Lyrics: https://genius.com/Hale-blue-sky-lyrics

As a child, I used to long for adulthood. I thought being an adult meant being free, free to be alone, free to do whatever I wanted, free to buy the things I dreamed of. But now that I’m older, I’ve come to realize that adulthood is nothing like I imagined. Circumstances change, and we change with them. This isn’t the kind of freedom or happiness I once dreamed of.

Hearing this song again now, as an adult, gave me something I didn’t expect, hope. Hope to live in the moment. Hope to stay young at heart. Hope to resist the pressure of adulthood and all its expectations. It reminded me that it’s okay to hold on to your inner child, to keep dreaming, and to grow into a better version of yourself every single day.

Because maybe growing up isn’t about leaving everything behind, maybe it’s about carrying the best parts of our childhood with us as we move forward.

It’s not just a love song — it feels like a safe space. It reminds me of people I’ve loved, moments I’ve cherished, and even the versions of myself I’ve outgrown. There’s comfort in the way it embraces both joy and sorrow so gently. This song doesn’t just move me; it stays with me.

This song made me reflect on how short life really is. It reminded me that time keeps moving, with or without us. We spend so much time being sad, overthinking, or stuck in uncertainty, and before we know it, everything changes, everything is gone. The people, the moments, the chances, they all pass. And one day, all the things we've done or held on to will be left behind. But this song also made me realize something more meaningful. Even though time slips away, it's how we choose to spend it that stays with us. The love we give, the courage we show, the memories we make, those are what truly matter. "Time" made me feel both the sadness of letting go and the beauty of holding on to what’s real. It’s more than just a song for me. It’s a reminder to live fully, to not waste the little time we have, and to make sure we’re living in a way that feels true. And yeah, this song will linger in my heart for a long time, like a quiet echo that reminds me to keep living, don’t just exist, to keep making every little things meaningful.

NIKI’s rendition of “You’ll Be in My Heart” struck an emotional chord with me the first time I heard it. There’s something deeply personal about the way she sings not just the lyrics, but the emotion behind each word. Her voice is soft but full of strength, like she’s pouring quiet reassurance into every note. Unlike the original version, which is powerful and cinematic, her cover feels like a lullaby gentle, tender, and quietly heartbreaking.

What moved me most was the feeling of connection the song brought out. It reminded me of moments in my own life when words weren’t enough to express how much someone meant to me, especially during times of distance, grief, or uncertainty. Listening to this version felt like someone saying, “I’m still here for you,” even when they aren’t physically present. It’s a comforting reminder that love, once shared, doesn’t just disappear it stays with us, even in silence.

This song helped me reflect on relationships I’ve outgrown, loved ones I’ve lost, and the people I continue to carry with me in my heart, no matter how life changes. NIKI’s voice made that message feel real and raw. It’s not just a cover it’s a gentle reminder of the kind of love that transcends distance and time.

Today, many children in Gaza are experiencing similar tragedies. Like the siblings in the film, they are innocent victims of violence they didn’t cause or understand. They lose their homes, their families, and their chance at a peaceful childhood. The title becomes more than symbolic it becomes a reflection of today’s reality, where too many young lives are lost like fireflies fading in the dark.

This connection made the film even more powerful for me. It reminded me that behind every headline or news report, there are real children, just like Setsuko, who deserve safety, love, and hope not war.

Mob Psycho 100 is about a boy named Shigeo Kageyama, or just “Mob”—an esper blessed with overwhelming psychic powers. He meets a man named Reigen Arataka: a con artist, a life coach, a liar with charisma and charm (heavily on those two characteristics), but also someone who ends up being Mob’s greatest guide. Reigen, despite all his lies and complete lack of psychic powers, teaches Mob more about life than any supernatural ever could. He lives not as a perfect man in truth, but as a perfect man in heart; flawed, deceptive, yet always meaning well.

He lies, yes, but never out of malice. He lies to protect, to help, to lift others up when they can’t do it themselves. He lies so others can find their truth.

What moved me most is how Reigen reflects parts of myself I’m still learning to live with; the imperfections, the masks, the half-truths I sometimes carry.

I’ve lied. I’ve disappointed people. I’ve been Matahachi (a character from Vagabond), the kind of person who makes mistakes not out of evil but out of weakness. But I’ve also chosen to grow. I strive to do better, to be kinder, and to never betray the trust people give me, not again at least. I want to be the kind of person who helps, who sacrifices, who shapes others into better versions of themselves even when I’m still figuring myself out.

Like Reigen, I don’t have powers. But I have presence, words, and most of all, effort. I see it most in how I try to guide my little brother and sister. I want to be there for them, just as Reigen was there for Mob; not perfect, but present. Not flawless, but fiercely trying.

This show taught me that being extraordinary doesn’t make you a good person. Power doesn’t define worth. What matters more is character; emotional intelligence, self-awareness, kindness, communication.

I’m glad to have watched Mob psycho 100, because they taught me the kind of power that doesn’t just change lives, they taught me the kind that makes life worth living.

It's a song that's packed with so much emotion, that makes me feel both sad about what's lost and a little bit comforted by the shared experience. It was truly amazing how Lorde, even at a young age, understood that she was living through moments she'd one day look back on fondly. A masterpiece that make you feel both happy and sad at the same time. A very beautiful yet simple song about losing innocence and becoming an adult. The emotion you get from it really depends on how you're feeling when you listen to the song.

Being a kid, we often wish to grow up sooner, but when we do finally grow up, we find ourselves longing to be a kid again. Oftentimes, we also find ourselves growing up too fast. This song comforts me because it reminds me that it’s okay to experience emotions like a kid, even as an adult. It serves as a reminder that I am not alone in these feelings. We all have our fair share of struggles and challenges, and it’s perfectly okay to seek comfort and support from one another.

SEVENTEEN’s “Kidult” explores the balance between our childlike vulnerability and maturity. It’s a gentle reminder that acknowledging our inner child doesn’t diminish our adulthood. The song offers comfort and gently reminds us that it’s okay to feel overwhelmed or nostalgic because our youthful spirit remains as an important part of who we are.

As I looked up the translation, the lyrics hit even harder. “Kidult” explores the quiet struggle of feeling like you are supposed to be an adult, but still carrying the heart of a child. I was 14 when the pandemic began, and honestly, sometimes it feels like I have been frozen in that time ever since. The world moved on but emotionally, I feel like I have not caught up yet. Now that I’m technically an adult (19), I still find myself clinging to my inner child, unsure of how to grow without losing them. 

That is why this song means so much to me. It does not tell you to “get over it” or to be stronger, it instead validates my feeling of being stuck in my childhood without judgment. When I hear the line, “괜찮아, 이 세상은 지금의 우리 그대로” (“It’s okay, this world is precious; we are what we are”), it feels like a long-time friend telling me that I’m enough, just as I am; and that it’s okay not to have it all figured out yet. This simply is what I need as I go through the immense pressure of what adulthood has to offer. 

“Kidult” beautifully captures the tension between growing up and holding onto innocence. It is about accepting the messiness of being in-between strength and softness, maturity and vulnerability. And in a world that constantly demands growth, this song gives me permission to pause, feel, and just be myself.

The line “All you do is blindside me, it’s hard to be brave” struck me deeply. It speaks from the perspective of someone who keeps getting hurt, not because they’re naive, but because they’re still holding on to hope that things might change. Another line, “And I love you but with you, it’s heartache I breathe,” captures the painful contradiction of loving someone who brings more pain than peace. It’s a suffocating kind of love, where even moments of closeness feel heavy.

I was in the process of letting go of people I cared about, places that once felt like home, and even past versions of myself. Listening to Autumn was both therapeutic and unexpectedly comforting. It reminded me that grief and beauty can coexist, and that sometimes the hardest seasons are the ones that shape us the most, even when we wish we could skip them. Autumnmade me feel seen, like someone had finally put into words emotions I didn’t know how to express. It reminded me that grief, especially the kind that comes with love, can be quiet, beautiful, and devastating all at once.

Arttap - B

June 5, 2025

"Art that moved you"

There are many pieces of arts that have moved me, but I chose This song "Castle on the hill" by Ed Sheeran, one of the art that moved me. The song lyrics reflects on the childhood memories, friendships and the passage of time. This song captures the bittersweet feelings of growing up, how we change over time and how change is part of our life. Even though the lyrics does not personally relate to me. The song have moved me in ways that made me nostalgic, warm and loved. It reminds me and us that our experiences are what shapes us on what we are today. The people we knew in the past now live very different lives, but they remain a part of us. They've shaped us in many ways. And the song reminds me to go home, to where the heart belongs.

Golden Hour hit me in a way I didn’t expect. The first time I heard it, I remember just stopping everything I was doing, it felt like time froze for a second. There’s something so raw and beautiful about the way JVKE captures that feeling of being completely in awe of someone, like they light up your world just by being in it. The melody is gentle but powerful, and the lyrics really made me think of a moment in my own life where everything felt perfect, even if just for a little while. It reminded me to slow down and appreciate the people and moments that make life feel golden.

Photo Link: https://images.app.goo.gl/rPrKTeJqNPitYjKM9

During the pandemic, I watched with fascination documentaries on various art forms, including oil paintings and restoration, as well as lost art forms, specifically automatons. I love The Writer, but one that moved me was the Mechanical Theatre in Hellbrunn Palace. Out of all the automata that were built in the 1740s, one machine surpassed them all for me in terms of scale, ambition, and technical sophistication of this lost art form. This automaton was a form of an entire working city.

Archbishop Jakob von Dietrichstein commissioned the creation of a machine that was a vision of a perfect society, populated by well-behaved, obedient automaton subjects, which was harmonious, orderly, and at the same time an entertaining vision of how a city works or how a city should work. A mechanical opera that has almost 200 figurines moving and "working." The art itself is beautiful, but beneath it all, water pressure turns a wheel that is connected via a series of gears to the entire machine. All the intricate metalwork acts like a set of instructions, guiding each figurine to perform its actions at different intervals. The automaton, above all that mechanism, functions perfectly, mechanically, and automatically. What moved me isn't just its intricacy and beauty, but behind the vision of a utopian society comes a dark side of this entertaining spectacle.

The creator of the machine that runs the theatre was designed and built by Lorenz Rosenegger, who is a salt miner. These salt miners generated the wealth that the city relied on and funded this machine. However, the salt miners were radicals and rebels, and many of them were Protestants. They were expelled by the order of Salzburg's ruler. Rosenegger worked on this theatre under armed guard. Yes, this was a technical masterpiece for its time, but for the salt miners, it was a machine that portrayed the tyrannic power that ruled them. This art represented the mechanical ingenuity of the salt miners' artfully crafted and carved exteriors; their very souls came from poorly paid artisan workers. A machine built to entertain the wealthy court society of that time was made by skilled yet underpaid artisans, showing how this, the Helbrunn Mechanical Theatre, encapsulates the contradiction at the core of all 18th-century automata.

Most art that was built before our time had dark truths; for me, that is what makes art exceptional, making you wonder how such art came to life. Art like this never fails to give me a thrill and excitement at the same time, feelings of bittersweet melancholy when the true story is revealed. I love and appreciate art that revolves around stories or ones that reflect the similarities of the past to the current situation of our society. Art portrays the truth that we usually don't want to face. It shows us the kind of truth that is both enticing and repulsing at the same time. These kinds of art with rooted meaning, hardship, pain, and suffering are ones with a history that will shape, break, bend, or strengthen the future of art. For me, art should move you to its core, not just for its beauty, but for the truth and intentions behind it. Every art tells you the story of its creator and the amount of blood, sweat, and tears they may have poured for us to appreciate.

Photo link:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hellbrunn_mechanical_theatre_complete_stage_view_01.jpg

Aniñon, Akia Raine U.

ARTAPP-B

June 5, 2025

The movie "How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies" is a story about a man named M who quits his job to care for his dying grandmother. At first, he's just in it for the inheritance, but over time, he begins to actually care for her and learns more about his family’s past. 

A scene where the grandmother dressed well expecting that her family would visit her but no one arrived because they had their own lives. This broke me thinking what if that was my grandmother? Seeing that, as I, my brother and cousins grew and mostly left Zamboanga making their own lives. It reminds me of the time when I woke up at 5 am accompanying her at the market, and every time I go to her house even at her age she still always cooks for us, and many more times that made a core memory with her. 

Death is a topic that most of us don’t want to discuss, but it is one thing that is inevitable for everyone. As I watch the movie reality strikes, as time passes, we get old, our health deteriorates, and here comes death. It serves as a reminder that no matter how busy our lives are or no matter what keeps us busy, let us not forget to visit and make time for our grandparents even if it’s just an hour, and that love and time with family matter way more than money

Ghibli movies in general are my favorite because they make me feel better about things I didn't even realize needed to be healed. Miyazaki's arts have a gentleness and a quiet firmness to them, there are tender moments that warm your heart. The Wind Rises helped me in sitting with my own anxieties, aspirations, and desires in addition to telling me a story. It served as a reminder that we continue to try and live despite the uncertainty and fragility of life. We have to make an effort to live because there is still beauty to be made, people to love, and quite joys waiting to be felt. Even in sorrow, life offers moments worth staying for.

Lastly, the the film's animation, music, and pacing that make it such a reflective piece that brings the characters close to my heart. Above all, the relationship of Jiro with Nahoko which is full of love, but with a lot of pain in it, moved me very much. It reminded me quite a bit of those sacrifices which people have to make in the pursuit of passion and love, and also how brief life is. There are no easy answers from the film. It rather leaves you with this soft ache, which is the one that really made me appreciate beauty and loss in life.

As I watched Mr. Keating stand before his students, urging them to “carpe diem,” I felt like he was talking to me, too. I thought about the times in my own life when I felt like I was just going through the motions, following other people’s expectations instead of my own. I remembered the teachers and mentors who told me it was okay to question, to think for myself, to find my own path.

One scene that really struck me was when the boys stood on their desks in silent defiance, a simple but powerful act of solidarity. It reminded me of the small, but significant, moments in my own life when I found the courage to speak up for myself, even when I was afraid. It was like the movie gave me permission to believe that my voice mattered.

But it didn’t stop there. Because of Dead Poets Society, I not only learned to speak for myself but also found the courage to stand up for others, those who have a harder time finding their own voice. I realized that sometimes, being brave means helping others find their strength, too. Whether it’s supporting a friend who’s struggling to share their story or speaking up for someone who’s been silenced, I feel a responsibility now to be that person who says, “Your voice matters.”

The movie stayed with me long after it ended. It’s a reminder that life is too short to live in someone else’s shadow. That we all have our own verse to contribute to this world. And because of that, Dead Poets Society isn’t just a movie to me , it’s a reminder to live authentically, to speak up, and to lift others up along the way.

Movie description: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dead_poets_society

By Sarabi, Fatimah Dylenna’z A.

Since I was a kid, I have always been a fan of Adele’s raw and captivating voice. She expresses a burst of emotions that tugs at my heart and each of her lyrics feels like a story unfolding. Growing up in a home that used to bond through karaoke which brought us together every Sunday, I often chose to sing her songs. However, this specific song touched me the most.

Love In The Dark expresses not just pain, but the guilt that comes after choosing yourself and ending a connection that only drains you. It reminds us that loving other people should not come to a point where even loving ourselves becomes such a difficult thing to do. Love inspires us to live, rather than to merely survive— and if loving in such a dark place will only make us doubt our whole being, then it is the kind of love we do not deserve after all and we must have the courage to walk away from it.

This song touched me because it reminds me of self-preservation and not settling for something that hinders us to grow into the best version of ourselves. While I may not have personally gone through the situation the song describes, I believe that it is a masterpiece. The fact that the lyrics, expressed by Adele’s voice, can touch even someone like me who never experienced such situation speaks volume. I will forever be in awe of Adele’s form of expressing art.

The more I watched him, the more I wanted to understand his story. I researched his background, learned about his humble beginnings in Dagestan, his intense training under his father, and the values that shaped him. Behind his calm and quiet personality was a man who sacrificed so much, stayed true to his beliefs, and worked tirelessly without needing the spotlight.

Through Khabib, I began to see the deeper meaning behind MMA. The art of mixed martial arts is more than just physical strength. It’s strategy, discipline, emotional and spiritual resilience, and the ability to adapt under pressure. It’s where your character is tested, not just your body. Every fight tells a story of pain, growth, and purpose.

Watching Khabib fight wasn’t just entertaining it was inspiring. He showed that when you truly love what you do, stay grounded, and give your all with humility and discipline, success will follow. That’s why this image of him in the octagon means so much to me. It captures not just a moment of victory, but the years of sacrifice and belief that led to it. Photo from:https://www.forbes.com/sites/trentreinsmith/2018/10/08/ufc-229-a-look-at-the-post-fight-stats-from-khabib-nurmagomedov-vs-conor-mcgregor/

Walking across that rainbow road with my mom beside me was such an emotional moment for me. It wasn’t just about the road — it was about feeling seen, accepted, and loved by the most important person in my life. Growing up, I was scared to be myself, to speak up about who I really am. But standing there, hand in hand with my mom, I felt safe. I felt proud.

That moment reminded me that I’m not alone, and I don’t have to hide. My mom accepts me for who I am, and that gives me the strength to keep going and to live freely. It was more than just a photo — it was a memory I’ll carry with me forever.

I felt proud, emotional, and grateful all at once. Sometimes, it’s the small things — like a crosswalk and a smile from someone you love — that remind you how beautiful life can be when you’re true to yourself.

It made me realize that family is not always defined by genetics or last names—it’s defined by love, trust, and shared experiences. The drama taught me that sometimes, the people who love and understand you the most are the ones you meet along the journey of life, not necessarily the ones you’re born with.

This message resonated with me deeply, especially during moments when I’ve felt distant from my own family or longed for connection. Watching the characters create their own version of “family” gave me hope and reminded me that love can come from the most unexpected places. In the end, what makes a family is not blood, but the willingness to stand by each other no matter what.

https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSkhQaHUW/

The song “You’re On Your Own, Kid” by Taylor Swift (from the Midnights album)

This song deeply moved me because it reflects so many emotions that I’ve gone through as a young adult trying to find my place in the world. Taylor Swift has always been my favorite artist, not just because of her beautiful voice and music, but because she’s always been honest and real about the struggles of growing up, dealing with rejection, and learning how to love yourself. “You’re On Your Own, Kid” really hit me hard the first time I heard it. The lyrics talk about how we sometimes chase after things like love, success, or acceptance thinking they will complete us, but in the end, we realize that we have to face life on our own terms.

One line that stuck with me is “Everything you lose is a step you take.” That lyric made me pause and reflect on all the times I felt like I failed or lost something important whether it was a friendship, a goal I didn’t reach, or simply my motivation. But this song reminded me that those losses are not dead ends; they are part of my growth. Even when I feel like I’m alone, I’m actually becoming stronger and more independent.

As a college student, I sometimes feel overwhelmed, especially with academic pressure, life decisions, and the fear of the future. There are times when I feel like no one really understands what I’m going through. But this song gives me comfort. It feels like Taylor is saying, “Yes, it’s hard but you’re not the only one who feels this way.” It gives me the strength to keep going, to believe that I can make it even when things don’t go according to plan.

The melody is soft but powerful, and it builds up in a way that mirrors the emotions of the lyrics. It starts out gentle, almost like a quiet reflection, but by the end, there’s this sense of empowerment and acceptance. Listening to it feels like going through a journey from sadness and confusion to peace and self-love.

More than just a song, “You’re On Your Own, Kid” is like a reminder that I don’t have to have everything figured out right now. I just need to keep moving forward and trust that I’m growing along the way. That’s why this song means so much to me. It’s not just music it’s healing, and it’s a companion during the moments I feel lost.