Huge Update!
Here's something I wrote a while back about ... ya. Just read.
What the hell have I been up to the last 7 days? This is more for me, cuz I wanna remember this event clearly and write about it while it's still in my memory, but you can read if you want to cuz people have been asking "Where'd you go, etc. etc".
I guess I'll write about it now, so read up people, you know you've been waiting for this as if it was Harry Potter 5 or something.
The story starts off with the Warped Tour @ Long Beach on Friday. Went w/ Mike, Katie, and James. Thank you Katie for driving recklessly, I mean... safely. It was tight, got some free swag, bought some shirts, and of course the bands. Got to see: Poison the Well, The Ataris, Western Waste, The Used, Sum 41, Simple Plan, & Talib Kweli (why the hell is he @ a warped tour...). I think that was about it, but each year it seems more teeny (spelled right?) boppers are at the concerts. Like girls who are like 2 years old and "OMG BLINK 182! NFG, SIMPLE PLAN, you're soo hot, etc, etc, etc." Why did I even write that... not sure, I'm still kinda tired/out of it right now and I ... oh ya, because it was hella crowded @ the LB field and they took up a lot of the space, that is why. I had to leave early at about 3ish and I headed down to OC to Freedom Park for the Third International Vietnamese Youth Conference (www.lenduong.net) - click on the left for English if you really want to read about it... But ya the opening ceremony was pretty cool.
So, saw a bunch of vsa people from other schools that i saw before and couldn't remember their name... but ya. It was cool, cept for the fact it was only 3 of us representing for SB (Mike, James, and I). I got put in bus #9, 1 of 3 California busses I think, and we headed down to USD, not UCSD where the conference would take place.
Met up w/ my 'roommates', 4 of us shared 2 rooms, only 2 keys were distro'ed so there was this bullshit about $85 fine if you lose 'em and ya... but got to sleep around 2 or so and it was all early days for the rest of this conference.
Awoke at 7 and went to get breakfast, which was better than Ortega!!! All you SB people know what I'm talking about... but it still sucked. Meeting people, meeting people, meeting people, meeting people, ... most of whom I can't remember their names...
Opening ceremonies were done again, and the conference began, main points talked about in the conference and workshops:
- Human trafficing (sp?)
- Different fundraising approaches
- Charitable Assistance for Vietnam
- Improving living standards in Vietnam - Practical Approaches by Overseas Vietnamese Youths
- Mobilization skills
and lots more... gawd and like 90% of the conference was in Vietnamese + text and programs in Viet and everything... make my life harder please. I don't read/write Viet for those who didn't know, but now I sorta do... read it that is. But ya, it was tiring and shit and a lot of us fell asleep during the talks because of the lack of sleep... In the evening we did campfire song type of stuff, which was kinda cool cuz it was all in Viet and everyone was into it. There was a party after, it was fun.
The next day it was about the same stuff, talking about conditions in Vietnam, etc. etc. We left for the camp in Julian, CA at about 5ish and everyone was in tents. Actually, here's how the set-up worked, there were 4 villages, named after real cities in nam: Hue, Saigon, Hanoi, Nha Trang, and Truong Sa. - The first of which I was in (pronounced Hway). It was tight, mostly Cali people and everyone was down. We got tents, our tent had 4 people and ya, mosquitos suck major ass cuz they bite you soo much at camp. Everyone got bit, I got bit a lot, but not as much as some others, and then when you scratch the bite it's like temporary relief, but then hurts more after and ya... but you still do it, I guess it's like smoking. Yes! Scratching mosquito bites is like smoking, you know by doing it you're only making it worst for yourself, but you still do it cuz it feels good at the moment. But ya... the next day was tight, let me see if I can remember it. We did a bunch of camper hazing, haha, nah. We chilled, got food and stuff (note the food sucked also... bowl noodles in the morning?! Korean bowl noodles?! come on). We got into groups and got that group/camp spirit stuff up, you know w/ the group cheer and all that stuff. It was cool, got to know people on a more personal note, so that was tight. There was a camp fire that night, and we got screwed cuz they messed up the ordering and we didnm't get to go... wah wah wha, ya we were crying, you shoulda been there. So, cards from 11-5AM, 1 game, the game of 13 (fun game). Loser had to get make up drawn on them, it was fun.
The next day... Tuesday? Ya. Nobody in my group woke me up for the hike/scavenger hike, maybe I'm lucky, cuz I heard it sucked ass, 8 miles... hot sun... ya. So, I just ended up helping serve lunch and stuff, I was "that SB guy"... cuz I was like the only SB guy while every other UC had like 10+ members reppin'. But it was cool. Chilled the rest of the day.
We did our skit that night, every group had to do a diss, I mean skit, and ours dissed pretty much every continent there, it was good though, sorta... ya, cept most of it was in English and a lot of the Int'l people don't speak english.
BBQ after... the huge Hue BBQ, but it didn't happen cuz we got bad directions to the food place 40 minutes away... so ya, no bbq, but we did jack food from the dinner bbq, so it was cool we had a good amount. And it was about 40 minutes of beatboxing, which was tight to watch, then we headed over to Saigon (haha... weird to say that), for the 'final' party, and there was a good amount of people there, sorta turned into a rave though. The rest of the night was cards till about 4ish.
Oh ya, this is just flowing off of my memory, the camp director guy had huge sideburns and gloves, so he got nick named "Wolverine"... and another camp director guy was power trippin' soo much, making us line up and deducting points, it was ridiculous, everyone wanted to punch his lights out... eitherway, where was i.
The next day, pack up and back to civilization, the bus ride was tiring as hell, but alright. We headed to the press conference, I'm on the front page of a viet newspaper! (the back of me that is, sitting down... in a room.. w/ the other people, haha). It took way too long, but was alright. Headed to the Anaheim Plaza Hotel after and the rooms were gone, so we gave $ to this guy and he was going to go w/ others to get a room in the nearby hotel, and he didn't come back, so fuck that. We just hung out in Vinh's room and it was about 13 people to a 4 person room. Showered/destickied ourselves, then dinner at this Viet Seafood Restaurant (Nhu Y) in OC, and it was hella good (why am I using hella in my entries, arg). It was to the hotel party after which was really happening. The party was cool, but got shut down at 12 cuz of hotel rules, and cake was thrown EVERYWHERE... it was a mess. Hotel room party now, lots of card games, and ya, no sleep till around 5 I think.
Overall this conference was soo tight, and 'leadership camp' (VSA thing) is suppose to be tight also, so looks like I'll be doing that when that happens. This conference itself takes place every 2 years, it's gonna be @ Australia in 2005, so I'm down for that.
Highlights/summary of the conf:
- Actually wanna take some action to help out Vietnam now and having some ideas about how to do so.
- More of a sense of cultural identity and want to get even more involved in VSA and more UVSA events.
- Meeting lots of people from across the world/nearby (UC schools, Harvard, Yale, Chicago, Oregon, Denver, Kentucky, Canada, New Zealand, Australia... oh ya, story about australia later, Texas, Germany, and a bunch of other countries I cannot remember at this moment).
- Total Zetas @ the conf: 3. Oh, met a xdelt there, she was cool.
- Meeting lots of hot viet chicks from everywhere (emphasis on Texas, France, and Australia).
- Lots of fun, Viet people know how to have fun, and hopefully running into them in 2 years at the next conference.
But ya, there is my like 7 day excursion, down to the wire, most of it.
Also, I realized, actually something I forgot to write about b4 but someone brought it up @ the press conference.
The living conditions that we endured, for the 3 days @ camp:
- limited access to running water
- mosquitos
- hot and humid conditions
- living outdoors
- dirty clothes
- crappy food *actually good by world standards though...
- no electricity
- no communication w/ the outside world really.
- etc.
All of those, what we went through for 3 days, those in Vietnam have been experiencing for decades now... sad, but that really hit home. How we take soo much for granted in life, just warm clothes, a house to live in, food, family, friendster, and an education. Just think about that, all that bullshit people keep saying about kids and others in 3rd world countries starving and dieing each day, illiterate and living in terrible living conditions, it's all true. How a toothache and headache you might be having is more important to you than 10 starving kids DIEING in another country, how we are complaining about how shitty Ortega food is (though it is shitty), and others would eat it in a second cuz they have NOTHING ELSE to eat. Just ya... I'm in one of those 'take action' moods right now, so go me!
So... after the conference and all that stuff.
- I came back the next day to get my sandals (forgot it @ the hotel!) and got some food w/ the friends b4 they left. Went to chill w/ my cousin later that night, stayed over. Chilled... a day passed or so, went to Six Flags w/ my awesome friends (Paul, Varun, Ruben, Tyler, Aaron, Min) and Randy and his friend Julie. It was lots of fun, but the lines were way too long, minus the one for Viper (5 minutes!). Lots of fun! Enjoyed it, was very hot though. After that,... oh, before that and after, watched a lot of Family Guy episodes (thx to my cousin for him letting me borrow his DVDs). So a lot of us chilled and watched it. The day after, a bunch of us (Alex, Paul, Matt D., and David) went to see Bad Boys II, it was really good, + thank you Alex for getting us free tickets! The day continued, chilling w/ Paul, Matt, David, and Brett, it was lots of fun. Card games are fun! Finally that night, went w/ my cousin and his friend to a Thrice autograph signing by Thrice, it was about a 5 hour wait, but because they actually took the time to shake hands w/ fans and stuff. So, I got their new CD, a signed poster, and some pics w/ them, so that was cool.
Following day, chilled w/ Nick, boba run! It was cool, always nice catching up w/ that guy, still one of the few down to earth people from HS.
Lots of stuff to do @ home,... seems like my parents keep finding stuff for me to do to help out w/ the house, and ya, it isn't that bad... helping out is cool. So looks like I'll be here till Sunday I think. So claim me while I'm still here!
Oh, been working on editing some video stuff + the new vsa website... should be fun!
What the hell have I been up to the last 7 days? This is more for me, cuz I wanna remember this event clearly and write about it while it's still in my memory, but you can read if you want to cuz people have been asking "Where'd you go, etc. etc".
I guess I'll write about it now, so read up people, you know you've been waiting for this as if it was Harry Potter 5 or something.
The story starts off with the Warped Tour @ Long Beach on Friday. Went w/ Mike, Katie, and James. Thank you Katie for driving recklessly, I mean... safely. It was tight, got some free swag, bought some shirts, and of course the bands. Got to see: Poison the Well, The Ataris, Western Waste, The Used, Sum 41, Simple Plan, & Talib Kweli (why the hell is he @ a warped tour...). I think that was about it, but each year it seems more teeny (spelled right?) boppers are at the concerts. Like girls who are like 2 years old and "OMG BLINK 182! NFG, SIMPLE PLAN, you're soo hot, etc, etc, etc." Why did I even write that... not sure, I'm still kinda tired/out of it right now and I ... oh ya, because it was hella crowded @ the LB field and they took up a lot of the space, that is why. I had to leave early at about 3ish and I headed down to OC to Freedom Park for the Third International Vietnamese Youth Conference (www.lenduong.net) - click on the left for English if you really want to read about it... But ya the opening ceremony was pretty cool.
So, saw a bunch of vsa people from other schools that i saw before and couldn't remember their name... but ya. It was cool, cept for the fact it was only 3 of us representing for SB (Mike, James, and I). I got put in bus #9, 1 of 3 California busses I think, and we headed down to USD, not UCSD where the conference would take place.
Met up w/ my 'roommates', 4 of us shared 2 rooms, only 2 keys were distro'ed so there was this bullshit about $85 fine if you lose 'em and ya... but got to sleep around 2 or so and it was all early days for the rest of this conference.
Awoke at 7 and went to get breakfast, which was better than Ortega!!! All you SB people know what I'm talking about... but it still sucked. Meeting people, meeting people, meeting people, meeting people, ... most of whom I can't remember their names...
Opening ceremonies were done again, and the conference began, main points talked about in the conference and workshops:
- Human trafficing (sp?)
- Different fundraising approaches
- Charitable Assistance for Vietnam
- Improving living standards in Vietnam - Practical Approaches by Overseas Vietnamese Youths
- Mobilization skills
and lots more... gawd and like 90% of the conference was in Vietnamese + text and programs in Viet and everything... make my life harder please. I don't read/write Viet for those who didn't know, but now I sorta do... read it that is. But ya, it was tiring and shit and a lot of us fell asleep during the talks because of the lack of sleep... In the evening we did campfire song type of stuff, which was kinda cool cuz it was all in Viet and everyone was into it. There was a party after, it was fun.
The next day it was about the same stuff, talking about conditions in Vietnam, etc. etc. We left for the camp in Julian, CA at about 5ish and everyone was in tents. Actually, here's how the set-up worked, there were 4 villages, named after real cities in nam: Hue, Saigon, Hanoi, Nha Trang, and Truong Sa. - The first of which I was in (pronounced Hway). It was tight, mostly Cali people and everyone was down. We got tents, our tent had 4 people and ya, mosquitos suck major ass cuz they bite you soo much at camp. Everyone got bit, I got bit a lot, but not as much as some others, and then when you scratch the bite it's like temporary relief, but then hurts more after and ya... but you still do it, I guess it's like smoking. Yes! Scratching mosquito bites is like smoking, you know by doing it you're only making it worst for yourself, but you still do it cuz it feels good at the moment. But ya... the next day was tight, let me see if I can remember it. We did a bunch of camper hazing, haha, nah. We chilled, got food and stuff (note the food sucked also... bowl noodles in the morning?! Korean bowl noodles?! come on). We got into groups and got that group/camp spirit stuff up, you know w/ the group cheer and all that stuff. It was cool, got to know people on a more personal note, so that was tight. There was a camp fire that night, and we got screwed cuz they messed up the ordering and we didnm't get to go... wah wah wha, ya we were crying, you shoulda been there. So, cards from 11-5AM, 1 game, the game of 13 (fun game). Loser had to get make up drawn on them, it was fun.
The next day... Tuesday? Ya. Nobody in my group woke me up for the hike/scavenger hike, maybe I'm lucky, cuz I heard it sucked ass, 8 miles... hot sun... ya. So, I just ended up helping serve lunch and stuff, I was "that SB guy"... cuz I was like the only SB guy while every other UC had like 10+ members reppin'. But it was cool. Chilled the rest of the day.
We did our skit that night, every group had to do a diss, I mean skit, and ours dissed pretty much every continent there, it was good though, sorta... ya, cept most of it was in English and a lot of the Int'l people don't speak english.
BBQ after... the huge Hue BBQ, but it didn't happen cuz we got bad directions to the food place 40 minutes away... so ya, no bbq, but we did jack food from the dinner bbq, so it was cool we had a good amount. And it was about 40 minutes of beatboxing, which was tight to watch, then we headed over to Saigon (haha... weird to say that), for the 'final' party, and there was a good amount of people there, sorta turned into a rave though. The rest of the night was cards till about 4ish.
Oh ya, this is just flowing off of my memory, the camp director guy had huge sideburns and gloves, so he got nick named "Wolverine"... and another camp director guy was power trippin' soo much, making us line up and deducting points, it was ridiculous, everyone wanted to punch his lights out... eitherway, where was i.
The next day, pack up and back to civilization, the bus ride was tiring as hell, but alright. We headed to the press conference, I'm on the front page of a viet newspaper! (the back of me that is, sitting down... in a room.. w/ the other people, haha). It took way too long, but was alright. Headed to the Anaheim Plaza Hotel after and the rooms were gone, so we gave $ to this guy and he was going to go w/ others to get a room in the nearby hotel, and he didn't come back, so fuck that. We just hung out in Vinh's room and it was about 13 people to a 4 person room. Showered/destickied ourselves, then dinner at this Viet Seafood Restaurant (Nhu Y) in OC, and it was hella good (why am I using hella in my entries, arg). It was to the hotel party after which was really happening. The party was cool, but got shut down at 12 cuz of hotel rules, and cake was thrown EVERYWHERE... it was a mess. Hotel room party now, lots of card games, and ya, no sleep till around 5 I think.
Overall this conference was soo tight, and 'leadership camp' (VSA thing) is suppose to be tight also, so looks like I'll be doing that when that happens. This conference itself takes place every 2 years, it's gonna be @ Australia in 2005, so I'm down for that.
Highlights/summary of the conf:
- Actually wanna take some action to help out Vietnam now and having some ideas about how to do so.
- More of a sense of cultural identity and want to get even more involved in VSA and more UVSA events.
- Meeting lots of people from across the world/nearby (UC schools, Harvard, Yale, Chicago, Oregon, Denver, Kentucky, Canada, New Zealand, Australia... oh ya, story about australia later, Texas, Germany, and a bunch of other countries I cannot remember at this moment).
- Total Zetas @ the conf: 3. Oh, met a xdelt there, she was cool.
- Meeting lots of hot viet chicks from everywhere (emphasis on Texas, France, and Australia).
- Lots of fun, Viet people know how to have fun, and hopefully running into them in 2 years at the next conference.
But ya, there is my like 7 day excursion, down to the wire, most of it.
Also, I realized, actually something I forgot to write about b4 but someone brought it up @ the press conference.
The living conditions that we endured, for the 3 days @ camp:
- limited access to running water
- mosquitos
- hot and humid conditions
- living outdoors
- dirty clothes
- crappy food *actually good by world standards though...
- no electricity
- no communication w/ the outside world really.
- etc.
All of those, what we went through for 3 days, those in Vietnam have been experiencing for decades now... sad, but that really hit home. How we take soo much for granted in life, just warm clothes, a house to live in, food, family, friendster, and an education. Just think about that, all that bullshit people keep saying about kids and others in 3rd world countries starving and dieing each day, illiterate and living in terrible living conditions, it's all true. How a toothache and headache you might be having is more important to you than 10 starving kids DIEING in another country, how we are complaining about how shitty Ortega food is (though it is shitty), and others would eat it in a second cuz they have NOTHING ELSE to eat. Just ya... I'm in one of those 'take action' moods right now, so go me!
So... after the conference and all that stuff.
- I came back the next day to get my sandals (forgot it @ the hotel!) and got some food w/ the friends b4 they left. Went to chill w/ my cousin later that night, stayed over. Chilled... a day passed or so, went to Six Flags w/ my awesome friends (Paul, Varun, Ruben, Tyler, Aaron, Min) and Randy and his friend Julie. It was lots of fun, but the lines were way too long, minus the one for Viper (5 minutes!). Lots of fun! Enjoyed it, was very hot though. After that,... oh, before that and after, watched a lot of Family Guy episodes (thx to my cousin for him letting me borrow his DVDs). So a lot of us chilled and watched it. The day after, a bunch of us (Alex, Paul, Matt D., and David) went to see Bad Boys II, it was really good, + thank you Alex for getting us free tickets! The day continued, chilling w/ Paul, Matt, David, and Brett, it was lots of fun. Card games are fun! Finally that night, went w/ my cousin and his friend to a Thrice autograph signing by Thrice, it was about a 5 hour wait, but because they actually took the time to shake hands w/ fans and stuff. So, I got their new CD, a signed poster, and some pics w/ them, so that was cool.
Following day, chilled w/ Nick, boba run! It was cool, always nice catching up w/ that guy, still one of the few down to earth people from HS.
Lots of stuff to do @ home,... seems like my parents keep finding stuff for me to do to help out w/ the house, and ya, it isn't that bad... helping out is cool. So looks like I'll be here till Sunday I think. So claim me while I'm still here!
Oh, been working on editing some video stuff + the new vsa website... should be fun!