Month: October 2015

Libbey Park Volunteer

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Photo Credit: http://www.conejovalleyguide.com/dosomethingblog/libbey-bowl-and-libbey-park-in-ojai.html

I went to the Libbey Park construction site in Ojai, CA, as a volunteer today.

From Ojai Valley School there were only five female volunteers, including myself.

Wearing dark green OVS T-shirts, the volunteers checked in and drank Gatorade, having no idea what to do.

Ally Su, one of the five girls, expected the volunteer work to be taking care of little kids.

However, what was waiting for her were a huge pile of mulch, shovels, and wheelbarrows.

Photo Credit: http://www.centralwisconsinhabitat.org/Thrivent%20Builds.htm

At first, we had fun.

Mr. Alvarez, our peacekeeper, came to us after parking the school van and took pictures of us shoveling, and we would make stupid poses and faces.

However, as the photographer left and we continued the work, it became more and more painful.

“I think we are going to get blisters on our hands,” Said Ally. Thirty minutes from then, I could see an already-popped blister on my palm.

After repeating filling and emptying the wheelbarrows for about an hour, we became all exhausted. Our faces had layers of dirt on them, and our hands had turned red.

We found ourselves the only ones working without gloves. We’ve been complaining about it the whole time, and I found out that we were actually the only ones who did not know that we could get them from the tool check-in center behind us.

We had pizza with lemonade for lunch, wanting to go back home. However, there came a truck with another pile of mulch. Sighing, we got back to work.

The teenage girls had become shoveling experts at some point. We shoveled so fast that we had to wait for other workers to make more space to pour the mulch.

“Stephanie [Shin] found her future job,” Said Ally Su.

After half an hour of eating and two hours of shoveling, we headed back home.

First, we drove to Ally’s house only to find it locked.

Then, we went to Starbucks and met another school van with Mrs. Cooper in it.

After we got our drinks, Mr. Alvarez dropped Ally off at her house, “shh-ing” when she tried to tell him the directions.

As soon as I got back on campus, I took a shower and found two things: dirty water coming off of my body and another blister on my thumb.

Part 1

whynotstayin

It was not long after the nuclear wipe out took place, a monumental event known as The Great Purge. All that was left were just scraps of the human race, the vagabonds, the cowards, the rats from the very darkest corners of grime.

How ironic, only the people too afraid to live were the last one’s left on the earth. The meek shall inherit the earth – it was foretold eons ago, well it seems that prophecy had finally come to pass, and the world had gone to spiraling out of control for it.

In the days before Act III of Humanity came to pass, the people left to breathe in the ashes of their loved ones sank to their knees.

Religion had long since faded from the lips of those whose God was so seemingly absent; it had turned into a simple words used to describe The Great Purge. But even so, with lungs clouded with ash, the people looked to hazy orange skies, with blood-shot eyes and veins bulging painfully from beneath sickly and wan skin.

They looked up at the unmerciful smog and smoke-filled sky as oil slicked tears fell from shattered souls, the meek prayed for the absent, so-called, messiah.

Photo Credit: http://livioramondelli.deviantart.com/

The last of humankind had gathered in small groups of tired and hopeless people, scattered throughout the world; but, the only ones that matter were gathered in the center of what had once been called the city of the future.

It was on that day, one day till night officially fell, that a scruffy teenager barely sixteen dragged himself through the streets of the burnt city.

He had the eyes of days past; clear and pale green; offsetting, in a face caked with death and heartache; hopeful and optimistic, set into the face of someone forced to grow up to quickly.

He had the tooth of a long starved animal buried in his abdomen and he was quickly running out of blood to spare.

The surviving meek where huddled at the very tip of the city near the, now poison, ocean; as the boy stumbled down the road toward them, his eyes met with the eyes of a girl standing at the front of all the survivors.

The girl stared at the boy who was slowly making his way toward her. She was short with even shorter hair, it was cut into a choppy bob that fell midway down her neck. She was distinctly Asian in heritage, Singapore, this city had once been Singapore.

She was pale, powdery, with dark jet black hair and they eyes of a bird of prey. Her eyes though, that is what truly set her apart from the rest of the meek.

They were tawny and gold like a lion, rimmed in a thick layer of dark lashes. Although warm in color, her eyes had the cold, impersonal, precision of a microscope, they were like ice and fire in one person.

She did not strike one, outright as meek, but what had grouped her in with the cowards and vagrants was not that she was cowardly, but she had never tried to live.

Time Limit

hubbabubba98

When you really stop and think about it there is a time limit on everything. Homework assignments, projects, childhood, innocence, love, and even life. Most people don’t stop and think about having a limit on things that seem so long-term until they are forced to.

My godfather Leon was diagnosed with squamous cell cancer back in 2010. When I first heard he was sick I was shocked and over come with a million different emotions. I never thought that someone so kind-hearted and eternally generous would be punished with such a terrible curse.

Photo Credit: http://www.c2.staticflickr.com

I was in a state of denial when my parents told me he was sick. The first time I saw him after he had started treatment was heart breaking. He was so thin, so tired and so weak.

Eventually the cancer spread and he had to get surgery. The surgery that he had been on his thyroid.

All of the memories I had with him, Leon always had a beard. The first time I ever saw him without one was after his surgery. In place of his beard was a scar reaching from the left side of his throat to the right side. While that surgery scarred Leon on the outside, it seemed as if his personality and courage  weren’t scarred at all.

After undergoing numerous rounds of radiation and chemo and going to doctors appointments after doctors appointments we had to accept that there is no cure.

Most people would just give up after this, saying that they have nothing else to live for, but not Leon. Throughout this terrible experience he has been the so optimistic. I have never heard him complain about his time limit.

If I could sum my godfather, Leon Azis, up into one word it would be: inspiration. To see someone who is so close to your heart go through that and not give up hope and to be so strong is unbelievably inspiring and amazing.

All I can do now is cherish the time that I have left with him and not focus on the limited amount of time, and just appreciate the time I’ve been lucky enough to have with him.

The issue with trust

stayhappy123

‘Just trust me,’ a phrase often used in our language, but not so often meant.

Our brains work by emotion, wired for compassion, understanding, and trust. It calms us, soothes us, and controls us. Learn more here.

So let’s start at the beginning. You are a small child, and your parent promises you ice cream. You have been exited all day, but when you finally get home, they say they are too busy for something so silly as ice cream.

You are already beginning a pattern of distrust. And you get older, friends, family, strangers, everyone you know throws around this idea of a promise as a way to calm, a short-term fix for a long-term problem.

We are often told not to make promises we can’t keep, good advice, yet seemingly impossible in our community today.

“Do you promise?’ ‘Swear on your life?’ ‘Pinky Swear?’ (Which, by the way, used to mean that if the promise was broken, he who was at fault would promptly have their pinky removed.)

Well, you say, how can we fix this? The answer is not that simple. You see, our use of human emotion as leverage has been evolving for a long time.

So help me, help us.

elev8.hellobeautiful.com
elev8.hellobeautiful.com

What Would You Do?

thebeigegirl

“What Would You Do” – It’s my favorite American TV show.

The show is about exactly what its name states.

It sets up very dramatic situations, involves ordinary people in them, and watches their reactions to the dilemmas given, with the hidden cameras rolling.

It usually deals with serious social issues, and a lot of its episodes have unexpected touching results, in which people step up and take action without hesitation in order to do the right thing.

However, in this particular episode, the result surprised me in a quite different way.

It takes place at a family restaurant in Utah, where African-Americans take up only 0.05% of its population.

In this scenario, a white girl introduces her black boyfriend to her father. Unlike what she expects, the father rejects her boyfriend because of his race.

Photo Credit: http://www.worldstarhiphop.com/videos/video.php?v=wshhXRzRC5V9z2W581wF

As she rushes out of the restaurant with her boyfriend, an old lady sitting next to his table talks to the father. “I am with you,” She says. “I think they should stay with their own.”

A woman behind her, nodding in agreement, is brought to tears.

“I have a daughter,” She tells her story in a shaky voice. “She has a friend that’s black… I told her, “He’s fine to be your friend, you are never going to get involved with him…” They were just friends, but… I worried about that.”

Then, the old lady adds her racist comment: “A pretty girl like her would pick something like that.”

Photo Credit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UuEegi4Ojo

Trying not to get emotional about her cutting comments, dying inside, the actor keeps the conversation going, asking if he is wrong.

“I was very proud of you,” The old lady responds. “Because that’s a shock to anybody.”

When the reporter of the show, John Quiñones, shows up in the restaurant, explains her about the show, and interviews her, the old lady tells us about her strong belief.

“I’m sorry,” She says. “If you are white, you are white. If you are colored, you go with colored people. And keep it in your family. Don’t put it in somebody else’s.”

She ends her comments with another incomprehensible statement: “It’s alright if you are a Mexican person, they are still white people,” She explains. “But black people and white people, no. I’m sorry, it breaks my heart.”

Finally, Quiñones introduces the man who acted a black boyfriend to the old lady. As they shake their hands, the guy asks her for a hug.

To my surprise, as she gives him a hug, she says, “You know, but I just think we should stay with our own, don’t you?”

This Episode shocked me. I thought racism was dead in America.

As an international student in California, I never considered rejecting an interracial couple as an option.

I heard of the word, “colored people,” for the first time in my life when I was studying To Kill a Mockingbird in my English class. Also, I was surprised when I learned that the setting of the story was within less than a hundred years.

Some people might think that racism no longer exists in America. However, for a lot of people, racism is still a big issue in their lives. A big chunk of generations was taught to be racist in its youth.

Now, the real question is, how should we react to this issue?

The episode ends with an interview with the African-American actor.

Quiñones asks, “She even hugged you. How did that feel?”

“Very weird, but I believe in people,” the actor answers. “I wanted her to know that, no matter what she thought, I was still going to shake her hand and I was still going to hug her because that’s how I am.”

Homecoming

happyrose15
Photo Credit: reflector.uindy.edu

This past weekend many schools held their homecoming dances and games.

A time in the year when school show their spirit and during their dances the student body dresses up and post on Instagram how they got asked to this “magical” night, most likely to spark a flame of jealousy into their hundreds of followers.

Photo Credit: twitter.com

At OVS we don’t have homecoming, for a couple of reasons.

First, we don’t have
a football team making those ever so famous homecoming scenes, where the home team pulls through when their star player is injured and the water boy ends up making the game winning touch down – impossible for us to recreate.

Next, we are a school of less than 200 people so it makes little sense to have a dance where only twenty people who really want to be there.

Homecoming is a time when of the student body comes together as a community and shows their dedication to their school, but since OVS is already such a tight-knit community we don’t need a dance or a sports event to bring us together.

 

Gender Bias

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There is a strong double standard in today’s culture.

For a woman, it is considered “improper” to show as little as show her bra strap. Yet, I see multiple men and boys sagging their pants, walking around shirtless, and more.

Most people today, including myself, don’t give it much thought when this happens. It’s normal for a guy to be able to show most of his body, while a woman is reprimanded or judged for showing a strap on their shoulder. 

CBS wrote a very interesting article about the dress codes in work places, and the “dress codes” seem to transition into people’s personal lives too.

There also seems to be an uproar when a woman asserts herself in her career and lays down the law, and she may be called some less than polite words.

I’m not calling anyone out here, or placing blame. But, the expectation for how men present themselves is, in some cases, much lower than the expectation for women.

Gender Inequality

Of course, this double standard goes both ways. Men aren’t expected to be emotional or sensitive, and in some cultures, are judged for it.

Men are also though of as “weak” if he is a stay at home dad, does the laundry, or cooks dinner because it is thought to be a woman’s role.

Why should the public be able to judge two different genders completely differently, on the same subject, and have it be thought of as OK?

Reunited at Last

hubbabubba98

There once was a little Korean girl living in an orphanage and an American soldier who was stationed in South Korea.

This soldier fell in love with this little girl and decided that she was meant to be a part of his family back home.

The little girl excited to start a new life didn’t understand that she would be leaving her home and her three older siblings for a new life.

Photo Credit: https://upload.wikimedia.org/

The little girl returned back to the United States with the solider, ready to meet her new family. She became the fifth member of this new family, leaving her past behind.

She wasn’t necessarily welcomed with open arms to her new family. Her new mother was unsure about the adoption and her new brother and sister also adopted, acted as if she was the only adopted one due to her ethnicity.

As she got older, her childhood memorize faded and she made new ones. Over the years she became incredibly close with her new father. When she was nine he passed away, leaving her alone with her mother and two siblings.

The girl, not so little anymore, grew up into an amazing young woman. She graduated college, danced professionally, got a good job, married and eventually had two daughters of her own.

Photo Credit: http://img4.wikia.nocookie.ne

Years had passed since her second daughter had been born when she received a letter in the mail from Holt Adoption Agency. This letter was from the agency that was responsible for her adoption, saying that her Korean family was looking for her.

A month later she flew to Korea to meet her family.

It is now 2015 and her family is visiting her in America for the second time.

Urban Exploration

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Photo credit to startribune.com

Just the other day I was browsing some dank memes on Reddit.

I got really bored so I went to “reddit.com/r/random/” which directs the user to a random subreddit.

After three attempts I finally stumbled upon a decent-looking subreddit that I had never even heard of: /r/urbanexploration.

I spent the rest of my evening on that subreddit. The subreddit is dedicated to exploring ruins in urban areas. It’s all about people’s findings of abandoned monuments frozen in time.

Spanning from secret basement doorways that lead to a massive tunnel system that were likely used by Al Capone, to old Yugoslavian monuments from the 1960s.

Photo credit to Michael Mehrhoff

The subreddit is mostly crap, but every few posts is an amazing story. The stories are really just a bunch of captioned pictures in the order of their findings.

My favorite was the post titled “Bad Ass Bunker.” The album is a series of 31 pictures with detailed captions.

The person who explored the bunker was visiting his old friend in northern Germany, which was formerly GDR.

They found a massive bunker. Some of it was already explored and had been tagged by teens. But the further and deeper they went, the more they found.

Eventually, the bunker was flooded and they had to turn back.

Photo credit to Johnny Joo

Urban explorers find a thrill in going through these abandoned buildings. Some even travel around the world.

They love it because the building tells a story and they get to be the ones to figure it out. Like what is this place, who was here, why was it abandoned?

Urban explorers are each like a modern-day Indiana Jones. Some of the explorers are photographers that actually take photos of abandoned places for a living.

Photo credit to Daniel Barter

For those who want to get started, the subreddit is a great place to get advice and learn of new locations.

Keep in mind, in most cases breaking into abandoned places is trespassing, and a lot of people on the subreddit have been arrested.

But there are websites that can be found on the subreddit that help avoid this issue.

Have you tried it?

thericemuncherLeave a comment

Some people believe that horseback riding is easy, that all you do is sit on the horse and it works for you.

Let me tell you from experience that horseback riding is not an easy thing to do.

Now, before I continue on why horseback riding is so difficult – let me explain my interest.

As a junior, I decided to try something different.

So I enrolled in my schools equestrian program; specifically the Western riding program.

Being that there was just one other male in equestrian before I joined – many students thought that it was a more feminine sport.

Now, let me prove that thought wrong.

First of all, riding is based on the idea that a rider, who weighs no more than 300 pounds, is trusting his 1000 plus pounds of pure mass to carry him.

Granted, most riders do trust their horses – accidents happen and riders fall. It’s basically guaranteed in horseback riding.

Photo Credit: “www.dauphinhorsemanship.com”

It also requires skill and patience. According to The Top Tens, horseback riding is definitely one of the hardest sports.

Like most sports, horseback riding can’t just be learned form a video or from books. Where horseback riding differs from other sports is that the rider needs to feel and understand every movement the horse makes underneath him.

If you’re riding Western like I am then the rider has to control his horse with the shift of body weight, leg positioning, and precise touches to the reigns. One wrong move and you can end up on the ground.

Photo Credit: “static1.squarespace.com”

There are so many details to horseback riding, not including all the other styles, that I just can’t get into it in this blog.

Point being, don’t judge a sport by what is looks like, find out for yourself and you might just enjoy it.