After a couple of domestic sibling trips, the Lee siblings finally made it outside of America! This trip happened unexpectedly but was a nice and rewarding surprise for the both of us.

It all started back in 2024 when I talked to my high school friend Ava, who was studying abroad in Italy, about visiting her sometime. After many back and forth, we finally found an overlap in our breaks!

While planning the trip, I wanted to make the most of my trip and visit the other cities. While I am mostly accustomed to traveling alone, I also thought of my brother who has never visited Europe. Our domestic travels were pretty fun, so why not try international? After asking my brother, he was ecstatic so I got straight to planning.

My first stop in Italy was Milan. I met up with Ava and we went to Lake Como. It was absolutely beautiful, and I had my first Aperol Spritz in front of the lake! We stayed until night and almost missed the last train back…

The next day, Ava gave me a tour of Milan including climbing the Duomo! The Duomo was truly incredible and seeing the arches up close was even better.

I headed to Venice to meet up with my brother, Joel the next morning. His flight was delayed by 10 hours that we missed all of our itinerary (still sad about the Gondola ride). Instead, we grabbed a nice dinner and walked around before heading back.

Our next stop was Florence. Florence was perfect. The weather, scenery, buildings- everything! We visited the Accademia, Ponte Vecchio, the Basilicas, Palazzos, and Piazzas. We climbed Giotto’s Bell Tower and it was a lot harder than we expected… The view was so worth it though! We did some leather shopping, like every other tourist. I think Florence had the most memorable food, specifically the Florence steak and Gusto Pizza! Joel and I were so exhausted from our early mornings and excessive walking, but the delicious food definitely saved us.

Our final stop- Rome! We did all the basic tourist things- Colosseum (both of our first Seven Wonders of the World!), Roman Forum, Pantheon, Borghese Gallery, Trevi Fountain, Vatican City, Spanish Steps, Castel Sant’Angelo, and all the Piazzas. We did a food tour of the Trastevere where we tried new food and learned about some niche Rome history from our humorous tour guide. We did lots of shopping, of course.

Overall, I loved Italy. It is different from West Europe, but still spectacular in its own way. I’m even more grateful I could spend my time with people I love. I haven’t seen Ava in over a year, so it was so great seeing her again. And with Joel, going on a trip with your sibling is truly an experience. As siblings do, we had our fights, but going on this trip together made Italy more memorable.

This semester, I had the privilege on working on 5 films: two of mine and three of my peers’.

I made an experimental film for the first time. To be honest, I struggled a bit in this class. Coming from a news background, I had received remarks about my film style aligning with documentary more but also my personal preference lies in more clean, aesthetic type of films. I don’t think I was able to fully grasp the concept of experimental films, but I learned a lot by watching my peers’ films.

My second film was through a class in which I also received funding for. I held auditions for the cast for the first time. Usually, I just asked my friends or mutuals for short projects, but this was a longer-term project so I was able to hold auditions. From meetings with my advisor, professor, and the fellowship office, I was finally able to shoot in late March. There were a lot of technical difficulties and weather issues for filming, but my small crew and I tried our best with the equipment and conditions we had.

I worked on crew for the other three films: Director of Photography, Assistant Director, and Production Assistant. I’m always so grateful for the opportunity to work on other director’s films as it allows me to learn from them and meet new people. Post spring break was very busy with all these films going on, but very rewarding and fun.

Last semester, I started dance for the first time. As someone who loves and has done a lot of sports, dance has always been on my list but I never got to it. I was finally able to try it out thanks to my two friends who convinced me to join the club with them. I loved it so much and decided to continue it this semester- this time with heels.

One thing about me is that I love heels. I wear them every day. So of course I had to try heels dance! And it did not disappoint. It was so exciting and I felt so tall! My mom came to watch my dance performance and although I was a little shy, I was thrilled to show her.

I wish I did more dances this semester, but unfortunately, time did not allow me to do so. Next semester, I hope to continue to do more dances- heels especially!

Recently, I found one of the most beautiful fabric ever and have been wanting to make a dress out of it. Luckily, junior class formal was coming up so I decided to use this formal as an excuse to make a dress!

I first checked how much of the fabric I bought. Because most fabrics are 54” in width, I couldn’t make a full-length dress. I decided to make a midi off-the-shoulder dress. I wanted the torso part tight and the skirt flowy with tulle fabric.

I took all my measurements and started getting to work. This is actually my first time making a tight fitted top and a circle skirt, but it was so fun! It took me around a total of ~20 hours to make this dress, from design to finish. I did end up not having enough fabric for the off-the-shoulder part but I make something work.

Unfortunately, I was not able to get a full-body picture of my dress from formal night. My hometown friends visited me for the weekend and I was just too excited to see them that I forgot about taking pictures of my dress.

This was the first time all of my hometown friends came to Yale at the same time. It was such a wonderful time and I truly missed the four of us hanging out. They are friends I grew up with and the comfort they bring to me is unmatched! I love them so much. I am grateful for the quality time we were able to spend together and the fun music video we made. I am already looking forward to the next time we can reunite!

This weekend, my brother Joel visited me at Yale! This was his second time visiting with the first being 1.5 years ago. I can’t believe it has already been that long! It feels like he visited me just a couple months ago. Time does fly by fast, but looking back, a lot of things has changed for both of us. Not only did we grow as individuals, but we also grew a lot closer. I am eternally grateful that we became closer to the point where he visits me!

At Yale, Joel met some new and old friends, and we played the Switch together. I didn’t really give him a tour since this was his third time at Yale. We just ate. A lot. One new place I showed him was my new on-campus job! He thought it was alright- I’m a little disappointed by his reaction but fair enough (I guess).

Since there is nothing much to do around Yale, I took him to Boston. Last time he came, we went to New York City. This trip was more special because it was his first time at Boston whereas he has already been to NYC a couple times before. While the sightseeing was great, I think the food was the best part. My brother loves dumplings/dim sum/baos so of course I had to take him to a good place in Chinatown. We also visited Newbury Street where he got to try the popular Levain Cookies. We ate lobster rolls and seafood as our last meal right along a nice view of Seaport. While these foods may be normal for the northeasterners, it is new and special to us southerners. Even though I am not a huge foodie myself, I remember when I first tried these viral foods after coming to college and loving the variety of Asian foods and other delicious treats. I think my brother enjoyed it and I am so happy I got to share the food and experience with him.

Our time together ended on a heartwarming note with a beautiful gift- snow! My brother has never seen real snow in his life! I am so thankful that I had the opportunity to see him experience snow for the first time. It snowed so much that the whole city got covered within minutes! Joel seemed so happy and watching him enjoy the snowfall warmed my heart incredibly. He threw his first snowball, tasted his first snowflake, and played with the neighbors too.

Coming back to campus alone, I felt a bit lonely and empty with Joel gone. Even though he was here for only a weekend, his presence alone brought me comfort and joy. It made me think a lot about our time growing up where we would fight a lot. If you told us or anyone that knew us that we would be this close today, no one would have believed it! I am still in shock myself at how fast we were able to mend our relationship. Even though we had a late start to a good sibling relationship, I believe that our sibling bond is the strongest! There is no one who understands and relates to me better than my own sibling, and I feel incredibly blessed and lucky to have a kind, pure brother like Joel. I am so thankful Joel took the time to visit me despite his busy schedule and I hope he had as good of a time as I did. Until our next sibling trip…

Technical skills aside, I love creative and hands-on activities. Unable to showcase my creations on paper, I decided to take on a passion project of creating a website as a portfolio + continue writing consistently.

I began planning how to build my own website during mid 2024. I took Harvard's famous CS50 course in my freshman year of college where I was first introduced to the world of coding. Although 2 years have passed since, I decided to refresh my memory and expand my knowledge of coding by attempting to code my own website. I started relearning during Summer 2024 while attending Yonsei University's KLI program. Relearning the basic python and html needed to build a simple website was relatively easy. However, finding resources and teaching myself how to elevate my website in the way I wanted was not easy. After the start of Fall semester back at Yale, I barely had time to work on my website, but made an effort to consistently improve something in my free time.

And before I knew it, I'm done! My website is published!

During Fall 2024 semester, I had the privilege of taking a class on woodworking. I can't express how thankful I am to have taken this class! While the machines looked quite intimidating and scary, I was very excited to try it out. I first made a desconstructable picture frame and small box. This was for practice so no painting or wood finishes were used in this project. For my final project, I decided to make a wine rack to celebrate my 21st birthday. I created my own design and went to work right away. I used plywood sheets, so the wood wasn't difficult to work with, yet because of the precise details, it took a lot of time.

After discussing with my professor, I was told that I lacked deep meaning and intention behind my work. As this was my first art class, I struggled in connecting sophisticated meanings behind artworks. I decided to think what wine meant to me. But all I could think of was how much I love wine. But as I thought deeper, I realized that I usually drink wine before I go to sleep and thought about how that could lead to dependence on alcohol in the long term. In hopes to express my concern for my own health and the overall issue of alocohol dependence, I decided to pursue this theme for my final project.

In addition to the wine rack, I decided to create a miniature version of a children's bed. I designed it so the design of the bed looked child-like. Another condition of the final project was that we had to incorporate another material other than wood. I decided to use fabric since I enjoy sewing and am knowledgeable in that field. I chose soft, comforting shade of brown for the bed and used a striking red fabric to intertwine the two wood pieces to showcase the dangers of alcoholic dependence for sleep despite its temporary satisfactions.

*Both wood pieces were painted in Dark Oak and finished with Tung Oil.*

This semester, I had the privilege of taking a documentary filmmaking course for the first time. Because I was a part of my school’s daily news team in high school, I was familiar with creating factual content, but making a longer documentary film that explored the topic in-depth was new to me.

I wanted to choose a topic that I am passionate about and that is relevant to my current environment. As I contemplated on the topic, I decided to pursue a challenge that I personally have struggled with coming to an ivy league from a suburban, less competitive town- the ivy league to finance pipeline.

Growing up, I was not familiar with the finance industry at all. In fact, I have never heard the terms “investment banking” or “consulting” until I came to Yale. It seemed like these jobs were the craze at Ivy Leagues and seen as the most prestigious jobs you can get post-grad. Everyone around me was talking about it or switching over their career goals to finance, and I too got influenced and started chasing after this industry.

But then, I took a philosophy course called “Life” by Shelly Kagan. In one of the units, we covered career. The discussions in the course led me to reconsider why I am pursuing finance and realized that I chose finance because everyone around me was doing it, not because I was genuinely interested in it. I wanted to be part of the prestige and fit in. I remember being shocked by many things coming here and how things were so different compared to my environment before college. It was an adjustment for me and all I wanted was to belong to my new community, pushing me towards the finance industry.

While thinking about this, I wondered why the finance industry is so popular. Yes, the salary is high, but it is also a very demanding job. Is the money the only factor that contributed to its popularity? Especially with Yale’s (and other ivy leagues’) diverse and renowned liberal arts education, why are students choosing to pursue finance? It isn’t even a major at Yale!

Thus, I decided to explore and expand on this phenomenon by creating a documentary. I interviewed six Yale students of different grades, majors, and backgrounds, as well as Shelly Kagan who inspired all this in the first place. I made sure to ask insightful questions to induce non-biased, honest answers, as well as some advice and observations. I am so thankful to my peers and Shelly who took the time to be interviewed and answer honestly. I also visited New York City, specifically Wall St., for b-roll where I had one of my best friends act. I also had other peers act for extra b-roll and narration.

The whole filming process took days, but it was so worth it. Filming this documentary was new and exciting for me, but also quite the challenge. Specifically, the editing process was the most challenging. As I was unable to predict what the interviewees were going to say, I did not have a specific script to follow when editing and had to watch the clips multiple times to create an effective story. With many sleepless nights, I was finally able to produce a documentary I was proud of!