Today a childhood friend of mine came over to my house. She has been living in Shanghai ever since she moved away many years ago. I haven't seen her for a few years. She's in California now because she's attending a creative writing summer camp (I believe it lasts for three weeks) at Stanford.

I'm afraid I'm not very good with people. Although my zodiac sign, Leo, says I'm supposed to be extroverted, strong-willed, ambitious, and a born leader, I don't think those things are true...Maybe I used to be more like that, but I've been changed by my experiences. (Or I happen to be unlike most Leos.) A person once said I was more like a Virgo. Virgos are shy, meticulous, intelligent, analytical...as well as being perfectionists and worrywarts. Maybe I was born at the wrong time. (But I was actually born a little bit late, so maybe I'm meant to be a Leo with a Virgo's personality?)

I'm not a very good host, and I couldn't really say much. There were things I wanted to ask, but I couldn't really express myself because I thought the questions would be too blunt and rather strange... And I couldn't really say what kind of things I do when I'm at home during the summer because it might take a lot of explaining. Nor was I able to properly tell her how video and computer games that I was playing worked. (I guess it's partially because I don't know what to say exactly and partially that I've usually figured out how to do things on my own or by reading instruction manuals, so I'm not so familiar with giving people verbal instructions...)

She did say that the Korean boys at her school were quite fond of Starcraft, and it occurred to me that some member of the Korean boy band SS501 had become a Starcraft programmer or something of that sort.

Anyhow, though, that's not really important. I'm sorry, I got sidetracked again. (I apologize for my disorganized posts recently. My thoughts are a bit...muddled.) To me, living in Shanghai is a foreign concept, even if I've visited the city several times. Through listening I've noted various differences between the city where I reside, in California, and Shanghai, China.

- SH: Hot and humid in the summer
CA: Hot, but apparently not as hot as SH (both my friend who lives in Shanghai and my friend who lives in Taiwan say that here is cold, comparatively. I was horrified. XD)
- SH: Friend gets on the bus at 6:45 am and rides it for an hour to get to school
CA: I leave for school at 8:00 am, about an 8 minute ride
- SH: A polluted city with weak sunlight
CA: Bright sunlight (but in my town, you can't see the stars that well at night. Yosemite, on the other hand, is just splendid for stargazing.)
- SH: No wildlife, except in zoos.
CA: Birds (mostly pigeons, crows, and seagulls) and squirrels. (Stanford University, as I just discovered today, has so many squirrels in this one area. It was amazing.)
- SH: 8 classes at the school my friend attends (which is an "international" school that teaches by USA curriculum.) 4 classes in one day, then the other 4 the next day. (It's a good idea. You would have 2 days to do your homework so you can manage your time. And if you have trouble with it you have one day to ask your teacher for help.)
CA: 6 or 7 classes, daily. (It's predictable, but I want to try the 8 class system.)
- SH: Many students use Skype.
CA: Kids are more likely to chat through Gmail.

I wonder if I would come to like Shanghai if I went there. Maybe I could have a dog, like my friend does, if I lived in Shanghai. But I have very little grasp of Chinese (at least as a written language - I can speak Shanghainese somewhat better than Mandarin, so maybe that's okay) and I like my big backyard and getting to use the Internet freely (in China, you can't access Facebook, Youtube, or Blogspot, as well as other thinsg). Perhaps trying out the lifestyle is the only way to see.

Labels: atmosphere, california, china, comparison, friends, inability, instructions, internet, korean, language, leo, lifestyle, school, shanghai, squirrels, stanford, starcraft, temperature, virgo, zodiac

When I was younger, I would always sleep without socks on. It felt too uncomfortable to me, wearing socks to bed. On hot days, I even stuck my bare feet out of the side of the blanket just to keep them feeling cool. This went on for many years, even in the winter, when my feet became all cold and numb. I didn't like the alien feeling I got from wearing socks.

But that has changed this past winter. My blood circulation has not been good. (At least, that is the theory that my mom and I have; if you have a better idea, you should let me know.) My body temperature isn't always as it should be. When the weather is cold I cannot seem to keep my body heat unless I am wearing a thick jacket (and even then sometimes it's not enough). My hands would be icy cold while my parents' hands would be quite warm. One of my classmates was surprised that I was wearing a jacket since she thought it was pretty warm. I myself am shocked to see students wearing t-shirts and shorts even on chilly days. (In fact, in elementary school, we would joke that one kid never wore anything besides t-shirts and shorts, winter or summer.)

My feet were really feeling too cold, so I decided it was better that I wear socks to bed. At first it felt all wrong, but after a while I got used to the feeling, and so it became a habit of mine. In fact, it feels a little odd not wearing socks. But since the weather is really warm, I figure it's better to sleep with socks off again for the time being.

I kept realizing right after I turned off the lights that I had forgotten to put on socks before bed. But it's such a hassle turning the lights on again and getting up to get socks. My mom says that I should just keep socks under my pillow. She said that she did that when she was young. I've been thinking to myself that maybe she didn't have teeth to give the tooth fairy, so she left socks instead. That makes it the Sock Fairy instead.

Recently I've been feeling some discomfort in my feet. The bottom of my left foot (specifically, the area known as the "ball" of the foot) pained me slightly during the day. I was still able to walk and run, but it sure made things uncomfortable. I looked at it at night and saw there was something like a blister on it. A dry, hard part of skin...Yikes. And then my other foot, the right foot is a bit odd around the ankle area (the side that is facing inward, facing to the left). It hurt me to bend it in a certain position, but only sometimes. At other times it is just fine. I keep wondering if perhaps I have injured myself without knowing it. Maybe I was sleeping in a really weird position. (I recall waking up some days with a stiff back or with pulled muscles from sleeping in a bad position.) Or maybe it's just one of those unexplainable aches that goes away after a while.

I've been stressed lately as well, due to a group project we have to do for language arts class (it's just so hard to meet up with my group members, so it's really bothering me). And I've also had to take quite a few tests. The STAR tests aren't really that big of a concern to me. But I have been taking awards tests. Since eighth grade is the last year of middle school, if you can show your excellence in a subject (essay writing, speech, poetry, mathematics, science, social studies, or art) you will be given an award. I was a bit reluctant to take a test for some of the subjects since I felt there was no way I would get the award (unless by some stroke of luck I managed to bubble in all the right answers, and it would be unfair for me to win the award when I didn't know what I was doing), but my mom urged me to, saying it would be a good experience and I might as well give it a try.

Well, the history was okay (though I didn't remember a lot, or didn't even know if I'd learned it), the science was tolerable, the essay writing was not too bad (just a bit of a time constraint)... But the geometry was something else. I could only understand how to do a few problems. Many of the things were either forgotten (like the formula for the volume of a cone or something along those lines) or I hadn't ever seen such a problem. These problems were beyond my abilities, so I ended up having to bubble in randomly at the end of class. (I should have taken Mr. Kulla's advice to just skip what I didn't understand immediately. I actually heard the problems at the end of the test were a bit easier...) Anyways, I am a little upset because I feel I had wasted a perfectly good hour of my time on taking a test that just ended up confusing me, but I suppose there's no use crying over spilled milk.

Labels: academic, awards, blood, circulation, discomfort, eighth grade, feet, geometry, health, luck, pain, pillow, problem, school, sleep, socks, STAR testing, temperature, test, tooth fairy

I didn't know who Ansel Adams was until quite recently. While I was on a school trip to Yosemite National Park, all of the students would walk to the theater for our evening program every night (usually something informative, like about rock climbing or climate change, but one time we just hiked outside and played a game similar to hide-and-seek). We always passed by a place called the Ansel Adams Gallery, which sold gifts, and I think you can rent cameras there, too.

Once I returned from Yosemite, I visited the library and checked out some magazines. I usually look for science-related magazines at the library because every trimester we must present a scientific news article. I happened to see the magazine called Popular Photography, and I have checked out a few of the issues (not particularly new ones, but oh well). I was looking at an article about 30 photo-friendly cities in the USA when I saw San Francisco, in 2nd place. And it was mentioned that Ansel Adams broke his nose in an earthquake in San Francisco.

I've probably written about this before, but this still keeps on happening to me. I even saw the very same camera that I have - a Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS3A - in an edition of the Popular Photography Magazine. It was apparently a good camera for a not-too-expensive price or something. In fact, when I was at the Campanile in UC Berkeley, someone asked my dad to take a picture of him, and he had the same camera, in the same color. I suppose it's just a common camera. (Not like my old Nikon Coolpix, it was a pretty rare one. A silvery sort of color. I sure miss it, even now.) But it's still unsettling to see it in other places. It's kind of like how I'm bothered by seeing people with the same name as me.

Ever since I arrived home after my trip, I've been feeling a bit out of sorts. For one thing, my dad left for Shanghai, China, to visit his family. It's pretty quiet because it's only my mother and I around the house. That's kind of a good thing, and kind of a bad thing. I'm not really used to having less noise around the house. But it's kind of good since I get to talk my mother more than usual. (My cell phone ringtone is starting to annoy me, though. I figure I should change it, but I actually still haven't figured out how)

Speaking of my cell phone...I'm still frustrated at it. Sometimes I think I don't get any signal. One time I was walking home from school and needed to call my mom, so I whipped out my cell phone and dialed her number. I kept hearing it ring, and ring, and ring, and finally I was told that the call wouldn't go through or something. I kept trying this over and over while I walked. I finally managed to reach her when I was near a school (I think the schools should all have cell phone coverage). What good is the cell phone if you can't even use it? Also, my mom said she called me on my cell phone, but I don't think I ever heard it ring. She says I probably had my cell phone on mute or some other mode where you can't hear the ring, but I don't know...I think perhaps it really is hard for me to get a signal, which will be troublesome if I ever desperately need to get in touch with someone.

Recently, I visited Cold Stone Creamery, my favorite place to get ice cream. There's actually a place Cold Rock Creamery, but I've only seen it in Australia. (It's not bad either. They have some different flavors.) My mom had some coupons, and I always leap at the chance to save money on yummy food. Cold Stone now has warm sundaes (we had a buy-1-get-1-free coupon for it, but sadly it expired before we had the chance to use it...) and I think my mom might like those. She used to complain about how ice cream was too cold for her. It kind of ruins the point of ice cream if it's cold (and it isn't all that fun to drink "ice cream soup") but it still does sound like it would be tasty. And it'd be nice during the winter.

When I was younger, I had trouble eating hot food. I would refuse to eat anything that was too hot (in fact, I even went so far as to put ice cubes in my hot chocolate so it would cool down to a reasonable temperature). My parents would say, "It's not too hot," but when I tried it, I thought it was still too warm. I wonder if we have different senses of temperature and taste. They don't see any difference in taste between water bottle brands, but I actually have slight preferences in water bottle brands. Also, I hear people are more accepting of alcohol when they get older because their taste buds have died and they can't taste the bitterness as much anymore. If so, I guess it's good if I have a sensitive tongue since that means I'm still young. (It does conflict with my trying to act like an old person, though. But you can't have both. It reminds me of a conversation I heard...A girl was saying to her friend that she didn't want to take some pills because her mother told her not to, since there was a drowsiness side effect. "So don't take it," said her friend. "But I need it..." said the girl - it was carsick pills. Her friend said, "Then take it!" Basically, there's no middle ground - she can obey your mother or she can save herself from being carsick)

Labels: ansel adams, camera, carsick, cell phone, choice, cold rock creamery, cold stone creamery, ice cream, inconvenient, magazine, photography, popular, signal, taste, temperature, tongue, warm, yosemite

When I visited the Grand Canyon, the most startling thing to me was the snow. There was snow on both sides of the road, surrounding the trees... I didn't expect to see snow. The Grand Canyon is in Arizona, and so I always expected it to be a really hot place, so snow was quite the surprise. But I suppose the Grand Canyon is at a high altitude and that's what causes it to snow.

The snow on the actual canyons had already melted, but the canyons were stunning nevertheless. We were only able to see the South Rim (there is a North Rim and South Rim) because the North Rim doesn't open until the warmer months.

I find it interesting that although California is considered to be a pretty warm state, Nevada and Arizona felt a lot warmer (even the Grand Canyon wasn't all that cold). When I got back home, I was pretty surprised by it. I guess that means Arizona and Nevada are really hot in the summertime, though. And I've heard that old people like to move to Arizona since it's a warm place. It helps with arthritis. (I've visited the Winchester House, which is pretty close to where I live, and I heard that Sarah Winchester had lots of heaters since she had arthritis.)

While I was on vacation, I would watch the Olympics at nighttime. I always hoped to see the skating, which I was interested in. The problem is, the skating didn't go on until late at night, so I'd be really tired by the time it was on TV.

I was watching the Pair Skating, and there was a pair from Russia, Yuko Kavaguti and Aleksandr Smirnov. Yuko Kavaguti is actually from Japan, but gave up her Japanese citizenship and moved to Russia to pursue her Olympic dream. I don't think I saw any Japanese pair skaters. I had heard on television that some people considered her a traitor for leaving Japan for Russia. But you know, making a decision like that couldn't have been easy. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices to make other dreams come true.

I also watched some snowboarding. It seems like having longish hair is a common thing for male snowboarder, though Shaun White, one of the USA snowboarders, had especially long hair... My parents think snowboarding is a risky sport and all. Really, a lot of the Winter Olympic sports seem pretty dangerous. I also watched some of the women's alpine skiing. It was pretty scary seeing athletes get into crashes. It sure is dangerous to do these sports. No wonder when I was watching the skiing, a person commented, "It's like she's afraid of the speed." Wouldn't you be, if you had just nearly gotten yourself killed? Hockey also seemed to be quite the violent sport.

I kind of wonder why people still go into sports despite that they could really injure themselves badly. Do they try not to think about that? Do they feel it is worth the risk? I guess there is a kind of thrill in doing something dangerous, too.

I was really freaked out when I was standing near to the edge of the Grand Canyon, even though there are railings and all. There was a sign saying people have died by falling into the Grand Canyon. My dad said sometimes being by the edge gives him the urge to actually go and jump in. I often feel like I'm going to fall in or drop my camera or something like that, and sometimes I'm really scared of falling in, but at other times I think it will be really thrilling.

My imagination tends to go wild a lot, and I think of myself doing all sorts of amazing things that I would probably never be able to do. When I was younger, I thought of myself with magic powers, being able to control things like a rainbow swirling sort of thing. That was inspired by the old Fishtime Club I was a part of back in elementary school. In first grade, one of my friends decided he wanted to a form a club. We started out with just him, me, and his sister, and we would spend time digging up rocks and walking around the YMCA daycare at my elementary school. But then we met more people, and there were some really fun and happy times. Later on, though it kind of split up, as my friend and his sister stopped going to the YMCA, and eventually I think they must have moved away (I haven't seen them at my middle school). They might still live in this area. I saw someone who looked a whole lot like him at Target once. I don't know if he still remembers me or if my old friends still remember those fun times. (A lot of the people who I spent time with were a year younger than I was. I guess I get along better with younger people because I've always wondered what it's like to have siblings. I like to spend time with my friends' younger sisters, too.) I'd be really happy if they still have those memories.

Labels: alpine, arizona, arthritis, danger, fishtime club, grand canyon, japan, memory, nevada, olympics, pairs, russia, shaun white, ski, snow, snowboarding, sports, temperature, winchester, yuko kavaguti

I have no idea whether I have translated that right, but it should be something along the lines of "The Beauty and the Beast". I just noticed something about The Beauty and the Beast. In the Disney movie, the girl is called Belle, isn't she? And the feminine French word for beauty is belle...Perhaps they did that on purpose and it wasn't just a coincidence. I have heard of secret goings-on with movies kind of like people comparing the villains Scar (from Aladdin) and Jafar (from The Lion King).

The weather seems to be changing all of a sudden. It's still sunny as usual, but now the temperature has cooled down. It's a nice change, but it's hard to get used to needing more blankets again...I was always annoyed by the summer heat but I'm pretty sure as soon as it's the thick of winter I will be pining for the warmth. The grass is always greener on the other side (well, not necessarily, if you have seen how dead some people's lawns are).

Speaking of lawns, I once heard that in certain places it's a law to keep your yard in good condition. Grass shouldn't be growing too wild, there shouldn't be too much weeds and you should prune your bushes, that kind of thing. Apparently you can even get fined for it. Wow... Well, we have nothing like that in my town, though, as far as I know.

I think the library is just really going downhill. Today I went to the library and there were strangely long lines for returning books and checking them out. I thought nothing of it until I tried returning the books and media that I had finished or that was due. It took a while for the system to make a connection, apparently. And then later I had to wait in line a long time just to check out what I wanted because the system is so slow. According to my dad it would take six months and a bunch of money to bring the library up to speed. Probably it's because so many people use the library (in fact, sometimes the recession is blamed for it since more people use the library during recessions) and also because the library hasn't got the cash. I suggested selling their fish tank (I'd buy it in a wink if I had the $$$) but my dad insists it's not easy to sell something like that, and it would be far from enough to pay for the system upgrade anyhow.

In French class we had a project where you color in a picture of a girl (or a boy, if you're male) and write a "paragraph" about yourself using words you've learned in class. I was trying to make my person have a ponytail since I almost always have my ponytail (in fact, the only time I took it down was for picture day). It was not going well, it always looked very awkward or in the wrong place or some other thing. I just gave up eventually and settled for something that looked so-so. The picture looks a little like me, but not much, because the hair has bangs (and I don't).

This is really out of the blue, but while working on some homework I stumbled upon a picture of a puzzle I remember doing when I was young. Click here to see it. I find Oklahoma's nickname really strange. What's "Sooner State" supposed to mean? Does that mean things happen sooner there?

Labels: belle, disney, drawing, fix, french, grass, lawns, library, map, movie, oklahoma, picture, ponytail, problem, puzzle, sooner state, system, temperature, the beauty and the beast, villains

That's a phrase which basically means "sleeping". Lately I've been able to sleep more since the weather is mild - not too hot and not too cold. Though I fall asleep around 11 pm, I wake up around 9 am (I have to get up then anyhow because of my summer classes) so I'm getting more sleep than during the regular school year (when I have to wake up before 8 am). It's made me feel a little more energetic, even if not too big a difference, and I'm glad of it. Maybe I could actually grow taller, something that has not been happening to me for a while...

...though one of my friends seems to have no problem growing. She's now increased her lead over me (Wow, when I talk like this, it sounds like swimming in the Olympics or something) and besides that my parents say they think she has lost some weight to boot. Her sister just looks kind of the same as always. It's probably because she has taller parents whereas my parents are kind of on the short side. My dad insists it's my mom's fault and my mom retorts that he's not exactly very tall himself...

I think my mom has way too many co-workers, classmates, and other assortments of acquaintances. She often goes a-visiting with them, and apparently she knows someone in Sydney, Australia who offered to take us around the city for a day. Even my dad seems to know a few people in Australia. (I guess it's because he used to live there and he was the only one who moved away? And that was because my mom "dragged "him) I wonder how my parents keep track of them all, but then again, it's not like they know my classmates, just like I don't really know their fellow people at work (unless I hear about them enough times).

I heard that my grandfather used to learn Japanese in school, which came as a surprise to me. I think it was because of something to do with Japanese were taking over China... He still knows a little bit, but it's kind of like my dad - my dad claims he knows German, but he really can only count from 1-10 by now.

We've had another death at my house recently. My blue balloon, which had the Earth drawn on it with Sharpie marker and which was hanging from a cord of the ceiling fan, popped all of a sudden, though it seemed like nothing was wrong with it. My mom says the over time the balloon's "skin" grew thinner until at last it couldn't handle it anymore. Something like that. I don't know very much of these matters, so if you understand it, let me know. Anyhow, it's a shame not to see that balloon hanging in my room anymore...It lived for a month.

When I went to the supermarket with my parents just the other day, I saw some chocolate milk buns - the kind that come six to a package which you can steam at home - and I was enraptured. It had such a beautiful brown swirly pattern. So my parents said we should buy them - though I tried to say "I'll use my allowance" (I barely keep track of it anymore. Ha, ha) - and when we were checking out, the cashier said "$1.99!" emphatically. My parents say that the cashier must've thought that was expensive. I thought, "Oh no! Maybe it is a bad deal to get only six buns for that price!" But still, there is nothing as cute as that among the buns at the supermarket.

Labels: acquaintance, balloon, bun, change, connection, death, food, german, growing, height, japanese, language, popped, relatives, rest, sleep, spending money, supermarket, temperature

That's what I felt like - something being cooked for breakfast. I mean, the weather where I live is just crazy. Before it was okay. It was warm, but that was normal seeing as it IS spring. But then today it was really, really hot. Even Sunday had higher temperatures than normal. Though we did PE indoors, I still worked up quite a sweat and didn't completely dry off until about the end of lunch. Walking home made me feel horrid all over again so I had to take a shower and change to shorts. (I usually don't wear shorts but I should buy more, so I'll have something to wear on hot days besides long black, brown, blue, and tan colored pants.)

Sunday was pretty eventful for me. Piano class went as normal, except I was really drowsy from lack of sleep over the spring break, and the teacher started bragging about me. This always makes me uncomfortable because it feels like I have more and more expectations to live up to. Just recently my mom has mentioned a few more Harvard/Stanford/UCLA/UC Berkeley/NYU/etc. type people. For some reason a lot of her friends' children who are old enough to have gone to college go to Ivy League schools and other bragging-rights places. I am very intimidated by it since only "smart" people even try to apply and yet only a small percentage get in. If I do insist I will be going to Stanford I may just be bluffing to try and convince myself. (Note I may have said something similar in a previous blog post, or even in person to friends. Not sure if I did.)

Oh yeah, we had some roses from my piano teacher one time. She had a lot of bouquets left over from the piano recital (reminder: That was back on March 28) so she insisted we take one of them home, as she was running out of vases. So we brought back some red roses. My mom thinks the bouquet we bought for my piano teacher was prettier. I still like the roses (they're already dead, so too bad) even if there are flowers I prefer. Say for instance - lilies, daffodils, tulips, morning glories, and so on. (By the way, since my dad always claims to be a gardener, he has bought a honeysuckle plant. It has orange, small, tropical-looking flowers. I heard it is edible somehow?)

Back to the real news I was going to talk about. My mom made me go with her to her acupuncture clinic. I was scared to death, as I expected I would be poked with needles and forced to drink ginseng medicines. Luckily it was only an "examination" of sorts to see how my bones and such were doing. I was very ticklish, so having my shoulders poked and my arm swung around and around really made me squirm. I have an assorted array of problems, such as a curved spine, stiff shoulders (from typing and playing piano XD After all, playing piano requires similar motions. My parents have the problem too since they are computer engineers), and ONE LEG IS LONGER THAN THE OTHER!!! AAAAAH!!! Actually, not really. It's just one hip is higher so the left leg is a little shorter. This makes my back tight to compensate. My mom suggests that I kick out my left leg to make it longer. I wonder if it really works. -_-;; She has the leg-length problem too. Must be genetic.

Also, my mother mentioned that one of my dad's best friends is looking for a cat. Originally he said he would wait until he bought a house, but he has changed his mind and wants a cat now. (He looked at an animal shelter, though he didn't find the breed he wanted.) I felt both happy and unhappy at this announcement.

Happy - Because if I wanted I could go to my dad's friend's house to play with the cat. (I don't know cats that well so it would be a good opportunity to see if I am fit to get a cat)

Unhappy - Because I myself won't get to have a dog or cat until I have a job and have graduated from college. My mom doesn't like animals (she won't admit it, but I can tell since she is scared of big dogs...) and so gets mad whenever I mention it to her.

It wouldn't be so big a deal, except I am an only child. Lack of siblings and pets, and always being taken care of by my grandmother or a day care center, made me lonely inside (I may have friends and people to talk to, but when I am by myself it hurts a lot. Over time I got used to being a loner so then I had trouble talking to people again, but I'm adjusting back a little). Even my mom made such a comment. Recently some of my dad's friends came over to our house, and gossiped while eating dinner. The only two "children" - one is a boy in high school, and the other is a younger boy who is in elementary school - were both only children. Neither talked much. The older boy was polite and just watched basketball, but the younger one was a little angsty. I noticed how his face was scrunched up in irritation and how he made snide, biting comments. He eventually went off to play his DS. (Haha, that reminds me of myself.)

Labels: acupuncture, bouquet, cat, college, confidence, doctor, gardening, health, heat, lonely, only child, PE class, people, piano, temperature

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