Schoolwork and T4K obligations dominated the first part of the year. In May, I finally graduated from UT with my two bachelor's degrees in biomedical engineering and computer science. But despite the huge sense of accomplishment, I knew that I was in for another big journey ahead. I'll certainly never forget that nervous feeling in my stomach that rendered me incapable of eating much throughout the last week leading up to Day Zero.

The summer ride passed by in a flight of moments, and I soon found myself back home. Although I had been aware of the transition period from the ride back to normal life, my own transition still managed to surprise me. I calmly recognized that I would most likely never again go on an adventure as grand as biking to Alaska to fight cancer, but I was also determined to make sure that this past summer would not be the greatest thing that I would ever do. Despite this mindset, I still ended up in some weird headspaces, and I am incredibly grateful for the friends who listened to me talk through those directionless feelings as well as some other interpersonal problems I was going through at the time.

PC: Grace Scoggin

In mid-September, I started my current job as a software engineer at RetailMeNot, and I've been enjoying myself while learning a lot! For one, I finally fulfilled my longtime goal of learning front-end development (yay React!) I also went to ACL for the first time, made some new friends, ate far too many yogurt pretzels while coding.... But I knew something was missing when I arrived home from work and just wasted my time away being a couch potato. After a month and a half, I enrolled myself into some extracurriculars, and I'm now mostly pleased with the direction I'm headed in this next phase of my life.

2018 Goals: Review

1. Learn, learn, learn!
2. Finish off the ride year and take Texas 4000 beyond the summer ride.
3. Get involved with Women in STEM initiatives again.
4. Network.
5. Stay in contact with friends.
6. Journal daily.
7. Blog at least once a week.
8. Post at least one song cover on YouTube.
9. Make a personal website.
10. Get back into dance.

I'd say that I accomplished 1, 2, 3, and 10. Despite not paying much attention in class during my last semester of college and not learning anything programming-related on my own, I started learning French, Japanese, and Korean. (Let me know where I can get classes for Spanish!) Texas RIDE was ultimately postponed, but I'm pretty satisfied with how the summer ride turned out overall. Although the last time I biked was on Day 70, I've stayed involved with Texas 4000 through interviewing candidates for the 2020 team and sitting on the ATLAS and Tribute Committees. I've also gotten back involved with the Society of Women Engineers. I'm about to complete training to become a coach under the Leadership Coaching Committee, and I recently started a role on the Outreach Committee working on the SWENext Program. Fitness-wise, I currently take ballet and contemporary classes at Ballet Austin after work since my office is so close to the studio. And as a bonus, I did a cover of BTS' Idol!

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6P6IpwkrLBw[/embed]

I made some progress on 6 and 9. I wrote about each day of the summer ride in my journal while on the road, and I am really glad that I did that. For my website, I did give it a new look with a template from HTML5 UP. But maybe 2019 is when I use my new React skills to truly make my own personal website?

I definitely did not accomplish 4, 5, 7, and 8. The extent of my networking efforts was ordering business cards. (When I gave my friend Brandon one because I was excited about them, he roasted me: "Nice, networking with people you already know!") I've also not done much for staying in contact with friends. As for blogging, I posted even less than I did in 2017, oops. And there is no song cover on YouTube, though I did learn how to play "22" by Taylor Swift (roughly) on the guitar.

2019 Goals

1. Pass the JLPT N3.
2. Continue with French and Korean classes and restart learning Spanish.
3. Pick up a technical side project outside of work.
4. Continue with diversity in STEM initiatives, particularly in K-12 outreach.
5. Pick up cycling again by participating in the ATLAS Ride.
6. Start volunteering at a health/cancer-related non-profit.
7. Catch up with friends more often.
8. Read 15 books this year (maybe a few that aren't in English?)

Happy New Year!

On the days when I would wake up cranky from lack of sleep and stiff from miles on the bike, I reminded myself of Mimi, a woman who I had never met before but whose life I was somehow able to touch. If my biking from Texas to Alaska can bring a smile to someone on their last day, it’s worth it.

It’s been about a month since my teammates and I crossed the finish line in Anchorage. Within the next two days, I reversed 70 days of biking with 7 hours of flying on planes. I also made a dramatic switch in lifestyles. I am no longer wandering about the continent from town to town, living out of a 60 L (questionably sized) duffel bag. I no longer have to fight with more than my siblings for the bathroom in the mornings and at night. I am no longer biking hours on end for a cause that I love.

The majority of my days have felt rather mundane. My two biggest accomplishments have been finally clearing up the floor of my room (don’t ask me about the living room now though) and cooking a single meal (with lots of assistance).

When I first arrived back home, my mom asked me multiple times to tell her about the ride: stories from it and my own thoughts about it. The best I could do was pull up photos of scenery on my phone and talk through the different memories that they sparked. But how could I tell her about those moments that weren’t captured on camera – what it felt like to climb mountains, to see the ocean roaring below us, to bike under the stars, to gaze up at so many different colorful skies? How could I tell her about watching the 2016 team’s videos with our hosts in Henderson, hearing a host’s voice crack while telling us that seeing us each year in Wasilla is like seeing his wife again?

You really don’t appreciate the things that you have until they are gone. That’s one thing I still need to work on – being present in the moment. If there’s one thing that I would change about the ride, I’d try to spend less time looking forward to the next time I got to shower, do laundry, and sleep. Sometimes it’s okay to take a little longer at a rest stop if you’re being crowned the Queen. Sometimes it’s okay to stay up until 3 AM listening to the Kimi no Na wa soundtrack and journaling with one of your best friends.

The best way I can describe life after the ride is that it’s like waking up from a vivid dream. The more you’re awake, the less real the dream feels and the less that you remember.

It’s in the little things that I am reminded of Texas 4000. Randomly craving PB&J sandwiches. Being hyper-aware of Kind bars while grocery shopping. (Did they launch a world domination campaign while I was distracted with biking? I see them everywhere now: ads in magazines, displays at my local Costco and HEB.) Listening to “Everytime We Touch” when it comes on shuffle. Driving down roads that I once biked multiple times a week to meet miles requirements. Cleaning out my desk and finding a small stack of index cards with faded highlighter and my training ride turn-by-turns. Listening to the rain. Taking a moment to look up at the sky.

A few days ago, I scrolled back on my messaging history with my best friend from Texas 4000.

We met as mutual friends at the beginning of Spring 2017. Due to similar schedules, we went to many of the same weekday workout sessions, and we messaged each other to meet up to walk to them. We dropped off communication over the summer, but after the second meeting in the fall semester, I messaged him my thoughts on applying to be a Ride Director – and ultimately opened a door to a conversation that would deepen our friendship.

We ended up completing many significant milestones together. We rode our first terrifying 10 miles together. We passed our half century test (with three minutes to spare) together. We passed our century test (in a three person group; shoutout to Tarika!) together. We rode Day 0 and ATLAS together.

And then we took off on separate routes on Day 2. Although it felt strange to be going through this momentous journey without him by my side, I knew that he was always just a text message away (except for in Canada where I had no service!)

One of the best things from my Texas 4000 experience was becoming friends with Louis. I’m excited for the 2019 team to start building friendships and making memories; I hope that at least one person is able to find their Louis this year.

Every week you go farther, climb higher, and find out you are capable of doing more than you thought you could. What will you find out this week?

During the training year, we received weekly emails about our Saturday rides; this note appeared at the top of one those emails at the end of March. Thinking of these two simple sentences has pushed me through the toughest rides at the end of training and even through the summer ride itself.

My next Alaska is still to be determined, but whatever it is, I look forward to finding out what more I am capable of doing.

• The Sierra Program team presented our first program a little over a month ago.
• I took a trip to the ER on the second day of Spring Break Ride after left turning too quickly and falling. Got stitches for the first time.
• As soon as the road rash on my arm was mostly healed, I sunburned during LBJ Ride and in the process undid my hard work of wearing sun sleeves on the first day of Spring Break Ride because I now have tan lines. PSA: wear sunscreen.
• Last Friday, I received a panhandling donation because of the tan lines on my legs. I've officially made it as a cyclist now.
• The longest ride I have completed was 96.8 miles long.

2014-2015

• Sour Skittles
• Sour Patch Kids
• Mini Reese's peanut butter cups

2015-2016

• Milano - mint chocolate
• Coke (sad reacts for picking up a soda drinking habit again)

2016-2017 

• Nothing - because I lived at home where there was no junk food

2017-2018

• Mini Reese's peanut butter cups
• BBQ chips
• Peanut M&M's

This one's a short one!

---

When I first got into Texas 4000, I didn't want to make a public announcement about it. I guess a part of me had doubts.

You see, I am always too scared of talking about my goals. What if I don't actually accomplish them? What if I end up not meeting the fundraising and/or fitness requirements?

But it's slowly but surely happening. We are now less than 95 days away from our departure from Austin. Embracing the dirtiness of biking in rainy weather, finding a new appreciation for water, and learning to eat to match my physical lifestyle... I've grown so much as a person while also discovering more about what has always been a part of me.

---

There is something magical about the Olympics.

The first Olympics I watched was the 2008 Summer Olympics during our family's first ever road trip to send my older sister to begin her college years at MIT. We stopped by relatives in Canada before arriving in Boston, and I remember watching Michael Phelps rack up those gold medals as we prepared to sleep on the floor of a room in the house of those relatives. Once we got back to the States, while my older sister and my parents were away at orientation events, my grandmother, younger siblings, and I spent time in the hotel. In the evenings when my parents would appease us by taking us to the hotel pool, I repeatedly kept on doing flips and handstands in the water, dreaming about flying through the air like Shawn Johnson and Nastia Liukin. I begged my mother to put me back into gymnastics. This desire to do gymnastics remained in me; I even remember getting jealous of one of my classmates in my French 1 class as a high school freshman who was competing in it.

This past Winter Olympics, I've fallen in love with figure skating. (Side note: I am a huge fan of the Shib sibs!) I also had a brief stint in this sport from 7th to 9th grade, but I ended up quitting due to two reasons. One, the nearest ice skating rink was pretty far away relative to where we lived, and it was getting to be a hassle for my mom to drive me and my little sister there every week after school during rush hour traffic. Two, I felt so drastically behind everyone. I would see little eight year old girls doing their spins and jumps, and I felt so inadequate as a twelve-year-old just getting started. I believed that I had no future in the sport and that I'd never get to competition level, so I decided to quit. However, I'll always remember the good memories I made during my time at the rink though. I feel like I was closest to my little sister when I was in 9th grade and 14 years old, when we used to slack off and just skate around the rink talking about our silly little crushes.

Maybe a little part of me still dreams that I'll miraculously be competing at the Olympics in the future, but for now I'll stick to cycling to Alaska as my sport!

The week before, we had done essentially the same route minus 1.5 miles. My ride group at the time had finished that in about four hours, so I thought that I was in pretty good shape for this test. I ate pasta the night before, slept for almost 8 hours, and made sure to eat some oatmeal for breakfast before leaving my apartment. On the bike, I took extra care to keep drinking water and eating food. Despite getting a flat and having to call SAG for a rider who unfortunately had knee pain, I felt incredibly optimistic during the first part of the ride.

However, when we hit the rest stop, we realized that we were cutting it incredibly close on time. We had 22 miles left to be biked in about 2 hours and 15 minutes. I'm pretty sure we didn't even spend 5 minutes at the rest stop because I only had the chance to eat one doughnut hole and grab some Clif Bar products to go!

Once we got back on the road, we were hit with a headwind. Our group tried to consistently switch out who was leading, but in the end we fell into one formation for most of the way back once I started gapping on every uphill and needed to be drafting behind someone. I told myself that I'd keep pushing because we couldn't stop; there was no time. I was going to be okay.

But it became increasingly apparent that I was not going to be okay.

While I was on the bike that day, I tried to remember that no matter where I cycled to, I would always carry my family and friends in my heart (as cheesy as it sounds), but it wasn't actually them that allowed me to push myself on the way back. I had woken up that morning to a short encouraging message from a 2017 rider, and it was this message that popped into my mind right as I felt like I would not be able to go even one more mile.

"Just remember, you can stop but you can’t quit".

When our group stopped at a red light, I turned and told them that we had to pull over and let me eat something. I ended up taking two strangely delicious orange-flavored Clif Bar Shot Bloks (gummies with electrolytes, sugar, and caffeine).

As we made it back to familiar territory about 3 miles out from campus, a strange sense of calm settled over me. I told myself that no matter what the result, I had pushed myself today, and I could only improve from here.

We made it with 3 minutes to spare.

Miles ridden: 815
Fall count: 10

I managed to avoid mention of Moana until I stumbled upon a review by someone of Polynesian descent around Christmas time. One of their comments was that the movie's music wasn't very traditional at all and felt more like she was sitting through a Broadway show. Curious, I listened to "How Far I'll Go" and absolutely fell in love. I had that song on repeat for a while, making sure to not spoil any other of the songs. And I made plans to watch the movie in theaters as soon as I could before I got sick of the song.

I ended up watching it this past Monday with the Nerd Herd, and here is a bit of my thoughts! There are spoilers in this post.

Plot

I actually ended up spoiling the plot for myself by reading the Wikipedia page. It was a pretty typical plot, but watching the actual movie made me appreciate the overarching theme of knowing who you are as it applied to both Moana and Te Fiti.

Characters & Relationships

The characters I disliked in the movie were Heihei and the "villains" Kakamora and Tamatoa. I didn't find Heihei's presence in the movie to add much to the comedy, and the "villains" weren't particularly captivating. Those scenes did do a good job of showing Moana's determination and intelligence though.

I liked the development of Maui and Moana's relationship, especially when he ended up teaching Moana how to sail. The review I read mentioned that Moana's presence in the quest wasn't very necessary since Maui always ended up swooping in and saving the day. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I didn't agree with that assertion. Although Maui had the sailing knowledge and the demigod strength and power to get the duo to their locations and also to hold off the dangerous Te Ka, Moana was the reason why he was even on the quest to begin with. Also, she was able to make the discovery that Te Ka was Te Fiti without her heart. The hero of the story doesn't have to be the one with the most knowledge and strength, just the person who was writing it to begin with.

I think the movie did an exceptional job of portraying Moana's relationship with her family members. I loved the scene when Moana's father showed her the stack of stones placed down by previous leaders of the village.

Perhaps I've gotten more emotional as I have gotten older, but here are all the scenes that made me really tear up:

• When Moana's mother saw her packing and then went and helped her during the reprise of "How Far I'll Go"
• When Moana's grandmother was reincarnated as a manta ray, also during the reprise of "How Far I'll Go"
• When Moana's grandmother sang that she makes her family proud in "I Am Moana (Song of the Ancestors)"

Aside from the two moments I mentioned above, all the scenes between Moana and her grandmother were particularly well done.

As for Moana herself, I loved her personality with her desire to sail warring with her sense of duty and her love of her island and her people. I do think that they tried too hard to make her clumsy; let's just leave it to Anna from Frozen to handle that.

Music

As I'm not Polynesian, I won't comment much on the songs without any English in them. While I was watching the movie though, I thought a lot about how nice it must feel for people to hear their own traditional language and music.

One-line thoughts for each song:

• "Where You Are" was such a cute song. It was very nicely used to introduce the setting and Moana and her family.
• "How Far I'll Go" is so filled with youth, vigor, and a hint of optimism.
• "We Know the Way" was a great way to reveal the voyaging history of Moana's ancestors.
• I loved how the reprise of "How Far I'll Go" occurred in such a stark contrast to the optimism and naivety that Moana originally sang "How Far I'll Go".
• "You're Welcome" was a funny song. It also keeps on coming back and getting stuck in my brain.
• I was not a fan of "Shiny". It seemed like a song just thrown in there for the sake of providing a villain song and also for the sake of extending the scene with the villain.
• "I Am Moana (Song of the Ancestors)" is my second favorite song.

Overall Thoughts

Moana reminded me a lot of Mulan due to their similar themes: knowing who you are and being true to your heart. Once again, I really identified with the main character's duty and love for her family while also not feeling completely satisfied with the pathway they were expected to follow.

I can safely say that Moana has put itself as my second favorite Disney movie.

November 20, 2017

This past weekend was T4K-filled! We kicked it off on Friday night with Friendsgiving.

I made deviled eggs for the first time ever!

Saturday started bright and early. We went on a new route, making three loops along Scenic Drive. The hills were a challenge, but the views were phenomenal! On the ride, I also (re)learned that:

1. Cross-wheeling is dangerous.
2. Helmets are very important.

This happened when I took my most intense fall so far, while on our second loop. Luckily, the place where I fell was perfect - we had Leslie on SAG just a bit back and it was a quiet road. My ride group was so great about getting me and my bike off of the road as soon as possible, and they even went to knock on a couple doors to get some paper towels to help wipe off my blood.

After getting patched up by some teammates ("it's the injured taking care of the injured!"), my stubborn self made it through the rest of the ride, faltering only one more time and walking up one rather steep hill all three times. (Some day I will CONQUER that hill.) I haven't gotten back on the bike since then because I need to wait until the large bruises on my left knee and right thigh heal up. It's unfortunate that I'm going to be put on probation with less than 9 miles left to meet the 200-mile deadline, but I'd rather take the time off so that I can get back on the bike stronger than ever. After all, it's not a race to Alaska!

I spent my afternoon resting and then headed out to the Circuit of the Americas racetrack to volunteer at LLS's Light the Night event. We arrived just in time to enjoy the finale fireworks before helping to tear down the event.

Coins for Cancer was pretty fun. A teammate and I stood at a corner for three hours. We had someone a lane or two over from the median throw us two wadded up $1 bills and shout "My daughter did it last year!" as he drove by. We also met someone whose cousin had married the sister of another teammate. We had a group of teenagers who felt bad about only being able to give us a $1 bill. Through the generosity of these people and many more, we raised about $210 in our corner alone. It was also great to see the open-mouthed, wide-eyed reactions of children after they finished reading our sign.

The rest of the afternoon was a break, but the evening was back to T4K with Business Development Committee meeting and Youth Program Team meeting.

It's been a busy and somewhat difficult weekend, and I haven't had a good night's sleep in a while. Hopefully that changes soon. Until next time, catch me limping around campus while listening to Christmas music (because yes, it is officially that time of year now!)

Miles ridden: 191.5
Number of falls: 9