ThucLam is Better than Nam

Every year, DECA hold their state competition for every DECA chapter in the state for 3 days at the Arizona Grand Resort. It’s very fun.

Day 1, we got there at like 1pm, checked into the rooms and had a late lunch, and then I had to get ready for competition. The way this works is every solo competitor has 2 events, sometimes one on day 1 and one on day 2, or both on day 2, it’s random. First time competitors and team events have only 1 competition, which is on day 2. But I am neither a first time competitor, nor a team event, so I had 2. Round 1 was generally easy, I don’t remember what the prompt was exactly but I didn’t think it was too hard. After that, I waited up on a few of my friends for their events and then we got dinner. I think it was lasagna. All the meals are paid for by DECA, and the total fee for the whole trip(at least for my chapter, it differs depending on how big your group is) was $50. Then, we went to the Opening Session, where they shove all 2,000 kids into a ballroom and the State Officers give speeches and they hand out a few awards for the chapters. My chapter in particular received a few awards at Opening Session; Diamond Chapter, which basically means we completed all of our campaigns, Gold-Certified SBE(Student-Based Enterprise), Membership Campaign Award, and the Community Service Campaign Award. We took chapter photos outside this big fountain afterwards and then headed back to the rooms.

Majority of Day 2 was competition based. I got breakfast early and went to competition. Round 2 was mediocre. My prompt had something to do with a relaunching perfume brand, and I had to come up with a plan to market it off to an older audience. I actually felt pretty good about both my roleplays at this time, but I knew the written test was gonna eff me up.

Every time we have official competitions, every competitor has to take a 100 question written test first. This test has all the vocab, terminology, company policies, etc. kind of questions. It’s generally a very difficult test because of all the terminology, and it’s 100 questions in one sitting. Then, after your roleplays, DECA takes the average score of your written tests and roleplays to give you the total score. So basically, the written tests nerf everyone’s roleplays scores. More times than not, a competitor will score very very high on their roleplay, but if they bombed the written test, they don’t place.

So after my second competition, I got lunch with my friends and waited around a bit for their competitions. After all the Round 1 and 2 competitions were done, AZDECA would post on their website the finalists in each category, who would then get ready for Round 3, where they do another roleplay and compete for a spot in the top 5 of their category. All the top 5 placers in each category get to go to ICDC(the international conference in Orlando), to compete and represent Arizona, for free. So around like 3pm, we were all sat around the living area of one of our hotel rooms, refreshing the website over and over to see if we had any finalists. No, I did not finalize. But we had like 7 people finalize, so that was great. While everyone sulked for a little bit, I snuck away with my friends, Natalie and Megan, to the AZDECA State Candidate booths and the Marketing Graphics competition.

Since I’m a junior, I got chosen to be a delegate for this year’s State Officer voting. They get a new team of officers every school year and they always do the campaigns and voting at State. So Megan, another delegate, and I walked around the candidate booths for a while and we talked to the candidates. One of the candidates, Gage, is my really good friend so I hung out with him a lot too. Spoiler alert, Gage, unfortunately, did not win.

Natalie, Megan, and I also went to the Marketing Graphics competition, which is basically a workshop and a chance to win glass(the awards), but it’s not a spot to ICDC. Still, we love winning so we did the workshop. They have it at every competition, they had it at Districts too(in which we won 2nd place), and basically you’re given a prompt, usually asking you to create a logo/symbol/branding for blah blah blah. They give you 3 hours and we ALWAYS use the whole time up. When we finished, we turned it in and walked away. We’d find out if we won at Closing Ceremony tomorrow morning.

Then, I took some photos with my friends and a few from other schools, before going to get dinner. Since everyone was done with their competitions by now, it was now the evening and kids were just roaming the resort, messing around. My friend, Erin, and I also roamed around, and Gage somehow found us and also roamed around with us. However, Gage started introducing us to all his friends and his chapter, and then they started talking about going out past curfew and playing hide-and-seek. And while it sounded very fun, it was not my cup of tea at the time because I didn’t really know these people and I would’ve felt very bad if we got caught. So, Erin and I pretended that we got a phone call from another officer and there was an emergency with our chapter, and that we had to leave. Phenomenal acting, I must say. We retreated back to our room and Annie Doordashed a bunch of food for all the girls in our room so we stayed up eating and talking.

The next morning, it was kind of sluggish because we had to pack and get out of the rooms, and get changed into business professional attire for  Closing Ceremony. CC Recap; we had 4 of our finalists place, and Megan, Natalie, and I won 3rd place in Marketing Graphics, so we took glass home!!

Because of the awards we won at Opening Session, our chapter gets to take like 6 more people to ICDC. And, as an officer, I am one of those people. So YAY!

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vietnam roadtrip. well, we actually had to take a plane first, to get to the countryside and out the city. and then we stayed at this nice house thing. i dunno how to explain it. and then the next day we got on this giant bus. then i think we went to the giant pretty place with the mountains and stuff. we took a bunch of boats through these caves and walked up and down a bunch of stairs and ate a lot of ice cream. there were a lot of big mountains and trees and the lake that we boated on. we also rode on a bunch of motorcylcles around the island which was cool because the motorcycles are my favorite part of vietnam. vietnam is located in the continent of asia. there are a lot of countries that are also located in said asia. for example china and japan and north and south korea and cambodia and loas and taiwan and thailand and hong kong and russia and india and pakistan and mongolia and iraq and iran and afghanistan and kazakhstan. i dont remember anything anymore without pictures.i dont know what to write. i dont even know why im forced to write this because nobody reads it anyways and even if anyone does nobody is gonna do anything with that information.

airports are my least favorite place on earth.

when my mom and i were traveling over to vietnam we probably almost died like 6 times. employee benefits are fine until we’re getting rolled over to every flight possible and spending 48 hours at one airport.

anyways we got to vietnam eventually and met up with my dad and TQ. it was kinda late so i just showered and immediately went to sleep cause i was so tired. the next morning we immediately packed everything up to move to a different place to stay. the new place was almost the same as last year’s place but not as nice. i’m not sure we did anything that day, but that night the whole family went out to eat. i saw tiger and ken and ruby again. they are very cute. and then we all went back to the apartment and waited for TD to land, but the jet lag was hitting real hard so i fell asleep at like 8pm. the next day we got breakfast near the building, short distance walking, and then did something else that i forgot. oh, actually we all got haircuts. this was my first time getting my haircut by a stranger and paying them so i was a little scared but, spoiler alert, i really like my haircut and i wanna go track down that lady in her tiny ahh shop in the middle of millions of other squished-together houses/stores and get my hair cut there again. we went back to the apartment building quickly because the rest of the cousins were arriving. that night, ken, tiger, and ruby met all my cousins and it was cool. i like the city a lot. it’s a lot more different than any cities in america and i like looking at everything going on. i made it a habit to try and read any signs i could and attempt to translate them, and whenever i didn’t understand something i’d ask tiger or my aunt and uncle. there were trees and streets and lots of people on motorcycles and in cars and the streets were very busy and there’s a lot of placing selling food and drinks on the side of the road so it was easy to get snacks or stop by a place to eat when we were hungry. the buildings were tall and all squished together and they all had people living in them and there were a lot of stray dogs that were dirty and skinny and probably contracted many diseases and we weren’t allowed to touch them but that’s okay because i didn’t wanna touch them anyways. and then i knew that the second we got home my mom would make me write a pointless blog talking about these things that i barely remember and do not want to write about because nobody important is going to read them and they’re a waste of time anyways because this doesn’t do anything for me and i hate writing and i’m no good at it and i’d rather watch paint dry on a 70ft by 80ft wall.

the next day we would be leaving for the cross-country  roadtrip. as fun and beautiful as it was, i do not ever wish to travel with my mom’s younger brother ever again.

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Every year, DECA officers in Arizona are invited to attend CAMP DECA in Williams. It’s super up north and we all stay at a cabin resort called Lost Canyon. It was a very fun time.

I have never been to any sort of overnight summer camp before. This was the closest I have gotten. We were all split up and sorted into different color groups filled with total strangers. And then we spent the next 2 days with them. It’s a lot team building and social exercises with the people you just met the night before. I spent a lot of time just introducing myself to different people and exchanging socials.

It’s a really pretty area. There’s basically 6 giant cabins, each with 6 separate room containing another 6 bunk beds, surrounding a giant grassy field where a lot of activities are set up. There’s also this hugeeeeeeeee dining hall where we all gather for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. There’s a pool, pickleball courts, basketball courts, and sand volleyball courts.

It was a lot of fun. We did a lot of games, running around, scavenger hunts, lip sync battles, pep rallies, and basically every single party game you can think of. I was also very physically drained. We woke up at 6am and would sleep around midnight, meaning we were awake for 75% of the day. Lots of cheering as well. My voice was gone way before the second day even started. By the last day, my entire body felt like a bruise and was constantly hurting.

The people; however, were the best part about it. I met sooooooooooo many new people. And they were al super lovely. I enjoy DECA people a lot. They are usually really nice and are very social people. Specifically DECA officers, since its basically our whole job to be nice to people and make friends.

So basically it was awesome.

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a month ago, i started my junior year of high school.

yeah i’d say it’s kind of awesome. i think the start of junior year has been the best one so far. except, i’m a generally optimistic person and i’ve also said that about freshman AND sophomore year. but whatever.

to start it off, this is my first year being an officer for a club. 2 clubs, actually. i am currently the DECA treasurer and the Drama Club’s social chair. i’d say that both are pretty big clubs, but so far, they haven’t been interrupting with my actual schoolwork too much.

this fall, the Drama Club is putting on Legally Blonde, The Musical, and i am stage managing it(cue standing ovation). if you don’t know what a stage manager is, here’s the definition that i just looked up; “the person responsible for the lighting and other technical arrangements for a stage play.” i have to be at EVERY rehearsal, which is every single day after school until 6. and i oversee everyone who shows up to rehearsals, i take notes of all the lighting cues and sound cues, and then i’ll be at every show night overseeing the entire production. it’s an insane job when you’re putting on a musical and i have definitely cried multiple times over this job but i did it to myself so whatever. anyways, i’m also a part of designing the set, costumes, lights, and sound elements of this musical during my production design class so that’s something i guess. it’s great. i’m also in charge of running the Drama Club meetings(social chair). basically, i spend the majority of my school days in the performing arts building.

currently, DECA has a lot going on. as treasurer, i keep track of all the deposits and receipts of our purchases from costco and stuff. it’s not that crazy of a job since we have a huge officer team and we’re kinda good at getting things done. we’re doing a lot of promotional stuff lately, so canva has been my favorite website the past month.

anyways, my classes are pretty chill this semester, which is why all my extracurricular stuff doesn’t get in the way too much. i’m taking earth space science, very easy, asl 2, also easy, and then i’m a TA for a college math class, so i just grade papers and nap, and then i have my production design class, where i do most of my drama club business. it’s all pretty balanced and not that demanding, so i think i’m good for the next few months.

overall, my junior year has become very very busy but i’m awesome and stuff so it’s no big deal. i’m gonna win a nobel peace prize for amazing or something.

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the second that summer started i wish it hadn’t.

we went camping, about two weeks into the summer. it was ehhhh. it was also probably the last time we’d go camping with my grandparents because i had told my nana that thucquyen absolutely hated being forced to go with them and she said that we don’t have to come with them anymore and that we could find something else to do together.

when we got back, thucquyen and i were at home for a good two days before we left again. my dad and thucquyen went to florida and i went to ohio. i wanted to go to florida because i’ve had the great urge to jump in a pool but all the adults told me i’d be lonely and bored. but i would never be lonely with a pool and a speaker, and plus, at least i’d have a pool.

we also went to cedar point in ohio. it was fun. 10/10 would go again.

and then during like the secondish week of ohio, i got so bored. i was unbelievably bored out of my mind because it was just a cycle of the same thing over and over. wake up two seconds before lunch, play music, roy away, shower, maybe watch a movie, rot away, sleep, wake up. it wasn’t very fun.

another thing. it’s not fun when the adults turn something enjoyable into a chore. i sang with nam and bien ONCE, because they wanted me to and it seemed like fun. all of a sudden i’m being forced to sing until 3pm everyday. don’t tell me i look unhappy and emotionless. it’s because IM UNHAPPY AND EMOTIONLESS. the fun thing about hobbies is that you do them whenever you want to, whenever you feel like it. it gets ruined when someone expects you to do it because they want you to, rather than doing it because YOU want to.

im back home in arizona. i have had the most fun in the past four days than i have in the last two months away from home. and yes, that is solely because of the fact that i get to see my friends. i went to freshman orientation on friday and it was great. my friends and i went out to eat afterwards and get dutch bros.

it was perfect. i was having a blast. i could’ve been having a blast this entire summer. if i had stayed. yes, it’s hot as balls and it makes me wanna rip my hair out. but i wouldn’t mind the blistering heat one tiny bit, as long as i was in it with my friends. this is actually proven because i say outside that dutch bros in the heat with my best friend for like 2 hours just talking and it was a great conversation that i would do again over and over.

so yeah, when people ask me how my summer was, i tell them; yeah it definitely happened.

on sunday, bác trường took me, khang, nam and bien to cedar point. the following ensued;

im a big fan of rollercoasters, but i’ve only ever been to disney and universal. so this was very different and on a whole different level.

the first ride we went on was this green one where the track was above you rather than below. it was the easiest since it didn’t go crazy fast and the loops were fun. bien doesn’t like rollercoasters though so we had to keep convincing it would be fine while we were in line for every ride.

the second ride we went on was the millennium force. i’m pretty sure it’s the second tallest rollercoaster in the US. something like that. i was very excited. but whenever we’re in lines for rides, i will literally poop my pants. it’s literally so scary while you’re in line cause anticipation is one of the worse feelings of all time in my opinion. but once we got up to the peak of the coaster it was quite enjoyable. i really like screaming and that gross feeling you get in your stomach and when you’re screaming the air blasts through your face and makes your mouth all dry. best part.

then we went on this orange ride that took forever. the line was so long and the ride was stopped for a while. even though it’s ohio, it was literally melting cause it was really humid and i was just dead. the ride was fun though. nam and i sat in the back and we got thrown around a bunch.

and then we went on the biggest boy of all time. the steel vengeance. it’s not as tall as the millennium force but it’s huge and it’s got all this wood rigging underneath it and it looks pretty scary. but it’s so fun. it was actually probably the greatest roller coaster i have ever been on. bien almost didn’t go on it but we’re the manipulators of all time so he ended up coming with us. i also love putting my arms up on roller coasters but on this one i was so worried my arms would get cut off.

after that we went on this super tame and, pretty slow in comparison to the other rides, ride because it seemed like a good idea to go on one chill ride rather than a crazy mind boggling one.

and then, our last ride, was this swingy thing. i really wanted to go on it cause it looked cool. and it was. it went really high and it was literally just a giant swing. but it gave me and nam such bad headaches i worried that we would throw up on each other if we went on another ride.

so yeah, cedar point; 10/10 would go again, there’s like 20 other rides we didn’t go on.

 

 

bear with me as i try to recall the last few days of my stay with my grandparents.

my nana bought this diamond painting thing for tq and i to do. it’s one of those tedious and detailed crafts with very explicit and easy-to-follow instructions. i thought it was very enjoyable. plus, tq and i like to talk aimlessly while we do our little white woman crafts so it’s entertaining to say the least.

one night, can’t remember which, we had hotdogs. very yummy. i love mustard. tq doesn’t. nana also forced us to eat beans. neither tq nor i like beans but oh well. that night, we also watched despicable me 3. wonderful movie, never misses.

have i talked about how much tq hates the campground’s public showers? obviously, we both appreciate that there are public showers at all(one more than the other). i think they’re great, especially for being outside in the middle of the woods. it is a murky and the floor is always wet and suspicious but what more could you need, really? tq hated it. she hated that you have to avoid touching the floor, she hated the musky smell, and she hated the gross atmosphere of the whole thing. i quite liked it. it was funny to have a refreshing shower and then step out and there’s just millions of trees surrounding you.

my nana also bought this dream catcher kit, that was like the second day but i just realized i never wrote about it so here. it was awful. do not buy a dream catcher kit. the instructions were horribly written and not definitive in any way, it left too much to interpretation. and the kit itself, was very inconvenient to use. we finished it, of course. but nobody really wanted to look at it.

oh, there was this one night tq exposed all her secrets she had been keeping from me since like february. it was whiplashing. my jaw was literally on the floor and i was clawing at the ground asking for more details and more of her secrets. tq lore goes crazy, you should ask her if she prefers right or left, trust me.

nana also bought an embroidery kit. very fun. i love embroidery. that was, until i snapped the needle in half and had to pause the project. no worries, i’m currently in ohio and i brought the kit with me, along with new needles and i’m slowly but surely working on the kit again.

for our last night with my grandparents, we had this microwave fettuccine chicken alfredo. it was good. yknow what else was good. LEMON SELTZER. I LOVE THAT STUFF. i actually hate sparkling water but whenever it’s from my grandparents’ fridge it tastes like heaven and has the effect that drugs would. please get me a case of lemon seltzer and i’ll have 10/10 burps for life.

on the second day of being out in the wilderness, we took a hike.

it was the rim trail, whatever that means(nana and pappy kept saying “rim trail” so i’m assuming that’s the actual name of the trail although i have no evidence of this other than the fact that the trail was, in fact, on the rim of the mountain), so it overlooked all the other mountains. it was pretty cool to look at although it made me head kinda hurt just cause it’s such a large amount of elevating mountains and trees and i had been walking so much that everything constantly looked like it was running away from me.

when we got back we had the most bunk burgers you could ever imagine. you see, on our way back to the campsite we stopped by the local town’s grocery store. but my nana bought hot dog buns instead of burger buns so we had burgers with hot dog buns. in reality, it wasn’t as funny as i thought it was. but in my head, i hadn’t had serotonin nourishment from something other than tq for a while so this hotdog burger was really great. best burger i ever had.

nana and pappy’s friend came over again that night and brought over all the stuff to make s’mores. yeah i’m kind of a god at roasting marshmallows. don’t fact check that.

and then we went to bed.

my sleep schedule was crazy while we were camping. cause my grandparents wake up at like 7am and that basically means i also wake up at 7am. that’s roughly 4 hours before i normally wake up.

anyways, the next day, tq and i when on another morning hike with pappy. it was light, i barely remember it cause i was definitely not conscious. i remember it was a wednesday? tq and i laid on the hammock a lot. we also played a lot of jenga and poker. i think we had pork chops for dinner that night too. oh and we watched minions. that might’ve been the night before but whatever.

last sunday thucdan took connor tq and i out to have seafood boil as a reward for my outstanding grades this semester. it was delicious.

tq and i also had to bring our overnight bags because afterwards, thucdan took us to tastea which was where we were going to meet my nana and pappy to go stay with them for a week. it was smooth transaction as we made our way to our nana’s. that evening, we had something for dinner…i don’t remember what it was. i don’t think it was anything crazy because on monday we were going to be leaving to go camping so there wasn’t much food in the house. tq and i always sleep in the office when we’re at our nana’s. there’s one makeshift bed/chair/thingy and an air mattress. tq took the air mattress, which was arguably more comfortable because that chair/bed/thing kinda hurts my back and it’s real skinny and not as close to the ground as the air mattress so i nearly fall off of it a lot.

the next morning my grandparents woke up super early to finalize everything and get all the stuff into the trailer/truck. nana woke me and tq up a little bit before we left. i packed up our things quickly and we piled into the backseat of the truck with zoe, that dumb old deaf dog that tq hates/loves. it’s especially funny when tq will tell zoe she smells and that she’s dumb and old, but then kiss her and cuddle her and shower her in affection. it’s also our first camping trip without trip so that was a little somber.

it was pretty early in the morning for tq and i so we just slept the whole way up the mountain. well, i slept. tq was awake when we hit payson and actually starting advancing up the mountain. apparently we hit some huge traffic going up, and we got delayed by 30 minutes, but i wouldn’t know because i was asleep!

every time we go camping, we stay at canyon point, it’s this pretty nice campground with electricity and water and publice bathrooms and restrooms so pretty luxurious and glorious. it doesn’t take long for us to set up the trailer and get settled in at our spot. nana makes us sandwiches EVERY lunch. they’re pretty scrumptious. tq and i also got to choose chips from walmart from our stop in payson we also have those to ration out throughout the week along with 30 caprisuns. first day was a lot of chilling and setting up the hammock and our decorative ribbon. we also met some of our grandparents’ friends who were also up camping near our spot.

tq and i sleep on this second makeshift bed in the trailer. it’s the tiny dining table with cushions and a comforter on top. it’s pretty okay except for the fact that thucquyen has the biggest butt a 13 year old could ever harness and it’s always up in my space, even more so in the trailer.

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