I take my Chinese final in the East Bay on Monday, then leave for the Far East on Tuesday. In the mean-time, I’ve been doing a lot of “general things” that aren’t studying, but should be – like going to the farmer’s market, taking care of business, general adult things.
Yes – I feel more like an adult now. Lots of my friends are getting married, I’m moving in with my boyfriend, and changing career paths. I think the only difference between me and a real adult is that real adults don’t proclaim themselves as such quite so often.
Changing career paths… yes it may happen. I’m considering going back to school to study cognitive science – a mix of all things I find wonderful. We’ll see what happens, there is no rush to decide. I’m going to China on Tuesday!
This is my favourite picture from the last week, found on the Internet:
Well I have (as usual) been very busy – I’m learning Chinese this summer and during these past 5 weeks I have absorbed an entire semester’s-worth of Chinese. It’s been really amazing – I LOVE learning languages, and since I get to practice with Tom (since he speaks) AND look forward to my trip to China in August (!!!!) it’s been a very rewarding 5 weeks.
Tomorrow Tom and I are going on a camping trip – we’ll be staying in one of California’s National Parks and enjoying the beautiful weather!
Some pretty cool news – Tom’s newest research project is on the Chinese Typewriter and, after researching them for nearly a year now and day-dreaming about eventually seeing one, he actually GOT one! You can watch the whole story in a video on his new blog:
I found two beautiful wooden chairs on the street a few weeks ago, and I have decided to try and restore them. I say they are “beautiful” – you can see their beauty under the layers of bird poo and caked dirt only if you are very dedicated to refinishing wooden chairs, or are very blind.
So far I have washed and sanded one of them almost completely – as far as I can tell from my research, my next step will be to clean it, then sand it again, then clean it again, and then stain it! I’ve been really lucky – whatever finish was on the chairs before now is really old, so it’s been really easy to get off with sanding and I haven’t had to use a chemical stripper.
I’m pretty excited. Here are pictures of the chairs!!
A chair I found on the streets of SF
A wooden chair I found on the streets of SF
Other than that, I’m still learning Mandarin, taking ballet classes, getting ready for an audition next Saturday (oooh!!!), training acrobatics….
I’m also getting ready for a trip to Washington, D.C. to visit my parents and meet up with Tom who is there right now, and then drive to Maryland to meet his parents!!! I’m pretty excited to meet his parents, and to see my Mom and Dad. I think it’s going to be a good trip!
We finished Alice a little more than a week ago – and it feels good. It was really amazing to be able to perform a show more than 40 times in about a 2.5 month period – I can hardly imagine doing a show fewer times! I loved that part of it.
Things I learned doing the show:
1. I like doing handstands.
2. Having a large role, making all of the costumes, and organizing transportation for everyone is too many jobs to have all at once.
3. I LOVE being thrown around semi-acrobatically, semi-dancewise.
4. Industrial-strength velcro is really the only kind of velcro worth getting.
5. Doing two shows a day is pretty exhausting.
6. Doing a show 40+ times is amazing in terms of how deeply it lets you get to know the piece, how it helps you really feel the timing, and gain the ability to take risks onstage.
Much much MUCH more, but I have tons of Chinese homework due tomorrow.
A workshop for a physical comedy adaptation of Romeo and Juliet; directed, conceived, and created by Felicity HunzekerHesed. I did the choreography and acted as movement coach! One of the most fun projects I’ve worked on in a very long while.
