rhysatsmith

[rhysatsmith]

03.03.21, wednesday, 3:03AM

when things get chaotic, I retreat to studying at my kitchen 

[rhysatsmith]

desi dark academia moodboard

[ something something sapphic bengali art student oc something something ]

[rhysatsmith]

A modern male dark academia look book 📖

[rhysatsmith]

I am South East Asian and I’m getting tired of people writing away my culture.

I am not sure how many of you know but Disney just released a trailer for the movie “Raya and The Last Dragon” and many people have been taking the moment away from the South-East Asian people (like me) by comparing it to The Last Airbender. Now I’m going to tell you why you should NOT be comparing them.

First, we need to debunk the idea that we can cumulatively call someone “Asian”. That is very much an American concept, a label slapped on our continent to make it easier for them to identify us. However, we have 48/49 countries, with over 1 000 000 languages and cultures. It’s very problematic to pin us down as Asian when we all have distinguishing ethnicities that sets us apart. If anything, certain provinces have similar mythologies, or came from the same previous kingdom, and for that reason it would make more sense if we were identified as North Asia (Siberia), Central Asia (The ‘stans), Western Asia (The Middle East or Near East), South Asia (Indian subcontinent), East Asia (Far East), Southeast Asia (East Indies and Indochina). I kind of wish a large number of Americans can see this so they will start calling us by these human geographical groups rather than a continent, and this may dispel the need to compare “Asian” movies.

Now to the comparison of the two movies. The Last Airbender follows East Asian (and some South Asian, New World, Inuit, and Sireniki influences). That is very very different from Raya and The Last Dragon, which completely South-East Asian. Here are some cultural aspects from the trailer:

She uses arnis as a weapon, Arnis is commonly National Martial Arts of the Philippines.

The intro of Disney shows a place in a rock; it represents Sigiriya Rock in Sri Lanka.

When she jumped out of a house, the houses were designed in Thailand’s traditional houses.

The Villain’s mask is called Barong Mask from Bali, Indonesia.

The Sword of the villain and the sword that Raya pulled are designed from Indonesia’s sword.

The wavy sword she’s using is a Kris which is a traditional sword in the southern part of the Philippines. So basically her fighting style is Eskrima which is Visayan (central Philippines) but use weapons from Mindanao (southern Philippines)

The whole thing might be inspired by Princess Urduja, the Filipino warrior princess.

The Sea Dragon is from Phillipines and it’s called Bakunawa.

Raya’s clothes are Vietnamese traditional clothing.

Her animal that she rides is Khmer name, Thuk Thuk. When u have came to cambodia for 5 years ago and you want to go somewhere, you have to call “Thuk Thuk” and they will ride you anywhere you wanna go.

Theory about the tribes;

the yellow tribe is Indonesian or Malaysian

the purple tribe is Philippine or Malaysian

the green tribe is maybe Thai because of the Elephants or Cambodian because of the advance weaponry

the white tribe is Thai because of the Dholes, clothes, and the sword

Please do not take this moment away from us- South-East Asian culture and mythology has always been written away in South Asian and East Asian dominant movies. Our culture was put into the Legend of Korra and was written off as East Asian and due to this misinformation of cultures, we are now compared to some show that has never represented us. Please stop it. Let us have our moment- though our cultures are mashed together for this South-East Asian adaptation, it retains alot of our key aspects. 

South-East Asians are not South Asians or East Asians or Central Asians. We are our own. Let us have that. For once in Hollywood, “Asian rep” is not a Chinese, Japanese, Korean or Indian.

[rhysatsmith]

i'm so obsessed with the idea of living in a big city where i can choose to be invisible and disappear between the crowds and live for myself and have my favorite little corner in a cafe and go to musea and galleries and appreciate art and architecture for hours uninterrupted and go to all the places where literary figures got inspiration for their poetry and their works and stroll down the streets by myself and look at people who pass by and invent little stories for them in my head and live in a small apartment where i can write by my open window until really late at night and sometimes stop and listen to the bustle of life on the streets below and i can also choose to be part of that bustle myself and part of a circle of artists who share a studio and support each other and go to social gatherings where i meet people who are as passionate about art and poetry as i am and exchange ideas and be inspired and have specific corners and monuments and cafes where we gather, and hold symposia stuffed in someone's tiny apartment and in general live as an active part of the urban creative scene ??? just ,,, living in a city where i get to see the entire assembled past and present existence of humanity ???

[rhysatsmith]

" 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠𝑒𝑒𝑘 𝑖𝑠 𝑠𝑒𝑒𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑦𝑜𝑢 " - 𝑅𝑢𝑚𝑖

Dark Academia // Hijabi Dark Academia (ii)

[rhysatsmith]

x / x / x / x

[rhysatsmith]

eat a fruit that you like. take a little walk and pay attention to the trees. dance to music alone in ur room. it’s the small things that will heal you

[rhysatsmith]

I'm so honored to be mentioned in this 😭😭💛

Aight it is time for a proper introductory post because this blog is a mess

Hello, hi, wassup? I started this blog way back in 2020 and I had no clue what I was doing and I feel I should have a proper post because I wanna take this studyblr thing seriously (as I desperately need some motivation). So here is some stuff about the loser who runs this blog in bullet point form because I know none of us have the time for the full on paragraph style (I’ll try to make this short)

- Hey! My name is Deepa, I am 17 years old, and I am a senior in high school (grade 12 in the USA)

- I am a scorpio? I know they get a bad rep but I promise I am a nice person lmao

- I am not the best student, I don’t have straight A’s, nice notes, or perfect stationary however I wanna become that level so I created this studyblr for accountability :)

- I was accepted into Smith College class of 2025 so that is where I’ll be attending college the next school year (and I am extremely thankful)

- I am planning on double majoring in Computer Science and maybe government or something business related. 

- I love making friends and talking to people so please feel free to reach out! 

- The classes I am taking as a senior in high school: Spanish, English, Ap Government, AP computer science, AP environmental science, and AP Statistics 

- Other than procrastinating, I like to watch anime (My pfp is me drawn as a haikyuu character ahahah), play video games on Xbox and Switch, and play violin (terribly)

- I think thats it? I have 0 clue what else to add but I am very excited to post more on this studyblr, become more motivated, and make new friends :) Feel free to send asks/messages! 

Some studyblrs that have inspired me:

@ourstudyworld @studyign @studywithinspo @rhysatsmith @castillos-co @eintsein 

[rhysatsmith]

[rhysatsmith]

Dark academia look book: plus size 💓

[rhysatsmith]

14.02.2021

I woke up early today to a white Istanbul and I’ve finished reading Wuthering Heights. It was my first time reading it in English so it felt like I read it for the first time. It took me a bit longer to read it than usual since I wasn’t familiar with some words and old phrases. Also, an old photo from Amsterdam, I truly want to visit there once again.

🎧ella fitzgerald, baby it’s cold outside

[rhysatsmith]

Afternoon and my obsession for maps (check)

[rhysatsmith]

as someone who got my start in activism or whatever by doing anti-war organizing under the Obama administration… let me tell you, pay attention to foreign policy under Biden. pay attention to the war machine. I don’t think things will look rosy and repaired on the home front either, but I know that the brutality of US empire will continue absolutely unabated on the global stage. trying to mobilize against that is difficult and maddening, but we’ve got to do it. and it’ll teach you a lot about the true orientation of this country, whatever color the administration is.

[rhysatsmith]

Green Mode! And Other Tales.

Hi everyone!

Smith went into green mode today (explanation of operation modes here), and this is exciting because while we still don’t have access to the Campus Cafe or Neilson Library quite yet, those are coming in the near future! Not only that, but we can now use common spaces in houses! Living rooms, kitchens - we can even have up to two guests in our rooms!

This sounds like my life is very sad and, well, while that’s accurate to an extent (look at me go, a whole comedian), the bar has been set pretty low by COVID-19; for good reason! But since humans are social animals, we’ve all taken a bit of a hit because of social distancing, and getting crumbs of our lives back feels like an incredible achievement. It wasn’t even as unusual as starting to see people back on campus! I think I already had that ‘culture shock’ a few weeks ago, and my brain got used to it enough to miss genuine interactions with both Smith College, the people, and Smith College, the place.

[I would just like to present a brief intermission of how the paragraph above perfectly illustrates how ADHD works in my brain. Moving on-]

As a short Day In My Life Now That Everything’s Excited Because We’re In Green Mode, I woke up (didn’t oversleep! was very proud), did a little bit of bullet journaling (which I haven't gotten round to in ages and was missing dearly!), got dinner, went to an amazing Presidential Colloquium about Black Futures, did some work and am currently studying into the night in my little corner of Wilder House.

Oh! And I started the hundred days of productivity 'challenge' today - it was a good day. I really hope I can get a repeat of the good vibes. See ya later!

Rhys xx

[rhysatsmith]

as a procrastinating overachiever i feel like i don’t necessarily “half-ass” things, it’s more like a “3/4 ass”. like overall did i do pretty well? yeah. did i reach my maximum potential though? i think the fuck Not.

[rhysatsmith]

19:55 — courage, dear heart is something i remind myself of every day. i may seem like i have all my shit under control, but it’s usually the opposite. it takes courage to be brave and repress the demons that pester the mind. mental illness is invisible, not impossible.