Before I left Providence, I had my friends gather together for an end-of-the-year party. While they nibbled their cookies and sipped their cider, I asked each of them to reflect and write down a favorite moment from the past semester. The reflection was also a bit of a test run for Project Wall-to-Wall. You can view the results above.

As 2008 draws to a close, I wonder what each of us will remember from this past year. A recent peek at Facebook revealed some sad and joyous moments: a friend engaged and another diagnosed with cancer. Life dolls out both in equal amounts. It’s been an atypical one for me, and I will remember trotting back and forth across the Pacific in search of myself. I will also remember the simple things like seeing a sea turtle poke its head above the water, photographing the sunset from my grandparents’ roof, visiting my great-uncle in the hospital, rescuing a gecko from under a surinam tree, beating my mother’s cousin and her friends at mah jong, walking the dog down to the lake, comforting a student who shed tears for his grandmother, chatting on my cell phone whilst a hummingbird hovered in front of my face, skinny dipping in Lake Washington, watching a lightening storm from my aunt and uncle’s porch, getting lost going to Boston, cooking my first turkey, delivering cookies to my friends, waiting with my friend at the airport, and getting sick in a restaurant bathroom back home. It’s a year full of memories, and I hope next year will be just as bountiful.

Well, now that you’re reading this, the title stretches the truth a bit…well maybe more than a bit, but had I been in Hawaii this winter, I would have been invited to a Christmas party just a few doors down from the Obamas’ vacation home. I’m talking walking distance! And since the beaches are all public access, there’s a good chance I could have run into him on the sand. You never know, he could be friendly with the neighbors and stop by for some holiday cheer. I realize that this sounds rather pathetic, especially since I’m sitting at home in California right now just 3,000 miles shy of such a meeting, but a girl can dream can’t she?

Normally, I don’t pay attention to frivolous details such as where the president elect spends his Christmas vacation (though after reporting on Obama’s spam musubi, I’m not sure if you’re likely to believe me). In this case, my mom started going on about how her cousin recently purchased a house in Kailua where the Obama family is staying. That’s interesting since 90% of my family in Hawaii lives on the western side of Oahu, no where near Kailua. The skeptic in me still didn’t feel the need to get riled up over this since Kailua is still a pretty big place. Then my mom got off the phone with her uncle in Hawaii, and she called me over to look at Google maps. I won’t say anymore, but you can look below to feel my agony:

View this post and others at karinko.net.

It’s been a while since I’ve written any updates for Wall-to-Wall. Brown is now on winter recess, and I’m currently back home in California for the holidays. Despite this, I do have some updates:

1. The video spot that ran during the VISIONS release party at the beginning of the month is now available both on Facebook and YouTube. You can also view it down below. If you want the text to it, a rough script is also available.

2. I’ve been in touch with a couple of administrative people at Brown to get permission to paper the bathrooms for a month. They’re also on break right now, so I probably won’t hear any more news until after the 5th.

3. I updated the project description, so if you haven’t had a chance to look at it yet, you should check it out.

That’s all for now, but while you’re waiting for more updates, watch the video:

Find out more about Project Wall-to-Wall.

This holiday season sales are down in just about every industry, except the craft industry. That’s right, in order to make their dollar count, consumers are turning from ready-made to handmade and bumping up the sales of stores like Michaels and Jo-Ann. I suppose you could count me among those jumping on the craft bandwagon. I’ve been beading for a little over two years now and mostly use the reserves in my bead stash, but occasionally, I’ll need to make a quick dash to the store to grab something I’ve run out of. I haven’t yet noticed the increased traffic at my favorite shopping spots, but if this report holds true, then none of them should be going out of business anytime soon.

Above, you can see the latest of my holiday creations, a necklace designed by me with beads from the Bead Fetish in Sacramento.

Long before the mainstream media started reporting on Barack Obama’s lunch menu, spam musubi was a favorite among Hawaii locals and Japanese Americans. I grew up watching my mom fry up the spam on the stove, and then we’d lay the marinated meat over a bed of rice, pile on some more carbs, and press it all down into the plastic mold. I’d take my ethnic version of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to school for lunch and eagerly scarf it down. However, some of my friends could never get over the fact that I was eating spam.

But we are in a different age now. If America’s next president can come away from the glitz of Washington to enjoy a lunch of spam musubi, then all the elitists out there who think of spam as poor man’s food will have to think again. Moreover, with the economy the way it (and not likely to change anytime soon), what is more cost-effective than spam and rice (well, the dried seaweed might set you back a bit, but let’s not harp on the details)? Just in case you need one more push before you dive into the wonders of spam, I’ve conveniently included several links to spam musubi recipes down below:

spam musubi recipe from SeriousEats.com
spam musubi recipe from AllRecipes.com
spam musubi recipe from WhatsCookingAmerica.net.

Links courtesy of Huffingtonpost.com

Enjoy!

I knew when I confused my friend’s shout out of “I’m done!” for the popular brand of instant noodles, Indomie, that it was not just my stomach talking. A few Google searches later, my suspicions were confirmed when I came to this page hosted by the University of Cambridge. The following is a piece of text, commenting on letter order and word processing, which started circulating the Internet in 2003:

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

If you didn’t get that, the text is supposed to read,

According to a researcher (sic) at Cambridge University, it doesn’t matter in what order the letters in a word are, the only important thing is that the first and last letter be at the right place. The rest can be a total mess and you can still read it without problem. This is because the human mind does not read every letter by itself but the word as a whole.

It is important to note that this isn’t entirely true. Since my background in Cognitive Science is rather weak, I won’t go into all the details, but one bit I found interesting in the analysis of the above claim was the idea that word shape influences reading. The typographer in me is inclined to believe this statement even before reviewing the hard evidence.

First let us revisit the offending text:

If we take away the swapped “M” and “N” and the “I” (since it only appears in “Indomie”), we can see the middle and ends of both words are visually identical.

Add in the fact that “M” and “N” are structurally similar and that the thin profile of the “I” tends to disappear when wedged between much blockier letters, and you do what I did, begin to see food in places where it doesn’t belong.

I lift my head above the porcelain bowl just enough to see the muddled contents of my stomach swimming down below. I brace one hand against the toilet rim while the other dangles toward the tile floor. In the back of my mind, I try to remember what the slated time is for food poisoning while also trying to recall how long I’ve occupied the one-room stall. Outside I hear eager bathroom goers speculate as to why I am taking so long. I check myself once more to see if I can make it to the door: sharp stomach pains, lightheadedness, and nausea. I lean my forehead against my wrist, waiting for the pain to subside, and then I get to my feet and stumble toward the bathroom door. I crack it just enough to utter my plea for help, “Can someone get the manager please? I think I may be sick.”

Just an hour ago I was the perfect picture of health. I was waiting in the car just outside of an apartment on 5th Street anticipating the arrival of my friend whom I had not seen in a year. The next second my phone rang and she said she’d be right outside. I hadn’t told her what car I was driving, so I stepped onto the sidewalk where she could see me. It was mid-morning but still chilly for December in Sacramento. I looked above me to see half a dozen ripening oranges still green on the tree. A few minutes later I heard a door open and shut followed by approaching footsteps. I looked toward the locked gate and saw her slip between the iron bars clad in a long teal coat and a silvery blue and purple scarf.

A hug and a greeting later, we were in the car whisking down Q Street on our way to my favorite breakfast place. While paused at stoplights, I asked her about her job at the Capitol and she about my move back to Providence. We chatted through the next couple of streets, and when we were a block away from the restaurant, I could already tell that the wait was long. A mass of customers hovered over the doorway and spread out across the porch. I asked her what she wanted to do, and when she left it up to me, I turned the corner and headed toward my second favorite breakfast place.

A half an hour later, we were seated at a cozy two-person table beside a Christmas tree with ornaments dangling above our heads. She ordered the pecan-pumpkin pancakes, and I had the southwestern salmon omelet. Our dishes arrived shortly after, and I had just downed the last piece of omelet when my stomach first complained. I ignored it at first, thinking I had just eaten too quickly. When the pain came back a minute later, I shifted in my seat. Only after the fourth episode did I excuse myself to the restroom.

Now I lie against the tile wall staring at the base of the toilet. The woman whom I asked to grab the manager was also kind enough to grab my friend as well. My friend walks in a moment later with the manager in tow. They ask if I want some Sprite, and I weakly nod at the request. While the manager leaves for the soda, my friend dampens a stack of paper towels and places it on my forehead. She asks if she can call anyone for me, and I take out my cell phone and pull up my mother’s number from my contact list. I laugh silently to myself after my friend says, “Hello, this is Karinko’s friend” a quick pause and then, “Oh I’m fine how are you?” I can imagine my mother asking her how she is doing before inquiring why she is calling in my place. The pleasantries become humorous given the topic to be discussed (my sickness) is not one for polite society. But the rest follows and after exchanging a few words with my mom, we decide that I should call my dad.

I hang up with him a few minutes later and tell my friend that my dad is coming. Meanwhile, the manager returns and attempts to move me upstairs to an awaiting couch, but I am in too much pain to move. She brings down a couple of pillows and I lie down on the bathroom floor while my friend gently strokes my head. “I’m so sorry,” I say between pulsating jabs of pain. She smiles and reassures me that she doesn’t mind. She’s glad that we got to spend the morning together even like this. I thank her again for being here because despite my apologies, I too am glad that she is by my side.

About ten minutes later the nausea and lightheadedness pass, and my friend supports me as I make my way upstairs to the couch. It’s cold near the eaves, so she runs down to grab my jacket and drapes it over me when she returns. The pain comes and goes but not as frequently now. I ask more about her, how is she liking Sacramento and is she glad she came here? She replies that she likes it very well. The pain is quickly fading now, so I poke fun at the whole ordeal and we laugh together. For a moment, I don’t mind the pain or the awkward scenario surrounding it. I am so happy to be with this friend of mine whom I have not seen in a year. Certainly many years from now when other typical meals have faded from memory, I will remember this one for its unusual development.

Almost as if Fate were laughing back at me, the manager comes up just moments after the pain subsides to tell me that my parents are here. I walk down the stairs unsupported and smile when I see my parents. My dad looks at me and says, “You look like you’re doing better,” and I nod in agreement. We stay briefly to thank the manager before heading out to the parking lot. While we walk to the car, I say goodbye to my friend and thank her for being with me. She smiles and we hug promising to get together once more before I leave. I get into the car with my dad and watch as she gets into the other car with my stepmother. As we drive off, I lean my head against the headrest, close my eyes momentarily, and think, “What a day.”

I was poking around the Style section of the NYTimes today and happened upon this delightful article, “Butter Holds the Secret to Cookies That Sing.” I’ve been baking a lot this past year, and in the process, I learned from my aunt that there is a reason why you keep the butter cold: Cold butter when set to bake releases pockets of air that form the structure of the baked good. Let the butter melt before you bake it, and you lose this added element and end up with cookies and crust that won’t hold together. So when the recipe says to cut in the butter, cut in the butter and don’t take a shortcut by melting it.

The NYTimes article addresses this baking principle as well as the intricacies of butter flavor:

Blind tastings by Dining section staff members and others found the differences among butters, European and American, to be pronounced. Some were waxy, some nutty, some grassy. Some seemed less greasy than others. Professionals like Mr. Bradley can taste many other flavor undertones in butter, some lovely and some not, including grass, flowers, whey, old cream, malt, must and weed. Some flavor differences come from cows’ feed. Others are acquired during processing.

Forget wine tasting. Let’s head out to the country and sample some butter!

The morning sun shines through ceiling high windows. I am sitting in the leather chair of Providence’s T.F. Green Airport ruminating over the past few hours. The sun silhouettes the people in front of me and blinds my vision. How different the sun looks at this hour. As I was driving to the airport this morning, I beheld a fuchsia sky embellished with clouds of gold and purple. It’d been so long since I saw a sunrise that I’d forgotten how beautiful they could be. As we neared the airport, the scene flowed by to the track of a Coldplay song. I felt myself welling up inside thinking of how simple, perfect, and beautiful this sunrise was and how much joy was brought by this single sight. I thought to myself, what a perfect close to this unlikely semester, which unfolded in pure beauty, a beauty that could only be reaffirmed by a fuchsia sky.

I stepped out of the cab on my fuchsia high, paying the missing dollar of my fellow rider and walking toward the airport entrance. The sliding doors opened to a stalled line of people and luggage, which stretched for about a hundred yards from curbside to counter. The doors wouldn’t even close since the line had backed into the sensors. I had arrived two hours early anticipating a lazy check in and a leisurely wait at the gate, but this line suggested that I would be lucky to get past security in the next hour. I might have waited patiently without incident, except that I turned around and saw a familiar face.

This friend of mine had called me two night previous after two failed attempts to meet before the end of the semester. I received her call just as I was about to go to bed, and our conversation had consisted of these few short lines:

“Hello, I’m sorry…did I wake you up?”
“No I was just getting ready for bed.”
“Oh, I’ll let you go then”
“I’m really glad you called. I was hoping to see you tonight because I don’t think I can get together with you tomorrow. Maybe we should try to meet up after break.”
“Yes, let’s”

Then came the click, and I vaguely wondered why it was that we could never get together.

Now I see her standing five feet in front of me, and my heart leaps because the missed opportunity to see her is no longer missed. I have minutes of waiting and she is a captive audience, tethered to the line by her baggage just as I am.

I greet her and she smiles. The line steadily moves forward and I move back a few places to join her. We overhear the woman on the phone next to us and learn the terrible news: the woman and my friend’s flight has been canceled. My friend looks up dazed toward the check in desk. The purpose of the line becomes all too apparent – 128 people forced to rebook their fights in a slow trickle to the counter. I realized that my “lazy” check in has just become a dash to check my luggage and make it to the gate in time. Traveler’s remorse sets in and I silently bemoan my decision to pack the bag that doesn’t fit into the overhead bins.

As I wait with my friend, I try to gather how she feels about the situation. She doesn’t say much and we stand there in silence. Part of me would like to consider this lack of conversation a failure: Here is the one person I wanted to see before I left and yet nothing is being said between us. The other part says that she is tired and perhaps frustrated and annoyed that her flight has been canceled. In this circumstance, I cannot selfishly promote my intention to socialize.

Soon I and other passengers whose flights have not been canceled are directed toward the skycap outside. I lose my luggage and therefore my excuse to remain in line with my friend. Yet part of me wants to stay and see if the silence will blossom into conversation, so I hold my position giving the reason that I would be waiting on the other side of security anyway. She just nods, and we stand again in silence.

The woman from earlier is off the phone with the airline reservations, and she asks me to watch her luggage as she runs from Delta to United in search of a new flight. She is decisive and knows her plan of action. I stand still as questions crisscross my mind: Do I wait? Do I talk? And finally, why am I still here?

I want a second chance to say goodbye to a friend, but my conscious nags at something deeper. It grabs at a shared memory from long ago when this friend and I came to this airport together for our Thanksgiving flights. We arrived three hours before departure, raced through check in and security in a half an hour, and spent the remaining time reminiscing over our first semester of college at a rectangular table in the Dunkin Donuts dining area. Here we are three years later and there is not a word to be spoken. So part of me is here to rekindle a dying flame, or what I imagine to be a dying flame. The silence itself does not mean anything. I only couple it with the unanswered phone calls and missed meetings to infer the state of a faltering friendship. But I can never know what passes through her mind. I am too afraid to ask. But the past does not have to define the future of our friendship. Maybe I began standing here out of guilt and nostalgia, but now I stand for what I desire in the present, a friendship based in love and support and quiet devotion. I choose to be here, and I want to be here.

I look past the crowd to the glass ceiling overhead. The fuchsia has faded, but the terminal is washed in a brilliant morning glow. It reminds me of when Ronald Regan said, “It is morning in America,” or more recently of the Obama logo rising over fields of red and blue. Both beckon to that renewed sense of hope: We can wake up one morning, discard the troubles of yesterday, and start afresh.

Friday night, I was on the phone with a friend, and she brought up Wall-to-Wall and the VISIONS video and added, “It’s great that you’re putting yourself out there.” I can’t remember if I said this back to her at the time, but later I thought to myself, “Yeah, that is also why I’m doing this project.”

When I originally thought of running this promotional spot for Wall-to-Wall at the VISIONS release party, the idea of putting my face on a screen terrified me. I nearly backed out of it, except then VISIONS’ managing editor emailed me asking if I was still planning to run the video, and I knew I had to go through with it for the sake of the project. The release party was the last big event of the semester for Brown’s Asian/Asian American community, and I knew that if I wanted to reach a broader audience before the break, this would be it.

For those of you who don’t know, Wall-to-Wall was created out of my participation in the Self-Expression and Leadership Program. Although the program is based around implementing a project, the course itself isn’t about the project; the project is the means by which I explore myself and expressing myself to my community. You may have noticed that this blog tracks the progress of the project as well as my own personal journey. The two are very much interwoven. So part of what was going through my head, when my friend mentioned that I was “putting myself out there” was this realization that something was shifting within me.

Personally I was very self-conscious about making this video, but that feeling was outweighed by my desire to grow the project. At a certain point I think I even forgot how afraid I felt until talking to my friend, except when she mentioned the video it wasn’t that I recalled the fear itself only the distant memory that I had once been afraid but was no longer. This next insight reminds me of when I used to attend church: In giving myself to something larger than myself, I find that I have the courage to act in spite of my insecurities. I knew the video had been worth it when the day after three people asked me about the project without me even having to bring it up.

Find out more about Project Wall-to-Wall.