When I meet people and they ask me what I do for a living, their reaction fall along the lines of "You must be really good at drawing" , "Cool! I thought of being an architect, but ___(fill in that blank)", “Is that like an engineer?”, or the biggest of them all "Did you play a lot of Lego when you were a kid?". What a stereotype! People just assume that every aspiring architect kid played Legos? Okay! I guess that’s a fair assumption. I did play with Legos a lot when I was a kid. As I look back and think about my childhood, I did do a lot of stuff that lead me to this path I’m on now.
Lego Architecture - Check out Eiffel Tower
Philippines
I was born in Torrance, California but I was raised in the Philippines. I was about 9 years old when I knew I wanted to design buildings. I didn’t actually know what they were called but I knew I wanted to be one. I was living in the Philippines then and every time we would drive home we would pass by this 2-storey house with a 2-car garage, covered entry porch, curved transom windows, big red gate and a red roof. I actually saw that house again during my trip to the Philippines back in 2015. To be honest, I don't know what I liked about that house. There’s really nothing special that can be said about that house except that it was “normal”. Nothing too innovative or exciting. Everything was pretty standard, but for some reason, it sparked something within me. I guess I had a better appreciation for things when I was a kid.
High School
Ever since then, I couldn't see myself doing anything else. I went to an academic-technical high school where we were taught about drafting, I.T., mechanics and electronics early on. We would have shop classes where we would make pencil holders, an owl that flaps its wings when you pull the string (you have to make sure the eyes lights up too to get a good grade!). We learned how to use drill presses and lathes, worked with brass and made clamps. We learned how to use soldering iron and make circuit boards. For our Information Technology classes we learned about c++/html/flash and we had to make our own website, and of course we learned how to use technical pens, triangles and do industrial drafting work (Yes! I did drafting using pen and paper! We didn’t have an iPad Pro and Apple Pencil back then). #kidsnowadays
By Junior year, you get to choose what you want to major in and have an in-depth study of that field. At that point, it wasn’t really an obvious choice for me. I had better grades in Mechanics, Electronics and IT than I did Industrial Drafting so I did question myself a little bit. I’ve always been a big picture guy and at that point it boiled down to “Are you willing to work hard to be good at something you love?”. Long story short, I chose Industrial Drafting. It made my knowledge and interest in Architecture grew stronger. I was even selected to be one of the students to represent our school in a "scaled model competition" (we got second place).
Rendering an elevation for a design competition.
College
Fast-forward to 2007 (graduated from HS). I remember my parents' reaction when I told them I'm taking up Architecture in college. My mom and dad said to me "We know you love art, drawing and painting, but we never thought you'd be interested in doing that." I know it was their way of carefully saying "we're not sure that's the best path for you." I guess a part of it was my fault. I wasn’t really the most vocal kid. I kept things to myself and made sure I was good at something before I start telling people about it. I was bashful (oh how times have changed!). I understood their concern, but I had my mind set. I told them that I’ll apply to the best architecture school in the Philippines and if I don’t make it, I’m not going to college. I don’t know how true that statement was at the time, but I was serious when I said it. At least I thought I was. I did apply but unfortunately at least half of the applicants were put on the waiting list and had to go through a drawing exam. After a few hours of drawing and forgetting the alphabet, I passed. (The proctor called the candidates who passed alphabetically and when I heard the last name “Hung” I had hit the table out of disappointment only to hear my last name be called next. “I” comes after “H” dummy!)
Architecture school was fun, but it wasn't easy. You need to work on a project (at least 1-3 per semester) that takes you weeks/months to finish. (If you're a professional crammer like me, then you always do it last minute.) In addition to that, you have homework for your other classes, study for exams and on top of that they'll throw in an Esquisse (small design problem that you have to turn in at the end of the class).
I can’t stress enough how many social activities I’ve missed because of architecture school. You pretty much have to get used to saying “No.” and “I can’t.” to your friends who are planning to go out on a Friday night. On the bright side, people in your class aren’t going out either! You know what they say; misery loves company. Ha!
Singapore
In college, our professors encouraged us to try to apply for a job in Singapore because they have good architecture and getting experience there would make us better architects. So after graduating, I moved to Singapore.
Living in Singapore developed who I was as a person and as a man of my profession. The opportunity to able to work in a fast-paced result-oriented environment taught me how to use my time efficiently and how to multitask like crazy. Nothing beats having to juggle 6-8 active projects that are warranting your attention at the same time. If you’ve worked in an architectural firm then you know there's always that day of the week/month where the contractor will call you and ask for drawings, or the client wants to have a meeting, or your boss needs you to finish a drawing that he needs right away, or simply the printer won't print properly all at the same time. For whatever reason, the printer would always act up the same day you need to submit something urgently. What's up with that?
Singapore became my home and I loved living there. Their culture, food, infrastructure and quality of life is truly beautiful. It is definitely at the top of my list of best cities. After 2 years of living in Singapore, I felt that my season there was over. It was time for me to move on, explore new things, and be in a different environment. I didn’t particularly knew where I was going but I left my job and packed my stuff and left Singapore.
Anchorage, Alaska
I flew to Anchorage to visit my family who I had not seen in about 2 years. After 2 months of debating where I should go, I stayed. I couldn’t have made a bigger change in my environment than moving from Singapore to Anchorage in 2014. I couldn’t imagine that now, this is the place I call home.
If someone told me a few years ago that after college I’ll move to Singapore then after 2 years move to Alaska, I’d probably laugh and tell them they’re crazy. That just shows you that there are things that won’t make sense looking forward because you don’t have all the puzzle pieces yet. There will be trials that would seem insurmountable until you’re past it. Even if I believe that “future-telling individual”, I would probably have done everything in my life to take it upon myself to make it happen and miss out on all the necessary steps and lessons along the way. There is beauty in not knowing everything. Just look at me! I moved here to be closer to where my family was, but little did I know that there were more blessings to come. As of April 2018, I became a registered professional architect and in that same year I married the woman of my dreams.
The path to where I am now was not easy, but it was definitely worthwhile. The good, the bad, the ugly.
God is truly so good!
"God is in the details" - Ludwig Mies van de Rohe
And as I write this post in my home office in West Anchorage in March 2019, I can’t help but be amazed by how my life turned out. It is definitely not perfect, but it’s good to see that I’ve made significant progress.
“You can't connect the dots looking forward you can only connect them looking backwards.”- Steve Jobs
That's my story. What's yours? I want to know!