Did you know that Kent State is one of two places in the United States that has black squirrels? Throws me off everytime I see one, it's like this place is infested with furry kittens or rats or something. Someone thought it was funny to import them from Canada or some such, it's ridiculous.

So I'm now at Kent State University. It's in Kent, Ohio, about 30 minutes away from Cleveland, 15 minutes away from Akron. Aaaaand I gotta say that this campus is nice. Lots of hills, grass, trees, you know. Ohio State was huge, but as far as nature went, we pretty much only had the South and Main Ovals. But anyway, I moved up here last Monday and classes started last Tuesday. I'm taking all Intro classes: American Politics, Sociology, Art History and Shakespeare, and then I am all done with non-major classes, forever! Unfortunately I have so few credits left to take and too many years left to take them, so I'm really going to be pushing to stay full-time. My classes are all pretty simple, just lectures and quizzes, my professors are all great, and I only have classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Yea, this semester (no longer quarters) is gonna be a breeeeze.

My roommate is great, her name's Jackie. And somehow she talked me into joining the lacrosse team, so yea I'll be doing that for a little while I think. Not doing too great with the whole finding a job thing, but I'm working on it. Anyway, Jackie is also a third-year, is supersupersuper involved with stuff (mainly lacrosse and teaching kids since she's an education major), and has a bazillion friends at this school, so I lucked out on that. Don't think she'll ever replace Ashley as a roommate, but she'll do :) Ashley and Amy also go here, so I've been chilling with them a lot. Ooo, and they have cars, so they take me places, heh. This town is pretty small, you pretty much need a car or else you feel really boxed in.

my side of the room, you can see my little cubby hole in the back.

my own private space! but those aren't my dangly lights...

Speaking of Amy, we're going to AMSTERDAM for spring break! How random is that. I think it started out as San Francisco, and then Tokyo, and then London, and then Europe in general, and Amsterdam ended up being the cheapest. So Amsterdam it is! And no we won't be spending all our time smoking in the coffee shops, I'm sure there's much much more to do than get high and go to the red light district. But did you know they have a thing called "The Heineken Experience?" I will definitely be checking that out :) I am stooooked, I can't wait until we actually have the plane tickets in our hands! Woohoooooo Amsterdam!

Other than that, no new news. Well I suppose that was a lot of new news anyway. My mom is in Taiwan until March, and I miss talking to her already. Plus to reach her at my grandmother's house I have to dial at least 20 numbers just to get to Taiwan, and then there's the fear of my grandmother picking up, and we don't exactly speak the same language.

Grandmother: Wei?? Wei???
Me: (In Mandarin) Ah-ma! It's Joanna! Hello?
Grandmother: (In rapid fire Taiwanese) Joanna? Who?
Me: (In Mandarin) It's Joanna! JOANNA!! Can I talk to my mother?
Grandmother: (In Taiwanese) Who? Who is this? Hello?

Yea, that's exactly how it would go. How do I know this? Because that's the extent of all the conversations I've ever had with my grandmother. :sigh: I envy all of you who have close relationships, hell any relationships, with your grandparents. I love my grandmother, it'd just be nice to, you know, exchange a few sentences with her once in a while. ....Or ever.

Recently I developed this strange tick with my neck. I had it for a little while in middle school, and I'm pretty sure it was related to the whiplash I got when my mom and I were in a car accident. And since I was just in another accident, this tick is probably a result of that. I really hope that it goes away soon, I look ridiculous when I have it and I'm pretty sure I'm ruining my neck and esophagus. Don't worry about me yet though, I'll have more details about this after I get it checked out today.

I rented Ratchet and Clank, it's SUCH a fun game I can't stop playing. I'll have to work on getting the second and third games too. Ashley C. also started playing Kingdom Hearts, so I'm sort of reliving that game through her, haha. Well that's about it for now, I just skipped my Sociology class and am off to Art History. Bye!

Posted by Joanna at 11:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Alright, I have a new goal. Aside from trying to be punctual from now on (which I've already failed but that doens't mean I'm going to give up!), I'm going to save up money to buy myself a car. Probably not a new car, considering my current money in the bank and my track record with car accidents, but hopefully a sooomewhat new car that's manual, 4WD, and has a tape deck (for Pete the iPod)! Then I will be content. I'm going to try to buy one by this summer because I think once school is out and I have a month or so between spring and summer sememster, I'm really going to need a car to save my sanity. But yea, I'm going to start car shopping now! :)

Also, I'm going to quit trash talking people. I've noticed that I don't actually do this quite often (well I don't know, you all would know better since usually when people gossip they don't realize it, so maybe I gossip a whole lot I don't know) but what gossiping I do do I'd like to cut down on. Why? Because I find that when people tell me something negative about someone else, that's what's going to stick in my head when I think of that person. Negativity is stronger than positivity. I might think nothing of someone, but the moment someone points something out I'll be on the lookout for it, and I don't want to just expect bad things from someone. Of course who am I kidding, I love talking about people who I haven't seen in a while and how they've changed and what they're doing, but I think if I cut down on the negative comments about people, I should be ok.

Hm, maybe I should save up money to buy a laptop first. This one's about to die, and at least I wouldn't have to pay insurance and a monthly fee for it...

I leave for Kent tomorrow morning! Good-bye Louisville! Man, is it bad that I already have a list of video games lined up for me to play this semester? Yeesh I'm a nerd.

Posted by Joanna at 6:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Time Magazine has a really interesting article this week about Asian-American kids with parents who immigrated to the states. The article didn't say anything that I didn't already know: Growing up, we often felt different, isolated, embarrassed about our heritage, and it's taken years to fit in. I've always prided myself on the fact that I knew early on that I shouldn't abandon my Chinese roots. Or so I thought. After reading the stories of the people interviewed for the article, I thought, have I really embraced my heritage? All of the people said that they felt a sense of community once they went to college and found others in the same situation. They joined ethnic clubs and made friends with other Asian-Americans. However, I've been in college for three years now, and I haven't made one close Asian friend. All of my friends are still mostly white, and I'm even dating a white guy. Am I just in denial?

Everyone always compliments me on my Mandarin fluency, and it's usually followed with sad stories of immigrant children who refused to speak their native language once they came to America and eventually forgot how to speak it. It was no easy task for me; my parents said that one day I just came back from school and spoke in English. They played this game with me where they pretended they couldn't understand anything that came out of my mouth unless it was in Mandarin, and eventually I grew so frustrated that I just gave in. After that, I've always spoken Mandarin with my parents, but over the years it's become more Chinglish than Chinese, which makes me a little sad. But I'm trying.

Anyway, so I have the language down, and I've attempted to learn how to read and write Chinese. But after reading the article, I noticed that I haven't bothered to make any Asian friends, and now I'm trying to think why. One person said, "We all grew up feeling the tension between trying to be Asian and trying to be American." Maybe I still feel this tension, or maybe I've become so American that I've lost all hope of bonding with other Asian Americans. When I went to a meeting for OSU's Asian American Association, I saw a group of people who looked and acted just like me; we ate Chinese food and joked around in English. But I think that's what repelled me from ever going to another meeting. I didn't want to see Asian people speaking in English, because for some reason it felt wrong. I know I'm Asian and that I speak English, but I never actually see myself; all I see are my white friends speaking English and acting American. Of course, this makes no sense at all - how come I don't feel uncomfortable when my gazillion Indian friends speak English? Also, when I met these people, I thought of all the Asian American stereotypes, how we're all obsessed with cutesy material things and with image and fashion. I'm exactly the same way, and yet I was judging people as if I wasn't one of them.

This is why I think I'm an Asian American in denial; I am unwilling to accept other Asians who are exactly like me. Yet we have the most in common: our crazy parents, getting used to two customs, growing up in a white community... This is, of course, the result of me growing up in a white community with white friends, and it's sad. When I went to OSU I had a great opportunity to meet many Asian Americans; all I had to do was walk around the engineering buildings (yet another stereotype) to run into a horde of strangely dressed people talking furiously in Chinese. I've always been quick to point out that I'm the Asian girl, the odd one out in the group, and one could see that as a sense of pride in my heritage. And I am proud. But now I see that I am also the first to judge people by their race. I am ashamed.

Posted by Joanna at 10:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

If you haven't already played Super Monkey Ball, you need to get on it. It's such a fun puzzle game, the music is awesome (!!!) and it has a lot of replay value. And of course, I like games with pretty bright colors. Because I'm a girl, and I play girl video games. Yay Katamari!

I'm done with Gap. They didn't schedule me this week because I didn't turn in my new hours of availability, even though no one told me to do so. It's fine, I'm sick of Gap, but now everyone's back in school (or in various exotic countries) and I still have an entire week where I'm essentially on house arrest because I don't have a car. I won't even have Gap to kill time with. Boo! Oh well, I realize that working at Gap hurt me a lot more than it helped. I'm...haha...actually in Gapcard debt. Well not really, I have enough to pay it off, but that leaves me with, oh, maybe $30? Thirty dollars... to buy books with. Great Joanna, just great. I calculated that I made about $2000 from Gap, and I have thirty dollars to show for me. Where did all that money go? Right back to Gap. Tricksters, they are! How shameful.

I also realize that retail isn't the best job if you want stability... the holiday season was great because I had about 30-35 hours a week, but ever since January hit, I've been scheduled 10...5...so I need to find a job that's steady throughout the year, like the wonderful desk jobs I had at OSU... siiiigh. I'm poor, and scared of Kent. Not good. Oh yes, did I mention that I only have classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 9-3? Either that will be very enticing for job opportunities, or I'm going to have nothing to do for a semester, and no car to get away from it.

My new year's resolutions: to be punctual, and to manage time well. That's it, should be simple enough. I'm still on the 20 lbs while I'm 20 diet, so far I'm up to 8 pounds. Only 12 left, wish me luck! And that's it, have a nice day. I'm mad the weather decided to be all wintery all of a sudden...

Posted by Joanna at 1:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I like this new template and everything, but now I have to come up with titles for each entry, and that's just way too taxing. I don't know what I'm going to write about until I'm done! I guess I can write in the title at the end. Aaaanyway.

I've gotten so used to my website being down that I don't really have motivation to update anymore, but alas I will forge on. Last time I left you guys, I was still back in Columbus, nearing finals week and working crazy hours at Gap. Now I've finished OSU, left my roommates and good friends (sniff) and am back in Louisville, still working at Gap. Oh, and since I'm switching from quarters to semesters, this winter break ends up being 5 weeks long, which is pretty sweet. I've spent it pretty well too, lots of time with my friends and not just Ben, which is a change. I haven't been working too hard either, this week I was only scheduled 5 hours but I managed to grab 12 more. But the Summit Gap is so much nicer! The lights in the store aren't ungodly bright, and there's a little lounge area with a La-z-boy and tv for employees. I guess the only person who'd appreciate all this is Ashley (Texas), but anyway. And thank goodness, I'm still right next door to a Qdoba, haha! Unfortunately I've spent all my paychecks on Gap clothes and burritoes, I need to stop.

So this winter break has been crazy eventful compared to previous times spent in Louisville. Emily Clausen threw a shindig in her really nice, furnished house. Lots of random people from high school, but that was to be expected. You know, I could really care less about some Manualites, but it's refreshing to see them once in a while and have that little shock of them being back in your life for a few hours. Though with facebook, it feels like you're never really out of the loop I guess. Ladida. What else? I've seen Narnia twice, King Kong which I thoroughly enjoyed even though I could actually FEEL the three hours passing by, rented March of the Penguins (most depressing movie ever), went to Gabriel's 14th birthday party yay!, went bowling, got invited to have dinner with Ben's grandparents in Bowling Green and then with his dad at Ferd Grisanti's (mmm mmm), New Years at Emma's, and then Diya's 21st at Melting Pot, crazy fun times. Lots of alcohol this time in the 'ville, which always freaked me out in the past. But now everyone's 21, can't really avoid it I suppose.

Mmm oh yes, and I got a new digital camera! It's a Nikon Coolpix 8700, and just comparing pictures from my little Sony to the Nikon's... it's damn good. Of course all I've taken are party pictures, or as Marc says "Friday Night Photography" (which I want to turn into a website...) but the quality! The sharpness! The colors! I'm very happy. My mom also got me the entire Calvin and Hobbes Collection, and even though it's too nice to actually touch, I've been slowly reading through book 1. Aaah, Calvin and Hobbes were such a great part of my childhood, I honestly think it's one of the most intelligent and successful comics ever written.

I also received Nintendogs and Animal Crossing from Eric and Jason, and Harry Potter 1-5 from Ashley... that should guarantee me no social life once I get back to Kent. Thanks guys, just thanks. :) I've been kind of nervous about Kent, I have to start over once again, make friends over once again, and :uuuugh: I have to explain why I'm transferring once again. I know it's a legitimate question, I understand everyone wants to know why, but my god if I have to explain one more time why I'm transferring... I'm trying to figure out a way to sum it up in 5 words or less but it's just not working. Maybe I'll just print out a pamplet about it that everyone can read, along with other important events in my life that people might have missed out on, like my car crash, or Greece. It'll be "What's Joanna Been Up To? First Edition", and then they can make a trivial pursuit game out of it. Ok, I'm done with this idea.

But anyway, the making friends part. I think I'm going to have a roommate in Kent, even though I requested a single, but now I'm grateful that I'll have company. I sort of envisioned myself at Ashley and Amy's every waking hour, but it's not really practical, and I can't rely on their friendship to get me through Kent. Plus, Amy's leaving after this semester, and I'm pretty sure Ashley is graduating a year or two ahead of me. Thinkin' ahead, I am. :feels smart: And I don't want Ashley to be sick of me before we even move in together, heh.

Man, there's a lot to catch up on after a website's been down for 31 days. I feel as if I've lost all my readers by now anyway, I'll have to start re-advertising. I'm also trying to come up with a catchy website name, John's going to kill thespork.com, and if he's not going to be associated with thespork, then I don't want to be associated with thespork! I was thinking www.allrice.com, but that was taken, then www.fantong.com (which means rice bucket, my childhood nickname) but that was taken... so if anyone has any ideas, let me know. And no, it doesn't have to be asian, I also tried www.joannabanana.com but that was taken TOO. But I'm sure everyone's tired of reading about what's been going on in my life, and I'm pretty tired about writing it, so I'm going to find some food. Everyone likes pictures, so click here to see pictures I've taken over the break. And comment and let me know that you made it this far! :)

Posted by Joanna at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Happy New Year everybody! I hope 2005 treated everyone well. Well I'm really excited that this website is finally back up and running, with a whole new publishing system and server and look and everything! This is just the default layout, but I really like it so I might just fiddle with the color schemes or something. But yes, John moved our sites to a new host, so hopefully this means that THIS SITE WILL NEVER BE DOWN AGAIN! Yaaaaaaay!

Well seeing as my website has been down for 31 days, I have a lot to catch up on. But fortunately, the holiday festivities haven't ended for me yet, so I will have to update at a later time. So until then, I hope everyone had a great holiday season!

Posted by Joanna at 5:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)