Catching fire Everythings better on fire while she spins with her tech fans

New burners usually start off using a sword so they can get used to holding the item while it burns and then move onto more intricate items like the diablo, staff or fans.

Since Brushwood always liked circus themed acts fire spinning quickly become a new hobby.

Though her current choice of instrument is the tech fan she, shared how she wants to learn how to “double-staff” this coming year.

“I’m actually asking for a double staff for Christmas, so I’m going to use those for now. Maybe traditional fans later,” Brushwood said.

Since she started fire-spinning, Brushwood admitted to igniting herself about three times.

She protects herself from injuries by wearing clothes that are about 60 percent cotton, fire and heat-resistant gloves, which makes the fire easier to brush off.

“I guess technically I’ve caught myself on fire three times. I guess I forgot it happened last Saturday at my aunt’s house,” Brushwood said.

“The first time, I was wearing pajama pants which was my fault. It was really baggy It probably wasn’t the best idea and caught my butt on fire.”

Josh Badger, has known Brushwood for four years they been dating for the last two years. He shared how they burn together, described Brushwood as shy, goofy and really girly.

“She’s really fun to hang around with and easy to talk to like even before we started dating we’d talk all the time like over text, Facebook just about pretty much anything,” Badger said.

Badger is also her fire safety and shared how he carefully watches Brushwood while she spins.

In the event she lights herself on fire, he can use their fire and heatresistant blanket to put it out.

She also makes sure to always have her hair up and out of the way in order to prevent it from fire.

“I always put my hair back, I think I have. I think I’ve singed it once or twice. I don’t know, you can smell it sometimes. Like when you’re done,” Brushwood said.

“It smells like burning hair, but you’re not sure but never significant enough to notice. But I did catch my hair on fire the second time I think.”

Overall Brushwood enjoys fire-spinning but hopes to be a psychology professor, after taking a class at Pierce with Jennifer Moses.

From the few times she’s taken Professor Moses` classes, she’s noticed on things about or understood before.

“The class was really fun even though it was the hardest class I have ever taken. She’s really goofy and first of all she makes it really interesting and really passionate and really does put herself in the subject she get really excited about it, and we are all like, ‘Dude it isn’t that serious,’ but she makes it seem great,” Brushwood said.

“I want to teach other people so they can have that little light build, light up in their head.”

In her free time she enjoys going to anime expositions with her friends and collecting stuffed animals.

She currently has over 350 dolls.

As a child her mom made get rid of her stuffed animals every year, and she would contemplate on which she would have to let go of.

“She would say,’Get rid of them,’ and I would say,’No they’re mine. They’re my babies. I can’t let them go,’” Brushwood said. “She’d like, make me get rid of a couple every year, and I’d be like going through all of them trying to figure out which one I’d let go I felt like I was abandoning them.”

One of Brushwood’s close friends shared how they have known each other for the past 10 years. She enjoys Brushwood’s outgoing personality and her willingness to try new things.

Brushwood tries to take Angel out of her comfort zone by burning with the fans.

“It’s amazing, she has convinced me to try it. It was really fun and exciting,” Angel said.

Filled with colorful international attire and an intertwined mixture of mouth watering smells, the cheerful conversations filled the room as the students and faculty members celebrated their diversity with traditional foods from their cultures.

The Associated Student Organization had its Global Village event that took place at the Great Hall room this past week at Pierce College as students came to represent within the community.

“It’s an event made to emphasize each culture and almost unite us as one people, “ said ASO Clerk Jonathan Vazquez.

Pierce student, Khosh Amadid, participated at the event and welcomed those in attendance by speaking in Farsi saying, “venga y toma and hakuna matata,” which translates to “Welcome, come and eat and no worries.”

Representatives said welcome was spoken in Farsi, which is a common language amongst Persian descendants in Iran.

They said come and take in Spanish, which also means come and eat or come and have. While no worries, which also mean everything is ok, was spoken in Swahili.

ASO President Alex Oloo organized the event and worked to make sure everything ran smoothly as Vasquez gave a presentation about Argentina while wearing his fútbol jersey to represent the influence of soccer in Latin American culture.

“We have Argentina, which I’m representing. We have Kenya, which is Alex’s representing country,” Vasquez said. “We have Uganda, Ethiopia, Portugal, Vietnam, Mexico, we have so many.”

“Right now Argentina is giving out sandwiches de migas. It’s like these little tiny Argentinian sandwiches. I have tried Mooncakes from Vietnam, which were delicious. I’ve tried roasted barley from Ethiopia. I know that Israel is giving out something tasty and Mexican Horchata is delicious too,” Vasquez said.

Yuliya Meskela and Rebekah Masresha are both 20-yearolds majoring in business who represented Ethiopia as they shared their enlightening information about their country. Their booth was decorated with the colors of the Ethiopian flag while Meskela and Masresha wore traditional white garments.

“A lot of people have misconceptions about African countries and I just wanted to set the record straight,” Meskela said. “It’s not all war and just dark, as Americans assume it to be.”

Other student representatives also hosted booths at the event in order to clear up misguided stereotypes about their country.

Maian Rahvalschi of Hillel, The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life at Colleges and Universities was at the booth representing Israel.

She is one of the few speakers to travel overseas to share her culture.

Around the room tables were set up as booths and representatives from several countries waited to share their presentations and cuisine. Some handed out pamphlets, while others answered questions.

“Welcome to Kenya,” Oloo said while standing at his booth. “The shield represents the freedom from the British.”

Oloo wore a red-checkered shuka, which is also referred to as a Maasai blanket and a pair of sandals.

He moved through the crowd of people and reminding the guests to make sure they get their passports signed as there was raffle they could enter in after three signatures.

“Then we have the colors on the flag. The green color represents the vegetation, the white is for peace.

“I came from Israel to bring a little bit of Israel to the students,” Rahvalschi said. “Unfortunately we had a very, very sad thing that happen today in Israel, with the terror attack. We couldn’t bring [real] candles, so we brought a type of a candle in loving memory of the four victims.”

As he gave his presentation several Iranian members of the Brahma community assisted in preparing a table of tradition food as they were preparing the food they were going to serve after the presentation.

At the end of Tehrani’s slide show he began to dancing while the crowd cheered him on.

The ASO plans to host another Global Village event taking place in 2015.