the LA-SF gw exchange

just chatted with the other greg wong (in sf). he's coming to LA this weekend while i'm going up to SF. guess we have to schedule our g*dub club reunion another time.

mighty long day

just got home a little while ago. been up since 4am or so. it was worth it. i think i did ok in my classes...tho i was pretty darn pooped out by the afternoon classes. i had to get an iced-tea for a little lunch time boost. trying to hold off from the really strong stuff for when i really need it.

the movie redo project

ok...cinephiles. another assignment input session for you all. this one is for my language of the moving image class. the one where we make digital films and critique movies (that's where i learned about the strong homosexual theme in fight club...i can't believe i didn't pick up on it...some of it is pretty obvious).

so here's the deal. for the rest of the next 10 weeks or so...i'll be tackling this one project. i have to choose a scene from a movie (from 3-12 minutes long) and refilm it. camera angles and dialogue has to be right on. i can put it in a new location or context tho. i could have my own actors...or else i can use action figures...or fruit...or whatever i want. it's not so much about acting. it's rather about the film making and directing/editing.

so anyone have any suggestions? hopefully nothing with big explosions or special effects. that could get tricky. i think i'd prefer to do something that i can get my friends to act out. (any vollunteers?...you'll probably have to be down here tho, unless i can time it during my july 4th weekend trip.) i was thinking possibly one of wong kar-wai's movies (chungking express or in the mood for love) since i love his stuff. but i'm pretty open to whatever will be fun and interesting. i just need to have access to the scene (on dvd or vhs). oh yeah, it can be a tv show too.

gimme some ideas! and fast. i need to make a decision pretty much by monday!

the tuesday school work groove

* 2:00 pm:show my video biography assignment (of freelancer pal tony). it went pretty well...get a chicken salad sandwich from the cafeteria...hear fight club mise-en-scene lecture (i had no idea that fight club had a really strong theme of homosexuality!)
* 6:30 pm: hang out in the library from 6:30-9pm doing random work (looking up fonts, scanning images.)
* 9:00 pm: drive over to the san gabriel lollicup to get a bite of eat and do more work until midnight. (breakdown the scene in hemmingway's the killers, read and take notes on tribal art wisdom and alchemy)
* 11:50 pm: get a concept break thru. check-in with a classmate about class. go to kinko's.
* 12:30 am: go home. surf. relax. zone out. sleep for a few hours. read the paper.
* 5:00 am: try to focus again. let the last minute pressure kick-in. realize that class is in under 3 hours and the comps still need to be pulled together. work.

moody blogger

finally! my archives are back!--->

i think blogger's been getting cranky on me with their supposed ftp switcharooney. so now if you've recently joined me and wanna catch up on my eastern european adventures (posts and pix...end of april/early may), you can do so.

conceptual conundrum

i've got a few AC projects hangin over my head. if any of you has some thought on them or could loan me a few tid bits of inspiration, thoughts or references...please go right on ahead. these will be projects that will develop over the next 4 or so weeks (yikes!), so i'll try chronicling them with some photos which appear in my LA life weekly albums (uploaded super late sunday nite).

i think laying out the outlines of my project here is also a good way to process the whirlwind of thoughts and ideas in my head. for the couple (or more) of you in my classes, i guess you'll just be getting into my head even more and seeing my conceptual process. it'll probably be good to do this from now on a semi-regular basis. it'll also help me blog regularly in a way that it actually supports the real work that i have to do. hope it can still be interesting to y'all. and hey, if you give me input and it's something that unlocks something brilliant in my head later...i'll be sure to send you a copy of the work i did. deal?

* the wisdom poster [graphic design 1] - kinda open ended. i need to design a poster arrived by a connection of experiemental visual explorations and word/theme/statement brainstorming. i started on a path to pull out words and themes from the wisest book in the world, the bible...particularly the words of wisdom from the wisest man who ever lived...solomon. then i remembered that i had this nifty book from auntie trice years ago for my birthday with a collection of maxims and proverbs from all over the world of wisdom. so now i'm exploring how to communicate two different concepts:

1) a thousand paths to wisdom.

different philosophies. different religions. different approches. right now i'm thinking about handwriting all of the ones that i found interesting and layering them with different textures upon each other. do they all reach "wisdom?" do none of them reach wisdom? is there only one real approach to true wisdom? what is the meaning of wisdom? what's it really worth? (i think i'll be looking into ecclesiates.)

my teacher told me to explore different visual languages and symbolic ways of expressions of wisdom... what's that archaic brain science called? when they believed different sections were responsible for different knowledge?...he also suggested alchemy and free masonry. looks like i need to do some researching in the library and stock photo sites for imagery. that's all pretty interesting. but i don't think that i'd want to go in a direction that would really praise a branch of wisdom which i don't really believe to be true.

2) the relationship between wisdom and folly. discovered a bunch of saying expounding upon their converse and complementary relationship. what kind of imagery might be able to communicate that? i was thinkning perhaps a tree...with raised up branches into a bright sky made up of a myriad of different bits of wisdom (handwritten) and with a long extensive root system pointing downward into the dark earth made up of different sayings of foolishness and folly. can you visualize this like i can?

* the AC poster [graphic design 1] - say something about our school.similar approach as above with experimental imagery and word/idea generation. where they meet is where your concept lies. that's the approach he's trying to teach us. i'm thinking about a corrupted grid system with a texture that i'm creating with wire mesh, either photographed or stamped with ink. i'd like to say something about the design boot camp nature of our school...how it's hard core, discipline, regimented, which shapes you as a person and a designer. i'd also like to say something about what "a sick place this is" (in the words of my first term teacher ry)...which causes you to abandon a social life, say good-bye to your friends, and give into a degree of sadomasochism depriving you of sleep, rest, and exercise. sound familiar?

he liked my ideas, i think. there's a lot that i can say with the grid as a texture, as a design element. perhaps something containing imagery of AC. i gotta shoot some photos of the craziness that exists at this school. i have an idea in mind of how to fracture the images in an interesting way too with the grid.

* the fanzine project [type 2].

do a fanzine. a magazine/underground publication of any niche subject you want. you present a particular view on it. needs a minimum of 4000 words in it. either original or borrowed from a source. (hmmm i wonder how many words this post is so far?)

most people are gonna do theirs in print. i think i'm gonna take a huge leap and make mine interactive (a website or contained on a cd rom, since that's the direction i wanna go now anyways). how do you handle the text? can't just dump it out like i do here...but you have to set it and treat it.

my concept: subway/light rail culture. the locomomtion lifestyle. not so much about the trains...but about the people who interact with each other and objects as they go about a journey thru public means to reach a destination. i think there can be a lot of metaphorical implications of life with the trains, tracks, encounters. there are sign markers. some are clear. some are confusing. we interact with people in a unique way crammed shoulder to shoulder and butt to butt during rush hour. in certain cultures we're used to a certain degree of personal space...which defines how we move and how we try to maintain distance from people.

i think this idea was inspired by my pal's idea for a cozy airport lounge, where people on a journey thru an airport can potentially stop, relax, exchange perspectives. plus this spaces are pretty cool. i think i'm attracted to the urban nature of subway stations...sometimes gritty, sometimes clean...and how you can see all walks of life in them.

was also thinking that if i'm short on ideas and material, i can take some from the brand new LA metro gold line which opened up in pasadena. i also know the designer of the new tickets. maybe i can interview her or something.

i took a ton of voyeuristic photos of people and subway places in paris, prague, munich, bratislava, viena...so i got a trunkload of interesting images to put in my 'zine.

whew...so that's a lot. writing it all here helped me to organize it in my brain. it can get kinda jumbled up in there when you're trying to balance and process a half dozen different concepts and projects all at once.

anyhoo...if you have any ideas or thought,s lemme know!

maybe if i sleep more, my subconscious will be able to do some work on it. ah well. maybe if i listen to jazz or go running too. that often helps me process. i think i'll go running or blading around the rose bowl tomorrow.

foolin with friendster

oh man, if you're bored or lookin for a distraction, friendster can really become a real time suck! it ate up a lot of time today. imagine napster with friends instead of music. i now have 16 direct buddies added...but with their friends of friends of friends...i have 17,214 people in my personal network! incredible huh? not that i'd ever really try to meet them. (if you become my "friend," you'll be tapping into a good portion of that.)

i think the majority of my network is based upon a couple social butterflies that i'm friends with or indirectly connected to. it's interesting seeing the connections and the paths laid out. some ppl aren't any use to expanding your friendship empire tho if they don't add any new friends. some guys say that we should just delete them off of our networks. but i'm too nice for that.

clearing out the schedule

i've got a tendency to try to do too much. as of last week, this was my schedule...

* 6 official classes and 1 unofficial class that i was enrolled in - tuesday - friday.
* 1 day of work - mondays
* church (sometimes 2x) - sundays.
* a church small group once a week. (but pretty short, and could be over dinner).
* lightbox - officially once a month on thursdays.

yeah...pretty ambitious stuff that i'm trying to do. especially with school work slowly ramping up. i really think that i can handle it all, since a couple of the classes weren't that hard. then all of a sudden it looks like a few things fell off my plate. didn't have to go into work today since no one was in the office. turns out i can't audit that class on thursdays after all. so now i have all day monday (this week) and thursday free. like twice as much more free time than i thought that i would have. i better get on top of stuff. there's lots of stuff literally all around me that i need to get in order.

the summer chillin LA life weekly

the bbq ... jazzfest ... class ... farmer's market...movie watchin...fanzine shoppin ... launderin ... birthday filled week. >> 42 pix for you to enjoy!

today was a mighty busy day. i think i drove close to 200 miles.

hip hop praise funk at newsong LA

it started off early to head out to culver city to check out newsong LA. i enjoyed it a lot. it was a very different worship experience from anything i've been to before. this is a church plant of newsong...out in the heart of urban la. it was very distinctly different demographically and culturally. i think 10-15% of the church was black. most of the rest were korean or other asian. all of the worship leaders were black, with the exception of one korean girl, who j and christina said looked like just like tyra banks (!) and so she fit in with the line-up. i didn't see it. korean musicians playing the instruments (guitar, drums, keys, violin). the pastor was black.

i guess it's the first time that i've been to a church where the key people serving weren't either white or asian. the style and slang was also very different. definitely more street. worship was a lot of different songs that i wasn't used to. definitely more of an LA hip hop feel...if you can imagine that at all. we were pumping our hands in the air and swaying. defintely a lot more energy than you would feel at a typical asian church. at the end of the final set, a brother came up and freestyled on the mic. that was pretty cool and interesting. altho a lot of it was different, and unexpected...i could really appreciate the sincere, lively expressions and heart of worship and devotion to god. that's what it's all about.

the message was pretty good. start of a series about the measure of a man. message about samson, and his weaknesses. the message was really solid and really made me honestly reconsider a lot about the path i walk and the vulnerabilities in my life. good stuff. very timely too as my mosaic life group, might be becoming a men's group.

it was cool seeing some old faces at church. it was also funny how i keep discovering more and more ties binding different people that i know or come across. maybe one of these days...i'll get around to my original idea to graphically document the network and ties between the different people in my life...how ppl are connected sorta friendster like.

it was interesting how suddenly there were a bunch of my friends checking out this church at the same time. there were more people that i knew at this church at this one time, than i know at my other church (mosaic). kinda odd.

venice brunchin at joe's

a few of us met up for bon bon's bday afterwards at joe's restaurant in venice. a really cute place. found it off digital city's listings for nice brunch places in the westside which don't cost that much. half of us had the smoked salmon served over the roti potatoes with a little caviar. it also came with the soup or salad. it was all so good. i recommend this place for lunch/brunch to any LA peeps who haven't been there before. i dunno about dinner...menu prices are kinda steep at that time.

i think this was the first time that i ate in venice. the area was pretty cool. lots of random boutique shops and neighborhood restaurants. i need to explore this place more.

the big run around

afterwards j and i tried to jet to OC to go to this free volvo performance driving classing, but we left lunch too late and didn't make it in time. oh well. it wasn't meant to be. i didn't have the directions on me either...so we were cruising around in circles for a little while.

T's dirty thirty birthday

after some fruitless cruising in irvine, went up to buena park claim jumper's for tony's 30 bash. it was cool seein a few peeps i met before and meeting a few more. lots of new song ppl. brought along ting and christine for company too. i split a citrus chicken salad with randy, who i just met. i don't think i've split a meal with a dude i've just met before. haha...but it was cool. i was still pretty full from lunch.

downtown disney

afterwards, i tagged along with the girls to meet up with mitch in downtown disney. i'm glad that i didn't have to drive. it was interesting catching up with where we're at now. looks like he'll be married next year. wowsers. this means that even more of the dudes from my fellowship class will be married. of the 6 or so of the regular dudes from our class, this leaves just 2 of us not on the marriage bandwagon. good gosh. but i'm not feeling any pressure. no sirree.

it's definitely an interesting experience getting back in touch with old faces from your past. sometimes its people who were once in your closer social circle (for me 5 years ago, it was my college fellowship). once your closer circle of community gets surplanted with new ones...the old ones start to fade into the recesses of your memory. we'll see how it's possible for those old ones to reenter your life and perhaps be part of a new circle.

since i haven't really tapped into a new circle which would replace what lumps was in my life, the cicle of people i interact with are hodge podged from a variety of past experiences and encounters. i kinda wonder what my life will look like when i'm the dirty thirty. (nothing against being old like that. someone else just coined that term today and i'm picking up on it.)

tony had ppl gathered from high school, college, and church all together to help celebrate his bday. i wonder what people who i know now will still be close enough to me to care to come out.

the super saturday so-cal solo shopper

today was a pretty chill day. spent the whole day by myself, altho i caught up with a few people on the phone. it was kinda nice to run errands, while i was pushing off paid and school work more. also nice to go into exploration mode cruising around. i got lost a few times, but it's not bad at all...when i'm not in a rush to really get anywhere

went to westfield santa anita, the local mall 5 min away in arcadia. it's much better than stonestown, the local mall up in sf. this one has all of the department stores - nordstrom, robinson's may, macy's, and jc penny (but i never go there). do all of the malls down here have all of those stores? i've only been to a few malls ever. i'm excited that this mall will be expanding this year to include more stores and a movie theater.

but anyhoo...i went to hit up macy's super saturday to get tim/kim a wedding gift. there's still a lot of stuff on the registry. i had to rule out all glass ware, crystal ware, and knives, since i'm flying up for the july 4th weekend. so that just left linens and some other kitchen stuff. so i settled on the latter.

gift picky sticky

it took me a while to find the right wedding gift. i try to pick something that might be slightly memorable and distinctive. i also wanted to get something that would be worth my money.
i didn't just want to pick out 1/2 of a set of bath towels. i think i spent too long looking for a gift and trying to decide. it probably would have been more worth my time doing some freelance work and writing a check or giving a gc. that's definitely a more practical

sometimes when i'm considering all of these things...my chinese cheapness, and my creative effort to pick something original or with imagination...it takes me darn forever to pick something out. so most times, if someone gets a gift from me...whether it be for a wedding, birthday, or vacation souvenier...i probably spent a lot of time debating over whether it's not the right thing. so hopefully the gift i give is good. otherwise...it's just that i made the wrong choice.

when i was traveling in europe last month, that's something that my travel buds noted about me...that it took me forever to decide on a gift. maybe it's my pickyness. maybe my standard to try and find a deal.

it also takes me forever when i buy clothes for myself occasionally. i think i spent about 90 minutes at the mall today trying to get a pair of shorts. well, a good deal was waiting for the lady to call two other stores to see if they had the right the color/size...which they didn't. so i settled. it was a pretty good deal. some small-name microfiber cargo shorts for under $20. i haven't bought clothes for a while now. my tastes slowly change.

i think i'm going for a comfort, yet still stylish look now. also whatever's easy too.i'm not too into button shirts. probably b/c i don't really have an iron that works.

...

laundary break intermission

well that was strange. it was the first time that my roommate and i were both in the laundry room doing our laundry. along with our occasional third roommate who makes an appearance here 2x times a month. it was only now that i learned that our third roommate brings laundry here. too funny...it was like an apartment field trip or something...hopefully i'll remember to bring my camera when we all go down to get our done loads from the dryer.

end of intermission

...

the so-cal settlin summer

i feel it in my bones. this is the summer that i'm starting to make LA my home. the first 8 mo were exploring and adjusting. i'm starting to feel it in terms of my perspective on community and people around me. one observation on my self was that nearly all of the phone calls (except for one) that i made today were to touch base with LA people.

today i also missed out on a pretty big family event up north, my cousin's high school graduation party. he said that i'm like a big brother to him. probably b/c i have no younger brothers at all...and he's also the closest first cousin in age to me. i really hope that i can make good on my graduation present to him...a weekend down here chillin and helping him move into cal. i really do hope that i can help to share bits of wisdom and advice, as well as help set him on his ways before he goes thru the college cycle and evolves to become a whole new person.

i'm not losing touch with sf people that much. after all i am going up twice this summer (which most of my classmates consider to be crazy considering our AC course load)...but now i'm feeling the appropriateness of connecting to people down here. to hang with classmates and friends. to try and catch up with people i haven't seen in a while. friday i kicked it with dave, probably the first new guy bud who i didn't know before i moved down. i thought that was pretty significant. tomorrow i'm going to tony's bday...which i believe is the first LA birthday party that i'm really going to. (ok, i'm celebrating another birthday earlier that day...but it doesn't count, since i knew her from sf and she's really out now in connecticut.) last weekend i went to my first LA bbq, which was cool...maybe you've figured out what a sap i am for milestone events in my life, both major and minor.

altho my online aim and friendster network is still primarily SF based (what? you're not on there? get on now!), i'm starting to feel the LA disparate tentacles of friends start to touch each other. i'm slowly starting to see the two or three degrees of separation, particularly when it comes to california chinese christians. i've had a few revelations about the connection of circles and histories this past week. when that happens it makes you go hmm. it also encourages me to get back in touch with friends and acquaintances who may have faded from active usage in my address book. (btw, if that's any of you...drop me a line and say something please!)