The hardest part about being an astronaut is the possibility of never actually being able to be an astronaut. The amount of trials and selectivity to never be able to accomplish the end goal. I was wondering if every trial has a worthwile conclusion? I can't fully relate to astronauts, we have different challenges, however, I feel the struggle in the process as well as the unheard uncertainties behind great achievements.

A time where I was put to a tricky test was the navigation of my life during the initial stages of the coronavirus outbreak. I had just arrived in Shanghai in late January to celebrate my birthday, getting ready to start school. The virus had already popped up in China and the second day I was there the opening of school was delayed for two weeks. So my best friend and I decided to take a trip to Cambodia and wait things out. Already in Cambodia for four days, my friend was called back home to the USA due to her parents worries, however I waited things out from the school. A few days later, the administration gifted me enrollment to NYU Berlin, so I was flown over to Berlin. I spent a month and a half in Berlin, extremely confused as I am not accustomed at all to the culture, until one night, the NYU administration closed all international campuses and kindly evicted us all. Despite everyone going back to the USA, the next day I booked a flight back to China, to go to the city of Chengdu. My journey back was right on the nick of time. In all the countries that I flew through, the borders closed to passengers from Germany on the following day. Arriving in China, I was placed in a 2 week quarantine hotel, greeted daily by workers in hazmats to deliver my food and take my temperature. Halfway through the quarantine, China shut its borders to all foreigners, I was lucky. Once my two weeks were over, it was already late April and China's lockdown had just been lifted, and I finally began what has been one of the best eras of my life.

Looking back on this experience, it turned out to be a test of my independence, patience, and motivation. On the surface, I just took a bunch of flights, however it comes down to me being alone, flying across the world during an international pandemic, narrowly avoiding being estranged in random countries, and dealing with intense isolation from everything that I was familiar with. I was making decisions against everyone else's opinion in order to give myself the life that I wanted. Everyone thought I was insane, but I wasn't doing this by choice, the administration scattered me across the world. In the end, I would say that I was successful. I managed to never encounter a single lockdown, have a few mini vacations, and experience things that I would never have otherwise. I can thank the power of luck for much of what happened, however I believe it comes down to me not acting out of fear, but acting out of my own nature.

The test didn't end just there though, I have faced many challenges such as housing insecurity due to xenophobia from landlords and government restrictions on foreigners due to the virus. These circumstances led to living in hotels and the back of a hookah bar at one point. However, I will leave the storytelling at here.

This recorded performance is trying to talk about the illusion of identity. I believe that when participating in the physical world, there is a necessity in attaching identities to people. However, this is just for simplification in communication. We cannot take these identities as something that is attached to our true self. It is merely a simplification of the ego. Looking at the brick surrounded by the house of cards, the cards just represent all the identities that the outer world has placed around us, however the brick, the core, remains pure and untouched. In my eyes, the blowing away of the cards felt like the destruction of this outer ego. The magic part of the show was also very intruiging to me, as I have never seen someone deal with cards in such a refined manner. I was left questioning how he managed to identify the self-chosen identity of each audience member. I was wondering if he had simply memorized it based on seat number or had some sort of microphone relaying him the information. However, due to how well he remembered the cards, I don't see how remembering the identities of the audience would require any more brain power. The experience of the card tricks and illusions did not affect me on a deeper level, however using these illusions as allusions to the philisophical concepts he is portraying is quite effective.

One thing that I found a bit difficult to accept was the extent to which the audience was reacting to their identities being chosen. It is possible that I am not connecting on the same level because I am not participating in the live show, however it feels a little weird to have card tricks playing alongside manipulating people's emotion into feeling something about themselves.