Interests
When not pursuing academic-related activities or working on the Alligator, I partake in a variety of hobbies. With some of my hobbies and interests considered "nerdy," I do take pride in them and enjoy spending my leisure time with these activities:
- Poetry - I live by the words of E.E. Cummings, Sylvia Plath, and and T.S. Eliot, able to recite many of their poems from memory. The lives of poets interest me as it allows me to understand the poet's words on a much deeper level compared to a casual reader. Poetry books consume my bedroom and I never get tired of reading the same works over and over again, admiring the art form. Not to mention, I love writing poetry in my spare time, mostly on nature-related topics.
- Photography - Not only have I met a lot of my friends due to our interest in photography, but we also use it as a creative outlet. It's a very adventurous process as we often take pictures in forests and nature paths and afterwards go inside to enhance the photographs with Adobe Photoshop. I most often post my pictures on Flickr.
- Gaming - I love gaming with my friends and that's a known fact. I'm highly competitive and enjoy wandering through fantasy worlds while calling others "noobs" in MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Play Games). I often play the healer role as I prefer to help others and stand in the back when my group fights. Some of my favorite MMORPGs include World of Warcraft, Warhammer, and Ragnarok Online. When I'm not "pwning noobs" on one of the following games, I'm often found playing God through The Sims 2, where I enjoy creating my own custom textures and sharing my stories via the Legacy Challenge.
- Deer - I feel that in a way, I'm quite connected with nature including the animals within it. I have always adored deer and am not certain as to when they became my favorite animal. In fact, I collect anything fawn-related and it has developed into hobby of itself. Scattered across my room, I have deer paintings by a variety of artists in bright colors. And yes, I do love the book and film Bambi, it's actually my favorite Disney movie.
- Trance music - Something about the hypnotizing beat of trance combined with the poetic lyrics enchants me - I've been an avid listener of trance even as a child and admire many of the DJs behind it such as DJ Tiesto and Armin van Buuren. For the most part, the trance artists are European and educated both socially and academically which I admire; they don't end up in the papers for some celebrity scandal unlike the artists here and remain quite humble.
- Yoga - Both the physical and mental aspects of yoga leave me feeling refreshed and when I can, I partake in yoga. I enjoy Ashtanga Vinyasa "flow yoga" and Bikrim the most although I do prefer the meditational aspects as well. The most difficult yoga experience for me was in a class called "Mindful Meditation," where we sat on stones for a good hour and a half to two hours, meditating and focusing on solely our breaths. It's in the moments of such meditation that you realize how itchy you are or your mind drifts off the most - it's both challenging and frustrating but leaves you with a relaxed mind afterwards.
- Obscure toys - I'm kind of a child at heart, I love to collect anything shiny, colorful, and obscure including vinyl toys and ball-jointed dolls. The thrill of opening a box with a random vinyl toy inside of it at Urban Outfitters excites me and as a competitive person, I'm severely determined to obtain each figure. I now collect the Hello Kitty vinyl figures and, much to my room mate's request, have them on display in the living room. Ball-jointed dolls too also provide a creative outlet for me, combined with photography. There's actually a mildly large community of ball-jointed doll collectors at UF who meet up every other month at Kanapaha Gardens and take pictures of our dolls together. Ball-jointed dolls come from Asia and are made from hand-casted resin then hand-painted. They're quite beautiful yet pricey and make wonderful models for photographs.
- Sewing - A lover of colors and patterns, I spend time sewing for both myself and sometimes ball-jointed dolls. This winter, I plan on opening my own shop on Etsy where I will sell doll clothing. The community loves unique clothing and some spend anywhere from $100-$300 for one outfit! I aspire to learn how to crochet one day after admiring the works of other collectors at UF. Despite the amount of new sewing machines out there, I continue to sew on my mother's vintage Kenmore from the 1960s that surprisingly works better than any of the modern ones I purchased beforehand.
