Author Archives: taemin.hwang

Beginning of the semester, I had to frequently go to the bookstore to buy textbooks. Everytime I went, there was always a long line of people. Had to wait at least 20~30 minutes to get in. Also inside the bookstore was packed with people on line to buy books. When we enter, we had to leave our bags in the front, it was tedious process since on the way out, we had to wait in another line to get our bags.

I finally got all my books and lined up to get my bag. There were these coffee cups on the edge of the storage closets. I gave my number to the employee and as he handed over my bag, we accidently tripped over the cups spilling coffee all over the floor. The guy looked at me like it was my fault when it was the employee who handed me the bag almost throwing it to me. Unfortunately, for some reason, it looked like I was guilty of spilling the coffee, everyone was just staring at me. It was an embarrassing moment that I wished never happened.

I thought the Voice performance was bit tedious. Not because the actors were bad or the stories were bad but just because it was on my shortest day. On that day, my anthropology class was cancelled so I was able to go home like 4 hours earlier but unfortunately we had to go to this voice performance. I forced myself to go, so basically my mind was already on my way home but my body was sitting in the hall listening to the on going performances.

At the end, I found some stories actually quite interesting. Stories such as a sick girl who got an organ from her best from and she was able to live but her friends didn’t, was an interesting story. The actress also played it very well, she was able to put emotions into it and acted it out like if it was her story.

From this workshop, I was able to learn a lot about how to register and what to register. The advisor explained things really clearly, I was able to get an idea of what I need to take next semester to all the way to senior semester years. I had a question about enrolling in the summer school and my minor. I wanted to enroll the summer school in different CUNY school but I was wondering if I could get equal amount of credits. She gave me a good explanation on how summer and winter session works. From hearing this workshop, I was able to make up my mind on what I should take over next semester and coming up summer.

Most influential person in my life was my dad. My dad is someone who doesn’t express his thoughts and feelings to other people even to his family. So I never quite knew what he was thinking. It has been 8 years since me and my dad lived together in U.S. Compare to life in Korea where my mom was always on my back for everything, life with my dad was just more relaxing and free. Even though I was young, my dad never really said anything about what I did. I was basically free to do anything I desired. I thought I was happy not being bother by my parents but I envy those parents who had rules for their children to follow, it looked like an act of care from the parents. I wondered why my dad never intervenes with my life. Craving for his attention, more and more I acted out, not come home without telling and hanging out with people who had bad influences. One day I got tired of acting out, so I simply asked my dad why he never intervene. What he said that day had a great impact on me, he told me that he trusts me to do the right thing and act right. I realized that unlike other parents, my dad had full trust in me. From that day on, I acted right because I didn’t want to betray his trust. His trust, had great influence on my life.

            Hello, my name is Taemin Hwang. I never really thought about who I am, but I would define myself as someone very easy going with basically everything. There are only few things that would anger me or make me serious. I can be very outgoing if I choose to be but in school, I try to act serious because I would like to focus on my studies.

            My first concern is to keep my GPA up, it is already almost two months into college life and I felt that it is going to be difficult to keep up with the materials in each class just because there are so many things to memorize. My second concern is to break my lazy habits that I always had. I know I kept making promise to myself every year to not be lazy but it is difficult to break my habbit. I always tend to do things last second. My third concern is to make good friends. I don’t want to make many fake friends but make few true friends in college. Since my closest friends left NY for college, I would like to make good friends in Baruch.

            Baruch experience is different from my high school because of its freedom. I started living by myself, starting the college year and there is so much freedom that I can enjoy. Even in college, there are freedoms, unlike high school classes where teachers try to make you work, in college, it is upto you to follow up with the classes by reading privately. At first, I was only excited about having these freedom but now, I’ve realized that the freedom comes with great responsibility.

           My first year at college will change me to someone who can manage time and be more responsible. I’ve realized that in order to survive in college, I need to manage my time in orderly fashion. I need to do things until the due dates and read materials by the due dates. In college, it is all about time management.