Well.. This was supposed to be a follow-up of the Minjok Herald Vision Trip Essay I posted.. But then, I fell asleep after posting that essay.. So.. Yeah..
Oh well.
Our Vision Trip was to the United States, from May 8th to 18th.
Ten days of school trip, that's one long vacation..
But well, I guess it wasn't that much of a vacation either, because aside from two days of tour (one in New York and one in San Francisco), we went to universities and took campus tours and info-sessions..
Ten universities, ten days.
Univ. of Pennsylvania
Swarthmore College
Princeton Univ.
Columbia Univ.
Yale Univ.
Brown Univ.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Harvard Univ.
Stanford Univ.
Univ. of California at Berkeley.
Well I just felt like writing the full names.. lol
But it was still fun.
I don't wanna go on and on about what we did at the Vision Trip and all that stuff here, cuz it's pretty obvious.. xD So I'll just write about whatever I have written down in the notes.
Though, they're probably gonna be all short, in the form of notes, so I'm not sure if I can call them "episodes"..
Anyways.
Ep #1
Broadway (NYC, NY)
Watched Mamma Mia! the musical. With all the ABBA songs. So fun. xD I laughed a lot. And by "a lot" I mean a LOT. I had changed my mind from Phantom of the Opera to this one, and I had no regret. When it ended, my hands were really really really red from applauding so much.
Dancing Queen~ Young and sweet~ Only seventeen~
Dancing Queen~ Feel the beat~ From the tambourine, oh yeah~
You can dance~ You can jive~ Having the night of your life~
Ooh see that girl~ Watch that scene~ Dig in the Dancing Queen~
Ha. So awesome.
Ep #2
Columbia Univ. (NYC, NY)
Meeting the KMLA graduates from Columbia/NYU/Cooper Union. This was probably the graduate-meeting session that I learned the most from. Well, closer to felt than learned, I guess. I thought I was a biochem major, and I still do after the vision trip, but I realized, especially from this session, that there are a whole lot of things I can do in the world. There was this KMLA 11th waver & a Columbia graduate who thought he was a chemistry major throughout his high school life and then changed his major to computer programming all of a sudden. Now he's working at Bloomberg News, writing a program that generates headlines for events around the world in less than one second. Awesome. Oh, and there was this biochem major too, who was doing her Ph.D. at Duke or something, and I somehow felt this aura-ish thing coming from her.. Maybe it was just an imagination.. Well it probably was. But still, I was kinda surprised.. And yeah.
Okay, it's really hard to put these feelings into words. But anyways, I was really touched somehow.. Yeah.
Ep #3
Everywhere
All KMLA graduates in a university had connections to each other.. Hmm how should I put this. It seemed like they were all bound together by the fact that they were KMLA graduates. Which made me think about the phrase "KMLA Family" which we use like every single day here but doesn't really put any meaning into.
Ep #4
 |
| Samsung VLUU i7 (mine's beige) |
Everywhere
When I bought my phone last August, I chose Galaxy Nexus over Galaxy S3. For numerous reasons (which later proved not to be much of a difference, though). One advantage Galaxy S3 has over Galaxy Nexus is that it has a better camera. And on the trip, I was jealous of the guys who had S3's and S4's..
Looking at the numbers:
Galaxy Nexus 5.0 megapixel
Samsung VLUU i7 (my six-year-old digital camera) 7.0 megapixel
Galaxy S3 8.0 megapixel
Galaxy S4 13.0 megapixel
So yeah. Well numbers don't represent everything, but still, having a digital camera that's worse than a typical phone camera doesn't feel all that good. Especially when it's too heavy to carry around.
Ep #5
In one of the hotels. Don't remember where.
Quebeckers. Bleh.
There were these French-speaking people with us in the hotel that day. At first we thought they were French, but then our French teacher (who went to the US with us) told us that they had a Quebec accent, so we figured that they should be from Quebec.
Anyways. They were SO. FRICKIN. LOUD.
I was alone in my room, completely worn out from the schedule that day, and I needed sleep.
So I lay down in my bed, and all of a sudden, there's a loud knock on the door across the corridor. And I hear, "Hey dude, stop being an a**hole and open the door!"
And it got louder and louder. And louder. And louder. AND LOUDER. For five minutes.
In the bed, I was thinking, "okay, wth. whoever's in that room, seriously, just open the door! Let me sleep!"
And it ceased. So I was happy.
For about ten seconds.
Then it started again, lasted for another three minutes, and ceased again.
Then they started talking. Loudly.
I was so frustrated that I marched out of my room.
Four of those people were just sitting in front of my door, talking loudly, laughing, yelling.
And I stared at them. For what, like ten seconds?
And then I went to the lobby, and then came back, and they were gone.
Only then could I sleep.
Actually, no. The knocking and the shouting started again.
I almost yelled, "OKAY WTF PLEASE SHUT UP"
But I didn't. Well there was no reason for me to start a fight or anything..
Then I somehow fell asleep. Maybe the fatigue just took over.
But please, let's be quiet in public places. Especially hotel, where other people might be trying to get some sleep.
Ep #6
Not sure, probably Boston, MA
Eating dinner. At a restaurant. Food.. Dripping oil.. And salty.. Umm.. Yeah.
And it's supposed to be Chinese food.
Ehh.
I MISS CONVOY
AND I MISS PANDA EXPRESS
AT LEAST WE HAD IN-N-OUT ON THE WEST COAST
FOOD ON THE EAST COAST.. OH GOD.
..Yeah.
Well for those who didn't live in San Diego.
 |
| That's what I'm talking about! @Convoy Street, San Diego, CA |
Convoy's the street where Koreatown is located. Like the 32nd Street in NYC. And they have a lot of Korean restaurants, run by Koreans, that serve real Korean food. Well San Diego's a popular city for Koreans going to live in America, so.. yeah. Oh and they have Chinese and Japanese food at Convoy too.
Panda Express is a Chinese food franchise. They have stuff like Beijing Beef and Kung Pao Chicken and stuff. Chow Mein's awesome. Didn't know it was only on the West Coast.
In-N-Out is a hamburger store, only on the West Coast. Just like Shake Shack on the East Coast. Fresh buns, fresh vegetables, and fresh patties. A bit expensive, as I remember, but the burgers were great. And the hidden menus too. Oh my god I miss the animal fries. xD
Ep #7
Probably the Boston restaurant, the one mentioned above in Ep #5
The waitress--probably Chinese--was cleaning up, and she kinda bumped into me. It wasn't anything serious.. Just a small bump. So small that there was no need to even apologize. Well, I guess more of a coming into contact than a bump.
But she looked up and apologized.
You might be thinking 'okay, well there's nothing bad about apologizing..?'
But there was something more to it than an apology.
I could see in her eyes a mix of feelings.
I saw "I'm sorry," and I also saw desperation, sadness, fear, and a bunch of others.
And for three days I couldn't forget the face. It just won't leave my mind.
I.. Could see how hard an immigrant's life is in America, how hard it would be for her to make a living (with that crappy(!) food)..
k, maybe it's a stretch. But I'm sure I saw it in her eyes that day.
Ep #8
San Francisco, CA, on our way from SFO to downtown
Coming to California at last. Well not San Diego, not even southern California, but it's still CALIFORNIA. Seeing the road full of cars with California plates.. With the month sticker on the top left and the year sticker on the top right, with black 0XXX000's engraved on a white background.. Oh. My. God. It was fantastic. I'm finally in CA.
And then I realized that I was on the I-5. The I-5. The I-5 that stretches from the US-Mexico border, through San Diego, all the way to the US-Canada border. (Actually, Exit 1 of the I-5 is located somewhere in the San Diego downtown area. xD) We were around Exit 400 something, but who cares. If we just follow that very road, we're gonna be in San Diego. That felt so awesome. :-)
Ep #9
Tram Station, San Francisco, CA
There was this street musician called Socks at the station. He was good at singing. And then he put on Gangnam Style by Psy. Then it was chaos. LOL. Five of our students started dancing to the song, the horse dance thing, and then like half of our group joined, and everyone around was videotaping us. LOL. We were here as tourists, and all of a sudden we were being recorded on other tourists' cameras. It felt kinda weird. But it was still fun. It would've been more fun if I had joined in the dancing crew, but since I was already on the tram--I was in the first group--at the time they were dancing, that wasn't possible.. But still, LOL.
Ehh, okay, I guess that's it.
No check on grammar, no proofreading of any kind here.
I just thought since these are based on short notes, I might as well just leave them as small thoughts, not some polished pieces of work.
So if you can understand these thoughts, great; if not, well I'm sorry, but I'm not planning to make any changes here.
Conclusion: It was fun going on the Vision Trip. xD
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