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00000…FOUR

Posted on August 29th, 2005 by Al'x.
Categories: AleXanga, Summer '05.

thats right, ‘04! most of the OG ‘04 south crew came down this weekend for some good ol’ partying. good times all night long…

met up with the guys at saigon grill on 88th n 2nd. really good food, btw. anyways, i walk in and the table is full of ppl i havent seen in forever. scotty, jc, ahmed, marc, bryant, jamil, manny, and cathy. word. so i sit down and say wussup to everyone and immediately get handed a bottle of gatorade. leave it to these guys to bring mixers to a random viet restaurant. haha…so the bottle i get? orange gatorade + 151. damn i missed partying with these guys. hehe, killed the bottle with cathy and her friend and headed out to catch the train downtown.

caught up with jc and manny on the way to some lounge. got there and hit up a couple of shots and a long island then outta nowhere, DIAS walks in. i find out that my windmill sensei lives in edgewater now so im finally gonna get some breakin action. hotness…beats breakin on my driveway, haha. anyways, also caught up with cathy and told her about my dj plans. interestingly enough, she told me what she felt about my spinning (at f380’s) and lets just say i got nice ego boost…haha. seriously though, thanks for the good words cathy, it really means a lot.

we leave the lounge place cuz it was dead and we wanted to dance. get to some other club in the area and have to stand in line for a good 15 min or so. but issallgood cuz we’re all nicely buzzed and nobody’s seen drunken chao in over 2 years. good shit. we get in the club and down another couple rounds of drinks then proceed to tear shit up on the dancefloor. funfun.

so we exit the club (still buzzed) and im hungry as hell. start talkin to jc about gettin food and i glance across the street and it looks like a restaurant. ok, i swear the name of the place was ‘fushi house’ but jc laughs and i feel like an idiot. so i make jc stand under the sign and take a pic so that i can read it later with clearer vision. rush hour, my ass…haha. anyways, we then pile up in jamil’s car and ride uptown to some diner. fries n gravy time~ so good. we eat and talk about random shit then drop everyone off. mad thanks to jamil for drivin me home. a bed beats a floor any day. you the man, jamil.

ok, let me say this now…if it wasnt for these ‘04 guys, life at tufts would not have been the same. these guys basically taught us how to party. our f380’s parties and gatherings last year were a tribute to what they did during their years at tufts. but not only that, living with these guys almost every summer led to some of the most memorable moments ive had at school.

respect to 3rd floor south, respect to 171, respect to a-tower, and respect to the crew that taught me more than any professor at tufts. ill miss you guys. good luck in all your futures and we’ll definitely party hard again. keep it real~

got a dedication? wanna make a shoutout? speak up! leave a comment~

4 comments.

yay, zoo~

Posted on August 26th, 2005 by Al'x.
Categories: AleXanga, Summer '05.

haha, so after a month of seeing strictly new yorkers, i get two visitors from boston on consectutive days this week. akiko and elton. funfun. got to play tour guide two days in a row…hehe. so heres the daily log for tuesday aka akiko-day…

being that she has less than a week left in america, no doubt she had to visit ny one last time. and what is the destination on the top of the list? bronx zoo~ cool by me since i havent been there since like 3rd grade…haha. she gets off the greyhound around noon and we’re both hungry as hell so where to? yoshinoya, mochiron desu ka. japanese beef bowl quick n cheap. cant go wrong…hehe. stupid me ordered a large and couldnt finish it, o well. finish eating and walk down to the japanese dollar store on 30-something. but kinda pointless cuz she was gonna see the real ones in less than a week…haha.

so since i havent been to the zoo since forever, i really had no idea how to get there. according to my sister, taking the metronorth is faster and less shady than fiding the 1 all the way up. sounds simple enough. so we get to grand central and buy metronorth tix. turns out we just missed one and we gotta kill 45 min. finally get on the train and it stops once at 190-something and keeps going…to white plains. turns out that that was an express train and we didnt bother checking. oops.

white plains. haha, waited only about 10 min for the next local train to come by and during that time i showed akiko where i interned last summer. and by intern, i mean going braindead and discovering how much i hate a routine life. anyways, get on the right train and finally arrive in the bronx. now what? we dunno where the zoo is but heard about a free shuttle that runs to it. couldnt find the shuttle so akiko asked a random bus-driver about it. turns out we just missed that and then he randomly asks if we’re tourists. she says yes before i open my mouth and he let us ride a ‘courtesy fare.’ the hell…? haha, if i knew that existed earlier, id have said that to every bus driver in midtown. cant argue with free.

zooooo. animals animals animals. dunno what to say about it. basically walked around the zoo and saw (and smelled) everything. random thought: if i had a choice, i think id rather be a fish than an animal. then again, maybe im just biased cuz of the hawaii trip. itd be cool to be a bird tho…hmm. but yea, zoo was fun. its always fun to hang out with akiko and pick on her~ felt kinda bad for the animals tho…all cooped up in tiny chunks of land and bored to hell. now i can understand what ungar was saying about going on safaris to see them in nature. too bad south africa is a lil outta the way. plus, call me stupid, but i wanted to touch them. being so close to animals and not being able to interact with them is kinda lame. but i guess it would be dumb to ride a tiger. too bad. haha, regardless, good times at the zoo.

we spent a lil less than 2 hours at the zoo and took the metronorth back to grand central and train back to times square. ate dinner at sapporo. the BEST ramen place in ny. i drank like 5 glasses of water. must be from watching animals drink all day. but yea, fun day all around. ill see you in nihon, akiko~

3 comments.

PVD @ SUMMERSTAGE !!!

Posted on August 21st, 2005 by Al'x.
Categories: AleXanga, Events, Summer '05.

man, where to begin…

ok, background info i guess…for those who dunno, paul van dyk aka pvd aka godfather of trance music, plays an annual outdoor concert/rave in central park nyc. being that im back in ny, theres no way in hell id miss this. c’mon pvd, thousands of ppl, outdoors! no doubt im there. so i go with mike, my friend since forever -> new raving buddy, and get to central park at like 2:30ish (doors open at 4:30). as soon as we step foot into central park, a group of ppl stops me and asks where pvd is spinning. i then realize my bright red pvd shirt probly distinguished me from the rest of the crowd…haha. anyways, we actually have no idea either so we wander with these ppl for a bit and find out that some of them dont have tickets. tsk tsk.

we eventually find the line and chill for a couple hours while the others try to find tickets. me n mike get in and secure a nice spot front n center. now we have another hour to kill cuz pvd wasnt supposed to start until 6. so we’re standing around just checking out the architecture (and by architecture, i mean girls) and out of nowhere we see the ppl we walked around with. turns out they never got tickets and actually climbed through the woods and over fences to get in. madd respect. thats dedication no matter how you look at it. one girl had a ridiculous amount of cuts on her legs and said that she tried bribing ppl $100 to let her in and that was the last resort. she knew she was gonna party, it was just a matter of getting in. props all around.

k…pvd hits the stage on time and opens with…hiphop!? but this wasnt any standard crunked out hiphop beat. it was pvd hiphop. haha, whatever that means. either way it was friggin hot. so he obviously increased the pitch until it hit trance levels and fucking tore shit up from there. godly. aiite, so ive been to a countless number of clubs and rave-ish events and this is my first time outdoors. and while having a sunset overhead as you’re dancing is a really unique experience, i felt that it was kinda weird. cuz normally in clubs n such, its dark so you only see ppl when strobes are goin. but when the suns still up, you see everyone. not that im a shy dancer or anything but i dunno, seeing everyone’s faces was just something totally new to me. but i dont think i was the only one feelin that either cuz the first couple hours was kinda chill. probly cuz pvd was playing things a lil too proggy and most ppl were still rollin. but as soon as the sun set… god damn, it was a whole different atmosphere. this is what everyone is used to. lights, lasers, and pvd hittin HARD. shit, when he wants you to dance, you dance.

oh yea, another weird thing i noticed about the darkness is that i notice girls a lot more…haha. i guess when theres light, everyone kinda blends together and the darkness filters out guys…or something like that. but yea, forget anything i ever said about me thinking hawaiian girls were hot. it must’ve been such a long time since ive seen one that i totally forgot they existed: asian raver girls. ohhh so hot. ufo-wearing, stick-wielding, candy-stepping asian girls. damn, there is nothing sexier than a girl who appreciates music, knows how to have a good time, and can BATTLE. shit, if there are any reading this, ill gladly battle for dates…haha.

those who have been raving with me know how mindless i can get at times. when i completely lose myself within the music and essentially become a part of it. when i stop hearing the music and start listening to the music. and when i get ridiculous and start hitting half and quarter beats at 140 bpm…haha. but yea, this was one of those nights. for the last hour n a half or so of the set, pvd started spinning harder trance with a lot more vocals. yum. busted out a tight ass fuckin remix of orgy’s blue monday and spun for an angel and other side while playing the synths LIVE. absolutely amazing.

shoutouts to my raving buddies (past, present, future): peter, nam, andrew, rosabelle, jay, ken, mike, marie

took some (shaky) vids, check em out in the media section of the site.
note: the vids are NOTHING like the real thing. if u get the chance, goto a rave at least once in your life…itll change ur life.

jealous? hungry? make it heard, leave a comment~

3 comments.

000005~

Posted on August 14th, 2005 by Al'x.
Categories: AleXanga, Summer '05.

so i wake up around 530pm on saturday…shower, change, spike the hair and head out to the city to meet TUFTS PPL! met up with dave, li, alicia, yoko, and jane to celebrate yoko’s “birthday”. much fun. gathered at li’s sexy apt in midtown and pre-partied. mmm…alcohol. haha…met two of yoko’s friends from home and basically met yoko and jane for the first time. weird how im still meeting tufts ppl post-graduation. anyways, we then hit up a club named rock candy. apparently, its supposed to be some vip club but looked like a standard place to me. crowd was boring, dj was nothing special (ill write about him later), but we definitely still had a good time. one of li’s co-workers, john, hooked us up. dude was ridiculous, he dropped over $600 on a table and a couple bottles of grey goose for us total strangers. madd thanks and respect to him. but despite all that, the man of the night was: dave fucking laporte. woot. he met up with a friend from school and lets just say that at the end of the night, there was one less person for the cab ride back to li’s. my hero. ask him for the amazing details…hahaha.

so last night made me realize how much i missed dancing and partying. but especially dancing. god, i love to dance. haha. no matter what i end up doing with music, ill always be a dancer first. theres just nothing else more fun than releasing like that…and showing off a lil at the same time…hehe. the music genre of the night was hiphop. well, more like 30 second clips of hiphop songs. the dj was just straight cutting from song to song after 1 verse, 1 chorus, or even less. man, if this is the level of spinning required for a hiphop residency, then i dunno why im practicing. fool had absolutely NO transisitons and the way he was cutting songs so quickly made the crowd feel rushed. didnt give ppl any time to adjust to the beats. but whatever, im a dancing fool so i had my fun. plus all-you-can-drink grey goose! man, i miss partying hard. especially with college friends. unfortunately, nobody from boston was able to make it down, that wouldve been funner.

thanks li for housing us all~

more pics at dave’s pic thing: click here

‘05 forever. no doubt.

oh yea, leave a COMMENT~

3 comments.

San Francisco

Posted on August 10th, 2005 by Al'x.
Categories: AleXanga, Summer '05.

aiite, so for the third and final destination, we spent a few days in san francisco. this entry is gonna be a lot shorter than the rest cuz we really didnt find much to do there…haha. but here goes:

[july 31(?) - august 4] San Franciso, California
k…the first thing that i noticed about SF was the weather. it was COLD. the rest of the country was goin thru a heatwave and the SF temp was in the low-70’s during the day and like low-60’s at night. i was totally unprepared for that. especially coming from hawaii, where i hardly ever wore a shirt, i definitely did not have any long-sleeves or jacket or anything. first purchase: fleece vest. haha…$10 at rite aid, not bad. so, we arrived in SF around 8am-ish, checked into the hotel and the family just passed out. i decided to seize the day and wander around the city. and yea, those famous SF hills are no joke. i was really cold until i hiked up a couple of them. some are damn near vertical, its crazy…haha. the hotel we were staying at was located near union sq ,which is basically the center of it all, but me not knowing anything about the city SOMEHOW wandered myself into Chinatown. must be instinct or something…haha.

SF chinatown is HUGE, it seemed like it was bigger than manhattan’s (but maybe thats just the hills messing with my mind). but oh so clean. and old. some of the restaurants and shops have definitely been around before electricity…haha. still, as clean and nice looking as it was, i found the SF chinatown to be pretty boring. every street looked the same to me; nothing but grocery stores, jewelry stores, and restaurants. call me biased, but i feel like theres more to do in nyc chinatown. o well, funniest thing i found was an actual restaurant named uncle’s! haha, for those that dunno, we referred to the chinese delivery place near tufts (golden light!) as “uncle”. cuz for the past 4 years, that same delivery guy has been takin care of us…haha. anyways, i definitely stepped into there for a bowl of jook~

so the first day or two we really didnt do anything, just wandered around n ate a lot. SF is a great place for food. although i really cant think of any examples right now…hmm…o well, just trust me. hehe. oh, we met up with a cousin of mine and took a trip to UC berkley. that campus is ridiculous. its like the size of the entire city of boston…haha. walked around like 1/4 of it and decided that was enough. damn the UC school systems, i would totally re-do undergrad at any of these mega-universitys. asians everywhere!

we then went into the actual city of berkley and amidst the bums and hippies, i found my theme for the SF trip: VINYLS.

holy shit, ive never seen so many LARGE record stores in such a small area. i broke off from the family n just dug myself happy for a good 4 hours or so. <3 bargain bins. haha…$.50 to $2 per vinyl makes me a very happy person. i ended up walking out of the first place with two big bags and about 30 lbs of vinyls…yummy. then walked a couple feet down the block and found another store. yay~ SF is like heaven for dj’s…haha. by the end of that day i was a couple hundred dollars lighter and curling like 50 lbs down the street. hotness. the next day i made my pilgrimmage to amoeba music. THE place to be. no doubt, the biggest and fucking BEST record store ive ever been to. spent a good 5-6 hours there and stuffed a grocery basket to the max with vinyls. sigh. so good. the only thing i was slightly disappointed about was that it seems like the entire city of SF just doesnt care for trance. what a shame. but regardless, there was still thousands of other records to look through in every other genre…hehe. i even found an m-flo album…sugoiiii.

so after my vinyl extravaganza shoppin spree, i really didnt care to do any other shopping or sight-seeing. i just wanted to go home n play with my new babies. speaking of which, with the retarded number of vinyls i bought, my parents were slightly angry cuz it meant way overweight luggages. solution? we went out n bought three new luggages. haha. oops.

did a bunch of other touristy stuff: fisherman’s wharf, botannical garden, cable cars. fisherman’s wharf was cool cuz they had a IN-n-OUT!! man, nothing is better than an animal style burger, NOTHING. im gonna move to cali just so i can eat them. serious. mmm…so we looked at alcatraz from afar. looks just like the movie. haha. oh, ghiradelli factory was there and being the cool lactose intolerant guy i am, i could handle the free sample they hand out and be good for the day. hehe, yum i suppose.

botannical gardens looked like crap to me. except for the japanese garden section. got to show off my vast knowledge on japanese achitecture. tried to remember what i could about ma and himorogi and stuff. i actually remembered a lot more than i expected, which still didnt amount to much i guess. goin to class once a month would do that…haha. still, the garden was pretty nice. im definitely putting a j-garden in my future home. torii and all…hehe.

mmm…last interesting thing we did was goto sony metreon. that place is cool. its pretty much a gigantic sony store, imax theater, movie theater, restaurants, and ARCADE. arcade was pretty shitty as far as comp goes, tho. o well, spent most of the money on ddr (the FIRST one…wtf). saw charilie n the chocolate factory on imax…not bad. but the food court was the shit. this one chinese place had the most interesting (non-alcoholic) drinks. black lychee ice tea, ginseng ginger ale, and my personal fav: cucumber …something. shit, dunno the name but it was a lightly carbonated cucumber drink. weird, i know. but thats exactly why i had to try it…hehe. it was really refreshing and uhh, cucumbery. yum.

so thats basically SF. cool city, but more of a place id wanna live in as opposed to vacation in.

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