a jenn-uine hwangster

hello! it's noon on a sunday.. and i'm posting to my blog again.. doesn't all seem *right* again in the world?! haha.. i'm just kidding... i really doubt that the "rightness" of the world has much to do with the "jennuine hwangster blog" :o)

so yeah.. good to my word (typed or otherwise! hehe..) i wanted to write down an update on the "life of jenn" since the end of august... i could just keep putting it off since i know it will take a long time or i could just dive in and write it down before i forget and you guys all stop even caring about it :o) so.. *deep breath*.. here it goes!

after i ended work on AUGUST 23RD! (which sounds like forever and two days ago by now huh! hehe...) i was packing up my stuff to move out of josh's house (which was sad since i really loved living there and all the housemates were just the coolest crop of brothers and sisters :(* i miss you guys!) and actually, the night before i left for home, a bunch of cfc people came down to union city to have a goodbye-jenn-dinner .. it's kind of funny since i'm not really that far away, and i still come back to berkeley periodically, but it was really a point of transition between being a really committed member of the church and being.. well, whatever i am moving on to i guess :o) it was so sweet of them, especially the berkeley students, for whom it was the first day of school! i mean.. for everyone who was there that night, wow, i was really touched :o) *big happy smile*

and then i was at home in san diego for a few days before leaving for china and taiwan! :o) yup.. the trip was.. really really action packed! first, my family flew into beijing and went on a 8 day tour of beijing, xian and shanghai .. actually, only my parents and i went on the tour itself, my sister was joining a school program between peking university and stanford university in beijing and just flew over with us :o) it was funny because when we first met the people in the tour group the initial night, we were a family of four.. but then all subsequent days, we were only a family of three.. sometimes, people would tentatively ask questions like "didn't you guys have another daughter?" and we'd explain the whole thing (much to their relief i would imagine! hehe..) anyways.. china is such a cool place! i mean, we saw sooo many historical sites (i mean, a history of thousands of years in 8 days?!) and the tour guides were really great about giving us the historical/legendary backgrounds of everything that we saw.. (as a side note, it really inspired me to learn more about chinese history and folklore.. seriously, chinese people -- collectively -- were really incredible and creative and i guess i never really KNEW much about the historical people and all that before this trip!) actually, learning about some of the individuals made me realize that a lot of the emperors/empresses (a.k.a. the "sons of heaven") were really crazy (like mentally! hehe..) for example (i cite this example a lot so sorry for those of you who have heard it already! hehe..) the terracotta warriors... the emperor reallllly believed that burying thousands of soldiers would protect him in the afterlife... essentially trusting his eternity to an army of clay! AND, what is worse/kind of more fascinating is that he had the kind of power to make it happen! to command big groups of artisans to spend decades! working to make this happen! (as a side note.. i always think it's sort of ironic that the "son of heaven" would need statues to protect him when he is in heaven.. like, in contrast to Jesus who is the son of God, and who can command all angels and demons by His name alone..)

but yeah.. after our tour of china, we were pretty tired :o) literally walking around all day for several days in really hot/humid whether :o) but then, my parents and i flew to taiwan for a few days before heading home again.. it was really a blessing because the day we were to fly to taiwan, was the day that the typhoon was supposed to hit taiwan! it was definitely ..umm.. some cause for concern :o) but by God's grace and as a demonstration of how He answers our prayers, the typhoon kind of hovered outside of taiwan for a day and then moved on! :o) yeah.. so we were able to have a really great visit to taipei and to see all our relatives.. my dad and my mom got to spend time with their dad and mom (respectively) and i got to see almost all of our relatives for a while :o) and of course, we all were taken out to loooots of really great and yummy food (we ate like sooo abundantly every meal!) and did lots of shopping and just in general had a really fun time :o)

hehe.. okay...
soooo, that was my trip! in a nutshell (a kind of rambling nutshell :o)

after i got back to san diego, i had about a week to hang out there before moving into school... it was really awesome for two reasons:
1) yasmin was also down there, preparing to leave for med school, so we got lots of opportunities to just hang out and talk and go try new dessert places :o) hehe.. i hope she's settling down well at med school in chicago, we promised to call each other after a few weeks for a really *honest* update of how we're liking it :o) but yeah, it's just always so great being able to be close to old friends still.. and to get together after not seeing each other for months and to just still pick up right where you left off :o)
2) also, carson flew down to visit for a weekend! :o) we got to hang out in the finest-city-in-the-world (self proclaimed! hehe..) and just spend some time together before we would be at rival schools and all the berkeley-stanford tensions takes effect (hehe.. i'm just kidding.. hopefully carson, and all my other berkeley friends, can see beyond just the stanford school that i attend now :o)

okie dokie.. so now you guys are all caught up to thursday, september 19th... which was the day that i moved up to stanford university... (more coming soon! i didn't want to write soo much that it would intimidate people from reading.. although i might have already passed that limit like 5 pages ago! haha... thanks for those who made it this far :o) *two thumbs up!* hehe..