Three Years Down, One Year to Go

All in all, it's quite interesting to have finally arrived at our last chapter of high school. Junior year was definitely a memorable year from meeting wonderful people to strengthening my relationships with those I have already met. IB and its splendid horror is nearly halfway done and despite all the rough nights and painful assignments, it was well worth it. I am very much grateful for another year of solid grades (extremely ecstatic to say the least) and I'm really happy that I was able to learn a bit more about my classmates and friends. In a nutshell, these are some happy moments I thought I would just type out:

• IB testing (ha, you probably think this is absurd but trust me you'll have fun if you only have one or two to study for. I will probably change my mind once this year unfolds...)


• Band (somewhat controversial but S/E festival was surprisingly pleasant and overall I enjoyed quality time with people I care about)


• Playing/singing guitar with some friends (Julia, Jenna, Michael, Christian and Josh to name a few)


• College trip/tour of California Lutheran University (with Josh and Clark); along with NHS trip to UCSB and small visits to UCSD, UCI, and CSUN


• Tinikling! (we lost about 95% of our team since they decided to be smart and graduated. I can't wait to do it again next year.)


• Being introduced to The Office and simply enjoying it after finally understanding the humor behind it all. (I love Kevin's huge pencil.)


• Competing against Josh in every single class and assignment. Thanks, bud. I'll let you win next year to make you feel better.


• Meeting wonderful IB kids in my class and establishing stronger, substantial relationships with friends


• Singing a song on guitar for Mr. Mcq and my IB psych class
  

It's quite difficult to essentially list them all but in short, I learned a lot more about life and truly did have fun. It was a hard year outside of school, but I really thank those who were there for comfort. It was very much appreciated and once again, I never say thank you enough. I also want thank Julia for inviting me to her church yesterday. Again, it really did make an impact and I hope I can come again.

I am looking forward to this summer although I realized it is in fact quite busy. Besides taking the second half of IB ToK with Dr. Reti ( I really like this guy), I will also be meeting up with my recently graduated friend Jenna Hang to prepare an audition for a musical performance at the Sagebrush Cafe. We decided to do a little collaboration during the year in Nichter's room and we thought it would be pretty neat to do a small perfomance at the cafe on a friday (every friday is Acoustic Music Night). We will most probably be playing guitar and singing a few duets (or at least harmonizing on a few favorite songs) and if I am lucky I might be able to get a ukulele and learn songs on that as well. I am really excited/nervous for it but in any case, everyone is invited to come watch and hear. I'd love to see you there.

For CAS hours and some quality time, I will also be dancing with Josh (foxtrot, tango, etc) during the summer. Even though I will most probably fail, it's one of those things that make me feel really happy and needless to say, I am very excited. I also plan on finishing my extended essay this summer and get volunteering and driving out of the way. If there is any time left, I also want to teach some friends how to make duct tape wallets for even more CAS hours. Overall, its a fun-packed summer and hopefully I still get to hang out with friends and just play guitar all day at random Filipino parties.

Tomorrow our ToK class will be heading down to Pasadena to visit and tour the Norton Simon Museum. I am actually looking forward to it not only because I am beginning to really like Dr. Reti but we get to relax and contemplate about the philosophy of art (ha). At any rate, I will probably end with that note. Ha, let's get rich and give everybody nice sweaters and teach them how to dance. Gee, I'm such a dork.