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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.

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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

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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!