tied up in the garage beneath my house!

I named him вулканович (Vulkanovich) which is Russian for "Son of the Volcano". It fits. That thing is a SPAZ, he's as explosive as Mt. Vesuvius (a good alternate name). He's a cutie though, I think I'll steal him.

Sorry I still haven't gotten any photos of my house posted yet. I really wanted to yesterday, but something happened. And by "something", I mean two power lines shattered at the base and broke up the street when they landed, leaving the entire city of Kahuku in utter darkness for the last 18 hours, and I figured maybe it'd be good to have some lighting for those pictures.

More Struggles With Strugsworth

2010-09-27T22:18:00.000-07:00

I completely forgot to post any pictures of my house. So it's long overdue, but I at least have these pictures of my room. No kidding, with the beds and the dressers, there's more moving space in Mom and Dad's laundry than in my bedroom. Take this along with the fact that I have a family of 4 Tongans and 2 roommates sharing the house, you can imagine it's quite a cozy squeeze.

Now the thing you need to understand is that in order to get this much of my room in the shot, I had to scrunch up in the back of an already crowded closet. To my left is the door to the room, and so this is really the entire thing. My bed's on top. So while both of us are slobs who don't make their beds, I'm a tasteful slob who at least has a nice cover slip for his mattress. You can't see it in this picture, but there's a ceiling fan that I've cut my head on climbing into bed because it's perpetually on. I've also hit my back and feet on it several times. Besides that, the bottom bunk is bigger. I can see why he wanted it.

And check out that extension cord in the window. Want to know what that's all about? In the bedroom there are no less than 6 outlets -- all of them broken. They have a heavy industrial size spool of heavy duty extension cable running into the room from under the door and everything else is powerstrips and extensions branching off of that one. This is the height of class in the islands. All this for only $400, what a steal right??

Now for a sad story involving me and my good friend Strugsworth. (I renamed my moped Strugsworth as opposed to the Strug because he's got this really high pitched whine when you ride him that can only be described as "Cockney") One night after riding that bruiser all the way to Kaneohe (about an hour's drive) and back, I decided I really needed a break. I parked him, tied dear old Mr. Strugsworth up to the side of a pole and tightly locked him into position like a good owner would. After a long, contemplative walk on the beach I came back to find the gates to the parking lot closed and this:

That's right, while locking the gate, they strung the chain through Strugsworth's basket and bolted it with an enormous pad lock.

Oh, it was on.

It was a Saturday night, there was no way I was leaving that thing all tethered up for all day Sunday. I wasn't going to let them do that. I looked around for a few minutes to see if there was any possible way to get it out, and seeing that there was no way to unhook the chain or even break the basket for that matter, I went to Foodland (Hawaii's Ream's) and bought a knife and cut Strugsworth to freedom.

(Sorry for the bad resolution, my camera doesn't take great night shots)

After only about ten minutes I was already out, and I figured after they put me to all that trouble, I'm not gonna tow my own trash out of trash out of there. I just wish I could've seen their reaction when they came back and saw that the animal had chewed off its own leg to get free of the trap. Anyway, I've got a scummy new basket which I'll take a picture of. It's covered with sea urchins and corals and demonic cherubim unfit for this world.

Still having a blast out here, needless to say!

Listen to Come Listen to my Many Musics

2010-09-17T19:10:00.001-07:00

Foot meat, the Strug and Death's Hills

2010-09-15T22:31:00.000-07:00

It's been too long since I updated, especially since I'm back in Hawaii now!! First, here's a little recap just before I left:

This is the world's sweetest kitty, Calli. She's giving her daddy lots of loves. I wish I could've told her that I was leaving! She's probably taking it so hard, poor cat!

I showed Jaden my new iPod Nano. I told him it has photo capabilities but it really just does video. I was hoping he'd hold the pose a little longer. Oh well, maybe someone here in Hawaii will fall for it!

Angel's kids had so much fun on the moving sidewalk at the airport! I'm so glad I was able to see you guys before I left, it was good to see the cute little guys running around. It's a comfort to know that even if I'm 10,000 miles away, I'm still so close to my family

Now--onto the current stuff.

I live off campus, about 2.5 miles. I've been wanting to find a moped or a bike, anything to get around, because at $2.50 a ride, the bus was getting too pricey too fast. I experimented around a bit. I decided one day to see if I could just trudge the long trek to school if I got up early enough. So at about 6:30 the next day, I donned my chacos and walked through the muggy Hawaii marshes. This is what happened to my feet:

Ultimately I decided that if I didn't want to be walking on meat stumps for the rest of the semester, I'd do well for myself to buy a bike or something. So I found my way to Craigslist, and the outrageous demands for prices of mopeds. $800 for a used moped when a brand new one costs $850. I didn't want to spend that much though, so I kept looking. Occasionally the diamond-in-the-rough $500 bike came along, and I'd e-mail, text, call and wait only to have them either A) not respond or B) inform me they've already sold it.

Luckily, my landlady's husband is a super sweet guy and always wants to be helpful. Too helpful. To the point that it makes you cringe at his idea of what's good. Rather than let you take something which is less than perfect, he'll willingly send back a fantastic specimen because of minor flaws that aren't even a problem. Twice this happened--he calls me and says in his broken Tongan-English "Bruddah, I find great moped, get youself home it real cheap, $400 2008 Yamaha!". So I hurry home and then he says "It no good. The reverse light broken." Seriously? I don't care if it's broken! I just want something to get around on! Then he'd always inform me of these phantom mopeds he found, claiming there was a great deal, '09 mopeds for $500 in Honolulu, free delivery. Yet each time he found one of these amazing bargains, he somehow managed to neglect taking down ANY information. No link to the ad, no phone number of the buyer, no e-mail, not even a title of the ad.

If I was going to get one, it was up to me.

I kept looking, feigning interest in Tali's offers, because I honestly didn't expect them to come through, I knew that if we checked it out, he'd find some nitpicky problem with it and refuse to let me buy it. He had actually talked two other people out of buying quality machines. He has this weird obsession with the year the model was made too...first question he'd always ask when I told him I found one is "what year?". Don't care, brother Finau. If it runs, I want it. Maybe this is terrible and stereotypical of me to say, but I didn't imagine someone from Tonga would be so particular about his moped.

Regardless, I found this guy with a Razz in Honolulu for $520. I haggled with him, then today I took a dive. I offered $400. He denied. BUT--wonder of wonders, I check Craigslist one last time, find a great reliable moped of the same kind for $425. I throw $400 in my pocket and take off with sister Finau to Sunset Beach to meet the guy. When I saw it, when I tested it, when I rode it I knew it was a great idea, but I also knew that sister Finau was watching me like a hawk. I drive back into the parking lot of the Chevron and tell the guy I love it. Sister Finau's waiting in the suburban with her window rolled down.

"Alex, come heah!"

No.

"Yeah, what's up?"
"That moped look no good"

I don't care.

"It rides just fine."
"What year?"

Irrelevant

"'97, but the Yahama Razzes are known for being pretty durable. Guy says he's used it for 5 years and he just put new parts in it."
"How much?"

Time to lie if I don't want hear about it every day for the rest of the semester

"$300. It's great, I think I'll buy it."
"But--"
"Thanks so much for bringing me down here, I'll meet you at the house!"
"That moped--"
"Oh yeah, here's $15 for the gas money, almost forgot. See you at home!"
"I have question--"
"Don't worry, I cleared everything up with him, we're just going to finish out some details, but it seems good and I'm probably gonna get it."

I don't know why she was so bent on me not getting that thing. But I did! Unluckily, on the way home, I got a flat. Luckly, Heavenly Father is a loving Father and He blessed me in several ways this evening. On the way to Kaneohe to get the tire changed, a friend of mine from the ward pulled up and rolls down his window, "Your tire's flat,". I explained my situation, and miraculously the moped fit in the back of his rental car. Even more miraculously, he still had his rental car! His motorcycle had just come in the day before and he was supposed to have picked it up at the shop, but he held onto the car one day more than necessary, which was a huge blessing for me.

I got it to the shop, and another big blessing occurred. Because the moped was on its side in the back of the car, it got flooded. Had I taken it anywhere else to get the tire fixed, I probably would've ended up paying and then they'd ignore me. But these two guys who were working on my moped stayed 20 minutes after closing to help me start the thing back up after they saw the engine was flooded--a task I know for a fact I couldn't do on my own.

Finally, it started and I made my way back home. On almost every hill, the life was drained almost completely out of my poor moped, but luckily it stayed alive to get me home. After seeing how many issues that beater had in just one short day, I decided on a name for it.

The Strug.

Short for The Big Struggle. Anyway, it's about time you see this bad boy!!

Only one rear view mirror (with no mirror in it!)
That's the moped equivalent of an eye patch

Tops off at 30mph, now THAT'S class.

It's been a fun week =) i miss you all!! I love you!

Fatty!!

2010-08-08T10:48:00.000-07:00

By now everyone's already met her, but I don't know if anyone has noticed my little kitty Callie has been getting FAT. To give you an idea, have a look:

You can even see it from behind...

Roundikens

But look at that sweet face! It's impossible not to love her!

So sorry I haven't updated in so long, but I figure since I'm going to be getting back to Hawaii soon, I should probably pick this back up

Heartbroken

2009-10-22T18:30:00.001-07:00

That friend's been on my mind a lot and in my prayers consistently for the last few days, and today I made a discovery that breaks my heart. I know that's an overused cliche, but I'm not exaggerating when I say that this is one of the most devastating things that I've ever experienced, I literally didn't know how to respond and I still don't. I'll still pray for her and think of her and I wish her the best, but today I was on her "info" tab in FaceBook and saw that it's not just a matter of not believing in the church, she's actively involved in a lot of anti-Mormon groups.

It's funny though, because because now I have a stronger desire to share with everyone what I believe in, what I stand for. It's interesting that in every bad situation some good can emerge.

Don't get me wrong though everyone, please keep praying for her because I know that Heavenly Father will help her if we have faith that He'll help the right thing to happen. Heavenly Father won't ever give up on her and I don't want any of us to either.

A Close Friend

2009-10-19T22:00:00.000-07:00

I have a close friend, someone who told me that she no longer believes in the church. I was talking to her a few minutes ago, and I wanted nothing more than to tell her of the joy she'll find in praying to her Heavenly Father and gaining a closer relationship with Him.

I bore my testimony to her that if she prays to Him about every aspect of her life, no matter how silly or frivolous it may seem, then she'll grow closer with Him, and in doing so, she'll be happier than she has ever been.

I think I'm beginning to understand how a missionary feels towards the people he meets out in the field, how he feels towards the people he comes to love, because when I was talking to her, I was telling her this for no other reason than I know it'll make her happy. In that moment, and even right now the only reason it matters to me whether or not she'll pray is because all I want is for her to be happy. I hope this is what it feels like to be a missionary, because I've never wanted anything this badly before. The thought that she'll recognize the love and special relationship that she has with our Father in Heaven makes me happier than anything.

Anyone who reads my blog, I want to ask you to say a prayer for this girl. You don't know her, and you probably never will, but it would mean so much to me. I want so badly for her to start inviting the spirit into her life, so that Heavenly Father will to be able to start working within her, and hopefully she'll begin to recognize the Spirit in her life and how much we all need it.

This is a missionary effort, and I want everyone to take part in it.

Thanks everyone

Mahfuja

2009-10-10T19:55:00.000-07:00

In the interest of privacy, I won't post her picture. She told me that the reason out of 500+ photos on FaceBook, only about 3 are of her, and not even tagged is because she doesn't like her image floating around on the internet.

But I've read a lot of books about Muslim women, every single one being an account describing Islam as an abusive, hating religion in which the men are all Satanic, sadistic evil people and the women are all brainwashed drones. I didn't want to think of the religion this way, so I searched all over the place for people I could ask, hopefully men, about what the real beliefs were of the religion. But face it, I live in Utah.

So I joined all sorts of Muslim FaceBook groups asking someone to explain to me, how are women really regarded in the Muslim faith? I was completely ignored which made me even more frustrated because I saw this as secrecy, people completely dodging a question or dismissing it because the honest answer was something they didn't want to confront.

Well, after about a month and a half, I finally got a message from someone on FaceBook, her name is Mahfuja Ahmed, and she cleared up a lot of misconceptions I had and helped me to understand and respect the religion as one that's peaceful and really based off love and service, in fact, there are a lot of parallels similar to Mormonism:

Modesty : Outside of a person's home, women should have their shoulders covered, and be covered from their collarbone down to their knees, and men should be covered the same, unless working outside, in which case it's okay to be shirtless. Swimming is an exception.

Word of Wisdom : There was some exotic word for it, but essentially they're held to the same standards as we are; no tobacco, alcohol, and avoid things that are unhealthy or prone to cause addiction

Worship : Obey the Sabbath, be an example to others and study the scriptures to gain a better understanding of God and His will for you

Relationships : The roles of husband and wife are sacred, the two are equal in importance but different in purpose; men are to support the family and offer spiritual guidance and strength to the family, a women should help raise the children in the best way she can. It's a partnership of union and respect, and women need to be held in high esteem at all times, and likewise with men

It goes on for a while, the similarities between our two religions.

What made me glad, and excited, is when Mahfuja began asking me about The Book of Mormon and Mormon beliefs. I was able to explain her our beliefs about God and our relationship with Him, the Book of Mormon, prophets, the restoration of the church and the plan of Salvation.

This makes me really excited to serve a mission =)

100th post!

2009-06-03T14:34:00.000-07:00

It wasn't until I signed into blogger that I realized I was at 99 posts, and this is perfect, because there's nothing I'd rather have saved for my 100th than my awesome trip to go see Ben and Jana!

Speaking of which, Ben and Jana, I'm sorry it's taken me this long to upload these pictures. Here's what happened, once I got back I started up the semester at UVU, was way frazzled and busy, and finally I got a free day, but I lost my camera for a few weeks. I finally found the camera but since then it's been crazy studying and tests for a few days in a row, but I finally got the CD AND my camera back, and luckily the computers on campus have SD card readers, because the USB I brought doesn't fit the jack in my camera. I've been dying to tell you guys about this trip, and finally I get to!

I honestly don't know where's a good place to start, and I got the pictures so jumbled that they're not in any sort or particular order, but---

I generally try not to do too many successive shots, but I love how this leads up

I just love how disappointed or freaked out I look.
Chicken feet is obviously something I can
easily go without for the rest of my life

This just surprised me, because Jana can take a
picture of ANYTHING and make it artistic.
NOTHING could've made the food look appetizing, but
she could at least make it pretty

Ben and I totally blend in. But when you have little leprechaun
children on the streets it's hard not to

Now THIS I thought was cool because that sign
is identical to a shop in Provo, it's even hanging out
at a weird angle like that.
I'm sure no one cares, but
"Xiao Gao Dian". "Little Tall's Shop".

People say I have an attraction to Asians, but Jana
looks absolutely smitten

Is that expression on my face NOT that of a
DANGER MAN
?

Again, Jana has the coolest ideas for pictures
and this was with just a regular digital camera like I have
but I can't ever imagine getting an awesome shot like this!

adAhh, I thought I could do it, but I guess not. I was kind of racing the clock but there are so many pictures to go through and I'm in a rush. Institute's at 7:00 and it's 5:00 right now and I need to do two homework assignments both require watching an hour long tutorial. I'll finish up later!

Interesting day at work

2009-03-19T12:15:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I had a pretty interesting day at work. In order for me to go to the temple dedication on Sunday, I had to swap shifts with someone, and finally I found a person who was willing. So I traded what's usually a really calm Sunday shift where we usually watch a movie and the guys all go to bed for a shift with the same guys (who are habitual liars and explode at you when you're not stupid enough to believe their lies) who frankly are kind of difficult to handle while they're awake.

I was kinda stressed because

1. Wednesdays are my only day off during the week

2. On my day off, I didn't want to be working with them

3. Whenever they freak out, I never know how to take control of the situation

So Mom and Matt were sweet enough to put up with my griping and offer me some advice, which completely took my stress away and replaced it with confidence that I could pretty easily handle these guys. It worked, but with a price.

One of the kids has some bad habits so whenever I catch him doing something he shouldn't be, I'm always sure to let him know I'm watching.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

"..."

"Look, just stop, I know exactly what you're up to"

"You DON'T know! Frickin' liar..."

"All right, then explain it to me, because I'm apparently seeing something totally different"

"YOU'RE A FRICKIN' LIAR!! I'M NOT DOING ANYTHING!! S.O.B, (about 20 other expletives)"

Then he stomped off to his room where I stood in his doorway and watched him further.

"Hey man, you're going to have to stop doing that before I'll leave"

"I'm not doing it anymore"

"Yeah, I can pretty much see that you are"

"GO AWAY AND LEAVE ME ALONE!"

"Absolutely, once you stop"

so he did until I left the room, then I came back and he was doing it again

"Why are you doing that man? If you want me to leave, then just go to bed like you promised"

"GET OUT OF MY ROOM I YOU!! STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO DO YOU CAN'T CONTROL ME!!"

"That's true, but I'm also supposed to make sure you don't do anything you're not supposed to be doing"

"GET OUT RIGHT NOW! I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ANOTHER WORD OUT OF YOUR FILTHY ******** MOUTH! GET OUT! I DON'T WANNA SEE YOU, HEAR YOU JUST GET OUT!"

"You know the deal"

"GET OOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUTTTTTTTT!"

So I pull out my phone and just start texting standing in his doorway until he's done freaking out. There's about a forty-second pause, and then he starts doing the toenail thing.

"Stop it, man"

But this time, rather than scream or yell, he picks up a steel-toed boot and starts coming at me. I thought he was going to throw it, so I backed out of the doorway out of sight, then I see that he's coming at me and he just plans to hit me with it. That was a REALLY stupid plan, because as soon as I noticed he didn't plan to use distance as an advantage I just rushed him, got down low like I was about to tackle, but didn't follow through. I got my arms around and him and threw him off balance a little (because if you're too rough you can get fired/sued/arrested etc. so I wanted to play it safe) and I just held him there.

Unluckily for me, he bit down on my left forearm and just held it for like three minutes, the entire time I'm trying to get my arm free without losing a big chunk of meat and trying to console the younger kid who's bawling like a baby but refuses to go back in his room like I say.

I know it doesn't look too bad, but that's a human bite mark and it's still all puffy

Finally, with my right arm still pressing his arms to his side, I hook my finger on the inside of his cheek and just rip as hard as I can, which gets his mouth off me so I can get a better grip on him. The entire ordeal holds off for another seven minutes probably until he finally calms down enough that I can believe him when he says he's going back in his room.

How many of YOU can say you've been bitten by a group-home resident at work?

2009-03-07T19:58:00.001-08:00

A Good Message from the Media???? Nawwwwww...

2009-03-07T19:00:00.000-08:00

I heard something that made me think when I was watching t.v., a commercial for "My Name is Earl" came on and he said

"I've been a bad person. If I want a better life, I've got to be a better person."

Bad person or not, the last part applies to everyone. If you want a good life, be a good person. If you want a BETTER life, be a BETTER person.

Rob Thomas fans

2009-02-28T16:12:00.001-08:00

This probably is completely unsignificant to anybody but me, but if you know who the singer Rob Thomas is, then you probably knew before he went solo, he was in the band Matchbox Twenty. Well, I recently found out he was in a band BEFORE that, called Tabitha's Secret, and one of Matchbox Twenty's most famous songs was written and performed by him before that band was even formed. That was the worst way to form that sentence, but I don't want to hit backspace, even though mom is right next to me and saw me re-write that previous sentence six or seven times.

Anyway, if anyone like Rob Thomas, then weird huh?

2009-02-28T15:59:00.000-08:00

I have no pictures, and if I did, then I'd probably get arrested because I'm pretty sure it's illegal if you work at Chrysalis to post any pictures of the clients on the internet, for any reason. So I guess this works out for the best, but there is one story I want to tell because it scared me so bad and there's no breach in privacy since none of the guys were involved.

Every Monday night I work from 9:30 pm to 6:30 am at my house in Orem. It's awesome because as long as I prepare lunch in advance for the guys in the house and check on them once every two hours to make sure they're not having seizures or otherwise up to no good (so far, they haven't been) then I have no limitations on what I can do. I can watch movies, play video games, do whatever I feel like just as long as the volume is low enough where it won't wake up any of the boys.

One night when I was working though, I was making lunch, part of which was hard boiled eggs, so I put them in the water and waited for it to boil. The thing is, I was almost positive that I'd set a timer for like, 20 minutes. Maybe I did and shut my phone by or maybe I just spaced it entirely. Regardless, I had just watched a creepy movie, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, and then I'd put in a scary PlayStation game, and I was on edge all night.

So about an hour and 15 minutes later, right when I was getting to a really creepy part in the game I just hear this loud "BAM" from the kitchen and I lost it. I was almost positive some creeper had broken into the house or something and I was just freaking out wondering if I should go check it out or just assume that somebody was plastered and trashing things around outside. Then I got to thinking, if someone's in the house, then the guys could get hurt, and if they get hurt, I'm sure as heck going to jail for negligence. Eventually my fear of being indicted overwhelmed my fear of being brutally beaten or kidnapped or worse. Stupid thought process, I know.

I walked into the kitchen and this smell hit me, and I heard some sizzling, and I immediately knew what happened. I walked over to the stove and two of the eggs had just exploded. All the water in the pot evaporated and the eggs were still cooking on high. Scared me half to .

That's why Chrysalis is the coolest job ever.

Elder Nielson? Not QUITE yet

2009-02-07T23:00:00.000-08:00

So I'm not done but I'm progressing. I submitted the "online recommendation" part of my mission papers (finally) to Presidente Fischer(e), so he can, in turn, review what I wrote and then recommend me if he so feels the need to the stake president for an interviews and basically everything is snowballing from here.

Go me.

Back to the Golden Days

2009-02-02T10:15:00.000-08:00

I got another longboard for Christmas since the one I'd bought in Hawai'i was unscrupulously stolen while I was at work (I don't know why either. I'd set mine along with about six or seven others against the fence, and mine was obviously in the most disrepair. It was a junker. The thief must have had really poor taste) anyway, I hadn't had the chance to ride it because

1. In Springville, they have this weird habit of just dumping gravel on the road, which opts for a very bumpy ride on anything but a car

&

2. Snow. Snow was everywhere, on the sidewalks, streets, cats, babies, snow covered EVERYTHIIIIIIIING

Riding it today totally brought me back to the golden days in Hawai'i. Just cruising around on a Sector 9 while listening to my tiny little iPod Shuffle. It was very nostalgic, except that in Hawai'i there was about a 30 degree difference in the weather. High or low? I'll let you figure that one out.

But today I woke up and I had to return a RedBox movie I rented, Eagle Eye. Not a bad movie. A little campy at some points but definitely worth $1. I kept it a day overdue so it was $2, and I'm not so sure how I feel about that. Regardless, I looked outside and saw most of the snow was melted off the sidewalks, so I decided I'd much rather take my longboard than to drive, since it would tack on what, an extra 10 minutes? So I took off.

I enjoyed the right a ton, so when I got to Ream's, I returned the movie, picked up Lakeview Terrace, and really didn't feel like going home just yet, so what did i do? I headed towards main street. My plan was to stop by Ace Hardware to see if they had a chain and padlock so I could lock this bad boy up outside of grocery stores and prisons while I did my stuff. But when I pulled to Ace Hardware, I realized main street was right there, and the Beijing Wok, this Chinese restaurant which I'm sure NONE of you native Springvillers even knew the name of was just down the block, and I'd been dying to know when their killer lunch special started.

11:30, apparently. I went to the restaurant right as the owner and her husband were walking in, so I stopped her, asked what time the lunch special starts, and then with a display of perfect innocence and ignorance, I asked politely in Chinese if she was Chinese. It was obvious answer, but it was an ice breaker.

Now this was a big compliment to me, because normally, I've found, if you speak with a foreigner in their native tongue, and they feel your skills aren't nearly as good as you think they are, they'll respond in English and really push for the conversation to continue in English. Not her. She responded in Chinese, she spoke really fast in Chinese and that was a really big compliment to me, because that was like saying to me that my speaking ability is good enough that she's willing to speak with me in her language.

Then I went home. It was a wild time and I got sweaty and felt great and it was all because of this incredibly awesome longboard I got for Christmas. So thank you so much Mom and Discount Pawn Shop Matt and anyone else involved in that gift, I'm so glad you guys realized how much I loved riding in Hawai'i and were kind enough to bring that gift to me back on the mainland!

very bothered by something

2009-01-31T22:09:00.000-08:00

I'm very perturbed by something. I was reading on Ryan's blog, and I saw the links to all his blogs that he visits often, and I recognized a name because I'm a vague acquaintance of the person, so I checked out the blog.

Then that sparked a memory in me. Maybe I'm the only person who recalls this, but I wrote a post while in Hawai'i about Chinese possibly becoming the new international language, and somebody I'm entirely unfamiliar with left a comment on the post about the chance that Esperanzo might be the language. Regardless of what he said, it just really bothered me because I STILL don't have any idea who that is.

It made me think of it because I made the connection this poor person has no idea I was looking at their blog, and I won't lie, it's kind of unnerving that people you barely (or don't, at all) know could be reading your blog posts. It just makes me feel like a stalker and/or some creeper is keeping tabs on me and it just spooks me.

about time for an actual post

2009-01-17T08:29:00.000-08:00

So here's my excuse: I basically forgot that even though I'm back in Utah, there ARE people who read my blog who aren't. And even some of those who are don't know what's going on and don't get to see me too often, so I figured I'd tell everyone what's going on with me right now.

I got a job at Chrysalis, which is awesome! If you read any of Ryan's blog posts about working at Chrysalis, it's essentially more of the same, except, the second week I worked, on my birthday, AND New Years Eve, I got assaulted by one of the guys in my house and the cops got involved and all of that super-fun holiday tradition. So what did I do? I got a job at another potentially hostile house in addition to this one =) it's no big deal, actually, really the worst thing to come of it is that the guy's now going to jail literally two days before he was supposed to be released from the Chrysalis program and things have been pretty awkward since. My new house is great. I'm older than all of them so it's a lot easier to enforce any rules. I work only graveyard shifts at that house, so it's basically Mega Man, Diet Mountain Dew and Chinese all night long.

Speaking of Chinese, I decided to do something that'll probably end up me mentally. This isn't very common knowledge, but there's what's known as the "3000 most common Chinese characters" and the rule is if you know those 3000, you're considered fluent in reading Chinese. Maybe even speaking, because a 3000 word vocabulary isn't bad. Anyway, I was working on the characters last night, and I went to all the trouble of having Ryan print off (no joke) 130 pages of nothing but Chinese character, pronunciation and meaning after character after character. It cost like $6.50 which is a ton considering it's only about 7 cents to print a page. Regardless, Ryan did that for me, Mom got me a white board for my birthday so I can practice writing the characters (and me being the culture nerd that I am, was THRILLED when I got it!)

Here's the downside though. 3000 is a big number. I'm inching my way closer to the MTC and a mission (more on that later), and there's no guarantee if I'll even go Chinese speaking or anything like that. So here's what happened last night during my graveyard shift: I watched two movies, four total hours of me actually not even watching the movie, but it playing while I worked frivolously on making these 250 flash cards for the top 250 most common characters, and guess what I did in the following 6 hours? I memorized 180 of them. So basically what I'm going to try (possibly fail, but try nonetheless) is I'm going to go ahead and try to cram the images of 250 different characters into my memory every single day for 12 days, which, if I can, would make me fluent. I did something similar in Hawai'i, for my class. I fell behind and I was eventually up to memorizing 60-80 in about 2 hours, so maybe I can do this. Can't hurt to try, right? Except that maybe it could mentally exhaust me to the point of a breakdown or or some other fun disorder.

Okay, and I'd saved the best news for last, and that is I'm almost done with my mission papers!!! I talked to the bishop on Sunday, he said "yeh, whatevs do whachoo want" and so then later he gave me the papers and I've been working on them and the very last step for me is to get my last two vaccinations (the first two made it so I'm illegible to sell plasma for 2 weeks, there goes all my play money D=) and then I can give them back to the bishop on Sunday of next week hopefully sooner and then from there it's all just meetings and interviews and I'm sooooooo excited!! You guys can all go ahead and guess where you think I'm going, but just keep in mind I'm not going to tell you. Speculate to your hearts desires.

There's a few more things going on in my life, but nothing as substantial as that, so I hope that brought everyone up to speed and in their books this passed as a legit post, despite the lack of pictures.

这个给我和我只

2009-01-13T06:05:00.000-08:00

都我喜欢做现在是出在大学校夏威夷。我想都我的朋友。我复习了跟学汉字，但是我知道不都懂什么说，和我只见多我可以写。我能写之有一点。好好好，我要出在中国还是台湾。我会买东西给你要是你能懂哲。再见

I spend time during my graveyard shifts to learn some more characters, and it seems I'm improving a little. Anyway, I had to get that off my chest, so thanks for listening, and don't worry I'm going to make a REAL post sometime soon.

Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3

2008-12-29T21:29:00.000-08:00

............................................________
....................................,.-‘”...................``~.,
.............................,.-”...................................“-.,
.........................,/...............................................”:,
.....................,?......................................................\,
.................../...........................................................,}
................./......................................................,:`^`..}
.............../...................................................,:”........./
..............?.....__.........................................:`.........../
............./__.(.....“~-,_..............................,:`........../
.........../(_....”~,_........“~,_....................,:`........_/
..........{.._$;_......”=,_.......“-,_.......,.-~-,},.~”;/....}
...........((.....*~_.......”=-._......“;,,./`..../”............../
...,,,___.\`~,......“~.,....................`.....}............../
............(....`=-,,.......`........................(......;_,,-”
............/.`~,......`-...............................\....../\
.............\`~.*-,.....................................|,./.....\,__
,,_..........}.>-._\...................................|..............`=~-,
.....`=~-,_\_......`\,.................................\
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.....................................`=-,...................,%`>--==``
........................................_\..........._,-%.......`\
...................................,<`.._|_,-&``................`\

I don't know what to write! Let's hope something exciting happens soon! =D

Visitor's Center

2008-12-11T16:13:00.000-08:00

Okay so I'm leaving to the airport in about 15 minutes. I'd pre-made this post earlier, so I figure I won't be able to post it tomorrow at all, I'll do it now. Anyway, my Chinese friend Jia came to the Laie Visitor's Center with me to see a mutual friend of ours play the piano for a Christmas devotional. Jia's not a member, but she's in love with everything Mormon, it was really cool to go with her and talk about how beautiful everything is and how different it felt there.

She had a lot of respect for it too. She said she really wanted to see the inside of the temple, and when we took some of these pictures, the sliding door to the temple automatically opened and she gasped and backed away from it really fast. She's one of many, many people I already miss.

She bullied me into getting up there

Laie Christmas Flood!

2008-12-11T15:40:00.000-08:00

This morning I woke up at about 10:30 and I heard rain pouring outside. I'd never been to the beach in the rain before, and I figured if I only have three days left, I may as well take advantage of it. I pulled on my swimsuit and started to walk to the beach, and this is what I saw...

Looks a little shallow, I know, but walk a little further into the field and...

Or you could go to the stake center...

Needless to say, the water was freezing and this was one of the coolest things I've seen since I've been here! I tried to take pictures of the streets, but it was too late. By the time I got my camera back out, they'd already drained most of it. I actually DID make it to the beach, and the streets were knee deep the entire way, and sometimes you'd step off the curb without realizing it. People were out there with their body boards and there was more people out the streets for the flood than for the Art City Days parade back in Springville! The beach itself. Pretty unimpressive. Very, VERY dirty, it was a nasty shade of brown and parts were black and it was just unpleasant.

The rest of today has been way fun though! And for everyone back in Utah, I just got my first taste of "cold" I've felt in a LOOOOONG time, and it's still 70 degrees here. Three days from today, I'll be reminded what it's really like.

Seasider Christmas Party

2008-12-09T22:07:00.001-08:00

Can be summed up in:

we had a blast!!!

Challenge from the BYUH 1st Ward

2008-12-07T17:19:00.000-08:00

Knowing that a lot of people will be leaving and not returning during the Christmas break, my ward came up with a really good idea. Each person in the Elder's quorum was given an engraved Book of Mormon that says "Christmas 2008 BYUH 1st Ward" and with it, a green or red card offering this challenge:

"We invite you to read the Book of Mormon with the objective to find Jesus Christ within its pages. Write your name on the inside cover of your Book of Mormon, for it will become a prized possession.

Please do the following for 60 days beginning January 1, 2009:

1. Read faithfully 9-11 pages
2. Underline/highlight each reference to Jesus Christ by whatever name He is called (i.e. Jesus, Lord, He, Him, I, Lamb of God, Immanuel, Lord of the Vineyard, etc.). At the bottom of each page, write the number of times Christ is mentioned.

We are certain this will be a spiritually uplifting experience and will help all of you develop an even greater appreciation and love for our Savior, Jesus Christ."

I issue this challenge to everyone who reads my blog as well. My mission will be coming up, so I'm going to start sooner in hopes of finishing before I leave to the MTC. I hope everyone takes this challenge and sees the difference it will make in their lives. I love you!

Thanksgiving Part II

2008-12-04T22:02:00.000-08:00

So if you remember where I left off, I was off doing slides on my own, which was no fun because being alone at a waterpark just isn't cool. But when I got back to the table, I saw about six or seven OTHER people eating, and I had noticed a really crazy looking water slide that required a minimum of four people to go on. They even had these weird custom-made tubes in order to do it, and I know I didn't take any pictures, so thank goodness for Google images. The slide was called the Tornado, and here's what it looked like:

It hardly looked like a slide at all, but it was wild!! The tube leading to the funnel was almost a 90 (180? which is straight up and down?) degree drop, so when you went off backwards, it was pretty crazy and scary! It was fun though.

Anyway,waiting in line with the people I got together was the good thing, because that marked the end of my being alone for the day. There was a New Zealander name Iriapa, another person from Springville, Jessica, a Kenyan girl named Isabelle and myself. Iriapa and Jessica seemed to be pretty into each other, so I started talking with Isabelle, and luckily for me, she was really, really cool. We got along really great, so after we went on the ride, I hung out with her for the rest of the day.

We went on all sorts of slides like the Cliffhanger...

...which looks suspiciously like Seven Peaks' SkyBreaker, which I've never done before, and this one is 30 feet higher!

The Volcano...

...which if you did a push up on the second drop, got some pretty good hang time...

The Shaka...

...which after the dinner rush there was no line, and we did it between ten and fifteen times straight....

The Honolulu Harbor....

...which was actually pretty lame, because the waves didn't go side to side, only back to front so you ALWAYS ended on the shore, and you could at very least 5 of these in the Seven Peaks wave pool...

The Surf Simluator...

...which is one of the most genius ideas I've ever seen, and fun to bodyboard on....

The Hot and Cold Pots...
...which besides the Shaka was our favorite hangout place...

and Keiki Kove, the kiddy pools...

...which isn't only for kids...

All in all, this was definitely one of the more interesting Thanksgivings I've ever had! It was a big blessing, I'm so grateful I was able to go, and for making a new friend while I was there!! Once we got back to Laie, she gave me a papaya, I've never had one before but they're delicious, probably my favorite fruit.

The only problem was, BYUH campus didn't think this through very well, but the cafeteria was closed literally the entire day on Thanksgiving, and all the wards/activities planned for dinner to be around 2:00, but when 8:00 pm rolls around and there's no dinner and no one's planning on sleeping for another four hours, it causes some problems.

Luckily, there was a gas station that was open, so I went over there, grabbed a diet Sprite (they're so addicting! Almost as much Powerade Zero, the drink that, if I'm busy with no time for lunch, I'll take down a quart of in favor of eating) along with a burrito.

After that, I was exhausted so I took a shower, watched a movie and went to bed. So I hope this covers my Thanksgiving, for all you who were wondering =) and see you all in a week!!!! =D

Thanksgiving and Cropping

2008-12-04T21:39:00.000-08:00

First I want to say, "thank goodness for cropping!" Take this photo for example: as it is, kinda creepy and if you didn't know it was my last day of work with a bunch of hyper Canoe Boyz, it would be kinda creepy and weird.

But you do a little cropping, and you get a photo that looks artistic and like I'm in a repository of deep thoughts while artistically playing my 'ukulele (yes, there's an 'okina before 'ukulele, I never knew that before either. I'll buy Yummies for anyone who can tell me what an 'okina is now)

Crop a little bit more and you get....

Okay, now on to the actual point of my post. I've seen everyone else posting about how great Thanksgiving was, and I think my blog is the only one that doesn't have that, not because my Thanksgiving wasn't super great, but because I feel embarrassed that I don't have any pictures =( I'm ashamed of my picture-apathy when I've been having so many good photo opportunities (case in point, Ala Moana, which you may never see...) regardless, it was still fun and I have a story to tell, so hopefully you guys will all enjoy it.

So gather around, children, and let grandpa tell you a great story about a water park, ethnic food and a fun-loving African woman named Isabelle....

Yeah, so basically all the clubs had rented out a cabana at Hawai'i Adventure water park and since many students were unable to return home for the holiday, there was this offer: $35 from each club member and you can come and have Thanksgiving there. Those unwilling to pay all had ward activities, so don't feel too bad for them, and I'm actually a little disappointed I couldn't do both.

Anyway, considering the Tongan and Samoan clubs have about 90-102 (yep, that exact) members between the two groups, I thought it'd be packed. The Tongan, Samoan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Kiwi (Australian) and Hawai'ian clubs all were going, so I was expecting tons of people! How it was, we were able to pack everyone together in two fifteen passenger vans and three regular vans. And a two passenger car. I recognized about four people, and they were all with each other in a separate vehicle, so I was really worried about how fun the ordeal would be.

We piled in, and I had to urinate immensely before I even got in the van, and it's a two hour ride to Honolulu, and I noticed we exited and entered the free, switching directions several times, so I'm pretty sure we were lost at one point. And the guy next to me was trying to show off the entire time, because we had a conversation that went something like this:

Him:"Hey man, you're a friend of Quynh's right?"

Me: "Yeah, she's in my CIS class"

Him: (already has a glazed look from boredom) "Oh okay yeah, but I'M her boyfriend"

Me: (I'm thinking "Great, to this guy really doesn't want to talk, he's just showing off because he has a cute boyfriend" but I SAY:) "Good on ya" or something to that effect

Him:"Yeah, I'm trying to get to know all her friends, because I'm with her all the time, I'd better get along with them"

Me: (thinking) "No you're not, you just think I missed your point" (saying) "Sucks that you couldn't get her to come then, right?"

Him: puts in his headphones and looks away until he finds someone else to brag to

When we finally got there, I took off, found the cabana area, dumped off all my stuff and then found a restroom. When I returned, everyone was gone, so I went off on my own to find some slides. Frankly, the first half hour wasn't too fun. I don't always need a ton of company to have a good time depending on what I'm doing. One of those things I DO need company doing is going to a waterpark, amusement park etc. No one was there.

I returned to the cabana to get some Thanksgiving dinner/lunch which was WAY good actually, considering there wasn't anything Thanksgivingesque or American about it in anyway. We had chow mein, fried chicken, white rice, cut steak and very Asian style shot glasses for water. I say Asian because Asians don't drink water. EVER. The shot glass was probably as tall as if you put two fingers on top of each other on a table.

This is getting long, so I'm splitting it up into two parts.

I'm a '90s Child

2008-12-02T01:14:00.001-08:00

You might think that I'm too young to be able to experience nostalgia, but these songs bring back the best decade ever, the 90's

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!!!

Is there any such thing as good advice???

2008-12-01T16:05:00.001-08:00

I just feel like I need to vent right now, because I've been receiving so much contradicting advice regarding this project I had to do in my CIS 100 class. At first I planned out the project and I told everyone what I needed from them, and there must have been a miscommunication because the others frankly, fell short on their assigned part of the project.

The FIRST piece of advice: don't rely so heavily on your group members, just get it done and make sure it's done well.

So I did that. I put forth hours and hours of work and finished the project until it was working fine.

The SECOND piece of advice: your group didn't help, throw them under a bus

This was the advice that I regret acting on so, so much -.- I DID tell my teacher privately that I received virtually no help on the project, and that caused a problem because the people might get a lower grade, which isn't fair because I recently found out that apparently they ALSO submitted the project.

The THIRD piece of advice: pretend you worked with the group the entire time

That's just idiotic, because I didn't, and the fact is I don't even know if my group worked with EACH OTHER, which I don't think they did, considering they didn't during the last two projects.

The FOURTH piece of advice: ask the group if they worked together so you can straighten it out with the teacher

Now this one isn't bad advice at all, it's just bad for me personally, because I can't seem to write out an e-mail which doesn't seem condescending. No matter which way I write it, it seems to come out saying "Hey, I did all the work, I was just wondering if you lazy, worthless scumbags did any work at all, because apparently we submitted the project six times". I can't do that, because I don't think it would be the best idea to let my group know that my teacher e-mailed me asking which of the six submissions he should grade.

If they know that, then it'll seem like I intended for them to get left out of the project from the beginning, when in all actuality, I was just taking some bad advice which seemed good at the time. I want them to get good grades, but after I took the second piece of advice, it came off as me antagonizing my group and saying they don't deserve any credit, but I do, I want them to get grades that go along well with their effort they put into it.

Not to mention group evaluation is on Wednesday, and if I imply that I threw them under a bus on this one project, then they'll be sure to do it to me on the other two projects =(

Interesting.....

2008-11-22T15:55:00.000-08:00

Normally I hate chain messages, and this one was no exception, because when I read the answers of the person who sent it to me, all I could think was "yeah, right. That's so staged." But after I got about four or five of these messages, I decided what the heck, I'll try it myself and see how NOT funny the answers are. So at the time I was downloading music with LimeWire, I'd gotten about 35 songs, and so I put them in Windows Media Player, hit random and this is seriously the result that I got. I was very pleased =) Here's the message, with MY songs/answers

-------------------------------------

1. Put your iPod on shuffle.
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS!
4. Tag 10 friends who might enjoy doing the meme as well as the person you got the meme from.

1. IF SOMEONE SAYS "IS THIS OKAY" YOU SAY?
"Nothing Else Matters" Apocalyptica

2. WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR PERSONALITY?
"Tearin' up my Heart" Nsync

3. WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
"Fallen Leaves" The Living End

4. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE'S PURPOSE?
"Miracle" Cascada

5. WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
"I'll Never Break Your Heart" Nsync

6. WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
"She's No You" Jesse McCartney

7. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
"Sally's Song" The Nightmare Before Christmas

8. WHAT IS 2+2?
"Larger Than Life" The Backstreet Boys

9. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND(S)?
"The Shape of my Heart" The Backstreet Boys

10. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE PERSON YOU LIKE AS?
"The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" Will Smith

11. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
"Who's Gonna Save Us?" The Living End

12. WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
"Teenagers" My Chemical Romance

13. WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
"I Want it That Way" The Backstreet Boys

14. WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
"Aaron's Party" Aaron Carter

15. WHAT WILL YOUR WEDDING SONG BE?
"Leave Out All the Rest" Linkin Park

16. WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
"Shallow Water" Sylver

17. WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
"Tabloid Magazine" The Living End

18. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET?
"I Don't Want the World to See Me" The Goo Goo Dolls

19. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS?
"I Can Never Leave You" Sylver

20. WHAT'S THE WORST THING THAT COULD HAPPEN?
"Fade to Black" Apocalyptica

21. HOW WILL YOU DIE?
"The Best Day Ever" Jesse McCartney

22. WHAT IS THE ONE THING YOU REGRET?
"Dance Dance" Fallout Boy

23. WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH?
"Red Violin Techno" Vanessa Mae

24. WHAT MAKES YOU CRY?
"Bye Bye Bye" Nsync

25. WHERE WILL YOU GET MARRIED?
“Everywhere” Michelle Branch

26. WHAT SCARES YOU THE MOST?
"X Files" TV themes

27. DOES ANYONE LIKE YOU?
"Every Time we Touch" Cascada

28. IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN TIME, WHAT WOULD YOU CHANGE?
"Insomnia" Sylver

29. WHAT HURTS RIGHT NOW?
"Sailor Moon" Vanessa Mae

30. WHAT WILL YOU POST THIS AS?
"Belle's Song" Beauty and the Beast

---------------------------------------

Seriously, I thought it was way cool when I was done =) I suggest other people with blogs try this out, I wanna see what you guys get.

Picture tag

2008-11-21T18:22:00.001-08:00

Since I don't have my own personal computer, I don't have photos organized into "albums" or even "files". Basically all 400+ pictures I've taken since I got my camera are all dumped into one file on my flash drive, and most of them you guys have already seen. So instead, I used the fourth picture on my fourth album of pictures from FaceBook.

Fire? Yeah, this should cover it.

I tag Lynzy and Courtney

Jurassic Park

2008-11-20T11:22:00.000-08:00

I was looking through my camera and stumbled across this video, thought I'd upload it for you guys. It's from the last day as a Canoe Boy, and I knew that some of you would appreciate this after having heard it on a cello, piano, cell phone, little lego toy thing, guitar and violin. Enjoy!

CIS 100

2008-11-19T17:58:00.000-08:00

So for my Information Systems class, our final "group project" is to create a fully functional web page but without any of the templates, meaning that we can't pick and choose which boxes we want to put where and which text boxes or anything like that, we have to go to a blank document in NotePad++ and write each line individually, instructing the program what we want it to do, and by doing so, coming up with some aesthetically pleasing.

The project was that we needed to create a website for a fictional veterinarian's office, and I say "group project" because I'm literally the only one in my group who's done any work on this, but regardless, even as an unfinished result, I like where it's gone. Now, I know that this basically screams "amateur", but tell me what you think!

The way I got that end result was by typing the code into what's essentially a blank Word document as shown:

There was actually five pages of this, but I just wanted you to get a brief overview of exactly how much work goes into an incomplete one page website. If you can see at the bottom of the last picture, it ends on line 240 or somewhere around that area. So I'm feeling pretty good with myself because it functions almost perfectly with just a few small problems here and there. This has been my first real programming/coding project, and I'm pretty satisfied with the results =)

Chinatown Second Time Around!

2008-11-15T22:49:00.000-08:00

I went to Chinatown again today!! It was even more fun than the first time around! Probably because the people I went with. It was a pretty diverse group, we had Sopa from Cambodia, Albert and Mei Fang from Taiwan, Claudia from Mexico and me from the Czech Republic. I'm exhausted, and I'm very proud of myself for taking the type to upload, considering how tired I was.

I didn't fall asleep till about 1:00 am, then I woke up at about 6:50 and we were on the bus by 7:30 am. Long bus ride, but it was made fun because Mei Fang helped me with my Chinese and otherwise I was talking to Claudia. We arrived there and then first stop: Ross!!

...I don't know why, but the girls really wanted to go, so I looked around, and I realized two very important things. 1. Never, EVER drink a 1 liter Powerade (Powerade ZERO, mom, don't worry) before getting on the bus for 2 hours 2. In downtown Honolulu, if you're lucky, maybe one shop every two blocks will have a public restroom, but the only way to find out is to ask every single store. It'd be smart to make a map and carry it with you of known restroom locations.

Anyway, at Ross was this awesome gang-symbol Santa

I couldn't resist

Actually IN China Town was THIS beauty--a muscled up Segway. I can only imagine that thing can cover all sorts of treacherous terrain and travel anywhere between 40-55 mph. I'm sure it's freeway legal

One of the many many Lion statues around China Town. I'm glad I finally got a picture with one, but the ones near the most framous street in China Town are actually about 11 feet tall. Oh, and I bought that hat for $5 in one of the marketplaces. As well as sesame seed cakes. They have weird candy here

A perfect example of weird China Town junk food is Green Jelly Grass juice! I don't know HOW they advertise this stuff, but I imagine I'm a pretty good representative, aiming towards the college kid/gangster scene. Anyway, it caught me off guard 'cause they have REAL jelly grass in the bottom of the can.

don't ask me what it looks like, I didn't see, and I don't want to know....

Too bad this is sideways, but outside the Hong Kong Marketplace is a picture of Mei Fang, Albert and myself =)

The Mao Zedong Marketplace with all four of us. That's why I like Asians so much, look how tall I am compared to all them!

We stopped for lunch at an authentic Taiwanese restaurant with an unpronouncable name and huge portions of food. The bowl my noodles came in was about 4 inches deep, in addition to the communal bowl and three dumplings apiece, all for $3.50 a person. I feel spoiled when I go to China Town!

Here's all my friends eating lunch

And I felt left out, so here's me completing the scene

..Uh...I seriously don't remember taking this one........

There was this really cool fountain, there was a wall with water trickling down into a pool. This picture was taken while we were all waiting for Mei Fang to return from buying honey from the Hong Kong Market. I kind of like how it turned out, though there was some stretching when I posted

Girl Talk!!!

This was at Ala Moana mall after China Town. This seriously makes me hurt, because THIS is the exact longboard I've been dreaming of! It's the longest model they make, meaning it's the fastest and the easiest to handle, and when bringing it back to Utah would make for an awesome ride going down one of our many, many hills, as opposed to Hawai'i's three =P What breaks my heart though is that this one is not only the perfect longboard for me, but is also $40 cheaper than the one I bought! Bad timing can be a real downer sometimes

I like this shirt a lot, and it was in the same shop as the longboard, and I was on th verge of buying it and then I realized it was about 4 inches too long. I personally think it's a good look on me, though I don't remember why I have that smug look on my face, which I could see to be less than flattering

Anyway, after the mall, we got on the bus came back home about 7:30 pm and then I went to a Latin orchestra concert with my friend Dani, now I'm here, telling everyone about it =) For everyone who misses me, just remember: exactly four weeks from today, I'll be home!

My Love

2008-11-14T14:32:00.000-08:00

This song plays on average 3 times every morning, and it's the only type of music Koreans will listen to here. And as much as I hate to admit it, I downloaded it and it's on my iPod now. I like his music. Which means I get along with my roommate, so that's definitely not a bad thing =D

Skydiving!!!

2008-11-08T22:17:00.000-08:00

Today was the most fun I've ever had!!! I just want to describe when I first jumped out, because that was the weirdest feeling ever. When the instructor pulled us both out, it was the scariest feeling! Suddenly we just rolled over, did a front flip and then KEPT flipping, but every time we flipped, I saw the plane farther and farther away.

The thing is, the instructor was telling me when we're falling, he'll tap me on the shoulder twice and then I need to put my arms at a ninety degree angle and arch my back. He was explaining this to me and all I could think was "Oh yeah, I'm falling out of a plane miles above the ground and I'm supposed to keep that in mind?" I did. Because after we fell out, all I was thinking about was "he hasn't tapped me yet" but I saw that he was already in position. We were flipping all over the place, and I seriously thought something was wrong for a second when we were falling headfirst. Maybe 4 seconds passed, then the tap, and I was in position. The fear went away.

The fear left, and then was replaced with about another 3 seconds of shock. I saw out to the sides the mountains, the beautiful sunset and a really pretty view of all the cities in every direction, then looked down and saw there was NOTHING beneath us except for the ground. My mind didn't seem to register that fact, and I almost questioned for a second whether I was actually falling. Then I got a grip on the situation, and from then on it was a BLAST!!!!!!

Here are the pictures:

This shot actually makes the place look all high-class and professional. If you see the rest of it, it's obvious that all it is is two people's houses connected with that onning and 4 empty vans, three of which sell food. Doesn't mean I didn't love the place! It was like hanging out with people on their front porch for a few hours before going diving

The girl is Svetlana Kuzovkina from Russia. She's cool, and I didn't take her for the skydiving type

This right here was our po-dunk little plane that was to be holding 18 people before jumping off. I don't even think it WEIGHS as much as 18 people

I just thought of the sun right here was really pretty. Ben, our photographer, he was REALLY good

This smile is genuinely excited and happy to be in the plane.

Now see how forced this smile is. Yeah, I won't lie, I was terrified at this point. Looking out the window and thinking "Man, I'm jumping out into that!" scared me out of my mind.

Just another really beautiful shot of the Hawai'i skies. These people have the best job in the world

My photographer was nuts! See that white tennis shoe? The camera was strapped to his helmet, he was LEANING OUT of the plane, not holding onto anything! He's a crazy guy. (By the way, what good is a helmet when skydiving? If you hit the ground, you're dead either way)

That's the West point of Oahu. I came from North Shore. The geography of Hawai'i drives me insane. EVERYWHERE if North whenever you ask someone for directions

At this point I learned how much deep breathing really helps. My heart was racing and my breath was short, then I'd force myself to slow my breathing and I noticed that if it didn't help calm my nerves, it at least helped me cope with the idea of dying

I love this shot. See how my right foot is sticking a little off the edge of the plane? yeah, I fought that as much as I could. It's hard to tell, but I was pressing back as hard as I could against my instructor. I was so worried that my foot was going to slide off and we'd fall completely off balance. Ugh, scared me to the point where I felt sick, yet, somehow that smile was totally legit. Needless to say, if he hadn't thrown us both out of the plane, I would've stayed in forever

This was one of about a dozen flips we did when exiting the plane. Seriously, that was the part that scared me. Everything else was just beautiful, seeing all the cities below when you were falling

If you're wondering what I'm looking at, it's the view. The view was gorgeous, and you'll get a better view of it in other pictures. That and, despite the fact that both guys were yelling at the tops of their voices to get my attention so I'd look at the camera, you coudln't hear a thing. It was just the wind screaming in your ears as you fell. I saw mouths moving, but didn't hear anything except the wind

Now out comes my photographer

That's actually not his hand, he took that picture as he jumped out. How do I know? I was back-down, falling through the air and I saw him do it. Crazy stuff

This is definitely one of the prettiest sunsets I'll have ever seen in my entire life. And I actually saw it too, while falling toward the ground. It sounds really weird when you say it

People aren't lying when they say you feel like you're just floating. At first I had to force myself into that position, arching my back and everything, then I just kind of went limp and it really was just like I was floating

Look at my cheeks. This is VERY mild, and I chose this one on purpose, but in most the pictures, my cheeks are seriously pulled back so far that you can see folds of skin at the bottom of my eyes and the backs of my cheek bones. It don't know, the best I can think of to describe it would be if someone got a firehouse that blows air, and blew it on your face on full blast

Look at the town below, I can't believe that I was so high up!!!

Same as the last picture, but with a really pretty view of the ocean behind me. It's just weird to imagine that I was that high in the air just me and one other guy, nothing supporting us

If I didn't say it before, Ben, my photographer was insane. When he fell down past us (I don't know how he did it, considering he jumped out a full 5 seconds after we did and we had more weight) he was doing flips and all these different tricks while taking pictures. Herb, my instructor grabbed his foot, and I was really tempted to, but the thing is that position is a VERY sensitive balance. If you move even one limb, you throw yourself off balance, and so I wanted to grab his foot but was paranoid I might throw us off

This picture looks epic to me. This was about 45 seconds into the fall, and this shows how close we were to the ground when it came time to pull the chute

The dive was basically divided up into two parts: the freefall and the gliding. When he pulled the shoot it felt so strange, suddenly we were upright, but the falling sensation didn't leave, it just felt like there was a LOT of pressure being put on my thighs and suddenly we were moving forward and everything sounded all muffled. Herb told me to plug my nose and blow, which never usually works for me. I guess traveling 10,000 feet in a few dozen seconds makes it sensitive enough to work even for me.

Anyway, I liked this part 'cause it was just like a relaxing cruise. The wind was blowing through my face, but not tearing the skin off, and then we just started talking. He started up a conversation and we were just talking, 8000 feet in the air as though we were sitting down at a table over lunch or something. He took us out over the water, pointed out the fish and turtles you could see then swung back around and toured over parts of the city. No pictures sadly, since Ben was doing his own thing at this point

Again, Ben beat us there, I don't know how. But anyway, this is us coming in

Trying to stand up felt so weird. My legs had no strength, and the 50-lb parachute/tent blowing in the wind didn't help much. It was a funny feeling sensation

I can't desribe in words the feeling I had at this point! It was the coolest, most exciting rush I'd ever felt, and when I landed all I could think was "Did that seriously just happen??" and I didn't stop smiling for forever! It was euphoria!

See the way I'm standing? That's because that harness was very restrictive, and it felt like somebody had a rope around my neck and was pulling down, and a rope tied around both legs and was pulling up. I couldn't stand up straight. But I couldn't stand up straight from the disbelief I was feeling too

And here we are back together again =)

All in all, the entire thing took about 6 hours, cost $240 for the jump and pictures, and it was worth every cent!!

2008-11-06T20:51:00.000-08:00

Today was my last day of work, and seriously, with how much I don't want to quit, I'd BETTER get my grades up, or else I'll regret having left so much. Mainly the reason I quit was to have more time to study, and if that doesn't help, I'll seriously feel like I've failed. Anyway, whenever I've talked/texted anyone, if I ever made it sound like I didn't like working there, I didn't mean it. That was the BEST job I've ever had in my entire life, and I, in all honesty, miss it already. The tourists could be difficult at times, but really, everything else about that place was just so perfect. I'm so glad I had the opportunity to work there, it was a blessing and I can't describe to you how much I'll miss it.

This a picture of EVERY Tues/Thurs/Sat Canoe Boy. I seriously already miss those guys! They are (left to right) and their homelands:

Back row:

Joe (Samoa)

Kapahu'ole'ole (Oahu)

Andrew (California[?])

Middle on the wall:

Lote (Tonga)

Doosan (S. Korea)

Tyler (Oahu),

Kalepi (Either New Zealand, Tonga, Samoa or Hawai'i. I never did find out),

Roger (I dunno, somewhere mainland)

Garrett (Malaysia)

On the ground:

Zhenya (Russia)

That's the number one thing I loved about work, besides the people, was the diversity! Out of so many, only 4 were mainlanders, and two were from Hawai'i which is hardly considered America.

I don't have any other pictures of Garrett, but he's a cool guy. Really blunt and could make you feel stupid for it, but I loved his accent. He was from Malaysia, his native language is Cantonese, but his accent is awesome!! His accent is a cross between Polynesia and Southern Bronx. It's really cool to hear, and he helped me out a lot with my Chinese homework, and for that, I owe him a lot.

This is Joe (Iosepa) the coolest boss I've ever had! (Sorry Andy =[ ) but seriously he was the one who initated the game of Lagoon Football when it was raining, and he just made my entire job experience awesome! He's a readlly nice guy and I'm so grateful for it, he defended me when people asked why I was quitting. There was a conversation today, Garrett was asking why I was qutting, and I told him the main reason was school.

Garrett: how many credits you taking?

Me: uh...like 11, not many. I'm kind of embarrassed that I fell behind, but I mean, it's my freshman year, work is a long time, and Chinese is a killer, and on top of that I haven't had time to really see the island, so it's kind of play time too.

Garrett: your school's too hard? Man, I got 17 credits, I'm working my coconut stand, I work here, I'm interning and I'm getting good grades still

Me: Yeah...that's, uh...why I'm trying to get my grades up. I took more than I can handle, personally...

Garrett: But that's really weak man, I mean, seriously.

Joe: Garrett, it's totally different from individual to individual, Alex is just Mr. Haole man, who's looking for a good time, it's all good

and that changed the subject. I felt bad for leaving, and I'm going to miss them =( but it's good to know that they all like me, because if they hand't been a little shocked that I was leaving, it would've meant they don't care, which means they don't like me, and it's good to know that I was liked.

This is Andrew. He was probably my favorite Canoe Boy. He and Kalepi were really awesome, and definitely made work something to look forward to. When we weren't pushing canoes, just sitting on the walls, killing time, it was just like hanging out on Walker's back deck, sitting and talking and really just having a good time. And I got paid for it. Anyway, as you can probably tell, Andrew was a pretty crazy guy.

Contrary to popular belief, this guy is actually 24, not 57. I don't know why, but he has a look way beyond his years. And is as dull as dirt.

Kalepi. He's a compulsive liar. Today after work I ate dinner with him and some of his friends, and when we were making introductions, he immediately said three lies about me. He introduced me, and said this is Alex, he:

1. Is from Russia

2. Served in Taiwan

3. Is married

I thought that was really strange, and then I talked to some of his friends at the table, and each of them told me at least three different names before I found out their real names. It was a strange experience. He also taught me some strange words in Tongan, and when I say "strange", I mean very inappropriate for the workplace. He's way funny and I like the guy, but I still don't know where he's from. He says New Zealand, but he speaks Tongan and all his Samoan friends make him sound Samoan. I don't know.

Another shot of Andrew. He's basically the epitome of Canoe Boy. The people love the way he talks and his tours, he's the fastest pusher, and would often push the canoe show and the 5-mile runs he always talks about pays off. He'd get a lot of compliments after the show.

Roger. He's a cool guy, definitely. He'd served a Spanish speaking mission, so it was always sobering for me to try to give a Spanish tour to some people from South America and then listen to him launch off at twice the speed in their language. Anyway, he was like Andrew's....balance. For how over-the-top and crazy Andrew would get, Roger was always being mature, acting his age and no kidding, Roger and Andrew remind me SO much of Ben and Jerem. They really were like older brothers to me.

Bad picture. Anyway, this was the Canoe Landing entrance. Can't find out how to delete it, so I kept it.

Sister missionaries. You had The Canoe Boyz and then The Sisters

They were always just there, right behind the Canoe Boyz. It was really cool to hear them stop people and start talking to them and they were always there just if you ever randomly felt like having a conversation with someone. The Japanese sister taking the picture would help me practice Japanese every so often. They're all great, and frankly, the PCC just wouldn't be the same without them, even if they are just in the one small area.

And because it's about time you've seen it, I've included a clip of me pushing in today's show, the Tonga canoe. It's unanimous: they're the hardest canoe to push, so tell me how you think I did.

Even just now, my friend Jonald walked in and asked why I was quitting. I explained to him why, but I'm really going to miss it a lot. I just hope that this feeling of missing my job isn't going to turn to regret. The way I see it, if I can get my grades up and see more of Hawai'i before I leave, then it will have been worth it.

Just to see if I can

2008-11-03T19:54:00.000-08:00

我喜歡今天！我寫中文太了好和。這個星期三我邀走在 Waikiki 跟 Jonald，我的朋友。他是費路鬢。昨天考了不錯。現在！

maybe I'll translate for you guys later. This was just for me, to see if I could write a post.

The Haunted Lagoon

2008-11-01T13:15:00.000-07:00

Just a few new things about work. We now have Halloween decorations up in honor the "Haunted Lagoon". This looks like just an entrance, but you have to keep in mind that there's a 12 foot long pathway leading from this entrance to the canoe landing, so that means someone built a tunnel, not just a fancy entrance. They put a lot of work into this. Granted, it was really crowded in the tunnel, and when I tried to take a picture of everything inside, a lot of it just got jumbled together and sadly, you couldn't tell what was going on. So I took a few pictures of some of my favorite things.

Here's the entrace, I like the snakes in the mouths

This guy is hanging through the roof. It wasn't supposed to be like that, but it rained and he fell over, and we all agreed it gave it a creepier effect (especially when you put a cowboy hat on him)

Again, another thing that surprisingly looks scarier with a cowboy hat, sorry you can't see what it looks like =(

And this is for those of you who think that being a Canoe Boy ISN'T strenuous labor. I took these pictures after pushing ONE canoe full of 20 people on a cloudy day.

Basically, look at the top of the back of my shirt and compare it with the rest. I'm soaking wet, and yes, that's all sweat from pushing the canoe, one way. On average I push 4 or 5 canoes a day, 2 round trip, and that's in addition to pushing the canoe show which is on a tight time restraint with people dancing on and shaking the canoe. It's a blast! =D I'll get a video of me pushing the canoe show as soon as possible!

The Haunted Lagoon was something else altogether. It was really fun, but it was so much more challenging!! Essentially it was pushing a round trip while wearing skeleton gloves, an ankle length robe with a hood and a skeleton mask. (I feel so bad, I wish I could've gotten a picture, but it was against the rules! =( ) Anyway, it was almost pitch black outside, everywhere where they didn't have black lights, and they wanted you to skirt the edge of the lagoon as close as possible on the right side, as close to shore as you could so they'd get the full effect when people jumped out.

That made it hard, because during the day, you're supposed to stay as in the middle of the lagoon as possible, so pulling it close to the side was a challenge simply because I'm not used to it, and it was even harder because of how dark it was, and the limited field of vision because of the mask. Don't think I'm complaining though, because I thought it was super awesome! It was just different, that's all.

They had all these different pop-out places, my FAVORITE was near the beginning! They have this little island about 15 feet offshore into the lagoon with two paths leading to it, one from the back, another from the side which takes a 90 degree angle and then heads back. The one in the back is made of rocks sticking out of the water, visibly seen. The other one is about three or four inches beneath the water, and I seriously don't know what it's used for.

Anyway, this girl with long black hair and in white dress (clichè, I know) would stand on the island. Once the lagoon pulled up closer, she got down on her stomach, and then crawled along that underwater bridge, lunging forward everytime she moved. Then she'd get to the end of the little pathway and sink underwater. She'd go under the canoe, pop up the other side, and then grab another volunteer in the boat who was posing as a tourist, and drag that person underwater. The person wouldn't come up. Everyone FREAKED at that part!

There were a few othehr good parts, like they dropped from a bridge what looked like a dummy, about 3 feet above everyone's heads, and they'd be all "oh, that's stupid" or considering how many high school students there were "oh *@#%$, that's !$!@#$ stupid, right @#$%?" and then the person who was dropped, the person who looked like a dummy would reach down and grab them and start screaming. That got the people worked up.

Considering the entire thing was done on water, with people clumped together on a canoe, it was actually really creepy! I'm impressed with what they did, and I'm really glad I was a part of it, even if only for one night. =)

and I know I'm kind of late, but Happy Halloween!

Desiring to have faith

2008-10-27T02:23:00.000-07:00

I was writing in my journal about an experience I had a few weeks ago, which I'm surprised I never posted as an entry in my blog. It was really cool and now I can no longer say that I don't remember the last time a prayer of mine was answered.

The situation was that I had lost my little blue flash drive, the one with literally all my pictures/video clips from Hawai'i. I was furious, I was depressed, I was frustrated and discouraged, I didn't want to lose those pictures forever, and I have this specific pocket in my backpack reserved for my flashdrives, but for some reason it wasn't in there, I couldn't find it.

I seriously tore my room apart looking for this little blue piece of plastic. I ripped my sheets off, checked every single one of my pants' pockets, went through all my dirty laundry to see if it was in there, moved my 300 pound metal box bed to see if it fell between the wall or something, and nothing. It wasn't anywhere.

I said a prayer. It was a very disrespectful and irreverent prayer, and I was saying it in the attitude of "look, I decided to say a prayer, now give me what I want" and I just kept the same fuming attitude that I had. I sat on my bed, even more upset now, because at the time, I seriously couldn't bring to mind any prayer that had been answered, and I was thinking why in the world did I expect my prayer to be answered this time? I've tried so many times, why do I keep bothering, why do I try to be all humble and beg for something that I KNOW isn't going to happen.

And then I felt humility. I felt shame, and tears came to my eyes as I felt prompted to kneel down again and this time ask for forgiveness for my attitude and the disrespectful way in which I regarded the sacred blessing of being able to pray to our Father in Heaven whenever we want.

It didn't seem fair. I had actually developed a good habit of putting things back where they belong, and I'd stuck to it, and had no idea how this little flashdrive had come to be misplaced. I felt like I had a legit reason to be upset and angry, and I felt like I was being told to apologize for WANTING something that to me, didn't seem like it was my fault for missing in the first place.

Regardless, I knelt down and repented for the way I had approached our Father in Heaven, demanding something in my own way and time with an impatient attitude, and I asked for humility to continue my prayer in a reverent tone. Then I shared with our Father how I felt. I said that I need the flashdrive so I could keep track of my memories that I'd made and pictures to look back and reflect on. I prayed for understanding that given all of the things in life, losing a few silly pictures wasn't all that important, especially when I still had the memories of what had actually taken place.

I prayed and I told him that I wanted so badly to find what I'd lost, but then confessed that I honestly didn't expect it to happen. I told Him how I (at that time) couldn't recall ANY times when a prayer such as this had been answered, and that I heard all these stories of people regaining something through the power of prayer, but that it's never happened to me, and that although I knew the importance of prayer, I didn't actually believe that I would find it. I asked for faith that the situation would end up in a way I'd be able to accept. Then I ended my prayer, finally accepting the idea that 300+ pictures would be gone forever.

My roommate walked in, and I decided I'd give it one last shot, and I asked him if he'd seen my flashdrive. My roommate, Young Jun Byun is Korean, and has a pretty limited grasp on the English language, so when he looked confused and asked what it was I was looking for, I wasn't surprised, I was in fact, already reaching into my backpack to pull out a different flashdrive to show him what I was talking about.

I was in mid-sentence, telling him "It looks like this, but it's blue--" and I pulled out a flashdrive to show him what it looked like, and when I looked in my hand, the blue one was right there. I quickly told him nevermind and looked in my backpack to see where it was.

Turns out it was in a different pocket than the one I usually put my flashdrives in, just a little to the left. When I reached in to grab one of the others, I'd reached into THAT pocket by mistake and found all my pictures. When I was putting it away, I must've dropped it in there by accident.

The thing is, when I was originally searching for it, I know for a fact that I checked literally every single pocket in my backpack at least 4 times each, because I wanted to be as thorough as possible, and I remembered specifically checking that pocket several times, because I'd already accidentally dropped a flashdrive in there before.

I can now no longer say that Heavenly Father has never answered a prayer when I asked for something. In this case though, He gave me more than what I expected. He gave me the faith that I'd been lacking and a stronger testimony in prayer as well as the missing pictures.

我有著證詞老天爺戀我們和祂是瑤一直那兒為我們

Wo you zheng ci lao tian ye lian women he ta shi yao yi zhi na'r wei women

I have a testimony that God loves us and will always be there when we need him

The forgotten element

2008-10-20T22:10:00.000-07:00

I was going through my pictures, and I just thought you guys might like to see a picture I forgot to post about Chinatown. The forgotten element of Chinatown.

In certain places, they have...

...underground toilets

I'm number one!

2008-10-20T16:25:00.000-07:00

I was recently assigned a number in one of my classes. The number 10. I'd like to demonstrate to you why this makes me #1

1 + 0 = 1
1 - 0 = 1
1 ^ 0 = ?
1 * 0 =/= 1
1 / 0 = Undefined

Any way you look at it, I'm #1!!

My Chinese teacher is Agent Alexander Mahone from Prison Break

2008-10-18T00:19:00.000-07:00

Brother Richardson

Alex Mahone

Longboard tour of Eastern La'ie (Part 1)

2008-10-17T21:39:00.000-07:00

I decided one day, it's about time you guys saw La'ie. So I hopped on my longboard with my camera and took pictures as I rode around. Some of it may seem disconnected, so sorry about that.

The parking lot outside my Hale

Circling around my Hale

This picture is immediately to the right of the last picture I took, it's the back of Hale 6, just to clarify, if you didn't know where it was

That window is mine. This is my backyard. Makes my FRONT yard look like an IDIOT

This is the faculty parking lot, on the exact opposite side of the other parking lot. I'm on a sidewalk right now, leading to the GCB (General Classroom Building)

The GCB

Directly ahead of me in this picture is where I have my Information Systems class. In fact, I'm in that exact room right now uploading my pictures and posting this.

This is the church I used to go to. Now I meet in the same building that I have Information Systems in.

Turning left, down the road to East La'ie. This is the other side of the church

Married housing (TVA: Temple View Apartments. You'll see why)

Typical Hawaii sky. Beautiful, I know! ^_^

To the left is the married housing, just barely out of the frame. I had NEVER seen this park before, I didn't even know it existed. It's amazing what you can overlook so easily.

To the right of that park, here's the temple. I've been here several, several times, which makes me wonder why I never noticed the park.

Turns out you can access temple grounds, just by simply going up the stairs and through a gate. It's actually connected TO the park!

Then you're on temple grounds! (I got off my longboard at this point, officially ending the "Longboard" part of the tour)

Some shots of the temple

From where I was standing, just turn around and this is what you see

Now you have a little bit of an idea of how Eastern campus looks. I'll take more pictures, adding a part three to the tour (some time after I post part II). And for good measure, here's a video of what it's like to when I go longboarding (albeit faster) the video makes it look like I'm crawling along, which is why I aim the camera at my feet at some points, to show how fast the ground beneath me is actually moving. I'll find a better hill to try it out. And Mom, you probably won't want to watch it. I can't keep the camera still.

So close

2008-10-16T21:57:00.000-07:00

I was going to finally make a post with pictures on it. Yesterday I'd bought a new pack of rechargeable batteries, popped them in my camera, plugged it into the computer and lo and behold--you need to charge them first. So I had to charge them while I was at work and now I'm just too tired. So close.

The other thing I'm so close to is Dad. I realize I take after him a lot. I mean, I'm in Hawaii, but even when I had no job, I found it hard to enjoy myself because even if I'm in paradise, I've got to be working.

Dad just spent the last ten days in Croatia with Mom and I'm pretty sure Dad was probably working during a big portion of that. Today was really stressful and I'm only here for another month or two, but the more I think about it, the happier I am that I'm keeping myself occupied with a job rather than scurrying around trying to find something to fill my spare time with. Even when I say I don't want to go to work, it's kind of comforting.

One thing I don't understand though is this: there's 168 hours in the week, I work for 18 of them, that leaves 150 hours of the week. Taking out Sunday 'cause I generally don't study or do homework on Sunday, that leaves 126 hours of the week. Assuming I sleep for say, 9 hours every night, 9 * 7 = 63 126 - 63 = 63 hours. Minus 11 hours of classes ever week is 52 hours to study/play every week. I can promise you that I've spent at LEAST 5 hours a day studying Chinese/Intro to Information Systems. 5*6 = 30. So assuming I spend 30 of the remaining 52 hours I have left, how I am STILL behind in those classes?? I mean, I'm leaving just 22 hours of personal time per week, that's like, 3 hours a day. Even while I'm at work I'll bring my Chinese flash cards and my Intro to Information Systems notes and study them, and I still am falling behind in those classes. I'm borderline obsession and I still can't keep up. I just don't understand.

Anyway, this week has essentially been hell week for me, it's been really stressful and busy with all my studying/work and now that I'm nearing an end, I'm gaining a vague....smug feeling. Kinda like "yeah, that's right, I took what you dished out and STILL going strong" and I'd be saying that to some abstract form of fate.

Speaking of fate, I was thinking of the concept of soul mates. The idea that there is literally only ONE person for you in the entire world, and that person has basically already been selected, and all you have to do is find them. I was thinking about that, and assuming heterosexuality plays into account for the idea of soul mates, the odds aren't in anyone's favor. That would still leave about a 1 : 3,000,000,000 ratio that you'll EVER find that person. I'm not generally good at math, but as I recall, that's a very low probability of you finding someone. It doesn't seem like anyone would ever get married. I personally don't believe it.

One more thing. In the last week I've memorized 372 Chinese characters. It's Thursday. That's 93 a day.

Man

2008-10-13T19:52:00.000-07:00

Okay I keep trying to put up a post with pictures on it, but I'm just mentally exhausted lately. I've been trying to catch up in my Chinese class, which means I've been memorizing 50+ characters each day. In fact, that's the only reason I'm writing this post write now, is because I'm taking 15 minutes before I go back to the characters to see if I still remember them all when I go back. I started at 4:00 pm, by 4:45 I'd gotten 44 characters, and I seriously am feeling tired, especially since from 2:30-4:00 I was busy making those flash cards and filling out the character workbook, which is the college Chinese 101 equivalent of those cursive handbooks in third grade. That and today hasn't been the best day.

What the heck, I'll just tell you why it hasn't been. I'll start by saying that Hawaii is an awesome place, really laid back, and there are some times when it drives me insane HOW laid back it is! For instance, the Hale 2 office is where you have to go if you need to recode your room key/ID/meal card, and on the door of the office it says "Open MON-FRI: 9:00 am - 11:00 pm; SAT-SUN 9:00 am - 4:00 pm". It wasn't open Sunday.

Sunday, I lost my card, therefore I couldn't get into my room or eat. It was fast Sunday, I wanted to eat during the evening. It was a day period. I wanted to sleep when night came. Neither of which were options after I lost my card, so I begged my RA to open the door for me, which he did.

My plan was to get up and hurry over to the ID office today and get a new card as fast as possible. I woke up at 7:30 which is no good because my Sharing the Gospel class starts at 7:00 am. Turns out I plugged my phone in, but the charger fell out of the wall, and my phone doubles as my alarm clock.

So I don't have time to shower, I just get up and rush over to class. After, I kill some time by longboarding, and then at 9:00 am when the ID is SUPPOSED to open, I show up. I hang around until about 9:45 and slap down $5 and get a new card, which doesn't matter anymore because breakfast is over anyway. Had the office opened up on time, then I would've still been able to eat. I have class at 10:00, in fifteen minutes, and my door is still locked and the key still needs to be recoded.

So I rush over to Hale 2, only to find out that on the calendar it says "Mon- HOIDAY!!!" which is the BIGGEST load of crap I've seen considering I had to ask literally over a dozen people before finally, somebody dove back into the deep recesses of their mind and somehow recalled "oh yeah....today is......I think Columbus Day or something....." and every single person in the working world is still at work, everyone else is still going to school, the only people to take COLUMBUS DAY VACATION are the stupid idiots in charge of Hale 2, when according to the school's employment policy, they're not supposed to.

So because of jerk freeloaders are too lazy and laid back to do their job when they're legally obliged, I'm ten minutes late for class and I have to beg my RA once again to open my door because my roommate keeps shutting it, despite the note that I left for him. I get all my books, head over to class to find out that I completely spaced the assignment that was due. So I left class fifteen minutes early, hurried and typed up/printed out the assignment and gave it to my teacher for (hopefully) full credit.

Then I have to go to Chinese in ten minutes. I swing by my room again only to find that Young had --once again-- shut the door, despite my note, and my shoe wedged in the door, and the piece of paper I used to cover up the latch to make sure the door wouldn't shut. I once again have to beg the RA to open the door for me, and then I grab my books and hurry out the door, and then halfway to the class remember that I forgot my Chapter 4 vocab which is due that day, (today was the first day I turned one on time, albeit still late because I was late to class) since I had to turn around, get the RA AGAIN to open my door, grab my stuff and then go back out.

Then in Chinese I had a test. I think I did all right, which is usually a good indicator I did fairly poorly.

Lots of days have rough starts, and I can accept that, but what I CANNOT STAND more than anything else is when something outrageous like this happens because some idiot is too lazy to do a job they're getting paid for! Hawaii's gorgeous, the work ethic makes me want spit on someone.

On the plus side, I saw Eric and Becky's blog today, and their baby is getting chubby cheeks and a beautiful smile =)

Now I'm off to study more Chinese.

Space Olympics

2008-10-08T22:09:00.001-07:00

Join the Space Olympics

This is for Eric and Captain Canuck

2008-10-08T00:08:00.000-07:00

This post is specifically for Eric, because he's the one who introduced me the Captain Canuck comic book.

Anyway, at work today we were debating who is the most worthless superhero, and I had them all beat. I threw in Captain Canuck's name, and I wasn't too surprised when none of the Canoe Boyz had ever heard of him. But I was shocked and amazed when I heard that my Samoan boss, Iosepa (Joseph/Joe) had not only heard about it, but knew the origins of the character and the fact that it was written by a Mormon kid in order to raise money for a mission. When I asked him how he knew about it, he said it was because his mission companion, Elder Comely had talked to him about it.

Now I don't know how many of you are familiar with the Captain Canuck and its author, but the author is Richard Comely. My boss had a mission companion named Comely, and believe it or not, Richard comely is actually Elder Comely's father.

I thought it was a big enough coincidence that somebody who's a member of my church wrote the comic book. But as it turns out, my boss personally knew the creator of this small-time, insanely obscure comic book that I only know about because my older brother decided to show it to me. People have connections in the strangest ways. Who would've thought?

....I'm STILL in disbelief.

Here's to you, Captain Canuck

Movies sequels and other stuff

2008-10-05T16:54:00.000-07:00

I just want to say, movie sequels drive me insane. It used to be that a movie would come out in order to tell a cool story, impress a lot of people and basically for all intents and purposes, just be an awesome movie, and if it happened to make a lot of money and be successful, then great, if not, it was still a good movie.

But Hollywood really annoys me now, because it's the exact opposite today. Today, it's become movies will come out solely for the purpose of making a lot of money, and for some reason they think it works, even if everyone involved realizes the movie will be complete trash (see "Jumper"). Basically they don't even anticipate a movie not becoming the next huge #1 blockbuster of the decade, for some reason that's not a possibility to them, and before the first movie's even made, they're already working on the next two sequels. Pick a random genre, say, superheroes. Go to www.imdb.com and type in the name of almost ANY superhero, no matter how obscure or unknown he or she is, and you'll see the sequels are being planned for release between 2008 and 2011.

As I said, I hate Hollywood now, because rather than coming out with actual GOOD movies, they're just pumping out crappy sequels to movies that were less than half-decent to begin with, (IMDB Ghost Rider/Ghost Rider 2 and you'll see what I mean). Or what's worse, is they take a movie that WAS really good, and then keep making suckier and suckier sequels based off it, which essentially just ends up being the same movie, just progressively worse and worse until nobody likes the title anymore.

Case in point:

And just to sum up how the movie industry makes me feel:
Now THAT would make a good superhero movie!!!!

Because mom would want me to after 3 weeks...

2008-10-01T17:58:00.000-07:00

I got a haircut today.

My apologies to Ryan for this picture, but seriously that look is legit consternation. I tried a few times and the dumb camera would NOT take a picture.

Canoe Boyz! CBP POWER!!!

2008-10-01T12:18:00.000-07:00

Okay, so finally I have pictures of me in my work uniform (and some of the other "Canoe Boyz" too) But first off, I want to show you the Outrigger uniform.

During the canoe show, all of the different islands, Hawai'i, Samoa, Tonga, Aotearoa, Fiji and Tahiti all come out on canoes and perform their dances, and generally, it's the Canoe Boyz' job to push the canoes that their performers are dancing on, and as they stated during orientation "Try as hard as possible to not be noticed. We don't want people to ever see you unless asking you for directions". So you know how highly valued we Canoe Boyz are.

Anyway, as I was saying, the different islands all have their own canoe and dance, but there's one little thing they call the outrigger, where a single boy and a single flower girl just row straight past without any worry about taking too long or going too fast, just having a relaxing time rowing in front of the guests.

Generally, they get a muscular Polynesian guy to push the flower girl. This time however, they decided it was an excellent idea to get a super white, super blonde (by Hawaiian standards) not super in shape mainlander to push the girl, and this is the outrigger uniform:

That picture was taken about 40 seconds before I was supposed to be on with the flower girl, so there's only one picture. Needless to say, I think one is more than plenty, but I just wanted everyone to see and fully appreciate what I do at the Polynesian Cultural Center. Ryan may get paid to watch movies, but I get paid to NOT wear a shirt.

These other pictures are mainly just the area I work in and some (two) of the other Canoe Boyz. I'll try to get a better picture of both canoe landings and hopefully all 15+ Canoe Boyz, but considering my camera was out of batteries and I happened to bring it completely on a whim, I think these pictures suffice, and mainly I just wanted everyone to see my work uniform.

That's Hoon. He's not actually a Canoe Boy. He's a Korean tour guide, but just will randomly show up and help us push canoes, and he's always welcome. He has a strange habit of singing "Near, Far, Wherever You Are" from the Titanic soundtrack at the end of every canoe tour he gives...

This is Doosun, another Korean. I'm pretty sure while I was pushing the outrigger, all of our Korean cousins (as we call everyone at the PCC) took my camera and just took pictures of each other for half an hour. This was one of many, many pictures that I saw of these two.

And just for good measure, I felt it was a good idea to take a picture of my broken phone. This is the screen now. I still use it though, as an alarm clock. I keep it plugged in and then whenever the phone I have with me is running low on batteries, I just swap the batteries, so I never have to actually charge the one I use now. It's a good system.

So I hope everyone liked my Canoe Boy pictures. I'm seriously going to get a lot better of ones, and definitely within the week, I'm going to include a video clip of me actually pushing one of the canoes for the canoe show.

And congratulations Jer!!!!!!!

Blargh...

2008-09-28T21:42:00.001-07:00

After having just read Ryan's post, I suppose I'll make a mention of what's happening on the exact opposite end of the spectrum.

Basically what happens when you decide you're going on a mission, is that you become Super Stud and every girl within 50 square miles suddenly wants you, bad. And suddenly certain girls become very attractive to you to, but as you're in mid-conversation, inching your way to asking her on a date, she becomes more flirtatious almost to the point of combustion and you can hear your intelligent logic screaming at you from the back of your mind "no, NO!! STOP IT!!! SHE'S JUST GONNA DEAR JOHN YOU!!" and finally by the time that loud, screaming, yet somehow subtle message reaches your conscious mind, you've already set a time and day for the date.

And what makes things worse, is the date goes incredibly AWESOME. I mean, at the time, you can't imagine a most excellent date than the one you're on. And as the night goes on, the girl suddenly finds you more and more irresistible, and uses your giant, football-pad sized shoulders as a pillow, and lets you know how comfy she is. At the same time, you find the girl more and more adorable, and you fight the urge to use her head as a pillow for yours, but suddenly your muscles atrophy and your head just slumps down, and you're unable to lift it again. Then the movie ends and you walk back to your respective dorm rooms, the entire time she's getting more and more flirtatious and more and more pretty.

Then three days later, you want to ask her on another date, and that screaming voice of logic comes back into your head, and then you bury your face in your hands and say

"...Great...."

Because face it, if you do that, then she's gonna expect you to keep asking her on more and more dates and then eventually, no matter how big of Mr. Super Stud you are, you WILL be dear Johned when you leave into the mission field.

So then you make the decision that's almost as hard as the decision to start preparing yourself to enter the mission field, and that's the decision, that no matter how badly girls want you to date them, and no matter how badly you want to BE dating them, you just gotta back off and pretend they're not there, and not shockingly beautiful.

And of course, this decision has the same effect as the first one, except tenfold. What happens, is you make the decision to no longer date, and now the girls think you're a thousand times as attractive and become proportionally as flirtatious with you! Because what I found out, that Israeli girl at the mall, she wasn't trying to sell me something, she was trying to get HERself a brand new American boyfriend, mmm hmm.

(For the record, she ACTUALLY said this: "It only cost $2000, and that includes all I show you and I come with")

So basically, Ryan went on a date with a terrific girl who showed him the benefits and fun of dating, and he's not gonna ask her out ever again because her heart belongs to another man. I went on a date with a terrific girl who showed ME the benefits and fun of dating, and I'm not gonna ask her, OR anyone else for that matter out until after my mission, DESPITE the fact that ALL OF THEIR hearts belong to me.

And no, this isn't vanity, it's actually chemical. Hearing the words "I'm going on a mission...." followed by any time frame within the year causes a chemical to be released in the girl's mind saying "This is the only guy for me", so when I say all the girls' hearts belong to me, for the time being anyway, it's 100% true.

But after the mission.....

That will be loooooooong gone.

Also, one other thing my bishop helped me realize. I know now why Laie is such a boring, small town. That's because if there was any sort of night life at all, then at night, I would be doing something really fun and entertaining, and I probably wouldn't remember to say my prayers or read my scriptures in the evenings. Back in Utah, with Provo really close and Salt Lake within distance, and a car at my disposal, there are many, many distractions that could keep one Alex Nielson from concentrating too hard on preparing himself for a mission. In Laie, there are only 2 distractions, and I haven't found either of them yet.

So, sorry girls, there's going to be no dating Alex, because he's got a 2 year date with the Lord that he needs to start getting ready for.

...

Sorry if that last line offends anyone.

Deep Thinking

2008-09-22T21:46:00.000-07:00

I was doing some deep thinking today, and I realized something strange. I don't think it's a contradiction, but definitely bizarre. I was thinking of other Christian churches who believe in the holy trinity, that Jesus, God and the Holy Ghost are all the same being. I understand that there are many people who don't believe their particular church is THE true church, but even if they don't, they obviously believe that Christianity in general is the right idea, and is true to the extent that Jesus was the Christ, God is our creator and there is a Holy Ghost.

The thing is, if they believe that Jesus Christ is also God, they believe that God is Jewish. Jesus was raised as a Jew, and if he's God, then that means God is also a Jew. It just seems bizarre that the God those Christians worship isn't even of their own faith. It seems one of two ways: either they believe that God is wrong, and that Christianity is the true faith despite the fact that their belief that God is Jewish, and that Judaism is wrong, which is a contradiction, as they believe God is perfect, or else they're willingly practicing a religion that would be false.

I'm just glad to say that we recognize that Jesus is the Christ, was raised up as Jewish, but is a separate entity from Heavenly Father and the Holy Ghost, but works in collaboration with them. Everything would be so confusing otherwise.

The ONLY Thing I've Learned

2008-09-19T17:58:00.000-07:00

I'd like to share with you what I've learned from my Chinese 101 class.

This is the Chinese character for "power"

This is the Chinese character for "mouth"

Put them together and you get the verb "to add".

NOT
"PowerMouth"

Ahhh, I give in!

2008-09-16T22:16:00.000-07:00

I was wanting to keep the last post cryptic because to me, personally, it has such awesome meaning, and it really does make me feel so optimistic whenever I think of that, but I finally realized that even if I share what I mean by it with others, it'll become no less personal =)

It's Coldplay's new song "Viva la Vida" and I'm so in love with the lyrics. Usually people listen to a song because the music is pretty or the tune is catchy, but I listen to this song because the lyrics are gorgeous and it makes me think.

"I used to rule the world,
Seas would rise when I gave the world
Now in the morning I sleep alone,
Sweep the streets I used to own."

"I used to roll the dice,
Feel the fear in my enemy's eyes
Listen as the crowd would sing
Now the old king is dead, long live the king
One minute I held the key
Next the walls were closed on me.
And I discovered that my castles stand upon
Pillars of salt, and pillars of sand"

"I hear Jerusalem bells a ringing
Roman calvary choirs are singing
Be my mirror, my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field..."

The reason the Jerusalem bells line stands out to me is that it's a common belief in America that anywhere in the Middle East is bad and terrible and tainted because of the connection with terrorists, but even if you believe that, it's impossible to deny that the bells there sound beautiful. Even if you despise a place, you can recognize that even something little, like the bells tolling albeit for less than a few minutes every day is a beautiful melody.

It just makes me think, and now I stand by this belief that no matter where you are, literally EVERY SINGLE place has Jerusalem bells that you can hear, whether you're in a physical place, a situation, or a bad mood. It says how you can just take a really small, seemingly insignificant thing, but recognize that as beautiful and realize that no matter where you are, there's something good about it. If you're in a situation or a place where you can't find a single good thing about it, at least listen to the bells.

I really want to thank Angel, because she put that on her playlist, and I've visited her blog several times a day every single day for a week just to hear that song.

Well, the secret's out, but I really wanted to share that, because that's now my favorite song I've ever heard.

Oh, and for the record, yes, I recognize that my posts are getting progressively cheesier and cheesier =) I would've thought my quota would be filled up, but I'm still gaining a lot of insights here that are helping me out and WILL help me when I'm on a mission.

Jerusalem Bells

2008-09-15T12:50:00.000-07:00

"I hear Jerusalem bells ringing"

They ring every day, but you'll never appreciate them until you actually listen. Some of the best things in life you either stumble upon or else you search them out consciously, but once found, add something beautiful to your life.

My Sassy Girl

2008-09-13T11:37:00.000-07:00

So I actually watched My Sassy Girl with the guy who loaned it to me and two other people last night, and I wish I could say it was bad, but it really made me sick. It wasn't bad, it was actually offensive.

Basically the entire premise of the movie was that the main character guy was stuck in an abusive relationship. It wasn't done in a cute way, either. Some girls are playful and will slap or tease, but in the movie, the girl would get mad for no reason at all, punch him, slap him, grab him by the head and shake him, and when he started to show that he was in pain, she yelled at him and made him believe it was his fault.

It had all the aspects of an abusive relationship. Physical abuse, she'd just start hitting him under no provocation at all, and it wasn't cute playful banter, she'd get angry and start punching him. She had control over every aspect of his life. If they went out to eat, she told him what to eat, she'd make him order, and then make him pay. When they went for a walk, if her shoes made her feet hurt, she forced him to trade shoes with her, no matter how humiliating or painful it was for him, etc etc. and the hypocrisy was bad too. He met her, she was drunk off her feet and so he took her to a motel so she should recooperate, and then he did the same thing, and when he woke up, she made him pay for everything, she was screaming at him and had him on the ground beating him, yelling how he can't do that, but for some reason it was okay when she did. And whenever the guy tried to defend himself, she'd pander to his emotions and make him feel like he was the enemy.

I don't know what it's like in Korea, but if the movie had been that way, but the guy was the one being abusive, it would've been an extremely cruel and offensive movie to a lot of people. But keeping it exactly the same and switching the roles of the man and woman and for some reason it was meant to be a comedy =/ it really wasn't funny, it was a perfect depiction of abuse, and I actually had to leave before it was over because I was worried about saying something that would bug the people who were enjoying it. That and I had work in 7 hours.

Español Hoy

2008-09-11T21:26:00.001-07:00

At work today, on the last canoe ride of the day, I gave a private tour. What happened is that I overheard some people speaking in Spanish, so I went over and asked where they were from, they said Venezuela, and then the conversation picked up from there. They never broke into English which is usually a good indicator that your Spanish is terrible or they're sick of talking to you and just want to humor you, so when we got on the boat, I continued talking to them in their language.

I gave almost the entire tour in Spanish, forgetting how to say a few things like "temple" "sacrifice" "chief" "heathen priest of God", you know, basic Spanish 101 material. But they really enjoyed it. They laughed at all the jokes, they were really involved, and their video camera almost NEVER was off of me. It was flattering.

The tour ended, and I actually translated the song off the top of my head "If You're Happy and you Know it", and they LOVED that! I had to tell them bye, but they insisted on taking several dozens of pictures with me and some of the other "Kanoe Boyz".

They all had interesting names too. Luzlinda (Pretty light), Luz (light), Luzclara (clear light) and I think Fransisco (Francis). They were really cool, and it's an awesome thought to think that I'll be involved every time they watch that home video or see those pictures.

Probably I'll be remembered as the 18 year old Americano who speaks like a 9 year old. I hope so =)

I Cruise Everywhere

2008-09-11T21:01:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone.....

Check out THIS bruiser.....

I am now the proud owner of a Sector Nine longboard. I bought it yesterday and haven't bothered walking since.

I can NOT stand blogspot

2008-09-08T15:13:00.000-07:00

Well everyone, I wasted about a half hour trying to make a new post about the second time I went to the Circle Island Tour, but some idiots decided that making the website convenient or providing functional ways to post pictures was a terrible idea, so I've given up on that for now.

Guys...

2008-09-07T21:49:00.000-07:00

I am weeks behind schedule. I have updates from 2 weeks ago that I haven't put up. So please be patient as I finally get access to a computer at a time when I have:

1. A computer (crucial)
2. My camera
3. My camera's USB cord
4. Batteries for my camera

Every time I'm at a computer, I'm missing at very least one of those things, which makes it difficult to update.

On the plus side, my friend loaned me a Korean chick flick which I'm going to watch on a date. I wonder how that'll turn out.

The English title is "My Sassy Girl" And from the looks of the poster, it's certain to be pure gold, or as some of my Asians friend would say "Pule Gord". I'm definitely expecting no less than

******/***** stars!

and for good measure, can you recognize THIS film?

Whoa, twice in one day!

2008-09-03T21:57:00.000-07:00

Okay, I hope you all can forgive me for that last post. It was kind of a pre-mi pity party thing going, but I forgot to mention it applies to everyone who's going through a little discouragement. I was thinking about taking it down because it made me seem like a whiner, but then I remembered a lesson from seminary in which the teacher mentioned how every single thing on this earth can testify of Christ, even a song sung by an American Idol =)

Anyway, what this post is mainly about is that I finally got my camera back from my friend Yu-Ting (Veronica) Wu!! I can finally upload some long overdue pictures!! "Wu"-hoo! (I know Ryan specifically will enjoy that pun) Regardless, I just have to mention a few cool things that have happened lately.

Sunday night I was talking to Dano my Latino friend from Buenos Aires, Argentina (Hi Uncle Lynn!!) and we had a long, long, loooooOOOooooONg "discussion" about where the United States will be in 25 years. In fact, I wasn't necessarily part of the discussion, but when I overheard him talking to a boy (yes a boy. I would never even consider this person a "guy") from my Chinese class. He was listening intently, and it was something about the international language so I stood near.

--DISCLAIMER--
Everyone, this is how strange and bizarre your Alex, your beloved little son, brother, uncle, friend, whatever I am to you really is.

Dano was talking about how in 25 years from now, the international language will be either Russian, Chinese or Spanish. I love my country and where I'm from, but when I heard that I seriously thought "No way?! Could that really happen??" and I was, I guess the best way to put it is, excited at the prospect that if I want to talk to a guy from Sweden, I might have to use Руский (Russkiy) or 中國 (Zhong Guo) to talk. So I jumped in the conversation.

Then Dano launched into all these weird conspiracy theories about September 11. He was talking about how he was watching YouTube videos about it and that it was indisputable proof that George Bush had planted bombs throughout the buildings and that he set up the entire thing to kill as many people as possible in order to have a "legit" reason for going into the middle east. The more he talked, the more crazy I began to think he was and the more convinced of himself he was. The other boy was talking, trying to force his own view in there, but he was way too timid and whenever Dano said something like "What? Are you serious? That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard." The kid would immediately back down and act all apologetic saying things like, "Welllllll....yeah, I guess you're right (George Bush MUST be the source of all evil, I'll give you THAT one)" and the kid had no spine. I felt bad. I only had this to say to Dano.

YouTube is international. Making Bush look like the bad guy in this situation only gives other countries (like the extremely anti-American Argentina) another reason to hate America, regardless of whether or not there's any truth behind it.

That shut up him up.

Then later he and my friend Lane stopped in my room and Dano talked about his mission experiences and was telling us about how great and spiritual a mission could be, since both Lane and I were pre-mis. I really like him =) he may have some crazy ideas, but I like how we can both respect each other regardless of the others' beliefs. And I owe that to my mother, because of all her pushing me to "save face" and not overreact to situations. I was totally calm during the entire 45 shpiel of September 11, and then all I said was about YouTube.

The other thing I wanted to share was at work. I was pushing a canoe full of people and I fell off. When I got up, literally everyone in the last three rows had turned around and was taking pictures of me as I tried to catch up with the canoe, and then when I got back on, they were all speaking Mandarin or Cantonese with each other (it's impossible to tell those two apart) and looking back every so often. I hate them.

On the plus side though, I got a girl to blush. I've noticed, girls always do this thing when they're embarrassed or flattered. They'll cup their hands around their nose and mouth and crank their neck downward toward their chest, but keep their eyes level with you and make a noise like

"Ohhhhhh......."

While their friends all giggle. That's exactly what it was like for this one girl of four from Japan on a canoe that I incidentally wasn't pushing. The reaction was cute though, and I appreciated it. Mom's calling right now though, so I'm going to go pick it up.

Innocent

2008-09-03T11:15:00.000-07:00

I was listening to this song today on my way over to Sharing the Gospel, and for the first time, I actually listened to the lyrics for the first time, and the chorus really made me think. This is how it goes:

"I Remember feeling low
And I Remember losing hope
And I Remember all the feelings and the day they stopped"

I've heard missionaries and pre-missionaries are the ones who get attacked the hardest, and i think it's true. As much as I've been listening to the Spirit, it's been hard to ignore Satan. Once I heard the line "And I remember all the feelings and the day they stopped" I just felt the Spirit tell me that I'm doing what I need to be doing, and even if I've been listening to what Satan is telling me instead of what Heavenly Father is, it'll be over. The day will come when how I felt will just be a memory, and I'll remember the day it stopped, and then I'll feel just happy and grateful to know that no matter how rough it got I stuck with it and continued doing what's right.

Needless to say, I like this song now.

Tender mercies

2008-08-31T21:35:00.000-07:00

Again, another post with no pictures, but the reason is tied in with a future post, so I won't mention it, otherwise it would completely void a potentially good story. So I'll just say I don't have my camera for maybe another day or two. Don't worry, it's in good hands.

But this morning I woke up, stood up and walked over to my dresser, and in the process, knocked my fan off the shelf (for what I think is the 9th time) but this time was different, because one of the blades was cracked really deeply, and another blade was broken completely off.

Naturally, my initial reaction was "This is just great" because face it, when you're in Hawaii, you NEED a fan. But this was a really good lesson in finding a blessing in a bad situation. I had a roll of masking tape and spent over an hour trying to fix it, and it scared me half to death because whenever I turned my fan on higher than the lowest setting, the taped-on blade would be thrown against the opposite wall going approximately mach 3. I'll definitely be sure to include a video of it.

Needless to say, because one of the blades was broken off, two thirds of the entire blade base were off-balance, and so when I turn it on, the entire fan rocks hard back and forth and makes this hideous noise, and I spent another half hour or so looking around, trying to find someplace I could put it and insulate it with clothes or something to muffle the noise and keep it from dancing around the floor. I got really frustrated then just gave up.

I was lying on my back holding the fan in front of my face on my belly just letting it blow on me, then I finally just gave up and set it on the bed next to me, and something amazing happened.

Because of the short distance between the fan and myself, it worked just as well on the lowest setting as on the highest setting before it broke, the dancing and a lot of the noise was toned down because the base of the fan was wedged down into the mattress, and because of that, my entire mattress was shaking like a massage chair.

I found the best of a bad situation. I may have lost a good-looking, well functioning fan, but as a result, I now have a massage chair and a decently working fan, and the knowledge to not put my expensive, necessary equipment on the edges of things where I knock them off every time I stand up and open a drawer. =)

First day of work (sorry no pictures)

2008-08-28T22:53:00.001-07:00

Perhaps I'm a masochist. I've been sitting in on a Mandarin Chinese class in addition to Sharing the Gospel, Japanese and Intro to Informatin Systems. Also, today I started work, and so this is basically how today went.

-Before Work-
1. I had no classes early in the morning for a change, so I took advantage of it and slept in until 10:00 am.
2. Breakfast ends at 10:00, and lunch doesn't start until 11:00
3. At 11:00, my sit-in, non-mandatory Mandarin class starts
4. I work at noon on Tuesdays, Thursdays (today) and Saturdays
5. I had ten minutes to get to the PCC and in uniform (which I did, hooray for me)

-During Work-
1. I wore a lava lava, or a sulu for the first time in my life. It feels strange to wear a skirt to work. Or anywhere, for that matter
2. During my introduction, I referred to my homeland as "The beautiful island of North America" to about 200 or more strangers. They appreciated it, which made my job more fun
3. I learned how to push a one ton canoe with a stick twice my height, losing my balance several times
4. I fell in the water in front of 300 or more tourists
5. I stayed wet for the rest of my shift
6. I pushed the canoe for Tahiti during the canoe show at 2:00 pm. I did bad, but luckily my partner kept control
7. There was a couple from Germany, so I asked the woman to remove her sunglasses, then told her "Du hast schun augen" which means "you have pretty eyes". Needless to say, I was a real crowd-pleaser today
8. I mastered canoe pushing

-After Work-
1. I realized I locked myself out of my room, and I was wet and had nothing to eat the entire day
2. I finally got my room key/meal card out after a blessing of running into one of the RA's who happened to have the master key on him. The system is ridiculous and I can't stand it. RAs don't work from 5:00 pm until 8:00 pm, but the cafeteria closes at 8:00, so basically, they wait until the EXACT MINUTE that the cafeteria closes to let you get your meal card out of your room. Whose idea was that??!
3. I went to dinner (my first meal of the day) and met my friend Jia, from mainland China, and her friend. I don't know her friend's name, but I can safely say she's one of the most obnoxious people I've seen here, and if she somehow found out I said this, I don't care, because someone needs to tell her and I'm not afraid if she knows how I feel
4. I told my friend Shin-Pei that "わつぁしわいちばんひとです/Watashi wa ichiban hito desu" which means "I'm the #1 person!" and he couldn't stop laughing for a few minutes. He told me to shorten it to just "Watashi wa ichiban (I'm #1)". I'll do that. Thanks man
5. I asked Jia to help me figure out my iPod shuffle because it won't turn on and she has one too. I'm worried it's broken because it was still clipped to my belt loop while I fell into the water. But my headphones still work =)
6. After dinner, I came here
7. I'm still wet

And that is a fairly good summation of what has gone on today with me. I'm so tired and it's barely 8:08 pm right now. I want to go to bed but my roommate will think I'm a nerd. *sigh* the pressures of college.

I know I said no there were no pictures in this post. I saw this and I couldn't resist. Interpret it how you want.

Goodbye to Doris

2008-08-21T14:40:00.000-07:00

I don't think I ever made any mention of Doris or her friends before. They were at BYU Hawaii on an exchange program, they were visiting for only three weeks. But my friend Kevin made friends with them pretty quickly, since all of them were from Hong Kong like Kevin. So they became friends of mine pretty soon too because there was hardly a time I saw Kevin without them hanging around also, so I either had to get used to them (which wasn't hard at all :D) or else not hang out with Kevin, and that's how I made new friends.

They had to leave last Saturday, so on Friday, I was eating lunch with them and they said how they were going to the PCC with my friend Kevin as their tour guide and they invited me to come along. So I grabbed my interview paper for the job interview I had on Monday, flashed it to security and went in. I would've paid to go, but seriously, $80 is way too much. So these are just pictures of the day we spent at the PCC.

I feel bad, because the only one whose name I remember is Doris, and she's the third to the right. She was awesome and her English was perfect, which was nice because while everyone else was speaking in Cantonese I was able to speak English with her. The others knew English pretty well also, but they just weren't very talkative for the first while.

For those close-minded people who think that foreign people are any less "human" hang out with these two for a while. They were great, and the girl on my left acted exactly like any and every girl I knew in my American high school, so yeah, I'm pretty sure there's not too big of a difference.

And this of course is Kevin. I'm assuming he's not smiling because he had to work on that day which was really the day before Doris and the girls had to leave, and who wants to work then?? But Kevin leaves for Hong Kong on the 27th I believe, and I'm not going to forgive him for that :(

I've NEVER seen a tattoo like this one before. It's a shame though, because I can read it, but I don't know of the meaning. "Onganinimi saesangol ichiram sarangongasa moksaeng sarul madnun sa mada myalmangchianongko yaongsaengul oyapim inira" I'm going to try to get the actual meaning of the phrase up, but it's hard to find romanized korean dictionaries, so I might just end up asking my roommate. I mainly just want to know if I divided the words up correctly, because I'm not 100% sure where one word starts and one ends. It's definitely an interesting tattoo though

So this was the once-a-day canoe show, where the dancers for each of the islands are rowed out into the center lake/stage and they perform their dance while an announcer gives a brief bio about the island's heritage. This is Aotearoa (New Zealand) and personally, I think they might be my favorite to watch dance. Either them or Samoa.

This is some out of commission Mormon church that was established several years ago when the first missionaries made their way over here. There's something about the friendly polynesian language signs behind me combined with the look on my face that just don't match. I like it :)

This is an example of why I love Cantonese and Mandarin. The languages are SOOO flowery! The thing that this girl was wearing all day, it connects to the pants and makes something sort of like overalls, but the Chinese name for it is "Ice Fire". I mean, how dramatic and over-the-top poetic is that for a pair of overalls?

This was really cool. It was a game they taught us over in the village of New Zealand. The point was to keep up with the person in the middle's commands. The one standing in the middle would say "up" and you had to take a step forward, all in unison. Or they'd say "right" and everyone would have to move right, but if it wasn't at the same time, you'd hit somebody, hit the sticks you were stepping over and then you'd be out. The commands got progressively faster and I was in the top three until I stepped on the ladder and got out.

This was the village of Samoa performing THEIR dance, the Ha'a. This picture is kind of bad, but I had to hurry and take it before my camera died because that girl is in my ward! =D

This is more recent, but I didn't feel much like making an entirely new post about it, but I finally got my room after much hassling those poor people at the Housing Office, and this is what I found when I walked in:

This is how I found my bed. No legs, no matress, nothing to even support a mattress. Just a metal frame with drawers. Wow.

It really turned out to be a blessing though, because originally I was going to be rooming with Jon Patterson, a mainlander that I was supposed to have roomed with last semester. Although this was a stressful procedure and took a lot of work, I'm glad for it, because I have a really chill, down to earth Korean roommate and I'm looking forward to this semester =)

Another thing is I'm an OGL ('Ohana Group Leader) so that means I show around all the new freshman and show them what's what and introduce them to the school and all that. But what I found out is for some reason the president of BYU has almost completely switched the rolls. Meaning, originally out of 800 new freshman, 100-150 of them would be mainlanders, but I found out recently that out of thew new 800 freshman that arrived, 600-650 are mainlanders. I don't know why he decided to do this, but it's really different now and it's taking away from the intercultural experience I was having, because now every other person I see is a mainlander. I don't agree with that choice, and it really makes no sense to me, but all I can say is at very least I have a Korean roommate so I'll still be getting a little bit of another culture while I'm here. I just don't want to be clumped together as a group with the rest, being known as "one of the mainlanders", which is a worry I have because since the new arrivals, the cliques have gotten tighter, and I don't want to be forced into any one group.