FRO12 DTG

What can I say?

I find myself to be like any other person right now.  The same habits, similar things that I enjoy are much like many other people.

It all starts on the best part of the week, when we’re done with school on Friday.  Around 60 hours of whatever I want to waste it on.

When I finish school on Friday for the weekend, what do I do? Not work, of course.

Whether I get back late or sleep the day away, its 12 of the 60 hours gone.

On the following Saturday I find myself saying that I’m going to finish my work first and then enjoy the rest of the weekend.  Of course, that never happens.  I don’t know exactly where the time goes.  Another 24 hours gone in a blink of an eye.  On Sunday, I know I have the same feeling as many other people,  where did my weekend go?  Now I have to spend my day finishing all of my work.  I plan it out and tell myself that I’m going to finish by 7.  But too bad it’s too easy to get distracted.  It always seems to be a nice day when I need to finish my work.  I just look out my window and see Queens center mall and the nearby park and I lose my focus instantly.   After an hour of doing nothing,  I attempt to get back to work.   But unfortunately theres lots of football to be watched on sunday.  The giants at one hour, the jets at a different hour and then theres the primetime game “sunday night football”.  All of that ends near 12.  All of those sleepless nights are ones that I’d rather not recall.  This vicious cycle goes on week after week and the loss of sleep eventually catches up to me, but luckily I’m in the middle of a change.

Monologue

            It was when I was in second grade when I got and shared my first computer with my sister. It was a Compaq computer, a company probably no one remembers anymore since it’s been taken over by many others over the years. The computer didn’t come with sound but that didn’t matter to me at the time. The first thing I did once windowsXP was installed was move the mouse towards the start button and clicked it. Clicked all programs, clicked the folder named Games, and opened up pinball.

I love games, maybe not all games but a good chunk of them. Before my parents bought a computer, I would watch my cousins play. Since my cousins lived in the apartment above mine I would go up there and watch them play Starcraft almost every day. If they weren’t playing when I visited them, I would literally take a nap and wait for them to start. But once I had my own computer I found my own games to play and because I couldn’t get a hold of starcraft since I highly doubted if my parents were going to buy it. Nevertheless, I still had fun without it. It was only until 2010 when Starcraft 2 was released and by then I did not need to ask permission to buy it. I was a very happy boy that day.

One thing that would complete my gaming crave is either a playstation or a Nds. Not everything can be played on the computer. I have always wanted either one of those but they cost a fortune though. It’s just the next best thing keeps coming. It was the gameboy advance, Nds now it’s the 3ds. Maybe one of these days I’ll finally settle for one and pray the next best thing doesn’t beat the 3ds.

I believe the greatest education is best acquired through experiences and journeys; which was the exact type of education I received last year.  Normally, one goes straight to college after finishing their senior year, but in no means am I nor do I want to adhere to normal.  Instead of going straight to college, I took off for a year and travelled 6,000 miles away from home to a foreign country with foreign people and foreign customs.  I went to study religion and philosophy in Har Nof an extremely orthodox town located in Jerusalem, Israel.  I had no idea what to expect or what would be expected of me.  To say I had an unbelievable year would be a huge understatement; my year exceeded any possible expectations and not only did I experience an entirely new world, I experienced an entirely new me.  Being 6,000 miles away, not speaking the language fluently and not having my parents bail me out of trouble, made the experience and my time being there that much better.  I didn’t realize being thrown into a completely different environment and a different culture would actually make me responsible for my actions.  That’s the thing about being so far away, away from home, away from what you are used to; you are forced to grow up and take responsibility for your actions.

In that one year away, I learnt more and experienced life through actually living.  I learnt about religion, about life , about philosophy.  I travelled from the North of Israel all the way down to the Southern tip of Eilat that borders Jordan.  While being in Eilat, I hiked a mountain that from the top of it you see Egypt, Syria and Jordan.  I lived on a kibbutz and spent some time there.  I spontaneously took a trip to Cyprus and Rhodes.  What i am trying to get at is that when you are thrusted into an unknown world and culture, it forces one to be appreciative of what you have and get by by yourself.  I did not have a car  there I either took a public bus and got lost or hitchhiked with whomever (something i do not suggest unless you are in israel!).  These experiences and journeys are ones that made me grow up and take responsibility for my own actions.  I got into trouble and didn’t have my mom to bail me out, I got lost and didn’t have a phone to reach anyone.  These experiences shaped the person I became and I learnt more about life and about myself then any classroom will ever teach me!

It feels as if all the sincerity has left me. My work is no longer a product of honesty but something that has been forced out of me. I don’t want to be here. The days bleed into each other and my thoughts of accomplishment disappear, I don’t know what can possible be the point anymore. Where did all the genuine go? I know its still in here, it must be. College hasn’t changed me. Why is that? Shouldn’t that be the point? It’s hard to put the blame on myself, I don’t want to. I refuse to. But it’s entirely my own fault. Repetition. This is all the same. These thoughts are put on repeat and blasted through the speakers of my shiny MacBook. This is filer: I am going to do as they do in the movies. Showcase my personality through a lens, one of many I might add. I don’t feel the need to make myself more interesting to you. If I did this would have gone down differently. You expected for this to go down differently but I’m not going to apologize. The way I choose to do these things, with meaning that speaks in false irony, is my choice. You don’t know what that means. The structure is undeniable but not because I choose for it to be, it just comes out that way. Just looks at all the eyes, lets revert our thoughts to Rimbaud. I thought it was a style at first. I had finally found my niche. That’s not the case. It’s a cage I cannot release myself from. I don’t want your help. I don’t need it. This is my fault and I have come to except it in the hopes that sincerity will come back to me.

https://plus.google.com/photos/107188753218772686901/albums/5802205558279121073?authkey=CJmVi9akvJjDBw

Being happy, in a deeply real sense, I think comes with first recognizing who you are and embracing that.  Being fake is a bad habit that I believe too many people today have, and so while the level of smiling may be higher than in my parents’ youth, the number of people today who are actually depressed is at a frighteningly high level.  The first and second image on my collage sums up the way I feel about how you should go about things; just be real with yourself and others, and you won’t need to chase smiles.

Pokémon is a fantastically steady constant that I have had throughout my life.  I don’t know that I was a particularly social person at a younger age, and I’m mostly to myself now, and the game pictured second in my collage is the first one I ever owned.  That game helped spark the deep passion I have for video games today, and nothing gives me a rush of nostalgia quite like that game.  Wherever I decide to go with my life, I know that I can always take a break from the real world and escape for a while.

I take great pride in my Israeli heritage, and few things are more important to me than that nation’s sovereignty and security.  I may be a New Yorker and an American both at heart and on paper, but the home of my ancestors is Israel, and it is important to me that my children have that opportunity open to them.  Every member of my extended family and my parents has fought for the Israeli army, and the sacrifices they have all made to keep that nation free I do not take for granted.  The fourth and fifth pictures of my collage communicate the importance of politics in my life.

Expanding my knowledge and exploring the world around me is what drives me.  I always feel the need to keep moving forward, to becoming a better, more educated person.  Art, in whatever form it comes, often inspires me to further pursue that goal I just stated above.  The limited amount of traveling that I’ve done over the past few years has only sharpened the passion I have for history and the world around me, and the last image is that of Grindelwald in Switzerland, which I hope to visit sometime soon.  The sixth image of Plato and Socrates sums up my love of study and education, and the seventh image is an album cover of a music producer whose work I listen to as I do my own work.

I’m sorry for being late.

Since I was an infant, I have listened to music, because my parents enjoy listening to it, including classical and many other genres. I think that is why I love music so much, both listening to and playing it. To me, music is one of the only things that can get me away from the stress I get. It also is a thing that has connected me to the closest friends I have now.

I have grown up listening mostly to Korean music because I lived in Korea until I was 12. I still often search for new Korean songs online, and enjoy listening to it. I also love to listen to American music. What I usually listen to are the old soft songs, since I like to relax listening to music. However, I sometimes have to listen to loud music to get pumped up, since I tend to be too relaxed and get lazy.

The list below is the songs that I enjoy listening to, that describe a little bit of who I am.

The first five are American songs , and the last five are Korean.

1.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTfTjVtZO8Q

Billy Joel – And So It Goes

2.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE-U5e78WHc

Eagles – Desperado

3.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2Cti12XBw4

Maroon5 – Sunday Morning

4.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oqgTA6N-iw

Boys II Men – End Of The Road

5.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLexgOxsZu0

Bruno Mars – Lazy Song

6.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0

PSY – Gangnam Style

7.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7aW5moDV7w

Dynamic Duo – Ring My Bell

8.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGReh7eNTUU

Urban Zakapa – My Love

9.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22F094b67Hs

10cm – It’s Snowing

10.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xR2BrtoBfjk

J Rabbit – Asking for Tomorrow

http://grooveshark.com/playlist/Freshman+Seminar+Blog+1/78559752

1. HIV Song By Ween: I chose this song because it only has two lyrics and doesn’t say much. I don’t say much.

2. Yonkers By Tyler The Creator: I saw in an interview that Tyler wrote the song so that every pair of lines contradict each other. I tend to contradict myself in a lot of things in every day situations, leaving me with no opinion.

3. Make Peace and Be Free By Perfect Confusion: The song describes my average day. I wake up and go do what I have to do. Not much else goes on.

4. Live For the Day By Perfect Confusion: This song describes the way I wish I lived my life. Doing more vibrant things would probably give me more of a personality.

5. Thrift Shop By Macklemore feat. Wanz: I find this song really funny. My friend described him as “the definition of swag” and stuff that includes swag is just funny to me. It  shows my sense of humor.

6. Flow By Cage the Elephant: The song says “Looking out a window, wonder how it came to be”. Sometimes I wonder about how things are made and spend time on wikipedia trying to figure it out.

7. Eyes Closed By The Narrative: This song is talking about a daydream someone is having. I spend a lot of time in class and out daydreaming.

8. In One Ear By Cage the Elephant: This song is about not caring about what people think about the things you do and doing them because you like to. I like to think I do this, but I’m not sure.

9. Four Chords By The Classic Crime: I want to do something with my life. Leave something behind in the world before I die, so at least one person remembers I existed.

10. Loser By Beck: This is just the type of music I like. It has a unique sound and it’s catchy to me. That is all.

http://imgur.com/a/kCrYd#0

This is a little late but hey, my name’s Melessa I’m 18 years old and I was born in Queens, which brings me to the first picture.  I’ve used the A train countless times and I’ve encountered a wide variety of people on the subway, some more eccentric than I would like. But that’s all a part of living in New York, as anyone reading this post will know. I love riding roller coasters and when I found this second picture on the internet I could feel a little of the anticipation you get when you’re on a roller coaster about to go down that first hill. The third picture is a picture taken at Disney world, where I had some of the best moments of my childhood. There are a lot of things I still do that are childish and immature but I don’t think people should take themselves too seriously all the time. The next picture is from one of my favorite shows Breaking Bad, everyone should watch this show. The fifth picture is taken in England, where I’ve always wanted to visit. I’m actually planning a trip there for next summer. Next is a picture of a cup of tea. In my experience, a good cup of tea can fix anything and up to this day, if I go to my grandmother’s house after a bad day the first thing she does is start making a cup of tea. The last picture was taken graduation day with most of the kids from my major, Industrial Design. I saw this group of people A LOT for the past two years and some of my closest friends are in this picture.

In order to complete this assignment I chose to use the picture gallery. I believed that it would be the easiest way to show a little about myself. When i started the assignment I didn’t want my picture choices to be to simple or obvious. Of course while I was trying to find pictures the only ideas i had where simple ans obvious. My heritage is important, so there is both a Greek and a Cypriot flag in my gallery. My home and neighborhood in Queens is important and always will be which explains the picture of Bell Boulevard in Bayside, Queens. Learning to drive and gaining the ability of have that kind of freedom was important so i put up a picture of my car. The computer I have right now may not be the most important thing in the world to me but my love for computers in general is. My family is massive and though i found it a bit creepy, I put a picture in my gallery of some random family to show this. I grew up with my dog and now that i moved away from the house i spend a good amount of time thinking about her so of course i had to put a picture of her up. Lastly i chose a picture of a plane. From really young i have always really enjoyed traveling. Everything about it is interesting and I believe that it is my inspiration for a lot of choices in my life. I would like to one day move to Cyprus and learn more about my heritage. Even though the pictures are kind of lame they show a good deal of information about my life.

Calvin abel Slide Show

The first picture is about the Giants they are my favorite football team. Me and my whole family love them.

The second picture is about the yankees most of my family loves the mets but im a yankees fan till death and Derek Jeter’s my favorite player.

The the third and fourth pictue is a Brookyln logo and the Brooklyn bridge. I was born and raised and Brooklyn and have never been any place better. Its the greatest place on earth and has the best people you can find.

The fifth picture is a picture of the album ‘The Blueprint’ by Jay-Z. Its my all time favorite album and he is my favorite artist.

The sixth picture is of a football. Since I was a little kid I loved football I can watch it for days and would have played for the rest of my life if I could have.

The seventh picture is of a laughing smiley face to representsthe jovial side of me me. I can be very goofy at times because I feel humour is one of the best ways if not the best way to interact with other people.

The eighth picture is of picture is of a cartoon studying because aside the the laidback and goofy part of my personality I can be quite studious when im interested in something.

The nineth picture is of my dad, sister,cousin and myself and the tenth picture is of me and some of the seniors on my high school football team.