An Overwhelming Last Few Months

 Hey everyone. Jonathan Yip on the line here writing before I hit the hay for the night. These last 2 months have been a rollercoaster ride, with its ups and downs. 

    Earlier this month, I participated in the worldwide 24-Hour Animation Contest for students. In this annual contest, you get into teams of 5 and create a 30-second film within 24 hours based on the theme given. With most teams staying up the entire 24 hours straight with little to no sleep, it is very intensive, kind of like a very rushed animated film at the end, but on the bright side, one can make everlasting connections with potential future studio co-workers and gain experience working with other animators. Unfortunately, as a result of staying up basically all night but 2 hours, I got a major headache towards the end of the contest.  Now, participating in this contest for 3 straight years, with myself not feeling very well after the last 2 contests, I am starting to question the worth of doing 24 hours every year. Yes, I have met so many hard-working and friendly artists and animators along the way and received the experience of working in a team. But is this worth sacrificing my health, especially having a need for more sleep due to my special needs, especially that this lack of sleep gave me a major headache that took at least 2 days to fully recover? After asking myself these questions, most likely, as a result of my need for 9+ hours of sleep daily to function well the next day, participating in this contest for 3 consecutive years, most likely, I will probably skip out on 24 Hours next year. Anyway, my team, this year put in a lot of hard work and thought into the creation of this film on COVID, our theme for year's 24 Hour Contest. I helped out with some of the animation and character sketches. A big thank you to everyone on my team for our hard work and to everyone, including Aubry and the CSULB faculty, who made this contest possible. This is our film we made together: 

Many of my peers on Discord like to talk about their favorite popular games they play and all of that. People have asked me if I play games like Roblox or Minecraft. I feel awkward often when I tell them I'm not too big of a fan of most video games, that I don't have time to play video games, and would rather spend my time drawing and planning for my future. Honestly, unlike most people, I tend to not follow popular trends. As a kid growing up with autism and other learning challenges, I'm also not the type of person that needs to fit in with the status quo. Growing up, I have been made fun of for not fitting in and having significantly different interests. While many people live in the moment, I live for tomorrow and the future, always dreaming about what my future will look like and worrying about the potential obstacles or downsides I could be facing soon. 

That being said, I have also been doing a lot of sketching in my free time. I love to sketch animals and am thinking of more anthropomorphic characters to bring to life in the future. Here are some of my recent works:

Also, allergies have been a concern on my end lately, Growing up with allergies is a unique experience. On the dark side, I can't eat certain foods like peanuts and cow's milk, which drastically limits the number of foods I can eat and limits the number of places I can travel to. On the bright side, it made me very aware to look at the ingredients on a food package insert and to always tell others around me about my food allergies. My allergies have gotten better in recent years, I can now eat eggs and certain tree nuts. I participated in the Stanford Peanut Trial back in late-11th grade and am now ingesting 1 peanut every day. However, I still do get minor reactions from time to time, such as an itchy tongue. Usually, right after I ingest my peanut for the day, I rush to eat my regular dinner food to flush the peanut down to avoid any major reaction to the peanut.

Also as a result of COVID, I have been staying with my parents up in the Bay Area for the past few months. I usually go on night walks with them every night. What's unusual is that during certain night walks, I would come back to my parent's house having an allergic reaction, usually with a very itchy throat. Even more unusual, I have only had these reactions in the Bay Area. I have noticed these minor reactions happen spontaneously several times in high school before I left the Bay Area to pursue my dreams at CSULB, and also during the times I visited them up in the Bay Area, like the reaction a few days ago. I've never witnessed a reaction like this walking during the night back home in Los Feliz/Silverlake or at school in Long Beach. 

A friend of mine from CSULB who travels to the Bay Area often to visit family has environmental allergies as well and told me his allergies are worst in the Bay Area than they are back in Southern California. I am definitely feeling the same way right now, noticing this with my nose a lot the past 2 years, especially during the winter in the Bay Area, and now with the occasional reactions after night walks. Winters in the Bay Area are literally freezing cold most of the time that I have to wear at least 2 jackets with a beanie and a scarf. This is what a lot of times, causes my nose to get very stuffy. As with the walks, my parents and I are thinking that it may be due to the specific trees and the increased number of trees overall around Redwood Shores and the Bay Area. I'm praying that we find answers soon with my allergist tomorrow.

Anyway, that is all I have for now! Hope you guys are all having a wonderful week! Stay tuned for more animation and life posts, coming soon.