Halloweening

Some of my friends are apparently getting too old for Halloween. Which is really sad to me. It's the only night you'd get free candy from strangers and get to dress up as the weirdest thing ever.

Ugly Doll or Gumby?

The people who aren't getting too old for Halloween don't dress up in very good costumes... I was talking to my friend about a quote from the movie "Mean Girls" where the main character says "Halloween is the only holiday where girls can dress as badly as they wanted to and not be called *****." Haha but the sad part is that...this is partially true. Girls in my school literally think it's okay to wear underwear-like clothes to school for Halloween. I would feel self conscious showing my butt like that.

But nonetheless, Halloween's pretty fun. I don't really eat candy that much, but it's a really fun holiday. I was watching one of my favorite shows "Gravity Falls" (My friends don't watch cartoons either......so maybe I'm just lame.) and one episode was called Summerween. It was really good because Dipper (the main character) thinks that since he's older he should no longer Trick or Treat even though he and his twin sister Mabel always go together. Then the Summerween trickster comes along and Dipper has to go trick or treating in order to get 500 candies along with Mabel and some friends so they won't get killed.

Summerween episode of Gravity Falls

Anyways. I'm sort of digressing. Okay.  I have this sort of tradition where I make my own costumes. One year, I was a robot made out of cardboard boxes and chopsticks for antenna. Another year, I was a blue recycling bin (I wore 'Heelies' too so I can be wheeled around like a recycling bin). Last year I dressed up as a giant Ugly Doll (but people thought I was Gumby). I also have a tradition of always going with my friend to trick or treat in a neighborhood called Cheviot Hills, which (sadly has a lot of stairs) and even sadder, I have a tradition of tripping over those stairs and not being able to walk very well in my costumes.

This year, I made a Finn hat, and I'm going to be Finn from Adventure Time.

 Hope you all have a great Halloween tonight!

Oh, and I designed some Halloween buttons for our school library. They will be given out to kids who comes to the library in a costume. We only had time to make 200 buttons, so they will be given out on a first come first serve. Our library mascot is a narwhal, so I designed the narwhal in Halloween costumes. I on the library promotion club and of all nerdy names, we're called the "ACRONYMS". Ouch.

Okay now, everyone, go read a good spooky book or watch a spooky show tonight after trick or treating. (Sadly, I have to study for my test tomorrow).

New Shop at Mitsuwa Marketplace

We love going to Mitsuwa Marketplace at 3760 S Centinela Ave, Los Angeles, for a quick bite at the food court there. We can get a bowl of noodles, or curry rice from one of the food stands. While we wait for our food to be cooked, we like to roam around and visit the book store/cafe, or check out this really cute store called Trendy.  It's fun to browse through some manga or Japanese fashion magazines at the book store, or check out or buy some cute gifts from Trendy.

Sadly, Trendy close down lately. There's been an empty space at that store front for a few months. However, today we discovered that a new store opened up in its place a few weeks ago.  It's called Power Anime. In the display case facing customers, there is an awesome giant Mazinkaiser robot (we could be wrong).  Inside, there are all kinds of smaller but cool anime action figures. Apparently Power Anime used to be in the Westside Pavilion, but moved to the Mitsuwa marketplace. It's probably a good move too because we never noticed it at the Westside Pavilion, but here, it's immediately noticeable.

A temporary Marion Crepes place is also open at the Mitsuwa Marketplace, but for only a month, until November 4. So it's only around for another week. Don't miss it.

Neat Freak or Slob?

When I was younger I think I had a slight obsessive compulsive issue. It wasn't very severe, but I just was kind of a neat freak. I was the weird kind of kid who liked to clean when I was little. And I must have been pretty annoying too because I would always sing the "Clean Up Song" whenever I cleaned.

My stuffed animals had to be in an exact order every single time I set them up on my bed. My "OCD" got to the point where when my friends came over and they picked up one of my stuffed animals I'd have to try my hardest to restrain myself from putting it back in the right place. Eventually I would give in and put them back in the exact order, otherwise I would be bothered throughout my play date. My best friend thought I was kind of weird. I needed to sleep with my blankets folded a certain way and my stuffed animals in their exact places. The result is that I have less space to sleep than my stuffed animals.

It's not as bad now. Sometimes after my mom changes the sheets on my bed and the animals order is messed up, I don't freak out anymore.  Seriously though, I know that I will never be able to forget how my stuffed animals and toys are supposed to be set up on my bed, and I'll always know if one of my buddies is missing.


I used to be crazy neat too: I had all of my clothes folded into neat little piles in my drawer organized by long sleeve, short sleeve, tank top, and whatever else. Every time my mom wanted to go through my drawers to donate things that don't fit me anymore to Goodwill, I would get really upset because she would mess up all my neatly folded piles. When she gave up and asked me to pick things out to donate, I couldn't bear the thought of giving up anything. In fact, I would go though what she had sorted out to donate and secretly retrieve my things without her knowledge. The result is, I still have shoes and clothes that date back to second grade which I can't wear anymore.

In middle school, my OCD sort of stopped. I had too much homework to deal with so eventually I sort of just got messier and messier. Every now and then though, I'll get some weird tingly feeling and just think I'm living in this dump of a place and I'll go all out and clean and mop the floor and everything. The problem with that is, I then forget where I put things and get frustrated trying to find the things I squirreled away. These days, I'm more relaxed. My room sometimes ends up a complete mess and I'm not bothered by it.

By contrast, my sister has never been neat, and is in fact, a complete mess. Go figure how we are so different.

My sister's room on a neat day.

Let us know what kind of a kid you are (were): Neat freak, or slob?

Guest Blogging about Kids' Books, and a Few Others Not Just For Kids.

This past summer, we were honored that Pragmaticmom.com asked us to guest blog for the site about the Top 10 best Asian-American books for kids.  You would think this was an easy task, but it wasn't. First, sis and I couldn't agree on the list. Then we got side tracked into wanting to read those favorite books again.  So it took a while, but we think it is a good blog.

We wrote about some of our favorites: Dance, Dance, Amy Chan, by Lucy Ozone Hawkinson, Lon Po Po, by Ed Young Crow Boy, by TaroYashima, Yang the Youngest and His Terrible Ear, by Lensey Namioka, Millicent Min, Girl Genius, by Lisa Yee, American Born Chinese, by Gene Yang, and a few others. A couple of them were featured in our other blogs. For example, Dance, Dance, Amy Chan was mentioned in a blog we wrote about the Obon Festival, and American Born Chinese was featured in a blog we wrote about Legend of Korra and Comic Books by Gene Yang.


Finally, since I'm in high school, there are a few other books by Asian writers that I enjoyed, but they probably don't belong on a list of books for kids and were eliminated from the final list for Pragmaticmom.com. Here they are:

 


1. Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro, the Japanese/British Man Book Prize award winner of 1988 for his other book, The Remains of the Day. This is a haunting book about a society where human clones are raised and bred for their body parts and trained to accept their fate. Told from the quiet point of view of a clone, at first we think of her as a normal young woman, until the novel slowly reveals the devastating world that is her reality, an the truth that is her destiny. The book's scenario is science fiction, yet one can imagine that with all our modern day scientific advancements, it could become real. The book was made into a movie this year starring Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightly, and Andrew Garfield.

2. The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan. This book is about four Chinese immigrant women who play mah jong together regularly, and about their now grown up daughters. The daughters narrate portions of the book about their upbringing as Asian Americans, conflicts about their self identities, feelings of inferiority, and heritage. The mothers narrate portions of the book about their lives in China, political turmoil, and what they lost and gained in leaving China and coming to America. Ultimately, the rich portrayal of these women's past and present, and their embracing of their lives and heritage is quite satisfying. This book was also made into a move directed by Wayne Wang, who also directed the movie of another one of our favorite books Because of Winn Dixie by Kate DiCamillo.

3. The Choke Artist: Confessions of a Chronic Underachiever, by Dave Yoo. This autobiographical novel about a Korean American guy growing up in a white neighborhood and trying hard to hide his Asian-ness is sometimes laugh-out-loud funny. The main character's pathological tendency to lie about himself is painfully and cringe-inducingly familiar to me.  His decision to finally be truthful about who and what he is comes as a relief and revelation. For an Asian American teen, who is constantly struggling with the model minority standard, (check out my blog www.belowtheasianstandards.xanga.com) this book is very insightful.

Also, check out Asian/Australian Shaun Tan's Tales From Outer Suburbia, a collection of short stories are are incredibly and beautifully illustrated by himself. We especially like the illustrated stamps of imaginary places in the Chapter Contents page. Reminds us of an incredible artist, Donald Evans. Donald Evan's World of Stamps.


There are plenty of other cool posts and information about books on the pragmaticmom site too. Check it out. We got good ideas from the site about what books we'd like to read in the future.

Supporting a Good Cause and Fan-girling Do Mix!

Sis and I got super lucky.  If you haven't already heard, KevJumba is hosting The Supply Cup tomorrow night, a charity soccer event organized by The Supply Education Group.  Before I gush about getting to meet our favorite Asian American stars, it is worth noting that The Supply Education Group is a non-profit organization that seeks to raise money to build schools in slums around the world and to empower children who live in slums to change their environments. We think this is a really good idea and a good cause.

Another non-profit we have donated to in the past is Heifer International. This is a non-profit that donates livestock to aid poor communities in poor countries. The animals produce milk, eggs, labor, and food to help communities end poverty and become self sufficient. We've solicited money to buy chickens, goats and llamas for poor communities as a service project since our elementary school days. It's fun to know that we are donating actual animals to communities that need them.

Now, the gushing.

The Supply Cup soccer match is a 4-team soccer game that features KevJumba, WongFu Productions, (Home is Where the Han's Are) and Dante Basco (the voice of Prince Zuko from Avatar, The Last Air Bender! Whaaat?! Chloe is thinking of wearing a shirt with Prince Zuko's face on it to the event) as captains, plus a bunch of other awesome awesome players like the Fung Brothers of (626) music video fame, Arden Cho, AJ Rafael and Just Kidding Films. It's understandable that we gush about these people because they are Asian Americans who just happen to be in our favorite shows, whether on TV, or on Youtube.  Their humor, antics and talents are so Asian American that we as Cool Asian Kids, can really identify with their work.

KevJumba

Prince Zuko

We were lucky enough to score two VIP tickets to the event through Drama Fever's ticket giveaway! How? It's because we watch Korean dramas on TV (we blogged about our favorite K-dramas previously) and followed Drama Fever. When they announced the ticket giveaway, we immediately entered the drawing. (Oh the joy of social media!)  That means we'll have the chance to meet all our favorite Asian American stars.  How cool is that? We're super excited and we'll definitely be sure to update you all about it afterwards!