President Clinton's Speech at UCLA - My Own Experience

Former President Bill Clinton spoke at UCLA last Friday, October 13, to promote Proposition 87 in the November 7 election.

The moment I found out about it the day before (Thursday, Oct. 12), I got so excited that I downloaded the free ticket to watch the speech as soon as I got home. I initially didn't care what Clinton was to talk about. All I wanted was to see this former US president who has my respect at least for being able to speak in intelligible sentences. This is not to say that the topic itself was unimportant. It was, after all, about alternative energy and tax on California oil producers.

Now I really do not understand the bill so I cannot say whether I agree with Clinton who supports it. Maybe that's a good time to hear about it. Or maybe I shouldn't really care. (By the way, reading about a good bill that gets vetoed or politicians blabbering off with words fashioned from twisted logic is enough to appall me). On one hand, I'm not a US citizen so maybe I shouldn't care about their bills. On the other, certain bills do have an impact outside the US borders, simply because of the power and influence of Uncle Sam.

The speech was scheduled at 9:15AM. This required a determined effort on my part to wake up at about 6:00AM - not an easy one, to get to the campus with ample time to spare and get a good view of the one-time Rhodes scholar. I still thought it was worth it, though. The plan was to get to UCLA at 8:40 to get ahead of the others and grab the perfect spot for taking a picture or video of Clinton. Har har..

Anyways, I prepared my things the night before the event. Digital camera, checked. Printed ticket, checked. Cellphone with video recording capabilities, checked. Alarm clock set at 5:40, checked.. I went to bed earlier than usual (read: 12:15AM)**. For some reason, I couldn't sleep soundly so I grabbed and read a book at about 1:00AM, 4.5 hours to go before wakeup time. I finally got my sleep at 3:15AM... 2.5 hours of sleep...

By the time, I was half-half-awake at 5:45 to 6:20, going back to sleep never felt so good. It took a while before I was able to get up. I permitted myself some more time to close my eyes. Just a little bit more Rom, you have a long day ahead of you. Some moments of oblivion follow...

And then some more... Is it too much now? Indulge yourself.

Then it was time to rise. The clock greeted my morning with its report of the time. It read: 9:48AM. There was no way I could make it. Great!

Therefore, my mind came up with these consoling ideas: It's not like you would have met a prominent person. You would just have watched the person maybe even from afar. No big deal, eh?

**As I try to recall, it could even be later than 12:15

 

Classroom Confusion - 5317 or 5137?

I could still remember my first day of class in UCLA Extension. It was a Monday, September 25. Even though my class was at 6:30PM, I came to school at 4:00PM to "familiarize" myself with the large campus of UCLA. I ended up tiring my legs and feet from walking aimlessly around the campus, and my eyes, afterwards, from reading a book on international terrorism, when my lower limbs momentarily surrendered.

At 6:00PM, I decided to start walking towards my classroom. Unlike how I may have looked a couple of hours before, I didn't want to look like it was my first time in UCLA as I was going to my Information Security class. I took out my enrollment receipt and memorized the building name and room number. I planned to go directly to my classroom, in all confidence, like it was just this time of the year when I have to start the term as usual.

Alas, the room numbers for the Math Sciences Building, where my first class was, baffled me. The room number for Information Security started with 5 so I thought my class would be on the fifth floor. It turned out that the rooms on ground level all started with 5 (like 5117 or 5126). Weird. And for some reason, the rooms apparently are not arranged in ascending or descending order of room numbers. Weird again. Now, at the building entrance, there was a couple of people who assisted the new students who were confused with the room numbers by giving the directions to their proper rooms. I had no choice but to admit my newbie-ness and approached one of the guides.

Man: Where is your class?

Rom: It's 5317 of this building.

Man: What?

Rom: 5317.

Man (looking at a list): ... uh....

Rom: Wait, I'll just take out my enrollment receipt (and show it to you since you don't seem to believe me). There. Oh! it's 5137. I'm sorry.

Man: Ah. there you go. It's on the other side of the building. Go past those glass doors. Somewhere on the left side.

So I went ahead. I chose a spot in the middle of the second or third row, I can't remember which row exactly. Time check - 6:20, still early. I went out to find the restroom, which I was told by the same man, was farther out to the other side of the building. By the way, that's what I usually do when I arrive early for class - going to the restroom, I mean.

Again, I found the room number arrangements to be weird. What I also found unfamiliar (to me) was that the restroom had a room number. Haha! Then something caught my eye which I momentarily forgot. Then, as I went out, I glanced again at the restroom's number. It read: 5317.

***Flashback***
Man: Where is your class?
Rom: It's 5317 of this building.
Man: What?

Maybe that was why the man was apparently surprised. Or maybe he just heard me wrong. Whatever the case, I mistakenly told the man that my first class in UCLA was in a restroom.

 

My Immigration Status

I'm staying here in the US indefinitely.

My application for change of immigration status just got approved (October 4, 2006). This means that I am now effectively on F1 (international student) status in the US. I can stay in the US for as long as I am enrolled as an international student in any USCIS-approved university. If the application was denied, I would have been forced to go back to the Philippines since my previous immigration status (H4) expired when I turned 21.

When I submitted my application, I've had doubts on whether it would be approved. I guessed that the decision would be made sometime between October and November. Hence, I was preparing myself of the possibilities of becoming a balikbayan before the end of the year or having a prolonged and extended stint as a student, this time in a foreign university.

Since I got the latter result, I might as well make the most of it. I am very happy with how my classes are going so far in UCLA Extension. The professors are of top-quality and I think my program, Systems Analysis, is very good. The university's Powell Library also has a vast collection of books that I can take advantage of. The best part, though, is the overall experience of studying in UCLA.

 

Back to School

I just concluded my first week (September 25-29, 2006) of school here in the US. I'm taking up Systems Analysis certification in UCLA Extension. UCLA Extension is the continuing education division of UCLA. Its courses are designed as post-bachelor's studies for working professionals. Naturally, almost all of my classmates are professionals with the exception of a few international students (like me) here and there.

For this term, I only have 3 subjects, adding up to a grand total of 12 units (4 units per subject). 12 is the minimum number of units required by immigration laws for an international student to take. I didn't take more subjects because the tuition is expensive. I hope to take up more in the following terms though, if my application for extension of stay gets approved.

Anyway, my classes are Mondays through Wednesdays, 6:30-9:30 PM. The reason why they are held at night is to enable working professionals to attend after hours. UCLA runs under a quarter calendar system, with each quarter running 12 weeks. Here is the week that was:

Monday, September 25
I originally enrolled for the course Business Programming and Software Development. This is a required course to take for the certification, not an elective. However, when I browsed through the text books I ordered, I found out that the subject covers the basics of programming using C and Visual Basic. I felt that I already know this stuff so I talked to an academic advisor. He was pretty liberal about it as I told him that I've been programming in my undergraduate and that I felt that this course is not useful to me and I'm better off taking a course where I could learn new skills, blah blah. Eventually, I was able to transfer to another subject, Introduction to Information Security, two hours before the class started.

I was excited about the Information Security because the instructor turned out to be the author of a new book tackling the same subject. He must be popular in the industry, I thought. So I set out to my very first class located at the Math and Sciences building of UCLA, in which I had a weird experience (I'll talk about this in another blog post).

After three hours of lecture, mainly about the course overview, I didn't feel like attending this subject too. I'm having second thoughts on how useful this would be since it's very generalized and I don't intend to pursue the Information Security track (which includes Cryptography and Advanced Information Security) and be an expert at this field. I don't think I could tell a company, "...Well, I know something about Information Security and how it works coz I've taken 4-unit subject about it but when a hardcore, extreme hacker breaks into your system, you might want to consult a real expert to clean the mess. Oh! I know, my instructor in UCLA is pretty good at this..."

I went home that night thinking about how to tell the academic advisor that I want to transfer to another subject again.

Tuesday, September 26
For Tuesdays, my class is on Relational Database Management. Right at the start, I don't have any plans of not taking this subject since database management is one of the core concepts in Information Systems.

My class is at the Humanities Building. I know already have someone I know in the class who's also an international student from the Philippines. I think I've got a very good instructor. He's a graduate of BS Mathematics at UCLA. He started in the Computing Industry in the 1960's. Despite being there right when business IT got out of its mother's womb, he seems to have kept himself updated with the latest trends and technologies.

We are expected to read the book on Modern Database Management by Jeffrey Hoffer et al. throughout the 12-week course from cover to cover, the whole 600 pages of it. I just finished reading Chapter 1. At least, I can expect to get the most out of the 150 dollars spent on purchasing this book.

Wednesday, September 27
My course on Wednesdays is Introduction to Client/Server Computing. I was also kind of iffy about this though I knew I had to know something about high level networking.

This class is also being held at the Humanities Building. My instructor is the Senior Managing Director of Citigroup. He talks with what he calls, "...slangy Californian accent with a touch of profanity..." With a great sense of humor to boot, I feel like he can make any class interesting as long as you don't mind the, uh, minor profanities. What's interesting about him is that he has worked for the US Air Force in computer simulations and projections, a job I once dreamed of having.

This course is also a keeper, so I went home planning what to do for the rest of the week.

Thursday, September 28
I was again back at the UCLA to talk to my academic advisor who was warm enough to welcome my crappy words on how I think I need to take up another subject for now and decide if I should take Information Security in the future. He did suggest a subject, C++ Functional and Object-Oriented Programming, because he said that the instructor there is "different". Apparently, this instructor just got a recommendation from the Dean of UCLA's engineering department of being an exceptional one who teaches a lot of programming and problem-solving tricks. I remember the advisor telling me that this instructor pulls off surprises now and then and will make life different (difficult?) for his students.

Partly out of curiosity, I decided to take the class.

Friday, September 29
I went again to UCLA to have my payment for the books in Business Programming refunded. This marks the first time I chatted with someone I have never met before for more than 30 minutes during the travel to school.

It started when he asked me which bus to take to Westwood. Eventually, we talked about 9/11, Pres. Bush, and the Bourne Identity. This guy turned out to be an action film fan. So even though I said that I've watched the Bourne Identity, he still narrated his favorite action scene and practically acted it out (as Jason Bourne) along the street as we waited for the bus. He goes on talking about a James Bond movie starring Sean Connery, and acts his favorite scene even more dramatically. By this time, I was thinking the guys back there must be thinking this guy with me is a weirdo. He almost falls off the street to the road at one time. When a bus came by, all of a sudden he says, "You know what I don't like in riding buses, you encounter all sorts of weirdos. I know a weirdo when I see one..."

I couldn't help but smile as I thought of the weird looks from the other people's faces when they saw him do his stuff. But I figured this guy isn't really a weirdo, just animated. Then I thought I could get pretty animated too. I hope people don't find me weird but I don't blame them If they do. Where's justice?