Yoojin Cho

Hello ISLAND!

A lot of you know already, but in case you didn’t, I have officially moved to Martha’s Vineyard for a job. I already started yoojincho.tumblr.com in my brief effort to create a blog for my island living. After realizing how much I miss WordPress, however, I decided I should continue my Yooj(in)________ blog series.

It all began with Yooj(in)London when I spent a semester in London, England. Then I switched over to Yooj(in)Boston, and now, I am here, Yooj(in)VineyardHaven.

Vineyard Haven is one of six towns on Martha’s Vineyard. Luckily I found a place to live in VH, aka Tisbury, where most year-round residents live. Other towns include Oak Bluffs, Edgartown, Aquinnah – formerly known as Gay Head, West Tisbury and Chilmark.

I have officially been here for 11 days. I have been at the Martha’s Vineyard Times for 8 days as web coordinator. So far I’m enjoying and taking everything one small step at a time.

I’ll definitely keep everyone updated on my island living and post my work here as well!

ps. if anyone was wondering, my latest scoop tells me Lady Gaga is building a house on Chappaquiddick, an island within an island.

Destination: Los Angeles

Sunshine, Warmth, Food (and lots of it, too), Drinks, Friends.

All these do a perfect job describing my week in California and Nevada. For spring break, Jack and I visited our friends in Los Angeles and spent a few days in Las Vegas. Needless to say, it was incredible.

Usually after a week of vacation anywhere, I am ready to come home. This time, however, I was actually sad to hop on the red eye back to Boston.

Los Angeles rose high above my expectations. Sure it was smoggy, but the atmosphere and the weather totally won me over.

The trip involved a lot of exercise. I left dreary Boston thinking I will be laying out on a sandy beach, doing nothing and eating nonstop. The actually itinerary, however, took me hiking, biking and a lot of walking.

First day we hiked up to the Hollywood sign and spotted two celebrities – A.J. from the Office and Ravi from the League, although I was too distracted by A.J.’s adorable golden retriever to actually notice his face. But totally understandable? Right?

After the hike, we sat down for a lovely dinner at In-N-Out. After three visits in a week, I think I can proudly say I have mastered its secret menu. Let me help you out here – especially if you have never experienced the joy of biting into In-N-Out’s delicious cheeseburger.

Double-Double: Yes, for the first time in my life, I ordered a double-cheeseburger. Double patties and double cheese.
Well-Done Fries: Meaning, extremely crispy!
Animal Style: On your burger OR on your fries. I actually suggest both. Carmelized onions + cheese + secret sauce.
Neopolitan Shake: Strawberry + Vanilla + Chocolate milkshake.

My mouth is watering just thinking about it. In general though, the food in California was absolutely incredible. I consider myself a foodie – I love food; I enjoy eating; I love trying new food.

Baja-style Mexican food matched my high expectations of Mexican cuisine in general since I grew up in TX after all. English pub we tried in Santa Monica offered one of the best fish & chips I tried in the US. Even a tiny little food shack along the beach near Manhattan Beach – owned by a nice Georgia man with his homemade chicken salad recipe – was amazing.

We also biked from Santa Monica to Manhattan Beach… Long long long bike ride, but totally worth it! Sure it took all day and sure I ended up with some funny tanlines thanks to my decision to wear a blazer, but the view and simply the idea of biking right along the beach and taking in the scenery… Just, WOW.

Though LA is not a walking city, we chose the simplest mode of transportation – our legs – to see Sunset Blvd, and that wrapper up our stay in Los Angeles.

I would loooove to go back – possibly live there in the future?

(View from the Hollywood sign. Yes, it was a long hike, but totally worth it! Especially when there is a trip to in-n-out involved afterward.)

(While biking down from Santa Monica to Manhattan Beach. one day… I will be a proud owner of one of those modern, chic, fancy houses.)

(Near LAX… Alvin and the Chipmunks. Downstairs there were Sully & Mike from Monsters Inc.)

Post on VEGAS to come soon!

Quit Playing Games…

No, but seriously, quit playing games with my heart.

Dear scammers who send “job scam” e-mails to Boston University students, DON’T. A couple of days ago, I received this e-mail from College of Communication Career Center.

Subject: Beware of email employment scams

Body: Please be aware that there are a number of recent email scams that are targeting BU students. We are aware of most of these scams and have alerted the BU Police Department. If you receive a suspicious email stating that a company received your resume from “university/college career services”, and is asking for personal or financial information, do not respond! The BU Police Department has asked that all suspicious messages be forwarded to them.

Really? I personally have not received any e-mail offering me a job in exchange for my personal financial information, but simply thinking about the fact that someone out there has the guts to send out scam e-mails disguised under prospect of a job…

Imagine, you go to your inbox – usually my first stop in the morning – and you see an e-mail saying something about a job. Obviously you get excited. You open up the e-mail with extremely high hopes, only to be crushed 5 seconds later when the e-mail actually asks you for strange information, clearly indicating it is NOT a potential employer.

Devastating.

Especially as a senior with only a couple of months left in college, “job search” is an extremely sensitive topic. In this economy, trying to stay positive about post-grad life is hard. With so much uncertainty ahead of us, we do not need yet another scammer trying to take advantage. Definitely not.

All seniors out there, don’t fall for scams and keep your hopes up. We will ALL be hired soon enough… Soon enough…

Journalist Immunity?

Recent events in Egypt led me to think… do journalists need something like diplomatic immunity?

We are witnessing history as we speak. After 18 days of demonstrations, the Egyptians people have successfully ousted President Mubarak who has ruled the country for three decades. And the future? Well, quite unknown, but hopefully a change for the better.

In the process ousting the dictatorial regime, we saw the army defending the protesters, refusing to use weapons. We also saw hundreds of thousands of people mobilizing due to the power of social media. Then we saw violence escalating with pro-Mubarak crowd playing a hand, even hurting American journalists.

The day pro-Mubarak crowd made a grand entrance in Tahrir Square, reports, rather, tweets, flooded my feed.

“Got roughed up by thugs in pro-mubarak crowd..punched and kicked repeatedly. Had to escape. Safe now.”

“Situation on ground in #egypt very tense. Vehicle I was in attacked. My window smashed. All ok.”

Both from Anderson Cooper… I strongly believe only because of his status as a well-known journalist, people instantly perked up and started paying attention.

Regardless, my initial reaction, actually to most incidents that involve journalists, basically went something like this: WHY? What is the point of beating up reporters? What do you prove? NOTHING.

Let’s be real. Roughing up American journalists does not exactly contribute too much. Sure, it draws attention. As we saw in the case of Katie Couric’s crew and Anderson Cooper, people immediately began paying attention even more.

With that aside, though, it still did not bring American intervention nor did it increase or decrease foreign support. All other countries can do is basically continue to stand by.

Most recently, we are deeply disturbed by CBS correspondent Lara Logan’s attack.

Another tweet from AC:

“Sickened and saddened by the attack on Lara Logan. She is in all of our thoughts and prayers.”

This makes me wonder, why don’t journalists enjoy immunity? Diplomats do. They represent the government of the sending state in the receiving state, and they have all sorts of diplomatic privileges and immunities. Including but not limited to special parking spaces, no income taxes and special security forces, these rules protect our diplomats.

In a way, couldn’t we say the media also serves as a representation of a certain country? By having our reporters out there, we show we care. We are delivering news to people back home so they would know what’s going on and in Egypt’s case, so Egyptian Americans can receive information.

Perhaps calling for diplomatic immunity is just too much. But why can’t we get some respect and protection from horrible crimes? All we want to is produce that newscast.