Black, white, and shades of burnt orange

The University of Texas at Austin's Tower

Time for some time to blog

I haven't been posting lately. I'm a sucker for stating the obvious. The problem with blogging about my college transition is the transition itself. It's very hectic and exhausting! I am beginning to value time the same way Americans do. There are many reasons why I can't update this blog frequently. I will jot them down because I love bullet points:

• There's too much going on and when I have a free time, I would rather spend that time resting. I get physically and mentally exhausted often these days. Living on my own requires a lot of energy. Learning independence is a gruelling process. My single-parent mother still pumps the finance for me though, and for that, I'm whole-heartedly grateful to her. I can blog if I want to, but really, I want some rest instead.
• I'm using a netbook with a 9-inch screen. It's a pain to type using its keyboard. I can't even post-process my shots in Dubai yet because I need more screen real0estate for editing. Sigh. I am going to have a new computer soon and it's going to be my inevitable switch to a Mac.
• I write on a very small notebook regularly. Sometimes, the amount of information in my head get very overwhelming that I have to write down the overflowing thoughts. Sometimes, I would think of something and I know I just have to write it down in-case I can use that thought later. Sometimes, I have nothing to do and I take that small notebook and start writing. Those sometimes happen a lot nowadays. I miss the bus, I wait for an appointment, I sit under the shade - sometimes - with that small notebook at my hand's reach. And when I write, I sometimes lose the purpose of blogging what happened because I know I wrote it already.
• I really miss home. When I stare at this laptop's screen to blog, I think of a million things and I can't help but randomly remember memories that would give me a rushed painful burst of nostalgia. There are many happy things going on every now and then in this awesome city called Austin, but I have not yet really accustomed myself here. I'm still an alien. It has only been 2 weeks.
  
• I can make a lot more of excuses. And again, I'm a sucker for stating the obvious.

Creating thunder

"I swear guys, I've been doing this for the past five years and this never happened before!" The power is down. The room is dark and Asim, our facilitator for our Immigration Briefing and Check-In (IBC) seminar, kept his hands busy opening the window blinds in the room while trying to reassure us that the current scenario is one in a million. Light poured in from the slits of the blinds and we watched how the raindrops and wind pummelled the trees outside, making them sway sideways. A big woman entered the room, "It hasn't rain for the past hundred days..." she stated apologetically, but with a hint of joy that only a person who knows how to appreciate a rare rain could notice. I've been around Austin, Texas, for the past 24 hours and I had numerous people telling me how the current summer is the hottest in 50 years. But really, it's nothing. Dubai's typical summer heat would make Austin's hottest summer record blush.

Asim started waving his hands in a praying manner. Please let the electricity come back. Please, we need to finish this session. Please, we don't want to waste our time waiting. He said those lines loudly, more like a way to amuse us. He told us to concentrate commanding the electricity to return, as if our accumulated sense of frustration would miraculously generate a spark. "You guys are either the luckiest or the unluckiest group of international students to attend UT." I smiled. I know it's the former. We are lucky. I am lucky; lucky for so many things that brought me to where I am, in my own shoes. "So which one of you brought this freak weather?" The big woman asked like a bad cop in an interrogation room. I looked around, searching for no one. Can someone bring a sudden weather change? I pondered. I looked down. I laugh at myself after realizing that am wearing a shirt with prints of lightnings.

20 minutes earlier...

I was walking briskly uphill and beginning to sweat. It was hot and humid and windy. The sky was shrouded with huge dark nimbus clouds gloomily staring at me. Walk fast boy, you're gonna be late. I thought of the dark cloud's voice in old husky Texan accent. I walked faster. A drop of rain pelted my left cheek. You call that walking fast? Maybe you should run. I glared at the demonic clouds; don't you dare rain on me. I was 2 blocks away from the International Students' office, trying to walk even faster. My bag shook and my dSLR rolled inside. I paused and begged the stop light to change. Turn white already. (White light signals go for pedestrians) The raindrops increased and it began to drizzle. I tried to look up and make a come-back at the clouds, but looking up would cause my eyes to be punched by heavy drops of rain. Who are you anyway? You think I would listen? I found a covered walking path and ignored the sky. I stuck my tongue out. I'm new here, and I'm sure we'll make good friends. A thunder growled and I reached the International Students' office in time.

I was soaked both in rainwater and sweat. I just got baptized by Austin, Texas. I reached the front desk and asked for tissues. "Whoa! is it that hot outside or is it raining?!!" the friendly black woman exclaimed. The ending tone of her sentence sounded like she just asked me if I could turn her bottle of water into a bottle of wine. I told her that it was both, and that the rain just started. I grabbed two sheets of tissues and began to dry my face and arms. "Is it really raining?! Oh my God it's raining!" she involuntarily started clapping her hands. I gave her a sad face while I dried my neck. "Oh. I'm sorry!" And she laughed, and I laughed, and we both laughed.

5 minutes later...

The IBC seminar had begun and the facilitator introduced himself. His name is Asim and he's from Lebanon. He's doing his PhD in the university. He asked if anyone else is from Lebanon. One basic thing everyone should know about Lebanese people is that they are extremely proud to be Lebanese beoble. No one reacted and it became quiet. "Anyone here from Lebanon? Hello guys?" He asked again, unsatisfied. I answered "la!" before another awkward silence ensues. He laughed, "Look here! At least someone knows Arabic!" I cringed and did not reply; heck, I wish I know Arabic.

We started filling up the forms through Asim's instructions. The lights shut down and a subtle ooh lingered in the room. Great. The power went out for a few seconds and came back quickly. Asim was amused, "Interesting. This is the first time that something like that happened," and the light went out again and he started laughing. A minute passed before it came back, again. "Interesting, really, you guys!" He turned on the projector and the power went out again, long enough for our seminar to be postponed for tomorrow morning. Asim laughed hard, an infectious one - one that would confuse each of our subconscious into thinking optimistically. "Look at the bright side," he grinned, "we all get too see each other again tomorrow morning!"

And I know tomorrow's going to be another amazing day in The University of Texas at Austin.

Ready, steady, go

"Are you psychologically ready to leave?" Khaled's message flashed on the conversation window. I had no idea what to say, so I replied with a convoluted lengthy answer which I could describe in one word, like, definitely. Whatever.

I'm leaving after around 12 hours. I'm excited and shit scared; new place, new people, new beginnings. All alone. In the midst of this pondering, I remember that my UK AS Level board exams' results will be released on the same day I'll leave Dubai - only 12 hours earlier than my flight's schedule. It's almost out now and I won't check my results. I will feel shitty and cranky while traveling if my results suck. Right now, All I want is to go to Texas in a blindly optimistic I-can-definitely-conquer-the-world mood. I reckon I should rephrase Khaled's question to "Are you ready to leave, Psycho?" Makes more sense that way.

On packing

There are two pairs of 23 chromosomes in a human cell. One set of 23 comes from your mum, one set comes from your dad. Those two sets combined when they fucked and ended up with you. True story.

I have a limit of two bags with a maximum weight of 23 kilos each to bring to the USA. I have two similar suitcases. One is dark teal and the other has a dull shade of lavender. My mum got them for me saying that those obscure colors should make the suitcases easy to spot. I imagine how the contents of those two bags would define me just like my chromosomes do. What would be the color of teal and lavender combined?

Yesterday, I started packing my stuff for college. I listed the things I need to bring and slowly assembled them inside the suitcases. I put my clothes and personal items in one of the suitcases and not so personal stuff in the other. Guess which color I used for which?

It's interesting how my mum forces her maternal prowess on the content of my baggages. She already pleaded to go with me to the USA, thinking that she could help me with the move to my new apartment. I am 19 years old already, I told her. She said that's bullshit because I'm Cancerian and I can never be alone; I'm a crab and crabs always grab on someone else and walk sideways. I told her she's an Aries and she's a goat and goats only eat grass and are known for their diabolic representations.

I don't know whether it's the grass or the diabolicalness that got into her, but she got me a lot of stuff in green. She says green must be the motif of my new apartment. I sigh and thank God I convinced her not to go with me or I'll be living like Tarzan in my new apartment in Texas. She got me stuff which I repeatedly told her I can easily buy when I'm already in the US. But her argument was basically: why buy there if you can already get it from here? You have so many spaces in your bags! So with that idea, she got me:

• a green chopping board
• a set of green plates
• a set of green spoons and forks
• a pair of knives with green holders
• a green iron
• a pack of green toothbrushes
• a green towel
• a quadruple boxes of green tea chai
  

I told her, with disappointment, that my favorite color is red. She smiled and told me not to worry about that and voila! out of the shopping bag she produced two red colored Tefal pans. I cringed. I cringed with an overwhelming feeling of grabbing the pans away from her hands and bang them together and make loud noises to shoo her away. Boom. Bam. I will miss that woman.

8 of 8

One of my favourite numbers is 8. The other is 17. They bring me luck that no intelligent reason could explain. I'm terribly sleepy and I don't want to haphazardly talk about things.

I'm posting due to a few significant reasons. Mainly, I want to dedicate myself into blogging about my college transition - a long term project that I can only think of in a positive light. I assume it would be an interesting read for those who have nothing better to do, or to those who are simply interested. But first of all, I need to get a grip of my long lost cheery and amusing way of blogging!

I feel old and slow and forgetful and sleep-inducing. There's an awful tone in my writing style that makes my readers feel wrinkly. Even I want to sleep from what I'm writing about. Oh crap.

Things I learned from shooting my vacation

That's a mouthful for a post title so I guess a better one would be "Noob's photo lessons". There's an awful lot to learn about photography through practical experiences. Here are some stuff I learned the hard way while shooting during my vacation:

• The tripod is your best tool for taking tack sharp photos. It's not rocket science. The heavier the tripod, the more stable your camera will be - and the more calories you will burn by carrying it around.
• That being said, don't forget to turn off the fucking stabilizer mode (that's "VR" for Nikon) when your camera is mounted on the tripod. I don't know if there's a "tripod + VR" mode, but leaving the VR mode on will negate the stability that the tripod provides. Trust me, I messed up a lot of shots 'cause of this. I only later found out when viewing the photos on a large screen.
• Have a spare battery for your camera. If you're cheap like me and you don't have an extra juice pack for your gear then you'll likely end up with a sad face when your camera power dies in the midst of a tour. You'll miss a lot.
• Leave some time for your camera and lenses to adjust to the temperature. If you don't, you'll cause moisture to build up inside them. You won't want that. I hated it and I thought I destroyed my cam.
• Filters do wonders. I finally got myself a circular polarizing filter and damn it's awesome. Google what CPL does and try to get one. You'll love it.
• Pre-setting your white balance does even greater wonders. I bought this cheap white balance lens cap which beats the crap out of the auto white balance mode and other pre-set white balance values in the camera. You'll always have the right colour and that is fantastic. But don't get me wrong, there are times when the incorrect white balance works better for the photo.
  
• Feel the moment and scenery first before shooting it. That way, you will know what you want to capture instead of taking just another meaningless shot.

That's all I can remember for now. Chances are my brain's milked out already or I'm just sleepy. Hey, it's better if you learn from my errors yeah?

Next post, I'll show how I uglified my Nikon D80 to make it "ghetto friendly" and an interesting conversation piece for the entire family.

Try and try until...

Obviously, I suck at trying to revive my interest in blogging. So all I can do is just try a couple more times till eventually... who knows? I'll be optimistic!

A quick and nasty sum up of what I've been up to since the last post:

1. Won the Canon Middle East photography competition called "Celebrating Cultures". 2nd place overall and 1st place in the UAE. I didn't get the round trip flight to Dubai since I already live in Dubai. I got a 1000D which I still have no idea what to do with. I attended the workshop prize which was a good refresher.
   
2. Shot at random places in Dubai. Driving around town with a dSLR is such a privilege that I fail to take advantage of.
3. Got stuck with my books revising for my AS Level examinations. Crammed so bad. Results will be out soon!
4. Did the exams... which was very painful given the dready schedule. Why 3 subjects exams should last for almost a month, I will never understand.
5. Won 1st place in my school's "photo of the year" competiton. I got a 16GB iPod Touch as prize. I knew my first Apple product was going to be free. :o)
6. My last year of high school got over and I was jobless.
7. Went for a vacation back in the Motherland. Took tonnes of photos and bought some cheapo photography accessories.
8. Preparing to leave for college in Obamaland. Nerve-wrecking stuff.
   

Time to start writing post worthy stuff!