Nerd Girl Inc: My Favorite Sport

Roller derby is my football.
I attended my first bout last weekend on Saturday - two NYC teams (Manhattan Mayhem and Brooklyn Bombers) against two outsiders (Suburbia and Providence Pigeons). New York cleaned it up with some amazing wins - Brooklyn creamed the Pigeons and Manhattan pulled a close win in the second period against Suburbia.
But, other than the winning and the NY pride, I just felt giddy and pumped up to be there. Strong women on skates knocking each other over and scoringh points? Male cheerleaders in boat costumes? "Bout-fits?" Sign me up!
Although the sport I played in high school was tennis, I neer really watched many matches on TV or outside of the team. It was inaccessible to me - high prices, no talking or cheering during points, and tiny white skirts were all I saw in televised tennis (until, of course, the Williams sisters walked out). My only involvement in that game was actually playing it.
But derby invokes some hidden sports fan in me. I cheer loudly and watch intently. I buy the team drink cozy (pictured above) and develop girl crushes on players like Raggedy Animal. It excites me a different way than any other sport.
My intimacy with derby started - funnily enough - after listening to a Stuff Mom Never Told You podcast and ballooned into a full-blown lust. I bought some expensive skates during the summer and... immediately got frustrated with how hard it was to relearn those skills from childhood. But going to that bout cemented my desire to play. Maybe not now, maybe in a few years time, but eventually I'll be out on the track with those ladies I admire, ready to beat up some other team.

Want to learn about roller derby beyond my furious love for it? Here is a site that explains the rules and the history of the game: How Roller Derby Works. If you’re interested in watching a match – which are called “bouts” in derby lingo – you can head over to Derby News Network. And, if you’re interested in getting involved with an NYC team, Gotham Girls is the collection of NYC teams that have positions available for trying out, training, volunteering or refereeing. Check them out at the Gotham Girls website.

P.S. I'm trying out subject sections for this blog so I can keep track of what I'm posting/have interesting things to say. Hope it's not too awkward...

Read more Nerd Girl Inc. posts and check out the related series, Caught My Eye.

Another Month, Another List

I have a love/hate relationship with lists.

At the beginning of every month, I get out my well-worn planner and write two lists down in red pen: Accomplishments and Goals. The notes can range from personal things (like, see more of the city) to academic things (make sure to get homework done in advance) to just practical things (make sure to buy groceries every week). I have completed this "tradition" since the end of last school year - and, so far, it has been pretty profitable.
It seems like just another to-do list, of which I make many over the course of just one day, but this one is slightly different. I rarely look back at these goals over the course of the month. I forget most of them in a few days. But, for some reason, I find myself at the end of the month having completed most - if not all - of the goals and then some. Somewhere in my subconscious, those goals are lurking around, predicating what I do with my time.

So, that's the good part about making lists. They can really program your brain to think linearly, to make things happen, to finish things off. But there are some things about making lists that also make me feel insane.
Have you ever made a list and felt that it was controlling your life? That it was going to judge you for not finishing it? These ideas sound absurd, but when you become a chronic list-maker like I am, it's hard to get away.

On the weekends, I will still make lists of what I need to do. Deviation from this list feels like breaking out from a padded cell - I spend some time lazing around on Low steps or walking through the city, and I feel both reckless and nervous. What if I don't get everything done on time? What if I don't finish the list?
I feel like I'm drowning in work and even my own free time activities feel like another burden to be ticked off. On top of that, it reduces my personal spontaneity and creativity.

So, what is there to do? Shall I be chained to my to-do list, never getting time to sleep in or wander the city without guilt? The predictable answer is 'no.'
I'm still learning as I go, but refraining from obsessive list making is the first step. Making a list only for specific things (homework, say, but not free time activities). And I have to make sure that I find a new down-time past time - yes, I make lists every time I am bored, even if they are repeats. Lists can never fully disappear from my life, but they don't need to take it over either.

Out of Work Slam Poet

My job at the library is reading zines. For 8-9 hours per week, I am forced (forced!) to read and write up descriptions of zines from the 70s all the way through the present. And, unlike other mundane jobs, it actually makes me want to do many things - like roller derby, feminist activism, writing up a South Asian dictionary (not of a South Asian language), read a million books about lesbians and trans people and multi-racial people and black people and white people and Asian people...
But the most recent of my inspirations has been to write a slam poem. And actually perform it. Since most of the zines I have been reading are intensely personal and talk about their experiences through personal essay, fiction, and - obviously - poetry, it has made me wonder about expressing myself in that way once more.
But I feel like a lion that has lost its fangs. I have been wondering about where my rhythm went as of late. In high school, I was unafraid. I wrote whatever the hell I wanted to and somehow it worked. I would read it at Hugo House and feel some sparkly confidence after the audience started applauding. But somehow... after my high school graduation speech (which was, itself, a slam poem), I have felt that I've used up all the beats. I get anxious when thinking of the stage. I worry about what people will think and I worry about whether there's even a venue for my type of stuff.
I know that a lot of my fears are unfounded, but I feel like this post is a good starting point to work on it. There are a lot of things I want to say and I know that if I work on it, they'll fit. It's all a matter of time...
To make this a little more interesting, I'm going to post up my graduation speech slam. I wish I had a video of it... it must be out there somewhere!

Grad Slam
I had a crush in the eighth grade.
Thought we could be forever,
Through stormy Washington weather,
Through bad pop music and TV clichés,
Through all the internet abbreviations – lol, rofl, omg – that became our new phase
Through all the cheesy movie musicals and awkward first days…
I was in love with high school.
And not Highland Middle School, no,
That place was a joke.
I was too old for the activity bus-riding, Yu-Gi-Oh gaming, Reflections-writing, D.A.R.E. abiding hoax that tried to tie our elementary days with all of the other grades.
Now that seems like light years away.
My love affair with high school lasted much longer than that.
9th grade wasn’t that cool.
High school and I were like buddies on AIM chat who thought we knew each other but were just strangers meeting for the first time.
He was a fan of Calvert 5 page essays and I was a fan of sleeping in on Saturdays.
Still, he tried to be nice;
Linked me up with a Crew to show off the new two-story school,
Taught me to bark at football games,
But as soon as we found the breakdown of senior, junior sophomore, and… us (the little freshmen with the whole maturity thing comin’ our way)
We stayed wrapped up in the insecurities – the awkward shuffle at tolo, the braces, eyeglasses, gym class miles and stuttering
The answers just trapped… on the tip of our tongues
Who wasn’t lost when they told us we’d eventually end up getting such strange diseases?
Like School Spirit, Spring Fever and Senioritis?
It was confusing enough even without all that MLA formatting. Uh, how do we cite this again?
But then it was sophomore year, and we had no time for any of these questions.

High school and I, we had some better dates back then.
Homecoming and its glossy thrill – the light rain and freezing temperatures on the field (we’d learned that the cheering was mostly for drill; high school wasn’t the best football player)
We were still kind of kids back then.
Joining our first AP classes and fancying ourselves little women and men
But it wasn’t so long ago when we wouldn’t have dreamed, wouldn’t have schemed
To skip classes or copy notes at the age of 15.
We were good kids, more or less.
But add on some stress and the morning math tables just couldn’t express
The interest of Halo and pointless internet quests
(Myspace and Youtube are guilty no less
Than our crazy parents who always wanted to test
Whether we could take on the WASL and Ms. Boness
Without our foreheads exploding and leaving a mess)
And high school and I? We learned how to argue.
My parents thought him a bad influence – taking the precious sleep I had left,
Dinner or vacation or even “conversation” all became things of the past,
I had no time to put together syllables and sentences; we were hermits studying for the next big exam… or tuned out in front of the television, trying to trip that final security switch and pass the next level without a hitch
There were shouting matches, indeed, but the sound of our yelling finally receded
AP World finally retreated
And the summer broke open that repeated desire that, at the time, very few knew.
College, that trickster, was about to ensue.

So when high school and I met again, as upperclassmen I knew where we’d been.
Now AP and IB would blend
Our mood swings and social deprivation – leave the fortunate ones laughing at our desperation
To spend hours and hours on school work and clubs
We begged and we pleaded, but the teachers’d say ‘tough’
As we filled that 24 hours with Millhollen’s math packets, an essay or two, a physics lab, a makeup test, some theater work, and then – maybe – some rest? Alas…
High school always wanted more – but I’d had enough.

To tell you the truth: I knew.
That those lyrical voices were about to ensue,
All the friends who came out of hibernation to advise,
That high school had been feeding more than a spoonful of lies;
He’d want me to work for him, and I’d said sure,
But now…
I didn’t know where we were.
He was the master at his own chess game,
Telling me to make a move, take another test, never rest,
Until the school year seemed like it was surely a jest – what kind of life was it when you were only a guest?
Barely staying overnight in your own bed and chained more often to that high-tech desk.
Finally, we asked for guidance, and here came the reply:
College.
Just work for college, we were told, the almighty counselors and past seniors would preach;
Start early, don’t look back,
But at that time with high school, all we knew was the past.
So we were old soldiers before we knew it.
Battling down through a hallway of freshmen and spewing word vomit to complete the next oral presentation, the next essay, the next line of code, about to explode… then,
Then the dust cleared, June came, and we knew where we stood.
High school, remember when I came in saying, that I’d never catch senioritis?
Haha, well… it caught me.
It was the downward slide,
In a relationship that’d lost all it’s steam.
Now we relinquished our hold on the work we had done – essays weren’t exciting, in fact, neither was class. Seriously, we only had to pass. {}
We thought we could breathe when we were blessed with snow – no!
High school still drove us to work for the next moment, the next second counts,
But hey, procrastination felt all the sweeter,
When it was taken with a snowball fight and some hot cocoa.
Over the years, this little freshman girl had grown more rebellious,
Now, owing my ammunition,
To the armies from the pages of novels and violent video games,
The arsenal had built up to buck the Man, the system, in any way, shape, or form.
But our parents, well, they still threatened (or “asked”) us to toe the line.
So instead, we huddled up, put our fingers to keyboards, pen to paper, and applied ourselves into the future realm,
Of dorm rooms, sleepless nights, and foreign lands…
People we hadn’t known for years at a time and…
COLLEGE! It was on everyone’s lips like a delicious secret to be kept from high school at all costs; a tasty tidbit of the “real world” (if there ever was such a thing)
But we were careful to trip over our own tongues and mask our delight with knocks on wood and plenty of shaking – we still had tests to take after all.
We started counting on June 5th, which became June 22nd, which became only a few months, weeks, days away, until…
Graduation. The end game, crash-land paradise, that emptied us into the pool of a new summer, a new situation. Not just a vacation, but an escape from the ordinary – and who didn’t want that after so many years?
So here’s to celebrating the moments:
Prom on a warm night in Seattle – subjecting ourselves to an onslaught of photographic nostalgia, parents and faculty reminding us to “be safe” and “have fun”
The final minute of your final (last, latest, penultimate) final, finally come to meet you with a hoot and holler.
The crying/laughing hysterics of the going-away party, the roads all spreading out in front of you and your friends… but there’s an epilogue to the story that just has to end.
So, high school and I, we’ve gone our separate ways.
Our head-butt drag-out relationship just wasn’t going anywhere.
He wanted me to stay, but I had to leave,
The cramped hallways, 7 periods a day, claustrophobic 35 minute lunch – hey, I don’t know about you, but this dog just got too big for her cage.

Congratulations class of 2009, you’ve earned it! Have a great summer!

More poetry is also available for your perusal.

Art Crash!

Sometimes, when you work on a project for too long, it starts to look like a mass of craziness. You heave an internal sigh whenever you look at the thing and hope to God that it passes for something not hideous. That, my friends, is what happened to me with my negative space note card project.
Negative space, defined to us Basic Drawing students as "the spaces around an object," is hard to see if you're not looking for it. Shown above in its final form, the assignment was to isolate negative space, draw 100 note cards of it, and then paint in a colored ink around the negative space you drew. But, in this pursuit of exalting negative space, many mishaps may arise.
The first one was that we were supposed to isolate negative space rather than draw the entire area around an object; that means that what you get are non-distinct shapes rather than something that looks like, say, a necklace or something. I had already finished 10 note cards by the time I knew this.
My second mistake was underestimating the drawing time it takes to make 100 cards. I spent a 2 hours during the week and 5 hours at the Met on Saturday working on drawing those cards - it catches up with you if you don't plan ahead!
Finally, my third mistake was thinking that taping and painting was going to be the quickest part. While it took 3 hours less time than drawing the cards, a few issues arose. I couldn't get the studio door lock to open. My tape ran out. I didn't bring any music. My brush skills make me cringe... but, after 4 hours in the studio, this piece was finished.
Looking at it now, I think the whole looks much better than the sum of its parts. It is a work of art when looked at not as a laborious process of 11 total man hours, but as a piece that I myself made from start to finish. Overall, I am glad that all the individual mistakes did not hinder this project's outcome - but I am mostly glad that it is now finished for good!

Take a look at further art and drawings that I have created.

Class Act

I have been fading in and out on this blog recently, but not without regret. In the past month or so, I've been trying to keep up with some strangled emotions - when my boyfriend left for Singapore, when I was hospitalized for respiratory problems, and when I (not two weeks later) had to uproot my life once more and move back to New York City. Needless to say, it's been a crazy time.
But I hope to commit myself more fully to my blog this school year, simply because I will be once again doing interesting things that are not so hard to talk about! Creative writing class and basic drawing alone should account for a lot of my miscellaneous adventures.
So enjoy this recap post and look forward to some more au courant posts in the near future!

Week of August 29th to September 4th:
- Moved back to NYC in 2 days. Much hunger and panic over household items ensued, but I love my apartment and I got to move in early so it wasn't totally insane
- Promptly became a Well Woman* at a week long training full of laughter and death by heat exhaustion at the Student Services Fair
- Survived the two biggest milestones of dorm living: getting locked out and killing a cockroach

- Went on a crazy Chinatown search for pho, found it, came back the next day and got TERRIBLE service (so that place is out)

- Had my roommate Liberty move in (yes, now it's official!)

*Well Woman is Barnard's wellness center; it consists of peer educators (like me!) and infinite resources for stress management, sex, and overall health

Week of September 5th to September 11th:
- Went to the Museum of Sex (quite an interesting experience)
- Found another pho place in Chinatown (much better service!), and hung out with Nina and Bradley
- Went back to class (Black lit, French, Perception [psych with lab], Drawing, and Fiction), went back to work (mail room and zine library), went back to having my head explode with buying groceries and expensive textbooks...

- Made a few excellent meals and then ate cauliflower mashed potatoes for the rest of them...

- Submitted my Extemporaneous Speaking Project zines to the Barnard library - check them out when you get a chance!

- Kept up with a continued version of my Outfits Photoshoot project - I call it: the Daily Outfit project!
- Bought art supplies downtown and had the handles of my portfolio break in the subway

- Wrote a draft of my blog post for Refuse the Silence!**

**I will now be blogging for Refuse the Silence, Awaaz, the Well Woman blog, and the Barnard Zine Library blog, so if you're interested in class/race privilege in liberal arts colleges, South Asian art and new, wellness topics, or zines, look me up!

Outfits Photoshoot

So, after a period of intense quiet around the blog, I have decided to resurface in pictures. In the next three days, I am going to overhaul my life once again and move back to NYC for the school year. Over the summer, I have completed many an interesting project, but I have realized that I much rather having a schedule to my days. So, in preparation both for the new school year and for my return to necessitated organization, my friend and I undertook a speedy outfits photoshoot!

I got the idea from the blog Already Pretty where some users were discussing how to utilize their "closet orphans" and feel inspired by your clothes even when you're on a lean budget. This vastly appeals to me as a broke college student. So, when my style-conscious (and photographically inclined) friend visited me this past week, I decided that we had to do this. I tore up my closet just two days ago and, with all the fury of a passing hurricane, my bedroom became a whirlwind of forgotten jackets, worn-out skirts, and ignored jewelry items. As I sat amidst the tossed open drawers and empty hangers, I was forced then to think where to begin.

The final verdict was to go in series; working with one category (dresses, skirts, jackets...) and one piece of clothing, I would combine it with shirts, accessories, and shoes. I started out thinking I would put together two outfits for each item of clothing but, as I realized what a large undertaking my closet was, it became more and more simplified. In the finished product, there are photographs of one-item outfits with no accessories just waiting to be put together alongside multi-layered masterpieces. But the most interesting - and rewarding - part of this project was the ability to visualize what was in my closet. After going through the photographs (we got a little camera-happy and ended up with about 400+ pictures to sort through) and making an Excel inventory (which appealed to my slight OCD nature), I finally was aware of the volume of things I have. It scared me! After reading about people limiting their items to a small bundle, I saw both my own consumerism and selfishness. I felt really fortunate and humbled by the idea that I had this much of a stash, albeit collected over the years. I hope that this understanding will teach me not to get frustrated when I feel I "don't have anything to wear." Just seeing those options on a page is daunting!

This photoshoot was also therapeutic besides that initial shock. It was like making a Polyvore of my personal closet, rather than focusing on wishing. And it made my creative side come out because, when I have this amount of time to look over the outfits, it becomes easier to pair them up and make interesting choices (especially those pictured above!) And, the most important result of this mixing and matching, this inventory taking, was to make me feel really beautiful. Weaving through my closet, I got to know how my body looks in the clothes I put on it - it showed how versatile my form could be! I think that when I just threw on clothes to get through the day, I ignored the fact that they were there also to make me feel good. On occasion I would look fantastic, but many days it was just an average standard. Sometimes even boring. So this project let me explore my body through the wardrobe (and have a record for when I get stuck on outfit ideas!)

I suggest that, if you have a weekend of free time or just want to play with some little-used pieces in your closet, that you take some time to do your own outfits photoshoot. I used my friend and a tripod, but if you have a point-and-click camera and a secure place to seat it, you can do this project. It is a true creative experience!

Check out some more posts featuring my photography and guest photography.

Artistic Update: J's Extemporaneous Speaking Project

For the last month at my ZAPP internship, I have been working on a final project that took me to a different place than all my usual artistic routes.
So I decided to combine two things that I have little experience in: extemporaneous speaking and comic drawing! Each week of the month, I spoke into a microphone for 20 minutes and then made a comic mini-zine based on the results. My mini-zines were one page designs, folded up from an 11x17 piece of paper. In the last few days, I finally realized that I had to present my work in some way, so I frantically went to Kinkos (now FedEx) and copied many of the little booklets. I was cutting and folding for hours! And now, since I have finished my work at ZAPP for this summer, I have time to scan and put up my work online.
In retrospect, this project brought up a lot of my insecurities about public speaking - when I am speaking to an audience of my peers or friends, it's natural that I will make stories and speak casually, but when I am just talking aloud to a quiet room, I get nervous. But I was surprised at how creative I was in talking about certain subjects with no prior planning. It was therapeutic in some ways to let those opinions out so that I could work through them without being challenged.
And the drawing was excellent! I have always felt inadequate in my drawing abilities (though I found some amazing drawings in my closet from when I was in middle school - who knew?). Yet, since this was a completely personal project, I did not feel pressured to draw "well" or measure up to my clearly talented illustrating peers. It was exciting to explore this new avenue of art, and I expect to continue with it.
My mini-zine consists of a little booklet that is folded, so if you want to get your own copy, please shoot me an email at jordanalam@gmail.com! I think that it looks much better when you can flip the pages after listening to the segment.

There are going to be a lot of links below, first to my DeviantArt account for the mini-zine scans (which are cut off in some places, but definitely readable) and second to my SoundCloud account for the sound files.

In Transition (mini-zine)
http://thecowation.deviantart.com/art/In-Transition-173661576

On Dreams (mini-zine)
http://thecowation.deviantart.com/art/On-Dreams-173662785

Body/Self-Image (mini-zine)
http://thecowation.deviantart.com/art/Body-Self-Image-173663270

Memory (mini-zine)
http://thecowation.deviantart.com/art/Memory-173664163

Recordings (in accordance with each zine)
http://soundcloud.com/the-cowation

You can buy my zines on Etsy.
This zine series is one of many - check out The Bearniverse and RBW Zine for more zine fun!