https://plus.google.com/photos/117774213843021640448/albums/5927561466168566385?authkey=CP7U6-iUv7jc7AE

I am Zhifna Ye, you also can call me Kevin. I come form Shanghai, one of the most modern and international city in China. As a big city, Shanghai have its own dual character.
In many tourist’s eye Shanghai is full with tall buildings and financial center. But my favorite place in Shanghai is different kind old fashion streets and the feeling of old Shanghai. Another my favorite thing is food, I would like to try different kinds foods from different places. I like music, I can play piano and cello. But I also like pop music very much. I like travel, I like to visit around the world.

This is my third years in states, I spent my first two years in Philadelphia and I went to a high school called Archbishop Ryan. Philadelphia is also a historical city, there are many scenic spots could show the history of United States.

Now I come to New York and Baruch. As the biggest city in the states, there are many similar points with Shanghai. But there still is a totally fresh place for me. I also glad to come to Baruch.

http://open.spotify.com/user/johnny353/playlist/3FtJCb0bsO6Kg4t3uxabuP

My heart will go on-Celine Dion

Norwegian Wood-Beatles

I’m so tired-Beatles

Wake me up-Avicii

Ave Maria-Beyonce

Paradise-Coldplay

Non, je ne regrette rien

Over The Love- Florence   The Machine

Chelsea Hotel No 2- Lana Del Rey

Young and Beautiful- Lana Del Rey

The ten songs above probably are my favorite songs. Once I falling in love with a song, I will never stop to listen. It will be bored sometimes, but I am not going to delete any of them from my playlist in my heart. The song “Norwegian Wood” is more special for me than the others. I know this song because it is mentioned in a book also called “Norwegian Wood” by a Japanese writer Haruki Murakami. I feel this song is pretty sad because one of the main character says so in the book, but I have never understand the meaning of that song. I replay it over and over and look for the lyrics. It does not matter if you understand or not. It just does not matter at all. I do not need a reason to love a song as I love a girl. You can assume that I rarely have my own idea because I always agree with others such as eating lunch and the sad feeling of “Norwegian Wood”, but I will not admit that anyway. Because this is my own way to respect others and to show my polite. All those songs have one common which all are very sentimental. I am not that kind of person, but I do not that I just like to hear this kind of songs.

New Soul —- Naim. Yael

I’m a new soul/I came to this strange world/Hoping I could learn a bit about how to give and take. /But since I came here/Felt the joy and the fear/Finding myself making every possible mistake

The Show —- Lenka

I’m just a little bit caught in the middle/Life is a maze and love is a riddle/I don’t know where to go I can’t do it alone I’ve tried/And I don’t know why

Today My Life Begins —- Bruno Mars

I will break these chains that bind me happiness will find me/Leave the past behind me today my life begins/A whole new world is waiting its mine for the taking/I know I can make it today my life begins

Fuckin’ Perfect —- P!nk

Mistreated, misplaced, misunderstood/Miss ‘No way, it’s all good’/It didn’t slow me down.
Mistaken, always second guessing/Underestimated, look I’m still around

Homesick —- Kings of Convenience

Every day there’s a boy in the mirror asking me…/What are you doing here?/Finding all my previous motives/growing increasingly unclear.

What Doesn’t Kill You —- Kelly Clarkson

What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger/Stand a little taller/Doesn’t mean I’m lonely when I’m alone/What doesn’t kill you makes a fighter/Footsteps even lighter/Doesn’t mean I’m over cause you’re gone

Details in the fabric —- Jason Marz

If it’s a broken part, replace it/If it’s a broken arm, then brace it/If it’s a broken heart, then face it. Hang on/help is on the way/and stay strong/I’m doing everything

We Don’t Cry —- Chris Garneu

And neither do my friends/though some of them pretend/and its easy if you cry/cos you feel bad for yourself

You Haven’t Seen The Last Of Me —- Cher

I was built tough/I’m gonna show you all what i’m made of/I’ve been brought down to my knees/ and I’ve been pushed right past the point of breaking/ but I can take it/ I will be back/ back on my feet/ this is far from over/I am far from over/ you haven’t seen the last of me.

Not Afraid —- Eminem

Everybody/come take my hand/we’ll walk this road together, through the storm/whatever weather, cold or warm/just letting you know that, you are not alone/ holla if you feel like you’ve been down the same road.

The list above is the songs that can be the best description of me. I was born in Shanghai, a big city in China, at the end of 1994. I was a new soul to this world, growing up under parent’s pampered love, and learning different skills to survive. It is hard for me to remember things happened when I was little; Memory is like a 4GB flash drive, and I always have to delete the old things to save the new stuff. At the age fourteenth, I was a typical teenager girl who confused by the adult world, lost in the maze of live, and felt like I was an outsider that looking all the others enjoyed in playing their interesting live shows. Then, my life turning point came. I came to New York in September, 2009, and it was a brand new beginning for me. I hoped to find new friends and to have a different life style, and I believed that everything will heading to a positive direction. However, my freshman year in high school brought a lot of troubles because of the difficulty in language. Mistreated, misplaced, and misunderstood made me missed my home in Shanghai so badly, and I was wondering what I am doing here. Nevertheless, what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger; I thought the best way to get into the society was learning the English. I forced myself to study harder and to speak with the others in English. We all had to study the SAT in our junior year, and the vocabulary was a huge problem for me. Music was always staying with me in the late night, and the lyrics were telling me that everything will be fine as long as I don’t give up. When I think of the past four years in high school, I feel like I’ve gone such a long journey. All the experience I went through, things I learned, and mistakes I made built me today. College life is a new starting point to me, and I have my friends and my family at my back supporting me, but the most important thing is I’m not afraid of it.

PHOTOS: http://www.flickr.com/photos/103169755@N06/sets/72157635863440323/

I have been living in New York City for as long as I can remember. I emigrated from South Korea when I was just a baby and have never been there since. I am a big  NYC gal and I honestly don’t think I can live anywhere else. The art, shopping, the entertainment, the FOOD is endless here and I love it! Essentially, I am a tourist in my own city and that makes it all the more exciting. 

While I love the city with all my heart, I also love enjoying my time in the city with my best friends. Almost every night was a girl’s night and we would try different restaurants and just try to have the best time every time. Honestly, I don’t know what I would’ve done without them. I owe it to them for influencing my life in some positive way. Because of them I wanted to study hard and try to become the best person  so that ten years from now we would be the same, fun-loving, adventurous gals.

I guess you can say I’m outgoing since I love to socialize, and anywhere I get to meet people- count me in! I just love how everywhere I go, I am meeting people who are from different cultures. I love how I can step out and see new faces everyday, and talk to someone new everyday. I always love meeting people who are different than me, and who like different things. I think people are interesting. Even boring people interest me. It is always exciting for me to see people who don’t look like me. I mean how could it not be when living in NYC? 

While I LOVE socializing with people, I try to take Sundays off for myself. During this time, I often like to read, pig out with junk food while watching TV shows, plop in front of my laptop and go online shopping, and reading blogs!

I also love volunteering on my free time. What started off as a simple Google search had turned into dedication. I came across Room To Grow, a nonprofit organization which dedicates to helping babies born into poverty; to provide necessities for the healthy development of babies, and little did I know that I wanted to be part of it. While I can’t volunteer as frequently as I could, I still try to do so as often as I can. Volunteering taught me a lot more than one would think. Different places taught me different things. I learned to be more tolerant, patient, understanding of life and people. It really changed my perspective of life, my behaviour, my way of thinking. I also thank volunteering for  helping me become who I am today and for helping me see the world a more beautiful place to live in.

http://youtu.be/HyJYasZPuhQ

Hi! My dear classmates! My name is Yunxiang Li and English name is Steven. I was born in Chengdu, China. Although, both of my parents are not local people in Chengdu, I can count as a Chengduer. Chengdu is a wonderful place to visit and I am feeling lucky that I grew up and studied there in Chengdu.

I set a Bugatti sportscar as my first image. It is the car that I really love. When I was young, I stood behind the window to see all kinds of cars and I could identify almost all the models and brands of cars. So, car is one of the most thing I love. The second picture shows the Tianfu square in Chengdu and it is the geographic center of Chengdu city. Then, a picture of original hotpot with red background really reminds me about the spicy food in my hometown. Hotpot is one of my favorite dinner choice when I was in Chengdu. Dog is my Chinese Zodiac.  Also, I always want to have a golden retriever. I think dogs are good friends of human beings.They are also cute and active. The next photo is a earphone made by B&O. I love listening high quality music with fancy equipment. I also bought a speaker which sounds amazing. Then, It is a screenshot from Google map. What I want to express is I like traveling. I traveled at least twice a year(long-distance travel) The next picture shows Alps mountain in Switzerland. Switzerland is the country I like and also the place I’d love to visit. The last image exactly reveals who I am. I am really a dozer and foodie. I’m super lazy and I mean it.

Yunxiang Li

https://picasaweb.google.com/109957402287314882452/September242013?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCMegyNST3466RA&feat=directlink

Hi my name is Henry Chen, and now let me introduce myself and talk about my interest and background a little bit. I was born and raised in China until my family decided to immigrate to the United States. I finished Middle school and High school here, and now I’m happy to enter college and exited to meet more people.

I have many hobbies. One of my hobby is volleyball. I fell in love with volleyball since I was in high school. I was on a school team and we won some games against other schools. I was really exited to represent my school on a volleyball team. I still play volleyball in college during the weekend. In addition, I like to go hiking. Last summer I was hiking in the Rocky Mountains in Wyoming through a school named NOLS. I had a good time hiking there. By the end of the summer, we hiked up to over 100 miles in a month. Sometimes I even go to central park to do a little bit hiking there. Central Park is a good place for hiking in the city or picnic. Furthermore, I like to watch movies. My favorite movies is “The Day After Tomorrow”. Yes, it’s a disaster movie, but I like it because it motivates us to enjoy our lives and improve our environment. Recently, I started to workout more because everyone is so tall and big in college. I want to be like them too! That’s why I have food picture as my album, but that’s not the only reason. I love to eat!!! I just don’t gain much weight from eating. Maybe for some people that’s a good thing, but for me it’s kind of frustrating people I have to eat a lot more to get big!

Anyway that’s pretty much what I like to do in my life so far. I’m hoping to find more hobbies and interests in the future to make my life more meaningful. Also, I value great friendships. I’m hoping that I can find some good friends in college and share the things I like with them. Good luck everyone!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cddyDvA76_8

My Life

During my junior year at the high school, it was very hard for me. The reason was that in my junior year, I had to do SAT’s. For me it was really hard for me to focus on both schoolwork and SAT. Eventually I did not have any time to relax and socialize with my school friends. In the beginning I felt bad and sad that I did not have any time, but however, I got used to the ways I spent my days and I kept on studying. After I got my SAT finished, I had very good days cause I had a time to go out and party with my friends. Starting my senior year, I began to study less and less and finally I stopped to worrying about my grades and in the end it was fun at not even thinking of work and enjoying life. During the end of my senior year, we all had fun at the senior prank. In my senior year, I had fun time cutting classes and instead of playing tennis with my friends. At home, I would rarely study and except for AP Statistics and Calculus homework/tests. But during the senior year at high school, senioritis comes to play and it was fun. Once, a freshman asked something and I responded back to him by saying “shut up freshman.” I personally felt bad for him, but I had to say that to him because I just wanted to feel the senioritis in high school so I had to. During the graduation day, my friends and I all lined up in an order and when we were heading to our spots for the commencement ceremony, I felt so happy that all the hard work for the past four years have caused me to graduate and in the end attend fantastic college. When the ceremony was over, and we each got our diploma, we headed back to our car and I was really feeling good and I carefully took a look at the diploma and it felt amazing to be holding a high school diploma.  During the summer I had tons of fun as well and it was amazing to have a summer in which I basically did nothing except to hang out and have fun all the time. But when the summer ended I wanted to relax more, but I knew I had to go back to school and it was time for me to study again and do well in college. In the beginning, college was not bad because it was early in the semester and professors did not give us much homework. But as the semester went on, the workload and the amount of work became a lot and I began to worry, however, I told myself that I can do it and here I am doing my best to succeed and I think I am doing pretty good. I hope my first semester goes well and I know I will succeed if I do my best.

10 songs that speaks to who i am are here: http://grooveshark.com/#!/playlist/Project/90663702
I like a variety of songs but i think that peaceful and easy going songs fit my personality the most. I like the sound of classical instruments a lot. Most of these songs have a soft beat and it matches me very well. I think that i have a very soft presence; In other words, I don’t get noticed much and I don’t stand out because of it. I don’t really interact with people much either, that is why I have less friends than other people in my class. On the first two days of classes, I didn’t speak to anyone at all. I didn’t meet any friends until my 4th day in class. I think this is due to the fact that I’m a single child and don’t really know how to interact with other people as much as other people who have a sibling to talk to. Once I make friends with other people I open up to them a lot. When I’m alone I don’t like to talk much or smile. But, when I have friends with me I talk more and laugh more as well. These are the reasons why I feel that these soft songs represent me well.