"Korea" Part 2: Fighting

"Grandma, I'm going to Korea."

I'm never going to forget the day I told my grandmother I booked a flight to Korea. I will also never forget when I thought my grandmother was right about not being a good idea to travel by myself.

During my first Korea trip, I fell ill. I was vomitting, waking up with a bloody nose, and just in general my body didn't cooperate. I've been to Canada and Mexico, but I've never been out of the North American continent until that time. I also never went out of the country by myself. Sure, I flew to other states and to Southern California on my own, but never to some completely foreign place.

Was grandma right?

I was bedridden, crying and felt like my heart was being ripped out of me. I was really depressed. Despite the fact I was absolutely sick, the thing killing me the most was...loneliness. Were things turning for the worst? "Jasmine: 22 years old, died from vomitting and nosebleeding whn she went overseas. Oh and was lonely." Was that going to be my fate? Was I going to continue being lonely since everyone else that I knew at the time was busy? Was I going to keep complaining that my original plans had to be scrapped?

Nope, I refused to let that slide.

I refused to let myself get thrown aside and let myself mope around the entire trip. I had to stop being scared. I had to stop letting myself be comfortable and lazy. I decided to try befriending my guesthouse roommates and socialize more. I ended up opening up my borders and exploring more.

If it wasn't for this trip, I wouldn't have been more adventurous. If it wasn't for Korea, I wouldn't be as curious to travel and make new friends. I met many people with different stories on why they came to the country. Some came to study. Some came to work. And some...well, came for love.

When some people ask me "Why did you go to Korea?" I came to accept that I'll be saying:

"I went to see a guy."

First Barre Class

I haven't taken a dance class in years.

I also haven't been very "active", and I'll be honest: I hate running, hiking, a lot of hard activity. But lately I've been disappointed in myself because I'm definitely out of shape. I want to wear midriff tops. I want to feel good about myself. I miss dancing and I honestly shouldn't be letting myself go.

So, I ended up trying out a barre class at Pop Physique in San Francisco's Mission District.

Was it easy? Fuck no! My instructor made me work! She helped me push myself even if it was my first day. Am I tired? Definitely!

But you know, it made me feel good. It made me feel awesome that even though I am totally out of shape and sweating buckets, it made determined to keep going. I wasn't the girl that walked out. I wasn't the girl who bullshitted. I am the girl that wants to change herself.

I can't wait for next week's class!

Why I Went to Korea, Part 1 up

I've been thinking about it for a while. I love to Korea to death. I especially miss the friends I left behind there and the many memories that happened there. Every day, I wonder what they are up to and how they are doing. Every day, I wonder why fate made it that I would be so far away from them and why I still think of them.

I'll be honest. I went to Korea for the first tme for all the wrong resasons. These reasons were extremely selfish and back when I was very immature. Back in 2013, someone asked for me to come to Korea. "Well, I'll think about it..." I thought. During that time, I just started becoming a substitute teacher so I can get hands-on experience working in classrooms and working with children, and scheduling was pretty flexible as long as I told my agency I wasn't available to work certain days. I eventually realized that I had the opportunity to tak advantage of it. So I wondered...."Now that I went to Evo, went to all these tournaments, what's next for me?"

When I was young, I always wanted to visit the Philippines, the birth country of my parents and the home of my relatives my grandmother keeps in touch with still. However, I also wanted to visit Japan, France, and a bunch of other countries. But honestly, besides Canada and Mexico, I never really left the country. As thankful as I was to go to other states, I never really got out of the North American continent. But anyway....

Let's fast forward to say, maybe a couple weeks or a month after Evo. Grandma says "Jasmine, we're going to the Philippines next year." I blurt out "Grandma, can we visit another country too?" Grandma offers China as a side trip, but then I think about when I was offered to visit Korea.

"Grandma, I want to go to Korea."

 My grandma immediately disapproves. On top of that, a few weeks later after telling some of my friends that I'll be going to the Philippines next summer, my grandma suddenly decided to postpone the trip.

Why? I asked my grandmother. Then I knew what was coming...

"It's too hot, it's too rainy, not safe, etc."

What the fuck? I'm 20-something years old, and I'm thinking this is the same shit all over again that you constanly said the past years I asked as a preteen and a teenager. At this point, I'm done with this bullshit.

Then I realized, wait, I'm 20-something years old. I can book my own flight. I can book my own room. I have a job with flexible scheduling. Fuck it, let's find some flights to Korea.

Bam. $700-something USD flight roundtrip from SFO to ICN.
Bam. Cheap guesthouses to stay at.
Bam. This girl is going to Korea for Summer 2014.

But what this girl didn't realize was that things weren't going to be truly a dream trip.
This girl didn't realize after three days, she was going to be ill and bedridden at one point of the trip.
This girl didn't realize her phone was going to get wiped out.
This girl didn't realize she was almost screwed over.

Yet, somehow this girl ended up picking herself up and enjoyed herself. This same girl decided to not let her dreams be shattered and took action to make new friends and go beyond her comfort zone. As difficult as it was at first, this girl ended up coming back to Korea, not twice, but a total of five times.

How did she do it?
Why did she do it?

To be continued...

I played a notoriously bad game...

And actually had a fun time!

Now you're probably wondering "How can I have such a blast playing a failure game?" and "How bad of a video game are we talking?"

Well, lo and behold...

One of the teams I had. I always use Juri when I have to resort to using a pad-style controller!

Yes...that is indeed the infamous Street Fighter x Tekken. But you know what, despite the fact that this game was a lost hope for the competitive fighting game scene, when playing it in a casual setting witha an absolutely shitty game streaming service (NVIDIA please fix that shit), it was one of the most memorable experiences I had during San Francisco Foundry's Game Night.

This game's controls is definitely a lot more like Street Fighter, but there is a tag option that is similar to Tekken Tag. As for character choices...well it's not as "populated" like Ultra Street Fighter IV or Tekken Tag Tournament 2, but hey, Capcom had to pick and choose! However, on a serious note,  I can definitely see how this game was rushed and overhyped. While I feel like Bandai Namco takes their sweet old time *cough #whenstekkenxstreetfighter and #tekken7forconsole cough*, Capcom likes to go full speed despite the fact this results in things not working in their favor.

Do I think that Street Fighter x Tekken would've been a lot better if it wasn't rushed? Definitely! Is it a terribly made game? Kinda, but hey, it's not as crappy like the disaster of The King of Fighters 12. Overall, I'd probably play Street Fighter x Tekken to fulfill my preteen fanfiction fantasies of the Street Fighter world and Tekken world merging. And you know...for fun! When your friends are quarreling to play some Street Fighter or Tekken, make them play this. Maybe they'll reconcile, sit down and play. Get some laughs in and have a blast, or even make a drinking game out of it. Or you know, maybe they'll think it's so bad they question why they were fighting about video games and they can do other things, like go outside and enjoy the California drought weather.

Real talk though, shoutouts to Street Fighter x Tekken for making me actually update this damn blog. When Twitter can't express all my thoughts, I need to remember this exists.

Whoopie! I have a new banner!

I just LOVE this new banner that my friend, NY's Finest, made me!

It's now my banner for my Facebook fanpage, Twitter, and well...this blog!

Come check out his stuff here!

One Year of Street Fighter, and Many More for the FGC Life

Hey everyone, this is "Miss ShinoBee". I suppose it's time I start a daily blog to vent out my thoughts and chit chat a bit more about what's on my mind and what's going on in my life, since you can only do so much on other social media platforms.

Wall art from ArcadeStream in Seoul, Korea.

At this point, it's been a year since I started playing Ultra Street Fighter IV. I first got to try it out at Capcom Cup 2013, then once more at SoCal Regionals 2014. During this time, I was trying to lead a "more normal" life but also wanted to finally get out of the North American continent for once. It was the first time I traveled out of the country on my own: I was a 22 year old girl that honestly didn't know what she was gonna do in life and no serious goals. I was not motivated, unless it involved chasing false dreams that turned out to be disappointments.

I first played USFIV on console in Seoul, South Korea. I remember having no clue on anything about Street Fighter 4 except that Poison was cool and that I was going to pick up the game once Ultra was out. I remember getting looked down for fucking sucking. What do you expect? It wasn't like The King of Fighters or Tekken (I sucked at both of those games despite liking them), it was a game I didn't take too seriously because I had no interest in it during previous years. And then I saw the problem: I jumped in not knowing what to do. It was jumping into a deep sea of danger without any scuba gear or a flotation device, where I could sink and come out dead. After that, more disappointments occurred that spiraled into swimming in the deep sea of no return.

Or so I thought.

Then it occurred to me. After enough moping and not getting shit done around, I realized "Hey, what the hell? My family didn't raise a dumbass. My life isn't over. Fuck what those idiots think. Fuck those people that tried to make me quit USFIV by constantly talking down on me even though they are no better. I shouldn't look up to them, I should have looked up to the people who matter, who are there for me and make sure no one gets in my way." With whatever I had, whatever help I found along the way, I floated back up to the surface.

That doesn't mean I ended up quitting. No, I jumped right back in, willing to fight more. But this time, I have motivation, goals, and a future to carve and look forward to. Sure, there may be times I'm feeling down, but that didn't make me quit. That didn't make me whine about the FGC being toxic and that it should be annihilated.

Looking back, I was younger and dumber. Hell, I still think I'm young and dumb! I definitely need to learn a lot more, but I'm willing to become wiser. Do I get busy? I definitely get busy and I definitely get exhausted, but I can't let that stop me. I still so many goals waiting for me, and if I were to give up now, I might as well give up on living. That is definitely not on the agenda.

Here's to a year of playing Street Fighter. 
Here's to a year where my life took a turn. 
Here's to a year of surviving the odds and fighting no matter what. 
Here's to a year of not giving up. 

Here's to surviving the first half of the 2015 saga.