Day 1 and half of two

I was planning to do a short update each day but never really got the chance to because sitting in a car for endless hours is actually more tiring than you think. I actually typed most of this thing up during an excruciating part of the drive on the second day. Anyway, here it goes

After 2 and a half states worth of bugs on the wind shield, multiple sightings of road kill including but not limited to: squirrels, mostly racoons, occasional birds, and one baby dear, endless hours of (lum chi churn, mui yeen fong and all the other oldie Chinese songs/singers), almost a chapter from Dancing with a ghost, some family bonding, some good old nostalgia and of course, the inevitable arguments.

The start of the trip was a bit rocky and cranky as usual. Waking up early and leaving by 8 of course was just the plan, it never happens. Lack of sleep and having to wait for other people to get ready is the best recipe for a good old argument. My dad, being the driver, of course wants to leave as early as possible so we can get to our destination before it gets too dark. Usually my mom or sister is the slowest, today being mom. My dad hates driving in the dark just because it is a totally new place for him. Plus, I do agree with him in saying that it isn’t really the safest thing ever. Sometimes, it is pretty creepy and scary if you are the only car on the road with only your tiny headlights to guide your way. By the way, I honestly think that my dad is one of the best drivers in the world. He actually puts a lot of effort and concentrates really hard to keep the car steady. Sometimes, if you close your eyes, you’ll just think he’s driving a straight road because he controls the car so well that it feels like we’re gliding on the road. With him at the steering wheel, I have no worries and can fall asleep no problem. Quite quickly if I might add, which he complains about a lot haha. He always says that we all fall asleep leaving him to drive by himself so I tried my best to stay awake this time to keep him company. So Kudos to dad for being an awesome driver! Yea, we’re a Chinese family so there are no complements to each other lol but we do appreciate each other, just not done through the typical verbal complements.
Well, we did take a looong time to get moving, we actually got out of the house around 9:15 I believe, and headed for the border. Of course there had to a wait (1/2 hour – 45 min.) which made the cranky and sleep deprived dad into a grouchy old man. “I told you to come out earlier!” The more we waited the more annoyed he was. Let’s just say sleep deprivation can make people angry. It wasn’t only him though.

Not going to bore you with the details so I’ll just give some highlights.

During one part of the car ride, we started talking about the good old days and one of the funniest things came up, something that I wasn’t even aware of myself. Apparently when I was about 1 or 2? I’m not quite sure on the details but our family was planning to move and was looking for a new apartment, this was way back when we still lived in Hong Kong. The 4 of us went plus my mom’s friend and my grandparents from my dad’s side. We were with the real estate agent who was going to show us around. On our way up, the elevator broken down and we were stuck there for a looong while. Being the miniature versions of ourselves, my sister and I obviously cried. We waited soooo long for someone to rescue us that we couldn’t hold it in anymore and had to pee in the corner of the elevator. LOL! That’s not even the most epic part! We were stuck in the elevator for 2 to 3 hours and before we even got rescued, the corner was all dry already! LoL Pretty gross I think, but also pretty funny.

The next day, the second day, we planned to leave the hotel by 8 and leave for some national monument in a city called Cave Junction. It sounds pretty cool though, it’s not quite spelunking, it’s a guided tour in which they show you the cave and apparently it’s really really nice inside. It’s famous for it’s marble. We brought our good old GPS, we don’t quite have a name for it, I was going to do a little video of it and post it here for you guys to help decide what it should be called haha. Anyways, our good ol’ pal showed us the way. We were kind of skeptical about it because the road signs were telling us a different thing. But, we had faith in her because she led us around so many times even though we doubted her before. Well guess what, she did lead us on the fastest way, but one of the roads was a unpaved and an off road type of road. It’s one of those roads that you need an ATV or at least a 4 by 4 for. So we didn’t end up going, which kind of sucks because the description sounded pretty cool and a friend of ours suggested that we go because it is well worth it.

There's still so many more things that have happened that i'd like to document but like i said, i'm tired. It's been a loooooong day of walking around like crazy. As some of you know, San Francisco is really hill-y so walking isn't exactly fun here, it's more like an intense workout.

Just some random pictures taken along the way



They have these hearts all around down town. Kind of like the Vancouver polar bears, Orcas and eagles i guess.
Playing with the functions on my camera. Changed the M&M machine from being yellow to green.
alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5363041601328251490" />

Have you ever seen a hand print on a license plate before?

This lady bug was eating one of the many carcasses on our windshield. Quite gross if you ask me.

Putting the Pro in procrastination...yet again

For those of you who know me know of my procrastinating ways and how I'm always screwed over by them. I should really be finishing my paper but what am i doing right now? Facebook, msn, random stuff on the net as usual. Even as I type this right now I'm procrastinating! This, my friends is the definition of epic fail. So why is it that my procrastination is correlated to the importance of the task? High importance = more stress which = running away? What paper, I have no paper :/ . It's not like this paper is even that hard, in fact, it's quite interesting. I get to pick any person in the world real, unreal, family, or even myself and then analyze their personality using the theories we've learnt. Could range from anything like Homer simpson to Hiro Nakamura to Michael Jackson! This is for a psyc class by the way, psyc 305. It's pretty interesting. The prof is an awesome lecturer and she makes the material really intriguing. She designed the course really well too! After we finish learning 2 or 3 perspectives of personality, we would watch a film and then analyze the personality of the person in the film. So far, we've done Hitler, Jeffrey Dahmer, Isak Borg (from the film wild strawberries which was in swedish + black and white! Of course i fell asleep ;)), Gloria and Carl Rogers (documentary of Rogers giving Gloria some sort of psychological therapy). It's kinda late right now.......to paper or to sleep? you were expecting a hamlet quote weren't u >=)

Summer senses

Summer never was my "favourite" season. Whenever asked what my favourite season was, I would immediately blurt out spring. Why? I'm not quite sure myself. I think it has something to do with the weather and it warming up, not to mention it's the season where everything starts growing and blooming.

I was really bored at home, channel surfing right after dinner, the usual. Couldn't really find anything that would satisy my overbearing boredom even after trying for probably a good half an hour. I'm actually starting to get sick of the tv. Shocking, I know, I suprise myself too sometimes. TV used to consume my life. I am THE epitome of a potatoe couch, I used to think that I could actually sit/lay/sleep on my couch for a whole day just watching tv. Sad now I come to think of it haha.

Anyway, so after the much wasted time of doing essentially nothing (staring (not engaged) at a tv screen) I decdied to go to my room and try and find something to occupy myself. I opened the window and found myself zoning out, staring at the beautiful pastel, yet glowing red, slowly fading and mixing with the gentle baby blue creating a soft velvety lining of purple right in the middle. All the while enjoying the gentle night breeze hitting the leaves on a tree, brushing them together creating a calm and serene sound. Feeling the sensation of what's left of the sun's rays warming up my arms and smelling the sweet sent of the pine even though i'm allergic. (and the disgusting smell of asphalt! yea, we're fixing our roof aka, the root of my insanity for the past few days! Non-stop banging and bashing from 8am-5pm. PLUS the dude's random and loud bursts of song in some Indie language) It never occured to me that Summer was the only season where I watch the sunset/sunrise, soak up lots of sun, stay out all day and not get cold. The stuff that i really love doing! I guess I never really realized and understood the beauties of this season and the wonderers that God has made it. Truly, He is a God of wonders.


I don't have much of a view from my room because of that pine on the left. However, I actually really like that tree because I've seen it grow and it makes a really nice rustling sound in the wind.



I was going to do a progress check kind of photo gallery haha but they basically finished everything in 2 days. But there's still hammering!!!! DIMM GUYYYYYYY :)

Edit: I was listening to Miles Davis throughout this whole process. I don't know what it is about jazz music but it gets to me and calms me down.

Epic fail quote of the day

Me: I want to get some artichokes hearts cause i wanna make a dip.
Sarah: eww, that's disgusting! Why would you eat fish hearts!

she thought artichokes were anchovies LOL! they don't sound alike nor do they look alike other then the fact that they both start with an a.

A smooth pickup, or a geniune desire to learn?

I was on my way to school today taking the 480 bus. As usual, I fell asleep midway through, but, this time, i was woken up by a Spanish fellow, or so he says. "Excuse me, excuse me. Hi, may I practice speaking English with you" he says in a mild tone to the girl sitting behind me. The girl is obviously a little creeped out by him as she says "sure", in a nervous and scared kind of tone. Throughout their whole conversation, I was just thinking, was he trying to get a date for Friday night? Or did he simply want to improve his oral English. Why would I think that you might ask. Well, plain and simple, his English sounded almost perfect with a tad bit of an accent. Some of my friends don't even sound as smooth as he does. Not only that, the girl also noticed it too and she was mentioning how he spoke as if he knows the language inside out. He then explained that he learned it throughout highschool i believe. I was actually still half asleep so i didn't catch the whole conversation, but, may I mention that it was a long one. Anyway, he was saying that his first language was Spanish and that he has learnt english throughout highschool and his undergrad. He just never got the chance to practice it becuase he would always speak Spanish to his friends and family. At this point, it reminded me of something Dr. Mariam Adeney said that was quite funny. I remember during the Koinos class that she taught about missions, she explained that there was this method of learning a lanuage that was developed by missionaries and she gave us an example. So on the first day, she would go to the learning center and learn some basic vocab and phrases and in the afternoon, she would walk around town talking to people. "Hi, my name is _____ and i come from ____. This is all i can say, have a good day." She would go from store to store to say the same thing and hopefully try and learn names. And everyday, she would do the same thing over and over again, learning more and more words and phrases. I thought it was the funniest thing. Imagine if you were a baker and everyday the same woman comes in and says the exact same thing to you, how would you react/feel?

Anywayssssssss, I'm just wasting time here because I got to school at 3 and was planning to see an academic advisor just to talk about courses and what not. However, when i got there, the receptionist told me they weren't taking drop-ins any more, so here I am, trying to waste time. Lalalalala goodbye.

This little blurb is going to be stupid but i can't help it :P By the way, this is not me, it's just something I read

Today, I was at Walmart when my stomach began to hurt. I quickly waddled to the restroom in pain. As soon as I got in the stall, a huge crap exploded out of me. The child in the stall next to me started crying. When her mom asked what was wrong, she said that I'd "killed her nose." LOL funniest thing i've ever heard haha

Epic fail ---> epic adventure + fun

So by now most of you probably already heard of our (Antonia, Karen, Tim and I) epic journal. If you haven't already, just go read Antonia and Karen's blog cause they've already written about it so therefore i shall not bore you. Just pictures, since they're worth a thousand words :P

Racing against the clock

Get out of our way woman! We're trying to catch the sunset!

I flashed her to get her attention (as a joke)

Didn't except her to actually notice :S

Speeding our way there

It was freaking cold! no joke! hugging for warmth lol

The end to our epic adventure and off to bbt!