I love to go out and skate with friends or bike out with my dad. I love to play the piano, go out with friends, play video games, and have civil conversations. At school, I attend a Mandarin and computing class. I love to learn how to code, and I had nine years of Spanish, so Mandarin is a new step into languages. My dad is from Guatemala, and my mom is Chinese. I was born in San Francisco and have never moved in my life.
I used to go to a Catholic school which was very strict on presentation and manners of oneself. I would say it was tiresome to my rebellious self, but it did teach me self-control and basic manners. In my Catholic school, I met a lot of people who I could connect with. It took me a long time to realize that they weren’t the best of friends, so when I got into high school, I was the only one to go to my school. This gave me the opportunity to reevaluate myself and who I associate with.
As a person, I have experienced a lot in sports and as an indoors person. My parents really pushed me to do sports and get me outside when I just wanted to play video games and do nothing else. It gave me a perspective as a sports kid who hated going outside, quite confusing when I say it but I loved both. I played all the sports I could be signed up for, baseball, basketball, and soccer. I, however, found a perfect balance in the two general ideas. I would come home after practice, do homework then play until I had to go to bed. At the time it seemed fine, but I didn’t feel right as a person, I felt like I could do more. It shocked me when I realized I had no hobbies of my own. So I immersed myself in getting better at games, programming, and playing the piano. I would go biking and skating with my dad to Mclaren park to calm down after a week of school. High school in my eyes at the time was a tremendous opportunity to get more knowledge towards my goal of being a software engineer.
I feel like I live in the moment for most of my life, I don’t want to miss anything, and I don’t want to ruin my future by living more then than now. So I do my best to balance my hobbies and goals. Currently, I have down much to narrow my view on religion. As I said before, I used to attend a Catholic school, so I had to learn much about the religion. However I never really understood the concept, so I would twist details, mash other ideas from other religions into my own view to make the most sense for myself. At the moment I feel as though I am going through adolescence where I get to attune my thoughts on the world a whole and in my own eyes. I hope to be able to share it with others and others to impact my view to better me as a person.
I am a native born resident of San Francisco. My parents and much of my extended family immigrated to the US from China. But unlike the majority of my family, I am unfortunately not fluent in Cantonese, which is an issue I am currently attempting to remedy by taking Cantonese classes while I am attending City College of San Francisco. My mother was bilingual, so it wasn’t a big issue at first. But after she was hospitalized for long-term, communication with my monolingual father has become a longstanding issue. I also hope to bridge the gap between my immediate and extended family by lessening the language barrier that has left my relationship with my relatives awkward and distant. Because despite that distance, they have shown only warmth and support for any issue I have reached out to the with and wanted to express my gratitude for their patience and understanding properly.
I have always had a fondness for technology whether it was hardware or software. The way it developed along with my own growth had mostly made it impossible to ignore. From the booming video game industry to the explosive rise of streaming, all these innovations would quickly outdated many things I had grown accustomed to in my childhood. The seeming constant shifts in paradigms provided by tech have made the last two decades of my life quite curious about the things I would take for granted before a change which is what has led me to my current study of Computer Science. Studying the primary language of software has given me many new insights on the software I interact with daily and has surprised me with how inflexible it can be. The number of ways people have worked out to streamline and solve obstacles with software has genuinely astonished me with the clever workarounds for the limitations of programming languages.
I’d say the field which has most influenced my interest in technology is video
games — a hobby which has changed with me, more than any other. I have
often gravitated towards single player games due the rare, but inventive
mechanics people have come up with to make their interactive experience
more immersive which would spark my interest in how media and
technology come together to affect the user/audience.
Of course, as captivating as technology can be, I can't say I have a
strong sense of direction in my future within the field. The vastness of
the field has left me at a bit of a standstill, but I think my experience
with Youthline has made that field a tad less foggy. Getting an
opportunity to work with some of the software I might make in the
future has allowed me to at least narrow down some of my future
prospects. Ultimately I would not say I am a very enterprising guy
and don’t see myself in a position standing under the spotlight by
driving future innovation forward. I am a timid person by nature
and think I want to be in a collaborative position where I can
easily get feedback, which can allow me to grow even once I
am firmly entrenched in a career. While I admittedly lack
ambition I do make up for it with my reliability, which is what
currently drives me forward. I want a stable career I can rely
on because I want to be able to provide for the people who
have given so much of themselves to support me even
when I was at my most aimless points.