LC 24

I still  remember  that I applied for Baruch College on the 1st Feb, the last day of  CUNY application. It was just a few days after I arrived to NY and since I was still “new” over here, i had no idea about how colleges here work. Besides that, I was having jet lag and not used with the climate difference, everything I did was a mess . Luckily, I was accepted by Baruch College and got into LC24 and had the first semester with them.

Honestly, I didn’t expect myself to get good grades in the first semester,however, i hoped that I could get myself accustomed with my new life here.  Things went pretty well ,and i made some friends through the freshman seminar. Moreover, I never expected we could get so close even though we live in 5 different boroughs and having different backgrounds. It was kinda amazing that we could get along together while we have some difficulties in communicating. Because of them, i started to feel comfortable studying in Baruch.

My first semester in Baruch is just mediocre. As i mentioned earlier, i was just trying to adapt to the new environment. As long as I am passing all the courses, I am satisfied. Other than that, for me , the first semester is mathematical. I used trial and error to figure out what suit me best and how to tackle some issues. For instance, now I know that I can’t concentrate on study in the morning but afternoon and evening.  Also, i found out that I can barely stay focus after riding on 3 different types of public transportation.

If I could redo my first semester again, perhaps I would do a research about differences of climate between New York and Malaysia so that I could prepare myself well enough to engage into college life. The climates here really affected me much and i always felt sleepy and sometimes i would feel like i am as soft as a jellyfish.I really want to know how to overcome my body condition so i could have a better semester to avoid myself taking summer class( Actually i feel “good and normal” during summer).

At last, Baruch offered a good education throughout the semester, In fact, the great professors in Baruch change my point of view on education. Study is not just about memorizing class material like stuffing ingredients into a sausage case but to learn and use the knowledge to improve myself.  Overall, i believe that Baruch  helps a lot in cultivating me into a better person in the first semester. I hope that there are more improvement in me in the future semesters.


I don’t know if the others had this feeling but when i came to know about the compulsory museum visit, i was like ” WHAT? Museum? Again? Are you kidding me?”. From  all different museums I had visted, none of them actually left me a good impression because i would always get lost in the museum or end up leaving my camera in the restroom. Is it my problem or maybe all the accidents happened were destined? However, since it is a compulsory trip, I had no other choices but went to the Rubin Museum reluctantly. So,  Wei Fang as the group leader , leaded Ru Fang , Yong Chen, Tony , Will and me to walk the longest 20 minutes in my life. The location of the museum was confusing and we ended up entering the museum from the cafe entrance and thought that we had  mistakenly entered into a restaurant before the guard guided us to the  main entrance.

To my surprise, Rubin Museum is  absolutely different from the museum I have visited before. In fact, it is the only western museum which depicts workpieces and diorama of Asian cultures. The ambiance of the museum is somber with all the Buddhas, yet very artistic and precious with the yellow flight focusing on their golden surface. As a son of my Buddhist parents, I am not surprised by those sophisticated statues, since I have seen a lot of them. However,when I stumbled onto an area showing the process to craft those irreplaceable precious Buddha, I was amazed deeply by the great craftsmanship and patient of a craftsman.Without them, I think wonderful sculptures that I have met would not exist, and hence, cultures would be hardly preserved. After that, I discovered a large map which indicates the sources of Buddhism. I usually don’t really care about the content on the board but the big map also showed where Malaysia is. Since most of my friends, did not know about where my country is, i took the chance to show them and tell them some stories of my country. Through my speech, i realized that my own identity was actually hidden in my history. I identified myself while showing where Malaysia is and how i lived my life over there to my friends. Had a great time telling them my stories and my life  but not from learning the stories of the artworks.

By the way, i forgot where i put or i might have lost my memory card of my camera again as well as the pictures in itFortunately, I have one picture of one artwork of the museum  in my phone. But it turns out that i can’t upload the picture since the storage memory is full. I will try my best to find my memory cards and share the pictures in it.

In the nights before  this,  I had been thinking of  ” who was I?” , “Did i change?” and ” who am I ?”  in my small single size bed. These question brought up a lot of flashback into my mind. I remember I was once an introvert  whom didn’t speak up for himself  or assert his opinions and somewhat antisocial when I was in junior high school. It wasn’t a surprise to me if anyone in my class didn’t even know my existence at the end of the semester. But everything changed after I joined into Red Crescent Society about the end of junior high. The activities and training the seniors provided were grueling and meaningful.  What I learned from it really turned me over a new leaf. It was like a pair of worn out leather shoes changes into a shiny leather shoes because of a great shoe polish.

A shot after a victory in a competition with my peers(2006)

Other than that, even though I have changed quite much, I still don’t quite understand myself. I don’t know what my character is. However, one day I stumbled upon a web page  about one of my childhood favorite video game, Super Mario Boss. Again, it reminded me of how much i  addicted to it before and it was also the leading cause of my shortsightedness.  Nonetheless, I found out that I see this game different than how i thought of it when I was a kid. In the game, Mario has a great journey  to rescue the princess in distress from Bowser. His journey is tough because of the numerous number of  enemies but he also get help from his comrades and his superpowers. In my eyes, I relate the game with reality. There are both advantages and disadvantages in life, I shall use my advantage effectively to overcome and conquer any hindrance lies ahead of me. Therefore, I should appreciate the chances that Baruch give me to improve myself and get rid of my bad attitudes. For example , I am quite a vain person and I always get complacent even though i achieve only a little goal.Besides, since I am considered as a multilingual, i am setting a goal to get into an international organization after I graduate. I will work as hard as possible to accomplish the goal.

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Mario (adult and macho version) =D

First of all, I am a freshman, totally fresh in both college and educational system. And Blogging too!

I think I am merely a follower right now. A few months back, right after I graduated from my high school in Malaysia and came to the United States, I kept  thinking of what would be my next phrase of life.  Career or College? With not much determination, I simply chose to pursue a tertiary education since almost everyone in my Facebook’s friend list does that! “I don’t want to be left out  and I want to be cool.So,I want to go to college too.”, “I want to stick with my best friend forever!”, those were what I thought back then but of course the second one didn’t work out. So, I am now in Baruch College but I have no clue of what i am going to achieve here.

The top 3 concerns that are bugging me a lot right now would be choosing a club,time management and the major i have to declare later. I was a very active club member in my high school. I took part in Red Crescent Society(also known as Red Cross) and an organization, which was alike to Student Government but it managed only clubs. These 2 club and organization brought me a lot of fun to my high school life. Therefore, i hope i can participate in at least one club in Baruch. I need a good time management to make sure that I make time for study, work , entertainment and clubs(if any). Choosing major is really a tough decision and almost every freshman face the same problem like mine. I hope that I could find what I am interested in as soon as possible.

Baruch has more building and bigger classroom than my high school. Other than that, my high school consisted mostly Chinese students and has around 1200 students but Baruch has students from different part of the world. Sharing opinions and discussing class material with different races is really a brand new experience to me. However, as i mentioned before, I think that joining a club will provide me a chance to have different perspective on this school.

Since the educational system in America is different from Malaysia, i have some hard time to accustom myself to the new environment and sometimes it is hard for me to understand native speaker who speaks English  fluently. But in one year, I anticipate that Baruch can help me out and change me into a more diligent and independent person.