An Experience of Micro Aggression

Everyone had at least experienced a micro aggression moment in their life. According to Google, "Microaggressions are the everyday verbal, nonverbal, and environmental slights, snubs, or insults, whether intentional or unintentional, which communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative messages to target persons based solely upon their marginalized group" 

There were many micro aggression experiences I had in both middle school and high school and probably I would have a few in college too and I wouldn't be surprised or shocked because I've got used to it. 

There was one moment in middle school where my class were all playing a type of soccer game and when it was my turn to go I was being my usual self playing soccer and kicking the ball and one of the students shouted, "Let's go Pocahontas!" and I felt a bit offended. But I knew it was a joke but I took it a bit to an offense. 

Also there are many experience where people asked where I'm from and before I would answer they would automatically assume, Indian. But when I said Indonesian they were like what is that? When I explained they would be surprised. And so yeah I would have a small feeling that it would happen in college. 

Why I Love my Darling Family

Many, many years ago my mother and my father gave life to me in 1997 and a few years later after I was born, I would always have trouble eating. I didn't remember anything but every year on my birthday I would hear the same stories over and over again.

When I was around 18 months old I was told that I wouldn't eat a thing. After my family would eat a meal my mom, aunt, and uncle would hold me down by the hands and feet and my mom would force a spoonful of mashed rice, chicken, and veggies into my mouth into my stomach. When I was two years of age, the doctors supplied me with an alternative or what my parents would call a solution to get me to eat. The solution was to get a tube into my nose and every night my mom would fill up my bag transfusion with Pediasure (a toddler's brand milk) and that's how I would get nutrients flowing in my body but I would still be forced food into my mouth.

My parents would try everything from taking me to the park, to the gardens, everyone was trying so hard to keep me healthy. Even the neighbors in my building would suggest ideas for feeding me. Most of the solutions people recommended was not to force me to eat and they knew for sure that I would eat when I get hungry. However, I guess my parents and my family got too concerned about my health that my parents would hold me down to eat just one spoonful of food. My parents also felt embarrassed when my family went out to go to social events with family friends so they would take out the tube out of my nose and dress like a normal toddler.

This changed my life because I realized that everyone loved me and cared for me when I was little and even now. It taught me to be a friendly, nice, and kind person like my parents and it taught me how to respect and treat everyone nicely. this moment in life made me who I am today a person who cares, loves, and respects everyone well especially my family and friends. So thanks to my family and friends for doing everything you can to make me me.

5 Awesome Book Covers

Here I have chosen 5 book covers that I find interesting and unique:

This book caught my eye easily because of the 3D-ish lollipop popping out of the book. And when I read the title it hooked me more because I would never correlate crime with a red lollipop. I also like the designers choice with the different fonts for the cover. For example, the title and the author have different fonts however the size is really similar. However, the focal point of the book is the red lollipop slammed right in the middle of the cover then your eyes will glance to the title and the author and lastly the quote on the right. 

This is another book cover I like because I love the bright color spread across the page. The color really represents the theme and the title. The font of the title and the author also seems garden like. The alignment as well as the interesting font of the author's name really fits in with the theme and comparing to the lollipop cover the size of the author's name is small it makes it seem hidden which is one of the reasons I don't like it because I think it should be a bit bigger. However, I was really draw to this book because of  the cool vines and nature around the book and the name and the font of the title makes it even more engaging. 

This book cover my first reaction was like "why is there a bed in the middle of nowhere?" and "why is the mattress floating". Looking at this book just arose many many question like "I wonder what this book is about?" or "is it about sleeping or dreams or getting lost in your dreams?" What I find interesting was the the vertical alignment of the words on the cover. The words looked as if it was floating in the sky. I also love the color choice and the reality looking cover. The green grass and sky blue sky catches my eye instantly. 

This book's focal point was definitely the egg with the crack on it because it just seemed really weird how an egg is on the cover it also rises many questions and leaded me to predictions of what the book is about or even the title name (before looking at the title of course). I also like the color choice of both the title and the author's name. Yellow is a great color to make words pop up if the background is a deep dark color of course. I also find the choice of alignment interesting I wonder if it would be different if the title and author's name were vertical. The focal point would probably change to the yellow letter bubbles. 

I thought this has an strange, unusual, but interesting title and the choice of image they put for the background. When I hear the word porcupine I would think sharp and pointy-like just because I think of porcupine the actual animal. I also like how the title is arranged such as the different color for the "I" and how the letters are all capitalized including the author's name. The pink "I" is the only real color they have since black and gray are really shades. It makes the pink really stand out throughout almost the whole cover. I still find curious on why the designer placed a smooth body with a hand on it, to me representing smoothness and not rough pointy-likeness. 

Hamlet Book Cover Designs

One of my favorite books of all time is Hamlet from William Shakespeare just because Shakespeare's plots were just out of the ordinary. I read Hamlet for Dramatic Literature last year in 2014 of the winter season and I received the book with the cover that looked like this:

If I were at a library and was a human being who was not interested in shakespeare at all, I would honestly not pick up this book at all just because of the simplicity it has. Although we are not supposed to not "judge a book by its cover" we constantly judge it by its cover because our eyes are attracted by color, absurdity, and its mysteriousness. 

As I was surfing through the internet I came across an alternative cover that looked like this: 

Now this cover will catch my eye because it would catch my eyes. I love the mysteriousness in this book cover. It also hints the ending which is obviously a tragedy. When I see this book I would think of death, tragedy, killing, and blood, and maybe revenge. Although the color may not seem eye popping it seems like it has a specific theme which I look forward to in a book cover and just a book in general. 

GAGA Poster Before & After

             Before                                                                                               After

My Colorful Midwinter Break

This midwinter break was a really crazy I guess transformation? Because my family and I decided to paint and remodel the whole apartment. And it took us most of the break; Monday through Friday. We thew many things away like cabinets, shelves, bookcases. Although it was difficult to throw a lot of our furniture, the post after modeling was a relief because the apartment looked fresh, new and more spacious.

The hardest part of this experience was deciding the colors for each room. I wanted purple or lilac for my sister's and I room however, she disapproved and said no I want blue and so we argued for a little while and finally I gave up and agreed to have a specific blue that both of us would like. Deciding for the living room was also challenging but fun. Overall, the whole process was really tedious and somewhat annoying.

Everyday during the painting days it was really hard for me to do my homework because all my stuff was packed in boxes that were on top of other boxes. So I started my homework on a friday night where we started to move things back to where they were.

While a close friend of the family was painting I was stuck babysitting our close family friend's son who was a bit of annoying he is one of those kids where you have to keep him busy all the time or else he gets bored and starts throwing temper tantrums. Although I love babies and children, I particularly did not like this one.

One day we would take him to the natural history museum with my sister, aunts and cousins which was really fun because i didn't really need to take care of him as often as I had to do when I was at home. It was also fun to look at all the cool exhibits in the museum.

Well that was all, that's what I did during my midwinter break.

Painting in Process:

                           

Finished Product:
       
                                                             TV Room/ Chillaxing Room

                                                                 Dining Room

Living Room 

My Sister's and I's room 

                                                                       Parent's Room

Natural History Museum Pictures: 

THANKS FOR READING! 

Vocal Club Logo Design Presentation

The most challenging part of this project was getting used to using Adobe Illustrator because I was still confused with all the tools especially using the pen tool which was supposed to be the easiest and common tool to use in Illustrator. Along with the pen tool it was hard to make the microphone with the pen tool because first of all it was hard to make the microphone due to the angles and the music notes were so small and too many lines so I just drew it out with a pencil tool. Although the drafting out was tedious I really enjoyed the process even though it was hard to sketch a variety of ideas. 

The most successful part of the project was making a presentation board because I think it was a bit easy to design a project board. First I had to have an idea where to put all the information on the board. I had one separate document with all my requirements for the presentation and then I would rearrange all the objects. Then I would rearrange the objects to where it should be and lastly final adjustments and I was done. I was also successful on creating ideas at first I had two ideas I made on illustrator and although it was hard to pick I asked people for opinion and they choose the one above due to the organization and the simplicity of the objects. Therefore, getting people's opinion helped me a lot throughout the project.

A visit at the American Indian Museum

Visiting the American Indian Museum located downtown manhattan was a wonderful and amazing experience. I learned the different traditional headdresses they wore during the time along with the huge handmade jewelry they wore. Many unusual and cool masks were created at the time and some were really simple but some were more complex then other masks. For example, one mask I found interesting was the Ooger Uk Inua made by Larry Beck in 1982.

This mask was really interesting because it was made up of only tires and kitchen utensils and maybe a bit of glue here and there but still it was so surprising how things around your home can be made into a mask. I shouldn't thought of that when I was making my Oedipus mask for my English project. Beck was interested in Yup'ik masks and he decided to experiment with found objects and make it into a somewhat mask. According to the caption of the sculpture/mask this mask represented American pop sculpture but did maintain its masking traditions and elegance. This I found was impressive and interesting because in my opinion it didn't really look elegant but did look neat. Around this piece of art was also many other sculptures and masks tat were created from other artists. 

Another piece of art that I found interesting was a war shirt made out of photographs and film strips with glass beads, metal and plastic. 

  

I was just surprised that this was a shirt, I mean how would you wore this shirt made out of photographs? I thought that the photographs somehow connected it was all in the same scenery and setting. The dangling film strips reminded me a cowboy's vest. Bentley Spang created this sculptor and like his ancestors he used materials that served and honored his family and culture and his artwork helped define his personal identity. I thought his artwork were really sentimental that were made with interesting materials.