A Day in Pre-History

May 16, 2012 – 7:42 am

One of the best things about UCLA is the incredible faculty. Every member of our faculty is very accomplished and they are incredibly smart people. Of course, there are a few stars. I have the privilege of taking a geography class with Jared Diamond. Professor Diamond has written New York Times bestsellers including Guns Germs and Steel, has won numerous awards, and is considered a leading scholar in his field. His research is groundbreaking and has reshaped our perceptions of the ancient world and the effects of geography and history on current events. Just like any other professor at UCLA, Professor Diamond is required to hold office hours. Fortunately he is very approachable and is known to make his students tea during the office hour. Even if you do not have specific questions about class he is more than willing to talk to you about things and it is a great opportunity to learn from the best and brightest.   When Professor Diamond speaks you tend to listen, so when one day in lecture he told us we all should go to the La Brea Tar Pits I took his advice and went.

I have been meaning to go for a while because it is only a short distance from campus and it is a very fascinating place. At La Brea many pre-historic animals have been well preserved after being trapped in the abundant tar pits. These animals include saber-tooth cats, wooly mammoths, giant ground sloths, short faced bears, and dire wolves.  It also includes a nice park and active excavation sites. It is hard to believe that a place like this could exist in the middle of LA. When you go to the tar pits, it is like stepping back in time. The contrast between modern LA and the prehistoric version is amazing. When I went on Friday it was a beautiful day, and I decided to make a day out of it. I went with my friend, and we brought lunch to eat in the park, went to the museum and then stopped by LACMA (Los Angeles Count Museum of Art). This day is a perfect example of why UCLA is so great. I was inspired by my fantastic professor to go see something I have not seen before, and being in LA makes everything so close and accessible. GO BRUINS!

By Steven Simons | Posted in Academics, Life off campus | Tagged , , | Comments (0)

Princeton Ly – Savings

May 15, 2012 – 7:56 am

With college costs rising every year, students need all the help they can get to save money.  I recently started using NerdWallet’s* tools, and it has helped save me a few hundred dollars a year (and lots of time).  I thought I’d share some of the things I learned to help save you money.

1) Checking accounts with no fees

Free checking is difficult to find these days.  Banks often charge a monthly fee that can easily end up costing over $100 a year, especially since most of us don’t meet qualifications to waive the fee (direct depositing, maintaining absurdly high balances minimums).  Moreover, frequent withdrawals from an ATM not associated with your bank will cost you a few dollars each time.  Before you know it, you’ve paid the bank $130 each year, just for holding your hard-earned cash.

Luckily, there still seem to be some checking accounts left that won’t charge you for everything you do.  Based on my answers to their questionnaire, NerdWallet’s checking tool recommended Citibank’s* Student Account, which doesn’t charge any monthly fees or out-of-network ATMs fees.  Now you can go eat at Westwood’s cash only places (Diddy Riese!) and not have to worry about paying unnecessary fees.

2) Rewards credit card

Having a good credit card can also help save you money.  As a student, my biggest expenses are food and textbooks – every quarter I spend a few hundred dollars on the former and a few hundred on the latter.  Little did I know, I could have been using a credit card and getting 5% back in rewards for all those purchases. For example, there are credit cards for students that will give you 5% rewards on books (including Amazon!), movies, music, and dining out. You can even use the rewards points to help pay off student loans.  To sign up, you need either a steady source of income or a co-signer (a parent).  Just be sure you pay off your balance in full every month, or the interest will end up costing you. (Oh, and if you’re interested in a card with low APR, there’s a tool for that too!)

Lastly, if you want to learn more about how to manage your finances, NerdWallet has an excellent primer here.

Good luck!

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 *NerdWallet, Inc. and Citibank are not endorsed by, the University of California Los Angeles.

By Princeton Ly | Posted in General | Tagged , | Comments (0)

Test Taking Continues

May 14, 2012 – 10:18 am

Yesterday, I took the CSET Multiple Subjects test: it includes of three subtests spanning over English subjects, History, Science, Math, Physical Development, Human Development and Visual and Performing Arts. It was one of the hardest tests I’ve ever taken. Though it doesn’t go all the way up to the hardest parts of every subject it does require you to think critically for every question. Granted, I’m finished with it now after being in the test taking room for 5 (yes, five) straight hours. Now, I await until I receive my test scores. Please pray for me y’all!

As I await my scores, I will enjoy my time off not thinking about the test. Now it’s all about enjoying my last weeks here at UCLA. It’s the start of Week 7 and I’m so excited for what awaits me. I’m truly blessed to go to such a beautiful university.

By Manny Macias | Posted in Academics | Tagged | Comments (0)

Spring Sing

May 11, 2012 – 8:09 am

Remember a little over a month ago when I wrote a post about camping out to buy Spring Sing tickets? Well after lots of waiting, Spring Sing finally came! The big night was last Friday and it was so much fun.

We got there fifteen minutes ahead of time (yippee, reserved seating!) and all got settled in our seats with just enough time to look through our programs before things got started.

The show started with an exhibition act – an all-male step group called TDB – and was quickly followed by the traditional Company intro video and dance. Like I said in my last post, Spring Sing is UCLA’s end-of-the-year talent show put on by SAA. It features mostly musical acts that are broken up by comedy sketches performed by a group called Company.

This year, their intro video showed the members of company preventing the end of Spring Sing (and the end of the world) as was predicted by the Mayan calendar.

Company performed lots of other fun sketches and skits. My favorite was a parody song about the Flyaway bus, and this video about finals week deserves an honorable mention.

The actual musical performances were spectacular as well! The coolest part about watching all of them is that you know that everyone singing goes to UCLA. It’s fun to see the talent that your school holds!

In addition to the funny sketches and the brilliant musical numbers (most of which were original!), the night was also exciting for its star factor. A number of celebrities attended the event including Sarah Bareilles – a former bruin! She even did an 8-clap on stage and took a video with her phone of the whole thing (which I’m pretty are she posted to her Twitter feed).

At every Spring Sing there is an award given out called the George and Ira Gershwin Award to honor a member of the music industry who has had amazing accomplishments. This year the recipient was Bruce Lundvall, the President and CEO of Blue Note Label (he helped get many musicians’ careers off the ground like Natalie Cole and Norah Jones (cool!)). Although he couldn’t be at the ceremony, Mr. Quincy Jones accepted the award on his behalf (so cool!).

The highlight of the evening was definitely the announcement of the winners at the end of the show. Every year, there are a slough of winners in a variety of categories. There are winners like best solo/duet or best production number, and of course there is a best overall entry winner. A band called Alto was the biggest winner of the night (and rightfully so, they rocked it!). They won in every category they were eligible for! Best band, best overall entry, and probably the coolest one to win – Bruin Choice (the one where the student audience votes with their cell phones).

The night was awesome! And that camping out was definitely worth it.

By Charley Guptill | Posted in Life on campus | Tagged , | Comments (0)

Sherman Oaks

May 10, 2012 – 7:31 am

This weekend I ventured ten miles north of UCLA to a community pool in Sherman Oaks. We have many swimming pools on campus, but the pool at Sherman Oaks is home to the only public pool with a five meter platform (according to the nice man at the pool).

We had a beautiful weekend here in Los Angeles, so I was happy to get some pool time.

However, I decided I had to dive off the five meet platform since that was the whole reason for going. Needless to say, five meters gets really high once you get up there. It used to be a mundane task for me when I was still diving everyday so I thought it would be no problem. However, to keep things simple, I was just a tad bit nervous when I got up there. But, there was no way I was going to climb down, and I think simply jumping off is much harder then diving. Thankfully, old habits die hard, and after the first dive, I was able to get back up no problem.

On the way home, we stopped at Starbucks for frappuccino happy hour. Very convenient promotion for my midterm studying!

Go Bruins!

By Gina Provenzano | Posted in Life off campus, Athletics/recreation | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

Princeton Ly – Apartment Hunting Part II

May 8, 2012 – 8:53 am

I know what a daunting thing it is to start looking for off-campus housing. As I mentioned in a previous post, the earlier you look for apartments, the easier it will be for you.

There are many, many factors to consider. How much can I afford? Who will I live with? How far away is this from class? How far away is this from a grocery store, now that I actually need to cook for myself?

My friend recently introduced me to a really neat tool called PadMapper that could really help in finding an apartment amidst all those questions.

After searching UCLA, Westwood in the address bar, I was transported to a map of Westwood with a variety of rental listings. I could filter listings by price, number of bedrooms, and even see a place’s proximity to grocery stores and nightlife. It was also really helpful to compare the apartment listing’s price to the median price of the neighborhood, just to make sure I wasn’t getting ripped off. I could share saved listings with my future apartment mates, and more importantly, could see how close I was going to be to my friends and to my classes on campus. The user-interface made it easy for me to navigate, and I found myself wishing that I had known about this tool when I was looking for apartments.

While I definitely recommend that new first-years or third-year-transfers live on campus to truly experience UCLA’s community, I also know that there are students out there who might be seeking an alternative. Moving to a foreign place can be daunting, so I would definitely encourage that newbies to the area utilize tools like PadMapper. Scouting out the terrain beforehand to make sure your new home is nicely located will be well worth it in the long run. I was lucky enough to have found a great apartment with the help of older friends; I’ve definitely heard horror stories of other students who have been trapped in leases with rent almost twice as much as mine. Ouch.

In short, when you decide that it is time to move off-campus, take a look at tools like PadMapper that make the whole process easier.

Happy hunting.

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*PadMapper is not affiliated with, or endorsed by, the University of California Los Angeles.


By Princeton Ly | Posted in Life off campus | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

Magic Castle vs The Avengers!!

May 7, 2012 – 9:35 am

The Avengers!!! Enough said, you already know what I want to say… It was so amazing!!! I’m not a big super hero fan, but for this movie I can say that I loved it!! It was worth my time and worth my money to watch it :)

But before that, let’s back up couple hours shall we. So I told you all about how my de-stressing weekend last week, which I still believe was amazing. This weekend I was supposed to go to Magic Castle. For those of you who don’t know, Magic Castle is this private club in Hollywood where you can have fine dining while watching a magic show. I’ve never been there, so I thought it was so amazing that I got a chance to go in!!

Some basic rules before you go to Magic Castle are that you have to be at least 21 years old and ladies and gentlemen you have to suit up. Ladies are required to wear cocktail dress at least, while gentlemen (I’m literally using their language,haha) have to wear suit and tie. No jeans, no tennis shoes, no zipped jackets. Pretty intense ha..

So my boyfriend and I went there along with some other friends who invited us. But lo and behold,  my friend who had the invitation forgot to make the reservation for the dinner!! And since it was Saturday, the place was over-booked and we couldn’t go. So we decided to make a reservation for next month since we’re all busy. I was a little bummed that we didn’t get to go in, especially since now I’m super curious how the building is on the inside . But everything worked out actually because I went to see The Avengers instead that day!!! :) It’s was win-win situation I think,haha..

With Magic Castle scheduled for next month, I’m really looking forward to it!! In the mean time, back to UCLA and Starbucks (where I mostly study,haha).  I have to get back to reality that the second round of midterms are already on their way next week!! That means I have to start studying this week again.. But it’s all good, because I have something else good in the store for this month!! Don’t worry I’ll share it with you once the time comes; until then let’s welcome week 6 Bruins!!

By Olivia Harjanto | Posted in Life off campus | Tagged , | Comments (0)

UCLA Luskin Lecture for Thought Leadership

May 4, 2012 – 7:46 am

Gina gave you the scoop on how having the former president come to campus shook things up, but how about an insider’s look! I was one of those lucky students she mentioned who got to go see Clinton speak (for free, woo woo!).

Besides a bunch of extra security à la the secret service (which made me feel like I was in the White House) having Bill Clinton at UCLA was just extremely cool.

I had seen Clinton speak last year as part of a political rally with Gavin Newsom and our then almost-governor Jerry Brown. Although I like politics, I hadn’t really felt super connected to the whole political scene. Attending the rally and hearing those guys speak about jobs and alternative energy and just politics in general was so ~intriguing~ and got me super excited about the political process (Jerry Brown’s election as a governor was the first election I had ever got to vote in!).

Wednesday’s lecture was exactly the same – except this time, Clinton wasn’t talking to his audience about politics and we weren’t gathered in clumps on the grass. We all watched him give a fab lecture on our common humanity in Royce Auditorium (which is basically the prettiest place on UCLA’s campus). The lecture was as inspiring as the rally. He shared his knowledge with us about how to solve humanitarian crises, what we should be doing to create positive change, and mostly just how to be a better person.

The most special moment of the night was when he told us a story about some pictures he had bought in UCLA’s bookstore (pictures that he had bought 41 years ago with his then girlfriend Hilary!). He said he has them hanging in his house and that he thinks about UCLA everyday when he looks at those pictures (awwwww).

The night was awesome – how often do you get to see Bill Clinton speak for free?! Oh yeah, I guess it’s about once a year here at UCLA. :)

By Charley Guptill | Posted in Life on campus | Tagged , , | Comments (0)

Bill Clinton

May 3, 2012 – 9:08 am

On my normal day walk back from class, I passed by a security notification restricting Royce Hall access tonight due to Bill Clinton’s speech. Yes, Bill Clinton, former president of the United States. It’s certainly not an everyday occasion that a man of this stature speaks at our University! He was the keynote speech for the Luskin Lecture for Thought Leadership.

What’s even better, students were offered tickets to hear him speak. I, unfortunately, had a midterm scheduled for the time of his speech and was unable to attend. On the bright side, I was allowed to use a cheat sheet and completely rocked biostatistics. But, I did enjoy the increased presence of security guards.

Go Bruins!

By Gina Provenzano | Posted in Life on campus | Tagged , | Comments (0)

Princeton Ly – Photography

May 2, 2012 – 8:48 am

Century City----Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/borjamatic/4958850742/

Los Angeles has lots of cool art museums to visit, from the Hammer (literally five minutes from UCLA) to the Getty (also literally five minutes from UCLA) to the LACMA (please do more than just take pictures with the lamps) to the MOCA (the Geffen of the Geffen Contemporary location is the same Geffen of our medical school!).

But one underrated and often overlooked cultural treasure of our great city is the Annenberg Space for Photography, located just a short drive from campus in glittering Century City.

The modernistic space itself, while new, is rather small, but the curators really do make the best of it. There is typically one coordinated exhibit being shown at any given time, with pieces from both established greats and up-and-comers. The first time I went, the theme was the socially oriented “Water: Our Thirsty World“, and focused on the future of our earth’s fresh water – a very relevant topic indeed. More recently, they have been displaying photographs from their series titled “Digital Darkroom“, an exploration of photography in the digital age. The central gallery, modeled after a irising camera lens, usually shows a documentary or movie shot just for the show at hand, with artist interviews and the like.

The next exhibit looks especially promising: “Who Shot Rock & Roll” (starts June 23rd), so be sure to check it out!

Oh, and did I mention it’s free!? All the more reason to visit!

By Princeton Ly | Posted in Life off campus | Tagged , , , , , | Comments (0)
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