WHERE DID YOU GROW UP? WHAT WAS YOUR PATH TO CAL?
 
I grew up in suburbs of Durham, NC, a town about half an hour from the capital, Raleigh, and known mostly for its major exports of tobacco, minor league baseball, and gang violence.  We have a Burt’s Bees factory now, as well!  I graduated from CE Jordan high in 2008 and went undeclared to NC State University in nearby Raleigh.  The indecision lasted until I took my first computer science course, after which I jumped ship to nearby UNC-Chapel Hill and graduated with a BS in Computer Science in December of 2012.  After that, I was offered and accepted admission into UC Berkeley’s CS MS program, beginning this year.       
 
HOW MUCH PROGRAMMING HAVE YOU DONE (& WHAT LANGUAGES)?
 
I guess technically I got my start programming on a TI-85 in middle school, but it was years later in about 2010 that I picked up Java as my first real language in college, followed shortly after by C, C#, C++, perl, html, unix scripting stuff, javascript, and SQL.  I dream one day of being fluent in Whitespace and INTERCAL.
 
WHAT ARE YOUR HOBBIES?
 
I enjoy reading, biking, jogging, and playing games, as well as dabbling in continued study of Japanese, a thing which I have been pursuing for the last three years and am still working at.  One day I will be able to read a newspaper!  That day is not today.
 
WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR TALENTS & SKILLS?
 
I can juggle a single ball, ride a bicycle (like a unicycle but with two tires), and speak intermediate level Japanese.  I can also do a variety of other things too varied, obscure, and impressive to list here.
 
HAVE YOU DONE ANYTHING REMARKABLE? HAS ANYTHING MEMORABLE HAPPENED TO YOU?
 
When I studied abroad in Japan in 2011, I climbed Mount Fuji with a friend overnight, and watched the sun rise from the top.  I also, during the same trip, discovered that the top of Fuji is very cold when you are wearing a windbreaker, that a bathroom full of foreigners huddling for warmth at the top of the mountain can be a sight for sore eyes, and that there was a reason that the Japanese people my friend and I passed were taking their time climbing the mountain. 
 
WHAT COMMITMENTS WILL BE CONSUMING YOUR CYCLES THIS SEMESTER?
 

I’ll be attending to TAing CS10, in addition to covering all of my own course work and acclimating myself to the Berkeley area.