#apoxinterchapter

Chair: Winnie Banh, Alpha Epsilon

MATAGUAY WAS SO FUN THIS YEAR! I'm only speaking for myself, but I had a lot more fun this year than I had last year. I really wish more people from Chi chapter would've gone because it really is such an amazing opportunity to meet IC brothers and learn more about APO. Rides were kind of difficult to arrange because all of us ended finals at different times. A brother from ZO (Edwin Ng) picked me up from UCLA, Stacey rode with Aaron Torio from LM, and Jessica, Kevin, Diana, and Olivia met up and drove to Mataguay together. The ride was trafficky and rocky; we all got there at different times. The first night was introduction and just hanging out, then we went to bed in the Boy Scout cabins, which was totally fine except it was webby. Gross. We started activities at 8:30am the next day by first splitting into groups. My group, Team 11 AKA THE BEST GROUP WE WERE ON FIYAHHHH, started out at the shooting range and I did soo well :). Afterwards, we dug trenches and helped widen this thing where electrical wires were going to go through. At 12:30pm, we went back to the common area and ate lunch (hamburgers & hot dogs), then continued our services painting cabins and platforms. It was really tiring and I got a lot of paint on my shorts. We actually stayed longer than we were supposed to, so we got back semi-late for dinner (steak, chicken, vegetables, pasta, salad). Each group had to prepare a roll call and skit (theme: celebrity neophyte). For group 11, our roll call was, "THISSSS GROUP IS ON FIYAAHHHHHH (fiyah fiyah fiyah fiyah). GROUP 11. SSSSSSS *finger to bootayy*, oww." We were hot. Yeah ;). Jessica and Kevin, who were group leaders, ended up winning, but my group is still the best. I went on a night hike with Stacey, then we went back and played games till 4am and went to sleep. I have a moth story I'm going to post after this. It's really funny (now that it's over). We woke up at 9:30am on Sunday, got ready to leave, ate breakfast, took pictures, hung out, went to Julian Pie Company, and headed back homesies. We also toasted, woot woot. So yes, Mataguay was really fun & now I'm going to post highlights and things to keep in mind for next year. I hope more people go. IT'S WORTH IT. GO. IT IS SO FUN OMGAWD.

TEN-OTIC. Wait, no. Chi-otic, WHADDDDDUPPPP. Just kidding, they're exotic. #ambiguousflag

Oh dang, Diana. You werkkk dat FIERCE.

SPREAD YOUR WINGS AND PREPARE TO FLY, FOR YOU HAVE BECOME A BUTTERFLY. #dianaisready #mariahcarey #butterfly

A normal picture :D. Go Olivia and her group, arf arf!

Group picture! HAPPY MATAGUAY FACES ON!

Kevin Wang. Justin Bieber. Strong resemblance, obviously.

THE WINNERS OF MATAGUAAAAYY!!!!! PUT YO CROWN ON, GUYS. WE RULE DIS SCOUT RESERVATION.

Chair: Catherine Teotico, Alpha Iota (pledge)

The inter-chapter event was bright and early at 7:00am. The traffic to Manhattan Beach was not too bad and Catherine arrived there at 6:45am with Peter already waiting in the parking lot. They waited for the other chapters that were slightly late. Rho Gamma arrived at 7:10am with other people from their chapter trickling in at 7:30am. Alpha Kappa arrived at around 7:30am due to the GPS leading them down the wrong way. The beach was very clean and did not need any cleaning. Rho Gamma's IC Chair decided to make it an IC Bonding day instead. We walked over together to Starbucks and spent about an hour there just talking amongst one another. Peter and Catherine learned about the various similarities and difference in the requirements of pledges in other chapter. They spoke about our majors, future career goals, why they decided to join Alpha Phi Omega, and various other topics. It was really nice to get to mingle with the other chapters. Around 8:30am, they all decided to head down to the beach and just enjoy the beach before they all left. It was cold down by the beach but it was nice to see all the people surfing and the sun coming out. At 9:00am, they parted ways with the toast song. Overall, It was a wonderful experience especially since it was Peter's and Catherine's first Interchapter event.

PLEDGES:

Catherine Teotico

Peter Vo

Chair: Winnie Banh, Alpha Epsilon

This week, our brothers volunteered with brothers from both USC and UCI to help maintain the garden at a local middle school. Jessica, Emily, JJ, and I met up at 7:55am at Westwood & Strathmore to take the Culver City 6 bus to Daniel Webster Middle School. The bus ride was fairly short and so was the walk (total transportation time = 30 minutes!). Since we arrived pretty early, we made a pit stop at McD's for dadadat hashbrown & Sausage & Egg McMuffin and tangy OJ that was not up to bar with Jamba Juice (obv. reasons, I guess). At 8:45am, we headed to Daniel Webster Middle School (it was in sight from McD's). We arrived around 8:53am, and it turns out that none of the ICs were there yet (props to us for being on time :D). I called Chelsea to let her know about my arrival & shortly after, Alpha Kappa arrived (hooray~). We all signed in, then got put to hard labor. We were working on the garden at Daniel Webster Middle School, and booooy, was there work to be done! We spent the entire 3 hours doing miscellaneous things from weeding (LOTS LOTS LOTS OF IT!!!!), turning over the soil (we're all gonna be sore tomorrow), and planting tomatoes, flowers, and other such wonders. Thirty minutes into it, Rho Rho showed up (shout out to Eric Chou, Kathy, and ... the other person from PP). It was seriously a really tough 3 hours and hard earned service hours (or IC credits). At the end of the event, we toasted.  The downsides of the event (but semi-upside) was the beautiful, hot weather. Can you imagine turning over soil in the hot sun or getting rid of weeds scrunched over in the hot sun? Well don't because you'll stress yourself out from the imaginary exhaustion you'd feel. Besides that, though, the event went really well. Personally, I got to meet a handful of new IC brothas and see a few old IC brothas' faces. It was fun bonding over our free labor :). If we were to do this event again, the chair should remind attendees to briiiing waterrrr!!! WATER WATER WATER. Water.

BROTHERS:

Winnie Banh

JJ Chiang

Emily Tchang

Jessica Chen

OMG KYOOOOOT.  The group from today with a few holding their prized scallions in their hands!

This is where we worked today!  Hopefully in a few weeks, the plants that JJ, Jessica, and Emily planted will be full grown and beautiful with the help of Mr. Sunshine's sunshining rays.

Emily workin' that ho(e) to turn over the soil.  Work it, girl.  Work it!

Jessica is kicking all her weight onto that shovel to make it go down so she could dig dem weeds out!  Eric from AK stands by and poses for my iPhone.