.hiatus

I haven't really updated this blog in a while. However, a very fun summer session is coming to a close. I am going home in a few days, and I am in the mood to start writing again.

Updates are coming soon.

_D&

Homecoming, Part 3

After all the eventful happenings along the way back from New Haven, I'm glad to finally be home. I'm quite a late writing/posting this conclusion due to computer-related problems and breaktime happenings.


In any case, I ended up boarding to leave Phoenix about half an hour later than scheduled. On the plane, however, we had to wait again due to a fluid leak at the rear of the plane that fortunately turned out to be deicer. After that, our flight departed without any other special event.

Before we left, I planned on catching up on some more sleep during the flight, but I conversed with the Army infantryman in the seat next to me. Our conversation started with both of us expressing relief at the fact that fluid leak at the rear of the plane was not hydraulic fluid.

He was a conservative and we had a good conversation about various conservative views, some of which I shared as well. I found that though I identified myself as more left-leaning throughout most of high school, I have discovered recently that, I was quite conservative in many ways, though I have aligned myself with the Democratic Party thoughout the 2008 Presidential Election.

He also expressed his distaste of the extended war in the Middle East, especially since he would be going over to Afghanistan in a few weeks. He said that he would rather go to Iraq at the moment since there is not much to do in Iraq anymore and all the action and the danger is going on in Afghanistan. I did remember hearing on the radio back during the summer that the casualty rate in Iraq has dropped below that of Afghanistan. This may be a good sign that the conflict in Iraq is soon over, but on the flipside, when will our involvement in Afghanistan end as well?

What I don't understand is why we had to enter Iraq in the first place. Initially, the reason was that somebody believed that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. However, as it turns out, we didn't find any and although we removed a brutal dictator and a regime of terror, we destabilized the state which caused terrorists to appear in Iraq. If we focused our efforts on Afghanistan, we may have actually captured bin Laden and ended this conflict much more quickly.

In any case, I do hope as well that we can remove our troops from Afghanistan soon. I have a friend from high school who is also in the infantry. He left for Afghanistan last summer. I pray that he and the rest of our troops stay safe and that this new year and hope that our new administration will bring forth the promised change.


After an hour and a half, we were finally over the San Francisco Bay. I have flown into SFO many times and each time, seeing the Bay shimmer beneath us was a wonderful feeling as I spot the familiar landmarks: the salt fields, the Dumbarton and San Mateo bridges, and finally the peninsula where San Francisco International is located on. We actually go pretty close to the San Mateo Bridge which arches upward alongside lofty high-voltage powerlines. I have seen planes descend while driving on the bridge, but it is different feeling looking down on the bridge and the cars from the plane. There is a slight anticipation since we are over water the entire time until we reach the runway. Nonetheless, the touchdown smoothly sighed, "you're finally home."


After I retrieved my luggage, I took SFO's completely-automated Skytrain to get to the BART station. I'm taking BART (Bay Area Rapid Transport) to Pleasanton where I would meet my parents and then go by car home to Tracy. Right now, the Dublin/Pleasanton stop is the end of that particular BART line. Extending BART to Tracy has been proposed for as long as I remember but they still haven't started any signs of construction yet.


I actually brought a BART ticket with me when I left for New Haven back in August, but when I looked for it among the myriad pieces of paper in the expanding file I put the ticket in, I wasn't able to find it. I ended having to buy another ticket. I spent about 10 minutes trying to find an ATM but then someone told me that you could use credit cards in the ticket machines too, something I didn't notice before.

I had to get off at Balboa Park to transfer to the Dublin/Pleasanton train. I remember there used to be a train that went directly to and from Dublin/Pleasanton and SFO but now they make you transfer. The only train that goes to SFO is the Pittsburg/Baypoint train. The Dublin/Pleasanton train ends at Daly City.

In any case, after having dinner in Pleasanton with my family, I got home at around 9 PM on Saturday. 

Homecoming, Part 2

3:44 AM CST
From what I have heard, they will start checking in at 4. They already turned the lights back on and the conveyer belt behind the US Air counter is moving. The self check in kiosks have finished booting Windows XP and are now displaying their usual menu. There is a large group of Army soldiers that arrived here over the past few hours, and I will wait for them to check in before getting in line. I spent the past few hours learning Common Lisp and trying out Adobe Lightroom CS4 before I started writing again. My flight will leave at 11:55 for Phoenix, and I’m just waiting to check in as soon as I can and go through security (for the second time) and hopefully by then some of the restaurants have opened.

I am writing this post as things happen and as time goes along rather than doing so after getting home since I will have a lot of wait time. I’ll keep writing these logs until I board my flight from Phoenix to SFO or until my battery runs out.


5:28 AM CST
At around 4:30, I checked in and went through security. Most of the stores were still closed but thankfully Burger King was open and I had dinner/breakfast there. I found it interesting to note that this was the first time I’ve had fast food in about 4 or so months. I found my gate, E35, which is actually full of people waiting for an earlier flight.

There is still a good 5 hours of downtime before I start boarding. I found a place with some power outlets to recharge my laptop and some seats to hopefully recharge myself. Like other airports, DFW has Wi-Fi, and, also like other airports, it unfortunately isn’t free. I actually realized once more just how much I seem to be relying on the Internet. I found that there is actually not that much to do on my computer without an internet connection. Most of what I do on my computer nowadays other than homework usually involves some a web-based service.

However, this is not surprising since I am definitely not the only one. I recently read an article on CNN about a study that showed that adults in America would rather forgo sex than Internet access. I am not going to comment more about that at the moment because my relationship with the Internet is comparatively dissimilar.

Anyway, I sometimes wonder if or when the Internet will reach its maximum capacity in terms of number of nodes or the amount of data being transmitted at a given instant, and when the core technologies of the Internet will be dramatically changed or upgraded. I read about the superfast network connecting the Large Hadron Collider to various servers throughout Europe. This fiber-optic network is supposedly 10,000 as fast as the Internet that we use. The Internet will continue to become more and more essential in the coming years, especially with the proliferation of cloud computing. Some speculate that in the future, operating systems as we know it will become obsolete and will be replaced with network-based systems.

But for right now, I am in a way finding that my lack of Internet access relieves me of a major distraction and has allowed me to take more time to think and write. I apologize for all the random tangents in this post compared to the last. There’s still a good 5 hours before I board my flight.


7:25 AM CST
I moved to a seat at Gate 35 now. It looks like sunrise outside. I can’t actually see the sun but there it is already somewhat bright and there is a red glow among the haze on the horizon. It is interesting because back in New Haven, it was actually really bright at around 7:30. Here, it seems like the sun hasn’t fully come up yet, but maybe it is because Dallas is in the South or because it is even brighter inside the terminal. In any case, it is good to see that the weather will be pretty clear today.

I’m finally feeling pretty drowsy now so I think I’ll get some sleep. I have my alarm set to 11:00 so I won’t miss boarding my flight.

2:22 PM MST
I actually got a lot more sleep than I expected.

After fortunately being awoke by my alarm, I boarded and we left Dallas. I didn’t really get a good view of Dallas as we flew in last night aside from a field of city lights drawing gradually closer. As we took off, the view was pretty amazing:


In the daytime, the endless field of lights is revealed to be an endless field of sprawl. For some reason, my mental prototype of a large city is a big clump of skyscrapers, leaving out the suburbs and industrial zones and everything else. In any case, though I'm not too fond of flying, the amazing aerial views never cease to amaze me.


After going through the layer of clouds and approaching cruising altitude, I got a good amount of sleep before waking up as we prepared to land in Phoenix. The shadow on the ground is us:


Now, I am waiting for my final flight in an unusually packed terminal in Phoenix (hence the picture preceding this post). A lot of people are sitting on the ground or just standing because all of the seats were full. As it turns out, a number of flights are being delayed. The flight to Las Vegas is delayed because the plane was late coming in. The flight to Kona is delayed due to "connecting problems." At Gate 29, we're waiting for the flight to Atlanta to leave before we would board our flight. However, for some reason, the plane didn't come in for the Atlanta folk so we will be flying before they do, and at least half an hour later than scheduled.

This will be it for now. I won't have a chance to write until I get home, but I am glad that home is now not at all too far away.

Homecoming, Part I

Yesterday, my first semester at Yale came to a close with an intense 3.5 hour Multivariable Calculus final exam. The exam was much more difficult than any exam for any class I have had before, and the stakes in this exam were higher since it was worth 50% of our semester grade. Though the exam was 8 questions long just like our midterms, it was a lot more difficult. I managed to “finish” all of the questions, however, I know for a fact that there were a number of problems I didn’t necessarily do correctly. Actually, I had to basically BS (AP style) one of the problems since I couldn’t find a way to parameterize an ellipse in space created from the intersection of a paraboloid and a plane and then project it onto the X-Y plane. In any case, I am glad that it’s over. The exam was a good fight, and I tried the best I can. All I can do now is hope that the curve will be beneficial.

In any case, I would say that my first semester overall was great. Though there were pretty tough times, I really enjoyed my classes. I learned so much both in and outside of my classes. I am actually really looking forward to the semester, but for now, I am glad to be finally coming home.

Now about that.

My flight was scheduled for Today, Friday, December 19, 2008, departing from Tweed at 3:55, arriving in Philly, and then connecting to San Francisco where I would arrive at around 9 PM PST. However, at around noon today, it started snowing hard. I heard the night before that a lot of flights today might be canceled, but after contacting U.S. Airways a couple of times, I was told ultimately that they didn’t know and that I should wait till the next day. This morning, the flight status on the U.S. Air website didn’t say that my flight was going to be delayed or canceled, even when it started snowing. So, at 1:30, I took a taxi over to Tweed where I was told that my flight was canceled.

I asked the US Air agent there to try to change my flight. He told me that I could go home today, but I would have to fly out of Hartford at 6 and catch a connecting flight at Dallas and get to San Francisco by around 11. The only other choice was to wait until Sunday when the weather will supposedly be better.

At this point, I was faced with a dilemma. Taking a taxi up to Hartford would cost about $120. However, tomorrow, I will be going to the Buck Foundation Winter Gathering, one of the biannual conferences for my scholarship. Also, though I could go back and Yale for a few nights (and go to Nimit’s All-Night Movie Marathon), the dorms will be closing on Sunday at noon. And not to mention, I really want to see my family as soon as possible.


After consulting with my parents, we decided that it would be best if I spend the $120 on the ride up to Hartford and come home today. And so, I went. The US Air agent changed my flight to the American Airlines flight out of Hartford and I left Tweed. The cab driver was really nice. We had a great conversation on the way there talking about New Haven winters, tips on driving through snowstorms and other conditions, such as adding weight to the rear of the car, the cab business, and culture. The highway during a snowstorm was quite interesting. though the plows were going through, the snow built up so much that you could no longer see the lane markings. Except for an exceptionally daring few, everyone drove at around 30 mph. However, we passed by at least 5 accidents on the way there, and the radio was also reporting jackknifed big rigs and multi-car pileups left and right. In any case, my driver was really careful and skilled, and we arrived in Hartford at about 5.

However, when I checked in, the AA agent told me that I could get to Dallas, but my spot on the Dallas to San Francisco flight was unconfirmed, and told me to go over to the US Air booth in the other terminal. I went over and the US Air agent told me that the connecting flight was overbooked and that I didn’t have a spot on it. At this point, the situation had become really inconvenient. He told me that there was no other way to get to SFO tonight, but that there was a flight available on, believe it or not, Sunday. Another option would be to fly to Dallas and spend the night there and then, in the morning the next day, catch a flight to Phoenix and finally a connection to SFO.

Going back to Yale would cost another $120, an option that I refused to take unless I am absolutely forced to. While the cancellation at Tweed was due to weather, this a mistake on US Air’s part. The agent here said that it was interesting that the printout that the agent back at Tweed gave me said that both flights were confirmed because the second flight was in fact not confirmed. I would not have come here if I knew that there was no way that I could fly home tonight. I would have just saved my money and went back to Yale for a few days. However, I am here and in any case, I would need a place to stay for at least one night. I decided to go to Dallas but I requested that US Air cover a one-night stay since this was a mistake on their part. I told the agent my reasoning, but he adamantly said that it was due to weather and therefore they cannot cover anything.

Not wanting to spend two too many nights at the airport, I decided to fly to Dallas anyway and see what I can do from there. Thus, I changed my flight again and went back to the other terminal to the AA booth to check in my bags where I was told that I would have to get my suitcase from the baggage claim and then check it in the next morning. I and my backpack then underwent a more thorough than usual inspection at security since I changed my flight, and finally got to Gate B5 to board.


The scene at the gate was quite interesting. Outside, the snow was still falling heavily and they were dragging the Boeing 737 back and forth, trying to dock it with the gate. Since they haven’t plowed the area around the gate, they were having difficulty getting the 737’s cabin door to where it should be. People inside were standing around the window, taking pictures and silently cheering on the efforts outside. Finally, at around 6:15, we started boarding. However, we were told that because we have been delayed and that the plane needs to be de-iced, many of us will be missing our connecting flights and that some of us may have to fly tomorrow. However, they told us that we have to pay for our own accommodations if we have to spend a few nights. Well, that brings appealing my case out of the question since we were given this announcement, and I would miss the original connecting flight anyway.

After boarding, we still had to wait another substantial amount of time so they could de-ice the plane. In any case, we finally took off. This was probably one of the roughest take-offs I have ever experienced. At first, it seemed alright, but when we passed through the snow cloud, the few eternal minutes of turbulence was so bad that it felt as if the plane fell into the grasp of Godzilla who then proceeded to shake it wildly. Finally, we came out of the cloud and into the clear night sky. They showed two movies during the flight, Get Smart (which I watched and was amused by), and Elf (which I didn’t watch out of exhaustion). The flight attendants came around with the usual round of complementary beverages and, as usual nowadays, if we wanted food, we had to buy it; they don’t even provide peanuts anymore.

The rest of the flight and the landing went very smoothly and at around 10:30 CST, we arrived in Dallas/Ft. Worth. I was glad that we got out of the snowstorm and arrived safely. However, I was slightly dismayed that all of the stores in the terminal had closed (I haven’t had dinner) and that the only vending machines I found were the ones that sold beverages. In any case, I went to retrieve my suitcase and then took a shuttle to Terminal E where I would check in for my US Air flight the next morning. I finally gave up on appealing my case after finding that all of the airline agents and apparently most of the airport personnel were no longer present.

After refueling on a bottle of Mountain Dew, I settled down on the most comfortable place I could find next to the check-in area for the night. It has been a long and tiring day, but I decided not to sleep since I have all of my belongings with me in an unsecured area. Instead, I read the first few chapters of C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity (which I recently bought) before they turned off the lights.


It is 2 in the morning right now as I am finishing up this post. I am sitting in front of the US Airways booth, watching the self check in kiosks boot up Windows XP. I am not too frustrated at my situation anymore. I am grateful that I was able to fly at all tonight and glad that the situation ultimately came down to was not so bad after all. I will ultimately be missing the Buck Winter Gathering, but I am glad that I will be home soon. I am grateful for God’s guidance and protection today, and I also pray that He watches over everyone who is traveling in this hectic and stormy time of year.

I will check in as soon as the booth opens and I hope that the rest of the trip will go smoothly. If all goes well, I will arrive in SFO at around 3 PST. I might start writing Part II pretty soon if I can’t find anything else to do but I will finish and post after getting home.

Sunrise

Coming back to my room after a very late late-nighter in one of the cozy rooms of the Saybrook Library, for the first time, I saw the break of dawn at around 6:30 AM:

I was pretty amazed by the sight of sunrise since this is the first I have seen in who knows how long (I was hardly a morning person), so I decided to take a few more pictures. This next one is a 15 second exposure:

Finally, at around 7, I decided to go to sleep/nap and try to make it to my 9:25 class:

Anyway, though I was exhausted after working until the morning and regretting that I procrastinated, I did find the experience of seeing the sunset rewarding, as literally both the end of a day and the beginning of the next. I know that this will not be the first time I will see the sunrise after an all-nighter, but I am glad to have found and experienced another one of God's great creations.

Lunch with the Grand Master

I had lunch with Jason aka the Grand Master in Berkeley on Wednesday. We had a long and thoughtful conversation, catching up and talking about life, the world, and God. Looking back on our conversation, though we talked about many different things, there was a common theme to pretty much all of what we talked about: generosity.

Generosity

As usual, we talked about spirituality and my own faith. Jason asked what Jesus meant to me. It took me a moment to think this question through. I have started going to church again since I came here to Yale after not going throughout most of middle school and high school. As a result, I am very much just starting to earnestly develop spiritually. To me, Jesus represents living not to gain for yourself but living for others.

Jason said that truly living for others is extremely challenging for all of us. We view generosity as a positive virtue and we try to be generous when we can. We sometimes casually equate generosity with selflessness; however, is being generous the same as being selfless? I have been thinking about this question for a long time now. This semester, I have been taking the Generosity section of English 114. On the first day of class, our professor asked us about what we define an act of generosity as. At the end of the discussion we had three different and apparently conflicting definitions:

1. A selfless act of generosity - the form of generosity we idealize. We give without receiving anything in return.
2. A "selfish" act of generosity - we give but we get something out of it. For example, we volunteer and it makes us "feel good about ourselves."
3. A selfish act of generosity - the form of generosity we usually frown upon. We give in order to receive something in return.

After reading Mauss's The Gift and several other literatures, our class still felt that each of the three above definitions define generosity. However, we came to the general consensus that all gifts prompt reciprocation because we give to enhance solidarity in some way. As a result, we inherently have selfish motivations behind our acts of generosity.

In any event, I was reminded of what we had discussed in English that day. We discussed the idealized form of generosity of the first definition: "a selfless act of generosity," in other words, a free gift.

Free gifts

We had a discussion in English that day, right before lunch actually, about free gifts and our class once again came to the conclusion that a free gift, a gift that results in no reciprocation whatsoever, is mostly nonexistent because after reading Mauss, Bourdieu, Veblen, and many others, we were ultimately ingrained with the principle of a cycle of reciprocity. A gift causes reciprocation which eventually strives to enhance solidarity. A free gift is not reciprocated and therefore does not enhance solidarity. Before the discussion, I have talked to other people about whether or not generosity can be purely selfless (our class concluded that it cannot) and I've gotten mixed opinions.

Jason told me that in most cases, it is not possible to be generous and not have any selfish motivations at all. However, it is yet possible, though sometimes difficult, to be generous and purely selfless in intention.

"Only with the Holy Spirit working through us, may we be able to really give a free gift."

Jason made a point that I feel is very true and reconciling. It is possible to be completely selfless. "We have seen Jesus give a free gift, and we may also be able to give free gifts by learning from Him."

We place the concept of generosity in very high regard. We see philanthropy, charity, serving one's community, are all very honorable virtues because they are very honorable acts. But even so, today, sometimes, we do things that can be considered "generous" but are motivated by selfish intent. This is why despite the millions of dollars that wealthy philanthropists donate, many of them they actually donate to the cultural institutions that in turn benefit them rather than to charity organizations that aid the poor. On a more familiar level, looking back, I do see that part of my motivation behind all the community service I did back in high school was that my service would eventually look good on college applications. As a semi-random sidenote, the username that I commonly use right now, Alltruist, was a product of those high school years.

Selfishness is a human trait. Although it is not necessarily wrong for one to benefit from generosity, it is questionable if one is generous solely or even mostly in order to gain for oneself. Then again, there's the ends vs. means argument. What counts more: the end result of generosity or the means and motives of generosity? This is more or less an open question and the answer varies depending on viewpoints and cultural backgrounds.

In any event, it is extremely difficult to really be purely selfless, to perform an act of generosity and accept the fact that there will be no reciprocation. It is possible to learn from Jesus when he gave the ultimate free gift, but then again, we're still human. However, we can definitely come close by placing God above all of our worldly desires in our hearts.

To live for others

Looking back upon my pre-college years, I do realize that I have been largely living for myself. Most of the time, I was preoccupied with getting good grades, entering leadership positions, participating in all kinds of activities, all in order to appear good and "well-rounded" when come college admissions. Certainly, I did try to be the best person I could be and help others whenever I could. With all modesty, I admit did eventually end up as "the popular valedictorian," but in any case, my "popularity" was largely due to my academics as my focus was on that and not on the social scene.

Since coming here, I've decided to try to "begin anew" and be who I really am rather than conform to the image others had of me as I have had to do before. However, though in theory this works but old habits are still there. I have found that one impression that I tend to make is that I am a quiet or even "pensive" person. To an extent this is true. I tend to not talk very much, and when I am not talking, probably due to my demeanor, I appear to be pondering something when I am actually not. In any case, my quietness partly due to my lack of effort to advance myself socially and partly due to my self-absorption during my high school years. I have noticed in my conversations that I am quite passive. I don't really ask questions. I don't make enough of an effort to get to know others. Also, there are many people who I see on quite a regular basis that I don't really know as well as I perhaps should.

In any event, this is all part of living less simply for myself and more for others and caring about others. It is a difficult change to make fully, but then again, is a common challenge. At the same time, I have to be able to place God above my own worldly priorities and desires. Only then would I truly be able to "live for others." I do see the progress that I have made since I came here. But in any event, there is a long way to go. It is all part of the constant process of growing. There is so much to learn every step along the way.

The Second Iteration

This is actually the second blog that I will be keeping on a fairly regular basis. What makes this blog different from the my old one is, I guess, pretty much what I write and how I will write. I have always tended to write in a way that somewhat glossed over or sugarcoated whatever I wrote about, in a way trying to fit the material into a kind of mold with the goal of "looking good" as a blog post. Alice, my TAS mom, once said:

The danger with the online blog is that there is a tendency to package yourself into something -well packageable, and at the same time interesting. The goal is for people to see you for "who you are."

I suppose this is a tendency when maintaining any blog. It is very easy to end up trying to create some sort of idealized image and write according to that image and actually writing what is actually on your mind.

For what I write here, I will write in a way that is more true to myself. This does not mean that I will not at all frame what I write in a certain way but that what I write will be more true to my thoughts and just basically less sugarcoated or "modified."

Now, about the name of this blog. I decided to call this blog Second Iteration because a lot of I will write here will be reflective, reflections upon experiences, observations, accomplishments, mistakes; reflections upon emotion, thought, faith. Since the start of my first semester here at Yale about three or four months ago, I have learned more about myself as a person than I have through much of high school. I have become more aware of my personal attributes, my potential, and also more of my weaknesses and shortcomings, and at the same time, I am getting a clearer picture of what and how I should improve myself as a person. Though I have found that I have definitely changed a lot in the past four months, I know that I still have a very long way to go. This blog will, in a way, be a chronicle of my growth, in my faith and spirituality and in myself as a person.