Professor Espinosa

Some good news:

THE BIG NEWS!! I got offered a graduate assistantship (highly competitive) to teach at the university next semester! Not only will it mean earning some skrilla, but also it will mean I get to be a real instructor, listed in the official course schedule, and with the authority to assign grades that will go on people's college transcripts. How scary is that? (for them, I mean). I will be teaching 2 courses (I don't know what yet) at the English Language Institute (ELI) which offers courses in academic reading, speaking/listening, and writing for international students enrolled at UH.

PLUS! Today I got my second exam in my linguistics class and I got a PERFECT score (105%) and it was supposed to be hard. I'm kicking ass this semester. :)


HERE'S MY CONCERN: Knowing me, despite the fact that I will be teaching 2 classes (a 20+ hour committment, including prep and office hours, per week), I'm sure I will add to my plate a bunch of other things too. The GAship grants you full-tuition waivers for as many credits as you want to take, while the department waiver only gives you up to 12 credit hours. That tempts me into taking advantage and signing up for more than 12 hours. I'm thinking I might take one of the more demanding core courses (I was planning on taking two) and then maybe 2 other less demanding elective courses. Then I could also sign up for a "for-me" class which could be a language class or maybe ballroom dancing or who knows?! I better not do a play too... ;)

Stage Kissing

Continuing on the notion of stage kisses from the last post...

Ever since I joined the noble art of acting, I longed for a role where I was kissed. If you are familiar with my acting history (my oeuvre, so to speak), then you know that those roles were not easy to come by. Instead I played a handful of "character" roles that often involved some sort of service to others (i.e. gardener, waiter, butler, orderly, etc.). I played them quite well, but didn't get any "play" out of them (if you know what I mean). These last two shows I've done, both Under a Western Sky and A Streetcar Named Desire have landed me (literally) a kiss. I often get from those not involved in theater comments like, "Ooo, are you practicing your kiss scene. So lucky!" I usually play it up like it is a big deal, but I suppose it is time to admit that it is not. While the kisses in both plays were real kisses, not just pecks on the cheek (although not tongue kisses either), they really aren't as exciting as they seem. I was thinking about this the other day, and I'm destined to be kissed again tonight, but it really doesn't have any impact on me whatsoever. Besides perhaps the soft sensation on my lips, I'm too busy thinking of how I should play up this moment for the audience and I have my eyes closed and by the time it's over I don't feel changed at all. I guess that is a big difference. I think a real kiss should penetrate you to your heart and leave you changed somehow afterwards (usually happier). And in the last play when I kissed her she bit my lip. That could be exciting the first couple of times, but after that it just hurts! ;-)

I Was a Sk8er Boi

I tried wearing a beanie today, all skater-boy and stuff, and I got ridiculed. I bought it this weekend at the Oakley store in the mall and thought I was so cool (with that and my new shark’s tooth necklace). Everyone asked if I was cold, informed me that it wasn’t winter, and proceeded to demand I take off the hat to show everyone my bad haircut. Why else would you where such a thing if you didn’t have a bad haircut?! Even my solitary friend who praised my appearance mistakenly called me “ghettofabulous” not recognizing that I was going for the “skater” not “ghetto” look. There goes my statement for the day. Although I did get a kiss out of it. Oh wait, it was a rehearsed kiss for the play. Still, a kiss is a kiss!

Shyness

So, people have been pressuring me to pick a costume for Halloween. Although, I’m not even sure what the plan is for partying. Still, I’m sure there will be cause for wearing the costume, even though I have rehearsal that night. I am actually really nervous about a Halloween party. Lots of drinking and costumes and people scare me a lot. So I’ve been telling people that I don’t know if I want to wear a costume and that I’m really shy and nervous about it. Their response: they laugh. They can’t believe that I could be shy. They all think of me as so outgoing and public-speaking (and attention-seeking?). In my “I am” poem I wrote:

“

I am shy and sometimes antisocial, but some people don’t know that.

I tried to explain to them that I can be really comfortable in some situations and that fools people into thinking I’m really confident and outgoing. I feel really scared at “parties” though, despite Sarah’s party last week which wasn’t so scary. I guess I realized that I’ve grown a lot over the past few years. I remember how socially awkward and shy I was the first few years in high school. I get it from my mom. I think between being involved in drama, making my first real friends, moving out of my sister’s house, and doing better in school, I became a little more confident. Then going to Vanderbilt, getting involved in my majors and enjoying classes, teaching, traveling, making more real friends, and (of course) *Summerbridge* taught me a lot more about being social, taking leadership, and confidence. I honestly should thank Stephanie too because she did a real number on me when I felt really small this past year, trying to get me to stand up tall, take charge, and get on with it. I am a lot more confident than I used to be. I sometimes like being the center of attention (I get that from my dad). I do feel a little shy sometimes, but maybe it isn’t as appropriate of a description as it used to be.

So, I decided what I’m going to be for Halloween. I’m going shopping tomorrow. But you can’t find out until Halloween like everyone else! ;)

Star Student/Writer

I was excited because I got my first grade in my L2 writing class and i got the following response from the professor:

Mat,

Your reflections every week were rich, exploratory, innovative, and attentive to the texts, the spirit of the texts, and also attuned to your own knowledge and lived experiences. Because of the high quality of what you wrote, the responses you got from peers were also of great caliber. You get an A+ in the reflections assignment and an A+ in the Taking Stock assignment too. I look forward to your workshop on “writer’s workshop”!

Lourdes

and...

"I agree with her, you are a very good writer. And you have a very personable voice that makes others/readers feel included but doesn’t fall into trite or superficial concessions to readers :)"

Not bad, eh?

Giving Thanks to Kegs and Kaua'i

My friend Sarah, the one who so graciously took me into her home and gave me shelter in my time of need, had a birthday party Friday. It was actually a lot of fun. I just realized talking to Stasia that it was my first keg party which was really exciting. It really wasn’t very crazy or anything, and I still haven’t gotten drunk, but a good experience nonetheless. Far better than stupid frat parties, for sure. The best part was that I got a chance to finally talk in length to some of the second and third years in our program (yes, it isn’t a two-year program as advertised…most people take three years) since Sarah is in her third year. I felt like I bonded. One girl, who happens to be the president of our student organization HATESL (Hawaii Association of Teachers of English as a Second Language), got so excited about doing a flash mob (which unfortunately I discovered does not involve flashing, but instead getting a mob of people to gather in a public place doing something strange and then just leave after a few minutes as if nothing happened). It sounds pretty awesome and I think she wants to do a flash tag game which sounds like chaos of the best kind. Also, I was invited on a trip to Kauai over Thanksgiving break to go camping and hiking. Kaua’i is the oldest of all the Hawaiian isles and is known as the Garden Isle due to its lushness. It sounds fun, but I kinda wanted to be home for Thanksgiving so I could spend it with Ellie’s family. This will be my first Thanksgiving without my family…ever…and it would be nice to have a big dinner and all the fixings and family. I’d rather not spend it in some cabin with some people I don’t know that well and eating canned beans. Ya know? Maybe I can go the day after. Anyways, we’ll see where I end up. Hopefully somewhere exciting!

The Earth Is Alive!!

EARTHQUAKE!! BIG ONE!!!

Actually, while it was about the fifth that I can remember experiencing, I think it was the strongest. Thanks for all your concern. I actually can’t believe that it was such big global news (I got emails from Hong Kong!). It felt like King Kong was shaking the house. My canine instincts made me wake up way earlier than I should have (i.e. 6:30am) and the earthquakes happened at 7:07 and 7:14am. Shortly thereafter the power went out for THE WHOLE STATE!! That was the worst thing. Our power didn’t come back until 11pm and no power makes for a long day. It was kinda cool to see the city at night so dark and quiet. Everything was closed so most people stayed in and putzed around. It is funny how people around the world knew better what happened than we did. They are still discovering more and more structural damage around the state, but there weren’t any major injuries. Like you said, just another things to say I survived: The Great Hawaii Quake of 2006.

Mira Loma Strikes Back!

Mira Loma High School is a public high school located in Sacramento, California. It is a part of the San Juan Unified School District with a student body of approximately 1800 students.

Academics

Mira Loma is most noted for being an International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme school. In addition to the IB program, Mira Loma offers the International Baccalaureate Middle Years Program for freshmen and sophomores, the International Studies Program for less academically oriented students, and the International Passport Program for students who speak English as a second language. The school also possesses one of the largest special education programs in the San Juan Unified School District.

The Mira Loma science department is especially strong and school teams regularly win the regional Science Olympiad and Science Bowl competitions. Mira Loma also sends several students each year to the International Science and Engineering Fair, the Junior Science and Humanities Symposium and the semi-finalist level of the Intel Science Talent Search. Recently in 2006, Mira Loma students gained recognition for the history department for their achievement in National History Day - they placed 3rd in the nationals.

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Culture

As the variety of academic programs listed above indicates, Mira Loma is a school noted for its diversity. In early April Mira Loma celebrates its annual International Night, in which students from various ethnic backgrounds set up booths about their culture (typically offering some traditional food as well) and sometimes give performances of traditional dance or music.

Another Mira Loma tradition is the annual Sports-A-Rama in which the four classes compete against each other in a variety of games to win the competition. Games begin with Penny Wars several weeks in advance of the event itself and culminate in the event known as the statue wherein around fifty students perform a choreographed dance routine on the subject of the class's theme.

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Day of Silence Controversy

Mira Loma has a large Gay-Straight Alliance club on campus that attracted local media attention during the 2006 Day of Silence. On April 26 around 30 Mira Loma students, along with an estimated 450,000 students nation-wide, voluntarily remained silent for the day to protest discrimination against the LGBT community. A group of students, organized by a local Slavic church, launched a counter-protest that day, handing out brouchures that argued that support for the Day of Silence undermined freedom of religion. Several students handing out fliers were subsequently suspended from school on grounds that they were spreading hate messages. Three after-school protests organized by the Slavic church were then held in front of the school from April 26 to April 28. Over one hundred demonstraters participated. Advocates for the Day of Silence quickly organized their own, albeit smaller, demonstration and later printed t-shirts in support of gay rights and condemning the actions taken by the protesters.

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External links

• Official website
• Information about MLHS on the San Juan website
• Mira Loma IB resources
• Information about Parent Organizations

About Punahou

Courtesy of Wikipedia:

Punahou School, formerly known as Oahu College, is a private, co-educational, non-sectarian college preparatory school located in Honolulu in the U.S. state of Hawaii. With a student body that averages 3,700 students annually in kindergarten through the twelfth grade, Punahou School is the largest independent school in the United States. Also, with tuition set at about $15,000 a year, per student, this school recieves an incredible amount of income.

Founded in 1841, Punahou School was originally a school for the children of Congregationalist missionaries serving throughout the Pacific region. It was known as Oahu College from 1859 to 1934.

The land on which Punahou School sits was a gift of Queen Kaʻahumanu to the Rev. Hiram Bingham, the first Christian missionary in Hawaii. The first class was held on July 11, 1842 and consisted of only fifteen students.

Punahou is considered to be one of the top schools nationwide because of its rich tradition in academic and athletic excellence. The school is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Along with academics and athletics, Punahou is home to strong visual and performing arts programs. Students have access to a jewelry studio, photography darkroom, and glass-blowing facilities. Its drama, dance, and music programs are recognized nationally. The Punahou marching band marches in the Rose Bowl Parade once every four years, and the student yearbook, The Oahuan, has won national awards from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association and the American Press Association.

The Punahou athletics program is the most successful in the state and one of the most successful in the nation, having won more state championships (322) than any other high school in the nation.[1] In 2005, it was named the #4 U.S. high school athletics program by Sports Illustrated.[2] Top-notch facilities include a heated Olympic-sized swimming pool and an 8-lane Mondo track surface.

Punahou students have the opportunity to compete in 22 sports, including air riflery, baseball, basketball. bowling, canoe paddling, cross country, cheerleading, football, golf, gymnastics, judo, kayaking, riflery, sailing, soccer, softball, swimming and diving, tennis, track and field, volleyball, water polo, and wrestling.

Punahou also has a tradition of sending athletes to the Olympic Games.

Voggy Days

The "dreaded Kona weather" has arrived. What is that? Well, it is when the tradewinds transform into light breezes, humidity rises, it feels hotter, and it doesn't rain so much. The humidity was at 90% yesterday afternoon. It also means the vog settles into the city. It looks like smog, only it is sulfurs and is called vog because it is created by Volcano Kilauea on the big island (Hawaii) and due to the change in winds, drifts all the way past Maui and through O'ahu. Yay for us. It makes some people sick and maybe it has been part of the reason I've been so low energy the past few days. But, just another weather type to say I've lived through. Now I've experienced everything from the typical snow, rain, fog, hail, and sun to earthquakes, typhoons, graupel, red cloud storms, snizzle, and smog thick enough to turn your nose black.

The Salsa of Love, Loss, Work, and Play

I didn't get called to sub again today. While I like lounging and having more time to do homework, I really would like to work a bit and make some money. I'm worried that maybe since I've probably been added to the bottom of the list and no one knows me so they won't request me, that I won't get called much. If I don't get a job at all this week, then I will have to go bother these people again.

Nonetheless, today was a good day to not be working. I had an eventful, busy, emotional, sleep-lacking weekend and didn't do much homework either. So, it is good that I had a day off to recuperate. I still have a bunch to do, but at least I got to sleep in a bit and I'm not exhausted from working all day.

I had a practice salsa fiesta Saturday. It went so well!! I was thinking it would be super simple, but then Pam got involved and wanted to add some dishes and make it more authentic (which was cool) and then Ellie invited a bunch of her family, on top of the friends I invited, and soon we had 2o people. The more the merrier! I had a blast! Pam and my friends helped with all the cooking (actually I did minimal amounts of cooking, I mostly directed and facilitated the cooking). We made chicken enchiladas, Spanish rice, refried beans, Mexican salad (i.e. salad with lots of lime juice), chorizo and eggs, and had some canned tamales and fresh salsa and chips for pupus (appetizers in Hawaiian) and some Coronas and wine and cinnamon caramel cashew ice cream with fresh strawberries for dessert. Delicious! And it is so much fun to cook with friends. :) You'll have to check out the photos on my flickr site.

The emotional part of the weekend was that I've been thinking a lot about my parents recently. It is mostly just missing and reflecting on the changes of my life and how that impacts my future. Also, how it makes going back home for the holidays this year different than in the past. I've been thinking about it more because of it coming up in conversation with people here. I guess I'm usually pretty upfront about it, like it is just another important event in my life that I don't want to hide away, but I also don't want people to feel really bad for me or feel like I'm mentioning it just to get attention or sympathy. That's not what I'm looking for. I just think it helps to understand who I am. But with these other interpretations, you start worrying about censoring yourself. And I don't want to.

So, besides love, loss, work, school, and play, I don't know if I can cover much more in this entry. This was an all-encompassing blog entry. I'll try to come up with comparable ones later this week. :)

Smiles for everyone!!

It is HOT!!!

Last night I had a dream that combined elements of Vanderbilt, Hawaii, and had a bunch of the staff from Hong Kong present. Well, I woke up (way earlier than I wanted to, mind you) and I found myself in Hong Kong. There has been an inescapable humid, sweaty heat here all day. It's definitely the worst since I arrived. Totally hongkongy. I'm sitting here, shirtless, with the fan pointing right on me, wondering how people could be having fall weather in other places.

The bright spot is that I'm officially hired at Punahou School! I turned in all my paperwork today and I'm ready to work. I don't know when I'll start, but any day now. Here's a link if you want to check out this chic prep school.

http://www.punahou.edu

Cool enough to have it's own .edu site. And Jack Johnson was just playing a concert there a few weeks ago.

Getting LOST

The glitz of tinsel town made its way to Waikiki this weekend and I was there to watch the stars walk the red carpet! It was the premier of LOST season 3 and the cast came out to support the showing of the first episode to be aired this week. I hadn't watched a single episode of this show before, but I was in touch with pop culture enough to know that it was huge and lots of people love it. Still, I had to be explained who I was cheering for as the stars passed by. It was a lot of fun though! There were probably about 10,000 people out on the beach around dusk watching the show on a big projection screen. Matthew Fox and Sawyer the Hobbit were like right there! And I even got to talk to/within the reach of Kate and John Locke and, having just learned how to say "I love you" in Korean the day before, I shouted it to the Korean actress in the show and she turned and smiled at me. How cool is that? I hope she realizes that I don't really love her or even know who she is. Still lots of fun. One friend had his Japanese wife with him and he kept yelling to the stars that she came all the way from Japan to see them and it worked a few times! So she has some pictures with the stars. Unfair, I should have come up with a gimmick like that.

Okay, so her is my review of episode one (remember this is the first episode I've ever seen):

WARNING!! MAY BE SPOILER (but I wouldn't know)

The opening scene apparently is shocking. I didn't realize this because I hadn't seen the show, but apparently you find out something really interesting about "The Others."

The rest of it looked a lot like a knock-off of Prison Break (of course, I haven't seen that show either). But most of it was of people in cages trying to figure out how to break out and why the hell they are there and who these crazy people are that put them in there. Basically it looks like it is some wierd science experiment. Sponsored by the government? Who knows what's going on on this island? I guess that is the fun of the show. I enjoyed it; I'll have to watch more. One friend here has the first season DVDs so I'll try and watch those.

Okay, let me know what you think if you watch it on real time.