One Week In New York; What Am I Doing?

I was hoping my next post would have some pictures for me to post, as well as a new digital camera to boast about, but unfortunately I’ve been having some credit card authorization delays with the website I bought the camera from. Hopefully everything’s going to be OK now, but this week would have been really awesome if I could have used my camera because you see, I really have nothing else better to do.

The main reason I originally moved in on Sunday was so I could take a Chinese placement exam at NYU. I had taken a semester’s worth of Chinese over the summer, so I figured why not take the exam and see if I can get right into Elementary Chinese II? This sounds like a good idea, but if you factor in the fact that I haven’t so much as looked at my Chinese book in the past three weeks and forgot about half of what I had learned, you can see that this might be an issue. So I came to New York, thinking to myself, ‘If I come on Sunday, I’ve got Sunday night, and then all of Monday and Tuesday to relearn a semester’s worth of Chinese. Piece of cake!’ (The test was on Wednesday). However, it was only wishful thinking, because as you all know, Welcome Week in college means parties every day, and parties means Emoinacloset will be there. I basically gave up on Chinese at that point, so I didn’t even bother going to the exam.

But not going to the exam left me wondering if this was a good start to a college semester for which I promised myself I would work my ass off. Everyday I compare myself with my suitemate who always keeps himself busy, whether it’s by working hard in school, doing internships, or getting involved in club stuff. I have another friend who’s in this 4 year rotational internship program at JP Morgan Chase. It’s a friendly rivalry, but as of right now I feel like he’s clearly got the upper hand. Even when I talk with my peers who say they’ve been going to interviews for internships and so forth, I always feel like I’m so behind. I have friends who tell me that I’m not the typical Sternie (Stern is the school I’m in within NYU) because I’m so lax about everything, but to tell you the truth I don’t want to hear that. I want to hear people talk about me with admiration and respect.

Maybe this is coming out now because school hasn’t started yet and I feel useless, but I’ve been self-conscious about this for a while. Now, excuse me while I go to another party.

-Emoinacloset

Can I get that laptop with the guilt accessory?

Just yesterday I got another laptop to replace the really crappy one that I started college with. I worked out a deal with my mom where I trade in my old laptop and netbook for 900 dollars towards the new laptop. So what laptop did I get? The best bang for the buck gaming laptop that I could get my hands on of course! Forget practicality, I got this huge 15.6in Asus G51 that has less than 2 hours of battery life because it plays any game I want right now and for the for see able future. Needless to say I ran over budget by about 250 dollars (damn 10% sales tax).

Now my family has been sort of a tight spot financially ever since my dad lost his job. Due to a serious of misfortunes and blunders he now works out of a necessity for a company that pays him a fraction of what he used to make. So already I felt a little guilty for splurging on something so unnecessary. When I got home with my new laptop, I felt guilty to the point of numbness. I was contemplating whether or not to take it back and get something more practical (but probably equally as expensive).

The guilt bomb really dropped the next day. I thought my mom had worked it out the laptop deal with my dad but surprise surprise she did not. My dad did not even realize that I had gotten a laptop until last night when I was playing on it right in front of him. And boy was he angry, suddenly the whole room went silent as he asked how much it cost. I dreaded telling him that it cost $1050 and braced myself for the inevitable backlash. As soon as my dad heard the price, he repeated it in a tone where I knew I was in trouble. He then proceeded to loudly exclaim "(in Cantonese) I can barely put food on the table and I am not even making the mortgage so why would you dare buy something like this!" I responded to this with silence, what could I have said?

After the conversation, I immediately pledged to find a job for myself back at school and repay the $1147.11. This post is my promise to myself that I will get that money and pay my dad back before the school year ends. My mom tells me she let me have this laptop because she wanted me to be happy and that I deserved it, but I am not too sure. I know I deserve it when I get the money.

Wheres that fucking book deal for this blog when I need it?

Resume in hand,
-muffinman

Duality

“Jesus.. look at emoinacloset go. It’s just one entry after another with this guy. Better write another one.”

And with that thought, I write this blog entry. Not really inspired by anything other than my wanting to keep up with emoinacloset. He really makes the rest of us look like douches.

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Well, I’ve recently started classes at a state university. MIT recommended that I take some classes before I go back in order to help make adjusting to the crazy-ass, “holy shit”, nocturnal lifestyle just a little bit easier. (If you haven’t read my previous entry, I decided to take a year off from college about half a year ago.)

And let me just start out by saying. Holy crap.. does the state of California suck right now. California, as many of you know, is experiencing somewhat of a budget crisis and what many of you do not know is that it has retracted 44 million dollars in funding from the state university that I am currently attending. This has appropriately resulted in pay cuts for all faculty members and an increase in tuition fees for all students. On top of that, they’ve decreased the class sizes, because teachers aren’t willing to teach more for cut in pay. Of course, there are a few teachers(God bless them), who are more than willing to take on more students, but the majority are doing what I would’ve done in the same situation. I would’ve said, “Fuck this. I’m not grading more papers for less money.”

On top of that, I’m not even a regularly enrolled student. As a non-matriculated student, I can’t register for classes beforehand. I have to show up on the first day of class, and if there is space (which there never is), I can add (which never happens). If I stupidly decide to stay and waste my time, I get put on this beautiful “waitlist.” I am, of course, put at the bottom, because I am last priority.

The shittiness (aka the beginning of fall semester) began the Monday of last week. I must have gone to 7-9 classes per day, desperately trying to add a class. I managed to salvage 2 classes from the wreckage that was the budget crisis, and I’m still attending classes with hopes that I’ll be added.

My blog entries just get happier and happier, don’t they?

But, never fear! Hot girls are here!

Despite the 44 million dollar shortfall, there just does not seem to be a scarcity of good-looking women at this university. Yes sir, tits and ass are always in surplus. And yes, these two things are what have pulled me through the dark times.

It is stuff like this that reminds me that our universe is a balanced one. Light and dark. Good and evil. Hot girls and budget cuts.

After storming out of a class in which I am #20 on the waitlist, I just take one look down the hall at some beautiful, smoking hot Asian chick, and all is good again.

Thank goodness for the 10’s out there and thank goodness for the creation of restraining orders for the 5’s like me who ogle at the 10’s.

-Robocop

71 Irving Place Coffee and Tea Bar; In Other Words, Starbucks Is So Cliché

Today I missed the bold flavor of a good cup of coffee. That and I felt like I was going to fall asleep if I didn’t get my caffeine fix so I decided to go to this café near my dorm. The main reason I wanted to come here instead of elsewhere was because it had free wi-fi, but the rave reviews on the coffee were so good I had to come here and see what all the hype was about.

It’s a small place, but the ambiance is everything you’d ever want in a coffee shop – that or it was the realization of what I’ve imagined a coffee shop should be. Unlike Starbucks and its corporate-ized ambiance (coughCLICHÉcough), this place felt cozy. The smell of fresh roasted coffee beans as I walked in and the coffee/cream-colored walls made me want to stay here forever.

The chairs and tables were pressed up against each other, but it wasn’t crowded in the “fuck when am I getting out of this elevator” feeling you get sometimes when the elevator’s cramped. You feel like you’re part of a community of coffee-drinkers, who don’t come because drinking coffee is the “in” thing to do or because you really like the taste of sugar in those frappachinos. Coffee can awaken your senses and inspire you or it can taste as bitter as life sometimes can make you feel. Coffee isn’t a necessity, yet we still drink it not for the pleasure of drinking coffee for itself, but for the experiences we gain when we do drink, whether it is with a couple friends or just alone by ourselves.

The never-ending conversations between the people around me, the upbeat jazz music in the background, the click-clack of laptops typing away, and the occasional schlepping noise the espresso machine made all added to my own experience. The coffee-of-the-week I got was made by beans imported from Kenya, which tasted different from anything I’ve had before. The flurry of people walking in and out of the shop made my own stationary position feel more dynamic as I continued to sit and type away, watching the different people that came in the café.

I felt inspired by this coffee shop today. Perhaps I’ll bring people here and have coffee talk with them just like I did back home. I think this is now my new, favorite, go-to spot for when I need some time to myself.

-Emoinacloset