Most days, my classes end as night begins. I walk out to softly, glowing oranges and dusky blues. The dimming environment becomes a comforting blanket after the stresses of the day. It is usually a brief respite though. There are club meetings and the omnipresent threat of work still to be done. But as night advances, your sense of time elongates. I am usually absorbed by the computer screen, its glow lighting up the darkness. It is so easy to lose hours as there is no deadline for a long time yet. The consequences of staying up are also quite far away. By 2:00 in the morning, everything falls silent and still and its only me left typing at my laptop.

The night is intoxicating to me. I drink it in because it is my time. During the day, I am forever a slave to my schedule, shivering from one classroom to the next. Reflection in between is rare. There is always something to be done. So even as my head begins ache dully, I realize that I achieve greater clarity in the silent hours of the night. I can slow down and give voice to my thoughts. I perch on the edge of my seat, floating in a bubble of light. It is loneliness, but not an uncomfortable one. There is no longer any pressure to do anything other than sit and work. But it’s also a false hope. As the hours pass, the urgency of day begins again clashing with my idling brain. I am practically asleep, but I want to cling on to consciousness. Occasionally, my eyes drift toward the darkened window and wonder about the parties, the drinkers, the vivid adventures lived out only when the sun has gone. But I can’t worry about that too much. There is statistics homework to do.

Two hours pass and I’m already imagining the next day. It will drift, my mind obscured by the fog of the night’s non-excursions. I can see it, hear it too loudly. And suddenly, I am. I’m not in my bedroom, I’m sitting in a crowded lecture hall. My bleary eyes search out the rest of the students sitting around me. How many of them are fighting through confusing weariness? Frankly, I’m too tired to care.

The college experience is as much about what happens at night as what occurs during the day, although they are never represented equally. The bright and glossy brochures arrive in the mail, hinting at nothing. There are classes to go to, but the real work happens afterwards. Even clubs usually meet under the cover of darkness. It is what truly differentiates life at the University of Michigan and all the years before. There are no more parents sleeping upstairs or younger siblings in their prying eyes. The only curfew is the sunrise creeping closer as the hours pass. Only fear prevents you from wandering through the quiet streets. The liberty of becoming an adult, coming to college, is only truly realized at night. Sleepless nights. Peaceful nights. Nights lit with the neon glow of a club’s sign. Nights are without boundaries and without routine, without even the obstruction of time. Outside, the glint of the rounded street lamps is omnipresent. Here and there are sparks of blue. Up above, the stars.

When you think about something deemed “original,” what do you think about? Perhaps you speculated something along the lines of “something unprecedented?” In all, it is simply a question I ask out of curiosity. Across several disciplines, the question of originality is a widely debated topic, and each of these disciplines defines originality differently. In the sciences, originality typically refers to substances pure of any hybridity or human influence, or the first generation. But what about the arts? Some artists define originality as a product being “one-of-a-kind.” Others say originality is the uniqueness of each person’s interpretations and conclusions drawn from a precedent. Perhaps there has not been a concrete definition of originality in the arts because the objects of judgement are so personal- “personal” in the sense that it is a natural tendency for artists to be emotionally attached to their creations. To students of other disciplines, that statement sounds like a sort of joke. However, as an architecture student, it is reality. We spend hours toiling on our creation assignments, so it is natural for us to be inspired by our personal experiences and incorporate those feelings into our studio work. Then, when a classmate tweaks our idea to make it their own, we feel cheated. This is a common nightmare of any arts student. However, if you never take any risks in sharing your work, you have less exposure to feedback, which means less personal growth. After all, what is the point of bringing something into this world, if you are not willing to share it, or have it built upon?

Anyhow, I agree with both definitions of originality provided by artists. I agree that something can be called “original” if there is something unlike it. I also agree that something can be still be called “original” if a new idea or purpose is applied to what that thing first was. An example of this is a hallway. Despite how ridiculous it sounds, a hallway was actually an innovation from the past, since it was a major step-up from caveman days and the one-room buildings. When the concept of a typical hallway was first introduced, a hallway was considered an original creation. However, as time passed, hallways have come to be incorporated in people’s basic idea of a building, and the originality of the hallway itself has long been forgotten or overlooked. But does this mean that the idea of the hallway no longer deserves to be called original? Or is its originality considered part of the originality of the building itself? Or does originality related to time? Or is this a question that cannot be resolved? I think that the hallway was original when it first became a thing. But I also think that the hallway can still be deemed “original” even when it became a part of newer buildings because there were original ideas behind the logic of its shape, design, and location within that building. In addition to that, another building with a similar hallway can still be considered original if they took the bits they liked about that hallway and incorporated it with other ideas that they liked. This process goes on forever in the arts discipline, and originality is infinitely discussed. In the end, I would say the overarching truth about originality is that it is the product from making something our own, whether it is a precedent for innovations to come, or if it followed a precedent. What would you say originality is? And do you think it is ethically acceptable to only call precedents “original?”

Along the polyurethane track encircling the park, I saw a rat slightly bigger than my hand running in the shadow of the curb holding back the dirt. It was running alongside a young woman who was exercising in the middle of the night. In the heat of a South Korean summer, it was fairly customary that the busy professionals of the urban hub of Seoul would exercise once the day cooled off. I could not take my eyes off of that grey rodent nor could I tell the runner in front of me of her uninvited workout partner. It was one of those moments, that was not particularly astonishing, exciting, or at all warranting of a blog post, but it was certainly memorable, sitting right on the edge of banality and extraordinary.

I cannot even describe the rat to you in full detail. In fact, it may have been a mouse for all I know. However this mysterious rodent was special to me in that it validated the existence of a critter my mother abhors (not suggesting that I felt like rats were a fairytale before). There is this dated fear my mother has: you cannot, or you must not, sit on the grass in any old park in Seoul, for the diseased rats could have, or most likely did, scurried over every inch of the sea of green blades. Silly. And a part of me could not accept that my free will, to step on, sit on, or I don’t know, chew on grass, was somehow halted by a rodent that I had never seen before in the wild urban landscape of the far east. Fuck the rat that tells me what to do.

But seeing the rat run alongside that woman, made me consider Veronica the name of an all too important rat in the sewers of Manhattan (ironically my mother’s baptismal name). Father Linus Fairing, the mad priest who preached to rats, had one special one that just kept on returning for that good old sermon. I never much cared for religion either. Feasibly, what keeps the rat running at night is not so different from the runner in the night – a sense of security beneath the moon and the dim street lamps; a feeling that the great heat of the day has sailed on by, leaving the grassy realm free for their tiny palms, dirtied by the dirt treaded on by countless others. It is but a part of a fiction we are all a part of.

Of course I see reason to hate the rat. I see reason to love the rat as well. It never told me what to do of course. That was simply my mother (who had every reason to be suspicious of grass). But the rat is running not because it needs to lose weight, but because it has things to do, rats to see, food to eat, and places to be, just like the runner in the night. When the unseen becomes seen, it is quite dazzling. It is amazing how a little critter just minding its business, can be the producer of so much abhorrence.

Before I get carried away with by my train of thought, I must first say that Manchester by the Sea was brilliant, and Casey Affleck does a phenomenal job as Lee. I saw this movie knowing nothing about it other than its title, so I will leave the same opportunity to my readers who have not seen it yet by keeping details out.

When the credits began to roll, the audience remained still as if they had been petrified to stone and the theater filled with silence. Moments later, the stillness was finally interrupted with the onset of surrounding lights and soft footsteps that signaled it was time to go.  Throughout the movie, director Kenneth Lonergan blankets each scene with the perfect sound, whether it was a classical number by Handel, Poulenc, Albinoni, or Massenet, elements of an original score by Lesley Barber, or a piercing silence. Sometimes the music would overpower a conversation in the film because the conversation itself didn’t matter; the feeling associated was far more powerful than the words.

Words are limiting because they form a framework for thoughts whereas silence does not give any direction. We can use words and sounds to communicate with each other so we can follow and understand each other’s direction. Without these, we are left stranded. Perhaps this is why Lee is surrounded by silence during his story. When he feels the most pain, it becomes so overpowering to the point of numbness. The silence embodies the numbness. However, the absence of noise does not have to be a bad thing. It can be almost…liberating. Like a fresh start.

So I refrained from spilling details about Manchester by the Sea because my words might have influence your own perception of what you would expect to see going into the movie. They might steer you in a direction that you would not want to follow. For some movies, I think it’s important to have a sense of background and public opinion, but for this one, I highly recommend viewing without any expectations.  Instead, watch it for what it is in each moment.

My earliest memories are of a brightly lit restaurant wall. It is an unnatural red that catches the eye. But what holds my gaze is the golden dragon. For a mythical beast, it is strangely friendly looking with its bushy, comical eyebrows. It swirls to meet up with yet another creature, a phoenix with a feathery tail. Both figures are clearly formed from a plastic mold that has produced thousands like it to be placed in thousands of other Chinese restaurants. These places are so common in the United States. They hide in plain sight, small and insignificant on the street corner or in the middle of a strip mall. They use small, dirty signs as their disguises. So perhaps this restaurant, that still holds a place in my heart, is not that special. But I don’t care. There is something extraordinary in those little spaces.

I grew up sitting at the dim sum table, even before I can recall. Dim sum is a tradition from Hong Kong, traditionally composed of many small appetizer dishes, shared among just as many. It is not the “Chinese” food like Americans would typically experience it. Its bean curd and intestine and strange textures. There is rarely cheese and always rice. Its served in bamboo steamers, wrapped in banana leaves, and even in clay pots. Served with it all, is hot Oolong tea. But is not even the strange products that differentiates Chinese food to me. Unlike the typical conception of what Chinese food is, it is slow. It is not take-out in little white boxes. Rather I remember taking home containers of leftovers, excess from a long meal with my family, a reminder of good times.

The funny thing is that even that doesn’t even begin to summarize what Chinese food has become as it has been translated and moved to a new continent. China is a vast country with the world’s largest population and it has resulted in a variety of food culture. This has only grown as it has traveled to a new locale. Mostly, it has been food that has originated from southern China that has been introduced to Americans. Pan fried noodles and potstickers are both southern products. But the transfer goes both ways. During the British occupation of Hong Kong, many European traditions were translated too. The breakfast café rivals dim sum in popularity, serving baked spaghetti and pounded, pan fried steaks. It doesn’t matter, in the end, it doesn’t matter if I’m eating at a café or at a dim sum restaurant, I end up content and not the tiniest bit hungry.

My favorite part of the meal is the beginning. It is the special type of anticipation waiting for a meal that ends. One that forces you to talk just to stop your imagination from yearning too much for the awaited food. It is a rhythm, talk interspersed here and there with sips of tea. Moments linger longer than they should. My mom smiles from the other side of the table. My sister and dad are talking about the Chinese variety show playing on the TV. The dragon looms over my shoulder as I raise my porcelain cup and drink.

When I found out I was going to be shooting the Lumineers concert I started preparing immediately. I read articles online and watched videos that gave advice on camera settings and how the whole “concert photography” thing works, but nothing could have really prepared me for the actual experience.

When I pulled into the parking lot of the Palace I was 10 minutes late for my arrival time and slightly freaked out. I managed to avoid paying for parking- after holding up the line for five minutes frantically trying to explain that I was late and had no cash- and got a spot in the VIP section right in front of the main office.

I hauled my equipment inside the office, which was a separate entrance than the main concert doors that were crowded with people, and realized that I had just missed the communications director. The receptionist said I had missed him by about two minutes, so I searched my email for his contact information and called him from the lobby. I could barely hear him over the noise of the stadium and the failing reception, but after apologizing profusely he grudgingly agreed to come back up and get me to take me down to the general admission pit.

The guy was probably the least friendly person I’ve met in a long time, and that really didn’t help with my nerves. But I just followed him as he led me through the concessions area and down the steps into the arena, putting my personalized photo pass around my neck.

The first opening act took the stage shortly after i had assembled my camera and taken a few test shots. I was inside the pit with the other concert goers, but there was barely any crowd this early in the night. I walked back and forth from stage left to stage right taking pictures constantly just trying to adjust to the constant motion and dramatic lighting. After three songs I met the communications director and the two other photographers who had been on the other side of the barricade, near the entrance to the pit. The four of us left together, following the director out of the arena and back to the main office lobby.

We sat down and I began to look through my photos, deleting almost all of them, while listening to the photographers talk to each other. These guys were definitely professionals. Their equipment made mine look like dollar store purchases.

While we were waiting for the next opening act to start two more photographers arrived. They greeted each other with familiarity, talking about recent shows and asking about each others holidays. It was almost funny how out of place I felt in that room, and I really couldn’t help but laugh at my situation. There I was, a 19 year old college student with her school issued camera that rented a zip car to come to the Palace to cover her first concert on behalf of a college newspaper, surrounded by these middle aged men who had camera lenses strapped to their bodies like tools in a tool belt who were professional concert photographers working with local popular Detroit radio stations and magazines.

When it was time to head down for the next opener, the five of us followed the director and this time i went with them to the other side of the barricade. I was as close to the stage as i could possibly get and I was savoring the moment, knowing how enviable my location was to the concert goers. We photographed the first three songs, moving around in front of the stage getting different angles and perspectives. Right as I was starting to feel like I was getting the hang of it, it was time to go. We crawled underneath the stage and followed the director back up to the lobby. I was much happier with this round of photos than the last, and I was feeling excited and prepared for the Lumineers.

When we finally made it down for the Lumineers the general admission pit, which had been almost empty an hour before, was packed tightly. We could barely get to the barricade through the mass of people, but i reveled in the space once we made it to the other side. When the band came out I was almost shocked by how close they were. With my telephoto lens, close proximity, and experience gained from the last two performers, I was getting awesome pictures. But the time went by super fast, and suddenly it was time to make my way through the mass once more and meet the director by the entrance.

Shooting the concert was one of the most stressful experiences I’ve ever had, but also one of the most fun, interesting, and unique experiences too. It challenged me artistically and demanded things of myself socially and professionally that I didn’t know I was capable of.