Illusion of Words

Fall Break

Fall Break is here. And nearly over, actually. At any rate, fall break is supposed to be a break, a chance to catch your breath in the middle of the hectic semester and try to catch up with things and get some rest. At least, ideally. Not that my semester is too hectic, or that I am in need of a lot of rest.

But suddenly I’m eating much better food than the usual fare. Which is always good. A free burger at TGI Friday was nice, so was IHOP. Free burger worth nearly $9. Well, sometimes, if you know where to keep your eye on, good deals pop out. Of course, good deals doesn’t necessarily mean buying - if you know what I mean, that sometimes, we buy too much stuff that are ‘on sale’ and ‘good deals’, thinking we are saving money, when in fact, we actually waste more money with a bunch of needless junk.

A trip to Memphis involved eating pho, going to an art museum. Actually, wandering around outside, being unwilling to pay the price of entrance. After all, we had barely an hour for the museum, because of course I had to go to Guitar Center. The benefits of being in a city bigger than this little town I’m in - and well, of course Memphis is the famous blues town and all, with the Gibson factory and Graceland and zoo with pandas and stuff. None of which I’ve visited, actually. When you’re in a party of people, not everyone wants to go to the same place. Alright, back to Memphis - the Guitar Center visit only lasted less than half hour, since the original extra one hour that we could have had was taken up languishing in the traffic. The traffic!

At least though I had enough time just to strum a few acoustic guitars, including those way-over-1000 Martins and Taylors. By the way, it is somewhat obnoxious that outside the acoustic room, some people are shredding on the electric guitars and some are banging on the drums and others are playing some real fancy stuff on the keyboards. Way to make me feel lame - I don’t think I can actually play a full non-acoustic song yet (as in, all the solo parts of a particular song), because I start on one song and desert it halfway through for a long long break of playing random stuff before starting on a different song. Well, in the very least, I managed to finish the Little Wing intro.

Well, if you’re interested, some activities over the break included:

Marshmallows roasting over candle fire…

The art museum, which actually isn’t too shabby, really. Okay, so I didn’t see the exhibitions, but there was this masterpiece special exhibition, which isn’t too bad. The day was a little cold for fall though, cloudy skies and all.

Yay for a long post.

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Fishing and LifeChangers

No, the two things mentioned in the title have nothing to do with each other. At any rate, I’m just lumping two events into one post.

First, fishing. Was the first time ever. Went to a trout farm, with two other adults, stood there with a long bamboo pole with the string/wire at the end of it. One of my companions was also a first timer, but it seemed that it was her lucky day, and the fish came in frequently - even a giant 4.3 lb trout that had people admiring it in our bucket.

As for me. I think I caught only one. But it was fun, sitting there, staring at the red and white thing bobbing on the surface of the water.

The Big Fish

Lifechangers
Went to ‘visit’ them along with two other new acquaintances (literally). Lifechangers is a week-long program, where kids from middle/high school help out in the community. Mostly, their schedule is morning, work (e.g. pick up trash, tear down houses), afternoon backyard Bible study for neighborhood kids, and night worship. They all stayed in a big gym, girls and guys separated into the two ends shielded by tall black curtains. I went with them on their bible study trip, and we walked around a bit trying to ’round up’ kids, but didn’t see anyone. At any rate, kids started coming in after a while. They had a little fun, and I saw some sharing the gospel, which was good.

As it turned out, they had something called the ‘5 questions’, which they are taught to ask people as a way to share the gospel. I didn’t realize that until the short testimony session at night. After which, a pastor came up and preached on removing idols in our lives, and opened the altar to the people. To which many kids responded.

All in all, I truly felt that it was a lifechanging matter, not just for the neighborhood kids who accepted Christ, but for the participants, some of whom may rededicate their lives and become ‘new’.

Story time.

They stayed in a school.

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New York City

I’ve always wanted to go to NYC. What a bustling city, full of life, full of energy. One of those ‘never sleep’ cities. Anyway, I got the chance to go there for 3 days. Of course, that wasn’t including the 10 hour car ride to get there. And back.

Before I go into the stuff that I saw, let me just say that it was quite ironic considering that the place where I stayed (Brooklyn Chinatown) had no internet. Ugh. This is almost like the very heart of civilization, and no internet? My definition of civilization would be clean place to stay and clean bathroom, modern things, and most importantly, internet. During the couple of days there, without access to the world, I might as well have been living in a jungle (concrete jungle?).

Anyway, the place where we stayed was at the sixth floor and overlooked Brooklyn and even the Statue of Liberty could be seen at the distance.

First day practically rained all day. So we jumped into the subway, emerged at Times Square, tried to stare up but was distracted by all the umbrellas and trying not to step into puddles. Went underground again quickly, and emerged near Central Park. Where we then walked briskly to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Apparently the others wanted to go shopping, so one decided to go with me into the museum.

It was rainy, as you can see everyone trying to hide around.

That was pretty much the day. I spent nearly the entire day walking around the museum, and still haven’t seen all of it. In fact, even the stuff that I saw were mostly just walking by as fast as possible. It’s that big. My feet ached at the end.

Second day the rain let up. Finally! Now we can do more walking! Subways, then more walking. Down to Wall Street, visited the Trinity Church, went to see the World Trade Center site, which is basically just construction - looks like we came at the wrong time. Just in between times when there were some things to be seen.

The inside of the church. Majestic thing, only dated from late 1600s, which is considered new when you think about the truly ancient Gothic/Romanesque cathedrals in Europe.

Because we didn’t want to spend money to go to Ellis Island (where the Statue of Liberty is), we boarded the free ferry bound for Staten Island which will pass the statue.

The Manhattan skyline from the ferry. It’s a cloudy day, sadly. Not so good for nice pictures.

See. It’s so small even though we’re passing it. Sigh.

Went to Times Square again. This time was more like it. A sea of people. I don’t understand the hype of it anyhow. Just a bunch of screens on the buildings.

Chinatown is pretty remarkable. You wouldn’t know you were in USA. Everywhere people speaking Mandarin or dialects, with quite authentic food - first time I ate Foochow food in a year. Although the Foochows were mostly ‘real’ ones, not from Sibu (obviously), so the food was a little different.

That’s about it. Saw Carnegie Hall, visited Central Park a bit - at least just walked maybe a hundred feet into it and back out again. Walked around Chinatown (sigh, horrible place to live). Visited Long Island (the folks I were with were visiting a church), and I got “lost” in the church - at least I was separated from the party for quite a bit. Quite hilarious. Of all places to get ‘dumped’ by the group.

New York City is an awesome place to visit. I like the subways, the sight of all the yellow taxis jamming the roads, the roadside hotdogs - it’s much like the stuff you see on TV. Which I guess, makes it awesome. Not a very pleasant place to live, however, especially if you’re going to live in Chinatown, which is going to be plain horrible. Chicago is a nicer place to live overall, imo, but for excitement and fun and just the rush of city life, it can’t beat NYC.

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Chicago again

So finally I got to go downtown again, this time to the ‘Museum Campus’, which is basically the bunch of museums overlooking the lake. Only the aquarium was giving free admission tickets, so I only went there. The other museums were practically empty outside. The aquarium was a bore, and hot, with so many people crammed inside that I could hardly see anything around the more popular exhibits. There weren’t many interesting fish though, a couple of eels, spider crabs, giant catfish, river otters… no sharks, jellyfish and that sort of cool stuff.

Anyway, I was about to head off to Navy Pier, when the bus passed by a banner with “Chicago Blues Festival” written on it. Nearly everybody got off the bus, and then, I realized that it was once a lifetime chance. Navy Pier will always be there, but not a Chicago Blues Festival! So off I went, along with my companion.

Turns out it was a right decision. There were so many people, again, which explained the traffic jam. A few stages were rigged and people were performing the blues. And there were a bunch of booths, much like a carnival of some sort. And at the end of one line there was a Gibson guitar booth where they displayed a bunch of Gibsons and let people try on Line 6 Pods. I didn’t get a chance, however, since all the spots were taken.

The main attraction was a huge stage so far away that I could barely see, and a huge crowd obviously prepared with their chairs and food and drinks. I stood for a while at the sidewalk, one side of my face directly in the sunlight, while some people danced and others sat leisurely around me.

The huge stage

The huge screen in front of the huge stage

The more expensive custom shop stuff.

The cheaper, for people to play stuff. Still, my first ever time touching and holding a Les Paul.

Two words (actually, 3): People and Heat. In the aquarium, of course, the brighter part with the Amazon exhibits.

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Chicago

Finally I went into the city. Was a gloomy cloudy day, raining periodically, which is probably not the best weather to go to the parks.

Skyline from some bridge over railway. Not sure where exactly, but it’s close to Grant Park. I think.

The steel bean thingy at Millennium Park. See if you can spot me.

The famous spitting water thing - Crown Fountain.

The Jay Pritzer Pavilion. They were having a gospel music festival that day, but of course the main events were at night, which we couldn’t go. Unless I insisted, of course, but I didn’t insist, so we just went home. Gospel music is fun - the lively choir, the overboard solo vocalist…

Buckingham Fountain at Grant Park, which we didn’t really go, because it was just the ’same lake as the park near Northwestern Uni.’ Okay…

Welcome to Chinatown! Not a particularly pleasant place, as in dirty. Went mostly to buy egg tarts and go to toilet, because after the second Starbucks of my life (vanilla latte), I was bursting.

Chicago is a pretty nice place. The subways are pretty lousy, however. The trains just not very nice. That is, when compared to Hong Kong, because HK is pretty much the only big city I’ve been to a couple of times. Haven’t seen enough of Chicago though. Haven’t tried the pizza. Haven’t seen Navy Pier and other famous places. So hopefully some time soon, even if the 1-hour train ride into the city is painful. Meanwhile, I’ll play Sims 3. Or maybe the PS2 that was picked up at the dumpster, working perfectly well. You won’t believe the stuff that can be found in the trash - like new things that Americans throw away wastefully.

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Summer

So I’m spending summer in the north. At least, it’s not as hot as it would have normally been, since sometimes these days we’ve had to wear jackets outside. Was at Michigan for a week, where I basically spent all my time indoors in front of the computer. Then went to Chicago, supposedly. I actually haven’t been inside the city proper, besides the initial arrival at Union Station. Too cold, too lazy, and the rest of the same old excuses. But of course, some time I’ll have to go, perhaps during the weekend.

Distant view of Chicago from the bus.

Distant view (maybe not so distant) of Northwestern University’s campus. From the park around it. Not exactly sure where I am.

Rocks at the park, where you can paint your own rock. I think it’s overlooking Lake Michigan if I’m not mistaken.

After almost a year, I finally had a chance to drink a Starbucks coffee. Yes, I never tried it because 1. I’m too frugal. and 2. I don’t drink coffee. But since my hosts have a gift card, why not? I got a caramel frappuccino.

Oh btw, can you tell which pictures were taken with a proper camera and which were with a crappy 1.3 megapixel camera phone? Sadly, I can’t, not when the pictures are so teeny (but of course, I know which is which. I just can’t tell if they weren’t my pictures).

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Heading for Summer

For students here, summer means one thing: holidays. A whole year of studies is over. I’m no longer a freshman! It’s weird. The whole process, however, is extremely exhausting. Who knew packing was so hard? Tons of boxes, and having to depend on kind people to store the stuff. The box sitting in the middle of the living room is formidable. It’s a tv box, the type that a child could use as a house in an imaginary game. Or the perfect box for Spongebob Squarepants, in that episode where he and Patrick play pretend. Yes, I actually remember such an episode. Truth is, it’s not just a time or two when wanting to watch a show that I hardly ever watch, the tv broadcasts the exact same episode that I had watched before. Of the tons of episodes, what are the chances of the same episode showing? Bah. Well, I digress.

So back to packing. Why do I have so much stuff? I should have got rid of my textbooks, but it’s too late for that. The luggage is piling high.. but I’m fairly confident that I could crush the clothes enough to zip it shut. There’s the printer, and the guitar amp. I was going to sell that, but well, this is a remote place, and an advertisement on Craigslist doesn’t get many hits. So now I’m stuck with one more thing for people to store. And I wish I could bring my guitar along, but I’m not about to risk it in a gig bag, on a plane which might be too full. And not to mention quite a bit of traveling in the next couple of months. Not quite worth the extra worry.

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Spring Break

It’s the difference during the one-week holidays. Back home, you just sat home. There wasn’t much you could do, unless you went to the same old places, or went eating more. Or something like that. But this place is huge. No one stays around the school during spring break, it’s time to see new things. Go to new places. There are so many places to go, just within a few hours of driving.

So I went with a couple of friends to Knoxville, Georgia, and Florida. Had a blast - kind of - camping on the beach. It was terribly windy and the tent was close to collapsing, which was quite scary in the night when above you the canvas is flapping fiercely.

The tent.

The beach, which was not exactly pretty. Granted, it’s just part of a national park, so it isn’t a real beach place… kind of…

In some restaurant in downtown Disney marketplace, in Orlando - the great land of Disney and all those expensive theme parks stuff. We just went to the place where you didn’t need to pay entrance fee. Maybe some day I’ll enter into the real Disneyland/ Universal Studios.

An Oreo Glacier, from custard, which is basically the fatty version of ice-cream. It’s delicious personified.

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