| const VBS1 = "When I came to the Brentwood area in 2015, I was not religious at all. My parents did not attend church, so I knew nobody there, and honestly, it was a pretty scary idea that there was a God.
";
14
| const VBS2 = "Yet, every year there was 1 event that I would always go to - VBS, or Vacation Bible Study. It was fun; the stations where I got to play games, the crafts that kept me entertained, and the physical activities that would get my heart racing. In fact, it was so fun that I went there as a student almost every year until I reached 8th grade. It was also meaningful-many parents in the neighborhood brought their children to VBS for the free food and childcare. It attracted people from diverse backgrounds, ethnicities, and socioeconomic statuses.";
15
| const VBS3 = "Soon, it became my turn to be a volunteer and give back to the community. I had been the recipient of many of these experiences as a child; now it was my turn to help create these experiences for even younger kids. Initially, I had a lot of difficulty getting close to the kids. The younger kids were too unfamiliar with me, and the age gap of 4 years seemed massive at the time. I did not understand how to connect with them, much less become close to them. Unlike when I was a kid, I was counting the hours that I had to stay rather than relishing the time I had left.";
16
| const VBS4 = "As the days went by, though, the kids started opening up to me. I learned each of their names while playing games with them outside in the summer heat. I sat and joked with them during lunchtime, getting closer to them with each experience. Even when I got tired, they asked me if I was okay and begged me to keep playing with them. Truly, seeing them enjoy the games I had planned made me feel grateful to be able to serve and lead, and I realized that if I had given up in the middle of the week, I would have never seen these moments. Soon, VBS was over, and I had to say goodbye to the kids. As they voted Games and Activities(the station I was in charge of) as their favorite station, I truly understood that my patience, endurance, and effort was worth it, and since then, I have always volunteered at this program(2019-2024, except COVID in 2020).";
18
// This is important! This will make him have more patience towards approaching problems and allow him to persevere even in hard tasks!
19
| return ("Minjae Bae" + "patience and resilience");
| const Missionary1 = "I have been to Mexico twice, and both times, it was as a missionary to low-income regions. and it was for church. As a missionary, we did VBS there, sang songs, and became closer to the local people.";
24
| let Missionary2 = "Volunteering at VBS in another country came with its own challenge: the children only knew Spanish(a language I was unfamiliar with), and we only had one translator on the team. however, I had learned from previous VBS years that perseverance would produce connections. As I fell into a rhythm of teaching and hand-gesturing and playing soccer, I found that the kids in Mexico were similar to the ones in America. They enjoyed making jokes just as much, they smiled just as brightly, and they played games just as competitively.";
25
| let Missionary3 = "My most vivid memory, however, is singing a Spanish song song, 'Jesucristo Basta', written by Un Corazon. We wanted to sing a song together with the local people, and this song was both simple and beautiful. Despite being (very) off-key and only half understanding the lyrics, I felt much closer to the people at the small church than I did with a lot of other communities I have been a part of. Singing this song brought an inexplicable connection; I felt that I had known them for much longer than just 2 weeks.";
26
// Appreciation will prevent stagnation and create a desire for learning and self-improvement! Community will help him get along with other people, both in the workplace or and in everyday life. General improvements!
27
| return ("Minjae Bae" + "gratitude and community");
28
};
29
30
publicvoidExtras
= { . . . };
30
publicvoidExtras
= {
31
| let lines_of_code = "This website took about 900 lines and around 293kB(excluding song, which was 7619kB), which still very inefficient in my opinion. Will definitely clean up later. One improvement I could make is making this website reactive to the screen size, as this website was only designed for screens, mainly computers!";
32
| let achievements = "This website was made purely from scratch! Except for occasionally Googling, everything was hand-coded, no Wordpress, no Wix! I also am hosting it on a dedicated server and rented the website url!";
33
| let purpose = "This was my KWF application for a chance to win a computer I can use in the future, for college and beyond! It would be undoubtedly nifty since I am in need of need a personal, dedicated laptop for coding. ";
34
| let html_experience_previous = "None, actually! HTML was something I have always skirted around, but this was a fun project to code. I got to mess around, figure out how everything works, and make a functioning audio player!";
35
| let future_plans = "Go to college, get a degree in computer science and do design games in my free time! I already have some ideas that I am working towards!";
35
| let favorite_books = "I enjoyed Don Quixote and Faust. Funnily enough because I could relate to both main characters, haha!";
36
| let why_the_theme = "No clue, I felt creative, and I felt at home since I see this gray screen all the time. It might not be the most aesthetic website, but I love how it relates to me!";
37
| let hosting_questions = "I rented an address (minjaekwf.com) and got it SSL-certified at IONOS, and hosting it on GitHub Pages! When the lease on the address expires, it should be available at https://mazinouruk.github.io/minjaekwf/";