Today, I REALLY need to decide which college I'm going to. MUST. Is IMPERATIVE. Cannot leave until I do! And what better place to do it than the blog? I shall now make a pro/con list, which will probably coincide with my recap. These two schools are as different as different can be.

AMHERST
PRO:
-Because of its really small size (1600 total), they give a lot of personal attention. The classes are really small and many of them are discussion-based. There are no graduate students, so the professors are all for the undergrads. They have a writing center, where you can go in and people (whose sole job is to help with papers) help you with your writing.
-REALLY nice dorms
-a LOT of financial aid; going there would make it really easy on my parents
-Open curriculum. No GE. Basically, I can take whatever I want, which I both like and dislike. I like it because, obviously, I am sick of science. But I dislike it because I think that it lets students get away with just doing what they're good at and not pushing themselves to explore new things or challenge themselves with things they know they're not good at. But, I know that I could force myself (or my dad will force me) to not just stay with the humanities and social sciences, but to take sciences and maths, no matter how much I dislike them.
-Most people get into their graduate school of choice
-Their music policy: As long as you take one music class, the college will pay for your music lessons for all four years for your instrument of choice. Holy crap!!!
-They basically throw money at you as long as you have a pretty legitimate reason.
-Obviously, good education.
-They really encourage study abroad and give a lot of money for that.
-I really got the sense from talking to all the students that they really push you to try new things. Most people don't do the majors they originally declared, and they're really open with clubs and organizations.
-Because they have the Five College thing, I could take classes at any of the four other colleges around (with good transportation provided) if Amherst doesn't offer anything, such as international relations.
-It's cold, but it's not as bad as Chicago.
-Semester system, which, no matter what Kathleen and the Chicago kids say, is better than the quarter system in my opinion.

CON:
-Location. It's 1.5 hours away from Boston, which isn't bad, but the immediate area is very, very in the middle of nowhere, especially by Southern California standards. I don't think it'd really matter that much to me, since I'm used to staying at home and doing nothing, and it's really easy for me to have fun without clubbing or actually going somewhere, since all I think you need for fun is good company. And because it's rather isolated, there's always something going on. But I do think that by my senior year, I might get sick of it.
-It seemed a little cliquey. The jocks (even though they're division III) and the singers seemed to be on a higher level. Lots of rich, prep school kids, which is what Amherst really is in the end.
-Not very diverse, at all.
-No minors, which is slightly annoying.
-Only 1600 students. Total. It might feel stifling, though they do have the other four colleges within 10 miles of each other, which means that there are LOADS of other students around.
-Cafeteria food is not so happy.
-A lot of people I talked to said that they feel like the students are really passive, as in they don't really get into war protests or anything like that. They like to discuss and argue, but they don't really put their words into actions.

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
PRO:
-They're nerdy. I am nerdy. They are famous for their intensely academic atmosphere, which I really like. People are happy to sit there and debate Kantian ethics for hours. The professors really make the students work hard, though I don't know anyone from Troy who goes there because I'd really like to know if it's harder than Troy, which I somehow doubt. But yeah, I really liked the intellectual atmosphere.
-The food is better than Amherst's.
-More majors to choose from and they have minors. Bigger school = more options
-The location. Obviously. It's in the South Side of Chicago, which is a rather shady area, but within Hyde Park itself it isn't bad and as long as you're not stupid, it's not that bad. They also have the second largest security force in the world, other than the Vatican. But I mean seriously, it's 20 minutes away from downtown Chicago.. Michigan Avenue. It's so culturally rich and there's so many things always to be explored.
-Because it's in Chicago, there are so many job and internship opportunities. I met a girl who was working for the state attorney of Illinois and another guy who was going to be an associate editor for Penguin Books.
-An EXTREMELY rigid core curriculum, for which they are famous. Fifteen courses, in each of the subjects: humanities, social sciences, math and physical sciences, biological science, language. Though I might begrudge them most deeply, I'm sure after being subjected to them, people really are very well-rounded.
-Very deeply rooted in classical texts. They basically bombard you with Kant and Plato and Locke and all the rest and make you experts, which is really good (but also very difficult.)
-They're not big partiers. Greek life is about 10% and lots of people don't get drunk but still have fun.
-A really good debate team.
-The undergrad population isn't that big: between 4000 and 5000, which is very small for such a big school.
-The campus is absolutely gorgeous... with all that ivy creeping along everywhere.
-The most awesome bookstore ever. :D
-Barack Obama is on staff. :)

CON:
-It is a major research institution, and it is huge. It's got undergrads, grads, PhD students, researchers, two hospitals of its own, museums, etc. Thus, not as much personal attention as Amherst, and though undergrads can take the same classes as grad students, I still think there's probably more emphasis on their grad students.
-They really suck about aid. Grah.
-Dorms and facilities are nowhere near as nice as Amherst's.
-I can always apply here (or somewhere similar) after four years for grad school.
-South Side of Chicago's rather dangerous.
-The campus is HUGE. I felt so lost and confused walking around.
-LOTS OF PEOPLE SMOKE. Yes, petty concern, but it was REALLY ANNOYING walking around unable to breathe.
-Quarter system...

So essentially the question is: small and personal but rural or large and intellectual but not as nice?

This week is insane. I got back from Amherst around 11 PM last night, got up early for school today, and am leaving for Chicago tomorrow morning at 5. Wow.

I was going to post a long recap about Amherst, but I guess it'll have to wait and get mixed up with Chicago. :) But for now, I'll just say that I really really liked it, except for the location.. typical small New England town.. totally different from anything I've ever experienced (which is a good thing as well), but otherwise, it was BEAUTIFUL and BRILLIANT. :) My parents really want me to go there.

See you Saturday!

Filming the Telenovela

I'M BLUE DA BA DEE DA BA DI!

Remember that? Whatever happened to that song? *goes to download* I KNOW YOU KNOW IT! EVERYONE KNOWS THAT SONG!

Anyway, I really should understand physics and math before I take off for almost a whole week of school-absence/ultimate failure at physics and math. Grr. MOTIVATE YOURSELF!

We filmed the first half of our Spanish telenovela (soap opera, for all of you who do not understand the language of Fernando Torres y Xabi Alonso) yesterday. It was actually a lot of fun (most of the time), in between the shrieking catfight scenes and the "MATTHEW SHOW EMOTION" moments. I felt like a total mommy again as I traversed the Fullerton landscape, picking up Yogin and then Sarah in my soccer mom van and then answering Matthew's phone call, "Uhh.. are you here?" No, in like 10 minutes. "Should I go in?"
"Umm.. normally Matthew, when you get to someone's house, you ring the doorbell and enter."
"Well I didn't know if Danielle was weird about it or something."
... such a strange being.

Once we were all at Danielle's house, the first thing that the boys went for was the Wii. Forget filming. We are now going to compete in our masculinity through little pink dots on a screen smashing each other to bits. We eventually did get to film, even though it took FOREVER because no one knew their lines. I can't wait to actually see the monstrosity :) I think the highlights included Sarah standing in and then getting pushed out of a cardboard box holding a stuffed animal turtle and a stuffed animal shark that are her "children" (who grow up to be me and Yogin). That and the "OH F***" that followed every "push her stuffed animal children into the pool" take we tried. It's like, "UHH I DON'T THINK WE CAN INCLUDE THAT!"

However, the greatest scene was still me and Danielle's catfight scene. That was INTENSE. Two girls SHRIEKING at each other in Spanish. I forgot my lines about halfway through and started improvising. :D I'm a terrible person haha. Danielle was supposed to be crying and then angry, and by the time we finally finished filming it, she actually looked like she was crying. Haha I love Sarah and her scream of "SCENE THREE. TAKE FOUR. ACTION!!!!!!" I think she should work for a director, and according to Danielle, if she weren't going to med school, she'd drop out and do "sound effects" for Sony.
*EXPLOSION*
CUE DANIELLE: KABOOM!

I think Yogin's favourite part of the day was when we filmed the fight scene between him and Matthew. Yes I know. Lots of fight scenes. This is a telenovela after all. Originally, it was scripted that Yogin would push Matthew into the pool, but for some reason, Matthew wasn't all that enthusiastic about this turn of events. So finally, a compromise was reached. Matthew would get pushed into the bushes. I personally, thought the pool was better, on both fronts.
1. More dramatic
2. Less painful for Matthew really
The first take... omg.. I thought Matthew was gonna go flying. Yogin pushed him so hard... but anyway... we did like four takes... and let's just say that uhh... Danielle doesn't have a bush anymore.

Lunch was really fun. Danielle bought two pizzas and breadsticks, while Matthew had a meatball sandwich from Subway. Danielle, Sarah, and I (plus a couple slices for Danielle's sleeping brother) finished off the pepperoni. And... YOGIN.. ATTACKED THE CHEESE and ate TEN SLICES!!! OUT OF TWELVE!!!! OMG!!!!

Getting Matthew to BE EMOTIONALLY INVESTED in the scene was just about as difficult as getting Yogin to be social. Matthew was supposed to be SEDUCING DANIELLE, and he was completely monotone and emotionless. NOT. ATTRACTIVE. NOT. SEDUCTIVE. Not that he is.. ever... but EVEN LESS!! Not to mention he didn't know his lines--AT ALL.
Actually, I think he was just messing up on purpose so Danielle would have to hug him more.
And then there was the scene where Yogin MANHANDLED me. He's supposed to burst into my room ANGRILY looking for his girlfriend Danielle while I'm sleeping. Yogin storms in and just like.. GRABS ME and ATTACKS. OWW. It's okay though. I STILL HEART YOU!

Though we had planned to film more, Matthew's camera ran out of batteries, so we sat around and played Taboo! Boys vs girls! No need to say that girls kicked boys' butts badly. All of Yogin's hints were sexual... it was terrible.

This just goes to show that it doesn't matter what you're doing. Everything's fun when you're with good company! :) And I was with some of my favourite people, so it was all good. :D

Afterwards, I took Yogin home, and about two minutes after I drove off, Yogin called, "My mom asks you to dinner."
"What? WHY? Are they going to kill me?"

So somehow, after I dropped Sarah off at her grandma's, I found myself almost killing myself and my car trying to park at Yogin's. Yogin had to come out and direct me ("turn your wheel left. now right. now left again. now reverse. now forward.") It took forever. Then, I found myself in their house, greeted at first by Darshan, who said, "Well this is awkward," and then by those infamously scary parents of Yogin's. AHH!!! When I called my dad and asked if I could go, he's like, "are you sure they're not going to murder you?"
Lovely.
HOWEVER, I SURVIVED (as you can tell) and they were actually kinda nice, though I was scared out of my wits the whole time. Yogin's dad left really soon after I came, and thus I'm still scared of him, but his mom and I actually.. kinda.. got along, which apparently, Yogin found hilarious. Basically, we ganged up together against him and I told her stories about Yogin. :D
Dinner was actually pretty good, though definitely different.. eating with hands.. and Yogin decided that I was his servant. "Pour me water." "Get me grapes." ... what do I look like? Your wife? NOPE.
After that, he made up for it.. because... I GOT TO SEE BABY PICTURES!!! SOOOOO CUTEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!! BABY YOGIN WAS SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO ADORABLEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!! AWWWWWW BIG EYES AND CUTE SMILEEEEE!!!!! haha and baby Darshan's cute too!!

And the best part of it was, the OFFICE was back!!!!!!! We sat there and watched the episode while eating cheetos, and despite my intense paranoia, it was actually cute. :) :) TE AMO!!!

I haven't done much these past couple of days. Mainly sleeping till noon (or later) and being lazy around the house, which includes watching way too much television (mainly sports--football and figure skating). I did enjoy... IMMENSELY... the fact that I could actually watch a football match LIVE!!!!! LIVERPOOL BEAT ARSENAL!!! It was the most exciting, excruciating game ever too!!! I think I had about 130958 heart attacks during it. At one point I actually cried in happiness. Torres!!!!

Oh, by the way, if any of you are ever possessed to do so for some strange reason, watching "Bend It Like Beckham" in Spanish is one of the most bizarre experiences of life. Trust me. Danielle and I did it on Monday when we had our "Spanish hour". It was scarring. Scary, old, fat British-Indian women speaking Spanish while screaming at their "failing" children is truly frightening. I feel sorry for Yogin just thinking about it.

I actually won't be at school almost the whole week next week. I'm going to be at Amherst from Saturday-Monday, I'll be at school Tuesday, but I'm taking off for Chicago Wednesday-Saturday. Lovely. MAKE UP WORK!!! AHH!! I think I'm missing the physics test too.. GREAT. I'm going to fail calc just because I don't get it at all and I'll be missing it.

And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make

How wonderful the Beatles are!
And with that introduction, I think I shall avoid doing calc hw by playing this ridiculous game!

Step 1: Put your itunes on random.
Step 2: Post the first line from the first 20 songs that play.
Step 3: Ask everyone to guess what song and artist the lines come from.
Step 4: Strike out the songs when someone guesses correctly.
Step 5: No cheating.

1. I wonder what it's like to be loved by you.
2. This is 10 percent luck, 20 percent skill, 15 percent concentrated power of will.
3. She calls out to the man on the street. Sir, can you help me?
4. And now I'm all alone again, nowhere to turn, no one to go to.
5. There, out in the darkness, a fugitive running.
6. I can hear the bells. Well, don't you hear them chime?
7. Every single day, I walk down the street. I hear people say, "Baby's so sweet."
8. I may run and hide when you're screaming my name, all right.
9. You're in my arms and all the world is gone.
10. The dawn is breaking; a light shining through.
11. Even in my heart, I see--you're not being true to me.
12. He was a boy. She was a girl. Can I make it any more obvious?
13. My life is brilliant. My love is poor. I saw an angel, of that I'm sure.
14. Starry, starry night. Paint your palette blue and grey.
15. A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far away.
16. Summer has come to pass. The innocent can never last.
17. Eight years later, time goes by fast.
18. Estuve bien. Estuve mal. Tuve rabia. Tuve paz.
19. Drew looks at me. I fake a smile so he won't see.
20. Close your eyes and I'll kiss you.

Yogin--"Pretty Woman" came up, but I'm pretty sure I would type the lyrics incorrectly. :)
Royston--with that song selection, you should get like 18 out of 20!!!

I should probably also mention that I CUT MY HAIR! It's VERY short. It's very strange. It's exactly shoulder length and I'm not quite sure if I like it better this way or longer. All I can say is that it's lighter. :) I have yet to take a picture in it, but I'm sure I shall soon!

I still don't really believe that everyone's going to go their separate ways. It's really quite bizarre and surreal. I've noticed that about myself. I don't quite understand it. I somehow seem to kind of being in a daze whenever I hear bad news (like rejections) or go through momentous events like graduations. It never really seems to hit. I don't quite accept it most of the time until quite a bit later when it's just been around for so long that it's accepted fact. I hope that won't be the case for this graduation. I like emotions. It's really sad that really, no matter where I go, I won't be with any of my really close friends, and while I'd like to be optimistic and promise that we're all going to be friends forever, I have my doubts and questions, especially after junior high. Very apropos with Isaac's party tomorrow--every year I go and I see all these people I used to be good friends to fulfill my once a year quota, and every year, I have absolutely nothing in common with them anymore. I really don't want that to happen to these friends, and I don't think it will, since even in junior high, I had problems, I guess, "fitting in" with my group of friends. I was always kind of the different one, the "which one is incorrect" answer you pick on the SAT, but in high school I've really, to be cliche here, blossomed and really became confident in all my insanity. So while Yogin, Vicki, Shayne, Royston, Alison, Matthew, Jen, Kristina, Sarah, and all the others may not be going to the same school as me (maybe Danielle--faint chance), and I'll be sad I won't see them daily, I think it'll be okay. In the words of the Beatles and Jim Sturgess, "you know it's gonna be all right." All right spelled as two words just for Mr. Sawaya. :)

OH! AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY EDDIE!!!!!!!!! Even though it's really no longer your birthday in Minnesota!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY IN CALIFORNIA!!!

Wow it's been a while. Hmm... I think it's because I'm so ridiculously tired all the time nowadays that I kind of just sit and stare inanely at my computer (usually Facebook) rather than actually think about my day and write.

First thing's first: SPRING BREAK!!!!!
I am currently worshipping the power of Claritin. After suffering all day, it's amazing what it can do. :) My throat still hurts a bit though. :( Great. Start off spring break sick.

ANYWAY!!!
PLANS FOR SPRING BREAK (that will never be fulfilled):
Tomorrow (Saturday) night: Isaac's party
Monday: La primera hora de espanol con Danielle
Since we're learning absolutely nothing in Spanish now that Donnelly's gone, Danielle and I have decided to take the initiative. We were talking one day and one of us said, "You know, if we just took that hour we spend in Spanish every day and just sat there and talked to each other in Spanish, we'd be so much better off." And Lo! The idea was born!
We're going to have "Spanish hour" (or hours) at least once a week, where we'll go over to each other's houses and just kinda hang out. But we'll speak Spanish the whole time, and probably watch movies in Spanish, do practice exercises--anything to get us to speak the language.
Thursday: filming our telenovela! I'm excited! Get to be overly dramatic in Spanish! Whee!! I also get cheated on, dumped, and killed! I also get to hang out with some of my favouritest people! Yogin! Sarah! Danielle! Matthew! In that order! Haha jkjk
Saturday 4 AM: Boarding a plane for Amherst, Massachusetts for a return Monday evening!

In between, I REALLY want to go Knott's, but everyone has conflicting schedules :( and Sarah's going to come over and teach me how to bake while eating Chinese food!
Oh! And there must be an Office watching party Thursday (after we film) for the first new episode!!!

As always, a reading list that never gets done:
-"Long Day's Journey into Night"
-"The Brothers Karamazov"
-"The Dao De Jing"
These first three will be read, since they're for school.
-"The House of Mirth"--Edith Wharton
-"The Hobbit"--JRR Tolkien
-"Till We Have Faces"--CS Lewis

So college decisions have come out. Final list:
Amherst College: accept
University of Chicago: accept
Northwestern University: accept
UC Berkeley: accept
USC: accept
UCLA: accept
UC Irvine: accept
Yale University: reject
Harvard University: reject
Princeton University: reject
Brown University: reject
Cambridge University: reject

Final count (as Legolas would say): 7-5 not too shabby

I'm toying between the first three at the moment. Going to visit all three hopefully and see how I like them. They're all good schools, so I guess it's just a matter of where I like more.

I shall now begin my epic tale of the Oracle. As you may or may not know (probably not since no one on the Oracle staff reads this), we always come out on Fridays, which means we export to the printer Wednesdays, get the paper Thursday morning, stuff them with inserts and count them Thursday, and deliver them Friday 2nd period.
However, this lovely past Wednesday, as we were actually exporting, the network shut down unannouncedly, leaving us with no copies of our pages. Thus, the only thing to do was to export Thursday during the period and then come early to school Friday morning to stuff them with inserts before distributing them as usual. No big deal. We've done it before. We did it twice last year.

When we told the staff about the predicament and asked how many people could come early on Friday, around 6:15 a.m., only six people raised their hands. And--they were all editors. Not a single cub, now that they don't have the reward of editor positions hanging above their heads, not a single one wanted to come just to be altruistic and help the paper.
So, this morning, I got up extra early and drove to school in a hurry, arriving at 6:10. There was not a soul in sight. It was actually rather eerie, seeing the campus so empty, so full of expectant energy, the lights dimmed, the marquee streaming, waiting for the onslaught of the day.
I walk into the 300 building and who do I see? Sarah, Ana, and Camille. Camille gets brownie points for being the only cub to show up. I checked the back of the office and no papers are there!! We wait and wait and wait, until the school is full and the bell actually rings. Then, as we run to class, we see them--stacks and stacks of newspapers being unloaded--an hour late. How were we supposed to insert them all and count them all when we all have class? Were we going to distribute after spring break when all our stories will make no sense whatsoever??

In Sawaya, we had a sub and were doing absolutely nothing, and I grab Yogin and Amy (out of the six Oracle members in the room, Amy was the only one willing to come. Jon Noguchi flat out said no, even though he's the sports editor. Bastards. Just because they're going to college doesn't mean they can stop caring about the paper. Oh wait. They never cared in the first place. Yogin's not even on the damn staff and he worked harder than all of them.) So Amy, Yogin, and I, with the help of Ana in the middle and Camille at the very end, essentially stuffed and counted 2500 papers in the space of an hour. We sweated, we bitched, we listened to bad music (HSM and hardcore rap courtesy of Yogin), but in an hour's time, we 3.5 in an hour what 35 people usually do bitching and whining while not really working in 40 minutes. And thus, at the expense of Elaine's hands (I could barely write my philosophy essay 1st period), the Oracle was saved. YET AGAIN. OUT OF SHEER HARD WORK. Thanks so much Yogin!!! Nav does owe you lunch. :)
I just wish that people could care 1/4 of how much I care about the paper. It's just absolutely disgusting when I hear Jon and Jordan complaining about having to be at layout for like an hour (since they never stay anyway) and reading three drafts (as opposed to my 30) and doing the least amount, instead of the most as I always try to do. SIGH. Where can I find people who are as crazy as me? That's the college I'm going to.