Peace

It's been such a long time since I've posted on this!
Sophomore year has been pretty enjoyable so far. I really like it a lot more than freshman year. I love the people that I hang out with (even if they are mostly boys) and I feel better about where I stand in my classes and my involvement in activities outside of school and church. I've gotten to know some more people in my classes and just generally people that I saw a lot of on campus but never really talked to before.
I think subconsciously I've been aware that I've grown really complacent with a lot of things in my life... First off, I was very complacent with my walk with God over the summer. I've slowly grown to be more in awe of God and less.. jaded, I guess. This summer made me realize a lot of things. One of which is that I really rely on the community that surrounds me to continue to grow spiritually. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but I think it's rooted in the fact that I grew a lot as a result of being surrounded by such a strong and tightly knit community, and it means that I have a lot more growing ahead of me..
I'm also really complacent with the group of friends that I have. By no means do I mean that I am unhappy with the group of friends that I hang out with so often now. I often reflect about a conversation I overheard because they were talking about the importance of being closer to your girl friends than your guy friends. A lot of it talked about boundaries and what would happen once your guy friend gets a girlfriend because the nature of your friendship changes after that. I don't think I cross any boundaries with my friends, and I think of them wholeheartedly as my brothers, but I sometimes wonder how a girl who likes them would feel if they knew that there was already a girl who was very close to him...
I know I should try harder to build deep relationships with the girls around me. It's just so much harder. It's so convenient to hang out with Dan and Charles and the other IV boys... they're fun, they understand me and my humor, and it's comfortable. It's easy to just go to them after a long day and have a few good laughs and feel a lot happier when I return to my homework. Girls are just so much harder to connect with... I feel judged more often by girls than by guys and girls like to talk about boys too much. I get along really well with Lily (Orgo lab partner / general study buddy) but she seems to already have a good core group of friends and other than, she just seems to busy to really hang out with a lot. I do adore the girls that I am close to; unfortunately, three of them are off campus and two of them live on Central which is just... separate.

I love writing in this blog because everytime I finish an entry like this, I feel like whatever has been weighing down my heart is lifted.
& I love taking pictures. Whether or not I have my camera, whenever I see something that would inspire me to shoot it, I can only think of the things God has done to create a world as beautiful as this and put someone like me here to live in it.
Might sound cliche, but 100% genuine.

Hello, Goodbye

Ça commence aujourd’hui

Translation: It all starts today
I had to watch this movie today for my French class. It all starts out with a Kindergarten teacher in a small town in France. The town is in a depression and a huge economic slump (sound familiar?). The thing about the movie that struck me the most is what the children had to encounter. The first case was one girl whose mother is a drunk and continues to drink all the time because she has nothing better to do. She can't pay the bills, and as a result, her family has gone without electricity for over 8 months. She talks to the teachers about it, and they try to help, but the government is plagued with complaints and is in debt as well. To avoid everything, she decides to kill her children and herself.
The second case is about a family that is completely unemployed. The parents have lost all hope, so they stop setting the alarm to take their kid to school. The kindergarten teacher tries to convince them that their child's education is something to have hope in, and that even if they don't have a job they should still try to take their kid to school--especially because it's free for those who can't afford it. They do end up sending their daughter back to school, and she manages all A's.
The third case is about a boy who is abused by his uncle. They find marks and bruises all over his body, and the breaking point for the teachers is when they find a gash on his head. The uncle is reported but not without a fight, and he comes to threaten the teacher who reported him. The child is finally separated from his uncle and mom, and it can only be assumed that it is for the better.
Throughout the movie, the teacher tries to gain funding for his school; however, the local government is reluctant, to say the least, to give him any money, and they insist that the parents must pay the $5/month needed to keep their child there. They also refuse to give lunches for the kids because the kids can't eat for free.
That's one of the things that bothered me the most. Will there really be a point where the government will completely ignore the needs of a minority in order to do what they think is best for the majority. Honestly, not using $4 for kids to eat lunch is so depressing. They're only kids, and it's not their fault that their parents are out of work. I dunno, the movie was really sad, BUT the ending was vaguely happy, but my attention span didn't last that long. haha.

Alcohol

Right now, I'm sitting in a Lecture Room in Sanford Building and outside of the classroom, adults are drinking and eating pizza while watching Obama give a speech about something or other. As I passed by the adults who were holding bottles of beer, I realized that I didn't feel anxious the way I usually do around people who are drinking. Even if my fellow college students were of age, I still feel uneasy watching them drink because I fear their uninhibited personalities. How come I don't fear adults when they're drinking?
I realized that I think it's because adults are able to control how much they drink, and they're drinking for social reasons rather than for the clear objective of getting drunk so that you can forget about some of your problems for a few hours. For college students, freshman especially, we don't have a grasp on our tolerance, and being Duke students especially, we think we know everything and that we are good at... just about everything. So when college students drink, they drink to their utmost capacity and I think I fear people's behavior when they completely let themselves go.
When adults drink, I think I unconsciously assume that adults are in control of themselves regardless of whether they are or not, and so I don't feel as anxious about when adults drink. As I hear the clatter of glass bottles hit the bottom of the recycling bin, I don't feel uneasy about who consumed how much and who's acting completely retarded even though many of the adults outside have very impaired judgment.

Muddy Waters

Life is moving pretty quickly now; not much time to mull over my thoughts (that, and I'm napping a lot recently).
Some things to talk about later:
-French views on Christianity (& Americans' relationship with love)
-Early morning tennis
-My need for sleep
-Friend group
-How disgusting the bathroom gets over a weekend

Beautiful Weather

Definition of yesterday :) Fun tennis with good pictures + yummy bubble tea and American-Chinese food.
Today was a long day.. finished Physics Lab early, and I really like my lab partner. He's really smart, but I feel like he's gay but just doesn't know it yet. Anywho. After dinner I had to go back to East Campus to go table for FEMMES. It's so weird being on the side that's trying to hand out the flyers rather than being the Freshman trying to avoid eye contact so I won't have to carry papers while I'm getting food. I really like the girls that I work with for FEMMES; somehow, when we come together, we all feed off of each other's really weird parts and become weirder collectively as a group. It's all good, and I'm really glad that I found this group. :)

Mondays

This morning started off with rain. Rain coupled with longest day ever = grumpy and reluctant-to-go-to-class Angela. I trekked off to Orgo recitation at 8:45 this morning. Of course, I couldn't find the classroom, so I was late. I went to French class, and it has shrunk again--from the original 10, only six remain. I want to get closer to the group of girls in my French class, but it's so odd. We have this common interest in French, and we have a bunch of other things in common, but it seems like we're in such a rush to leave and head off to our next class that we just don't bother to get to know those around us. It's funny how if any of those girls were Asian, I wouldn't feel as wary about approaching them and getting to know them. Yesterday, I found out one of the girls in my class is half Chinese and half French (how cool is that) and I automatically felt like I wanted to get to know her more. It's so stupid when I think about it, that I want to get to know people who have a similar cultural background as me when there are plenty of other people out there who may not have a similar cultural background but have ideas that are similar to mine. Even if they had ideas that challenged my own, that wouldn't be so bad. I don't know. Why is it so hard to approach fellow students? It really shouldn't be that hard.
Anyway, the rest of my academic day passed by uneventfully. I had dinner with Sarah Chang, and it was really fun. It's cool how she isn't any different even though she's married and all. Kinda crazy. I can't imagine being 25 and already married... there's just too many opportunities out there that are much more easily accomplished if you don't have kids. haha
Finalement, I thought of some culture differences that we talked about in French class today. It's so interesting some of the things France values versus America. French people don't talk to strangers because conversation creates a bond and they don't want to create bonds with people they will never see again. They also close their shutters at night because the house is a private space. Whenever they meet new people, they never ask for names or occupations because that kind of thing is too personal. Instead, they argue about politics and current events. They have a very fluid concept of time which is why they are sometimes obscenely late for things and it really just doesn't matter. Finally! They also think that political figures' only job is to govern rather than being a role model or to have high moral character aside from the government.
I guess some of those things just blow my mind. It'd be so cool to just go up to a stranger and start talking about politics and just walk away without ever knowing his name. At the same time, I don't think I could ever have a fluid notion of time. People have got to be on time.