Writing, NACLO, Spelling Bee? etc.
Well, it's been two months, so I guess I should probably get around to writing another post?
I'm here to talk about something not directly related to learning languages, but the art of language - for me, writing.
Most of the time, I don't consciously think as I write. I express what I need to (or try to) in the most direct terms possible, because that's what we're supposed to do. In APUSH essays, lab write-ups. But when it comes to creative writing, it's a little different. I do have to be clear, but what I need to convey most directly are a certain emotion, state of mind, and rhythm of the heart. And it's bad writing if I do directly describe things like that.
The reason I have been pondering on this is that I recently wrote a story for a writing contest I had committed to participating in weeks before. I ended up writing it in a span of two to three days about a week ago, because I like to ~procrastinate~. And boy, it was an experience. A month ago, I brainstormed pretty much one word on a blank Google doc, closed it, then opened it just when I forced myself to start writing. And when I started, I took off. The story ate at me for days and days on end. I couldn't think about anything else, and I poured everything I had into it - I tugged with wording and syntax constantly throughout school, the Word doc always open as I "paid attention" in class. Keep in mind, this is when I had about 10000000 tests going on at school. And, the entire time, I was trying to balance between how do I make people know what I'm trying to say without actually saying it? Am I too obvious? Is this cheesy? Is it too abstract and just stupidly pretentious? Writing is a big pain. And I'm not even a full-time creative writing student or writer.
In addition to that, I thought about my writing in particular. Some people craft the most wondrous universes and fantasies that overload our senses and leave us with a sense of awe, desire, and some melancholy. But all my writing is deeply personal. I think it is for everyone, but mine is personal in the sense that I channel my eloquence and whole-heartedness the best if I am part of the narrative I write, whether that is a personal essay or short story. Again, I think all writers leavethemselves in the story somehow - but I feel like I openly expose myself, as supposed to leaving subtle traces of me in the writing. Maybe that's why I'm rather averse to sharing my writing - it takes a lot of courage to share your art with the world.
I'll see how I feel by the end of this blog post - maybe as a separate post, I'll release my story - "Supernova."
The Open Round of the North American Computational Linguistics Olympiad occurred a few weeks ago! I signed the slip that said I wouldn't share any info on the problems til they're released online. I'm 90% sure I won't be arrested if I do discuss questions, but I'm not taking chances - linguists can get very passionate when they need to.
In any case, I felt it went rather well. I was surprised I made some sense of the Vietnamese problem, and I almost had time to solve the number system problem completely. and I hate number system problems. Also, I realized the writing system problem was written right to left - how tricky. At least familiarity with Chinese characters makes writing characters and symbols in other languages less intimidating for me.
I hope everyone who participated goes on to the Invitational Round!
For National English Honor Society, I participated in a spelling bee because I desperately needed points, and participation gives more points than mere attendance. And... I won? The words weren't particularly hard (though the judges threw a few super difficult ones at us just to prolong the event). Some words I spelled were appendectomy, senility, and poriferous (the last was my "winning" word).
I did spelling bees in third and fourth grade, and I remember that I failed to spell cachet and infamous. I use infamous in my vocabulary now, but cachet? That's rather obscure.
Lesson learned: The English language is so tricky that we have full-blown competitions just to tackle its terribly confusing, exception-ridden spelling methods.
