Don’t Call Me Fat!

Today was the first time I visited some of my mother’s former co-workers since I left for California. Since my mother’s workplace is in SOHO, it means that it is full of pretentiousness and homosexuality (not that there is anything wrong with that). Upon seeing me, most people replied with praises such as, “Oh wow, you look so healthy and great! Your hair looks awesome? Did you dye it? You look so much better? Did you get taller? Wow, you look like you’ve grown!” You know, just the type of stuff that doesn’t offend people. However, there was one comment that caught my attention from one co-worker that made me want to put a knee to a groin.

“You’ve gained a lot of weight.”

What? Did he just say that out loud?

“Yeah, I know.”
“Oh, good that you know then.”

What the fuck. I would kind of know if I gained weight since it is well, my own damn body. I do not need to have other people remind me. Is the fact that my pants cannot button and my ass looking bigger in shorts not enough of a hint? Yes, I damn well know that I gained weight, but that doesn’t give you the damn right to tell me that so damn fucking bluntly. The only one who has the authority to do that is my mother.

Even then, you never ever tell a girl she is big. It doesn’t matter if she is a fucking size 0 or a size 22. It is just how society works. Plus, no one has the damn right to scrutinize someone else in the face (notice I meant in the face) unless they themselves are perfect human specimens. Unless not an ounce of fat jiggles off of your toned body (think swimmers but Michael Phelps is quite the mouth breather), you have no damn right to talk shit about anybody.

And damn, when did it become a sin to become a size 8?

Fucking ass society.

Jose

DAMN! I’m actually fucking sad >.<

So TASP has entered its final day and omg, I’ve cried so much, I’m practically dehydrated. After staying up since friday afternoon til now with little sleep in between, I’ve lost my perception of time and space indefinetely…a somber, remorseful cloud has settled upon the great Telluride House. As I type, people around me sob and weep while one tasper plays a melancholic piece on the nearby piano…I’ve temporarily taken a break from writing heart-felt letters to my fellow taspers and am so incredibly torn apart by the consistently brutal departures and the dwindling presence in the Telluride House. No ones smiling or laughing anymore. Instead, people are trying not to cry too much or making failed attempts to lighten the mood.

It started at about after 5 this morning when thee first five taspers were scheduled to leave…most of those taspers happened to become very good friends of mine. As soon as we gathered in the foyer, my nose started to burn uncontrollably and my vision immediately became impaired by the relentless flow of tears. Then the chin quivered and the sobs arised and from then on I’ve been a complete wreckage. Gah! Everything is so emotionally complicated now but I’m happy that I’m sad

What not to do when you’re bored…

Today is my last day at the Avery Research Center. This means one thing, sitting in my office browsing the internet for hours upon hours. What did I just decide to do? Watch The Notebook. Bad idea. Toward the end of the movie, I find myself wiping off tears from my face praying that the other intern in the office does not hear the snot leaking out of my nose. It was pathetic. Not only is the liquid eyeliner on my face practically nonexistant and flaky, I have to spend the second half of the day looking like I have allergies.

Hence, watching sappy romance movies that make you cry at the office is a bad thing to do.

But, the movie was good.

Jose

Caltech Rock Band

This is why I don’t flirt with the Caltech boys. And yes, that is Rock Band.

Sigh.

Jose

Squeezing dry lemons

TASP has ran its course. It’s been fun with the people I’ve met and bothered to talk to but….I have a life outside of this “utopian” world. I feel sorry for the people here who really have nothing to return to – no outlet through which they can channel all of their opinions and intelligence. no one to engage and challenge them. no one to entrust with their darkest secrets. But i have nice friends and a cool home and a great school. I’m not going to pretend that these were the most wonderful people I’ve ever met. It was interesting – really, it was. I’ve learned about cultural relativism, solidarity, and the wonders of live jazz. I had fun walking down the street, linked arm-in-arm singing union songs and anthems for socialistic uprisings. But 6 weeks is just enough before I’m ready to blow my head off out of frustration. It was an experience of a lifetime. But this next week will involve my thinking of home, planning the rest of my awesome summer, and basically trying to squeeze non-existent juice out the lemons metaphorically acclaimed as TASP.

California Earthquakes

Los Angeles Area Struck by 5.4-Magnitude Earthquake

I was sitting in my office waiting for work, as usual. Sitting by the computer (procrastinating college applications), I felt the ground tremble, kind of the like the ground shaking as a train pulls into a station or the floor of a car when starting the engine. That’s odd, what’s that shaking? The computer CPU? The shaking became more prominent until my partner looked and asked, “Is that?” EARTHQUAKE!

The trembling became more prominent and before we knew it, the walls began to shake, as if the room was being rocked back and forth. The windows rattled and objects on desks moved. THIS IS SOOO COOL!! My partner on the other hand was not as excited as I was about the earthquake and made her way under the desk. The shaking lasted about thirty seconds, with small after tremors that felt like waves below my feet.

After all was settled, we sat in our chairs, ready to go back to browsing Youtube and playing Sudoku when Avery staff members motioned from outside the office to evacuate. I grabbed my cellphone and dialed home. No connection. Again, no connection. Once outside, I tried dialing again. Dialing “Apartment.”

“Hey Mom, guess what?”

“What?”

“An earthquake happened! It was soooo coooool.” The other staff members smiled realizing that I’m not a California native.

Jose

Caltech Nerds

Can you smell that son? That, I tell you, is the smell of sadness and virginity rolled into the male specimen known as the Caltech nerd. No, he no longer needs to remain in hiding as he was in high school. He can fully enjoy the freedom of expressing his CompSci passions to the fullest extent while arguing the logic behind quantum mechanics right here at Caltech. What, you think he has BO? Yeah, me too, let’s find another place to go.

That’s right, after having spent about four weeks in a Caltech dormitory, it should come to no surprise that I am more than ready to leave. How anyone can have sex with male specimens of the Caltech student body is beyond my comprehension. Who are some of the Caltech students I’ve witnessed in their natural environment?

Big fat smelly guy
He’s big. He’s fat. He smells. And he insists on joining our game of taboo while contributing nothing at all except for the horrible stench emanating from his direction. Please. Just. Go. Away.

Constantine (that 1800’s virgin?)
He dresses like he is from the 1800’s. He wears three piece suits all the time and has hair that resembles Laura Bush’s tresses. Constantine also has a harpsichord in his room (which I have yet to see). Apparently he is the son of an oil baron. Hm, for someone so stinking rich, why would he attend a school like Caltech? He could go to Yale, Dartmouth, Harvard, or any other school in the Northeast with an extremely high WASP population. I think that is all a lie. He’s probably a Frank from Mississippi. And his momma lives in a trailer.

Skinny Dan
He’s really skinny. And walks around with a laptop. Did I mention, he’s really skinny. Like, I could bench press him, and I can’t bench press the pole in gym class.

So ladies, if you think that by going to Caltech you’ll have the choice of all the boys, think again. You’ll be better off getting some action at Wellesley.

Jose

Summer Camp 15?

Ah college food, nothing sounds sweeter to my ears.

Breakfast
Sunrise BLT (BLT with eggs)
Cheesecake
Pibb Soda
Yogurt with granola

Lunch
Cheeseburger
3rd Frappucino for the day
M&m’s
Salad

Dinner
Panini
Cake
Ice Cream
Soda/Iced Tea

Snacks are littered throughout and include generic brand ‘nilla wafers and lots of m&m’s.

It should therefore come to no surprise that I might have succumbed to the summer camp 15. No, not the freshman 15, summer camp 15, where in 6 weeks I gain as much weight humanly possible because I am away from home and can in fact eat cake for breakfast. Mmmm.

But why do people, when away from home decide to indulge themselves in the most sinful of foods (chocolate cake at 11 PM, SEX IN THE MOUTH!!!)? I know that I’ve gained weight. Pants that were once loose are now bodysuits. I cannot walk stairs in them without feeling the ass seam strain above the new layer of fat under my skin. Bending over, a big part of my job (do not laugh, it really is), has become a hassle. The pants manage to both tighten and fall at the same time, leaving me helplessly exposed in front of male colleagues.

Will I stop? I keep telling myself that it is only three more weeks of sweet sweet deliciousness, but I wonder, will I pay the price when I realize that I can only fit in sweats and t-shirts when I return? What do I do? I do not want to succumb to the torture of depriving myself of food (unlike semi-bitchy Anorexic Eurasian) and yet at the same time I’m too poor to buy a new wardrobe.

Fuck. Having a female metabolism sucks.

Jose

TASP Shenanigans

TASP is the place where you do shit that you would, under normal circumstances, abstain from. No…not wild orgy sex or gratuitous, unadulterated drinking. Just things that normal people just wouldn’t do. But whoever said we were normal? Ah, perhaps I’m not being exactly clear in what I mean so let me just provide examples.

The Seance

Yes, a seance. Actually following through on a plan that requires you to scale hilly terrain, meditate in the cemetery after 10 pm, and share ghost stories from a Welsh kid’s iPhone will only happen at TASP. And yes, the Telluride House is fucking haunted. (seriously. the attic is barricaded shut, the cursor on the computer fucking moves on its own…and it like opens new tabs and shit, and doors shut assertively and spontaneously. freaky shit)

Talking to strangers

Yes, our parents did teach us better but we choose not to take their fucking advice. Hell, if we want to wave at random people who are driving their cars or looking through four-story windows, then goddamnit, we will. And no, we don’t care if they flip us off or brand us as freaks b/c your opinion is inferior

Rain Party…

Yes, we know the consequences of walking in the rain without an umbrella but fuck..can’t we just live for once?!?!?! I don’t care how wet while laying on the cold, hard pavement and letting acidy raindrops hit me in the eye. I don’t care how smelly my weave gets b/c of water retention. And I damn sure don’t care that people completely steer clear of us when we offer them free wet hugs. Damnit, I just don’t give a fuck.

Ultimate frisbee

Yes, we’ve turned a totally uncool, white-boys game into an epic, perpetual battle for Cornell I/Cornell II domination. We sacrifice our bodies; intercepting passes, rolling down grassy hills for a catch, and tearing down the field to reach the finish line. And don’t you dare call us petty or judge us in any remotely negative way…you just don’t understand

Pillow Castle

Ah, pillow castle. Pillows galore all in a seductive pile, waiting for us to jump in and cuddle on. Rolling luxuriously in fluff and random tasper body parts is an awesome way to squander the afternoon.

Water gun ambush

Cornell II has devised a plan to once and for all claim our revenge on the bastard Cornell I group (the feud will be discussed later). This Friday, we plan to sneak all the water guns out of the house, leave class early, and silence those punk-bitches once and for all.

Nerf gun ambush

This actually already occured. We attacked everyone; men, women, children, cripples….virtually anyone in our path. We busted into rooms, belting out our war cry, and pelting our victims with nerf bullets, permenantly disfiguring them. Fuck, I don’t care if you’re working on a term paper that’s due tomorrow or you’re on the phone with the mother you haven’t seen in three weeks – prey is prey. Unfortunately, we’ll have to implement gun control laws within the house since people have gotten trigger happy…..and yes, we do play russian roulette.

These are just a fraction of the crap that goes on here and there are more to come. TASP brings forth the wild side in everyone and it’s fun to live without caring what people think of you. Here, we do and say whatever the fuck we want

TASP…the future reprobates of tomorrow

Inferiority 101

After spending a total of 3 whole weeks with my fellow taspers, I have realised that I am a masochist; I am a masochist because I’ve willingly surrounded myself with super geniuses that are so brilliant that they are almost garunteed to get into Yale, Stanford, Columbia, and Brown. So brilliant that Cornell is their safety school.

I’m surrounded by people who throw fillers into their sentences such as “esssentially” and “in a sense” in order to illicit an air of academia and intellect, even when their point is total bullshit. Surrounded by people who incorporate words such as “subvert” and “relativistic” and “causality” into the most casual of conversations. I would make myself feel better by telling myself that they all pretend to know what these words mean…but that would only be a feeble attempt to delude myself.

I’m surrounded by people who have already finished reading the Communist Manifesto, attend socialist pizza parties, argue over whether truth is objective or subjective, and sit down for hour long lectures about topics that would only interest a middle-age professor of ecenomics, political science, or some other field that involves abstract thinking and the implosion of brain cells. People who know that they will major in Gender Studies and Comp. Lit.  People who are state champions on their debate or forensics team, the vice president of NHS, volunteers who’ve fed children in Haiti, Mexico, and Costa Rica (this is no fucking joke), and can develop a 20 minute presentation on the 10 dimensional world, WEB 2.0, and transfinite numbers.

I’m surrounded by people who got 2400 on the SAT and 36 on the ACT (again, I’m not kidding). I’m surrounded by know-it-alls and pretentious pricks that sometimes love shoving their douchebaggery and assholery down everyone’s throats. Sometimes I wish I could shoot them in the face or inject H2SO4 into their bloodstreams…but then I remember that I’m surrounded by actors and dancers and artists and musicians (everybody here plays the fucking piano) and theorists and athletes and singers and all of these wonderful people with wonderful talents and I feel blessed to be here.

Being inferior is fun when the people around you don’t notice or mind. Plus, you can always use them to further your own intelligence (w00t to being advantageous) and getting business connections. Masochism has its perks.