INFO POST;
this is shit you should know about me
before you decide whether or not you want to be my friend.
it may come in handy later.

Name → Online I go by Nyx, but my real-life friends know me as Emily.
Age → Eighteen until February.
Sex/Gender → Sometimes both, sometimes neither. I really don't care which pronoun you use.
Location → Los Angeles, CA.

Email → aijisatsu@gmail.com
AIM → break like time, mmmmmmhumans, apres lui, aerowyn says
MSN → eabettencourt@msn.com

( contents under pressure )

MEME PART TWO, also tagged by ronsard

1. Reply to this meme by yelling "I DEFINITELY DIDN'T STEAL THIS SHOUTPHRASE FROM MAI", and I will give you five words that remind me of you.
2. Then post them in your journal and explain what they mean to you.
3. Keep in mind that if I don't know you that well, your words might end up kind of odd or weird.


Chuck

This is definitely a Chuck Bass reference, orz. TWO PARTER ANSWER: Somehow whenever I comment to Mai's journal, I wind up using a Gossip Girl icon. And since all of the Gossip Girl icons I have are of Chuck, that inevitably means that she gets 100x100 pixels of Chuck Bass. Which is not altogether bad though I can't unthink of Chuck as a filthy Slytherin now, jeez, thanks Mai, just a weird coincidence.

Also, I think Ed Westwick is hot like the sun. That's pretty much the other part of the answer—not that exciting, I know ;__;

Plato

Plato and I have a love/hate relationship, yes we do. I had to read a bunch of Plato's writings for my Human Nature class last semester, and though I managed to avoid doing any of my reading for that entire class (and still pull an A), I did manage to cultivate a slight dislike of Plato's rhetoric style. I have nothing against Socrates, and he seems like a pretty neat dude, if a bit tedious to talk to, but Plato... I don't know! I'm bitter at him for writing so much crap I had to understand for Philosophy. Maybe one day when the wounds have healed, I'll read The Republic, since I heard it's actually pretty good.

Piercings

Despite my constant bodymod posting, I actually don't have that much by way of piercings. In a previous life, I had my left ear pierced three times and my right twice, as well as my navel pierced. This summer, I had both ears pierced twice. Now, I have only my first lobe piercings still open, so most of my bodymodding comes from stretching those piercings (I'm at 7mm right now, aiming for 10mm—let's see how long that goal lasts). I do have plans to get more piercings; I want to redo my seconds, as well as pierce my nose maybe. I'm not going to get anything truly wonky, though.

Japanese

I study Japanese! I'm an Asian Studies minor at uni, with an emphasis on Japanese language and culture—which means that on Mondays and Wednesdays, I have History of Modern Asia followed by Japanese followed by Intro to Asian Studies. Granted that the APAM class is actually "Intro to Asian/Pacific Islander American Studies", but hey. You take what you can get, I guess.

With regards to the Japanese language, I like it a lot—the kanji particularly, despite me being really crap at memorizing them. I like the way that you can put two kanji together to make a word, and you can derive the meanings of words based on the kanji that comprise them (like how 大人, adult, is comprised of the kanji for big [大] and the kanji for person [人]). And I like how it sounds, though I don't think it's as pretty as Mandarin.

With regards to the culture, I just find it fascinating, honestly. The social hierarchy and attitudes towards certain things, the contrast between tradition and modernism, the exportation of Western values and their clash with traditional Japanese values... It's so interesting to me *__* I get a lot of people assuming that I just want to go to Japan because I like anime, and while I do like anime and manga, I actually have a deeper interest in the place's culture than just the pretty boys and fun things.

Maps

I have this thing about maps. I really like the idea of cartography (lol username?), and the cartography and topography of the human body particularly. I think that the human body is absolutely fascinating—the way muscles work, the way that skin shifts over everything, joints and bones and askhdfkljhawkf IT'S JUST SO COOL.

So my fascination with cartography is less about actual geographical maps than it is about the idea of mapping the terrain of someone else's body, or mind. That, and I think the fact that historically speaking, terra incognito meant "here be dragons" is bloody awesome.

So yeah, comment and I'll give you words!

Uhh okay so ronsard tagged me.

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 4 sentences on your LJ along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it! Just pick up whatever is closest.
6. Tag five people.

"An uncle of Yang Kaihui's also wrote to Mao and received a courteous if guarded reply. Mao was more forthcoming when he got a letter from Li Shuyi, Yang Kaihui's closest girlhood friend in the Fuxiang girls' school of Changsha. Li Shuyi's husband, a close boyhood friend of Mao's, had been shot by the same warlord who killed Yang Kaihui, giving the two surviving spouses an unusual kind of bond from the old days, which they relived by sharing poems. Li Shuyi desired to come to Beijing so that she could 'study Marxism-Leninism with greater seriousness.'" (Jonathan Spense, Mao Zedong.)



UHHHH YEP. I don't actually read books on Mao Zedong in my spare time—it's a course reading for History of Modern Asia.

Eeee ♥

http://www.formspring.me/bioluminescing

Yeah, I joined that bandwagon.

I think there's probably nothing in the world more awesome than getting surprise packages. I'd ordered some things and forgotten about them, but they arrived today! I got three packages :D And those three packages were full of awesome.

( dichro porn this way )

I also got a 1g taper, but that's not interesting enough to warrant pictures right now.

Over winter break I seem to have forgotten basically everything we learned in Japanese last semester.

私はたっつーをしたほうがいいですよ。　私はままたないほうがいいですよ。　たっつーをしなくがいけません。　Can you tell where my thoughts are focused right now? あしたは"History of Modern Asia"と"Gender & Globalization"と"Japanese 204"；　いきたくありません。　中国にいきたいです。　日本にいきたいです。　アメリカにとどまりたくありません。　Old news, I'm sure. アメリカに住んでいるがいいですけど、　私はどこかに行きたいでし。

Even in Japanese all I do is complain! I need to work on making gerunds.

あしたは金曜日です。　あしたが漢字クイズです。　漢字クイズがだいきらいです。　大学がちょっとむずかしいですね。。。　クラスに行きたくありません。


I know, I know, my Japanese sucks. Blah.

Oh god sdfkjh brb vomiting up everything??

I always end up feeling sick when I stay up late and don't get much sleep, so I'm not really surprised. Last night Natalee and I drove up to Santa Barbara to see Neil Gaiman speak at UCSB, which is a 2-hour drive. We left around 4:45 yesterday afternoon, fully prepared to just zoom on up and go—which is basically what we did. We arrived at UCSB around 7:30, and the talk started at 8:00, so after meeting up with Natalee's friend Jen (who bought the tickets for us), we headed over to the auditorium to get our seats.

( Let me say this: Sitting in seats 9, 11, and 13, row D, for a talk by one of your favorite authors? Priceless. )

Alright. Now I'll go back to bed. Suffice to say that Gaiman = awesome.