happily ever after...

i just finished watching "enchanted." and MAN.

in one aspect, it was a terrible, jumbled mess of a bunch of fairy tales jammed into one movie. on the other hand, i absolutely loved it.

it was every bit as cheesy and ridiculous as i had hoped, and just as predictable. i pretty much knew what was going to happen...before it happened. usual.

but now i feel kinda like crap. isn't it great?

i love fuzzy, cheesy, romantic comedies. they leave you happy and makes you feel like you're floating on air. sorta. and i felt like that for all of 5 seconds before i crashed back into reality and got a really big headache.

it's really depressing that there may not be a "happily ever after" ending, or that reality sucks so much. and there's nothing you can really do about it. so now i'm left in this funk, wishing i could sing away my worries like amy adams did as a princess. but it's not possible, so i'm just gonna suck it up, put a fake smile on my face, and pretend that everything's ok.

being in a funk really sucks. i'm not even sure why it's happening, or why it comes so suddenly and frequently. or even why i'm switching the subject to this after talking about "enchanted." but it happens every so often, and i get so blah i just wanna sleep. and sleep some more. or reach into my insides and claw out this blah-ness. i'm not even sure it's something i can really fix.

right now, this funk leaves me feeling like there's a gaping hole in my stomach. it just feels...empty. and i'm not sure why. it sure isn't fun. isn't watching a happy fairy tale supposed to leave you feeling better than this?

slacking off

so i've taken slacking and procrastinating to a whole new level for myself.

i had a test this morning, and i spent all of last night sleeping. yeah, sleeping. not cramming, not studying, not reading, ZIP. i planned on doing all of the above, but after coming home and eating, my body just could not resist passing out. i initially wanted to take a small power nap so i could be refreshed, revived.

i woke up at 7 this morning. granted, i was refreshed, and i'm surprisingly awake right now, but i also hadn't studied. but for some weird reason, i wasn't panicking. odd, huh? instead, i got out of bed, walked to the computer, and quickly crammed everything in about 45 minutes before i went to take a shower. amazing.

the test was actually not that bad either, but this usually means i failed miserably. still, i only left part of my short answer question blank, just the last part of the 3 points i was supposed to make. so i think it's not too bad.

sadly, because of this, i will once again not learn to start studying early, and continue to practice procrastination. especially if my grade turns out ok for this exam.

on a brighter note, it's april fool's day. i racked my brain all morning to think of pranks i could pull on anybody. through all of that, i've realized i'm not much of a pranker. tis a pity, because i think i'm pretty good at lying...not that it's anything to brag about, heh.

i am much too cheery and awake for this hour, it's kinda freaking me out. so i'm going to stop.

cheers.

facebook is the devil

it really is. especially when you're trying to study. i think i'm completely addicted to it, sadly enough.

it's pretty bad when you click the "home" link maybe 10 times in a row, hoping that something will change. but usually, it's always the same. not much happens in the span of 30 seconds.

my head is killing me. organizational psychology blows. i really don't care about the expectancy theory and approaches to motivation. because obviously, i don't have any of that.

something that's really bothering me about this semester is that so many of my classes involve business-y things. now, i'm not a big fan of such, and i've been avoiding taking business classes and put my foot down and refused to major in business. but now, i'm in a business journalism class (sadly, photojournalism filled up pretty quickly. what a bummer.) and i'm sitting here reading my damn organizational psych book, "learning" about how groups work together, and different things managers should do to make a better, happier working atmosphere.

gawd. i hate reading. there really was no point to this post, except to vent, clear my head, and take a break that didn't involve facebook. ha.

fashion at the park

ok, so s'been awhile. i actually think i'm kinda hung over right now. it's a loverly feeling. plus, i just found out that my one class today was canceled. and i had no idea because i skipped last class. i really should look over my syllabus more often.

anyhow, yes, i was able to go to fashion at the park yesterday, and watched two shows. oscar de la renta, and the diesel show. and let me tell ya. it was AMAZING. well, the de la renta show was a lot better than the diesel one, and i really, really, really want one of his dresses now. although i couldn't afford it for my life and i would have nowhere to wear it :)

the diesel show was pretty good. i'm not gonna lie...i thoroughly enjoyed it because there were male models strutting their stuff in their briefs. now add a nice buzz from drinking 3 glasses of champagne, and voila. it's an instant party. i took some video on my camera, so hopefully i can upload it and share with others, although it may make you a bit nauseous; it's probably on par with the blair witch project.

a surprising thing i knew but learned for real yesterday? models too have cellulite. lots of it. kinda surprising, actually, and i felt pretty badly for the girls. i mean, it must be hard to walk the runway half naked, with all these people watching you, and all you can think about is, i hope i don't trip, and i hope my cellulite isn't that bad. or maybe i'm just assuming that's what they think.

and seeing models in real life, they really are ridiculously tiny. and long. and tall. i'm glad not everybody looks like that. because they're freaks of nature...albeit really, really hot freaks of nature. ok. i'm going to stop now because i'm getting a headache. peace out.

naturalization

i'm officially a u.s. citizen now.
but i'm going to refrain from all the fanfare and cheering.
why?
honestly speaking...i feel so indifferent to it.
i returned from the swearing in ceremony about an hour ago. truth be told, i almost dozed off during that time.
still, i did some looking around, and man. everyone else seemed so thrilled and happy about it.
and it honestly was a big deal for some. a "special moment" was what the guy called it.
and i sat there, arms crossed, probably looking pissed off, and feeling a bit jaded.
is it really that great to be called a u.s. citizen? everyone else was waving their little flags around proudly. me? i stuffed it into my purse and didn't think twice about it.
also, everyone receives a certificate and a letter from the president. ha. isn't it lovely?
so what have i garnered from this experience?
how indifferent i am. or maybe it just means that i don't like president bush THAT much.

Virginia Tech Tragedy

No one can truly express in words the amount of shock felt upon hearing about the massacre at Virginia Tech. I don't know anybody at Virginia Tech, but when such horrible things happen, it affects everyone. Plus, the shooter, Cho Seung-Hui, was a Korean like myself. Here and there I have experienced stinging remarks about South Koreans and how terrible we are. But that's a different story.

As soon as news spread about the killings, the media immediately began mass coverage of the event. It was hard to avoid hearing about Virginia Tech; it was every news channel and every Internet site's main story.

On the New York Times site, there is a multimedia package that covers everything from an interactive graphic of Virginia Tech to a video clip of the candlelight vigil held last Tuesday night. There was also a page devoted to the victims of the shooting. Each person's picture smiles back at the viewer, and a rollover contains links to each victim's personal profile and comments left by readers.

It was quite touching to see such a memorial for the victims. Somehow, seeing each individual's picture makes the event seem more real. Virginia seems so far away, with us being in Texas. It really is hard to relate to the pain going through the people who were affected. The sadness I felt was almost tangible, and my heart goes out to their family members who are in much grief.

As for the interactive graphic, it covers in detail the buildings where the shootings took place. It starts out with a map of the campus and shows more detail as the massacre progressed. One particular graphic, showing Norris Hall and listing the death toll. Seeing the squares drawn for every person who was shot was quite impacting. Classrooms full of students and staff were killed and wounded. Honestly, 32 did not sound like such a big number, but seeing and counting those squares...there really were a lot of lives taken.

CNN.com also had special coverage of the shootings. This site had more video clips, probably because CNN is mainly TV news, as opposed to the New York Times. It is also an advantage this site had over the NY Times. Having short video clips is far more convenient than having to read through an online story. They allow the witnesses and other students to speak for themselves, convey their own emotions. One thing I didn't like about the clips, however, was the fact that they were so short. If they had been longer, I think they would be more effective. Sure, the main point of news is to report happenings, but sensationalizing almost seems unavoidable with TV news.

One clip was that which a student had taken on his cell phone. On the shaky video, gunshots are clearly heard popping in the air. It is horrifying and the sounds sent chills up my spine. To imagine that he was so close to the area where the killings took place. But for having survived such a tragedy, and being in such a close vicinity, he was strangely calm as he gave his interview.
Finally, I looked into Yahoo's coverage of the event. Because Yahoo is a search engine and not a specific news medium, most of its news stories were compiled of AP wire stories. It also had a far more information than the other two sites, most likely because it is a search engine and had pulled from numerous sources. In fact, most of the video clips provided were from CNN. Also, Yahoo wasn't as organized into a package as the other two had.

Yahoo's coverage wasn't as appealing as the Times or CNN. Too much information had been tossed together onto one page, but this was also the one advantage I thought it had over the other two. As for the Times, I personally liked this coverage the best. The package included slideshows of photos, video clips, detailed stories, and especially the profiles of the victims. CNN didn't have as much information as the others, I thought, except for the video clips.

Honestly, I was trying to steer away from the coverage of this tragedy as much as I can. I really don't know why; perhaps I'm choosing to stay positive and focus on the positive things that may be happening in this world. Or perhaps I just can't handle tragedy very well. Or maybe, just maybe, it's because the shooter was a Korean, and I feel ashamed at what happened. I don't know. All I know is that I've failed miserably. With so much information available so quickly, it really is almost impossible to avoid.

I hope the nation heals quickly. I've stumbled upon two sites that are dedicated to the tragedy. The first offers a bracelet with the inscription "we are all Hokies" that can be bought. The proceeds will be used to fund the Hokie spirit memorial fund. The other is a memorial to the event and includes a video tribute.

I'll end this post with a tribute video taken from the Facebook group "SMU sends condolences to Virginia Tech."



"Forget any and all college affiliations today.
For today, we are all Hokies."

-- Russell Denney, University of Miami

Nicholas Kristof

Two time Pulitzer Prize winner Nicholas Kristof was at SMU on Tuesday. Unfortunately, I was unable to hear the New York Times columnist speak. The Times Web site has an extensive collection of his work online, so I had to settle for that instead.

According to his Times bio online, he joined the paper in 1984 and started out covering economics and serving as a correspondent in Los Angeles. He also covered the 2000 presidential campaign. He and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn who is also a journalist at the Times, won a Pulitzer prize together, becoming the first married couple to do so. He won a second Pulitzer in 2006.

One clip I watched was "Mukhtar's Refuge." It was hard to tear my eyes away from the screen, even for a mere second. Seeing the surroundings of the refuge, seeing the anguish and injustice lined on the people's faces, left quite an impact. Sure, the story is powerful enough to have some impact simply through writing, but the words alone could not do the story justice. One woman on the clip, whose 11-year-old daughter was raped, tortured and killed, cannot hide her emotions from the camera. As she tells her story, her pained face expression tells of her sorrow, the pain she felt as she found her young daughter's body. She was not able to receive justice from her village or from the Pakistani government. Instead, she had to seek refuge elsewhere.

Another young woman, whose husband forced her into prostitution, also tells her story. She was married to a "gentle" guy whom she later found out owned a brothel. He told her to work there, and upon her refusal, began to torture her family. She assented, and was locked into a room for two years. She managed to escape, but her husband's gang retaliated by kidnapping her 5th grade brother and using him instead. He managed to escape also, and the family went to the police to report the injustice. The police, however, worked alongside with the gang and instead mocked the family.

The young woman sheds tears as she tells her heartbreaking story. The love among the family members is also evident when the brother says he would rather die than dishonor his sister. It was a heart warming, "aww" moment for me, but also sad. Her one-legged father also cries as he tells of his experience of "merciless beatings" from the police, who arrested him. Her mother firmly says that God should not grant daughters to poor people, and that if the family had money, they wouldn't have these problems.

I felt several different emotions watching this clip. Sadness, obviously, and pity, injustice, disbelief, and horror among others. I couldn't stop saying, "wow," for so many different reasons. These emotions would not be as strong had I read this story online. Although I was unable to watch all the clips on the Times Web site, a quick scan shows that his stories are all about people. People who have a certain plight, plights that other people need to know about. There are stories about the Darfur crisis, Pakistani people, AIDS patients, and so much more.

Being in such a safe, comfortable country, we as Americans don't experience genocide, epidemics, severe injustice, or extreme poverty like the people in Kristof's stories. He works make other people aware of the lives of other people, people who live in a country that isn't free, that isn't rich, and that isn't just. I think we forget about these people, being in such comfortable surroundings.

Kristof uses multimedia to his advantage in these stories. The stories use emotion as a key factor in leaving an impression upon the viewer. Watching this clip is far more powerful than if I had read the story online. Truthfully, I wouldn't have read through the whole story, probably skimmed through it. These stories need to be told, and other people need to be aware of such crises. Besides, who can tell one's own story better than that person? No matter how excellent a reporter may be, I don't think he could possibly retell someone else's story with the same emotions she felt, simply because he doesn't have the same experience. That's what Kristof does. He allows the people to tell their own stories. To let their emotions flow onto the film. This is why his method of story-telling is so effective.

I think it's important that such powerful stories be told using multimedia. Sure, some may argue it will become too sensationalized, but the method is effective. Stories should stir something in people, whether it is happiness or shock. Good or bad, if an impact is left in the reader or viewer, I believe the reporter has done a good job. Of course, I don't think multimedia alone will be good. All clips should have accompanying written stories that will go more in depth on the issue. I'm so glad that multimedia packages are becoming more popular. I believe it's the best way to tell stories, especially ones of other people. It spikes interest in otherwise indifferent people. Who knows? Because of such an impacting clip, someone may arise that could make a change. All because, like Kristof said at the end of this clip, "we are watching."