I have just arrived in San Francisco for the MFA this blog is about. The MFA classes themselves haven't started yet; I am currently doing a Summer Bridge program geared for international students and anyone who wants to get back into US academic writing styles (though CIIS is admittedly not as traditionally academic as most places).
In the weeks since I last posted on here, I have mostly been preoccupied with getting the logistics together for my course and this epic huge move. The Blogger format doesn't lend itself easily to short snippets of inspiration; I have tried to find non-Tumblr microblogging alternatives but none are well-supported. (My past experiences with Tumblr, while a great platform for microblogging, was so mired with drama and echo-chambering that it became too toxic to stay.) Also I was experiencing a lot of personal emotional shifts - and still am - and wanted to keep them private rather than (over)share with the world as I would normally do.
I do feel that I likely need to loosen the focus of my project, since I am not even sure what sort of work I will be doing or what my opportunities are. I do suspect that sexuality and culture (and their uncomfortable intersections) will make up a large part of my eventual MFA, but I also want the opportunity to grow and explore pathways that I can't even imagine now, letting the final project take up whatever form it needs to rather than being so didactic so early.
It will definitely be very personal, even if I don't explicitly make it so. Art was always a means of expressing some issue or idea about myself and my experiencesl even the more superficial of my acts relate to a personal deep interest (such as my Darren Hayes fangirling, which also informs a lot of my creative and emotional processes as well as ideas on mentorship and guidance).
The challenge then would be to not let my personal matters be carved up and destroyed in a degree setting, as it happened in my Bachelors, where my more heartfelt creative writing pieces were told off for "unrealistic characters" (the characters DO exist! they're me!). As it is I'm going through a huge mess of culture shock + depression + illness (a persistent respiratory infection; doctors seem to be booked up till October) + uncertainty. I live a little further out from city centers or hubs, necessitating a multiple-block walk or public transport to get to anywhere non-residential; I would explore more, but my current residential area has a reputation for danger after dark, and I'm unwilling to go somewhere unplanned just yet. (Today on the bus a young woman sitting in front of me wielded a knife, ready either to attack or defend. My naive foreign softy self was chilled.)
I was heartened to have been remembered by Robert, one of the caretakers of the Center of Sex and Culture and a father figure to me the last time I was in SF (especially after a really bad accidental-dosing incident where he and his partners Carol and Dina housed & cared for me); I dropped by the Center to say hi and he offered the keys to the place if I wanted to come in to study (their library looks AWESOME) or rest. It's not far from CIIS and is a hell of a lot more convenient than going all the way back home and then back again; I may take him up on the offer. (I wonder if I could get a locker to keep my stuff for late-night jaunts. And maybe a bed.)
If anyone has better ideas on a Tumblr-esque blogging platform, I'm all ears. Also if you are in San Francisco or the East Bay and want to hang out or chat or have suggestions, do tell!
