i must have angels

i had my last exam today! i'm done for the semester! yipeeeeeeee! funny story about my exam, though:

my exam was scheduled to be 12:20-2:20 today. so i scheduled everything around having my exam at that time. i planned my flight, i turned down lunch offers, i planned all my packing and everything around the fact that my exam was at that time.

this morning i got up at about 9:20 to get some packing and cleaning done, and i was also hoping to review a bit for my exam. but since i had so much time, i decided to take a bath. i get in the tub. it's about 9:40--when all of a sudden a thought comes to my head:

"I should get out of the tub, go to my computer, and check what time my exam is. Just in case."





















Yes, it occured to me that this was a strange thought. Why would I interrupt my lovely hot relaxing bath to check on something trivial that I already know the answer to? Still, for SOME reason, I decided to follow my instincts. So I got out of the tub, sopping wet, and I went to my computer to check my exam time. Lo and behold.....

MY EXAM IS SCHEDULED FOR 10:20-12:20!

What in the world possessed me to GET OUT OF THE TUB and check on that? I will never know! All I can say is, someone up there is watching out for me. Because there is no logical reason I should have done that. Period.

Thank God I did. Ya-Baha'u'l-Abha!

And actually, my exam went really well. I was pleasantly surprised at how well it went, especially considering the fact that I didn't review at all for it this morning. Seriously, someone up there is watching out for me.

"mom, the statue of liberty isn't silver, it's greeeeen."

i'm way too tired to try to write anything worth reading, so i will give you a photo of a halloween long ago and let you draw from it whatever conclusions you wish. enjoy.

the place 2 b

three years ago, i couldn't have named even one person i knew who lived in haifa and served at the Baha'i World Center. the story is now rapidly changing. slowly but surely, everyone i know is moving there.

okay, maybe *everyone* is a bit of an exaggeration. but it's really a lot. it is a really good thing in this case that my sister lives there. not only do i get to go for a month to see her, but i can also see all these other friends of mine who are moving there. and it truly is a magnificent place...i don't blame them for going. for more information on the Baha'i World Center or the Baha'i Faith visit this site.

i would elaborate on the whole topic, but i'm exhausted and i have piles of statistics homework to do.

better know a district

in case any of you wanted more information about where i live, you can always trust stephen colbert....

oh the mountain

after missing a week of classes (which incidentally was meant to be my most stressful week of the semester), i am having to make up all my work in one day. it's 1 o'clock in the morning now, and i would say that i'm about 2/3 finished with the work i have to do. i finished my statistics project, and now i feel like i have statistics coming out of my pores. i finished my dictation project for comprehensive musicianship. i still have a dictation homework assignment to do for that class and i have to study for a portuguese test. i missed two statistics quizzes while i was gone, but thankfully she drops our two lowest quiz grades. i just have to make sure i don't miss any more. by the grace of God (and my music history professor), my 10-page paper on the prague spring music festival which was due last thursday has been extended to next tuesday. that's truly a blessing, since i haven't done much with it, and it would be impossible for me to try to tackle that before the thanksgiving break.

meanwhile friends, i would ask that you all please keep my grandmother in your prayers, if you believe in prayer. she is 91 years old and in her final days now. she is a pure and loving soul, very precious to me.

i've been thinking...

what if the receipt of our everyday resources and needs depended upon the generosity of others? imagine going through each day knowing that the food you eat, the water you drink, the energy you consume... were all supplied through selfless donations of other people in the world. would you still let the water run the entire time you brush your teeth? would you still leave the tv on when you left the house? would you still throw away the food you don't finish eating? or would you save it for later?

i have been thinking the past few days about capitalism, and how the whole economic structure is based on the idea the humans are ulitmately self-interested. if we develop enough capital by promoting our own selfish desires, we can rise out of poverty. the problem with this model is that since it is all based on self-interest, who will help the poor? the most self-interested people will be the ones with all the money. as a result, they will waste all the resources they have because (since they are self-interested) it doesn't matter if everyone else has enough food, water or energy. decisions are based on immediate gratification for the self, not long-term happiness for all people. one friend suggested to me that maybe the idea behind capitalism is similar to the idea behind darwin's natural selection. the most self-interested people will be the ones to survive, and all the poor will die off. i dont think a capitalist would ever admit that, but it does seem to be the only way this model holds up. and in that case, in any given generation the least self-interested would die off, decreasing the population by more and more each time. then we would eventually be back to adam and eve. i guess everything comes full circle.

ok enough of that. i'm not saying it's actually going to happen. just since i've been thinking about these theories and concepts, all these ideas have been coming to mind.

so what about an economic system that is not based on self-interest, but one that is based on selflessness. of course, this would require a general shift in consciousness of popular society. but should that occur, and should such a system be adopted, our resources would certainly last longer. we would find ways to save money and resources across the board, because it would become more apparent that we're all in this together. not only would be concerned about the resources we consume, but we would also be more concerned about our interactions with other people. suddenly your own survival is partly dependent upon how you treat others. in this type of system, selflessness is actually in one's own best interest. kind of paradoxical i suppose.

i would love to hear your opinions on this. my thoughts aren't totally sorted out yet, and i'm not even sure how coherent this post was. but i would really enjoy hearing what you think.

a woman meowed at me today. do i look like a cat?!

oh man, i know i've been terrible about updating...the semester has really kicked in. you can expect my next decent and well-thought-out post to be during my next vacation. in brief, here is what my halloween costume was:

can you all guess what i am? people have been guessing it wrong all day long...

african elephants swinging from pink bananas and eating jellyfish

seriously dreading a stat quiz coming up in about 25 minutes.

going to boston today to see the opening of my mom's show! yay!

spending the weekend with good friends in amherst. :)

go listen to the new song i posted on myspace. it's called "Gems."

backdorm's back

so for those of you who remember the backdorm boys...well let me start with an intro for the ones who don't know who they are. they are a duo of chinese boys who made a bunch of videos of themselves lipsinging backstreet boys songs and posted them on the internet. the most popular ones are "i want it that way" and "as long as you love me."

now that you know who they are, i have recently discovered that they made a special video dedicated to the participants and fans of the 2006 FIFA world cup.

can someone who speaks german please give us a translation?

hairstyle 911

in response to a picture recently posted on martin's blog, i am posting these pictures of badi with short hair (before, during, and after a haircut in the czech republic in 2004). please, please, please....let's all encourage poor little badi to get a haircut.


maybe he has chosen to grow his hair out because he is experiencing some sort of quarter-life crisis now that he is 25. i guess it makes him feel younger....or something....

things that have been occupying my time lately

1. statistics

2. GW Baha'i Association

3. this game

4. being sick

5. work

6. playing guitar

7. playing piano

8. phi eta sigma

9. portuguese.....more portuguese

10. washing dishes

logic, music, bedtime

hello everyone.

i am exhausted.

i was supposed to be doing statistics homework all night, but i got distracted by this. i'm on level 19 and it is definitely bedtime.

in other news, check out my new music myspace page. you can hear me sing! (as if you haven't heard me before....)

that said, sleep tight.

my thug drink

yes, i'm still alive. school has been back in session for almost two weeks and i feel like i need a vacation already. this semester is going to be tough. the good news is: i got a job at a preschool (at the world bank, in fact) working only 10 hours a week that pays literally twice the wage i got at the parent-teacher store over the summer. goodbye slave labor....

ok i think is really funny. i took another one of those blog quizzes....this one is supposed to find out what my inner mixed 'thug' drink is. i figured since i don't drink alcohol it would interesting to see what kind of drink my inner psyche relates to--way more interesting and funny than finding out what color my aura is or what my name means. well, here's the answer i got:

Take the quiz:
What thug drink are you?

Grape Juice
You are your own very special thug. You dont like to drink alcohol but thats ok... i guess.

Quizzes by myYearbook.com -- the World's Biggest Yearbook!


figures. i don't even like grape juice.

in other news, visit rox's blog for an innovative yet frightening perspective on aging.

my visited countries map

inspired by luis, i decided to map out the countries i have been to. asia and south america look pretty lonely. i'll have to do some traveling.




visit this site to create your own map.

my map-o-friends

because i take after my sisters in so many ways, i thought i would copy one of them yet again and create a frappr map. so click here to join my map of friends...i really would like to see where you all live now. i think this map thing is a cool idea. it's like the 21st century version of putting pins in the wall map in your room.

will be at you soon with more details about my weekend in LA and my arrival in DC. i'm all tied up unpacking at the moment. in the meantime, i will leave you with this picture of me and angeline trying to stick spoons to our tongues by creating a suction-cup-type-thing. this was picture number 17...our only successful one.

los angeles

wandering alone around los angeles today has not been as boring as it sounds. well, i really shouldn't say i've been wandering around los angeles, because i've stayed within a 5-block range of my hotel. however, the alone part is entirely true.

i slept in. well deserved after my last few weeks of semi-slave labor at the parent-teacher store. don't get me wrong--the job was alright. but i was getting paid an amount that is below minimum wage in california. regardless, the extra sleep was nice.

my hotel is right across the street from CBS studios, so i wandered over to the ticket window to see if i could get tickets to a taping of a show. sadly, the price is right is not taping today (which i already knew), but i wanted to see if i could see something else. the only thing taping during my time available would be the tyra banks show. however, this ticket window didn't even have tickets for it. i would have to call another number to make a reservation. i wasn't particularly thrilled about seeing the tyra banks show, but i called anyway and left a message. nobody called me back. oh, well...there goes that.

so then i wandered over to the los angeles farmer's market, also right across the street from my hotel. i ate dinner there last night at a lovely falafel stand. this morning they had stands set up with all kind of fresh fruits and vegetables. i bought some fresh dates, fresh figs, sweet cactus pears, and a pomegranate. i noticed a food stand with a sign "breakfast all day." i got some fresh squeezed orange juice and homemade granola. i sat at a table, alone, eating my granola, drinking my orange juice, and munching away on my cactus pears and figs. when i finished that, i decided to make myself some pomegranate juice. i was squeezing away, kneading the pomegranate, listening to all the seeds inside pop, when suddenly i sqeezed a bit too hard and my pomegranate burst open! pomegranate juice and seeds were flying everywhere! and that's not all. when i looked inside, it was all brown and rotten. there goes my pomegranate juice....oh, bother.

i took the rotten pomegranate back to the stand where i bought and asked for another one. the ladies there were very sweet and even offered to slice it open for me. "no thanks," i said, "i like to squeeze it to get the juice." i went back to the table where i had been sitting and started to knead all over again. (side note: when i went back to the table, i noticed that i had left my purse there. thankfully, everything was still inside it. phew!) yum, yum. i was getting excited about this one. i had my dixie cup ready for juicing. squeeze, squeeze, knead, roll.......POPSPLAT! this one burst open, too! pomegranate juice and seeds all over the place, and even WORSE this time. i'm just sad nobody was there to laugh with me. at least this one wasn't brown on the inside. but it still wasn't any good. it was bitter.

"hm, what can i do next?" i thought to myself. i decided to go see a movie. i hadn't been to one since i went to see an inconvenient truth the night i met angeline...in june. i've really been wanting to see little miss sunshine, and there was a nice movie theater in the grove (a shopping center) right next to the farmer's market. i got a ticket for the 2:20 showing, and then i just killed time wandering and shopping for the next hour.

when i went back to the movie theater around 2 o'clock, i thought i saw a familiar face right before i entered the building. i stopped in my tracks, did a double take, and then thought really hard about where i knew this face. aha! it was paul rudd from the 40-year-0ld virgin. oh my gosh! he was on the phone, and i didn't want to interrupt him, but i really wanted a picture. so i waited outside the theater, a safe 10 yards away from him. you might call it stalking, but i call it waiting. finally after 15 minutes some girl comes by and they go inside. but he's STILL on the phone. damnit. i follow them inside. they're at the concession stand getting popcorn and drinks, and he's still on the phone. oh, well, whatever..maybe i just won't get a picture with him. it was time for my movie to start anyway. as i entered into my theater, i stopped and waited for a few seconds just to see if they were mayyyybe coming to the same movie. aaaand they were. they came inside and he was off the phone. yessss!

"excuse me, paul rudd?" i asked/stated an obvious fact.

"mmhm," he murmered.

"could i get a picture with you?" i asked.

"um, well, the movie's just starting."

"i know, but maybe we could just take it on the way. i'll just snap a quick one." and with that, i shot a quick picture of the two of us, probably ruined his day, and made my trip to LA entirely worth it.

"awesome. thanks." i said.

"sure." he was definitely not as thrilled to meet me as i was him.

so maybe i didn't get to meet bob parker or win the price is right, but i still had a pretty awesome day, and i'm about to have a fabulous night. i'm about to go check in at the Los Angeles Baha'i Young Adult Conference.

now if you're still thinking, "okay, she had a boooooring day. why is elizabeth even telling us this boring stuff?" just think, i didn't even tell you about the purses made of recycled paper or the oktoberfest display at the world market...














p.s. rox, that oktoberfest picture was taken just for you.

PTS and picture-fun

today is my last day working at The Parent-Teacher Store. i am on my very last one-hour lunch break at Panera Bread Co. i've grown quite attached to this place. i'll miss it very much. the mediterranean veggie sandwich has become somewhat of a comfort food for me.

on my last day, i'm working a 9-5 shift. today is the day we get our shipment. AND it's my turn to clean the bathroom. what a day.

here is a totally unrelated yet adorable picture from the weekend. jesse and i were watching ruby for a few hours, and in between dancing and changing outfits five times, we managed to have a little photo-taking-fest. this one's my favorite.

ear to the ground

i'm sitting in panera on their free wifi. i've made a habit of coming here during my one-hour lunch break every day, ordering the "you pick two" (i usually get french onion soup and the mediterranean veggie sandwich) and an iced green tea, and then sitting on my computer while i eat my lunch. yesterday i was lucky enough to catch my sister, solange, online while i was here. as we were chatting through gmail chat, she suggested that we both log into skype so that we can have an audio conversation. "but i don't have my headphones," i protested. she pushed me, "so? you don't need them." i finally gave in. so for the next fifteen minutes or so (during panera's peak hours, i might add), i spoke to my computer, laughing and giggling, as all the other panera patrons stared at me with concern. the volume on my computer was turned all the way up, but it was so loud in the restaurant that i still found myself having to lean over with my ear to the keyboard in order to hear her. i felt like a native american listening for the buffalo herd....or a caterpillar listening for the ant herd.

today i brought my headphones, but solange wasn't online.

this is the stuff life is made of

so about the canmore folk music festival--it was pretty much amazing. there must have been over twenty bands and artists covering a range of genres from country to celtic to bluegrass to african. there were two bands there who i had seen perform there in 2003 when i went, fruit and the duhks. i'm a big fan of fruit. here is a picture of me with them at the festival: three girls from australia. really nice harmonies and a jazzy sort of influence. the duhks are straight-up folk music. pretty cool. they have a banjo player, which earns them points in my book, and they've recorded all their albums in nashville. woohoo!

here's a funny picture i just thought i'd show you all. no real relevance to the story, expect that it was taken in camore, alberta.

i was also really impressed with the cottars. they're two brother-sister pairs. both the girls are 16 and the boys are 18. they knocked my socks off. the lead singer, fiona, has this incredibly sweet voice, yet so powerful and well-controlled. they're so young, yet they have such a strong connection with and respect for folk music of all kinds, celtic, slavic, and even a song in gaelic.

there was a vendor at the festival with a booth called the cats pyjamas. they sold all kinds of things like buttons and cuffs, handbags and clothes. real funky stuff. but their main sale was hats. this guy, kurt, made hats right there with his sewing machine. he had a bunch of pre-made hats which you could buy, but you could also pick out materials to design your own hat. then he'd come and feel your head, and in five minutes you'd have an awesome hat custom-made to fit your head. and it always fit! amazing, i tell you. and that's not all...as it turns out, kurt is from wodonga, australia, the same town as mona v. (gustavo). i just happen to know the wodonga high school fight song (long story), so when he realized i wasn't kidding about knowing where wodonga is, he and i became good friends and he cut me some good deals. he also told me i can have a job anywhere in the world where he's putting up a stall. sweet deal, eh?

but really my trip up to montana was way more than just hats and huckleberries. while i was at school there, the staff became like family to me, and the area became my home. i hold a very special place in my heart for the tobacco valley and eureka, montana. it was the place where a lot of significant changes in my life took place. where i learned and grew more than i knew i could. it was where i found the Baha'i Faith in my heart for myself. and who wouldn't grow and have spiritual experiences in a place like that? surrounded by such beautiful nature, when you wonder where it comes from, there's only one Source to attribute it all to.

the Chrysalis School, where i went, offered me a job for after i graduate college. actually, Kenny offered it to me to have me start immediately, but he was half-joking. but i would love to go back there. being there and having loving, understanding, and patient adult influences around me was the key to my growth and happiness there. not only do i feel like i owe it to those people to try to pay it forward, but i would just love to be a part of that process.

by the way, as it turns out i have a tear in my sphincter. when the doctor told me, i laughed. all i could think of was wayne's world.

warning: this post may contain content inapproriate for children or people weak of stomach. reader discretion is advised.

i owe you guys an update. sorry for my absence.

i'm getting a colonoscopy tomorrow. when i told my friend meredith, she responded with, "what?! why? you're not 50 yet!" no offense to any of my 50-year-old readers.

thankfully, i'll be sedated for the procedure itself. however, today i had to do the bowel prep (also known as a colon prep). this is the worst part of the whole process. it is the part where i clear out my colon in order that the doctors may have a clear look at it tomorrow. so what do i have to do? well, following the doctor's orders, i took the maximum daily dosage of dulcolax and magnesium citrate. i also got a prescription of miralax. on the bottle, it says that the daily dosage is 17 grams. my doctor's orders were to take 255 grams today. so basically i'm sleeping on the toilet tonight.

it's 11 p.m. and i still haven't finished my miralax. i feel completely nauseated because i wasn't allowed to eat anything solid all day. all i've had are a couple popsicles, a cup of tea, peach jello, some white grape juice, and two bowls of plain chicken broth. and of course, all my laxatives and gatorade.

the magnesium citrate was advertised to have a "pleasing lemony flavor." it has turned me off of sprite and 7up forever.

on a lighter note....i had a really nice vacation in montana recently. i went to boarding school in eureka, montana for my last year of high school, so i went back to visit. i hadn't been back there since 2003, and oh how wonderful it was to be back. kenny, my surrogate father at boarding school, has recently gotten his pilot's license and a little plane. so on my first day there, he took my flying in his little orage plane. i actually got to pilot it a bit myself. while i was in control of the flying, and we were caught up in conversation, kenny looked out of the window and said, "oh no! we're in canada. we'd better turn around before the F16's show up." thankfully, nobody showed up and we got out safely.

i also had an unsuccessful day of huckleberry picking. yes, a huckleberry is more than just the name of a mark twain character. they grow all over northwest montana, and they grow only in the wild. every summer, girl's from the school go huckleberry picking and get gallons and gallons of berries to freeze and use the whole year for pancakes, pies, jams, milkshakes, and smoothies. see all the gallon jugs they're carrying? on a regular huckleberry picking day, those jugs would all be full. yum. unfortunately, the bears had gotten to the huckleberries in that area before we did. it was still a nice hike. i found my new favorite flower:

indian paintbrush

we spent the weekend in the canadian rockies at the canmore folk music festival. i love canada for so many reasons, but one of them is that canadians all really appreciate the music of their ancestors regardless of where they came from.

here is a picture of the drive on the way up to the festival:

i'm going to have to finish blogging about canmore later. they told me that the bowel prep would give me the worst diarrhea of my life, but i think they actually meant to say i would be peeing out of my butthole.

talking embryos, the upset stomach and diarrhea of freedom, and Mahmud al-Zheimers

enjoy.

i was going to blog about the time two of my customers referred to kenyans as 'very primitive people', but i want to blog about this instead. enjoy.

look at me..am i not cuuuute?*

i think so...

mos' def...

but it does almost scare me how much solange and i have the same nose.

now i'm just trying to be artistic, buut i don't think it's working.

*proper response gwould be: joo kno', joo ar so budiful...joo cootie. i lob joo.

i know

i've been absent, and i'm sorry. i have been busy and too tired and lazy to blog. i will return soon. if you're really concerned about what's happening in my life, write me an email. i might respond. or you could find me on myspace.

for some good fun, visit these sites:

i am mighty

i got owned

the color purple

i'm not sure what has gotten into me..why i am into all these blogthing quizzes all of a sudden. but i did this one and it was really accurate. it was only like 6 questions. i mean, i don't know what color my aura really is...but all the stuff they said about me was right. this is much more impressive, albeit less amusing, than those name definitions and stuff.

Your Aura is Purple

Your Personality: You're a dreamer and visionary. You believe you were put on this earth to do something great. You in Love: You're very passionate but often too busy for love. You need a man who sees your vision and adopts it as his own. Your Career: You need a job that helps you make a difference. You have a bright future as a guru, politician, teacher, or musician.

What Color Is Your Aura?

for the moment

do you guys ever get that feeling when you listen to a song that is just so strong and inexplicable? i get it every once in a while when i hear a really incredible song. it's a feeling that makes you want to listen to the song all day long, and you feel that you just want to do something with it. if i could play it myself, i know i still wouldn't feel complete. it's a feeling of incompletion and utter hopelessness, but at the same time a feeling of complete freedom and liberation. it's like i really feel like i want to create something so powerful and so beautiful, but i know it won't be the same. every nerve in my body is moving to the rhythm of the music and my hands feel really ready to make something. but i just wouldn't know what. there isn't a thing i can do to shake this feeling. and it doesn't come so often. so what i end up doing is just listening to the song on repeat for a few hours, dissecting every beat the way they must have as they were recording it. i learn it inside out, like the back of my hand, like my life depends on it. then it's in me. then it's a part of me.

i went to the exit/in last night. i saw jeremy lister and the gabe dixon band play. they were phenomenal. jeremy lister has this amazing heavenly high tenor voice that he really knows how to show off in really creative ways. the gabe dixon band has a cool jazzy/funk feel, with an upright bass player instead of bass guitar, and gabe plays keyboard and does the lead vocals (and he also plays the accordion, which i found out when they came out to do an encore). he's played with names like paul mccartney and norah jones. i also went to school with gabe dixon's little sister for four years, but enough about me. ;)

jeremy lister played this song last night that just blew me away. it was the second song he played, but it was stuck in my head immediately and has been ever since. since i only heard it that once, i've been singing the same phrase over and over again all day long: "with your smi-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-ile....with your smi-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-ile." i finally found it on itunes, so i downloaded it IMMEDIATELY. you all should listen to it on jeremy lister's website. the song is called "for the moment."

i'm pretty sure the next one on my list to listen to for hours at a time will be "all will be well"...by gabe dixon.

e is for ebullient

so here's another RANdom post just for roxanne. i don't know what's wrong with my blog, but just scroll down.

ELIZABETH
E	is for	Ebullient
L	is for	Lucky
I	is for	Intense
Z	is for	Zealous
A	is for	Amorous
B	is for	Boisterous
E	is for	Exquisite
T	is for	Talented
H	is for	Honest

What Does Your Name Mean?

i don't know about you guys, but i didn't know what ebullient meant. according to oxford english dictionary, it means:

1. That boils; boiling; agitated, as if boiling.
2. a. Of the humours of the body: Agitated, hot, effervescent. b. Of drugs and diseases: Causing heat and agitation.
3. fig. Of energy, feelings, influences: Gushing forth like boiling water; bubbling over, overflowing, enthusiastic. Constr. with.

interesting.

hey, ukulele!

some of the kids i work with at the world bank children's center started calling me ukulele a few months ago. i'm not sure why, but they just started saying, "hey, ukulele!" ever since then, i've felt very close with the instrument. so the other day, i finally bought one.

...and i love it. i've been searching around the internet looking for all kinds of ukulele resources. i've found lots pages that have tabs and chords of popular songs, and i'm working hard now on learning to play "The Star Spangled Banner" (the national anthem of the USA). i think i'll audition in the fall to play it at one of our university basketball games. :)

one interesting thing i came across while i was doing my uke research is the ukulele orchestra of great britain. i didn't realize the ukulele was such a popular instrument. this ensemble has several different types of ukuleles played in it, and they play covers of all kinds of popular and classical songs. here is a video of them playing the nirvana song smells like teen spirit. and if that's not enough for you, listen to this cover of natural woman. wowie.

another thing i came across was a video of a girl known as the hoola hoop uker. no introduction necessary. i think the video speaks for itself.

i think the MOST impressive of all is jake shimabukuro,a professional uke player. below is a video of him at the strawberry fields memorial in central park, NY playing "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." i guess his version is more like "While My Ukulele Gently Weeps."






i think this may very well become a new obsession with me. when i bought the uke, i noticed that they had them in all kinds of colors: pink, red, green, etc. i just went with the standard wooden guitar color, but if i buy another one i think i'll go for the pink. actually, the guy who sold me the uke told me that the beatles were big ukulele fans. i've found other sites that attest to the fact that george harrison was a uke player. and this site has a very unique way of teaching beatles songs on the ukulele.

i have a feeling that this whole ukulele thing could get dangerous. just look what happened to cookie monster.

aliens in the mist (or rain)

so i was just chatting with JD, and he sent me the link to an article about some unidentified red-colored particles found in a random red rain shower in India in 2001. basically, the man doing the research has found that these particles are a lot like live cells, with very thick cell-walls. they reproduce and everything! however, they do not have any DNA. and life on earth as we know it must have DNA in order to be classified as life. also, they can survive in water up to temperatures of 600 degrees farenheit, which no known life on earth can survive. so this guy has a theory: maybe they're aliens! maybe they hitched a ride on a meteorite and ended up in the rain in india.

now apparently they think this is a really big deal. i don't.

look, if aliens do exist (which of course they do. are we really arrogant enough to believe we are the only life forms in this universe?!), they're not going to look and behave exactly like us. in fact, and this has been my belief my entire life, i don't even think we would recognize it as life right away. life on earth is exactly that--it is life ON EARTH. it is made for the conditions on earth. the conditions outside our atmosphere are very different, and we can't survive out there. so in order for something to survive, it would have to be very different from us. it only makes perfect sense.

so these people are spending obscene amounts of money to tell us something i could have told them in second grade.

now, they also say that if they do end up proving that these particles are extraterrestrial life, that it may give us some insight into the origins of life on earth. but how would that REALLY help us? don't we have more important things to worry about? i mean, if these scientists are smart and able enough to study extraterrestrial life forms, i think the money and energy they are using should be put towards helping our own life forms. what about finding cures for cancer, AIDS, and even the common cold? what about finding (effective) vaccines for things like meningitis?

maybe i sound a bit cynical and backward, but i just don't think studying this will get us anywhere at this point in our society. it's not where we should be focusing our energies.

anyway, so then i was still chatting with JD and telling him he should read my blog and try the name thing and see what he gets. so i decided to try it again too. strangely enough, this is what i got:

Elizabeth Hai -- [noun]: An alien 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

seems there are mysterious forces at work...hahahahaha.

definition hoax

ok, so i've come to the conclusion that this 'name definition' thingy is a load of crap, but also a load of fun. after reading roxanne's post about it and seeing all the various comments people posted with their results, i noticed that some names have the same definitions. so i thought, "hmm...what if i tried it again. i wonder if it would give me the same response. so i did. and it gave me this:

Elizabeth Hai -- [noun]: A beat poet working the streets 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

this is strange because last time i got "like in nature to a banana peel."

so then i decided to try some of the other names of people who tried it just to check.

roxanne's result was "a person who has the ability to be invisible." when i tried her name i got:

Roxanne -- [noun]: A master blogger 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

i think that's a very accurate definition.

i was having luck, so i kept trying. martin got "visually addictive" last time. here's what they told me about him:

Martin -- [noun]: A human transformer (Robot in disguise) 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

i guess that goes along with the "superpowers" theme. hehe.

carmel last time had "full of bees." my result for her name was:

carmel -- [noun]: A real life terminator 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

soraya was "fuzzy to the touch." my result:

soraya -- [adjective]: Like in nature to a train-riding hobo 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

hahahahahah. i think i should stop there. nothing can top that!

check out your definitions and see what you get! the exciting part is that you can check back multiple times and it will give you a different definition. let me know your results!


(added approximately ten minutes later:)
guys, i just have to add this one. it's too funny.

Elizabeth -- [noun]: A person who makes a living suing celebrities 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

blogger's audio clip feature

is pretty cool. y'all should try checking it out. i'm really impressed with it and excited about it. earlier tonight i posted a song in the 'audio clip' link in my profile. so you should all listen to it!

the song is called "I Left My Baby." it's performed by King James and the Serfs of Swing. the vocalist is yours truly. :) so for those of you who haven't heard me sing in a while (or ever for that matter), this is your chance! the quality of the recording isn't exceptional, but i think you can at least get the picture.

these pictures are from when we performed at a senior prom last month. and by senior prom, i do not mean high school seniors or college seniors....i mean senior citizens. that's right, folks. the average age of the attendees at the prom was 78. it was awesome. they loved it and so did we.

what does this even mean?

Elizabeth Hai -- [adjective]: Like in nature to a banana peel 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

liberation from a bottle of shampoo?

i just saw a truly amazing and inspiration movie documentary at the belcourt theater in nashville called The Beauty Academy of Kabul. the story is about some american hairstylists who go to kabul, afghanistan to open a beauty school for the women there. i went into the cinema expecting to get a few laughs out of it and then go home. i wasn't really taking it seriously. but i was, in fact, very touched and moved by this film.

first of all, the courage it took those six american women to go to kabul and open a beauty school is extraordinary. they were dealing not only with an entirely different culture and language, but they had to actually renovate the space to make it suitable for a beauty school. the afghani men who were helping with renovations were not used to having women tell them what to do, which brought about a whole new set of struggles.

but once this school opened up, so many women wanted to be in the first class that they ended up having to literally draw names out of a hat. many of the women taking the course had been hairdressers before the taliban came into power, and some of them continued to work in secret out of their homes under the taliban government. some of the women had never done hair before. but the one thing they all had in common was how much they wanted to learn. the teachers kept commenting on how quickly they were all learning and what outstanding students they were.

there was also some commentary on the homelives of the women in the course. most of them were married, but not to men they had chosen for themselves. the ones who were married were very fearful of their husbands. they didn't wear makeup because their husbands said they shouldn't. one woman couldn't come to class for two days because her mother-in-law was sick and her husband told her she couldn't go. but these women persevered. they had survived something i could never dream of living through--the taliban. yet they were all happy and smiling. the confidence they gained from taking this course was something they could pass on to other women.

toward the end of the course, they started accepting clients for free so that the students could have practice doing real hair. again, more women showed than they could handle. they were literally having to push women away fromt the doorway in order to shut the door. upon leaving, one woman said she felt the best she had ever felt because of a haircut.

one of the american hairdressers mentioned during the movie, "i'm a hairdresser, i heal people." and these afghani women would be healing the city, one woman at a time.

this was an inspirational, emotional, and sincere movie about real life. you should all go see it.

here are some other articles/reviews you may be interested in reading:
bbc.co.uk
l.a. weekly
chicago tribune

biggest personal space bubble in history.

sitting in the philadelphia airport on wireless. my flight should have left 11 minutes ago, but we won't be leaving for another two hours and nine minutes. guess why? go on, i dare ya!

ok fine, i'll tell you. it's because of the president. president george w. bush.

the president visited philadelphia this afternoon to tour a nuclear power plant. read this article for more information.

anyway, he's leaving philadelphia now. his plane is departing back to washington. so thousands, or tens of thousands, of travelers are being inconvenienced so that georgie porgie can have the whole airspace to himself. i've been traveling for 12 days now. have stayed in 8 different places in the last 12 days, and now my flight is delayed two and a half hours because of this guy. how long does it take to take off? 8 minutes? 10 minutes? yet all these flights are delayed two and a half hours. why exactly is that you ask? well, when the president is in the air, no airplane from maine to florida can be in the air. that's the policy. you know, they talk about americans having big personal space bubbles, that we don't like to be very close to other people in public spaces. we sit far apart in movie theaters and buses, we make it a point not to touch anyone around us...and God forbid we would ever make eye contact with a stranger. well i think this man takes the cake. the distance from maine to florida is approximately 2,000 miles. that's about 3,200 kilometers. i really think he should go into the guiness book of world records for biggest personal space bubble in history. that's one bubble i'd like to pop.

watch the video rox posted on her blog. definitely a funny one.

czechland

i'm home! it's oh-so-nice to be back here. after a long and arduous journey, i have a few days to relax here in the quiet and peaceful town of Hluboka Nad Vltavou.

but not so quiet and peaceful up at school. it's crazy day today at Townshend International School. what does this mean, you ask? well, the graduating class had their last day of classes yesterday, and they now have about a week and a half to prepare for their final exit exams. every year after their last day of classes, the graduates plan an attack of some sort against the school. they dress up in all sorts of bright and tacky clothing and each class plans a different strategy. last year, they kidnapped several of their favorite teachers and staged a trial where each teacher was found guitly of some crime against the students. then the students gave the teachers clever and embarrassing punishments. for example, the principle had to learn a dance to a kylie minogue song and perform it for the school. this year the students came into the morning assembly acting like monkeys and handing out bananas to the teachers. they've spent the last few hours running around with water guns trying to get everyone wet.

what a day to be back. i'm loving it. will post pictures soon. (may 24th, 11:49 p.m. posted pictures).

does virtual equal real?

well this is it. my last night in DC for a good few months. the next time i check in with you all and post an entry up here i will most likely be trekking across europe. i have to disconnect my internet now. i'm going to feel so disconnected from the world. funny how getting rid of the virtual realm makes me feel like i'm losing my connection to the real world. it should really be the opposite, right? i should feel more connected to the world this way. strange how things work in the modern world.

my wedding

solange informed me today of a quiz that is floating around on the internet called "how suitable are you to marry me?" the quiz was written by a guy we know named neissan. he said that if a girl scores more than 80%, she should feel free to contact him. no pressure.

i scored 82%. i guess i have found my husband. all i need now is consent.

for more interesting comments on this quiz, please visit the blogs of rox and ruha. and please tell me you were all as disturbed by this as i was.

race to the finish

i have exactly six hours to pack up my life. this is the state of it at the moment.

the story unfolds...

last night i saw meredith. she recounted the whole hospital adventure for me from her point of view. i must say--i'm more disturbed now than i was before.

apparently she saw the second spinal tap procedure looking through the window of my trauma room. when i got sedated after the first time, the nurse told her i'd be asleep for a while and said she could come back in an hour. but when she came back, they wouldn't let her in. she watched from outside the room until someone asked her to leave. one nurse gave her a phone number she could call to find out if i was still there or when they would let me go home, but when she called they wouldn't answer any of her questions.

i'm not going to go on, because it's truly too disturbing. i'm actually glad i wasn't in her place throughout the whole adventure. at least i was knocked out for a significant part of it.

music WHAT?!

so...martin told me i have to make my post today really good, because apparently it will be "getting a lot of traffic." that's a lot of pressure...i'll see what i can do.

i'm back in the real world now--back on campus, that is. and it is certainly straight back into the swing of things. i just got back from a meeting with my statistics professor.

i got a phone call from my sister in haifa. unfortunately i was meeting with my professor so she had to leave a voicemail. nevertheless, it has been months since i've heard her voice, so it was really nice to hear from her. love you, rox!

in other news, my university is in a bit of a pinch. there is a budget gap of $8.2 million for the 2006 fiscal year. now i ask you: how does the university with the highest tuition in the country (with the tuition rising each year) have that big of a budget gap? well, one reason is that they are using the tuition of the current students to pay for a new building on campus which will be called square 54. the best part is--square 54 will be everything EXCEPT academic! it will be for residence, commercial use, and food places.


ok ok, so what does a budget gap have to do with me? well, when the university has such a large gap, they have to cut the budgets of different departments all across the university. the columbian college of arts and sciences (CCAS) has to make $700,000 worth of cuts to its academic departments. here's where it gets touchy: the music department is being targeted.

starting next year, students without a "close affiliation" to the music department will not be able to take studio music lessons. so the university is basically saying, "i'm sorry, but you haven't studied music before, and a university is not the place to study something you have never studied before." (ok, maybe that's a bit extreme, but as a music major this is a touchy subject for me). this won't affect me directly since i am "closely affiliated" with the music department, but i feel a loss for any future students who might not have the opportunity to study music here.


now i ask you--and please feel free to post comments in response--is music not an integral part of a liberal arts education? if a university is going to offer music at all, shouldn't it offer lessons at the introductory level? it's as if i had come into university interested in taking an introductory sociology course. if, "i'm sorry, but you can't take sociology because you've never studied it before," was the response i received, i would seriously think twice about the motives of my university. some of the upperclassmen music majors i've been collaborating with have told me that if they had come in their first year and had to take some sort of exam in order to take a music lesson, they wouldn't have passed it and they would not currently be music majors. is this not distressing to all of you???


the university still hasn't announced exactly how much the budget for the music department will be cut, but we already know that it will be more than any other individual academic department.


the students staged a rally last wednesday. we assembled in front rice hall, the administrative building, bearing instruments. we played for over three hours, and approximately 60 people showed up to join in. we made a lot of noise (literally and figuritively)...so let's just hope we made some effect.

martin, was this good enough?

also...i'm not sure how, but rox and ruha found my blog independently. any guesses, anyone?