One Night in Beijing 2011

I finally have time to sit down and write about ONiB… it was AWESOME this year :)  It was basically my entire life this semester, and I’m really glad it worked out, because confession: This is the first event I have ever been in charge of organizing.   I never volunteered to organize anything in ARCC before, and I only did ONiB because Jack nominated me.

It was pretty stressful, but because I followed what Jack did last year pretty closely, it really wasn’t as bad as everyone thinks it was.   I set everyone’s deadlines really early so that when things fell behind we were still okay, and I think I avoided anybody pulling all-nighters.  I did have to pick up some other people’s jobs that weren’t done on time, but luckily I had a light semester so I did not have to pull any all-nighters myself.

I’m really proud of myself, because as I said, this is the first thing I’ve ever organized, and it was such a HUGE first responsibility.  I remember during my election speech last year I was asked if I would be able to do it because I was so quiet and soft-spoken – but I’m sure everyone I yelled at this year knows I’m the opposite when I need to be!  I still remember during my Microsoft interview, they decided that I was “pretty social” so they switched my developer interviews to program manager interviews.  They asked me: If someone wasn’t doing their job, would you be able to remove them?  I couldn’t answer with a definite answer at the time, but now I know that I am definitely capable of running a group and getting things done if other people don’t.  Although I would rather be a developer than a program manager, I wish I could redo the interview now, as I’m sure they would love all the experience I had running ONiB.

Jack will try to take credit for this year’s success, what with all the extra rooms he booked and his “ONiB doc”, but to be honest, I only looked at the doc once at the beginning of fall semester :P

Here are some highlights :)

As an MC: modern-day (fobby) Chinese mom

Modern-day mom: Aiyah!  Ni zenme hui shi??? *smack*

Now as a Tang dynasty mom

Fusion scarf dance

Up high… hehe

Umbrella dance as part of fashion show!

Fashion show in my awesome contemporary qipao

Funny expressions #1: Running around giving flowers / chocolates / personalized cards to all choreographers, singers, and MCs

Funny expressions #2: Jack gave me Medium Panda!  I look like I’m crying but I wasn’t…

Everyone :)

They signed a card for me <3

Part of the ONiB decorations

They also signed it for me… aww <3  I love everyone in ONiB this year

Watson

IBM’s Watson came to CMU today, and they played a Jeopardy game with Watson, a team of 3 CMU students, and a team of 3 Pitt students.  When the Pitt dude was introducing their team, he said that they had 3 students here from their honors college.  Then the CMU dude introduced our people… and was like, “We like to think of all of CMU as an honors college.”  Zing!

My Chinese friend was on the CMU team and was the only non-white competitor, which I thought would be an advantage for us, but they lost the question where the answer was Chinese!  They were given two words and have to answer with the language of origin; in this case they were given “KOWTOW, CATSUP”.  To be fair though, I think both of those are from Cantonese… I was excited I knew it!

Watson completely destroyed both teams.  Sadly, we lost to Pitt :(

CMU team, Watson, Pitt team

CMU: $7463, Watson: $52199, Pitt: $12937

What I learned in Chinese class (a rant)

We started a new chapter in Chinese today, and the topic involves love and marriage in today’s China. Apparently, my views on love and marriage are vastly different from those of the other students.  Their ideas and thoughts are pretty shallow… I’m not saying I’m not, because everyone is to some extent, but I thought this sort of thinking died out long ago.

To some extent, I can agree with people who believe you should look for a partner that has a stable job and makes a lot of money.  But their reasoning is so selfish.  I would want someone with a good job because it demonstrates that they are responsible and willing to put time and effort into something important.  However, people were saying that women want to marry a man that makes a lot of money so that the man could support them.  I can’t believe people are still saying this nowadays.  Women now can definitely support themselves.  Why do so many women argue that they want to be equal to men, yet believe the man should still support them?  I know for a fact that I can get a good job and support myself, and would never sit on my ass all day mooching off my husband; in fact I don’t even need a husband to live comfortably.

So many girls I know think the guy should pay for all their dates, yet expect the guy to treat them as an equal.  This is why I hate the “pretty girls” that take advantage of guys to get free drinks and food.  I believe both the husband and wife should contribute to supporting their lives together.  In time the type of contribution may change, for instance when they have kids and one parent stays home to watch them, but I get so angry at the stupid girls that want to marry a dude and just sit at home while he does all the work.  If I want to splurge on a vacation or something, I’m not going to use my husband’s money – I’m going to use my own, because I’m the one that wants to do it.  Once, somebody said about a friend, “She is so lucky, her boyfriend makes so much money!”  I was so pissed.  Not only were the girl and her boyfriend both the same type of engineers, so their incomes would be relatively the same, why is it “lucky” for a girl to get a rich guy?  She can support herself!  And the speaker was female too!

In class people also discussed what “romantic” things guys should do for girls.  Everything was completely materialistic.  Flowers, chocolates, nice dinner out.  I suspect these people also want an expensive engagement ring and bank-breaking all-out wedding.  None of these things have anything to do with love!  They all have to do with money and appearances!  I’m not saying I wouldn’t appreciate them, but this should not be something you demand.  I don’t want someone to buy me flowers and chocolate – that shows nothing except that you are willing to throw money away for me.  I would rather have something hand-made that showed they spent time and effort.  I’m not saying I don’t ever want to go out for a nice dinner, but I would much rather have a home-cooked meal – or even better, cook the meal together!  (Sorry my meals always involve bacon, Jack ^^;)  I don’t want some expensive engagement ring – people mostly just want them for show because they are shallow and care about appearances, and it’s not like the worth of your ring reflects in any way the strength of your love.

I love hand-made cards.  I love cute piggy photo stories.  I love random little post-it notes stuck on the door.  I love making dinner together.  I love playing video games with (or against) each other.

I love you Jack!  Can’t wait to see you again for spring break <3

Thanksgiving 2010

Sitting in bed browsing the internet all day, Hokkaido buffet and Harry Potter later tonight. Pretty lame Thanksgiving… the best part is not doing work all day despite planning on using Thanksgiving to catch up on work >.<  Oh well, this is my last Thanksgiving not at home, next year I’ll have my own place!

I might as well pretend to be productive and make myself some to-do lists.

For Monday: Chinese essay, Chinese presentation, chess lab, embedded lab part 2, robot obstacle avoidance
Next week: edit Chinese essay, present Chinese presentation, finish chess lab, finish embedded lab, finish obstacle avoidance and combine with other code
Finals week: study for exams, clean my room, pack for winter break
Winter break: make a new layout for BaconFriedRice, update ONiB doc, ONiB script, reserve ONiB dance rehearsal rooms, make responsibility lists for ONiB board members, make sure ONiB board members are doing their jobs, get sick of ONiB, work on PiggyTD, blah blah blah

Free Penguins game

These last two or three weeks have been so busy and stressful, this is the first time I’ve been able to sit down and do something non-productive.  I’ve consistently had career fairs or interviews or exams or homework or ONiB preparation or some ARCC event… It’s made me so tired that I’m either working or sleeping (note the lack of eating).  Saturday night I slept for 12 hours, went to dance practice at 12:00pm, then went back to sleep 3:00pm-9:00pm!

The TOC was okay.  I talked to a lot of companies the first day, including talking to four alumni.  I was going to go again for the small window of time I had the second day, but I ended up having a Qualcomm interview during that time.

I wasn’t expecting to have interviews that quickly, so I wasn’t that prepared for the Qualcomm interview Wednesday the 15th… other than asking me about projects on my resume, he asked me to write a tweaked version of the atoi function.  The next Tuesday I had my Microsoft and Citadel interviews.  I actually studied for these, but I never needed anything I studied!  Microsoft was pretty good.  The interviewer used to work with processors, trying to improve branch prediction, so he was really interested in the 18-447 processor.  I was surprised at the coding question, because it didn’t really require any special knowledge, but I guess it was just to see how I think.  Citadel… haha.  Let’s just say I know ABSOLUTELY nothing about finance and they’ve already rejected me :P  The interviewer kept asking if I read things like the Wall Street Journal, etc. and I was just like …no…

I have a GE interview on Friday and an Exxon interview next week.  I’m feeling good after getting five interviews, but honestly… none of them are in locations I want to work and I think I would only want to work at two of the companies.  The closest location would be Qualcomm, but it’d most likely be in San Diego… Jack got to choose to go to Santa Clara, but I interviewed with QGov, the division that works with the government, so I’m not sure I’d have that choice if I got the job x.x

I’m just going to have to wait for Cisco to tell me if they’re giving me full-time.  Why do they give their offers so late??? >.<

Anyway, on to the Penguins game.

My suitemate won free tickets to the Penguins vs. Blue Jackets game on Saturday (this was the game where all tickets were given away for free), so she took me to see them.  We sat really high, but it was right in the middle between the two goals, so the view was good.  I did not expect so many fights!  There were five fights that resulted in penalties, but there were a few fights that were stopped by the referees early enough not to warrant any penalties.  After the very first fight, Letang (#58) took off his helmet and my suitemate was just like, omg so manly… I have to agree :)  I mean, look at him (as a side note, when I found this photo online, the filename was sex_hair.jpg):

Penguins won that game… although it was only a pre-season game, so it wasn’t that important.  Also, there was a couple sitting beside me that had their baby girl with them.  She was adorable – they had her decked out in Penguins clothing, and even a little Penguins hat.  They put noise-cancelling headphones on her so that she wouldn’t be too bothered by all the noise; I even saw her fall asleep at one point.  So cute!

ONiB meetings are starting up soon – I’m going to set the board application deadline to next Friday, and start meetings the Thursday after that.  I’m going to be so busy!

I ramble too much.

Off-schedule already…

Went to the TSA/ASA/etc. Labor Day party yesterday.  We were planning on getting on the 11:30pm bus, but there were SO many people that we didn’t end up getting there until 12:30am because not everyone could fit on the bus.  It was PACKED.  There were so many sweaty dudes all over the place.  Oh well, it was fun, and I got a good use out of my new dress!

I think I’ve ruined my sleep schedule.  I woke up in time for a lunch today, but took a nap at 6:00pm.  I meant to only sleep until 7:00pm, but that totally didn’t happen – I just got out of bed at 11:30pm.  I also didn’t get any work done today.  I think I’ll stay up late to get work done, since I seem to be most productive late at night, and sleep in tomorrow, then just do work until around midnight and try to sleep then.  I need to stop staying up until 3:00am just to talk to Jack >.>

I’m still not sure how I feel about being a senior.  I’m looking forward to graduating and living in California, but I’m scared of having to find a job first.  I’m so terrible at technical interviews.  I’m worried I’ll be a failure and not find a job at all.  But Jack said he’d support me anyway, RIGHT??? :P

I miss my cats.

EDIT: I changed the temporary theme since you (Jack) were complaining about it.  I’ll find time to make a real one featuring Piggy, probably after TOC.  Also, I guess I miss you too.

Chocolate chip pancakes

First day of classes is over. I never realized living on campus was so convenient! Especially with food right downstairs. I’m a bit worried I’ll get fat if I only eat campus food though.

I’ve only been to two classes so far, and both look pretty fun. I was really worried about Chinese at first, but it’s not as bad as I had imagined. The only downside is that the majority of the book is in simplified >.> I’ll just have to actually learn to recognize simplified, like I was supposed to the last two years…

Survey of Western Music History is pretty interesting, and it doesn’t seem like I’ll have to do much for it. I wish he had a list of music he plays in class though, because there was one he played today I really liked. No idea what it’s called. It’s even seemed to have changed since Jack took it, so I don’t have to take listening tests!

I think all my free time will be spent on ONiB. Not too much right now other than figuring out dates for auditions and booking the rooms, but I want to get a good head start. Most importantly, I need a script writer…!!!

In other news, I miss Jack.

Piggy kiss