FoleyFunctional

Wooohoo! I will be White Water Rafting at the Ocoee River tomorrow with Linda & Mike, friends of mine from college! Hopefully it will not rain and we can get some good pictures. If it does, then we could just go again!

Time until we get on the river:

398 days, 23 hours, 45 minutes, 49 seconds ago  

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So, I’m technically done with all my writing. I’m try to think of things I did afterwards. As I think of them I will write them down and eventually make it flow. But for the most part, I just did random things for CASA when called upon. I still continued to play sports. Maybe I hold the title for the most consecutive sports player? 2001-2007…

Briefly thinking what I did for this year…I did the tennis tournament for all of Dean of Students Office, hosted the after party.

2006-2007

I roomed with George, the CASA president for this year so I was pretty much in the loop for everything that was going on. But I actually told him to try to keep  me out of the loop lol. I hosted Mid Autumn, wrote skit.

2007-2008

Mix music for ASA. Directed Mid Autumn skit. Captain for volley ball team.

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Well, I’m publishing this draft several months late. I can’t remember all of what we did, so I’m just going to publish the draft.

We touched down at St. Louis at night, and my Aunt May and Uncle Tony picked up Han and I. The plane took a while to gate, and for the luggage to unload so they had to wait a little bit. We had stayed up for sometime to chat, but we eventually had to sleep. The next day, the four of us met up with Tien and Ruben for lunch at this humongous buffet. I had paid immediately, and I have finally taken out every single relative on my mom’s side, post graduation.

It is a small gesture, but is a fairly big step to well, I guess manhood. The point where I’m out of college, making money, and can give thanks to my family for my uprising. Although my Aunt May lives the furthest away from my mom’s family, she did have a big influence in my life during a fork in my life between middle and high school. I’ve done some reflection on the actions of all my family members and I can say with full confidence that I have the best family in the world.

Anyways…back to Earth. After lunch, we came back to Aunt May’s house and had some tea – then just went to the local mall and watched Tropic Thunder. I can’t think of what we did that week in the proper chronological order. We went to the St. Louis Arch.

Washington University

St. Louis Zoo

St. Louis Botanical Garden

What was amazing was that the Zoo and Botanical, as extensive and well maintained they are free to get in!

While Ruben was still in orientation, me Tien and Han walked around the campus. We eventually found our way to my uncle’s library and he gave us a brief tour. We met up with Ruben during his lunch break and ate lunch at the new campus cafeteria. It was actually a pretty nice cafeteria, with real China plates. While we were seated someone asked if she could sit down with us. She turned out to be an administrator at the school and just loved to sit down and chat with students.

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I was in Reston Virginia to attend my first company/government sponsored training class. I was there to take the Java Web Application class, put on by Learning Tree. I almost did not go to this class because I had gone through all the material of the courses previously, using the course manual of the other students that went. However, I had asked my project manager and supervisor to send me and they were more than happy to do so.

I was originally suppose to go with one of my coworkers, Jennifer. At several weeks before the trip, another coworker, Michael, decided to forego his Web App class in New York City to attend the one in Virginia. His wife had never visited DC and this would have been a good opportunity. I, too  intended to bring my significant other with me, as she was on her summer/fall break. In the end, Michael’s wife could not make it and it was just the four of us that went.

I had decided to stay at a full service hotel, the Sheraton Premiere. Overall the hotel and rooms were nice. The bathroom was a bit small for such a nice hotel. I don’t think it has been renovated. After this trip, I’ve learned to try to avoid full service hotels simply because they do not offer free Internet and free breakfast. The main reason I chose this hotel was because it was near a metro station and Han/Michael’s wife or anyone could take a bus to the metro to go to DC.

Han was flying from Jacksonville to Dulles, with a connecting flight in Atlanta. At that point we both flew the same leg to Dulles – a flight roughly at 7:30AM. I had driven Jennifer up to ATL, and Michael took Groome Transportation. Jennifer and I had a smooth check in with Airtran, and security was basically empty. When we arrived at the terminal, we saw Michael chilling there already.

The first day we arrived, we checked in early and had a quick lunch at Panera (which BTW, was originally called St. Louis Bread Company, and still is in St. Louis). Then we took the metro to DC. I would just like to point out that the metro has a very confusing and poorly explained pricing structure. The customer service at the booth wasn’t the friendliest But in the end, I purchased a week pass for Han and everyone else just put some money on their card.

We spent that Monday in areas around the National Mall. We went inside the Natural History Museum, peeked inside the

Smithsonian Castle,

Air & Space Museum, and the Vietnam Memorial.

Throughout that day, we learned that the local DC residents have a very poor sense of direction. After leaving the Air and Space Museum we were planning on taking the Metro a few stops to get to the Vietnam Memorial. I knew one of the stops, Le Fount (or something like that) was nearby so I had asked a street vendor where it was. He told us it was 2 blocks west. So we walk 2 blocks west and don’t see a metro station. We then ask a security guard where it was, and he said 2 blocks to the west. So we walked further down…another 2 blocks before asking someone else. He then tells us it is 2 block south and then east. We follow those directions and still do not see the station. After walking around more we finally find a metro station – it was a different station from then one we were going to, actually one stop opposite the direction we were suppose to go to.

We get on the Metro and head to, what, according to the map is the closest Metro to the Vietnam Memorial. We get off and don’t see sure signs of the memorial. This time, Michael and I ask two separate people directions – and unsurprisingly we get two different answers. I get sick of it, bust out my HTC Touch and connect to Google Maps w/ GPS to get us going. And again, not surprisingly, the directions from Google is different from the other two!

Eventually we reach the Vietnam Memorial. On the way back, we decide to go to a different Metro Station (which we felt was closer) and went back to the hotel.

The next several days consisted of going to class and going out at night. Jennifer and Michael stayed in, or close to the hotel at night leaving Han and I to explore by ourselves.

That Wednesday night, we saw the Legg-Mason tennis tournament in DC. We saw a doubles match, where it was a Pakistani-Indian vs European team, and also Eisner vs another Georgia play.

“Restaurant Week” was happening in DC at that time, and me, Han, one of Han’s friends from her SMDP, Kim, last year and Kim’s friends went to

Melting Pot.

For $35 we had a 4 course meal. I’d have to say, Melting Pot is over hyped. One of those things where you do it once to see what the hype is and then realized it is over hyped. Dinner was long and we spent about 3 hours eating.

There is a fairly large Vietnamese community in Virginia. Han was excited about it and we went to go check it out. There are two areas – one is older than the other. We went to the newer, which was larger as well. There were tons of restaurants and shops. After walking around we settled on a restaurant that looked nice. That was the only thing nice about it. Service wasn’t good, food wasn’t good, and price wasn’t good either. We should have realized that when all there were white people patronizing the restaurant, some of the servers weren’t even Asian, and it had its walls plastered with reviews from local magazines – probably from white people who didn’t know better. We had ordered a seafood vegetable dish and the waiter had the balls to bring out a plate of vegetables without seafood! Han was stern and asked him to bring out a new dish, one with seafood.

On that Friday, the four of us went to DC again. We ate at what was suppose to be a famous eatery-

Ben’s Chilli Bowl. It was not bad, it was a bit pricey. Michael had paid about $10 for a burger with chilli fries and drink. Mine and Han’s combined meal was just over $10 – but I think due to their inefficient system they undercharged us.

After eating, we revisited the National Mall. Han was unable to obtain tickets for the Washington Monument (I blame like, like everything else, because she didn’t wake up on time). But luckily, as we walked pass the monument there was no line. There were two guards standing outside the monument. I had jokingly asked them if we could go up, and they said sure! We spent some time in the monument, which was a neat experience. We saw some of the unique plaques given by the 50 states and foreign territory. We had a night view of DC.

After the Washington Monument we went to the WWII Memorial

and the Lincoln Memorial. We saw the Korean War Memorial, which was kind of eerie at night. From then, we walked back to the car. Han had doubts, and thought we were lost. I knew where we had park but, like all other times she tries to prove me wrong. I let her lead the way through a little detour, and well, in the end, she didn’t know where she was going and I brought us back to the parking area. The parking area, is the area near the Jefferson Memorial across from the Washington Monument. That place is very poorly lit at night and I wish the city would do something about that.

While I am slightly complaining, the Metro is not very tourist friendly when trying to access the National Mall. If you use solely the Metro (no bus) you have a good 15-20 minute walk to go to the Lincoln Memorial.

Michael and Jennifer had an afternoon flight that Saturday. Han and I had late flight and we used that time to go to the Spy Museum, and Theodore Roosevelt Island. The Spy Museum was ok – a little pricey at $20 a pop per ticket. Most of the gadgets were, if not old, were new and corny (i.e. mannequin of a male and female like James bond with the newest spy gear). The tickets are timed, but because of their inefficiencies, I would recommend to anyone that decides to go to line up 15 minutes early if they are in the area. Don’t listen to the ticket exactly.

We had lunch in Chinatown at Jackey’s Cafe. It sucked. Don’t go there. As a matter of fact, most of the local eateries were expensive and sucked. If given a choice between a chain and local eatery, unless a local *highly* recommended it, don’t go.

Han and I in front of Teddy’s statue.

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