The Berkeley Archives: Jon Yip Talks to Himself

A Systematic Commentary On My Life At Berkeley

Week Thirteen: Winter is Coming

11-18-2001

Friday afternoon I watched 10 Things I Hate About You (just for Shirley!) which wasn't quite as bad as I thought but was still whatever is to be expected from those girly girly movies: you know, ultra-predictable plots, cliche characters, annoying girls and snooty boys, the girl getting mad at the boy near the end but the boy saves the "relationship" with nothing other than (what else?) money. Then I went to BART station and took it to Fremont, where Dad picked me up and took me home. At home I finally got to watch Empire of the Sun (by the way, I figured out what the problem was with my DVD player on my own. Those "support" people don't know anything. They should hire me instead) with the family. What a good movie.

On Saturday I started out by reading Much Ado About Nothing but I ended up stopping because it was a complete waste of a good weekend. Instead, I did other stuff. What was it? I can't remember, but I'm sure it was fun. We had cell group at our house that night, which was a bit destructive. However, Pastor Ralph (we should call him PASTOR from now on, because that's what he is) came this time (wow!) and added some helpful insight to our discussions.

This morning there was a worship leader/team meeting, but not many people showed up (lack of information, I suppose). Victor gave me some pictures and stuff that Jen made for me. How nice! Aahh I'm getting all girly now. Cindy was sick today so Jonny did the worship all by himself! Then Ralph did an especially great sermon about the constancy of the Scripture, and how the Bible is a brainwashing, but everything else the world tells us is already a brainwashing; the only difference is that the Bible is truth and everything else might not necessarily be. Anyway, afterwards I talked with Jonny and Pastor Ralph about our ideas for the Christmas play and suddenly it all hit me! I'm telling you, there's nothing in the world like the feeling you get when you're trying to think of something to write for a play and then out of nowhere it all comes to you in a glorious flash! I went home, packed and rested a bit, and then went to Crystal's house to hitch a ride from her (again). I feel bad for always filching rides from people. I'm like a leech.

Whenever I ride with Crystal I always gain much wisdom on studying and school things from her (contrasting from Shirley, from whom I learn much wisdom on non-academic things like life and girls and all those other fun things, and also contrasting from Leon and Jean, from whom I learn nothing but sit in the back seat and simply observe the brother-sister interaction that is always unique between individual families). It was sunny when we left (at around 4:30) and it was completely dark at 5:30, even before we arrived. Winter is coming! Whee! I WANT TO SNOWBOARD.

In my room once again, I began to go hard at work on the Christmas play, which I typed a large smattering of so as not to lose my ideas. Now it is 1:00 in the morning and I'm wearing those new contacts that I'm supposed to wear at night (finally! I was getting really tired of those annoying glasses) and my eyes are killing me now. Urg... AAHH so much reading and stuff to do this week! I need to catch up on reading, talk/negotiate (bribe?) professors, figure out my schedule for next semester, and talk with a major advisor! But I want to go watch Spy Game at Wheeler tomorrow...

11-19-2001

Got up, ditched the remainder of my Nvidia stocks (thankfully, they went even further down today), ate, read some more Shakespeare (I am trying to remember to put Crystal's studying tips into effect), and went to class. I actually didn't space out even ONCE during English 173 because we studied Watchmen the whole time and that was pretty fun. Film 25A, on the other hand...

Yeah, so I nodded off a couple of times during that one LONG Japanese film, I Was Born, But..., which was pretty funny but it dragged a lot, and even then we were watching it at 24 frames per second when it was normally supposed to be at the silent film standard of 16 fps, meaning we only watched it for 66% of the length it was supposed to be!

After class I went to talk to the instructor about my crappy grades. Well, she raised the grade of my "insignificant" shot analysis table redo from a C to a B (that assignment is supposedly only a small part of the grade, but right now I need every raising I can get) and she gave me a lot of advice about how to write the paper better. And I was completely right! I NEEDED MORE BULLSHIT. I am too accustomed to supporting a thesis with FACTS. What I need to do is take the facts, make up my OWN things ABOUT the facts, and use THOSE to support my thesis. I think I may be getting on the right track here...

At 5:00 I went back to Dwinelle to meet with Elaine for the editing project; I just went to review the second edit that she did, and also the first edit that I did. Then I went back to Davidson, read a bit, ate, read some more, and went to Wheeler at 9:00 to watch Spy Game, which wasn't as good as I expected, especially from Tony Scott. Enemy of the State was pretty fast paced and tense but this movie was pretty slow and it was all flashbacks and overdone cinematography and editing, and there wasn't really any action at all. The story was interesting though, so it wasn't bad at all either. I should probably get to reading now.

I am almost finished with the Christmas play, and I started only yesterday! Now, if only I could think of a title...

11-20-2001

I actually did the assigned reading for today! I COMPLETELY finished Much Ado About Nothing. I also bought 40 shares of Invision Technologies stocks, which was a good buy; they went up about $1.20 a share today (even though they went up like $3.50 yesterday). And I went to Shakespeare class and for the first time ever since I came, I PAID ATTENTION and took MEANINGFUL notes instead of doodling all over my notebook. I just took Dad's and Crystal's advice and sat, listened, and wrote down everything he said like mad. And you know what? Writing things down furiously keeps you awake! I had planned to visit the professor afterwards, but I thought to myself, "forget it, I want to go" so I went back to Davidson.

I went back to my room, watched the rest of Tomb Raider that I hadn't yet seen at Jonny's house, finally scanned that one picture for Eric; the photo that Leon took of me from last year's Mongolia trip, in the Beijing Airport. Then it was off to a Thanksgiving dinner with the Unit 1 and 2 fellowships! I went to Freeborn Hall at Unit 1, where we were supposed to meet. From there we took the bus to the house where it was supposed to be at.

It was at Mariann's house, I think. I started off the evening with some Bust-A-Move 2 on James' Playstation, then we ate lots of turkey and potatoes and all that good stuff. After all of our ravenous carnal instincts satiated with large quantities of food, we sat down to watch Nothing to Lose, which James brought. It was pretty funny, but we left near the end to go BOWLING! James drove the BOYS to the bowling alley while Eric drove the GIRLS. Heh.

Our team consisted of me, Leon, Mariann, Eric, and Carolyn. The first game I did really crappy and scored an 80-something; however, we still whupped the other team (James, Hung-Tzu, Sam, and Tim). In the next game, I scored a whoppin' 117!! And we beat them of course. Eric took us BOYS home to the Unit 2 area, and now I'm back. By the way, these contacts are amazing! I wear them at night and all day I can see really sharp, almost 20/20! Well, the downside is I get a lot of ghosting and starbursting (especially at night) but Dr. Han said it would get better after a few days.

Man, it's 2:30 in the morning now and I just finished writing an impossibly ambiguous essay (not for school, just for my personal fulfillment) about life. I love it when the feeling just hits you and you can't stop writing until it's all written down. I am slowly but surely becoming a writer! Now, if only I could finish that Christmas play...