I got it. I really, actually got it. I could kiss someone. I could pinch their chubby cheeks until they kicked me in the shins and I'd still be okay with it. I'm going to Beijing, China to study Mandarin Chinese, the language I've been practicing and learning for three years now--with the US government's help, of course.
After several weeks of calculated fretting and shaping thoughts into those blasted representations of human expression--application essays--I pleasantly discovered that I had been awarded a Critical Language Scholarship. This award is provided by the US Department of State for the purpose of increasing the number of people who are proficient in a particular, high-need language.
I was so lucky to get one. I think when I found out, I nearly cracked in half and oozed onto the floor. I might have pee'd myself a bit in reality. Just a little though.
----
My name is Joseph. I am an all-natural American-born Asian-American conceived and raised in the metropolitan metropolis that is Charleston, West Virginia (the term 'metropolitan' and 'metropolis' are pushed here, but it's still more concrete than most of the state). I am a college student at the moment, but I'm sure that will change in a number of months, as many things do. I am a reluctantly-admitting foodie (something I don't think will change in the coming months) and rather enjoy cooking what I can and trying to cook what I cannot. I find myself doing lots of different, often exciting activities such as parkour and bouldering and fencing, yet wind the pace down with playing music, watching various television programs on the internet, and over-thinking too many things.
I like to think I am a fairly neat person to hang out with.
I am going to be studying at Beijing Language and Culture University in the famed capital of The Middle Kingdom, China. In a little over a month, I could be chewing on beautiful, bronze, authentic roast duck; its sumptuous drippings rolling down my chin. I could be sipping expertly-crafted teas--mere miles from the fields where the same leaves were picked.
I could dance with old people in the park. Because that's a thing. Old people ballroom-dancing like a scene straight out of some vintage movie I've never seen. Really, the possibilities are vast and exciting and wonderful and... a little overwhelming, to be honest. But it will be so much fun, and so exciting, and so...hot (Beijing's summer is infamous, to say the least).
Anyway,
I want this blog to be a way I can transmit these experiences I will be having with anyone who wants to read/listen (conventions for conveying mediums of thought are confusing sometimes, right?). I want it to be a fantastic digital record that can be a little magnified piece of the record that is our human lives. We are all records, after all--records of love and hate, of pain and of joy, of flights and of failures. And if my record can add to the leather-bound tome of our human existence, then I'll have left a small footprint that displaced some of the sand on the ever-shifting shores of time (ha. these metaphors can only get better from here...).
I'd like to share with you a little of my record, and perhaps you can share with me a little of yours... You can expect more writings in the coming months, as well as videos, pictures, and descriptions of food you've only had in dreams that... you've also probably never had. But I'll change that.
Really, while this blog is being created for the purpose of documenting my time in China, I hope to expound it further in the future--time and interest permitting. Check back every now and then for updates! The pace will obviously pick up approaching departure (The whole shebang [huh... she-bang... what? she-bang... hard? shuh-bang. strange.] kicks off the about the second week of June 2012). But who knows? Maybe I'll come across something super-sweet and fantastic that is just dying to have my spin put on it (unlike so many on the internet before me). Until then,
Keep in touch and do good work.
-Joseph
For legal purposes:
*Any views and opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not represent those of the US Department of State or any other official party pertaining to CLS or participating institutions in any way.
After several weeks of calculated fretting and shaping thoughts into those blasted representations of human expression--application essays--I pleasantly discovered that I had been awarded a Critical Language Scholarship. This award is provided by the US Department of State for the purpose of increasing the number of people who are proficient in a particular, high-need language.
I was so lucky to get one. I think when I found out, I nearly cracked in half and oozed onto the floor. I might have pee'd myself a bit in reality. Just a little though.
----
My name is Joseph. I am an all-natural American-born Asian-American conceived and raised in the metropolitan metropolis that is Charleston, West Virginia (the term 'metropolitan' and 'metropolis' are pushed here, but it's still more concrete than most of the state). I am a college student at the moment, but I'm sure that will change in a number of months, as many things do. I am a reluctantly-admitting foodie (something I don't think will change in the coming months) and rather enjoy cooking what I can and trying to cook what I cannot. I find myself doing lots of different, often exciting activities such as parkour and bouldering and fencing, yet wind the pace down with playing music, watching various television programs on the internet, and over-thinking too many things.
I like to think I am a fairly neat person to hang out with.
I am going to be studying at Beijing Language and Culture University in the famed capital of The Middle Kingdom, China. In a little over a month, I could be chewing on beautiful, bronze, authentic roast duck; its sumptuous drippings rolling down my chin. I could be sipping expertly-crafted teas--mere miles from the fields where the same leaves were picked.
Look at it. LOOK AT IT!
I could dance with old people in the park. Because that's a thing. Old people ballroom-dancing like a scene straight out of some vintage movie I've never seen. Really, the possibilities are vast and exciting and wonderful and... a little overwhelming, to be honest. But it will be so much fun, and so exciting, and so...hot (Beijing's summer is infamous, to say the least).
"Why yes, I do need a napkin." Source.
Anyway,
I want this blog to be a way I can transmit these experiences I will be having with anyone who wants to read/listen (conventions for conveying mediums of thought are confusing sometimes, right?). I want it to be a fantastic digital record that can be a little magnified piece of the record that is our human lives. We are all records, after all--records of love and hate, of pain and of joy, of flights and of failures. And if my record can add to the leather-bound tome of our human existence, then I'll have left a small footprint that displaced some of the sand on the ever-shifting shores of time (ha. these metaphors can only get better from here...).
I'd like to share with you a little of my record, and perhaps you can share with me a little of yours... You can expect more writings in the coming months, as well as videos, pictures, and descriptions of food you've only had in dreams that... you've also probably never had. But I'll change that.
Really, while this blog is being created for the purpose of documenting my time in China, I hope to expound it further in the future--time and interest permitting. Check back every now and then for updates! The pace will obviously pick up approaching departure (The whole shebang [huh... she-bang... what? she-bang... hard? shuh-bang. strange.] kicks off the about the second week of June 2012). But who knows? Maybe I'll come across something super-sweet and fantastic that is just dying to have my spin put on it (unlike so many on the internet before me). Until then,
Keep in touch and do good work.
-Joseph
For legal purposes:
*Any views and opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not represent those of the US Department of State or any other official party pertaining to CLS or participating institutions in any way.
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