I have to say that I love my program. Lately I've been thinking that I think I would have been a much better guitarist had I come to USC earlier in life, like for undergrad or masters. It's a combination of the amazingly supportive guitar faculty who have the sharpest ears and most intelligent musical insight while being articulate enough to explain kinesthetic concepts and technical ways of playing the guitar easier, more efficiently, and more beautifully. I already feel that in the last 6 months of being here, I have learned more about how to be a better guitarist than I did in the past 6 years of schooling.
Which does not make me regret the decisions I made earlier in life, because I know that without being in those places, I would not be in this place. I also feel that with this degree, many aspects of my education are coming together in a way that weren't ready to be cohesive until now. In some way or another, it's all sort of coming together. A friend once told me that God doesn't waste anything. That is, the reason I majored in history, or played the cello, or ran for student government in high school will all come to fruition even if it doesn't look like it from the outside.
I also know that there is a reason I spend hours investing my time in playing the guitar better. I'm starting to feel immense satisfaction in even the smallest of improvements. There are many more to be made, but at the end of each day I have begun to feel that I am reaping some sort of fruit in a way that I have never felt before. At Juilliard, I mostly practiced out of fear of getting yelled at, or embarrassing myself in front of my peers. I was insecure and treaded carefully, trying to do the right thing, look altogether on the outside, and not rock the boat too much. I think I've needed to get that out of my system and although I still feel insecure at times, I don't work because I'm scared. I work because it is a choice I make every day out of pleasure, calling, and passion.
At the end of it, I don't believe that my destiny is to be a performer primarily. I've always liked to wear many hats. I have been dreaming lately about other things I'd love to do- like teaching guitar to adults in all walks of life, being a music history professor, mentoring students through the relationship between faith and music, organizing festivals, becoming a dean at a music school, working for the NEA. I feel great audacity in being able to even type these words because in the past I never verbalized what I really hoped for from life because of the fear of disappointment. It just occurred to be that I'm not afraid if I fail. I am satisfied even being able to just dream. God doesn't waste anything and I know He'll use me somewhere.
My husband (a hopeless dreamer) must be rubbing off on me.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
21 days of consecutive practice
Today, I had a two-hour lesson at school with my guitar teacher. I wasn't feeling all that prepared going in because we had driven up to the Bay Area this weekend for a wedding, and though I brought the guitar with me, I didn't get nearly as much time with it as I would have if we had been at home for the weekend. But it was the first weekend traveling where I had to be sure to fulfill my New Year's resolution to practice every day this year. So on Friday, I made sure to practice before we left for San Jose- got about 1 1/2 hours in, on Saturday, I practiced about an hour before we got ready to leave for the wedding, and on Sunday, I practiced after the 5 hour drive back to LA when we arrived home at around 11pm. This one was a hard one. I wanted so badly to crawl into bed, but Paul reminded me of my resolution and helped me build the resolve to sit myself down. He also told me that if I practiced, I could have the sour gummy worms that we had bought for the road trip but had forgotten to bring with us. I jumped up- this was just enough motivation for my tired body to get on my red practicing stool. (I love sour candy.)
At the very least, I got some affirmation today at my lesson. Yesterday I barely got an hour in between cooking for our small group dinner, teaching my fifth-grade guitar class in East LA, getting a run in around the lake, finishing some reading, and being glued to the election coverage. But I did get about 1 1/2 hours in at the end of the night, and today after I played my piece, my teacher said these words:
"Wow! You've been working your ass off."
I beamed. He has never said this to me. In fact, I've never had a teacher say this to me in recent memory. It's usually, "Ok, good." Or, on a bad day, "Good piece, huh?" For someone that gets bored pretty easily, I've never been one to practice enough, ever. But I suppose the consistency is a great start. I've been working. And it feels good.
At the very least, I got some affirmation today at my lesson. Yesterday I barely got an hour in between cooking for our small group dinner, teaching my fifth-grade guitar class in East LA, getting a run in around the lake, finishing some reading, and being glued to the election coverage. But I did get about 1 1/2 hours in at the end of the night, and today after I played my piece, my teacher said these words:
"Wow! You've been working your ass off."
I beamed. He has never said this to me. In fact, I've never had a teacher say this to me in recent memory. It's usually, "Ok, good." Or, on a bad day, "Good piece, huh?" For someone that gets bored pretty easily, I've never been one to practice enough, ever. But I suppose the consistency is a great start. I've been working. And it feels good.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
What's in a name?
Lately, I've been contemplating my name.
When I was a kid, I got made fun of. I got lots of Shoe jokes. There was a brand of shoes at the local mall called Connie and it was perfect fodder for a whole onslaught of Shoe jokes. Some kids got creative and thought up variations on that, like Connie Sock or Connie Boot or Connie whatever. After awhile I didn't care. I tried to use it to my advantage. When I ran for Junior Class President in high school, my friend designed a campaign tag that was shaped like a shoe and said "Connie for Prez" on it or something. They were super cute (I think they were designed to look like Converse shoes, which were in at the time and incidentally in right now) and I won that election.
I thought things would only get better when I got married and had the opportunity to change my name to something easier to spell, know how to pronounce, or not make fun of. But the other thing I used to get called when I was a kid was Connie Chung. As in the the first major Asian American news anchor who is married to Maury Povich. Little did I know that I would marry into a name that was so similar to this one. In fact, after two years I'm still not used to it. When I hear people call me Connie Chun I often think they are mocking me. In fact, I gave the guy who changed my oil the other day a dirty look when he said, "Connie Chun? Your car is ready." And when I hear them call me "Mrs. Chun" I often look around for Paul's mom.
Well, when we got our marriage certificate I remember the moment when I fiilled out the form and wrote that I intended to change my surname. Paul looked at me sympathetically and asked, "Are you sure? You don't have to." I responded that I wanted to, and that I wanted our names to symbolically reflect that we were becoming one family and I wanted our kids to have the same last name as both of us. At the time, I worked in a school where there were a lot kids whose moms had decided to keep their maiden names and I guess the traditionalist in me wanted it to be different than the kids whose last names were different from their mom's or who had hyphenated last names. But I also felt bound by a sort of duty or desire to partake in this rite of passage of for a married woman to change her name, though I later discovered what a pain it was (and still is) to fulfill this process. After this process, the feminist in me has often been bitter that this is still an understood social norm in our society for the woman to go through all that trouble and confusion. I mean, why can't we just decide based on which name sounds better for both people? I think Paul Sheu is pretty good.
So our solution was for me to keep my maiden name as my "artist name" as Paul calls it, and to use my legal last name (now Chun) for other circumstances, which was nice when we moved to a new place and people didn't get confused that we were married, and they know us lovingly as "the Chuns." I think that's kind of fun. It means to me that we are our own household and family, a concept that we spent a lot of time contemplating during our engagement. And I also get to write "Paul and Connie Chun" on things like address labels, Christmas cards, bills and such. That's kind of fun too, I suppose.
Well, now that I am in school again and most of my professors know my last name to be Chun, since that's what I put on my application and that's what they have on their roll. But the guitar faculty all know me by my "artist name" and it sort of feels like I have two identities. Part of it makes me feel special, a little bit like having an alter ego or being a superhero. But on the other hand, it is just plain confusing. So sometimes I resort to putting my full legal name down on papers, and in my email too, and for people not familiar with either name sometimes they get the vowels and syllables mixed up so that it becomes "Connie Shun Choo" or something stupid like that. And you would be surprised at the amount of people that pronounce a name like Chun to be "chooon." Because "fun" and "run" aren't good enough examples of a short U sound? Add on the mixed up consonants I become Connie Chu Shooon. I mean, come on people!
I thought seriously about hyphenating recently, and going through all the trouble of changing my name to something that would help people understand that it is a married name and to just simplify things and just use both all the time. This was because I recently got a teaching job in which the administration put "Shu-Chun" down as my last name. They apparently assumed that it was hyphenated (though they didn't spell it all correctly, but I'm used to that), though I never indicated anything of the sort. But then hyphenating wouldn't really help with the pronunciation, though it might aid in the confusion of knowing which name to use. However, one syllable Asian last names don't really sound that good hyphenated. I think that more than one Asian sounding last name for one person may be too much for the American general public at large. Paul told me he was sorry that he's not a Kennedy. Ooh, I thought to myself. Now there's a name I would have been ecstatic about. But alas, I shall remain Connie Chu Shun for the rest of my life.
When I was a kid, I got made fun of. I got lots of Shoe jokes. There was a brand of shoes at the local mall called Connie and it was perfect fodder for a whole onslaught of Shoe jokes. Some kids got creative and thought up variations on that, like Connie Sock or Connie Boot or Connie whatever. After awhile I didn't care. I tried to use it to my advantage. When I ran for Junior Class President in high school, my friend designed a campaign tag that was shaped like a shoe and said "Connie for Prez" on it or something. They were super cute (I think they were designed to look like Converse shoes, which were in at the time and incidentally in right now) and I won that election.
I thought things would only get better when I got married and had the opportunity to change my name to something easier to spell, know how to pronounce, or not make fun of. But the other thing I used to get called when I was a kid was Connie Chung. As in the the first major Asian American news anchor who is married to Maury Povich. Little did I know that I would marry into a name that was so similar to this one. In fact, after two years I'm still not used to it. When I hear people call me Connie Chun I often think they are mocking me. In fact, I gave the guy who changed my oil the other day a dirty look when he said, "Connie Chun? Your car is ready." And when I hear them call me "Mrs. Chun" I often look around for Paul's mom.
Well, when we got our marriage certificate I remember the moment when I fiilled out the form and wrote that I intended to change my surname. Paul looked at me sympathetically and asked, "Are you sure? You don't have to." I responded that I wanted to, and that I wanted our names to symbolically reflect that we were becoming one family and I wanted our kids to have the same last name as both of us. At the time, I worked in a school where there were a lot kids whose moms had decided to keep their maiden names and I guess the traditionalist in me wanted it to be different than the kids whose last names were different from their mom's or who had hyphenated last names. But I also felt bound by a sort of duty or desire to partake in this rite of passage of for a married woman to change her name, though I later discovered what a pain it was (and still is) to fulfill this process. After this process, the feminist in me has often been bitter that this is still an understood social norm in our society for the woman to go through all that trouble and confusion. I mean, why can't we just decide based on which name sounds better for both people? I think Paul Sheu is pretty good.
So our solution was for me to keep my maiden name as my "artist name" as Paul calls it, and to use my legal last name (now Chun) for other circumstances, which was nice when we moved to a new place and people didn't get confused that we were married, and they know us lovingly as "the Chuns." I think that's kind of fun. It means to me that we are our own household and family, a concept that we spent a lot of time contemplating during our engagement. And I also get to write "Paul and Connie Chun" on things like address labels, Christmas cards, bills and such. That's kind of fun too, I suppose.
Well, now that I am in school again and most of my professors know my last name to be Chun, since that's what I put on my application and that's what they have on their roll. But the guitar faculty all know me by my "artist name" and it sort of feels like I have two identities. Part of it makes me feel special, a little bit like having an alter ego or being a superhero. But on the other hand, it is just plain confusing. So sometimes I resort to putting my full legal name down on papers, and in my email too, and for people not familiar with either name sometimes they get the vowels and syllables mixed up so that it becomes "Connie Shun Choo" or something stupid like that. And you would be surprised at the amount of people that pronounce a name like Chun to be "chooon." Because "fun" and "run" aren't good enough examples of a short U sound? Add on the mixed up consonants I become Connie Chu Shooon. I mean, come on people!
I thought seriously about hyphenating recently, and going through all the trouble of changing my name to something that would help people understand that it is a married name and to just simplify things and just use both all the time. This was because I recently got a teaching job in which the administration put "Shu-Chun" down as my last name. They apparently assumed that it was hyphenated (though they didn't spell it all correctly, but I'm used to that), though I never indicated anything of the sort. But then hyphenating wouldn't really help with the pronunciation, though it might aid in the confusion of knowing which name to use. However, one syllable Asian last names don't really sound that good hyphenated. I think that more than one Asian sounding last name for one person may be too much for the American general public at large. Paul told me he was sorry that he's not a Kennedy. Ooh, I thought to myself. Now there's a name I would have been ecstatic about. But alas, I shall remain Connie Chu Shun for the rest of my life.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Enter 2009
Every New Year's, Paul and I take a little day retreat to recount everything that happened in the closing year and set a list of prayer requests/resolutions for the coming year. This year we decided to check out the Griffith Observatory and take a little hike in the surrounding hills in the balmy and perfect 70 degree weather.
Aiko dreams of being a movie star as she overlooks the smoggy view of the Hollywood sign.
We found a bench and sat down to have some water and apples after our not-very-strenuous hike. Here we took out my journal and jotted down all the things that happened this year. Some highlights:
Looking forward, I have a few hopes for 2009.
Practicing every day this year. Yep, that's right. 365 days of guitar. No two week breaks after a concert. No taking holidays off. Making it a part of the rhythm of my lifestyle. Seeing if it can become as second nature as eating or brushing my teeth and discovering what comes out of that. Which makes me think that I need one of these babies:
It's a travel guitar that my former teacher endorses called the SoloEtte. The wire edges come apart and they zip up into a portable bag. It has the feel of a normal guitar so you can keep your hand muscles in shape even while you're on vacation. It even has a headphone jack so you can hear yourself practice on the thing while you're traveling. I have never cared enough about playing that I thought I would need one of these. But I think its time to up the anti. Alas, this baby retails for a whopping $850 and I don't have any vacations planned right now. Oh well.
Taking better care of my body. I don't know why I've been feeling the signs of aging lately (being tired without fail at 11pm, seeing a few wrinkles around the eyes, feeling like its harder than ever to get back into shape), but I've been reminded of how much I should cherish my health and take care of my body- not only because these are the last few years of my 20's, but also because if we have kids in a few years, I know that my body will never be the same again. So I'm going to try to do more jogging, yoga at home, and get back into lap swimming, something I did briefly in college and learned to love at one point. USC has a gorgeous heated pool and a jacuzzi that I should take advantage of while I can. This also includes taking better care of my skin and cutting back on things like beer and fried food for sure. (Not so easy considering who I'm married to.)
Learning to live with little and seeing how God multiplies it. Right now we are doing our best to live more frugally. We've thought about some ways to save money during this season of unemployment, and have wondered why we can't make that a normal part of our lifestyle even after a job comes a long. God is really showing us that He can make so much out of so little. And life is all the richer for it.
Case in point: Korean BBQ at home! When you have all-you-can-eat BBQ in K-town here, it's about $17 per person, which is pretty cheap for the amount of food you get, but still runs a little over $40 after tax and tip. So instead, for our first dinner of the year we grabbed some thinly sliced sirloin from the Korean market (disturbingly cheap at about $2.50 a package) and all the coordinating veggies (green leaf lettuce, sesame leaves, thinly sliced scallions with red pepper flakes, and a Korean herb called ssuk) and whipped out the tabletop grill we got as a wedding present. So instead of $40, we managed to spent less than $10 with the stellar prices at the Korean market. Add an $11 bottle of champagne from Costco, and we were pretty happy.
The new year brings many unresolved challenges, but much excitement for what God has in store. As I've learned to say in Korean, seh-heh bock man-ee bahd-euh-seh-yo! Happy New Year!
Aiko dreams of being a movie star as she overlooks the smoggy view of the Hollywood sign.
We found a bench and sat down to have some water and apples after our not-very-strenuous hike. Here we took out my journal and jotted down all the things that happened this year. Some highlights:
- Fasting meat for 40 days and subsequently having to go on a diet
- Gaining a job extension, losing a job
- Saying our goodbyes to San Diego after a short year in paradise
- Starting my DMA
- Settling into a new church
- Seeing Paul's dad again after two years
- Releasing my first CD
- Paul joining/managing an adult baseball league
- Moving two times in one year
- Going to France at the last minute with my sister
- Waiting and waiting and waiting on God
- Enjoying whirlwind trips to New York
- Discovering that we like LA- who would have thought?
Looking forward, I have a few hopes for 2009.
Practicing every day this year. Yep, that's right. 365 days of guitar. No two week breaks after a concert. No taking holidays off. Making it a part of the rhythm of my lifestyle. Seeing if it can become as second nature as eating or brushing my teeth and discovering what comes out of that. Which makes me think that I need one of these babies:
It's a travel guitar that my former teacher endorses called the SoloEtte. The wire edges come apart and they zip up into a portable bag. It has the feel of a normal guitar so you can keep your hand muscles in shape even while you're on vacation. It even has a headphone jack so you can hear yourself practice on the thing while you're traveling. I have never cared enough about playing that I thought I would need one of these. But I think its time to up the anti. Alas, this baby retails for a whopping $850 and I don't have any vacations planned right now. Oh well.
Taking better care of my body. I don't know why I've been feeling the signs of aging lately (being tired without fail at 11pm, seeing a few wrinkles around the eyes, feeling like its harder than ever to get back into shape), but I've been reminded of how much I should cherish my health and take care of my body- not only because these are the last few years of my 20's, but also because if we have kids in a few years, I know that my body will never be the same again. So I'm going to try to do more jogging, yoga at home, and get back into lap swimming, something I did briefly in college and learned to love at one point. USC has a gorgeous heated pool and a jacuzzi that I should take advantage of while I can. This also includes taking better care of my skin and cutting back on things like beer and fried food for sure. (Not so easy considering who I'm married to.)
Learning to live with little and seeing how God multiplies it. Right now we are doing our best to live more frugally. We've thought about some ways to save money during this season of unemployment, and have wondered why we can't make that a normal part of our lifestyle even after a job comes a long. God is really showing us that He can make so much out of so little. And life is all the richer for it.
Case in point: Korean BBQ at home! When you have all-you-can-eat BBQ in K-town here, it's about $17 per person, which is pretty cheap for the amount of food you get, but still runs a little over $40 after tax and tip. So instead, for our first dinner of the year we grabbed some thinly sliced sirloin from the Korean market (disturbingly cheap at about $2.50 a package) and all the coordinating veggies (green leaf lettuce, sesame leaves, thinly sliced scallions with red pepper flakes, and a Korean herb called ssuk) and whipped out the tabletop grill we got as a wedding present. So instead of $40, we managed to spent less than $10 with the stellar prices at the Korean market. Add an $11 bottle of champagne from Costco, and we were pretty happy.
The new year brings many unresolved challenges, but much excitement for what God has in store. As I've learned to say in Korean, seh-heh bock man-ee bahd-euh-seh-yo! Happy New Year!
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