Take one step forward with your left foot — a small step suffices. Oh, no flip flops from this point on, please. Feel that delicate texture embracing your foot with such warmth and subtle sounds of acceptance. Another step forward with your right foot, and you experience a marvelous balance. Savour that sensation.
You tilt your head slightly, feel your long hair lifting...
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Summer Experience
Three Places, Three Projects: A Research-Filled Summer
A crew of businessmen and businesswomen all dressed in black and white, confidently prancing their way down the Mid-Level Escalators while their clones emerge from various corners of the street, including the ‘underground’. A sunlit sandy beach, mysterious societies of men who pledge their allegiance to the glorious local gastronomic scene, a surreal land where imagina...
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Halfway Through College! Sophomore Year Reflections and Summer Plans
It’s that time of the year again: Finals, followed by Commencement (goodbye, seniors, I will miss you…) and SUMMER! I have one more final project to work on, so this is a good time to jolt down some quick reflections on the semester and a few words about my summer plans.
This week is atypical of my finals’ weeks at Pomona so far since I don’t have any traditional in-class fi...
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Firsts
Chirps is up and running, and I’m copying my assigned readings for the semester to my master to-do list. In the dorms without air conditioning, we’re running fans and shutting windows. The ensembles are auditioning. People aren’t dropping classes quite yet. Posters for open houses are popping up everywhere. Welcome to the fall semester!
The class of 2019 is settling in, ...
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California Appreciation, via Summer in New York City
I love New York.
I realized this after I returned from visiting a friend in D.C. and was hit by an intense wave of comfort and relief upon stepping off my bus and into the familiar Manhattan streets. This city has managed to worm its way into my heart. I love so many things about it. From the museums to the Brooklyn Bridge to Central Park to the efficient public transpor...
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What Makes a Home? Finding a Piece of Pomona in Cambridge, MA
I felt like Goldilocks in my weeklong exploration of New York City’s wild concrete jungle and Northern Vermont’s wild lush greenery. After returning to cozy Cambridge, Massachusetts, I allowed myself a good stretch and a happy sigh that said, “I just experienced wild on two different extremes, but this is where I feel at home. This middle ground is where I’d like to be.”
The...
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On Leaving China
Last Monday, I woke up at 4 AM and proceeded to spend the next 24 hours traveling via bus, plane, and car, finally arriving in my hometown of Seattle, Washington.
I was not ready to leave to leave China. It felt wrong to suddenly rip myself from the life I'd built for myself in Kunming. I was getting used to life in my apartment, building friendships I cared about, feeli...
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Coming Soon to Theaters: A Paper, a Poster, and My Last Year of College
Here we are in August, and this has probably been one of the fastest summers of my life. I can tell because a lot of things that I’ve been mentally logging as “future” are suddenly up close and personal. August means:
the end of SURP, which in turn means:
a sizable research paper, clumsily starting to take form
a presentation poster, which I know will be rectangul...
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So What Exactly Do I Do Here at Princeton?
When I first stepped onto Princeton's castle-like campus, I was in awe of all the beauty, all of the ivy, and all of the greenery. If you walk down to South campus, you will stumble onto a beautiful river tucked into the woods. If you go up to North campus, you will reach the notoriously affluent Nassau street (not so friendly to my wallet). I am currently living in Bloombe...
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Independence at Pomona, via Summer in Cambridge
Grapefruits are bittersweet, right? After weeks of searching for an analogy to accurately depict my thrilling rollercoaster of a summer, I have settled on a fruit whose mixed taste is representative of my feelings at the moment. It is a bittersweet day leaving Boston.
(Well, Cambridge technically. For two months, I lived and worked across the Charles River from one of New En...
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