21winks

SUTORESU GA

21winks — Tue, 12 May 2009 13:20:36 +0000

WATASHI NI SHINU. So far. My co author has not held up on her promises of keeping this a gossip column. DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS TO KEEP UP WITH FRIENDS WHEN THEY ARE HALF WAY ACROSS THE DAMN WORLD. It makes me very sad sometimes. I have not talked to Bree as much as I would have liked to. I have not talked to anyone as much as I would like to. I’ve lost the right to contact the person I liked. It feels as if I’ve lost so much. Every time I talk to them, I feel extremely homesick.

About the courting thing. It was totally my fault. MY TIMING SUCKS WHEN IT COMES TO THIS. You can just ask Bree. I tend to do things RIGHT BEFORE THE DAMN SEMESTER ENDS. So. Now. I claim right now. When I get back, I’m being agressive. Yes, she might be kinda dating someone. So. It’s nothing official. And hoefully a summer away from each other can weaken that connection. I haven’t told Bree anything about this and hopefully she won’t be to… strange in her reaction towards this.

But otherwise, being in Japan, where I’m studying abroad has been awesome. I’ve been meaning to start a blog, seperate from this, where I can keep my family and friends up to date with the things I’ve been doing and to keep the memories of my time here, but… I would need TWO blogs. Because the way I talk to my friends is NOT the way I speak to my family. So, I just haven’t started one. Will I? Maybe. Should I? I should regardless, because maybe this way my family can truly understand my personality (cause I swear they don’t).

Signing off now, from Japan
~Murr

A New Semester, A Rough Start and an Interesting end…

21winks — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 08:51:51 +0000

Hey All!

I’ve not written in a while and I felt compelled to say something so late at night. This semester has been pretty rough, what with Murr away and small changes taking place. I’ve decided to treat my posts now as a sort of…gossip column if you will. Think Gossip Girl. This way, Murr can keep in touch with what’s been going on at school and people reading our blog might find something interesting to read.

I’m actually too tired and sick to really write something gossip-y. But keep visiting to see what news I have for you!

~ Bree

I fucking HATE elmo.

21winks — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 13:55:44 +0000

“Elmo refused to be interviewed for this column. I consider this to be a supreme act of cowardice. And it doesn’t surprise me one bit. Elmo is an annoying tool.

“Yes, I know that children love Elmo. But children are idiots. That’s why we don’t let them have jobs. Could you imagine an office full of children? They’d spend all day telling dumb jokes and talking about their poop. It would be like it was before women entered the workplace.

“’Sesame Street’ – which still has sharp, funny writing – is being destroyed by idiot cuteness. Not only is the patronizing, baby-talking Elmo usurping most of the hour, but “Sesame Street” – which debuted it’s 37th season Monday – added it’s first new female Muppet in 13 years: the sparkly haired, tutu-wearing, button-nosed, pink-skinned fairy goddaughter Abby Cadabby. Her shaky magic skills get her out of situations she needs to get bailed out of, like the anti-“Bewitched”.

“Plus, she’s got the creepy, throaty, little-girl Lindsey Lohan kind of voice, and a Paris Hilton-esque catchphrase: “That’s so magic.” When I watched Sesame Street in the 70’s, the human cast and the Muppets were quirky adults who didn’t talk down to me with baby voices. Now the human cast gets almost no airtime, and the show is dominated by Elmo, Baby Bear, and Abby Cadabby – preschoolers enamored by their own adorable stupidity.

“The lesson they teach – in opposition to Oscar, Big Bird, Grover or Bert – is that bland neediness gets you stuff much more easily than character. We are breeding a nation of Anna Nicole Smiths.

“I am not the only one who hates Elmo. Vernon Chatman and John Lee, the creators of MTV’s dark Sesame Street parody, Wonder Showzen, think the evil red one is destroying the show.

“Elmo doesn’t grow. People show him something and he laughs. He doesn’t learn a lesson. It’s the exact opposite of what old Sesame Street used to do. Elmo has been learning the same lesson his whole life, which is that Elmo likes Elmo, says Lee.

“Chatman, who refers to Elmo as the Jar Jar Binks of Sesame Street worries that Elmo teaches kids to care only about themselves.

“Elmo is just a baby voiced, self obsessed character who is only concerned with Elmo, says Lee. He just passively observes things: “Elmo is looking at a sandwich. Elmo is eating a sandwich. Elmo is crapping out the sandwich and writing his name on the wall with it. The last celebrity to so obsessively refer to himself in the third person was Richard Nixon.

“Whereas Count Von Count markets math and Oscar markets the acceptability of negative emotions, Elmo, brilliantly, just markets Elmo, leading him to be the shows cash cow, or whatever misshapen animal he’s supposed to be.

“I question not only Abby Cadabby but all of Elmo’s associates. You may recall that Elmo testified before Congress about music education. But you may not remember who requested Elmo’s appearance: Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, now in jail for taking at least $2.4 million in bribes. I’m not implying that Elmo has taken dirty money, but these are the kind of people Elmo surrounds himself with.

“I understand that Sesame Street has to compete in a Nickelodeon-Disney Channel-Wiggles-Pixar universe. In fact, the new episodes starting with “”Sesame Street is brought to you by the following…” and then, instead of gently mocking consumerism by listing letters and numbers, they actually show real spots for McDonald’s, Beaches resorts, Pampers and EverydayKidz.com – the last of which apparently helps children spell only if they want to become rappers.

“I desperately don’t want the show to go away, so I know they can’t afford to run the “Elmo accidentally drank bleach and died” episode. Instead, they need to simply take Elmo and his buddies and giver them their own hour-long show for the idiot spawn. Then put Luis, Gordon and the cool Muppets on their own half hour “Classic Sesame” for the kids whom will one day actually contribute to our society.

“Whichever of the two shows you watched would serve as a convenient litmus test for the rest of your life. “Which ‘Sesame Street’ did you watch?” will be code on college applications, Internet dating and job applications. Blue and Red states will be divided not by presidential choices, but by Grover and Elmo.

“If we can’t save all these kids, let’s at least save the ones who can master speaking in the first-person. The rest we’ll use for reality TV stars.”

– Joel Stein

I feel the same way. Strange?

~Murr

Catching Up

21winks — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 05:36:48 +0000

Hi guys, long time no see. How’s your new year been so far? Hopefully better than mine. My life has been… frustrating as of late. The way I’ve been lately hasn’t been making me too happy. Hm…

I’m to go to Japan in March. Sounds exciting, right? It definitely is exciting. But the thing I am MOST worried about is my financial stability. In preparation for Japan, I’ve been trying to find a job so that I don’t have to depend on my parents completely for financial dependence. And It’s not as if I’ve been lazy and not trying to find a job. Granted that I’ve been applying online to most of the places I’m trying to work at, but this has to be the most frustrating process ever. I understand that with the economy the way it is and just the way the American job market has been in the last 2-3 years that it’s hard to keep your job, let alone get a job. It’s been said A LOT recently that you would need a contact within the company or place where you wanna work in order to even be considered for the job.

EDIT: SCRATCH ALL THAT. I GOT A JOB. HURRAH FOR ME.

~Murr

Glasses

21winks — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 22:12:33 +0000

Got new glasses today. Now I feel short. Does that relate in anyway? Who knows, but it’s how I feel!

~Murr

Talk about Identity Issues

21winks — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 01:11:21 +0000

When meeting new people and asked where I am from, people always give me weird looks when I say Jamaica. Yes, I am a Chinese girl from Jamaica. And to make things more kooky, I was born in America. I’ve never really thought much about my “identity” when I was in Jamaica. I was just a Chinese girl living and going to school in Jamaica. Coming to America and going to a liberal arts college changed that. Identity politics is the buzz here, and the format is PC (politically correct). So what do I do in this highly charged community of categorizing people into boxes?
During Orientation my first year, I just told people that I was Jamaica, having lived there for 13 years. I never fit in with the mainland Chinese kids (they’d speak Mandarin to each other 24/7), I never fit in with the Jamaican kids (I was not into dancehall and just the popular culture from home). But somehow, the first friend I made was someone I could totally relate to – in terms of music, and ideals and such. We were both alternative.
As time progressed in college, I found myself befriending first generation minority kids. It was awesome; we related to each other well and we had similar humor and stuff. It was just a fun time. I also got more in tune with my Asian American side. I understood that there were lots issues in the Asian American community that I just wasn’t aware of. I was glad for this; I felt so empowered from this new identity of mine.
Today, I found out that 2 years ago, this girl from Jamaica in college (we’re in the same year) said that I wasn’t really Jamaican and that I was more Chinese. Now, when I heard this I just couldn’t believe it and started attacking the high school she attended (I went to the best high school in Jamaica, it’s ok for me to be elitist). But yeah. I mean, I know for sure that when I was in Jamaica that I wasn’t really into the popular culture, but did that mean that I wasn’t being Jamaican? Wasn’t there more to being Jamaican that just listening to the popular music, attending sessions, going clubbing, drinking and dancing? In my heart, I believe that I am Jamaican. I believe that I am warm towards people, that I am laid back and that I treat my friends like family. Just because I am not the stereotypical Jamaican does not mean that I am not Jamaican.
In my first year, I know that there were issues where the Asian mainlanders would accuse the Asian Americans of not being REAL Asians. Now that pissed people off. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now I know why. Just because we weren’t born in Asia does not make us less Asian. We just have differences in how we were raised. In essence, we are still Asian.
In Hakka culture, people call foreign born kids “11 points”. 12 points was a whole person, so us, being born outside of Asia were missing one point. When I was a child, I would always mix that term up and end up calling myself “13 points.” I believe that is a much better description of Asian Americans. We have something extra, something special.

~Bree

Are you serious?

21winks — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 08:51:18 +0000

Well, if that wasn’t the most embarrassing experience I’ve ever had in my young adult life? The sense of shame that occurred right after was something I have never, ever experienced before. It was a combination of shock and shame. I wanted to cry rivers, meaning more than one, of tears. I wonder if she knew about it when she went in after me. I was so ashamed, I went and hid in my room. Well, I’ll never do that again.

Now that I look back on it, it truly was embarrassing, but at least it didn’t occur in front of anyone but myself. Only I know about it and I don’t intend on sharing it with others. This probably occurs to people, people of all types, at any point in their lives, all the time. I cleaned up what I did and now I’m off to clean up the last of it.

In the meantime, this will cheer me up.

Thanks for remixes!

Geez, it was truly embarrassing, ya know?

~Murr

A worried homecoming

21winks — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 14:51:48 +0000

With only four weeks before classes are over, I’ve been worried lately about going home. According to the Jamaica Gleaner, about 700 children have been reported missing from January to September of this year. Women and young children have become the victims of recent abductions, rape and murder. I knew home was bad before, but things seem to be getting worse. I suppose things have always gone progressively worse. What exactly has the government been doing? How has the country become so unsafe that its own children can no longer safely go about their business? Intense supervision is needed. Is this the fate of the third world?
I don’t know enough about what’s going on in Jamaica to really say what the causes are and why the government hasn’t acted appropriately. I thought a change in the political party would mean better changes. Who knows what the hell they are doing, if not fattening their back pockets? People back home have asked me if I intend to go back home after my studies and work there. My answer has always been no. My mother has explicitly told me that she will not allow me to live in Jamaica after my studies. Why would anyone return to a sinking ship? But at the same time, I feel like I have this duty to return and help as best as I can, temporarily, of course. There’s no way I can live there permanently; the only thing that keeps me there is my family and friends.
Let’s hope that my six weeks back home will be nice and quiet. Lord knows I need the rest and the study time!

~Bree

The world rejoices to change!

21winks — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 14:41:52 +0000

Last night, something amazing happened. I’m sure there’s no need for me to say what it was. It was certainly an amazing thing for me to experience, as elections for me before had meant school closing, gunshots and rioting for a few days. I love Jamaica, despite all the upheaval that’s there, but last night, I was surprised to hear yells of joy, people about the place crying and screaming. Even the school’s infamous ‘sex-bell’ was rang more than once to celebrate this changing point in American History.
Not only that, I was surrounded by joy and surprise, rather than by fear and apathy. This election meant a lot to people. I realized this when I saw two of my closest friends cried and screamed and dance when Senator Obama was announced as the President-Elect. I was overcome myself; how could I not cry with them? This was something momentous. The crying only became more profuse during Senator Obama’s speech. This time, I cried from my own feelings. The world is going to change. It might not be something big, but at the same time, it’s not going to be the same. But that is what life is about, no? Change and progression, moving from one generation to the next. I’m glad that this happened in my generation. I have memories of crying when September 11 happened and when the Iraqi War started; even though I had been living most of life in Jamaica and was there when that happened did not mean that I could not feel the sadness of those events. People are people, regardless of where they are from. We all feel.
Needless to say, I’m glad that I was here for this historical event. I thank my friends for getting me into this election and making me realize how important it was. I’m also thankful that my school is the way it is. Politics and campaigns, man.
Let the good times roll, ne?

And in terms of how Senator Obama’s win has been receive in the world, here’s an article from BBC.

Asia approves!

~Bree

Yes We Can!

21winks — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 04:15:22 +0000

We did it.

We actually did it!

This is a great day in American History.