The afternoon of my departure left a strange tinge in my mouth. A feeling that I would not be returning the way I came, in the sense that should I ever return to this place, the place I called home for the past five years during my college life, I would not be the same.
The week prior to my arrival in NY I was in San Francisco, retrieving my soon to be permanent mode of transportation, a Blue 2004 Honda Civic. While I was there visiting my sister, I ran into one of my old childhood school friends who was there doing a PhD in the biochemistry department. Having never moved away from my parents, I inquired to him the process and feelings he felt prior to leaving the confines of his home. He told me “The week before leaving was really the hardest.” Nothing could be more truthful than that. Once I returned home, I reminisced on anything I had taken for granted earlier. The friends I met, the things I did, and all of it came flooding back to me.
I tried to leave my home with good memories, the great times I’ve had hanging out with all my friends in ROCK as well as many of my schoolmates. My last meeting with my school mates happened over a quite hilarious movie called “Kung Pow: Enter the Fist”. If you haven’t seen the movie, it’s a parody by Steve Oedekirk [who did Jimmy Neutron on Nick] about the ridiculousness of some Kung Fu movies. Afterwards we headed out to Denny’s just to talk about the old times and our near future plans. Josh going to Peru with Kevin +gf for adventure, Steph heading off to Dental school, Tim going back to John Hopkins for his PhD… Retrospectively, I guess it didn’t hit me till I actually arrived in NY how much a drastic change this expedition would be, but while it’s only been two weeks since then, I guess I can’t help think about all the good times we had back in school: the laughs, the experiences, the shared times…
Going to church on Friday was no doubt one of the greatest things I looked forward to during my last week. It wasn’t a usual ROCK Friday night mind you, it was the VBS: austrialian Boomerang Express’ closing ceremony where the kids n staff really showed the parents and company what they’ve learned for the past week. I’d have to say, I was quite impressed with everyone’s performance, especially the counselors: Rachel, Rudy, Chris, Tony, Tony, Tiffany, Joe, Cowie, Kristina, Jonathan, and that other guy. It looks like they had a great turn out and really put their all into the program. Praise God. I regret not being able to participate in the program [as well as having my name in the program when I don’t think I did anything to merit it]. I can honestly say, I have confidence that ROCK will only be getting better as the new academic year rolls by. My one greatest regret is that I won’t be able to return, but we kids gotta grow up sometime right?
Hehe, looking back at THAT particular weekend, really makes me laugh. Saturday was the guys sleepover and just remembering what happened, I don’t think [at least for me] it was the quality of what we did that made it memorable, just the fact that we fulfilled tradition and the fact we got to hang out. As some of you [and obviously those who were there] would know, I had developed this horrible headache, fever, backpain, coughing, the works the day of the sleepover. Although I made it at 3pm, I thank God we didn’t start till 5:30pm. I’d like to thank God for inventing Advil b/c once I took two of those puppies, hot diggady I was ready to scarf down some heartattacks on a strip. Hanging out with Joseph and Yi at Wingnuts [with delicious parmesian and bacon ranch strips] + Yogurtland afterwards was awesome. Afterwards Shinn, Josh and Garrett came over and then we watched like ¾ of Rattattoui, 1/6th of a Chuck Norris Movie, ¼ of another movie [I can’t remember ATM] and 40/100 most memorable events of UFC UFC [Ultimate Fighter]. By the time we got to moment 20, we all figured we’d want to watch it until even 1 and besides Garrett, none of us guys watched UFC more than a few times, and Josh fell asleep after moment 2 and missed the final one >.< . Ahh good times. One unfortunate thing which came from the sleepover was the lack of sleep all of us had arriving at church the next Sunday morning. I totally remembered what Tiff and Sabrina said during their presentations on Bolivia and China missions. Sounded like the experiences were most rewarding . The second service was a bit of a blur…
Later having the honor of eating at Bah Marche’ – the best Japanese Curry Chicken w/ ½ capsule of Parmesean Cheese w/ a lot of the Rockers was pretty cool… of course that’s negating the fact that I was exiled from the guys section and placed into the girls section. Awkward starfish… I’d have to say though, the girls did have a lot of things to talk about… a LOT OF THINGS @.@ , but Camille, Tiff and Lynnette gave some pretty good advice on what to do when I meet people here- like set the tone, be outgoing, don’t get into fights, etc and Priscilla was making kookie faces. Thanks for putting crazie faces of yourselves in my cell guys, it really means a lot to me.
Afterwards, the basketball w/ D-Wu was totally awesome, but OhMy Lemur, Yiiiiii is too tall… who can jump 8 ft high? I can’t legally… but fortunately I think I’ve been getting better at shooting, I’m making more than 1 a game now XD.
There’s so much more to say, but I gotta sleep… first day of school tomorrow! :O More to say later guys… don’t laugh too hard plz.
Tags: buffalo, ca, Chris Fung, FCBC, fountain, ny, omz, valley
