Three Words For Me

Among all foods existing in the world, sweets are the best to me. I specifically love chocolates. I love it when chocolates melt softly in my mouth. I love the bittersweet taste of cacao. I also love coffees. Many students drink coffees in order to stay awake all night and finish their assignments. But for me, coffee is like a can of coke you carry around and drink whenever you want. Coffee is like a perfumed soap full of pleasant scent. I really love the bitter taste of coffee and its own scent. Coffee gets even tastier with cream on it. I love caramels as well. It’s sugary and sticky taste makes me enchanted. One similarity among these three ‘best foods I like’ is that they are all brown. Not that I like those because I like brown. It’s just that, somehow the top three foods I like are all brown. Coincidentally, people usually state ‘brown’ when I ask them what color I go well with. This answer is largely due to my appearance, since my hair is far from black as Korean. My hair is more of a brown. My skin is dark, which makes people think of ‘brown’. I have brown eyes too. Anyway, ‘brown’ somehow fits perfectly to my taste and my appearance.

Grown-ups often say I’m a very unemotional for a teen. They say I’m heatless, zestless, and passionless. This is partly true. I was never fanatically plunged into something. I never cheered out loud or cried out loud. But I can assure I’m not an unemotional person. It’s just I don’t enjoy showing my emotions to others too much, especially grief. I desperately force back tears when people are around me. I also care much about people around me, but do not show my attention much. Ironically, my friends say I’m honest (or sometimes frank) because I am straightforward. So I am a lake. A lake that is transparent, but really we don’t get to see the floor of the lake. Underwater, there are thousands of fishes, plants, and little creatures. Under the clear, blue water, lake hides everything.

I like music. I started learning piano when I was five, but unfortunately quitted when I was ten. But I did attend several concours and won some prizes, and as soon as I quitted piano, I started playing violin for four years. Then after my violin teacher went over to Germany, I learned viola from my mom’s friend. After coming to KMLA, I got in FITM, a band. I learned bass guitar from one of seniors. I also learn 가야금 from In Soohyun teacher in Music class. Since I can’t have viola lessons here in KMLA, I got in KMLA Orchestra and keep playing viola. I like music. I like playing instruments I can play. However I don’t play any pipes. I have small lung capacity, so whenever I try to play wind instruments I feel dizzy and fail to make proper sounds. I like playing piano but I can’t make grand sounds well since my hands are small and fingers are short. But with my five fingers each hand, I can play whatever song. I feel thin strings sliding on my finger, vibrating, and making sounds. String is the best word representing me.

Six Ways to Save Internet

I felt like jabbing wordsmart words into my essay..And this definitely needs to be revised :( I really should work on my vocab more!

SIX WAYS TO SAVE INTERNET




  There are certain changes that we can’t simply preclude. We can’t repudiate 솓 wide usage of electric devices and get rid of them. One day you suddenly notice these subtle differences. Perhaps the most pivotal change is rapid technological development of the Internet.



  Sir Roger McNamee articulately introduced six major hypotheses of changes in Internet. ‘Six ways to save Internet’ is what he said, but personally, hi hypotheses were more of a list than suggestions to save the Internet. Anyway, here are his ‘six ways’.


  First, /;Windows is dying." This outspoken quote has nothing to do with denouncing Microsoft or anything. This is just one exemplary case that shows the swift from desk-top computers to smart-phones. This is admissible since people seem to do everything with their mobile Internet services including banking, ticketing, downloading, everything.

  Second, "index search has peaked." Google was a dominant index when Internet was something ‘unprecedented’, ‘open-source’, ‘long-tail’ with no leader. But he clearly showed how the Internet changed in the sense of a new growing industry, with the rise of innumerable rivals of Google such as Wikipedia, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and so on.

  Third, "Apps beat Web." While the World Wide Web is an open source absence of secure, Apple had developed a ‘branded’, ‘value-added’, ‘copy right-protected’ Apps, and as a result, people chose Apple.

  Fourth, "HTML 5 changes it all." In 2010, the debate was commodity and the app store. In 2015 and later, it is differentiated verses monetizable. However, these issues coalesce at one point; app store verses highly differentiated content. Mr. McNamee explained that html 5 is a profound programming language where the entire website can display all content without a flash box.

  Fifth, "Tablets". If someone asks sir Roger McNamee the reason why Windows is dead, he would probably answer ‘tablets’.

  Finally, social platforms. All social networks-Facebook, Skype, Twitter, and Yelp-are following the Zynga model.




  This was a concise summary of Mr. Roger McNamee’s speech on ‘six ways to save Internet’. Overall, the speech was very novel. Mr. McNamee had accurately pointed out the six important changes in the Internet with his acute discernment. He refreshed the speech with candid words and prevented it from being overly didactic. This reminded me of a news I saw a few months ago.

http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews.com/notitas-de-noticias/details/hispanic-standout-thomas-suarez-self-taught-iapp-creator-and-ted-event/11793/


  The era, which someone who can expedite the speed with better technology, is gone. What we need is an ability to innovate. No special technology is required. In an open Internet, where six billion people can freely access it, how toake the Internet ubiquitous and accessible to more people has become the main issue. Mr. McNamee was right. The swinging pendulum of technology has a fixed point. We always pursue highly differentiated content. Whatever content exists now, our goal has always been developing new, differentiated content. This is where we need our creativity. The phras, ‘We need our creativity’, sounds like the most hackneyed phrase in the world. However, I believe this actually describes our world today. "Be creative." "Be a predecessor of this world rather than being a follower who hardly keep up with all the changes."

WHAT ALL WOMEN LIKE-THEIR TWENTIES!

▷ALL WOMEN LIKE THEIR TWENTIES, DREAM ABOUT THEIR TWENTIES, AND REMENISCE ABOUT THEIR TWENTIES◁


     Age ‘twenty’ is the best period of life to every people. Twenty is when you can enjoy your freedom to the fullest. Twenty is the last period you can be free from responsibilities. Twenty is the age you can make romantic stories in your life. And twenty is the age you have all the open opportunities and chances. But somehow, ‘twenty’ seems to be more special to women, typically.

     A teenage girl wakes up in the morning disheveled. She has a light breakfast, brush her teeth and wash her face. Then, she finally gets into the real important procedure of her morning. She sits in front of the mirror. She takes out her pouch. Blusher, ready. Mascara, ready. Lip gloss, ready. After she finishes adorning her face, she gets to the next stage. She take out a curling iron, heat it, and then wave her hair. Final stage. She opens her wardrobe. It’s a fashion emergency, again. She think of every possible clothes she can wear, and after careful consideration, she finally makes her decision of which cloth to wear. All set. The girl leaves to school.

     Yes, in their daily life, teenage girls take exceptionally much care of how they appear. They love to go on a shopping spree looking for cosmetics and clothes. They spend much time looking in the mirror, including morning. They love proms. They love preparing for proms, searching for the best high-heeled shoes and low-cut dresses. All their behaviors meet at one will-will to look like a ‘cool twenty’.

     I returned home after two exhausting weeks in KMLA. I had a lot of things I wanted to talk to my mom. Good news, bad news, and personal agonies, I had hundreds of issues to say to my mom. But when I got off a bus, my mom hugged me. I was a little embarrassed because we haven’t had hugs since I was an elementary kid. Anyway, she used her childlike charms as she nagged, saying “Inhee, your sister doesn’t answer my phone calls. Help me, help me!” So what came to my mind was, she was becoming ‘cuter and younger’. Then I thought, she isn’t the only grown up woman who is becoming ‘cuter and younger’.

     Walking down the street you can see women in their middle age with a big yellow ribbon on their head. They wear sparkling clothes and short skirts. They wear pink hair band sometimes, and accessorize themselves with fancy shining jewelries. They get Botox to smooth their creases. Wishing to have a soft skin like babies, they do heavy make-ups. They, especially Korean women, dye their hair light brown. They truly wish to go back to their ‘vigorous twenties’.




     Dreaming about twenties and reminiscing about twenties are all good. These longing hopes can vitalize one’s life. I mean, I’m not too critical about women loving their twenties, as I’m one of those ‘women’. One little hope of mine is that, no one will go too far. :)

Cinema Paradiso

     Once there lived a boy who truly loved films. The time he lived was late 1940s, in Italy, and everybody was having a harsh after-war life. His name was Salvatore (but he was more often called Toto), and he had his best friend Alfredo, who was also his best mentor. Salvatore picked up operating movie projector. In those days, movies were censored, and Alfredo cut out films containing kissing scenes and put them on floor. One day, the movie house was on fire. Salvatore saved Alfredo’s life in the fire, but Alfredo got blind. New movie house was reconstructed, and Salvatore became a new projectionist of the movie house. Time passed, and Salvatore had his first love threshing his mind. Elena was daughter of a wealthy banker, and knowing his daughter was in love with a poor Latino, Elena’s father moved away with her. With broken heart, Salvatore left the town. He became a famous film director. After decades, Salvatore received a call telling Alfredo’s death. He returned to his forgotten hometown. What was waiting him was his family, married Elena, and finally, a gift Alfredo had left for Salvatore. It was a collection of kissing scenes that was cut out of the reels in the old days.

     This the whole story line of Cinema Paradiso. As to be one of the most seen movies in the world, this movie’s plot seems a little too dull. So this movie has several factors, other than its plot, that makes it so special. And perhaps, music is the most outstanding factor.

     There are three major songs in this movie: Cinema Paradiso, Toto and Alfredo, and Love Theme.

1. Cinema Paradiso

     As you can see in the title, Cinema Paradiso is the main soundtrack of this movie. This song usually appears in scenes related to the movie and film. When a new movie house opens because the old one got burnt, when Salvatore visits the movie house ‘cinema paradiso’ decades after he’d been there, and when ruinous movie house cinema paradiso is demolished, the main theme song flouts out.

2. Toto and Alfredo

Toto is a nickname of Salvatore when he was a boy. Thus, the song Toto and Alfredo often appears in the first half of the movie, focusing on the relationship between Toto and Alfredo.





This song can be divided into two parts. First half of the song has vivacious melody and quick rhythm. This part of the song usually floats when Alfredo can still see, and when their relationship is pretty simple and peaceful (as a friend of each other).

Second half of the song usually comes out in a heavier atmosphere. Scenes with this melody usually contain earnest conversations between Toto and Alfredo. Most of the time they talk on projectionist’s future and Toto’s love story. As a life mentor of Toto, Alfredo gives many valuable answers to Toto’s problems. This song appears last when Toto leaves his hometown, waving good-bye to Alfredo.

 

3. Love Theme

In fact, there are two versions for this one song-one for string version and one for orchestra version. Though, they both come in much more serious situations than other songs. When Salvatore is broken-hearted by Elena, when Salvatore counsels with Alfredo about love, and finally, when Salvatore watches the last film of kiss collection Alfredo had left for him.

My Subjective Review
Content/Structure ★★★★☆


▶I found the content of this movie a bit insipid. A story of a child growing up and eventually reminiscing his childhood after a long way around is one of the most commonly used synopsis. However, I liked the way movie was organized. The movie starts with adult Salvatore. Then it flashbacks to his childhood, and then returns to adult Salvatore.




Soundtrack ★★★★★

▶Soundtracks from this music is quite well-known. (I heard that Minjok Orchestra is performing ‘Love Theme’ for the school music concert thing this Saturday.) But other than the music’s’ artistic value, consistency of relationship between the music and movie scenes makes the moviegoers to associate the movie house and this song unconsciously, which definitely helps them to fall into the movie.



Creativity/Novelty ★★☆☆☆

▶Despite my personal preference for this movie, I do not think the movie Cinema Paradiso is so much novel.



Casting ★★★★☆

▶Among my ‘subjective’ evaluations, I think this category includes my subjectivity the most. I personally thought young Toto performed very well in his age. Alfredo’s affable appearance fits well to Alfredo’s character, too.

Metafiction

     It is raining outside. I squeezed my eyes shut, with a blanket pulled over my head. I gave up counting numbers when I reached three hundred. No use, I realized. The night was exceptionally quiet and dark. But somehow I couldn’t fall asleep. The sound of rain, the ticking of the clock, even the sound of my own breathing… Everything bothered me. I mussed up my hair irritably. I got out of my bed and shuffled across the room to the window. My head lolled on it. I felt the pattering of raindrops on my forehead through the cold window. Looking down the empty, gray street, I felt like being in that rain. I paddled to the veranda with my red slippers on. My thin pajamas let in a lot of cold. I shivered slightly. The early morning street is very still. While I looked at the street for about half an hour, nothing changed. I have a weird feeling that I don’t know how to describe it. A strange, weird feeling…

     I decided to go out. I really wanted to be in that raing. Really. I opened the frontdoor and creeped out. Then I noticed, I didn't bring my umbrella. Oh well, I thought, it doesn't matter. And that was when I found that girl crouching under the streetlght. I decided to approach her. The splashing sound broke the silence of morning street. I stopped. She glanced at me, and looked back down, stirring the puddle. I was surprised that her face was very unfamiliar. If she was my neighbor, she should be familiar, but I've never seen her face before. I thought, maybe she's a homeless. I felt a need to know who she is, so that at least I could seek some ways to help her.

     "What are you doing there?"
     She looked up, and again, looked back down. She didn't answer. I asked again.
     "Hey? What are you doing there? Do you live here?"
     She stared at me. Then she answered.
     "I'm drawing. And yes, I live here, ma'am."
     This peculiar girl stimulated my curiosity. A girl who got rained all on her, who is my neighboer yet I've never seen her before, who goes out to street in the early morning, and who draws on water with finger.
     "Drawing? With your finger?"
     "Yes, ma'am. Since I don't have a pencil right now."
     I wanted to hear more. And she did for me.

     I don’t write when I hold a pencil. But that’s not because I have a terrible penmanship. Well, I DO have bad writings. When I write something, others say it’s hardly readable. But that’s not why I don’t write. I don’t write because I’ve got a better thing to do with my pencil. It is drawing. I love drawing, especially drawing with a pencil. Wherever I go somewhere, I used to bring this tiny little pencil with me. Whenever I see something, or most of the time, see somebody worthy of drawing, I take out my pencil and draw. On any ‘draw-able’ surface, I would draw. Sometimes people looks at me oddly when I take out my pencil in restaurants and draw on napkins. But, it is my way of leaving memory. Just like some musicians who make songs to save their moment emotions, and just like some writers who write literatures to express their sentiments into words, I draw. With my 2B pencil, I draw.

     I especially enjoy drawing people’s face. I enjoy catching very tiny differences between people’s faces. Some have sharper noses. Some have higher cheekbones. Some have curlier hair, and some have exceptionally straight hair. Skin texture differs from people to people. Old people have their wrinkles, no matter how much they try to hide those. Babies have very soft and smooth skin that no other has. Men usually have a stronger feature than women. It’s not about having bigger eyes, higher nose, and thicker eyebrows. There is a slight difference that can’t be expressed into words. I love getting detailed differences and imagificating those on a blank paper.

     It was a life-long dilemma, drawing. My mom hated me drawing. She always expected me to sit down in front of a desk, hold pencil, and study. Ironically, she used to be a photographer. She has six cameras in our house, and there are few pictures in frame that she took in her old days. I don’t know much about her being a photographer, since as far as I remember, she was just a housewife. I don’t understand. Why would a person who used to be a photographer (which can be said to be one kind of artist) disdain her daughter drawing? Though, I agree that I am not academically great. Since the first year in school, my grades were way down on Cs. The only subject I was good in was Mathematics. Without spending much time studying math, I could get As in math. But other than that, my report card was mainly full of Cs. She always tried to make my grades A, but that was simply impossible. So when she first found me drawing, she was furious. She took my drawing, and tore the paper into pieces. “If you have any time to waste drawing such things, memorize one more word”, she said. I didn’t say anything. From then, I started drawing when my mom wasn’t around me. The final products were put on my shelves. When the number of drawings exceeded forty, I bought a binder. Soon within a year, the binder got full, and I had to get another one. When I bought a binder and got home, my mom asked me suspiciously why I needed two binders. I was embarrassed for a second, but I answered with a straight face, “Our homeroom teacher told us to get a binder for each subject.” My mom nodded, still looking me with a suspicious look, but she didn’t do any further. By the year I got eleven, I had four binders.

     It was when I became sixth grade that I met a person who appreciated my drawings for the first time of my life. I was the only one in the class room. I looked at a school yard during recess time, and found a boy throwing a soccer ball. He looked like a first or second grader. As soon as I saw him, I started to draw him. I was having a hard time drawing beads of sweat on a boy’s forehead.

“Is that Bred?”

     Someone asked. I looked back.

     “Ms. Dempsey.”

She was my homeroom teacher. She asked again.

“Is that Bred you’re drawing?”

I stared at her. I didn’t know the name of a boy I was drawing. I finally answered.

“Maybe, though I’m not sure.”

“Why don’t you color him? He looks a bit exhausted in the picture. Guess it will be more vivid when you color this.”

Well, there it goes. I don’t color my drawings. Never. And that’s partly because I’m a color blind. Being a color blind doesn’t mean you can’t see any colors, but it does mean that you can hardly see colors. For me, distinguishing green and grey and red is an overwhelming task. I can distinguish yellow and blue from other colors. In fact, yellow and blue is the only color that I can see. What people call as green, pink, orange, red, it’s just all same as gray to me. After a while, I answered,

“I can’t.”

She looked at me with curiosity. I felt a need to explain more to her.

“I can’t see colors.”

“Ah,” she exclaimed. Then she nodded. She ruffled my hair, and left the room.

Since then Ms. Dempsey paid much attention to me. Whenever she found me drawing, she approached me and asked me few questions. She eventually got to know how my mom detests me drawing. So she promised me not to tell my mom a word about me drawing all day long in school. She also got to know that I draw people’s faces most of the time.

“How about drawing some other things? You could draw our school building. You could draw a baseball glove over there. You could draw that big oak tree in the school yard. Or you could even draw your own hand drawing.”

There was no reason for me to refuse her suggestion. She looked out for a good teacher to teach me drawing for next few weeks, and she finally found one. Every Wednesday, I went over to Ms. Dempsey’s house and learned drawing from a teacher she introduced to me. Drawing objects were much more exacting than drawing people. I needed to be more accurate when drawing straight lines, and I had to know chiaroscuro. But most of it was fun. Wednesday soon became my favorite day. Ms. Dempsey informed my mom that I was having some kind of a special tutoring from her. My mom was pretty glad that I attended that fake tutoring. I was happy learning to draw, my mom was happy expecting my grades going up, and everything was perfect.

Apparently, my grades didn’t get better at all. It couldn’t get any better since I didn’t put any additional effort on it. My mom got angry and called my teacher. She made an appointment with my teacher the next day after school. She had few appointments with my previous teachers in former days, and most of the time appointments ended without any special points. But this time, I had a weird, ominous feeling.

The next day, my teacher called me to her office.

“Excuse me,” I said, and she turned back at me, smiling.

“Oh, dear. Sit.”

I sat down, facing her. She then suggested carefully.

“How about focusing on drawing? I see a great opportunity of you to be an artist. Or if you think just drawing isn’t enough, you can consider photograph. Photograph could really work well on you.”

“That’s not what I can decide,” I said.

“Yes, sure. So I was thinking… How about persuading your parents to consider the course of yours as an artist?”

That’s impossible, I said to myself. But I didn’t say anything. Maybe, I thought, this really could be an opportunity for me. This could be a chance for me to have somebody on my side, persuading my mom, and my mom might be moved. My head was sending a ‘no’ sign, but my heart was already pounding pleasantly.

But it didn’t take so long for me to notice that my head was right. I waited my mom in my room to come back from school. I looked outside. It was raining. I took out my notebook and tore one page. I started to draw raindrops tapping on the ground. I remembered when I didn’t know how to draw water drops. I once struggled drawing a sweat on a boy’s forehead. But not now. The paper was soon filled with clear loops on a dark road.

And that turned out to be the last drawing I drew. When my mom returned home that day, she headed directly to me and smashed my head. I was confused. Or maybe, I was not. I was somehow expecting my mom to do so, to become violent. She screamed, repeating ‘how dare you’. She then searched my desk and found four binders full of drawings. She threw those out the window. I stared at my works getting wet in the rain. I watched the papers losing its straightness. I watched my drawings getting all blurred.

But I couldn’t stare at my works being ruined by rain so long since my mom started throwing things. Whoa, I felt a life-threatening terror. Really, things were shooting over my head, as if they were to pierce my head. Her scream was piercing my ear. She was INSANE. And she made me quit my school. I didn't even get a chance to say bye to my friends-well, classmates to be exact-and my teacher. She got me receive a home schooling, and got a private tutor for me. Well, I like my tutor pretty much, though.

 

     When she finished up to here, a stranger interrupted her story.
     “Planning to escape, Mitchell? Huh?”
     We both looked at the stranger. She was a woman with umbrella. She appeared to be around her forties, yet her face was all wrinkled.

“No, mom. I was about to go in.”

The girl in front of me answered. I then realized two important facts: one, the girl's last name was Mitchell, and second, a wrinkled stranger was her mother. That strange woman then grabbed Mitchell's arm roughly and dragged her across the street. Mitchell looked back at me for a second, and disappeared into the rainy street. I had to be in daze for a second. I felt like I just heard a one-night dream of a girl. A sweetest, happiest dream the girl has ever had.

The Body

          We often compare our lives to four seasons- spring to childhood, summer to youth, fall to midlife, and winter to old age. Spring is a fresh start. Everything begins afresh. When hearing the word ‘spring’, an image full of cherry blossoms and songbirds singing pops into your head. ‘Summer’ is might be the busiest season of four. The rain keeps blocking your way. Sometimes a disastrous storm rages and makes you return to the initial, so that you have to start over. Thunder crashes the world. But fall, you get relaxed. No more storms, no more thunders or rains, just silence. Sometimes it even appears desolate. Realizing more than half of a year has passed, you feel sad, and suddenly becomes sentimental and introspective. Winter, you watch things leave. All you can do is to vacantly look out living things die and the world freezes. You wait till a year ends.

          The work ‘fall’ mainly has two meanings, first one referring to ‘autumn’ and second one referring to ‘an act of coming down suddenly to a lower position’. The word ‘fall’ from [The Body]’s subtitle. Fall from Innocence, may refer to both of these.

          ‘Fall’ may refer to autumn, when people become introspective. [The Body] is a story of four boys. But before it is a story about four boys, it is a memoir of one person, Gordie. He reminisces his experience of finding the dead body as an adult. So the ‘fall’ may refer to ‘autumn’, with a grown-up man reminiscing his past days.

          ‘Fall’ may also refer to ‘coming down suddenly to a lower position’, and therefore, ‘fall from innocence’ might mean losing innocence. [The Body] is a story of four boys. But before it is a story about four boys, it is a memoir of one person, Gordie. He reminisces his experience of finding the dead body as an adult. Most stories, especially those talking about memories of childhood, have ‘innocence’ as a main theme. Adults, who know their way around, find something valuable in their childhood. Leading a busy, hectic life, they forget their childish innocence and some precious values. They eventually find those in their past life, and start a new life with refreshed heart. Nonetheless, since the title is ‘fall from innocence’, I expect something more than finding the precious value in adult’s overwhelming routine life.

          The story has four main characters. Crazy Teddy who got his head shoved by his father, cool Chris who doesn’t appear to be a model student, and unintelligent Vern who ran two miles to be with his friends. Lastly, Gordie the narrator. As a friend of Teddy, Chris, and Vern, Gordie has his own trauma too. Deep in his heart, he has a wound from his brother Denny’s death. Deep in his heart, he has a hidden but desperate craving to be loved. These four boys, different yet similar, start journey on themselves. Boys’ friendship appears to be different from those of girls’. They aren’t like girls’ intimate, secretive, and quirky. They are more firm, frank, and straightforward. Or maybe this is a bias as a girl who’s never actually experienced so-called ‘man’s friendship’. Teddy, Chris, Vern, and Gordie appears disharmonious on the outside. And I wish to see how friendship works for those four boys.