So I had an interesting and personal run in with history/international politics this past week. 

I found out that I am ineligible for an internship because I was born in Taiwan.  The US broke off diplomatic relationships with Taiwan in the 1960s for reasons that have to do with China, so now Taiwan has no official diplomatic relationship with the US.  Althought I have been a US citizen since 1993, I am being disqualified because the work I might be doing has implications on national security and the US has no diplomatic relationships with Taiwan.

I'm not sure what to about all this yet, but I would appreciate some prayers and advice b/c on the one hand I feel like fighting it (since our founding forefathers were definitely British born and could have been considered homeland security threats), but on the other hand, I'm not sure if I'm just feeling rebelious.

So, before school started back up, I got to travel to NYC for a bio-medical engineering conference with my officemate Ozkan. 

We had to take a picture next to the Seinfeld cafe.


Met up with other Cal Bears transplanted to NYC (Dan and Christine).


I was actually thinking about applying to Columbia for engineering just for the name.


Double fried french fries at Pom Frites Shoppe (the menu is all dipping sauces).


more photos of the trip here: http://picasaweb.google.com/michaelfu/EMBC2006NYC


Then, 2 weekends ago, I went down to Akron (1hr south of Cleveland) to pick up a 1970s vintage Peugeot road bike that was in really good condition for $25.  The previous owner graduated from Case in the 60s, moved to Luxembourg in the 80s and bought the bike there before bringing it back to the states.



On a sad note, the betta fish that Jimmy got me 3 years ago passed away.