AmeriCorps/FEMA

AmeriCorps/FEMA

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

A Sneak Peek Look into the Glamourous Life of a FEMA Corps Member

Day 65 - Wednesday (16), Today was a standard day at work with the exception that it was also Sean's Birthday! So after work, Kristina and I went to the store to get some cake and brownie mix along with some icing and sprinkles! We then had the boys take Sean out to Spirit, a Halloween store, while the cakes were being made in our room. We had a little bit of forgetfulness, we forgot the eggs for the cake, but we substituted apple sauce for it. It actually didn't taste that bad, but definitely not good as it smelled coming out of the oven.

We took Sean downtown to a pretty cool coffee shop. It had plenty of couches and chairs so we hung out there for about 2 hours chatting. The shop had a pretty chill and low-down vibe to it and II really enjoy the time that our team spends together when we're out of our uniforms. It's just nice to be able to chat about other interests besides work and we always get a good laugh out of our conversations.

When we returned home, we had a tiny party in our room where we had cake and brownies. We sang to him and and well... we did a pretty bad job, but hey, those are the best types of happy birthday renditions. It wasn't nearly as good as the ones that my parents like to sing to me when it's my birthday! We all hung around for a little bit more before dispersing into our own rooms, ready to go to bed.

Day 66 - Thursday (17), Today at work, I went on a site visit to the University of Houston. For the part of the campus that I saw, I didn't really like it all too much. It was busy, slightly crowded and industrial looking. There was a bunch of cars and roads running through the university and you had to take a shuttle to get to some of the buildings. It felt like it was built around roads. They didn't have the greenery or visual appearance that I wanted; it was too city-like.

After work, we went to the gym. I made dinner tonight which was a Thai noodle dish called Drunken Noodles. I have never made it before so I tried my best to follow the directions 100% correctly. I have seen my Dad make it a thousand times but never really paid attention because either I was reading, in my room, or on my phone. I was not very social at home. Now I need to pay more attention on how he cooks or else when I live by myself, it'll probably consists of pizza boxes and tubs of ice cream!

The dish took way longer to make than I expected, but I was going slowly and carefully, trying not to mess up. I think it turned out pretty good and tasted like somewhat close to my Dad's dish but not quite there yet. But it was enough to taste like home. I also think the rest of the team enjoyed it too. They've been a little bit more open with trying my vegan dishes and tofu along with some other oddish ingredients.

The spent the rest of the night cleaning the kitchen because I made a complete mess, but it was worth it for the food. I then hopped into the shower I probably smelled like a mixture of soy sauce and oyster sauce combined (sauces that went into the dish), and went straight to bed after that. So glad tomorrow is Friday!


Day 67 - Friday (18), Today was a pretty chill day - spent all day entering in data and doing a little bit of number crunching making sure all the money added up correctly. It's tedious work making sure every number is input correctly.

After work, I hung out in my room for a while making a slideshow for the end of the year. Kristina took a 2 hour nap- it would have went on longer if I didn't wake her up before it messed up her sleep schedule. We then had dinner and had a movie night in our room.

Kristina and I ended off with some fun in our room - one of the boys used our bathroom and clogged it up I think, so I had to go to the lobby, get a plunger and then plunge the toilet. It was very gross with the the noise it made in the toilet.. I made Kristina take the plunger back down since I did all the work and she just stood there watching and laughing at me hysterically. She went to wash it off in the shower but didn't realized that it was in the shower head mode. So when she turned it on, she got sprayed with water by the shower head. Then it was my turn, I fell onto the floor and laid there laughing my head off to the point where I was crying. It was probably one of the funniest things I have witnessed for quite a while!


Day 68 - Saturday (19), Today I woke up early - 6:40 and left at 6:50 for CERT Training. It took a little over 30 minutes to get to our destination. In this training, we played the victims of a disaster. We had a card detailing what we were supposed to do, what our injuries were and we acted those out while an emergency team came and rescued us. I had a sprained left knee that I couldn't walk on unless I had assistance. I had them do my right knee since I had previously injured it before. There was quite a lot of "blood", injuries, and screaming people during this mock training. I found this scenario quite comical and had a hart time keeping my face straight.

I really enjoyed this training. As comical as I found it, I realized how stressful being an emergency personnel could be and that you always have to stay calm. People are constantly yelling at you for help, looking for lost loved ones, and etc. There were about at 100 victims and they were all giving the emergency team a really hard time, but we were just tying to mimic a real scenario for them. I thought the response team was quite a bit slow as in terms of getting everyone help and marking the injured or non injured with colored tape, but the whole thing was learning process.

We headed back to the hotel after the training and for those who had makeup injuries, we had to wash those off before heading to the gym. Mine was a little harder to get off than I anticipated but I got the majority of it off.

After the gym, we went downtown to explore a bit. We went to a touristy place- the water wall. It was really fun and we climbed up these huge "stairs" to take some selfies. It was pretty cool to look at and refreshing as the mist from the water was spraying everywhere. After that, we stopped at a World Market. We have one of these at home so I enjoyed the visit there and it was interesting to see some familiar products and unfamiliar products.

We drove by the hotel to pick everyone up for dinner after we finished downtown. We went to this ramen house. This reminds me of the ramen place that my parents and I go to all the time. They didn't have veggie ramen so I just got egg rolls and sweet potatoes tempura. It was all really good!

I took a shower upon arrival home because I felt to the point where I was really dirty. Kristina and I spent the rest of the night watching a movie called, Maleficent. We were so excited to go to bed and finally sleep in. So this is where I'm to end the night!


Day 69 - Sunday (20), Today was a very relaxing and chill day. I got about 9.5 hours of sleep so I was very happy with that. I spent quite of few hours catching up on videos and doing a little bit of work in and out.

The afternoon went by decently quick. Half the team went grocery shopping so I unpacked when they returned home. Sean and I went to pick up on of our other team member, Madeleine, from the bus station. She left to go back to Austin for the weekend. Sean and I wanted some dessert while we were out so we stopped at a place called Cafe Nu. This cafe was an Asian cafe located in this semi- large center full of other Asian shops and restaurants. It was like a Chinatown, but in a center. The center had a lot of stores squished into the smallish amount of space. The square yards and amount of buildings ratio was off, but it was cool to see because it reminded me of Chinatown and real China because everything is close together. All the stores were also written in Mandarin!

Sean and I got a sea salt Carmel dessert with M&M and brownie bites. It wasn't ice cream, but at the place they called ice something. It was really rich, but really good! It was a little overpriced, but worth it since we were trying something new so I didn't mind spending the extra dollars on it.


Day 70 - Monday (21), Today was a productive day at work. I did quite a bit of my media work today and was satisfactory with my progress today.

We headed to the gym for PT after work. I'm really enjoying having this gym membership. I never used to go to gym back at home because I always had basketball games or practice in addition to weight training for basketball. I always had a nice indoor basketball court and a weight room available for use when I needed it, hence the reason why I never needed to pay for membership. Since I'm paying for it now, it's a good motivation tool to get me out of the bed and hit the gym.

After PT, we returned home and I just chilled out for a while. We had dinner and our weekly team meeting. Kristina, our TL, is trying something new for the next couple months. Each member is suppose to do a learning activity and teach the team about something they want them to know. So tonight, Kristina taught us her knowledge about the Basque Country in which she visited a couple years ago. She showed us many pictures of her adventure, the country's unique dances, and their culture. It was pretty interesting to learn about what she knew and she was so excited to teach us.

My learning activity is going to be science experiments! As you all know, I love science, and some of you that know me better know that I'm a visual learner so I need hands on activities, which leads to science experiments. I have a couple in mind that I want to do but I will need to buy the supplies and research the exact science behind how the experiment works. So I'm excited for that but mine won't be until after fall break.


Day 71 - Tuesday (22), Same old day at work - data entry and helping others with computer stuff.

After work, we hit up the gym. I mainly focused on upper body strength and stretching today. My body has been very tight lately so I need to do more stretching before I get any other injuries. After PT, Sean and I took a 2 hour(ish) walk to Target and Ross. At Ross, I helped him pick out a nice causal long sleeve shirt and a vest. The shirt and vest match pretty well. Then I made a stop at Target, which was next door to Ross, to get some cocoa butter.

Something I have noticed since we got to Texas about a month ago, the roads here are not very good and there are so many crazy drivers! I have never seen so many bumps and potholes in roads before. I have yet to drive on a smooth road. The smoothest road so far is the Sam Houston Tollway, but all the money we pay going through the toll have to go toward maintenance for the tollway. Plus drivers here love to tailgate so close that you can't see them behind you and they're not afraid to speed up and cut you off with the tiniest amount of space between you and the next car! I have seen so many dangerous maneuvers and just general driving that I have never seen at home and if I thought some CA drivers were bad, well never mind! I officially disagree with that statement!

Day 72 - Wednesday (23), It's all set! I just booked our hotel room today and our bus tickets are already bought! I simply cannot wait to go back to Austin and see Summit 2! It's going to be a blast!

But this weekend is going to be so much fun! We're finally going to Galveston, which is something we had planned to do since we got here about a month ago. I'm excited to hit up that waterpark and hopefully the beach.

Today after the usual day of work, I went downtown with Kodiak and Alex. There was an outdoor shopping center where we walked around for 2-3 hours. We stopped at Barnes and Noble, H&M, and browsed in a few others. That part of town, especially the shopping center, you can definitely tell it was more of an upscale and a nicer part of downtown. It was an expensive area due to the types of stores and restaurants. I could also tell because every restaurant was full and a vast majority of people whether they were eating or just walking around shopping, they were dressed semi-nice to nice/fancy. But overall I really enjoyed the outdoor mall. Reminded me of the Fountains in Roseville, but this was way larger.


Day 73 - Thursday (24), Today was a pretty good day. After work, we went to the Museum of Fine Arts. It was pretty cool! There were relics, art pieces, and paintings from many different eras of history ranging from Aztecs/Mayans to the Holocaust and so on. So it was pretty cool to see the paintings, weapons used, and photography in the museum. It was also really interesting to read all the placards next to the pieces. We spent about a good 3 hours in that museum before heading back home and eating dinner.

I am quite excited for the next couple weeks to come! Let me give you a little sneak peek on what the team has planned so far and some in my personal things I have planned. This week, the team and I are going to Galveston, which is the beach! There is a water park there with tons of rides in which we somehow are getting in for free. Don't know how we got hooked up with those tickets!

And a couple weeks after that it's fall break!! I get a lovely 5 days off of work and to sleep in. I doubt I'll be getting as much sleeping in time as I hoped for but at least I'll be filling in that time with some fun! For fall break, instead of staying here in Houston or Austin, and instead of going home, I'm going to Oklahoma City! I have some of my Dad's family there in which I haven't seen them for 4 years since they moved from Southern CA so I'm excited to be seeing my aunt and uncle and also hopefully my cousins again!

Day 74 - Friday (25), Just a regular old Friday at work. Two of our co-workers bought our team food which was very nice of them. One brought in donuts in the morning and another one brought in pizza for lunch. After work, we hit the gym.

I'm trying to save you some time so if you don't want to read my rambling, skip this and the next paragraph. I'm trying to eat healthier right now so I'm going on a clean and raw diet for the next two weeks and hopefully extending it to a month and possibly longer if it works out. I added a few extra additional pounds of fat that I would not like to have and I'm trying to lose it and get back into shape because it just gets harder to lose it as you become older. This weight gain besides the culprit of unhealthy eating habits, is also probably has to do with my somewhat high cortisol levels (stress) and a lack of sleep. So I need to tweak those. I have also added some weight in muscle mass which is good, but I need to refocus to cardio and HIIT instead of resistance training as much. I've also been getting hungry a lot so I need to revert back to my eating 5x a day but small portions. That's how I lost a few pounds back at home.

My clean diet is hopefully going to consists of staying under 1600 calories (according to MyFitnessPal app), and mainly eating salad, fruits, veggies, whole grains, oats, low-fat yogurt and some soy milk. Dinners will be different depending on what people are cooking. Eating here is a lot different and more difficult because I have to watch what I'm grabbing out of the refrigerator and what I'm snacking on. At home, I'm used to just reaching inside the refrigerator and I'll know I'll be okay because everything is organic and healthy. Here it's not the same and I think it's has already came back to haunt me. So I kind of can't wait to come home at the end of the year right now and just hit the gym and work it off.

But enough said about my diet and weight, I booked my tickets to OKC for fall break and I cannot wait to visit my family again. I always have quite a lot do fun with them. I'm really hoping to get to see my cousins.

On another note, we are going to Galveston tomorrow. I've packed and am ready to go to the water park! I'll make sure to take lots of pictures and some videos of the rides if it's not too hard to hold the phone steady. I'm excited for tomorrow except the fact that it's late and I need to get to bed if I want to shave off those extra pounds of belly fat.

Thanks for joining me on today's entries and hopefully tomorrows will be more interesting and entertaining for you to read.

Day 75 - Saturday (26), Today we went to Galveston, TX!! We left at 7:30 and it took just a little over an hour to our destination. We went to a coffee shop for some breakfast and walked around downtown before the museum opened. The museum never opened. It was closed for some reason today, so we headed to Schlitterbahns, the name of the waterpark. Don't know where the name came from.The park was not crowded at all. The parking lots were not even close to full even though there were a couple hundred people roaming the park. We went down all the big slides you could find first and then did some not of fast slides towards the end. We never waited longer than 10 minutes for a ride because the lines weren't long due to the fact it's almost October and kids are in school.

We only stayed at the park for 3 hours because we ran out of stuff to do, so we got lunch and headed to the beach. I really enjoyed driving down the coast, with the windows rolled down, sunglasses on, and listening to calming beach music. Just the sound of the waves crashing were really calming and I enjoyed it immensely. It's just the little things in life that are the most important things sometimes.

I got into the ocean for a little bit - only like knee deep because I didn't want to get too wet and have sand all over me. Then I went back to my towel and took a nice little nap. It was really refreshing and relaxing.

After the beach, we went back downtown where there was this festival that was celebrating the anniversary of Hurricane Ike. Streets were closed, bunch of food vendors, gift/beach wear shops open, live music, beer, and a lot of people consuming bear. But nonetheless, I enjoyed walking downtime and experiencing the vibe of Galveston. Galveston had a very different vibe from Houston. Everything just seems more chill, more calm. It was quieter due to less people obviously and traffic, the coast made it feel relaxing, the roads were way better paved than Houston and everything was just like "take your time there's no rush or urgency." Driving down the coast and just how relaxed and chill the city was reminded me so much of California, especially when I used to go to the beaches in LA. It also reminded me of all the good times I had with my best friend, Kira. We did like everything together.

We started to head home at 6:15 since majority of us were starting to get a little tired and low on energy. I took a shower upon arriving home and it has never felt so good. Even though this hotel is having some issues with getting hot water, it felt good to just stand there and scrub all the dirt and sand off and feel clean once again. Since I had eaten very little all day today, I made dinner after my shower, watched TV, and did laundry.

Overall, today was a good day for me and well needed to relax and just have fun at the waterpark and lying at the beach. Next weekend will be quite fun also! Got good things planned out but can't say just yet. But you'll know soon!


Day 76 - Sunday (27), Today we had an ISP in the morning so we didn't get to sleep in. :( We went to a Wildlife Center - the center takes care of animals that are injured or rescued, nourish and take care of them until they are ready to go back into their natural habitat. We didn't actually get to play or hold any of them, but we did get a behind the scenes look at what they do and we also saw baby squirrels getting fed out of a milk bottle! It was really cute! Kristina actually got invited to come back and learn how to feed the baby squirrels!

We went back to the hotel after the ISP; I cleaned myself up a bit because I was covered in paint from painting the benches for the Wildlife Center's education room. We dropped Kristina back at the center for training and I went to Target to buy shampoo, body wash, laundry detergent, and razors. Just the basic hygienic stuff to keep me clean!

We picked Kristina up and went grocery shopping for the week. Picked up plenty of food that will help me on my healthier eating diet. We got some lettuce for salad, apples, bananas, nuts, yogurt and some eggs because I am lacking in protein. I found out Tofurky is high in protein so I got a package of that. I usually dislike diets because they take a quite a while for me to actually lose weight and get any beneficial gains off of it, but I'm going to try my hardest to be patient because it will pay off in the end. I need to eat less calories than my bodies burns a day. I'm trying my hardest to get my fat % and weight down so I'm reducing mainly saturated fat, watching carbs, and trying to increase protein intake. I'm also very closely monitoring my caloric intake and probably decreased it by a good 600 calories a day to stay around 1200 calories because I probably burn around 1800-1900 calories a day depending on what I'm doing. I'm eating in smaller portions like 4 or 5 times a day.

Hope this all goes well!


Day 77 - Monday (28), Today was a normal day at work. I'm almost finished helping another one of the project specialist with all his projects. Most of them have been submitted and a few are still needing to be touched up but almost there!

After work, we went to the gym for PT. It was a pretty good day for me. I got some cardio in and weight lifting. Couldn't lift as much as I could a few days ago but that's ok. It's probably due to my decrease in caloric intake so my body's not quite to used the reduce calories and lack of energy. I went with Alex after the gym to go find new windshield wipers for the car. It took way longer than I expected because we had to find a place that takes our GSA Fleet Card and then our purchase had to get authorized. So that was quite a process just to get new blades.

We had our weekly team meeting tonight just informing us about break and upcoming things in our agenda. I learned how to make scrambled eggs today. Normally I would I wouldn't eat eggs but I am eating a little bit now because I am lacking in protein and tofu is a little expensive and I'm the only that will eat it on regular basis. I then cleaned the kitchen, showered, and headed off to bed.

Day 78 - Tuesday (29), It was a very slow day at the office today due to the fact that more than half of our team was gone on a site visit or a meeting. The office was very quiet and the day dragged on.

We left at or usual time of 3:30 and I watched a bit of TV upon arriving back at the hotel. I then spent about an hour and a half talking to Apple to get some software issues resolved, so that took up majority of the night. I then spent another decent amount of time on my computer fixing some other issues - I'm having trouble getting my computer to recognize/connect to my phone. It was working perfectly fine a few days ago, then all of a sudden, it doesn't seem to want to work anymore. But I'll figure it out eventually.

I cooked some dinner for myself tonight - whole wheat pasta with arrabiata sauce from Trader Joe's. I packed my lunch for the next day and finished my night with touching up this blog.

I really want to thank all of you for your patience and support in these blogs. I know these blogs haven't been constant, it just all depends on my works schedule and if I have time to upload. So thanks for waiting and what you just read are the last 2 week's worth of entries.










My attempt at drunken noodles. The bottoms one, well... they ate a lot of it.












'
My "sprained right knee" (Playing victim for CERT)










CERT


















At the General D. Hines Waterwall Park











At the Cafe Nu in "Chinatown"






Puppet shadows at the Fine Art museum










Natural Arts Museum










At the water park, Schlitterbahns!





Took a nice little nap on this beach

No comments: