The Modern Great Wall

At awards night, I received recognition as the Most Outstanding Math Student of the Year. My calculus teacher said a lot of nice things, mentionned Cornell, and got me a membership to the Johnson Museum of Art. For the past couple months, the idea of learning and doing math has settled as a safe option - one that will hurt a little bit, sometimes out of boredom, sometimes out of inadequacy. But its safe. Its rising. My parents, my teachers, my friends - they would all see that it as fitting, and all of them, all of them, will know what its like to have a STEM job.

This is not a rebuke. To everyone who finds purpose and passion in engineering, law, biology, chemistry, to everyone who has been lucky enough to conduct meaningful research, to everyone who has struggled courageously against the current of affirmative action, go. We need you - I'm going to need you, to write me computer programs, to protect my freedoms, to save my dying body. I won't ask you to question your choices because I'm almost entirely sure that you have already asked yourself everything that I still ask myself. Is this what you want to do with 40 productive years of your life? Is this what you want to master and evangelize?

Because none of my parents' dreams, my teachers' and friends' expectations, every stereotype for my profile, are mine. My idol figures aren't successful architects, software developers, raging pop stars, or philanthropic doctors. The content that I consume has nothing to do with AoPS Alcumus geometry, Frontline, or Yale lectures. These are interesting, but not lively.

Because every time someone asked me to write down my dreams, I write about doing something creative. When I was in fifth grade, I wrote about being a famous author. In statistics, I talked about graphic design. Mrs. Moore mentionned math tutoring and I panicked just thinking about it. Grace rhetorically posed the idea of being an art teacher, and now I daydream about a basement studio. I'm no better at any of these things than I am qualified to do the sciences or maths, but they are what I want to do.

I'm slowly learning to accept my financial situation. I'm not poor; I'm barely cultured. I am not the wild spirit who can survive without my parent's aid. One day, they'll withdraw their support, and I won't know what to do. But I can't continue to feel guilty for allegedly "wasting" what they promised to give me. Its not that I'm entitled to the lessons and the thousands of dollars that they pour into making me child hidden by the Modern Great Wall. But I'm entitled to my own life, and if Baatarjiguur the camel herder was right, the wasted money and time won't matter so much. The core of life is the same everywhere.

The content I consume is created by artists and entrepeneurs and artists. John Green, Hank Green, Grace Helbig, Hannah Hart, Tyler Oakley, Lily Singh, Josh Sundquist, Bart Kwan, Geo Antoinette, Eddie Huang are some of the best that I've come across so far. The Just Kidding Films crew is predominantly Asian and each member has hurt his family to become himself. They're part of the Asian American movement to balance the massive disproportions, and I have every intention of jumping on that boat.

I'm so scared. But I believe in the power of art, even more in the power of poetry. I'm not talking about rhyming syllables and free verse though; I'm talking about rhythm of life. People read my tumblr quote reblogs and wonder why I label label them with a technically incorrect term, "poetry." Its not because of the literary beats or the sentence fluency. Its for the heartbeats and gushing blood of emotion that they contain. That's poetry.

Conversation and a couple blogs - that's all I have to create this kind of poetry. I don't know if I can do it, but I'm going to give it everything I've got.