I've been trying to meet more people now that I'm at USC, but I'm not doing too well on my own. Luckily I have an amazing suitemate who is very outgoing and social. His personality makes people more drawn to him and he also goes out of his way, a little bit, to try and meet people. In fact, thanks to him, I have now met almost every single person in my hallway and some in the others as well. I have met about 5 or 6 Koreans, one of whom is my suitemate. I'm glad that I have met such a great guy who has allowed me to meet so many people.
Not only that, but I've met a couple of other amazing people as well. The outgoing guy's roommate is a Korean who enjoys playing LoL a great deal, and I have no doubt that he has some sort of high rank, but I think I've met people on campus who are actually better than him. That's not the point, though. His contacts have allowed me to meet people who are in the honor's housing, which I guess I just didn't apply for or something, not that I would want it because I feel like A/C is kinda necessary... ish when you're living here. Anyway, I've been able to find people who are incredibly intelligent here as well through having the Korean guy as a friend.
My roommate is kind of a ladies man, I won't lie. Every time he's been out of the dorm, recently, it's been because he's been with one of the two girl dorms on our side of the hall. He's cool, though. He's hispanic and he seems pretty fluent in Spanish, which is really cool to me because I suck at Korean. He's also an Electrical Engineering major for now... but honestly, I know that he's really smart, but I think he's too chill to be in EE. I'm slowly starting to understand that this is actually a challenging major. I hope he chooses an awesome different major if he decides that EE isn't for him. Anyway, through this guy, I've been meeting more girls as a result of following him around.
From orientation, I met a group of guys who knew each other from middle school, but changed high schools. These three are each interested in different things. One enjoys LoL and is amazing at the game, another plays Heroes of Newerth and is also amazing at that game, and the last one... I'm not really sure what he does, but I know he can solve Rubik's cubes faster than I can... or maybe as fast. I'm not sure. Anyway, I've been following these guys around as well and I've met a great deal of different people. From people they know through older siblings or just people who play the same games, I've been able to meet a great deal of people because of them.
I'm still trying to make more friends so I can have more contacts as I grow up and leave this place. I know that graduating from USC apparently has its perks, as does graduating from any other school, but I don't want to risk having missed a chance to know an important person. I now need to sleep because I have classes again tomorrow.
-Sam Rho
Monday, August 26, 2013
Friday, August 23, 2013
USC Day 3
I've been on campus for just 3 days now and I've been in California for about 5 days, but I'm still rather tired in the evenings. The combination of walking everywhere and the time zone change is really causing me to have trouble staying up late and hanging with friends. Today, I decided not to go to a spirit rally because I would be extremely tired after something like that and instead, I followed around a suitemate and his friend. They're both into LoL (League of Legends) so I figured it would be interesting to see how they behaved and it turned out to be rather enjoyable. They joked around with each other a lot and it seemed that their enjoyment in the game allowed them to quickly become connected with many others who were interested in that sort of thing. As a result, I now know almost an entire suite that is full of LoL players. By the way, I'm currently living in one of the more expensive dorms on the campus. I had no idea because I didn't really research enough, but apparently this costs a great deal more than other housing. I guess the combination of being right next to the museum, park, cafeteria, and having air conditioned room make it rather attractive to students, so the higher demand leads to higher prices.
On an off note, I got my AP scores a while ago and I never really got to tell anyone about them. That being said, they didn't really matter much, but I'm going to write a bit about them here. I actually did rather poorly this year on my AP tests. The only 5 I received was in AP Environmental Science, and that was simple! I managed to get 4's in Chem, Micro, and Stats, which was exciting. I was not expecting to get that good of a score in Chemistry, especially since I had not properly looked over the actual format of the Free Response portion of the test. I had no idea that I would have to figure out what would specifically happen if two elements combined! I, of course, only got a 3 in English Lit, but I'm basically never going to do well in English, so I'm over it. The last test I took was Macroeconomics and I had my doubts about that class. I wasn't sure if I was even going to get an A in the actual online class because of the Macroeconomics section at the beginning. Anyway, I never got to properly learn macro, so I only got a 1 on it. It's depressing, but, with luck, I'll never have to deal with the economics of a nation or of a large company, so I'm over it.
Back to USC. I really enjoy it here. The weather is pretty nice all the time and the lack of humidity makes even the heat bearable. I have spent many hours in the sun these past few days trying to get to know people through the programs that USC has set up, but because some of them are so late, I have trouble staying up for things like the highlighter dance party that was last night and the movie that is tonight. Rather than attempt to go to those things, I have decided to write this post. I still feel like the time should be 1:21am instead of 10:21pm. Hopefully this time delay thing for evenings will start to wear off on Monday because classes start. I still need to try and keep the early morning waking up thing going, but also increase the amount of time I can stay awake. I have yet to properly time my route for the next week of classes, but the only real trouble I think I'll have is on Wednesday, where I have like three classes back-to-back-to-back. And I don't even think those classes are that far away from each other, so I should be fine.
I would write more, but I'm a bit too tired now. Perhaps tomorrow will be a free day for me to write. It's Saturday, so brunch at the cafeteria opens at 10... I have to wait until 10 to eat... Whatever.
-Sam Rho
On an off note, I got my AP scores a while ago and I never really got to tell anyone about them. That being said, they didn't really matter much, but I'm going to write a bit about them here. I actually did rather poorly this year on my AP tests. The only 5 I received was in AP Environmental Science, and that was simple! I managed to get 4's in Chem, Micro, and Stats, which was exciting. I was not expecting to get that good of a score in Chemistry, especially since I had not properly looked over the actual format of the Free Response portion of the test. I had no idea that I would have to figure out what would specifically happen if two elements combined! I, of course, only got a 3 in English Lit, but I'm basically never going to do well in English, so I'm over it. The last test I took was Macroeconomics and I had my doubts about that class. I wasn't sure if I was even going to get an A in the actual online class because of the Macroeconomics section at the beginning. Anyway, I never got to properly learn macro, so I only got a 1 on it. It's depressing, but, with luck, I'll never have to deal with the economics of a nation or of a large company, so I'm over it.
Back to USC. I really enjoy it here. The weather is pretty nice all the time and the lack of humidity makes even the heat bearable. I have spent many hours in the sun these past few days trying to get to know people through the programs that USC has set up, but because some of them are so late, I have trouble staying up for things like the highlighter dance party that was last night and the movie that is tonight. Rather than attempt to go to those things, I have decided to write this post. I still feel like the time should be 1:21am instead of 10:21pm. Hopefully this time delay thing for evenings will start to wear off on Monday because classes start. I still need to try and keep the early morning waking up thing going, but also increase the amount of time I can stay awake. I have yet to properly time my route for the next week of classes, but the only real trouble I think I'll have is on Wednesday, where I have like three classes back-to-back-to-back. And I don't even think those classes are that far away from each other, so I should be fine.
I would write more, but I'm a bit too tired now. Perhaps tomorrow will be a free day for me to write. It's Saturday, so brunch at the cafeteria opens at 10... I have to wait until 10 to eat... Whatever.
-Sam Rho
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
In an effort to remember
In order to give myself a little push to write often, I've decided to write today
Today will be my first full day in L.A. perhaps I'll just write again today with some pictures to document the experience. So far, I've had to go from LAX straight to the hair salon where my mom got a haircut. My mom actually then forced me to get a haircut there... that led to some interesting results.
After that we went to eat at a nice Korean restaurant where the food was overpriced, but at least we got to cook it on the grill ourselves. It's more excited to eat after that. My mom woke up this morning and said there must have been some weird stuff in the food because her fingers were bloated and my aunt agreed.
After that, we went to my cousin's house. Her husband was busy on a trip, so it was just my aunt, my mom, myself, my cousin, and her 2 kids. I have to say, small children have a bunch of energy! I was up until like 9 or 10 PST, which is past midnight in my usual time zone. Although it doesn't seem that late, I had been on a plane ride and I was rather tired.
Today we're off to buy supplies for my dorm. Lots of things like containers for clothes and a desk lamp as well as other normal school supplies.
I'm sure this will be exciting!
-Sam Rho
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Funchester
As I write this post I am listening to country radio in my sister's friend's car. Something about "Jolene..." I feel like I've heard this before.probably at Governor's School...
It's just 2 days before I'm gone until winter break. My lifestyle is, hopefully, going to change as I reach California. Not only am I going to have to change what I do everyday, I'm also going to have to change how I interact with people. In order to succeed in the future, making, and maintaining, connections with people is supposed to be very important. Logically, I've determined that I should try and make as many friends as possible, especially with older students and professors. In fact, I'm going to challenge myself, once again, to write here every day. As long add I'm making changes, this might as well be one of them.
Day 1 will be the 26th, when classes begin. I hope all 5 of you who read this will make sure I keep this promise to myself...
It's been nice, Funchester, but I'm going to the desert-y, ghetto-ish, extremely-safe-but-not-really city of LA.
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Trojan, Hokie, or Cavalier?
I haven't seen this in a while. Well, I apologize to whoever reads this for not writing in such a long time.
I've been having the most challenging time trying to decide between three colleges in the price range of my parents: University of Southern California, Virginia Tech, and University of Virginia. A private school that's across the country, but actually in my home state, and two public schools that are about 2-3 hours away from my home.
As I sent in my college applications, I organized them into a list that was sorted by preference:
1. MIT
2. Georgia Tech
3. USC
4. UPenn
5. John Hopkins University
6. UVA
7. VT
I got wait listed from JHU and rejected from MIT and UPenn, so those got taken off. Georgia Tech was first on my list at that point, so I went and visited it and found the campus to be great. Unfortunately, it was going to cost over $100,000 to attend that college for all 4 years. USC was next on my list and I was incredibly excited to hear from this college initially because they were the first to accept me. After researching this school online, I found that the school was pretty awesome overall as well. My parents and I calculated the cost of attendance for per year and it turned out to be about $14,000. Not too bad. After visiting UVA and going on the engineering tour as well as the Anh-led tour, I found that it was an amazing school. The campus life seemed great and the distance from home was very manageable for my parents. After calculating the cost of attendance per year was about $5,000, which is very attractive. VT was last on my list as I just didn't want to attend that school. After loans and grants, VT ended up costing $16,000. Not the greatest deal.
I also looked at opportunities for internships, as many people said that work experience was as important as education. Georgia tech had incredible coop and internship programs, so I knew that if I went there, I would definitely have a good chance at getting a job. USC seemed to have great programs as well, at least according to websites. UVA just didn't seem incredibly promising in terms of internships or coops. And I didn't even bother checking for VT.
After looking at everything, I've come to a decision about my college. Although it's a bit more expensive than UVA, I believe that the best choice for me is going to have to be USC. I am going to be a Trojan because it's better than UVA in engineering rankings, it seems to be pretty good overall on internship and work experience programs, and it still seems to be a good value overall because private schools are likely to give more scholarships in future.
-Sam Rho
I've been having the most challenging time trying to decide between three colleges in the price range of my parents: University of Southern California, Virginia Tech, and University of Virginia. A private school that's across the country, but actually in my home state, and two public schools that are about 2-3 hours away from my home.
As I sent in my college applications, I organized them into a list that was sorted by preference:
1. MIT
2. Georgia Tech
3. USC
4. UPenn
5. John Hopkins University
6. UVA
7. VT
I got wait listed from JHU and rejected from MIT and UPenn, so those got taken off. Georgia Tech was first on my list at that point, so I went and visited it and found the campus to be great. Unfortunately, it was going to cost over $100,000 to attend that college for all 4 years. USC was next on my list and I was incredibly excited to hear from this college initially because they were the first to accept me. After researching this school online, I found that the school was pretty awesome overall as well. My parents and I calculated the cost of attendance for per year and it turned out to be about $14,000. Not too bad. After visiting UVA and going on the engineering tour as well as the Anh-led tour, I found that it was an amazing school. The campus life seemed great and the distance from home was very manageable for my parents. After calculating the cost of attendance per year was about $5,000, which is very attractive. VT was last on my list as I just didn't want to attend that school. After loans and grants, VT ended up costing $16,000. Not the greatest deal.
I also looked at opportunities for internships, as many people said that work experience was as important as education. Georgia tech had incredible coop and internship programs, so I knew that if I went there, I would definitely have a good chance at getting a job. USC seemed to have great programs as well, at least according to websites. UVA just didn't seem incredibly promising in terms of internships or coops. And I didn't even bother checking for VT.
After looking at everything, I've come to a decision about my college. Although it's a bit more expensive than UVA, I believe that the best choice for me is going to have to be USC. I am going to be a Trojan because it's better than UVA in engineering rankings, it seems to be pretty good overall on internship and work experience programs, and it still seems to be a good value overall because private schools are likely to give more scholarships in future.
-Sam Rho
Thursday, March 14, 2013
3 for 4
Well, it happened. The decision from MIT came today. As expected I got a message saying that I was not accepted. At the same time, I won't deny that I wished that I would get in so I could show off, but that just wasn't allowed for me. It seems that I'm probably head to Georgia tech if all goes well for me, now. Sorry Tomy and Anh. At least I don't have to be regretful that I didn't go to MIT after being accepted.
In other news, my mom learned today that I actually know a guy on YouTube. Well, I used to know him, but no longer be cause he's a bit too famous now. If you don't know Victor Kim, I'm sure you've seen him at some point hanging out on the nigahiga channel or the YTF channel. He's amazing at dancing and is pretty good at singing as well. I'm surprised I had never remembered him. I kind of remember the name, but it had never occurred to me that I knew him when I was younger.
In other news, my mom learned today that I actually know a guy on YouTube. Well, I used to know him, but no longer be cause he's a bit too famous now. If you don't know Victor Kim, I'm sure you've seen him at some point hanging out on the nigahiga channel or the YTF channel. He's amazing at dancing and is pretty good at singing as well. I'm surprised I had never remembered him. I kind of remember the name, but it had never occurred to me that I knew him when I was younger.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Well... that was a short run
Hmm... two days straight was the last run that I had. That's a bit disappointing. Well, I'll go ahead and write some things about how I am so far. I'm sure you don't really care, but I mostly write for myself anyways. By the way, I have a little less than 2 hours to write this because I promised a friend that I would write something today. Along with that, he told me to write fat, sexy paragraphs... I don't really know how to do that, so I'll just go ahead and write as I usually do.
College news so far:
3 for 3! I've been accepted to Georgia Tech, University of Southern California, and Virginia Tech. I'm thinking of going to GT, but if Sam doesn't receive enough monies, Sam may have to go elsewhere. As unfortunate as that would be, I'm just glad that I haven't been rejected from a school yet. Unfortunately, tomorrow, Pi Day, at 6:28PM, I will, most likely, be rejected from MIT, so stay tuned. I might just go ahead and write about my thoughts after that experience. Along with that, I'll be at taekwondo right after learning whether or not I got in, so that will be a way to let out any negative emotions that I may feel after learning of my rejection. I understand that I have no chance of getting in, but for some reason, I think that I'll still be a bit unhappy after learning of my rejection. That's how positive I'm feeling about colleges so far. I believe UPenn has decisions on the 28th as well, so that will be fun.
School related things:
English is not as bad as I imagined it was going to be. The worst things for me are harknesses, which are basically where the class talks about the novel that was just finished, because I just have trouble thinking of what to comment on or how to reply to questions directed at me. Talking is just a challenge for me and I don't really know why. Also, I have these reading logs for every book that I read, one of which happens to be due tomorrow, where I have to write down my feelings as I read the book. Currently we are reading Heart of Darkness, which I've heard is a challenging read. I didn't think it was that bad, but after I finished reading, I checked the SparkNotes (shame on me) to see if I properly understood the book and I was completely off. I though that Marlow was a posh dude who really didn't like the black people in Africa, but it turns out that he just refers to them in that way because of the people he is hanging out with. I guess he just doesn't want to be seen as being too strange? Anyway, I'm going to have to get back to that log after this.
AP Economics. I have to say that of all the classes that I've taken in high school, this has got to be the worst. The teacher doesn't teach and instead tells us to read the book. Just like Dr.Felts, except that this class actually counts as a full grade not just part of another class grade. Ugh. The structure of the class is supposed to be that there is a chapter every week in an online textbook that we are supposed to read. Then, we are supposed to do some problems out of the online book and turn them in. After that, the teacher is supposed to give feedback on these and from that feedback, we are then supposed to do the problem set that she gives us. Unfortunately, what ultimately occurs is that she assigns all the work, we turn in the chapter review on or before Sunday. She doesn't grade them at all. We turn in the problem set on Tuesday and finally get results back on Wednesday for the chapter review. Then on the following days we get the results back from the Problem Set. We don't have any extra credit and the only thing that keeps us from getting B's and C's is the Reflection and the Open Forum. These are just little discussion things that the teacher has that are 20 points each. Tests and Problem sets kill my grade, but that's fine. I'll figure out micro and macro alone at home the weeks before the test. This class doesn't help me at all.
AP Chem is getting better, I'm understanding it more and it's getting a bit easier. APES... is just a bunch of work, but I'm learning everything, which is never bad.
I'm going to go ahead and abruptly end this because I have to finish this reading long. As I said before, I'll try and remember to update tomorrow on my MIT decision.
College news so far:
3 for 3! I've been accepted to Georgia Tech, University of Southern California, and Virginia Tech. I'm thinking of going to GT, but if Sam doesn't receive enough monies, Sam may have to go elsewhere. As unfortunate as that would be, I'm just glad that I haven't been rejected from a school yet. Unfortunately, tomorrow, Pi Day, at 6:28PM, I will, most likely, be rejected from MIT, so stay tuned. I might just go ahead and write about my thoughts after that experience. Along with that, I'll be at taekwondo right after learning whether or not I got in, so that will be a way to let out any negative emotions that I may feel after learning of my rejection. I understand that I have no chance of getting in, but for some reason, I think that I'll still be a bit unhappy after learning of my rejection. That's how positive I'm feeling about colleges so far. I believe UPenn has decisions on the 28th as well, so that will be fun.
School related things:
English is not as bad as I imagined it was going to be. The worst things for me are harknesses, which are basically where the class talks about the novel that was just finished, because I just have trouble thinking of what to comment on or how to reply to questions directed at me. Talking is just a challenge for me and I don't really know why. Also, I have these reading logs for every book that I read, one of which happens to be due tomorrow, where I have to write down my feelings as I read the book. Currently we are reading Heart of Darkness, which I've heard is a challenging read. I didn't think it was that bad, but after I finished reading, I checked the SparkNotes (shame on me) to see if I properly understood the book and I was completely off. I though that Marlow was a posh dude who really didn't like the black people in Africa, but it turns out that he just refers to them in that way because of the people he is hanging out with. I guess he just doesn't want to be seen as being too strange? Anyway, I'm going to have to get back to that log after this.
AP Economics. I have to say that of all the classes that I've taken in high school, this has got to be the worst. The teacher doesn't teach and instead tells us to read the book. Just like Dr.Felts, except that this class actually counts as a full grade not just part of another class grade. Ugh. The structure of the class is supposed to be that there is a chapter every week in an online textbook that we are supposed to read. Then, we are supposed to do some problems out of the online book and turn them in. After that, the teacher is supposed to give feedback on these and from that feedback, we are then supposed to do the problem set that she gives us. Unfortunately, what ultimately occurs is that she assigns all the work, we turn in the chapter review on or before Sunday. She doesn't grade them at all. We turn in the problem set on Tuesday and finally get results back on Wednesday for the chapter review. Then on the following days we get the results back from the Problem Set. We don't have any extra credit and the only thing that keeps us from getting B's and C's is the Reflection and the Open Forum. These are just little discussion things that the teacher has that are 20 points each. Tests and Problem sets kill my grade, but that's fine. I'll figure out micro and macro alone at home the weeks before the test. This class doesn't help me at all.
AP Chem is getting better, I'm understanding it more and it's getting a bit easier. APES... is just a bunch of work, but I'm learning everything, which is never bad.
I'm going to go ahead and abruptly end this because I have to finish this reading long. As I said before, I'll try and remember to update tomorrow on my MIT decision.
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