5 hours and counting

I waved giant happy new year's eve signs (i was holding the eve). i got a giant nivea hat. technically i snatched it from someone behind me... craziness.
i screamed at cameras. i watched greyson chance perform live - that kid is so adorable! god i am loving this.

watched ke$ha perform. try dancing your butt off while screaming a song at the top of your lungs and with no care at all that a million people are in the same square as you. just go try it. :D

4hrs! backstreet boys and 1 million people singing i want it that way. and hat throwing!

1 hour awayy!!!! GOT TO SEE TIAO CRUZ. oh my dear god there are so many people. jeezums. confetti like paper fairies

New Year's Eve Times Square!!!

8:00 just got into nyc. been up since 6am getting ready (there is so much food stuffed in my bag) and getting dressed (i'm wearing 3 layers of pants ><). i watched the sun rise over the highway.
in times square now.... not that many people yet, me and sally are just wandering. the stage and stuff are all being set up for tonight :D
went by the ABC studio and saw a crowd of people in there. apparently they opened the doors at 6am and took a bunch of people off the street for today's Good Morning America. saw a few famous people.... too bad i dont watch the show so i don't know anyone lol. (edit: google says that this is Robin Roberts o: )


9:30ish. sitting in mcdonalds lol. its cold.

12? left McDonalds about an hour ago, after draining my water bottle and then emptying my bladder. no bathroom starting from now, for the next twelve hours. dear god.
i'm sitting on a plastic bag on the street of times square... the nivea stage where ke$ha is scheduled to perform is about 10ft away from me :). i have pictures with things that will never go near the internet - if you want to see them you'll have to ask xD. think "only in nyc"
now the crowds start filing in and the boredom comes. joy...

1: a few people next to me just got interviewed by cnn! :O  i wonder if i got in.... on the edge of the screen.
Just signed giant posters/signs that this guy made. I have no idea who he is. Nor does he know any of us. Oh well. pretty cool idea though.

~time lapse~ sorries. there were about 3 hours where i was just standing around completely unable to move... pretty fun. we were caught in limbo between the crowd who could see the film crew arrival and the crowd up front by the stage. LG had a giant billboard that you could text messages to and they'd post it up. i texted a happy new year message to my iple group -- it either never was put up or i never noticed it. some girl next to me said she texted "yo front, what's going on up there?". no reply yet lol.
met quite a few interesting people. one of them is from indiana. the other one starting yelling when my mom began to peel oranges (he was certain she'd need to have a bathroom break because of it). there were so many people squashed into that space it was even difficult for us to make room and let people out to use the bathrooms at all.
then the police they started shepherding us back and forth and penning us up-i swear that's what the nypd called it-before settling down in a crowd along the side of the NIVEA stage. phew.

5 hours to go! Just watched the first hourly countdown + fireworks. :)

New Years Eve Times Square: 12.30.2010

the prep:

i'm going to do this real quick before i go sleep, seeing as its midnight and i have to wake up at 5am tomorrow to go to new york city.

spent an hour or so googling faqs on the whole affair, and then spent the past half hour looking for clothes to wear tomorrow. layers layers layers. all in the icy winds and recent slush of the greatest city in the world.

i'm so excited!

even though I went already last year, that was entirely different. Entirely different.


i'll be updating throughout the day tomorrow!

cheers and good night! :)

New Year's Eve Times Square: the first experience

this was last year's trip. probably one of the craziest, most epic experiences of my life. i was planning to use this as an app essay, but I guess not :)
anyway. happy reading

“Don’t come. It’s so crowded there’s no room!” With that, my grandmother left, leaving my parents and me frozen in shock.

It was New Year’s Eve, three hours until midnight.

“If they don’t want us at their dinner, we’ll make our own New Year’s dinner.”

Even so, I still had an unshakeable feeling of loneliness. I looked forlornly at the television, at the millions celebrating in New York…

“New York City? You can’t get there. Everything will be blocked.

“You can’t find parking now.

“You can’t make it in time.”

“There’s nothing to lose.” My mom and I left. The clock was ticking.

10:30. “What if Lincoln Tunnel really is closed?”

It was dark and ominously silent. The only thing we could see was the pale stretch of asphalt before our lonely headlights. I saw the panic in her eyes, and felt it within myself.

11:00. The car burst out the other end of the Lincoln Tunnel. The city was alive with celebration, flooded by a wash of rainbow colors. It seemed like half the world was out on the streets.

 11:12. “This is too good. How can I be so lucky to find a spot so big, right now?”

I already had one foot in the slushy snow. The car was sitting indecisively on 49^th Street. Times Square was just seven blocks away. “Just park! We can’t miss this!”

11:45. “Sorry. This area is closed,” the NYPD told us at 49^th. And 48^th. And 47^th. The closer we got to 42^nd, to the heart of it all, the more blocked it became. Persistently, I headed uptown. There has to be an open street somewhere.

11:50. “Quick! It’s open!”

I grabbed my mom, jammed into the crowd, and swarmed through the open roadblock.

“Ten minutes!” My voice was lost in the screaming masses.

“I don’t know if we can make it!”

“We’re going to!”

11:55. “There’s a gap here.”

I squeezed through and grabbed the cold metal railing that separated me from the center of Times Square. I could see the one million, freezing, cheering, and ecstatic beyond belief. Just like me.

11:59. One million voices rose into the air. 60. 59. 58… I added mine, declaring the numbers loud and clear.

31. 30… The railing opened. I joined the hundreds who were rushing towards the moment where it all counted.

22. 21. 20… The numbers left my lips in elated screams. I was vibrating with excitement.

10. 9. 8. 7. 6. 5. 4. 3. 2. 1! The clock struck twelve as a million voices filled the winter air in one deafening chorus: Happy New Year! A shower of confetti exploded from the heavens. A golden bubble of bliss descended upon New York City.

1:00. The headlights glowed brilliantly, one star among hundreds along the glowing streets. I looked out into the clear night sky, at the millions of celebrating people, the almost tangible promise of possibility. One billboard caught my eye. Bright, simplistic, unmistakable, three words: Go for it.

Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays!

Since its Christmas Eve and I probably won't be anywhere near a computer tomorrow...

Merry Christmas and/or Happy Holidays! :D

Blood Moon on Solstice Night

In 1638, on a cold winter night in December, the darkest and longest night of the year, a full moon rose overhead. It cast its light out over the land and bathed everything in a wash of red.

Last night, the same full moon, eclipsed into a dark red hue, hung in the black sky of winter solstice.

Now that I got that out of my writer's system....
Yes, it's true. Last night, December 21 2010, the full moon came into a complete lunar eclipse on the night of Winter Solstice. It took 372 years for the earth, moon, and sun to line up and coincide with the passage of time to allow for this. It's only the second time that this has happened in the common era (according to wikipedia).

I spent quite a long time lying in bed, wondering if I should go out and see the moon, or if I should, at the very least, pull up my blinds. Then I freaked out. Why? Call me superstitious, but a total lunar eclipse on the darkest night of the year just didn't sit too well with me. There's a reason that some people refer to last night as "blood moon on solstice night."
Basically, three major things happened: there was a full moon, it was Winter Solstice, and there was a total lunar eclipse. From a spiritual/Wiccan perspective...
Full Moon -- the time when spiritual and magickal energy are at their height. If there was ever a time to pray or do rituals, particularly for protection, it's during full moon.
Winter Solstice -- the darkest and longest night of the year -- signifies the of the Sun. Except the birthing part doesn't happen until the next day, when daylight hours are a fraction longer. During Solstice (Yule), the world is in a standstill of symbolic darkness, lit only by the light of the Moon -- the Goddess.
Lunar Eclipse -- I never know what to make of these, since some cultures (ex: Chinese) view such an event as an omen. Wicca sees it as another time when magickal powers heighten, as the three main celestial bodies around us align perfectly. It also shows the passage of all the moon phases in one night, and therefore the cycle of the goddess -- maiden, mother, crone -- which can lend to ritual work.

The issue is: this has only happened once before. There is no tradition or guideline regarding this whole affair. Quite a few people out there are using the combination of these three events for special work, and see the balance of power and forces, unions and dynamics. Others, like yours truly, are wary of this double delumination -- that of the sun and the moon -- and speculate occult activity.

Either way, I decided upon two things: I'm honestly very happy that such a rare event has occured in my lifetime, even though I was too scared to see it. I also recognize, and felt, the force of power and energy last night, no matter what it meant. Some things in nature are truly beyond our understanding, so rather than try to answer everything, we should probably just sit back and let ourselves feel the majesty and perpetual wonder of this world we live in.

Reminisce

I am happy. Apps are over and done with/put away never to be looked at for several years (if not decades).

I reorganized my bookshelf, so that one shelf holds a mulitude of my past school things:

• a calendar from when I was in 5th grade -- I was anal enough back then to mark the few due dates, assignments, projects, and events that I had (like the 5th grade play rehearsals + performances lol)
• 7th grade Verbal essays, Night (Elie Wiesel) notes, Julius Caesar (Shakespeare) notes, research notecards. Wow. We actually had to write notecards. (6th grade got lost)
• 8th grade poems & Freshman writings (some)
• Sophomore essays, negatives and prints from photography -- some are surprisingly nice, like the ones I uploaded here. Psych notes, pre-calc notes (why aren't those burned? o.o), World History stuff, Chem stuff
• Junior year stuff -- the millions of SAT I, SAT II, and AP books -- isn't on the shelf, particularly the APUSH binder. They're bequeathed to my sister.
• Folders from Frosh RMC, RUMUN 08 :), RUMUN 09 <3, RMC West Wing, duotangs! and some notes and speeches from past Model UN tryouts
• the Clarion paper that I was featured in for Runaway
• Handwritten manuscripts for Runaway, SQuared, and the new novel I was working on this November
• my 2 proof copies for Runaway
• Envelopes that I was supposed to give to guidance to send to all the others schools I planned to apply to but ended up not ;)

Eight years of my educational history (except for 6th grade D:) all culminating to this moment. JHU 2015 :)

"Jonathan" Hopkins ;)

Interesting day.

In the morning, I headed over to Chittick to volunteer for Buddy Ball. Basically, its a place where disabled kids can play basketball. Most of the volunteers there ("pals") actually do play basketball. I can probably count off one hand how many times my aimlessly thrown shots actually made it in the basket. oh well.
I just have to say that those hours that morning were one of the most rewarding hours of my life. There was must so much community spirit in that little gym (elementary school gyms are smaller than I remember). No one really cared who won or lost, everyone was just happy doing drills and playing ball. There was even this one boy, probably in middle school or so, who was working with this really tiny kid who seemed kind of shy when it came to shooting. So the pal ended up going down on one knee so he was level with his buddy, put his well practiced hands over his buddy's nervous ones, and helped him shoot from down on the floor. It was honestly the most adorable and heart warming thing I saw in a long, long time.
Even though I honestly can't play basketball to save my life, I got a lot of fun running up and down the court watching my assigned "buddy" shoot hoops like a pro.
I might be using the bball words wrong but oh well.

Right after, I went to tutor. I'm going to say it again, just like I did all the time when I taught over the summer: I love my students. I love utterly their creativity. To a writer, creativity is gold. I just want to say to them: keep up the good work & happy holidays! <3
I also happened to be wearing a Johns Hopkins shirt. One of them saw it and asked if I was going to "Jonathan Hopkins University."
"It's Johns Hopkins. Johns with an 's'."
It's true what the students/alum say. Once you're a Hopkins student, you get kind of sensitive about the s.

physics/iple/whatever am I going to do about that JHUMUNC paper?

Winterize

This is, without the slightest shadow of a doubt, one of my most favorite times of the year. por quoi?

Christmas/the Holiday Season, even though I'm not Christian.
I think Christmas represents more than being Christian. It's the magical joy and cheer that permeates every particle that is in the air during this time between Black Friday and Christmas Day. If Jess Yang were here, I'd ask her to figure out the chemistry of what exactly that joy and cheer is. There is just so much love and possibility, it makes apps and the coming of decisions almost bearable. Not the mention the fact that it makes me want to sing holiday songs at the top of my lungs (now that is saying something, since not even Adina has heard me sing that much in our twelve years of friendship).

As with every year, I need to make everything in my life ready for this season. I just put up my Christmas tree on Saturday. It's glowing rainbow colors on my floor right now, and all glittery with our baubles from when I was five years old (whatever is left/hasn't shattered yet) and the other assortment of ornaments saved up over the years. Outdoor lights should go up this weekend, hopefully. My internet themes are all changed, and I am singing... in the quiet privacy of my bedroom.
Trips to NYC are due, parties to attend, presents that need to be bought, cookies to be baked, popcorn for the reindeer...... everything.

Because, quite honestly, it's the most wonderful time of the year. :)



Success - day 30

50,278 words so far  

In case anyone was wondering, it is possible to rush 4000-5000 words of a novel on a school day when you have an IPLE paper to mass edit/finish. All before midnight.
Actually I finished at 11:40 something.

Definitely not as dramatic as my first NaNoWriMo, where I literally put in just over 50,000 words at 11:59pm (I was shaking in my bedroom from excitement), but still very adrenaline rushing.

Now for the whole noveling business...

First of all, I need a title for this new story. This is always a problem for me. A lot of people ask me, "if you're a novelist, why do you hate titles so much?" I just do. Noveling is a lot of expansion. It's difficult, for me at least, to condense everything -- emotions, tone, plot, etc. -- of a chapter into a few words, much less the contents of an entire novel into one title. Runaway had chapter titles. After that book, I gave up and fondly title them all "Chapter 1, 2, 3..." As for the book title, I grab a random word that shortens the idea of the book and it just sticks. Runaway is definitely better than "the book where four girls run away for a year." SQuared is infinitely better, and I guess catchier, than "that book with the squared numbers and roots." Perhaps I should just do that again, although I do not seem to be as attached to this story as I was to my previous two books..... Might have something to do with the length (this one is probably half as long as Runaway).

For some odd reason, I also hate coming up with character names and I hate coming up with titles. For Runaway, all my character names were from an online website with specific meanings attached to them, so no biggie there. But for SQuared. Oh my goodness. All my names were provided by my friend, Fanny. Even the name "Luvelle", which she entirely made up off the top of her head and is now one of my favorite names.

But looking back, I think I should take a break from noveling. For one thing, I don't read very much when I'm writing -- I don't want the authors' writing style to influence mine. Also, I really need to be focusing on college apps. Noveling makes me far too fluffy and descriptive of a writer, which isn't good when I only get 200-500 words per supplemental essay.

We'll see. I said this exact same thing after I finished SQuared, and I still ended up doing NaNoWriMo again anyway.

oh the joy of winning. Even if it is a clash of your will/determination against common sense and time.

and now to sleep