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Final Thoughts

I am not going to lie, but it feels like I graduated high school yesterday and here I am finishing my first year in college. So much has happened, so many new things I experienced that I never thought of. However, through all that experience, sometimes it’s easy to forget the main goals you want to accomplish by the end of the year. Coming into college, I had several goals I wanted to accomplish, but these three were my main ones:

1. Avoid Freshman Fifteen
2. Improve my social life
3. Maintain a good GPA

I knew coming into college that I would not be working out as much as I wish to, either it’s time, or due to my laziness to not work out. But one thing was sure was that I needed to not fall trap to the infamous Freshman fifteen. For those who don’t know Freshman Fifteen (FF), it’s basically when one gains an extra fifteen pounds by the end of freshmen year. In other words I needed to maintain my weight by not baiting myself to the junk food around me, or stress eating. However, I am a student, and therefore I had multiple occasions of stress eating (particularly around finals) and consuming fast food, particularly In-N-Out. Stressing about gaining weight while stress eating is not good for you, especially when it’s finals week, but I lived. I made it out while dodging Freshman Fifteen. Still I did gain a few pounds. Looking back, I was proud of myself for maintaining my weight, because my willpower against food is particularly weak, especially when I imagined I would eat a lot in college.

The second goal was to improve my social life, simply because I never really had one back in high school, and also because I was really shy. I wanted to be out there, rather than constantly spending time alone in my room binge watching netflix or playing video games. I was not planning to spend my time in college reliving my high school years with almost zero social life. To accomplish those goals, I approached a lot of people, and while I did not get along with over half of them, it was great, because I now have friends that I can hangout with rather than spending my weekend alone. People say that the friends you make in college usually are your true friends and in many ways more than one I agree with them. Now I don’t have that social life where I constantly go out during weekends, but it’s better than high school for sure.

My third goal is to maintain a good GPA. In high school, I never really worked too hard, and my GPA suffered the consequences. I started fall quarter with determination to keep a good GPA in college, especially since this is my first year and I don’t want to mess up. However, I stressed myself more about getting good grades and GPA than the actual class, I couldn’t really focus on understanding the material, and that was bad. Things took a bad turn as Spring quarter rolled by, because I was having a harder time focusing on my classes and those exam and midterm grades did not help me with my confidence. I know it’s not the best GPA right now, but I still have three years ahead of me, and I just need to work harder and smarter. The last thing I want in college is to repeat the same mistakes as in high school.

Not all is bad news, because a side achievement that I am happy about being undeclared is getting into ICS 31, because the demand for that class is really big. To get that class is basically first come first serve. I am not saying it’s impossible for an undeclared student to get that class, but I want to just advice that getting into ICS 31 (intro to programming) is difficult.

Throughout the year, I really appreciated applying to be a Zot Blogger, not because I can put this on my resume, but also because I was able to write blogs. I always loved writing in general, whether it’s fiction or nonfiction, but being a Zot Blogger made me realize how much I love to blog, whether it’s about myself or just giving advice in general. Topics were great too, as I got to write about what UCI felt to me in many ways, from meeting new people, trying new experiences and more. This also gave me a chance to give me insight about myself too.

With all the knowledge I have accumulated over this past year, if I was to teach a class on being undeclared, I would structure it more interactive-based rather than lecture based. This class is not too difficult to comprehend, but it requires more time and experience. For example, I would start off by debunking the misconceptions of being undeclared and instead explain how one can get their major based on how hard they work. Being undeclared sometimes means taking GE’s and because they are first years, maybe recommending students to take these GE courses that fulfill two or more GE will also help. For example, I would highly recommend taking Anthropology 2A with Professor Egan for many reasons. His lectures are traditional-lecture based; professor speaks and you take notes. Professor Egan makes his lectures entertaining in a way it becomes easier to understand and remember (but you still have to take notes). However the content is really eye-opening, because all the topics are things not well known. For example, there are a group of people who in the Himalayas who practice fraternal polyandry (where a group of brothers all marry one wife), which keeps the population in check and results in no food shortage. There is more to this, but it becomes hard to explain unless you take the course.

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Zot Snaps!


In between classes, I need cold coffee to keep myself awake, as I am drowsy during afternoons. All I need to do is walk in, grab a bottle or a snack, and instant purchase. All processes done within minutes. Also if you are looking to grab a light lunch, they have it all covered. They have everything from sandwiches, candies, bakery, coffee, water, and more.
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Libraries are great, but I chose this one because this one is usually the closest library in relation to Mesa Court and other classes. There are many things I like about this library, from multiple floors of study rooms, free to use computers, and power outlets to charge your devices. With the air-conditioned rooms, it’s nice to sit back and relax in the comfortable sofas and armchairs. Besides the atmosphere of students studying, you are also surrounded by books, the majority of which are older than you, which makes you feel like you are smart (not that you are smart already).
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Nothing like having an 8 am class in Computer Science tower, and taking a nice 20-minute nap under the sun in the Courtyard. It is one of the better places to either relax or take a nap because the sofas are big enough and you are under the warm sun which gives the warm feeling of your blanket in the morning. It’s not the best place to socialize, but if you are looking for a place to take a seat to relax, this is the best in my opinion.
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A Valuable Resource

Between classes, I usually am in the Anteatery or in my room taking a nap. Because of that I am not productive whatsoever, which affected me faster than I thought as classes became more difficult. The library is a good place to study, but to me it always felt crowded and every power outlet was occupied with someone’s laptop charger. I needed to find a place that was generally less crowded and had good places for computers. That was when I discovered the hidden place. It was near the blood center next to East Food Court. Right next to the blood center was a nice, quiet place to study, use computers to finish work, and as an added bonus, there’s a Starbucks right outside (plus there are plenty of sofas for one to take an easy nap between classes). I am the type of person to work if there is a working atmosphere. While it’s not a program, I always believed in using things around you to your advantage and everything else will fall in places whether you realize it or not. This is a passive resource, and to make the most of it, you need to be active and on top of your self-discipline. If not, at least you will develop self-discipline. The other advantage you will have is you get ahead of your classes which means more time to spend per your choice. Or if you are struggling to catch up with classes because the material is hard, you now have time. I wish I came to know about this place before, because I spend a lot of time procrastinating with my work. It’s not something you can put on your resume or make it a highlight of your college life, but I would definitely recommend this place.

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Near-end First Year Experience

Dear U/U Student,

Congratulations! You made it into UC Irvine! You might be excited/nervous about going to college or looking forward to building your career or brimming with questions. To me, it was imagining what my first-year experience would be like.

Now that I am in my near-end of my first year of college, there were several moments, events, and tips I experienced as a first-year U/U.

My first lesson: try. Back in high school, I never actually tried anything new, which led to some boring years of high school. Coming into college, the first interest was applying into a business fraternity. I went to every event hosted to hopefully get selected for the interview. I was rejected. I was really devastated that time, but looking back, I think it was a wonderful and necessary experience. When networking with members, I made friendships I probably never would have met. Another example: U/U office sent out an application to apply to be a Zot Blogger by submitting two different answers to their prompts. Thinking I got nothing to lose, I applied. Two weeks later I got an email saying “Congratulations on being accepted as a Zot Blogger!”. I was shocked, because I never gave it too much thought, and answered honestly, without worrying whether I would get in or not. My point here is that I want you to try something, anything without worrying about anything. Don’t expect anything and try, and enjoy surprises from life you probably never imagined. True, some surprises will never be pleasant, but there is always a silver lining if you know where to look.

Another lesson, more of an insider tip: explore. This one ties a little bit into the first lesson, but the main idea is I want you to know that your education is not limited to the courses you take. This is college, meaning there are organizations and clubs and research opportunities you should take advantage of. Mark Twain once said, “Don’t let schooling interfere with your education” and he is right. School is just scholar learning, which is necessary, but education has no bounds. Explore talking to people, because each person you make friends with is bound to teach you something you never thought of. As a U/U I felt that those with majors are already learning things I haven’t, but that is not necessarily the case. For one, it helped me discover what I was interested in studying further and what I was not. Back in high school, many people told me taking economics was not worth the effort, but after taking an econ class (which I would have never done if I had a major) I am now working on minoring in Economics. I am not saying that having a major is bad, but my point is to explore what this university has to offer.

I know it’s not your ideal starter pack for success in college, but I truly believe if the above is done right, your college experience will be worth remembering.

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Spring Break Fun

Spring break was a combination of half boredom and half fun. Throughout the first half of the week, besides playing video games and watching movies, I really had nothing else to do. In fact, I had a routine: wake up around 10 am, do nothing until lunch, video games/movie, dinner, and sleep. I turned into a huge couch potato to the point I was tired by being a couch potato. I wanted to hang out with my friends, but a lot of them were in school, as their spring break began the week after our spring break. It wasn’t until the latter part of the week where things were not boring. My friends and I played baseball, got food, and hang out for the most part. We watched the movie Zodiac on Netflix, which was an interesting movie. I also watched Captain Marvel, which was not that bad. My best friends finally finished his last class and went on a hike which was fun, since we caught up with each other a lot, talking about different events that happened. I finally watched How To Train Your Dragon 3: The Hidden World, which I was dying to see since it came out. Last and finally, I went to the DMV. Not exactly a fun place, but it was the most productive thing all week. I was expecting to not be done within 6 hours, but instead, I was in 4 hours! I got my token number within 10 minutes, and got called up within 2 hours! The rest took two hours but I am surprised how the DMV changed dramatically for the better! Overall my spring break was nice, until professors on Sunday afternoon starting hitting me with emails to do things. Even then I was experiencing positive vibes about this quarter because three of my four classes were related to my major and minor. And this time around, I had a better idea of what I should be expecting with balancing my life and working hard and smart with my academics to do better than previous quarters.