I’ve always known that doing the Disney College Program last semester would mean I’d have to graduate late. Graduating one semester late was part of the plan. But what wasn’t part of the plan was graduating a full year late.

The art program at my university has two-part class for seniors, one in which they must take in the fall semester of their senior year, and one in the spring. It has to be in that order. Coming back from the DCP, I had many, many meetings with my advisor, dean, and head of the department to see if there’s any exception for me. The head of the department told me that in his opinion, maybe I can just go through with doing one semester of this class rather than two. My advisor, however, is the instructor for the two-semester course, and felt it was best if I kept to the Fall-Spring format. But he said he’d have a meeting with the entire department to see if any exception can be made.

They unanimously agreed that I should stick to the Fall-Spring format, meaning I’d have to come back in the Spring of 2016 for that one class. At first I was pretty upset, but I understood the decision wasn’t out of spite, but in my best interest. The course is meant to strengthen my portfolio and my work as a whole. What is annoying, though, is that I’ve spoken to many of my classmates who’ve taken the fall semester course, and who are currently taking the spring semester one, and they all told me the same thing: “We did absolutely nothing all semester.”

The fact that I could’ve caught up by doing the course this semester if they’d only let me, since they didn’t do anything last semester, is what’s upsetting. But I’m glad I won’t have to pay full tuition for the Spring 2016 semester, though it’s still pretty darn expensive.

It feels weird to me that I won’t be graduating with some of my friends, my peers. On the bright side, there’s still plenty of friends at school who are graduating late as well. So I won’t totally be alone.

At this point in my life, I’m really just itching to finally finish school and move on with my professional life. Going to Disney for a semester really exposed me to new perspectives and insight. It’s probably made the biggest impact on my life out of all the decisions I’ve made in the past. Before then, I’d never lived away from home before - or for as long. I mean, I’ve lived away for a whole week when I went to Louisiana Boys’ State in high school, but I don’t think that counts. And I went to Disney alone, having to make new friends. I was really scared, but it worked out for the best. I was able to meet people from all around the world, and people whom I can call my lifelong friends. Living in Orlando and meeting all these people reminded me how big the world is.

Besides Disney, there are three other factors that’ve played a big role in my life - factors that are contributing to this “itch.” And these factors are important people in my life: my cousin Nam, my close friend Victoria, and my best friend Dil.

Other than my immediate family members, my cousin Nam was the relative I had the closest relationship with. He’s the one who introduced me to great films, leading me to this love for cinema. He’s been a great role model for me in terms of work ethic and passion. I haven’t been as close to him these past few years ever since he moved to Japan to fulfill his dream of teaching there, but we still stay in touch and talk every now and then.

I don’t have a lot of close friends here in NOLA, but one of them is definitely Victoria. She was one of the first people I met at Loyola, as well as when I joined LASO and the VSA/Asian community. Through the years we’ve gotten closer because of how much we work together, as well as how well we work together. What inspires me about Victoria is how she can juggle so much at once. She’s always at the top of her game, even when she’s a full time grad student working a full-time job, with extracurriculars like UVSA Gulf Coast, Fleur de Ladies, etc. She finally made the big life decision to move out of NOLA this upcoming summer, and I must admit I’m pretty sad she won’t be around, but I’m even more happy for her.

My best friend Dil is the one who’s had the biggest impact. The first time I met him I found out he did the DCP, and I was immediately inspired. I think around the same time I had already tried to apply, but got rejected. But as we became better friends, and after continuously hearing how great his experience was there, I had to apply again. And I did, thankfully. Dil’s the one who inspired me to dream bigger. Seeing how well he put his life together, and the steps he took to accomplish his goals, made me want to do the same. He’s the first one of us to get out of this bubble that is NOLA. He left to pursue his dream of living in California, and he did it. That’s what makes me proud, and that’s what inspires me to do the same.

These three people, together with my experience at Disney, showed me how much more I can do with my life, and to dream bigger. They all got out (well, Victoria will be there soon lol) of the bubble. They’re doing what they love, as well as living where they love, and that’s where I want to be. I don’t want to be comfortable, I want to be happy. I want to be excited. When people ask me what I want to do after graduating, I no longer tell them “My dream is to work at Pixar.” I tell them “I’m going to work at Pixar.” That’s the plan, and one day I’m going to make it a reality.

I remember in my high school psychology class, my teacher told us about this statistic and how like the majority of people die X-amount of miles away from where they were born/lived. I don’t recall the exact number of miles, but it was something low, maybe 20 miles? The point is, I don’t want to be that statistic. Like Nam, like Victoria, like Dil, I want to leave the confines of NOLA and reach my goal of California and Pixar. If I stay here, like so many of my family members and friends are, I won’t be 100% happy.

That’s why I was mostly upset at the news that I’d be graduating even later than already planned. When I came back home from Orlando, I was filled with the drive to finish my final two semesters strong, and work hard enough so I can get a stable job and save enough money to move and pursue my goal. A friend of mine recently told me about this animation/film studio in Louisiana that he has connections to called Moonbot Studios. They’re pretty cool, and they’re small competitors to Pixar - even beating out Pixar for an Oscar a few years ago. Ideally, after graduation I would like to work for them, which would mean staying in Louisiana for a while, but it would be a small sacrifice for an amazing experience.

Let’s see what happens one year from now.