This summer was one that Starcraft definitely played a huge component in. I've met a lot of people across the country now and have had a lot of fun with this game. Early in the summer I dreaded having to take a long flight from California to Washington D.C. to do a summer volunteer student at the NIH, but I found an opportunity for Starcraft that would be very rare. Returning home was difficult since the people over on the East coast were just amazing and really enthusiastic about Starcraft, but following what I did in Washington D.C. I had another amazing Starcraft experience.
When I first got to Washington D.C. I had to immediately start working the 9-5 for no pay at the NIH. It was definitely not fun for me in the place I was living in either - I shared a bathroom with three other people, had a terrible internet connection (9 people using the internet at once) and was furnished with nothing more than a few chairs and a bed. There wasn't even a TV! The internet connection was terrible for me because I would often get 1mbps or 2mbps on very low connection, or sometimes it would say 48 mbps very good but still be slow as molasses. Loading youtube videos took forever, and playing games on iCCup almost always lagged. In addition, my room was freezing since it was right next to the air conditioning and I had to do my own cooking every day, which I had never done before. Living by myself was definitely a fun experience though, because when I wasn't lagging terribly I got in a lot of Starcraft.
During my time I played one hundred games I think, getting myself up to B-. At one point in time I met lastshadow, and we decided to 2v2 after finding out that we didn't hate each other. Starting off was dismal, and we went something like 7-5 at D+ rank. But slowly as we started getting accustomed to each other we began getting higher and higher ranks, and though the lag was not comfortable, finally having a consistent 2v2 partner was amazing. We would often talk about the progaming scene, etc. I was definitely having a lot of fun with Starcraft.
In the same time period, I started a thread on Teamliquid asking if there were any people living in the area. I was planning to organize a LAN, even though I didn't even live in the area normally. Thankfully though, the response was enormous and we finally got a LAN date set up. The few days leading up to the LAN were so exciting that I would just sit and smile thinking about it. I was also very worried about the LAN though and extremely anxious - what if this went wrong, what if that went wrong? I researched tons of restaurants in the area and in my free time at work I would continually be looking at LAN tips and guides, etc. I was definitely consumed by this process! I remember one of the most nervewracking moments I had was calling the LAN center and asking if we could come in on the day we planned - I have no idea why I was so nervous and scared to talk to the dude, but with some convincing on Ventrilo by my friends I picked up the phone and called.
"Hi, how can I help you?" "Um... is this... Seoul...? PC?" "Yes this is Seoul PC, can I help you? "Ya well uh... we... I was wondering... if maybe we could come in on July 11th and uh... ya if we could come in and play Starcraft on the 11th?" "Ok, how many people?" "Twenty-five." "Twenty-five?! That's a lot of people... you can't make a reservation for that..."
As soon as he said those words I was really worried, but eventually we talked and, after I explained to him what "iCCup maps” were everything was settled, the LAN was set.
Seoul PC... Gamer's haven...
A few days before the LAN I met up with David (duckett), a TL lurker. He was also working at the NIH so over the next few weeks we would often meet up during lunch and eat some pizza together. On the day of the LAN, I took the bus to his house and after about 15 minutes, Mona (hazelynut) and her brother Peter showed up. Then, it was time for a drive to Virginia! It was really nice talking to them and easy too because we were all Starcraft fanatics – they introduced me to some kpop and everything and Mona showed off her amazing Korean skills. When we got to the LAN center we went and got some lunch and continued to talk. We were in Koreantown, so it was easy to get some Korean food. They were showing tons of dramas on the TV and they were really weird and awkward (though Mona loves those k-dramas :D) so we actually asked them if they could put up MBC Game on TV, but unfortunately they didn’t have it After lunch we went to Seoul PC and waited outside for the other people to come. As soon as 1:30 PM hit it was amazing how many people just showed up out of nowhere, wearing SKT shirts and TL shirts and etc and being almost perfectly on time. We went in and announced to the guy working inside that we would be planning to be there for like 10 hours, and he dropped his mouth and was like “10 hours?!?! We thought it was just going to be like 2!” but they let us in and gave us all the computers in a tiny crowded section of the LAN. It was really great getting to meet everyone and the LAN was one of the best experiences ever. We ended up playing from 1:30 to like 3:00 AM so more than 13 hours or something like that. My worries earlier were not completely unfounded - we almost didn’t have room in the restaurant because I didn’t make a reservation early enough, I messed up the brackets over nine thousand times because of people being late, me not knowing what to do and also me just being very inept at using binarybeast, and when I was leading to the restaurant I was really scared for a second when we saw the building and instead of saying some gooldongae restaurant it said “Honey Pig ++!” with a big picture of a pig on the wall. But overall it was great!
I thought it would look like this...
But actually... it looked like this!
The next few days would be spent working and then looking at the thread and seeing everyone’s posts. I would go out and watch two movies with TL.net members from the LAN in the course of the next week (Transformers and Harry Potter) and go hang out with Mona/David/Peter several times, in which we did exotic things like eat Hagen-daas ice cream from the Giant store, eat chicken wings, eat Peter’s homemade kung pow chicken, clean out the garlic drawer, get sprayed by a broken faucet and do some commentaries in the living room. Spending time with people who were just as interested in the same thing I was was just really amazing. Leaving kind of sucked, but when I finally got back home I knew exactly what I wanted to do…
Organize another LAN! I immediately started another thread and people started giving suggestions of where to go. The people in the Bay Area definitely seem a lot less enthusiastic about LANs. I remember in DC it was like – “Yes! A LAN! Any time, any place, let’s do it! I can help too, I’ll go and bring my camera, and go to Seoul PC and ask the owner what the rates are, and etc. etc. A LAN!” and now they’ve done another LAN and a finals meetup, and are planning another large LAN in October. They definitely have taken their enthusiasm and really run with this Starcraft meetups stuff People drove from over one hour away to get to the LAN. People donated a total of $90 to a prize pool! This is in stark contrast to here – “Oh… can’t do this day and can’t do that day, before the 22nd please but after the 13th!” but I guess it’s understandable because the people here are spoiled by a lot more LANs. Still, we had a great turnout (15 or so) and some people drove from pretty far away to come (although no one donated to a prize pool but me ). As well, I should have put more effort into the organization and been less ambivalent about the date, but I only realized this bad attribute thanks to their lessened enthusiasm. In DC, all the work was practically already done for me by everyone else! So all in all I’ve learned a lot about LAN organizing in just two LANs and I’m definitely planning to do a lot more. LANs are just really the most amazing, wonderfullest awesomenest thing! I’m hoping to have ones that aren’t as big either because sometimes tournaments aren’t that fun for those D’s and D+’s, so we could do some more relaxing things like UMS (we did this in the last 2 hours of the BATTL I) or maybe even “normal” things like going bowling or something LOL. Seriously it would be really cool to just go watch movies with other Starcraft friends like what I was able to do in Washington D.C.
Oh, hello yosh's face!
One of my worries is that when Starcraft 2 comes out the things will be way out of my league – but who knows? It’s still a long ways off and I’m sure I’ll be doing a lot more LANs leading up to that. Hopefully I can make small steps and get bigger turnouts each time, and make it more professional and fun to come to, etc.
Hopefully more professional than THIS masterpiece work of art, however…
My dream would be to get like 30+ people and have some energy drink company sponsor us with free energy drinks. That would be the culmination of AWESOME. Or maybe get a big enough event to rent out some school gym or something which would be pretty cheap, but then I’d have to learn how to do power management, table setups, routers, hubs and networks, but if there was someone skilled in that that would be really cool.
Getting B+
This blog, as I think about it now, is just going to turn into a big conglomeration of ideas and things that have happened that I want to slap down on writing. It’s not well-written at all, but I really enjoy Starcraft now. I went into a very long stint of no Starcraft – it was a several month long hiatus in which I played DotA with Testie and the TL Crew and poker (for playmoney -_-). But LANs, getting to meet people in real life, etc. has really rekindled my flame for Starcraft. Just today I got B+ for the first time. I still remember when I was a D/D+ newbie making commentaries with a high-pitched prepubescent voice. I’ve always wanted to get back into doing that, and I still do, but there’s so many put-offs for me For one, the scene is already dominated by Cholera and SC2GG, moletrap, etc. (Oh yeah, and I’m surprised moletrap didn’t come to the LAN!) If I do a progame commentary, it’ll already have been done and uploaded by one of them, and no one will watch mine because they want to watch their favorite commentator. Also, FPVODs and commentaries of replays are annoying to make because for some reason uploading them to Youtube takes me forever.
But anyways, back to the topic of B+. The road to B+, heh. I’m not sure whether my “knowledge” of the game has really improved, because when I look at it I still feel like I know so little about the strategy of the game. But the reason I am in love with Starcraft is just because it is so in-depth. I’m not the fondest fan of its community a lot of the time, but that’s just from my perspective (I really haven’t made a good first impression when I first came and it’s lasted for quite a while). So while it feels like I’m the same skill level as before, but now a higher rank, I question whether iCCup has been getting easier or whether I actually have been getting better. This season I achieved the high B with lastshadow (90-49, 7755), and probably could have gotten A- if we had continued or if I got another solid partner. But it’s always impossible for me to get a partner. And my 1v1 rank is 92-60, 8085. Two seasons ago when I got B for the first time, I was 64-27 and in the top 20 in USA (ladderwise). Now I’m B+ but in the top 30, so I’m not sure if more people played this season or if the ladder really has been getting easier. When I played yosh in the BATTL I, he still played me like a D- newb and I was completely dominated. He seemed to know my every move – I try to expand and he has a turret there in the middle of the expansion, waiting for me. I try to go around his army with lurkers to cut off reinforcements, he is ready for me and kills the isolated lurkers. I really never feel anywhere close to that level – I don’t know any of the “timings” of a Terran, like when they SHOULD have an ebay or when they SHOULD have their 3 raxes, or whatever. Protoss I’m a bit better with knowing what they should have and when. But I never seem to have accomplished the level of thinking in which you are analyzing your opponent as much and more than you are even making decisions for your own play. But I am proud of the B+ this season because I started playing early in the season, unused to a tiny laptop with a tiny screen and with lots of lag, and played often in Korean time (as opposed to two seasons ago, when I played late late season only and stopped playing as soon as Korean time started to begin).
Ah well, I guess as this year begins my love for Starcraft will have to be put on hold. I’m still only going to be a junior in highschool, as opposed to how most of the Starcraft people are college aged. I’m going to busy with sports, lots of AP classes, SAT, etc. but hopefully I can still find time to have LANs and to continue enjoying this wonderful game. When Starcraft 2 comes out I am a little bit afraid of the masses upon masses of new people that are going to be playing it. But for now, Starcraft is the best :D
Hi, I will be in Washington D.C. for about 6 weeks starting this Saturday (the 13th I think) for an NIH internship/volunteer work. Wondering if anyone has done NIH before and what it's like, also if anyone is near there we could meet up or something
Btw, I'll have a HP Mini-note laptop, you guys think it's good enough to play Starcraft? I'll try installing it tomorrow, but I read the reviews and heard that it's processor isn't great and the computer gets really hot... I've seen people playing SC on the Asus though iirc.
Thanks to Chill for allowing me to make FPVODs that increased my subscriber count from a meager 557 to a staggering 559. This augmented my confidence levels exponentially.
Thanks to iNcontroL for teaching me that 3 hat speedlings was the way to beat all Protoss, but only if they cannon rush six times of course!
Thanks to DotA for providing me the necessary micro to achieve this rank I once thought unattainable. My last hitting on zealots has improved immensely and I had wondrous denies on my zerglings and defilers. My farming beginning from early game continued to stack onto my creep stats to give me insurmountable advantages that I would take throughout the game to get the win.
Thanks to Michael Jackson for providing me with thousands of expert advice, replays and inspirational songs. My favorites include "A B- C" by the Jackson 5, which told me B- was easy as 1 2 3. Also "Beat it [intrigue]" which gave me a lot of motivation.
Thanks to myself not listening to Chill because I stayed in school and thus was able to use my geometry and algebra skills to determine game decisions such as flank angles and transitive properties. Conic equations were especially important in assisting me to quickly know where to attack and when. Without such education I would never have been able to attain this rank.
And lastly, thank you, for the support which I am grateful for. Except you intrigue, I hate you.
LAN B4 Time III yesterday on Friday was great. I took several pictures and the organization of the LAN was so much improved from last year, I was really impressed! This year they had snacks for sale, air mattresses, people with good cameras taking pictures, broadcasted finals on a projector (with Zalfor commentating), and they recorded us playing. Things, although they went smoothly, were a bit slow, but overall very fun! Unfortunately yosh or G5 didn't come, but it was fun regardless and I think the turnout was even greater than last year even though there was such short notice.
I began the day excited. At 7:00 I arrived in Berkeley and my brother had to eat some dinner a bit before we left - we arrived at Dwinelle at about 7:35 and there were already several people there. Many people I did not recognize, but I met Anthony (phase) and Nimue and Aaron (Gearitup). My brother's friends also showed up and I met them for this first time. As I began to set up the laptop and warm up, guess who showed up?
Evanthebouncey! bLAHAGHAagahgghahgahAHAGAHGAH!!!
I had met Evan the last year, and he is very fun to be around!
My brother Jing and his friends: Jing, Joey, Tren, Young
General overview of the room at about 8:30 - Zalfor at the far left, GreenGloop (in the green shirt), Nimue at the front of the room in the HYE shirt, Heathen (LxRogue) at the far right
People crowding around Anthony (phase) and his fast Terran hands, from left to right: Joey, Tren, John (Zalfor), Young, Anthony (phase), ?
Hey, it's paper! paper came last year and is a very cool person, although he didn't play any Starcraft and just obsed for about 4 hours or so (probably left to play DotA, LAWL)
Don't know the names of all the people in the picture but they are all watching Evan play some epic Starcraft, in the center of the picture are paper and evan.
From left to right: Allen (Nimue), Heathen (LxRogue) and Aaron (Gearitup). Aaron was referred to as 'the white guy' and Heathen was referred to as 'the other white guy'. They were the only white people in the tournament. On the board is Starcraft DeCAL - some course sometime next semester that Nimue (?), Yosh and some other people are going to be teaching that involves Starcraft strategy afaik. Heathen is left-handed and actually used the mouse with his left hand and macroed with his right hand, and it was quite interesting to watch. Nimue was some 380 apm C- Protoss and was really fast.
People crowding around to watch my brother play vs Evan. Look at the smiles and laughs on my brother's face as his reaver owns Evan's probes, and then look at Evan's gaping wide mouth as he is astonished by the incredible damage.
We had 3 girls at the LAN - one was playing the just-released WoW: Wrath of the Lich King (pshhh), and the other two played Starcraft ;D
A picture of me taking my miracle Starcraft drink in preparation for a game
Me playing vs John (Zalfor) ZvZ in an epic loser bracket semifinals. More on this later.
The finals - me and Heathen were set to another room to play while it was broadcasted on the projector in the other room.
My face of determination!
Heathen stares/glares at me with a wicked smile in an attempt to intimidate me... your actions do not phase me!!! Or do they =(
The main coordinator (I still forgot to ask his name this year) of the event informed us of what we were going to do. Heathen has his black screen of death.
Our first game on Andromeda begins.
The projector screen showing our match live, with commentary by John (Zalfor)
A mutalisk battle takes place. I had superior micro to him and was able to constantly take out his larger forces, but his economy builds and my lack of damage to him eventually led to my demise as he overran me.
Very fun event. I had lots of fun. Last Romantic also popped in for about 10 minutes and mingled around, but left because he HATES STARCRAFT!!!!%!@I)%!#*%^)#^T) %T*@V%_@TIFW
I got 2nd place in the tournament and $20, Heathen got 1st place and $40. The only sets that I lost were to Heathen, when he dropped me to losers' brackets and then again in the finals. However, I was very very happy with the outcome and found out he was about C+/B- rank too. Although I originally was going to leave early at around 11 o clock or so because of a volleyball tournament the next day, I could not leave because it was so fun (I wanted to continue playing in the tournament to see how far I got) and I stayed until almost 2:30 AM, and had to run on the tournament today with 3 hours of sleep. Didn't affect me much though!
The majority of all the people were Zerg, with a few Protoss and only one Terran afaik. Thus, I played many ZvZs and just only one ZvP and no ZvT. Heathen dropped me down to losers' bracket with a good hydralisk build that I did not counter effectively because I wasted too many units in defending a far away expansion. The second game he overran me when 6 of my scourge hit one mutalisk.
Next, I played some more people and 2-0'd them, and I finally came upon Zalfor in the losers' brackets. In an epic ZvZ set, I triumphed 2-1. First game I lost pretty badly, and the second game I was able to come on top. The last game was easily the best, with both of our apm jumping 20-30 more than average (we both had about 205 apm). Zalfor has not been playing much recently, yet he is still extremely strong. Last year he took 2nd place to yosh, this year he was dropped to losers' brackets by Heathen as well. It was a great series and I only saved one of the replays, but I hope Zalfor saved the rest, although I'm not sure if he did.
Finally in the finals after beating Nimue, I went in unconfident because I was already 0-2 vs Heathen. Regardless, I tried my best. Both of the games were fairly good, although I'll still have to check the replays to analyze his play more, I think he did some sort of 9 overpool fast expansion and lair. First game I went 9 overpool and we were fairly even until his expansion was able to kick in and overrun me. Second game I was behind the whole game and almost came back with 2.5 control groups of lings I sent at him as I was dying, taking out his entire main but only getting his last hatchery down to mid-red before he fended it off with newly hatched eggs and mutas. I was still alive at this point, but with only 2 drones vs his 2 drones (and 6 lings and 12 or so mutas), I had to type out.
The LAN was great fun and can't wait for the next one! Thanks for reading.
Tomorrow I'm going to Shanghai, staying for a night, a day and another night before leaving back to the States. No internet access there, so I'll be about 3 days without contacting TL o.o! After 100 posts in like, 3 days this week I've made(wow wtf). Anyways, yeah took some more pictures and tomorrow I'm off. This concludes my adventures in China, for at least 3 years I guess. My parents don't want me to come back every year like I have the last three years or so because they will want me to start taking SAT classes all summer like my brother did. ;( I really love visiting China!
Here's all the pics if anyone is somehow interested...
I have an ominous feeling that my plane back to America is going to crash and I'll die... fOREVER!!! But w/e, I've been on like 30 planes my entire life so yeah... but that's kinda freaky lol.
evan I don't think they're going to make another lan before time in berkeley so we're probably should organize one ourselves! Altho you are in Chengdu at the moment so w/e you don't even have internet T_T.
I just wanted to post this because right now I'm watching China own Cuba in the female volleyball in the Olympics, which is a pretty strange sight o.o and yeah I'm leaving tomorrow I have to get back to america and tryout for volleyball again and break my rust so I can face some people in some friendly tourney. oh ya and some gay ap summer homeworks... T_T wow I can't believe I haven't played SC or watched a VOD in over 6 weeks! Oh well, I had tons of fun in China! I definitely recommend it to those who haven't gone, and there's just a ton of stuff to do here. Thx for reading lol
I LOVE TL.NET!!! Stay cooooool like a cooooool cats!! woohoooo
Ugh. In my stupidity, I messed up the last blog as you should all know if you read some of my other blogs. Well, yesterday I visited Beijing (although I thought I wasn't going to, if you see my 'Olympic Terrorists' Blog) and I took a lot of pictures. It was pretty nice, so this time instead of posting a blog and messing it up, wasting my time, I'll just show the pictures with some bits of descriptions. A couple things that I should probably summarize from the blog I was going to make...
1. Played Popkart (for the first time) and DotA in Fuzhou 2. New Oriental took SAT classes, but all they did was teach English instead of any math so my mom made my aunt get the money refunded 3. CCTV 9 - english channel 4. Ugh not really much, Beijing looks really nice lots of blue sky white clouds etc. rest of China seems to be improving too.
Well I uploaded like 80+ pictures to Facebook and it says you can put a link that people w/o Facebook or not your friends can see... so let's hope this works!
I've lived a wasted 15 years, but this has been something I've taken great offense in. You must be joking...? 'Omg, Tibet needs free human rights lolooolol yaya let's go bomb tha stupid crane's nest or wataever then we'll free Tibetans 4ever!!! ayayayaya!1!1!1shift+1!1!' In my stupidity, I feel like this is like, the most hypocritical thing I've heard of. 'They abused human rights! Let's go kill millions of innocent people!' Being a 2 hour drive away from Beijing, I told my aunt and uncle that we should go visit Beijing and see all the famous stuff to see - but then my mom called on the phone and was like 'omg terrorists no more trip to beijing for youuuu'. There's so much security there and yet something is bound to go wrong.
I hope that this thread isn't one of those 'anti-china' threads. I don't want to discuss anything about Tibet or anything. I want to discuss why some people take it upon themselves to actually go terrorize an international event. Please forgive me if you take offense to this thread. I hope you venerable elders will provide your just opinions on this topic, though.
Please read this poem below and understand my viewpoint and perspective on this issue. If anyone deems something unwarranted in this thread, please do not hesitate to tell me so I can remove it as quickly as possible. ***The poem was not written by me but I saw it when my parents were reading it many months ago. Some points of the poem I do not entirely agree with but I believe the emotion is there and I fully agree on that. I have edited the poem for grammar and spelling.
When we were called Sick Man of Asia, we were called the Peril. When we were billed to be the next Superpower, we are called the threat.
When we closed our doors, you smuggled drugs to open markets. When we embraced free trade, you blamed us for taking away your jobs.
When we were falling apart, you marched in your troops and wanted your "fair share". When we were putting the broken pieces together again, "Free Tibet" you screamed, "it was an invasion!"
So we tried Communism, and you hated us for being Communists. When we embraced Capitalism, you hated us for being Capitalist.
When we had a billion people, you said we were destroying the planet. When we tried limiting our numbers, you said it was human right's abuse.
When we were poor, you looked at us like we were dogs. When we loaned you cash, you blamed us for your debts.
When we built our industries, you called us polluters. When we sold you goods, you blamed us for global warming.
When we buy oil, you call that exploitation and genocide. When you fight for oil, you call that liberation.
When we were lost in chaos and rampage, you wanted Rules of Law for us. When we upheld law and order against violence, you called that human right's violations.
When we were silent, you said you wanted us to have free speech. When we were silent no more, you said we were brainwashed-Xenophoics.
"Why do you hate us so much?" we asked. "No," you answered, "We don't hate you."
"We don't hate you either, but do you understand us?"
"Of course we do," you said, "We have AFP, CNN and BBCs..."
What do you really want from us? Think hard first, then answer...
Because you only get so many chances, Enough is enough, enough hypocrisy for this one world.
We want One World, One Dream, And Peace On Earth. - This Big Blue Earth is Big Enough for all of us.
omg i just spent like 45 writing my chinese adventures ii blog and i was gonna have pics and everything i had like 7 pages handwritten and i was on like page 5 and then i hit the backspace bar when the mouse cursor wasn't inside the white little box and omg omg omg I copy pasted like every 5 lines but then I accidently copy pasted the link to evanthebouncey!'s blog and then when I hit backspace it went back and I lost everything and i was like 'aha! this is where copy + paste comes in ahdny!' and then it only gave me the link to evan's blog T______________T
SO SAD SO SAD I AM SO SADDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
and then omg omg then now I'm like ok im just not going to write it no one cares about my life anyways but then i was like omg but i wrote for so long nooo and now i know the moral of the story use microsoft word for long stuff
o ya and i was gonna put how i was contemplating making like omg like a club in my school "esports club" and that woulda been so cool and i had so many plans and was gonna ask TL.net what else i should do toher than teach about korean peeps and all the games out there and wcg and then organize lan parties but now im so sad i dont feel like ((
i am enrage and delirious!!! ti30tuiqpgjeqw vt09832ny238 09yth30rmawdf;oeafheiofae!!!
?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?!?
EDIOT: omg i am so much mroe angry now i taken the shower and brushing teeth but now in america u all just waking up and im so much more angry because omg AHHHHHHHHHH
hot bid u have so much better the commentating because u chinese please i want you commentate more please do not hit it i feel like yelling 杀！杀！杀！like they do in that commercial chinese commerical and they go like woooo kill the mosquito!!!
but then chill would just come and be like hahaha but not hahahah because he don't laugh like that he laughs like the cool cat way which is 'kheehehehehehehehe' like when rofflesupplecakes came
but mabe tha stupid person is not actually the stupid person of stupidity u may be thinking because of stupid but the person is not really stupid but it is just becuz u dont want teh stupid person to win against the other stupid smart asian!!
and then evan will be like omg i so sorry and then turn emo and slit his wrist but then he won't because i met him at berkeley and he can only turn emo for 3 second before turning into bouncey again
and sayasp u know what u want i want and that is what you think!
please!!!! SO MUCH ANGERY!!!
I WANT TO SAY AYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYA BUT I CANT BECUZ DEPRESSION INFECTING ME (OR TASTLESS WOULD SAY INFEST OLOLOL STARKRAFT REFERNACE GET IT LIK INFESTED PROTOSS AND TERRN WITH TA INFESTER)
i goto sleepy bed now i recollect myself in the morning of tomorrow and pls all kid learn from my mistake and history will not undo itself!!!
edit: before i go to the shuteye i mus say tl probably find this ever more enteringtaining than a chinese blog so just knowing tl but make fun of someones angry is just like religious zealot coming to your house and eating your pancakes!!!
Well, as you probably know, I've been in China. Leaving on July 4, Friday, it was an 11 hour flight to Japan, a 4 hour wait in Japan and then another 2 hour flight to Shanghai. It was very tiring, and as of now I still haven't gotten over jet lag because of this weird thing that adds up to about a total of 18 hours travelling (plus I was awake about 4 hours prior to the planes) so about 22 hours, and I didn't sleep much on the plane because my brother and I watched Vantage Point, 21, and 10000 BC.
Basically we got to Shanghai and went to our aunt's house and played some GTA4 the next day, then left on a train to Fuzhou (18 hour train). On the train we were pretty bored, so we talked about stuff like Starcraft 2, Teamliquid, MSG damage and Rick Roll (which my brother thought was a sushi roll made by a guy named Rick o.o).
I'm pretty overwhelmed by the astounding rate of development in China. When I was 8 it was a huuuuuge difference between now, and I've had the privilege to be able to come to china almost every year (I've been to china at age 5, 8, 11, 13, 14, and now at 15). Everyone used to ride bikes and stuff, and now they've been replaced with lots of scooters (although bikes are still quite prominent).
Also, I've really been overwhelmed as well by the skill of the drivers in China. I don't know where the stereotype that asians are bad drivers came from, but in China they are great drivers. The lanes are WAYYYY more narrow than in the states and also the drivers must be much more aggressive and watch out of lots of pedestrians and bikes. In America, it's first come first serve, but in China, if you're the first person to block another car off then you can go. Basically if you were an american driving in China, you would get nowhere.
I also really like the culture of China. Really, the elderly are much more respected and filial piety is much more honored as well. If an old person comes on a bus, someone immediately gives up their seat for them. When people are honking, it's not like the american honk of "FUCK YOU BITCH" but more of an announcement of relative location. Of course, after about 5 beeps it becomes a more urgent "GET OUT OF THE WAY RETARD".
Anyways, about Starcraft. I'm a bit disappointed that I couldn't finish the qualifiers and attend the pacific region 3rd qualifiers round 2, but oh well, there's always next year (which I'm for sure not going to China). The biggest disappointment is when I was playing (the day before I left) I realllly felt like I was at the top of my game, reaching a consistent level of 210 apm and really doing great, whereas generally I have been hovering around 160-180 apm.
Tomorrow I will be gone for about 4 days, but I hope you guys have fun playing against Sea[Shield] and all that other stuff! I'll have to watch the finals and everything and I can't wait to see how that turns out :DDD
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After lunch we went to Seoul PC and waited outside for the other people to come. As soon as 1:30 PM hit it was amazing how many people just showed up out of nowhere, wearing SKT shirts and TL shirts and etc and being almost perfectly on time. We went in and announced to the guy working inside that we would be planning to be there for like 10 hours, and he dropped his mouth and was like “10 hours?!?! We thought it was just going to be like 2!” but they let us in and gave us all the computers in a tiny crowded section of the LAN. It was really great getting to meet everyone and the LAN was one of the best experiences ever. We ended up playing from 1:30 to like 3:00 AM so more than 13 hours or something like that. My worries earlier were not completely unfounded - we almost didn’t have room in the restaurant because I didn’t make a reservation early enough, I messed up the brackets over nine thousand times because of people being late, me not knowing what to do and also me just being very inept at using binarybeast, and when I was leading to the restaurant I was really scared for a second when we saw the building and instead of saying some gooldongae restaurant it said “Honey Pig ++!” with a big picture of a pig on the wall. But overall it was great!![[image loading]](http://seoulpcworld.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/seoul_network.209203549_std.jpg)
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). As well, I should have put more effort into the organization and been less ambivalent about the date, but I only realized this bad attribute thanks to their lessened enthusiasm. In DC, all the work was practically already done for me by everyone else! So all in all I’ve learned a lot about LAN organizing in just two LANs and I’m definitely planning to do a lot more. LANs are just really the most amazing, wonderfullest awesomenest thing! I’m hoping to have ones that aren’t as big either because sometimes tournaments aren’t that fun for those D’s and D+’s, so we could do some more relaxing things like UMS (we did this in the last 2 hours of the BATTL I) or maybe even “normal” things like going bowling or something LOL. Seriously it would be really cool to just go watch movies with other Starcraft friends like what I was able to do in Washington D.C. ![[image loading]](http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/7498/78640959.jpg)
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LAN B4 Time III @ Berkeley 2008![[image loading]](http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/6218/dsc03806hp8.jpg)
Evanthebouncey! bLAHAGHAagahgghahgahAHAGAHGAH!!!![[image loading]](http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/9548/dsc03807jn6.jpg)
My brother Jing and his friends: Jing, Joey, Tren, Young![[image loading]](http://img352.imageshack.us/img352/1439/dsc03808zp3.jpg)
General overview of the room at about 8:30 - Zalfor at the far left, GreenGloop (in the green shirt), Nimue at the front of the room in the HYE shirt, Heathen (LxRogue) at the far right![[image loading]](http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/5844/dsc03809xg5.jpg)
People crowding around Anthony (phase) and his fast Terran hands, from left to right: Joey, Tren, John (Zalfor), Young, Anthony (phase), ?![[image loading]](http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/2957/dsc03810dq8.jpg)
Hey, it's paper! paper came last year and is a very cool person, although he didn't play any Starcraft and just obsed for about 4 hours or so (probably left to play DotA, LAWL)![[image loading]](http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/793/dsc03811cp4.jpg)
Don't know the names of all the people in the picture but they are all watching Evan play some epic Starcraft, in the center of the picture are paper and evan.![[image loading]](http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/9965/dsc03812zr2.jpg)
From left to right: Allen (Nimue), Heathen (LxRogue) and Aaron (Gearitup). Aaron was referred to as 'the white guy' and Heathen was referred to as 'the other white guy'. They were the only white people in the tournament. On the board is Starcraft DeCAL - some course sometime next semester that Nimue (?), Yosh and some other people are going to be teaching that involves Starcraft strategy afaik. Heathen is left-handed and actually used the mouse with his left hand and macroed with his right hand, and it was quite interesting to watch. Nimue was some 380 apm C- Protoss and was really fast.![[image loading]](http://img239.imageshack.us/img239/6395/37150911ng4.jpg)
Evan![[image loading]](http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/732/43304921gk7.jpg)
Evan warping in a pylon! =O![[image loading]](http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/6108/84276059ny2.jpg)
Evanthebouncey!: "Reebo!!! Reebo!!! Reebo reebo reebo reebo reobeobeoboeboeboboeobobobo!!!"![[image loading]](http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/6138/95461899ra6.jpg)
People crowding around to watch my brother play vs Evan. Look at the smiles and laughs on my brother's face as his reaver owns Evan's probes, and then look at Evan's gaping wide mouth as he is astonished by the incredible damage.![[image loading]](http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/7936/65943343sc4.jpg)
We had 3 girls at the LAN - one was playing the just-released WoW: Wrath of the Lich King (pshhh), and the other two played Starcraft ;D![[image loading]](http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/5215/82013154wi3.jpg)
A picture of me taking my miracle Starcraft drink in preparation for a game![[image loading]](http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/9329/55048125xp5.jpg)
Me playing vs John (Zalfor) ZvZ in an epic loser bracket semifinals. More on this later.![[image loading]](http://img90.imageshack.us/img90/6245/48960364gh4.jpg)
The finals - me and Heathen were set to another room to play while it was broadcasted on the projector in the other room.![[image loading]](http://img291.imageshack.us/img291/2244/45115864oc2.jpg)
My face of determination!![[image loading]](http://img395.imageshack.us/img395/8255/25279383ez2.jpg)
Heathen stares/glares at me with a wicked smile in an attempt to intimidate me... your actions do not phase me!!! Or do they =(![[image loading]](http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/9009/44574271ws5.jpg)
The main coordinator (I still forgot to ask his name this year) of the event informed us of what we were going to do. Heathen has his black screen of death.![[image loading]](http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/6923/75667526rv7.jpg)
Our first game on Andromeda begins.![[image loading]](http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/2719/37753293ar7.jpg)
The projector screen showing our match live, with commentary by John (Zalfor)![[image loading]](http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/1714/89263822tx4.jpg)
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A mutalisk battle takes place. I had superior micro to him and was able to constantly take out his larger forces, but his economy builds and my lack of damage to him eventually led to my demise as he overran me.![[image loading]](http://img239.imageshack.us/img239/9721/32204353bi3.jpg)
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