Sunday, February 28, 2010

Always Suffer?

Think about this quote from Woody Allen. Is it true? Not true? Sometimes true? Or my personal favorite, it depends on the situation?

To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering, one must not love. But then, one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer.To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy.
Therefore, to be happy, one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness.
-Woody Allen

Sunday, February 21, 2010

The Best Dream Movie Award Goes to....

WOW!

Last night I had thee BEST dream ever! Well... in the movie category that is!

Everyone has dreams whether they remember them or not. But last night, I had a dream that was one of a kind! Picture watching a movie that you have never seen (so that you are pretty interested because you've never seen it before), only you are IN the movie and although you don't get to change or control what happens in the movie, you can control what YOU do in the movie!

Well this is exactly what happened to me last night.....

------------

I was running with a friend. Don't know his name but he was my friend. It was some sort of training camp session and the terrain we were running through was rough and outdoorsy just as if the trail were a trail normal people would hike on. We were ahead of everyone that was running and everyone now and then along the path, there were what reminded me of staff sergeants yelling and letting us know how far more the trail goes giving us the choice to either keep going where the end was far out of site, or stop, pack up, and go home. Although it was our choice, they gave it to us as if they were discouraging us from attempting to make it to the end.

My friend and I kept running and although the thought of quitting raced through our minds, that's pretty much all it did as we made the decision to keep on going no matter what these men along the trail said. We could make it. We were tough and we were far ahead of all the rest behind us.

Through rough terrain. Up the dirt trails. Down. Around the bend and alongside beautiful meadows sometimes. Trampling through small river banks and sweating hard, but alongside me? My friend and we were ahead of everyone one making us feel unstoppable!

We did it. The last test was over. We made it to the end and just as a dream disables you from remembering those fine, small details the end was a blur. But one thing I know. My friend and I made it and we were now part of some sort of special task force kinda like them Navy Seals. ....but better.

Months later, it was just another mission and although passing the test was still very vivid in my mind, we were now all experienced with many missions under our belts. That's right, there are 30 of us men and women. We are the best the U.S. military has. We have the highest skills and we are given the most dangerous missions. We were marching through a meadow of tall grass and overgrown weeds. It was some sort of valley as on both sides there were small mountains. It was a perfect ambush area to trap us. We knew it, but it was the only trail to take to reach our rendezvous point and we could only move through the valley as quick as we can. We're running at a fast pace and just ahead, a blind spot. The whole valley meadow bends around to the left but in our line of sight was a mountain we had to go around. We raced around the bend, a horrible mistake, for as we all got around the bend, there was an army of about a thousand men tanks and all. They were Russians...

Immediately, they start laying siege on us and just ahead is an old abandoned barn. Taking heavy fire from both men and tank, we took shelter in the barn and got into these trenches in the barn where we are in the barn, just below the ground, and if we look just over the lip of the trench and under the barn wall of wood, you could see the army out in the short distanced meadow. Everytime we popped our heads up, they fired at us. We were stuck, pinned down, and couldn't move.

Everytime some Russians tried to get near, we killed 'em. No one could get near us, but we couldn't take on their big army. Even the best can be outnumbered.

Hours went by and we were basically just laying there in those trenches! Every now and then Russians would try to sneak up on us only to be killed by the best the United States has to offer. The battle was at a standstill. We were in a barn and the Russian army was right outside. If we were to make any attempt to leave, there was no doubt we would all would perish; it didn't matter how good we were.

Suddently, like a flashlight cuts through darkness, a loud yell is heard coming from the Russian army and as I look up just over the lip of the trench, I saw a huge white flag being waved alongside a unarmed man who is walking toward us in the barn. We don't shoot letting him and his flag bearer in the barn. He is the General of the Russian army himself and he tells us that he will let us go IF we give up two of our men one of them being our captain. Who was the captain? Our captain was the same guy that I was running with at the beginning of my whole dream -my best friend.

A long pause of silence filled the room.

In shock of us all, our captain agreed and signed some sort of document and handed it over to the Russians. The Russians left for a while while the silence continued on for the obvious purpose of someone stepping forward to sacrifice themself for the rest of the group. One fellow soldier and friend stepped forward. All showing appreciation by patting him on the shoulder.

But I was still in disbelief. What about the captain? He's not just my captain, but my best friend!!!
The Russians returned, this time with 2 armed soldiers. It was execution style right in front of us. We watched as my best friend and fellow soldier stood side by side getting ready to be shot and killed from the back. Tears began running down my face and a few others started tearing up. I couldn't hold myself together.

I woke up from my dream and in reality I was crying! REAL tears were streaming down my face! I wiped my tears from my face and jumped right back in my dream.

All I heard were the gun shots. The visual perception was blacked out.

That night they died. A fellow soldier and friend of mine, as well as my captain and best friend. But they did not die in vain for the rest of us 28 walked away from the battlefield unharmed and free. We will never forget our captain and fellow friend and how they sacrificed their lives for us.

Never forget the fantedible 30.

Monday, February 15, 2010

An Awesome Weekend!

Hello!

So I tried to make a video blog to post here instead of just typing up a blog entry, but it didn't load. (Boy I sound lazy eh?) So here I go typing!

This weekend was AWESOME! A lot of things happened this weekend!

So friday, I got my new digital grand piano! Which I am super excited about! You know how they say to physically write down your plans & goals on paper for both short term and long term? Well a while back, I did that. I made a list of things I wanted and planned to get within the nearby (short-term) future. I put the 3 things on a stickie note on my macbook pro's desktop so every time I opened my laptop I would see the stickie and read it every time.

The 3 things on the note were:

1. Alexis USB Sound Board with 4 Inputs - $149.99
2. Yamaha Arius YDP140 Digital Piano - $1,039.99
3. 2010 Audi S4 $45,900

Now I don't know the exact percentage, but I remember reading that the percentage of all americans, if not, everyone in the world is very low when talking about people who physically write down their goals. The small percentage that do write down their goals are most likely to achieve those goals.

The first item on the list is a sound board or a mixer. I already have one exactly like it, but the USB piece of the board broke and doesn't work in the sense that I can't plug it into my macbook or computer like I want. So I need a new one to make recording A WHOLE LOT easier. I plan to get this hopefully within the next month or two.

The second item I wanted because it was the exact same digital piano I used in one of my music classes over at CSULA and I LOVED the way it sounded. I even brought my then working sound board to record inside the actual class during the class and also loved the way it sounded when recorded! So I made that specific choice.

And of course, who wouldn't agree how just flat out sexy audis are???

So a week ago I got a letter from the Pasadena City College saying that they were having a piano and being that I was a local musician I had the option of making a private appointment before the public sale to get first priority on the pianos that they have. Among the many pianos they had were digital pianos! So that night after receiving the letter I called to make an appointment. Instead of getting a used digital grand piano for a used price, I ended up getting a brand new digital grand piano for a used price! You see, the school (PCC), at the time of ordering, they had ordered one or two extra and in turn, never used. Upon arriving at my appointment time this past Friday, I viewed a used one. The lady showing the piano to my mother and I, said that it was sold and was unavailable. Even so, I sat down at the piano bench, turned the piano on, and started playing just to see how it would feel and sound. The showroom lady again stated that it was sold and was unavailable. I pulled out my headphones which I had brought, plugged them in & put them on, and continued playing. She stuttered to make the statement again but was quick to stop herself by stating that she would go check in the back to see if they have any more. So she did, and when she returned she came back with the sweetest news ever. They had one more left and it was still boxed up, brand new! I asked if we would still get the used price of $1,250.00 for this new piano. She said "Yessss! Of courseee for youu!" in a chinese accent. So I went home happy :)

I was shocked that I had gotten my digital grand. I thought of that list I made. Y'see I have been making money selling things on ebay ($850 in the past 4 weeks) and I will soon be getting a job building a friend's website for $500. Add that up, and it gets my digital grand piano! So WRITE YOUR GOALS DOWN EVEN IF THEY ARE BIG ONES. You never know how you will achieve that goal, but just by writing your goals down, you are one step closer to achieving it! ..just how I achieved my big goal of getting my digital grand piano to record my music.

With the sound board, like I said, I will probably getting it within the next two months easing my recording processes. And I have no doubt that my Audi S4 is coming soon.

Friday evening, I went to my usual friday night rehearsal for the youth praise band that I run.
Saturday morning I went to church and came back around 2ish?
Saturday evening I went to my church's Valentine Social which is basically a semi-formal dinner with live entertainment. The entertainment was the Michael McDaniel's Jazz Quartet. It was interesting for me to see the jazz band and to hear a different style of music I am not used to listening to. It's always a benefit to listen to a broad range of music genres and appreciate them. So that was nice. But I must say, this Valentines was quite lonely without a date! heeheehee...

Sunday morning I woke up early to clean the WHOLE house for my BBQ! I also transformed my garage into a music recording studio having drums, my new digital grand, speakers, my recording computers, bass amps.... Just the whole works! We had the BBQ. Some friends came over and it was awesome!

Sunday night 4 guys slept over and we had a blast! Everything from making crazy videos to wrestling, to... more crazy videos! We woke up this morning, had breakfast, made some more crazy videos, and did some more wrestling. We went to a chinese buffet for lunch and got some boba. Came back. Tried to make some fun, silly music recordings but failed miserably and the guys left. I then had to transform my garage back into a garage for I wouldn't have time tomorrow while I'll be at school from 8am to just over 8pm... A tiring but CRAZY FUN weekend.

So lesson I guess is to WRITE YOUR GOALS DOWN AND PUT THEM IN A PLACE YOU WILL BE ABLE TO SEE AND READ EVERYDAY!
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend, Valentine's Day, and President's Day! Have an awesome week!

-Aaron

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Anak, my child?

Hello!

Every evening we have a family dinner in my house except tuesdays and thursdays now since I come back from school late on those days. Today I was talking to my parents about the drop shipping business I am going to be starting hopefully within the next 3 weeks (Google what drop selling is if you don't know what it is). So we were all talking about it and we are just about ready to take the few steps needed to get underway and I finally asked what the name of my website will be.

My dad suggested that I do a 'my name' one like aaronnakamura.com or something which I quickly dismissed as being sorta lame and since I already have a personal website (www.sourmilkproductions.com) and I don't need a business one with my personal name. Plus I don't want the public knowing that my store's name is simply my full name. I stated that if anything, I want the store name to be the farthest away from my name! Then my mom suggested that I do something like AaronNak.com. Another lame name. Then I thought.... What about anak? I said this with having the filipino translation "my child" in mind. (Anak in tagalog = "my child") We started discussing it but I knew that with such a simple word also meaning my initials A(aron)nak(amura). But such a common filipino word I knew that "www.anak.com" would be taken... So I started thinking of stuff to add to the name like "anak123.com" or "easyanak.com" but non had that golden ring to it. It was hilarious. The ideas that were being pumped out by my parents were HILARIOUS.

But I have come up with a name for my website/business! I'm not going to say because I haven't registered the name yet. Hopefully I will have it registered tomorrow or by this weekend the latest.

Check out my current personal website at www.sourmilkproductions.com if you haven't already. Please keep me in your prayers that this business will be a success!!

-Aaron Nak

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Is This All Life Has to Offer?

So for those of you who don't know, I haven't been feelin' this quarter at all. School-wise. I don't like my classes and I don't know... the whole "ish" and the whole vibe about this quarter isn't so great.

With that said....

Lately, just about every night before I go to bed I always wonder and ask myself, "Is this what life has to offer? Is this what I'm meant to be doing? What will I be doing in the future? Will I be successful? I hope so.... Will I grow up and find "the one" and have a nice family? I really hope so..." and just questions I don't know the answers to. I could only hope for the best.... right?

Tonight just as I was about to go to bed, the series of questions began flooding my mind again except this time I remembered a quote from the bible I remembered reading when I was preparing for one of my lessons for my youth group a few weeks ago. It's found in the book of Matthew chapter 5 verses 14-16:

"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven." -NIV

And it not only gave me hope, but purpose, faith, and inspiration.

You see a lot of times we often worry about the future and wonder what our purpose in this world is. Well this verse clearly gives us the answer. We are the LIGHT of the world! We are to be good christians by setting an example on how the bible teaches us how to live! We are to spread the gospel and make disciples as it says in Matthew 28:19.

How do we know if we are being lights of the world? Ask yourself, Throughout your daily lives, Do people see God through your works? What kind of impression do you think you are making on people? Is it a good one? Live for God. Trust in God. If you trust in God every step of your life, then you should know that He will take care of you and He knows what is right for you!

Worry no more. God has a purpose for you!

Until next time, many Blessings!