Posted on 1 Comment on Meet Kylie: Your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger

Meet Kylie: Your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger

Hi! My name is Kylie Hadden. I was born and raised in the Bay Area; however, I moved to Portland, Oregon 6 years ago. As of right now, I am interested in becoming a data scientist! My favorite hobbies are dancing, playing softball, and traveling.

You might be wondering, how was my move-in day? As you can imagine, I was extremely nervous. Not only am I jumping into college life after being behind a computer screen for 2 years, but I also have to learn how to be independent. I was worried about making new friends, handling my schedule, and living on my own.

I realized that I wasn’t alone. Every first year is in the same boat. I was able to meet so many new friends just from living in the Middle Earth towers. We all spend time together in the common room and help each other out when needed. Our RAs were very welcoming and let us know that they are here if we need any support.

Now, let’s move on to Week 0 events! First off, I attended the Student Involvement Fair. Aldrich Park was packed with multiple clubs, sororities and fraternities, and club sports. UCI has an organization for almost everything. I was able to talk to multiple booths and learn more about their upcoming events.

That night, I attended Late Night at the ARC! There were so many activities: demos, rock climbing, belly dancing, and more. I decided to go on the zipline. Although the line was over 2 hours, I was able to meet students just by playing a game of charades.

The rest of week 0 I attended events that were with the organizations I was interested in. I attended a workshop hosted by the Chinese Association Dance Crew (CADC). Afterward, we all went to UTC to get boba and meet the team members! I also attended the All IDC event to watch multiple hip-hop crews perform at the Bren Event Center. Later in the week, I attended the first general meeting for the Filipino club, Kababayan. They also had a meet-up at UTC where I was able to meet some board members and learn about their programs.

Overall, my first week at UCI was very memorable. I’m looking forward to getting more involved with these clubs and experiencing life on campus. I can’t wait to see what the future has in store.

Check out this link to see a video recap of my week 0:

Posted on

Meet Evelyn: Your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger

Hi, my name is Jialin He. I come from China and moved to Seattle 4 years ago, so my family is currently living in Seattle. I love our school and it’s been my dream school when I was a freshman in high school, so I am very exciting about this new life; but I am also nervous about it, I heard studying in college is way more harder than high school.

I haven’t decided what major I want study, but I am very interested in Business Information Management and media major. I met a lot of new friends during Orientation; my new peers are all so nice, and our advisor helped me a lot. My roommate whos also from China is very cute, and we love the same kpop boy group which is awsome. We have been sending texts to each other through all summer, so I believe we could be the best roommate.

In this quarter, I hope I could enrolled in Ics 31 class. My GPA goal in this quarter is get above than 3.8; and my the other goal is made a lot of friends, not only Chinese friend, but also other countries’ friends.

Posted on

Meet Caleb: Your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger

My name is Kelenna Caleb Azu, I currently reside in the Mesa Court Towers and my current major is Undeclared/Undecided. I plan to switch to the ICS department and major in Game Design.

An interesting fact about me is I’m one of the oddest people that you will ever meet and I’ll probably remind you , but I’ll definitely be one of your closest friends after 2 days. On the day that I moved in I’m not really sure if this can be considered interesting, but when I was moving in one of the supervisors approached me and asked for my name and they took it with me. After a few hours, I ended up on the schools page which was really cool and it was pretty easy for everyone to know who I was because my hair was very distinct compared to others. We did a little bonding event by going to the girl volleyball game and I ended up falling off my seat because I got too excited, but I made friends because of how funny it was. After a few days I was known on my floor as the social butterfly in a good and weird way because I would say hi to anyone I make eye contact with, but I would always forget their names.

After a few days it was pretty easy to break the ice on my floor for most people since they were also social, so I just went to the other floors saying hi to the rest of the people and I realized how vast the world is and how little I know of it. It made me excited and to meet more people and learn about their culture and where they came from. The most exciting thing for me to do was to try the food of different places and different dishes from the ant-eatery. After a little while this place became my home away from home.

This is Caleb, speaking to you live from the home of anteaters signing out.

Posted on

Meet Sabrina: Your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger

“To the Doubtful and the Indecisive”

I can say with certainty that we students are all too familiar with the classic icebreaker question, “What major are you in?” If you’re doubtful and indecisive like me, you dread hearing it.

During a social event I attended during Welcome Week, I was talking to another Undeclared student, who admitted that their response to the dreaded question was often tinged with embarrassment. While our peers respond confidently with “I’m a Computer Science major” or “Engineering” or “Political Science,” we answer with a suppressed sigh, “Oh, I’m Undeclared.” Why do we find shame in being doubtful and indecisive about the academic topic — or career, by extrapolation — that we want to pursue for at least the next four years of our lives?

Even as a child, my doubts and indecision were evident. My vocational aspirations bounced from cowgirl to president to doctor to a role that I had set my eyes on in elementary school: an award-winning author. I believed that I, Sabrina Cheng, was destined to write a series that would surpass “Harry Potter” or “Percy Jackson” in popularity. I enrolled in the Creative Writing conservatory at an arts high school close to my hometown, Tustin, which is about 10 minutes away from campus (as a self-proclaimed tour guide, I’d be happy to show my non-local counterparts the best boba shops around Irvine).

Although I studied Creative Writing for the past four years, my doubts and indecision arose when I considered choosing English as my college major. I yearned to explore academic subjects outside the realm of Creative Writing, such as psychology and related subjects within the social sciences. I look forward to quenching my curiosity during Introduction to Psychology and other classes I will take in quarters to come.

Whenever sentiments of embarrassment arise as I answer the dreaded icebreaker question, I am reminded of advice that my mentor gave me this summer: To the doubtful and the indecisive, take the time that you need to discover and explore the subjects that most pique your intellectual curiosity. Avoid rushing into a major that you are not truly passionate about just because of external pressures to have it all figured out. Rest assured that you, in fact, do not need to have it all figured out.

Your friendly neighborhood Undeclared major,
Sabrina

Posted on

Meet Lucy: Your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger

My name is Jiajie Chen, you can call me Lucy, I’m from Qingdao, China and I live in campus now. I still do not have a major yet, but I’m intending to major in psychology.

I am interested in sketching, diving, and traveling. I enjoy watching movies or playing video games with my friends in my spare time. But I rarely watch horror movies… Some of them are horrible to me…

My first day at the university was like, this is huge! Then I had to drag three heavy boxes and a big bag for an hour to get to my dormitory and start to unbox my packages. This was all after I took about twenty hours of plane. Therefore, my first impression was that I was deadly tired.

However, when I start my campus life, this land, where I am going to live in for four years became lovely. I have now finished my first week at school. My professors are very kind, so I am very confident about my future study. Even I’m still not quite used to the life here yet, but I guess it will not be far.

During last summer vacation, I take a bunch of classes to learn how to drive. I also had a wonderful time with my friends traveling Shanghai. After this trip, I fell in love with Shanghai. It is gorgeous and I hope to live there one day.

My new goal is to be more committed to what I am doing, be more enthusiastic to my life, and hope to get good grades!