Hello! Welcome to my website!
For those who do not know me, I'm Tristan Lee, a third-year/first-year transfer Electrical Engineering student at the University of California, San Diego (Don't worry I am confused by it too 😂).
For those who do know me, I hope you are all healthy, happy, and safe! I have been wanting to create a new log for a while now, but I go well over the 2,200-character limit for Instagram captions, and I am tired of thinking about what I want to leave in or out of the log, so I decided to "vibe code" a personal website, move the logs here, and lay everything I want to say out here.
With that being said, here are some thoughts from my first month and a bit in La Jolla.
I am currently in the middle of Week 6 of the quarter right now, and I am exhausted. I feel like I am learning a lot and nothing at the same time. People were not over-exaggerating when talking about how intensive the pacing of the UC quarter system is. Having Evergreen Valley College (EVC), my local community college, I never understood why most of the people I knew from my high school decided not to enroll in there, but choose to drive (sit in rush hour traffic) for 30 minutes to an hour to go to De Anza or Foothill other than for better transfer rates until now. De Anza and Foothill being run on the quarter system, which makes students accustom to the system for when they transfer to a UC. EVC is ran off the semester system, so I was not bombarded with a midterm every two weeks and I had more time to learn material. Adjusting to the pacing of the quarter system has definitely taken a toll on me. I believe by Week 3 I was already starting to feel burnt out, but that's university for you and there's solace in knowing you are not the only one.
I must say I was in over my head when thinking how my first quarter would go here at UCSD 😂! After seeing my course plan and course descriptions of the courses I needed to take my first quarter, I thought I was chilling and was considering taking 5 courses rather than the recommended 4 along with joining clubs and playing on the hockey team. Flash forward to Week 4, I end up dropping a class. Those first few weeks with 4 courses was a humbling experience and a huge wake up call for me. Trying to balance being an engineering student and hockey player or an athlete for that matter is no easy feat, and I find myself questioning how Josh Dobbs (New England Patriots QuarterBack, B.S. Aerospace Engineering, 4.0 GPA @ University of Tennesse) was able to do it at the NCAA Division I level. The one and only good answer I find is: "If he can do it, then why not me?" Why not me? That's the real question there. When I try to answer this question, I just find myself coming up with excuses for myself.
While I study, I put on inspiredbyFlorian videos as background noise and a quote that always pushes me to go the extra mile is Denzel Washington's "Those who can, do. Those who can't talk about those who can. Now, can you or can you not?" Complaining never got anyone anywhere and if I am being honest with myself, I complain too much. I can not be mad about my midterm scores for the amount of studying I did not do like Khabib Nurmagomedov, former UFC Lightweight Champion, said, "who cares?" I should have studied harder regardless of how overwhelmed and tired I was.
Although I know I could have studied harder and longer, I must add, I do feel like I did my best to study for my midterms. I guess the material just did not click for me, and now I have to try harder and do better. Knowing I tried my best and at the same time thinking I could have done more is the greatest dilemma I face. Sometimes I forget that I am human and no one is going to be perfect, but you can be pretty close too it. One of my professors posted the answers to their midterm one hour after the exam and when I went over it, I was thinking to myself like "Oh, I should have got that one, done this, that and x,y,z" but it's real convenient when you are looking at an answer key versus taking the exam. I went into my midterms saying to myself what I know was what I know, and what I do not know, was what I do not know, and that is ok because I am learning. You do not have to be good the first time you learn or try something new. Coming to this realization helped me when I was dealing with imposter syndrome during this midterm season. Seeing all my other colleagues get higher scores than me, it's hard not to feel imposter syndrome and think I am not cut out for engineering when I can not even get good scores on exams for introduction courses, but if I knew everything there was to know, I should not be a student, and be the professor instead. My story, path, and learning is unique to me and I should not care as to anyone else's.
Luckily, the final for all my courses replaces the entire grade. So the way I see it is that I GET the next 30 days to learn everything and more about analog circuits, C, and C++. I emphasized GET because one of my colleagues told me the other day to start replacing HAVE TO with GET because nobody forced me to go to university and enroll in these courses, it was all by choice. I tried to come out with a rebuttal, but I could not because they were absolutely right, and me giving off the connotation that studying is such a burden is outright disrespectful to the people who did not get into UCSD or even go to university because they never got the opportunity I have right now, it's a privilege. Although it has been a few days since my colleague told me that, I noticed that switch in my mindset has made my days better; I find myself smiling randomly at times and thinking to myself, "How lucky I am to be right where I am." So from this point onward, I am just going to put one foot in front of the other, control what I can control, learn what I can learn, do my best, and keep moving forward!
Besides the rough midterm season, my life in La Jolla has been great. I love that my days are long and fulfilling. Getting to eat with an ocean view every day, walk down to the beach to catch waves, and work on the swing at the range two stops away on the weekends, it's hard to feel homesick. I will say the food situation at UCSD is absolutely brutal, but that's the university experience everywhere except UCLA, so I will give it a pass (I am down 11 lbs in the past month). I did not know I was homesick until after I came home, I went back to the Bay two weekends ago for hockey. The weekend was tough, going 0 - 4, with double-digit losses against San Jose State and Berkeley, but that's besides the point. I did not know how much I would miss the little things like having nice water pressure when you shower, not having to walk around your house with shoes on because the carpet is filthy and no amount of vacuum cleaning is ever going to make it feel clean, going to the ice rink, and reconnecting with familiar faces. Normally I would be frustrated going 0 - 4 on a weekend, but experiencing those little things made me very happy and grateful for the life I have. You do not know what you got until it's gone.
I am very thankful to everyone and everything in my life from my family, friends, hockey, teachers, professors, and to my newfound community here at UCSD. I want to do right by all of them and be the best decent person I know I can be.
With that being said, I think this is a good spot to end of the log. There's so much more I want to put down, but it's midnight right now, and I have an early morning flight to catch in the morning going to Seattle to play hockey for the weekend. I am very excited to visit Seattle again, visit UDub, catch up again with some familiar faces, and play some hockey. Hopefully, we can win some games and I can finally beat myself and pot a few in the net this weekend. I need some small wins to help me gear up for this final stretch of this quarter system. I have another exam on Monday right when I back from Seattle, let's hope I can find time to study over the weekend, and I can pass this!
Thank you to everyone who read this log! I write these logs mainly for myself as is a very cathartic process and gives me a good idea to where my head-space is at, but I post it for everyone to see for the slim chance my story and my thought can help someone else out!
Ever since I created my first portfolio website for my business class during my freshman year in high school, I always wanted to create a personal website, and I am very proud of this site. Let me know if you have any suggestions on what I can do to improve this site or what you want to see on here. You probably noticed I put the YouTube link in the sidebar; is it time to come back? Editing videos, let alone writing these logs, is a long process, but I enjoy doing it as it makes me feel productive and with 3 classes, I have some time. I am still debating on coming back, but I will keep my options open.
As always, check up on your friends, D3, called me the other day, and that made my day, which also in a bit inspired me to bring back the logs and make this website. Just a short quick message or call is all you need to make someone's day. A little goes a long way!
See you all soon!