10-28-2018

This is not the most visually appealing structure or picture, but it was the only picture I took today. It's Sunday, meaning it's time to go home :(

There was a couple sitting next to my mom and I in the airport. The girl looked over at my journal with Chinese characters (although I was actually trying to learn some Spanish from my mom) and asked what language it was. And the conversation floodgates were opened. Upon learning we were from a big city in Texas they responded, "Ah, yeah, so not much in Little Rock, right?" Which...is true I guess, but I feel like people are so quick to dismiss small cities. 

Anyways, they were a young couple, around my age. They had just married and were leaving on their honeymoon. I don't remember where exactly they were going, but some typical out-of-country beach destination. I don't think it was Mexico? But it was definitely somewhere Spanish-speaking, because the girl mentioned that she took Spanish in school but doesn't remember any of it.

10-27-2018

In all honesty, I spent most of my time today at the Arkansas State Capitol Building. It took me about 30 minutes to walk here from my hotel. My mom would have disapproved if she saw the route I had to take to get there. But walking is cheaper than Uber, and I haven't walked a lot in a while. I thoroughly enjoyed my time.

Actually, when I first got to the capitol, I guess something was going on, perhaps some sort of charity event? There were people dressed as superheroes standing outside of the capitol building, and there were a decent amount of kids getting their pictures taken with them.

The side of the building. That's another thing - it's actually a very beautiful building for being in the 'boonies', by more urban American standards.

Looking up to the ceiling on the inside. The building has four floors.

I wonder what it would be like to come to this building every day for work. Everything just looks so...important.

The bridge in the background goes over the Arkansas River. This was taken on my walk back to the hotel. I took a slightly different route than I did in the morning, and this stretch was even sketchier than where I walked earlier. Mom would very much have disapproved.

10-26-2018

My flight from Austin to Dallas yesterday was at 6:15am. I also live an hour away from the airport. So I woke up at about 4am yesterday, and didn't get to bed until maybe 10pm-12am. I was very tired, so I slept in this morning. My mom had to go to a meeting this morning, but we decided to meet during her lunch break and go to a purse museum nearby.

I know that sounds weird, but it was pretty cool, and my mom enjoyed it despite not being a huge museum person. They had exhibit containers displaying handbags by the decade, as well as items which would have been in the handbags.

One point I kept hearing is that this is one of three purse museums in the world - there is one in Seoul, and one in Amsterdam.

After our museum break, my mom had to go back to her meeting. So I walked down the street to the Museum of Discovery, which is a science-based museum aimed at providing activities for kids. Before I went inside, I saw the peanut mobile sitting outside. Funny story about this - if you know my mom, you know that she loves to keep up with the news. Usually she reads newspapers, but she had the news channel turned on in our hotel room yesterday afternoon. The news reporter was talking about how the peanut mobile would be going around to some downtown destinations on Friday (today). So, yup, just happened to run into it. 

Inside the Museum of Discovery. There were actually some pretty cool exhibits. It's pretty interactive too, which is nice cause I assume most kids don't have the patience to be quiet and read things.

View of Little Rock from our hotel room. The river that you can see on the right is the Arkansas River.

10-25-2018

It's been rainy and dreary and awful in Texas for the past two months. (Unfortunately, the weather was the same when I arrived in Little Rock.) I looked out the window for almost the whole flight from Austin to Dallas (a short flight - probably about 40 minutes) and the picture above was the only break in the clouds that I saw)

My mom and I made it to Little Rock, Arkansas! She's here for a board meeting. I'm here for no particular reason - just wanted to travel and get away from my office. The organization holding the board meeting paid for her room, so I only had to pay for my flight.

The last time I was on a plane was about two years ago, when I visited a friend after returning to the US from China. I forgot how much I love flying, especially if I have the window seat. (Although I hate to be THAT person who puts the window all the way up in an otherwise darkened plane cabin.) Some people say take-off and landing are the worst parts - I love all of it. Unless the person next to me is sick. Also, I don't care for flights longer than about 3 hours because it is hard for me to sleep on planes. And when I do sleep, it's usually in short intervals, no more than an hour at a time.

Anyways, my mom flew from San Antonio to Dallas and I flew from Austin to Dallas. Then, from Dallas to Little Rock, we were on the same flight. It will be the same on the way home.

Two things about Little Rock you may or may not know: 1. They actually have fall, that season where leaves change into pretty colors instead of turning brown and dying!

2. The 42nd President of the United States, William (Bill) Clinton, is originally from Arkansas. He isn't actually from Little Rock, but I assume he spent a decent amount of time here while holding other political positions since Little Rock is the capital of Arkansas. So there's a lot of Clinton stuff here. My mom and I don't care so much about political divides, and we kept joking about how my dad would hate this place.

There is a museum dedicated to the Clintons inside of the Clinton Presidential Library! My mom and I got here about an hour before they closed, so we didn't get to go through everything, but it was still really cool.

09-30-2018

Drove back to Texas from Kansas City today. But before I left, I took some pictures of my Airbnb:

my room. had its own fridge! and TV, but I didn't use that.

Kitty! They actually had two cats, but only one was allowed outside.

sitting room/dining room (?)

Other side of the sitting room/dining room, leading into the living room

Kitchen

And my car parked on their driveway!

I think I left Kansas City around 6:30am, if not earlier. I thought about and was on track to stop at a park in Kansas, but I felt kind of tired and really just wanted to be home.

I did stop for lunch though - and of course I chose Braum's! Burger was decent, but not anything special, although my opinion may have been influenced by the default cheese and condiments that I did not ask for. Still, I think Whataburger is better :P I'm pretty sure I took a video of myself trying the Braum's burger, and was going to post it here, but I can't seem to find it :c

Finally, I made it home around 4:45pm! There was still some time left in the day before work on Monday. But I didn't do much because I was so tired. However, I am excited to try cooking the vegetables I bought from the farmer's market in Kansas City!

09-29-2018

Today I went to City Market, a local farmer's market. I was so excited when I saw vendors with Chinese eggplant (or Japanese? but I'm so used to calling it Chinese since I became acquainted with this kind of eggplant in China) and bitter melon (even though I said I didn't like it when I tried it, seeing it made me happy - and I kind of want to try it again!).

There was a Chinese grocery store nearby, so I also stopped in here before leaving the area. Actually, this was a necessary trip because I am terribly socially awkward. So yesterday night I bought Vietnamese food for dinner and had leftovers. My Airbnb purchase comes use of a fridge and the microwave if I need it, but the only container I had was my styrofoam take-out box. If I had asked, I'm sure I would have been guided to a paper plate or another plate I could use to reheat my leftovers, but I just...suck at asking for help. (You generally exchange contact information with your host so that you can ask questions if they come up, and I did have her phone number..) So while I was at this store I purchased a set of two microwavable containers, each decorated with a picture of Disney princesses. I bought them because they were cheap. I still have them, and they make me feel like a child when I use them. Despite that, I occasionally use them when packing my lunch for work.

Anyways, after visiting the farmer's market, Chinese store, and eating leftovers for lunch, my afternoon was open. After spending a little bit of time studying Chinese, I decided to drive around. I bought a hot chocolate in Kansas City, KS to say I've been to the Kansas side, as most of the Kansas City tourist attractions are on the Missouri side. Then, I continued to drive around Kansas. Specifically, I chose to drive to a certain park (the name escapes me now). While I was on the highway, I saw a sign which listed the upcoming exit for a historical site. Since there wasn't really a point for me to drive to the park in the first place, I thought, 'why not?' and decided to drive past said historical site. It's called Grinter Place, and from the research I've done on the web, it's basically an old house. I'm sure the museum has interesting information about who they were and what it was like to live during their time (maybe 150-200 years ago?), but I didn't stop to go in.

In the evening, I went to Hank Green's book tour event at the Unity Church. Now, let me back up a bit and explain why this event was so great.

I started planning this Kansas City trip in June - at least, that's when I reserved my Airbnb. It goes without saying that I'm subscribed to vlogbrothers on YouTube. In early September, Hank uploaded a video talking about a book tour for his first book An Absolutely Remarkable Thing (which is very good, please go read it). I saw the notification for this video on my phone and thought 'nah', and proceeded to do something else. But since I didn't completely swipe away the notification, it was still on my phone when I turned it on again, and I decided to give it a go. After watching this video, I investigated the tour dates, and I saw that none were in Texas (WHY?). But I noticed there was a date for Kansas City. And it just so happened that vlogbrothers was going to be in Kansas City while I was there. So I impulsively bought a ticket (which also came with an autographed copy of the book!) and I must say, this was the best impulse buy ever. The event was awesome - Hank and John Green were hilarious.

There is a dance venue in Kansas City for free salsa dancing that I was planning to go to afterwards, but the book tour event ran a little long. I also waited in line after the event ended to buy an autographed copy of Paper Towns (they also had autographed copies of The Fault in Our Stars, Looking for Alaska, An Abundance of Katherines, and Turtles All the Way Down, but Paper Towns was the only one of these that I have not read).

All in all, it was a fun day, and now I must mentally prepare myself for the 10 1/2 hour drive home.

09-28-2018

Today was the day I planned to hit the main point of my trip - the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art! Below is a picture facing outside from the museum (because I am smart and didn't think to take a picture OF the museum..)

As I previously read, the Asian exhibit was surprisingly large. More specifically, they divided Asian art into categories based on region, so there were rooms for Chinese art, Japanese art, Indian art, etc. Actually, the whole dang museum was surprisingly large. Granted, I'm the kind of person who likes to take my sweet time and read about every single item, but I was there for about four hours and feel like I didn't even make a DENT in all the items that they had.  

above: a book/manuscript displaying grass script (essentially, Chinese cursive). It's beautiful and fluid writing, but even native Chinese speakers have trouble reading it!

Afterwards, I found a bubble tea shop cause I was craving bubble tea. No one was there, which was surprising. I studied a little bit of Chinese here - specifically, I was looking over the reading section from my first practice HSK 5 to look up words I didn't know. 

Since the boba place was nestled in a small shopping strip, I went into these shops and actually bought a couple gifts for friends! They were cute, little local boutique kind of shops. 

Then, I went to a book store (of course). That's kind of a new thing I've started doing - whenever I visit a place, I like to see if I can find a local bookstore to walk through. And to buy at least one book, of course. I love it when there are just books EVERYWHERE surrounding me, and this store did not disappoint.

I highly recommend the place! 

And of course I left with not one, but three books!! ._.

The finale of my night was attending a performance of West Side Story at the Kauffman Center for Performing Arts. My Airbnb host told me that the building is fairly new, maybe about four years old. It was a cool place, and the play was awesome as well. I have never seen West Side Story, but I did sing a couple of songs from the show in my choir class at Southwestern. We also listened to 'Cool' in my Music Literature class. Ironically, 'Cool' was the song that made me cry because of how familiar it was.

pretty good view despite buying one of cheapest tickets! 

the inside of the building from one of the upper floors during intermission

people compare the exterior to that of the Sydney Opera House

09-27-2018

I have occasionally looked back at my blog posts with fondness and nostalgia. I am certainly glad I set up this system so that I can vividly recall small details of my China trip, which would otherwise have escaped me now. 

But sometimes I'm so focused on the good times of the past and the good times that I want to create in the future that the present seems so mundane and dreary, like the present is something I have to slowly trudge through until I -really- get to start my life.

I'm now thinking of this as my adventure blog. But really, life itself is an adventure. And each day that I spend in the muddled haze of wondering what it is I want to do is another day wasted thinking, and not doing.

So, for those of you who don't know, I recently did a thing - 

I completely set this up myself. And of course, the question I am most commonly asked is 'why Kansas City?'

The TL:DR answer is 'no reason'. The long answer is that I went through a phase earlier this year in which I was particularly interested in western China, which led me to explore books at my local library on the topic, which led me to read a book called Foreign Devils on the Silk Road (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/149749.Foreign_Devils_on_the_Silk_Road), which mentioned the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City towards the end of the book as being a place with a relatively large Asian art collection. 

'Wouldn't it be fun to take a trip to this museum?' I asked myself as I pulled up the screenshot above which showed that it would take approximately 10 hours by car to reach Kansas City. And on that route, I saw an adventure. The longest trip I've ever done was 5 hours, and even then I had a companion. This would be 10 hours, completely alone, driving through good ol' 'Murica. 

But would I REALLY drive 10 hours just to go to a museum? 

Well, yes. But don't worry, I also found other things to do, which I shall talk about here!

The first day was mainly a lot of driving. Even though the trip was long, it was definitely engaging once I passed the Texas border, simply because I've never driven by myself through other states before. A few thoughts regarding the drive:

1. What in the world is the big deal about Braum's??

2. Why are there not gas stations at every mile, like there are in Texas? (yes, I know that's an over-exaggeration...but also '40 miles until the next service station'??? are you freaking kidding me?!)

3. Southern Oklahoma and Southeastern Kansas (east of Emporia) were the prettiest parts of the drive, in my opinion. The ugliest places were just north of the Kansas/OK border, and, of course, Texas.

4. I LOVED the signs in Oklahoma that say it is against state law to impede the left lane. And EVERYONE knew to get back in the right lane after passing! It was amazing. Texas drivers really need to get their crap together.

5. I was not expecting it to take so long to get through Oklahoma. That straight shot is so misleading. 

6. As I once read somewhere on the internet, I35 from Oklahoma City to San Antonio is terrible. (Not that I went to San Antonio during this trip, but I know enough about driving on I35 in/near SA.)

 I stopped in Oklahoma for lunch and to visit a friend in Stillwater (she's at OSU). So without further ado, a couple of Stillwater pictures!

 above: a cute restaurant in Stillwater, and my car in the background! I forgot the name, but they served waffles among other brunch goodies. My friend and I weren't sure where to go for lunch, and chanced upon this place a half hour before closing! They were kind enough to still take our order, and we decided to get take out so we wouldn't get in the way of closing. And we ate at...

below: Boomer Lake in Stillwater! Nice place with a lot of picnic tables. And geese. And yes, the water was quite still.

I left Temple at about 6:30am, and ended up getting to my Airbnb in Kansas City right before 9pm. I was pretty pooped, so I didn't do much before heading to bed. 

05-12-2016

Kazakh classmate watching a Spurs game - he was really into basketball!

For some reason, this post has been saved as a draft for two years xD I just now noticed that I should publish it.

06-06-2018 - English as the language of trade

English as the language of trade: my unconvincing opinion due to a lack of cited research and also (mostly) a thought-exercise

If you don't already know, the general acceptance of English as the language of trade is a concept which bothers me immensely. My greatest grievance is that those of us born into English speaking families grow up with an innate advantage over other people who have to work hard to learn English.

Okay, so some people have to learn a language. Why does that matter?* To me, it's more than just foreigners needing to learn English if they want to cultivate a successful international business career.** This is just an assumption, but I imagine most English-speaking families live in countries where the predominant language is English. Just by virtue of living in that country these people reap other benefits as well. Most of these countries have free public education, access to adequate medical care, and clean drinking water. I am not saying that these amenities are perfect and not flawed in any way (look at medical care costs in the US and the fact that Flint, Michigan still lacks adequate drinking water!), but I think it is fair to say that most people who live in predominately English-speaking countries such as the US, UK, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and so on enjoy a much higher standard of living than most of their counterparts.

So I thought, okay, it kinda sucks for those people who don't know English as their first language. What if the world were different? What if the language of trade wasn't English? And, realistically, in that case it would most likely be Mandarin Chinese or Arabic or Spanish or Hindi due to the sheer numbers of people who speak these languages.

But, my main issue is that most people who speak English are already somewhat 'well-off'. What if the language of trade were to be a minority group's language, especially a group which struggles economically?*** Let's say the Navajo. Perhaps they are a well-known group/tribe within the Native American community (and maybe rather well-off?), but in general I think they are not considered powerful players on the global scene.

So, what if Navajo was considered the language of trade? Perhaps Navajo culture would flourish, their economy would be stimulated, and other countries/political entities would bow down to their prowess. The Navajo could rise in status and economic standing, but there are many other minority groups out there, so what about all of those? We're kind of back to square one as far as 'those who know the language of trade are inherently well-off compared to other counterparts'. But another item which is important to remember is that while English is widely regarded as the language trade, this is not an official declaration.**** There is no 'international trade police' looking out for and banning trade conducted in different languages. So realistically, even if some super high power declared that Navajo is now the official language of trade and it's "off with your head!" if you aren't conducting trade in Navajo, unless there was a HUGE international organization behind this monitoring everything*****, I doubt everyone would be rushing out to buy price-inflated Navajo text books. People would still have their knowledge of English as well as other languages, and so why would they go out and learn Navajo for the sole purpose of trade when both parties can already speak English?

Then I thought, okay, clearly it doesn't help everyone in the world to choose a language which already exists to be the language of trade. In that case, we create a language of trade which everyone has to learn! Right? Absolutely not. The previous assertion of 'there is no international trade police to monitor transactions' still applies, but what if there was such a powerful organization?***** If it is that advantageous to know this trade language, and you are lucky enough to learn it, wouldn't you want your children to have that knowledge so they reap the benefits of it? Perhaps if there was effective policing of this as well, the idea as a whole would be feasible. Additionally, there would have to be someone or multiple someones in charge of creating that language, and it would be interesting to see what kinds of qualities the language ends up with. I imagine the learned languages of said person[s] would most likely be taken into consideration unless that bias is somehow controlled, but this may be kind of ingrained in the way we consider language.

I guess that makes the TL:DR of this writing thing "I don't like that English is considered the language of trade because it benefits those who otherwise have a lot of benefits already, but it can't be any other way unless all people who know how to speak English were to suddenly die out. And then in that case the language of trade would become a language which already exists and a lot of people already speak. So why am I even complaining about this in the first place? Just...give up."

* and I'm not even getting into the difficulty of learning English as a foreign speaker!

** it doesn't even need to be an international business career - the general assumption I perceive from foreigners is that 'knowing English leads you to where the money is'. 

*** not to mention you would need a way to define/measure what counts as 'struggling economically' or 'how many speakers makes a language common versus uncommon'

**** as far as I know. Please let me know if it is!

*****hm...sound like anyone you know?