Vina Tran

RICE BOWL 2026 🍚 The first of many?! 🤞 ❤️💛 The most joyous day of derby I have ever played. So much love to my league @angelcityderby for making my dream of an all-Asian skaters tournament come true, and to every skater who came to LA to be a part of it. To those who couldn't make it, we missed you! See you next year? 😍 💛❤️ We played our hearts out, but there were nothing but good vibes on the track. Thank you to @concretefoxy for capturing the magic! 📸😁

So happy to have been able to represent Vietnam at the @rollerderbyworldcup in this beautiful jerseys by @leftturnclothing . I love skating in RED ❤️💛 📸 @concretefoxy

When I first read Ptolemy's Gate when it came out in 2005, I fell in love instantly. For years after that, I made a habit out of rereading the Bartimaeus Trilogy (it was not yet the Bartimaeus Sequence) every year and having a big old cry about the ending every time.      In 2010, I wrote a letter to the author (@jonathanstroud ) expressing my deep love for the series, describing the aforementioned annual rereading/crying ceremony, and the trials and tribulations of being a writer.      In 2011, I got a very sweet reply letter in the mail! The signature included this adorable drawing of the titular Bartimaeus as a cute little imp (or, as I thought of him for many years, a friendly little gargoyle). This letter immediately became one of my most prized possessions, and it now lives in a nice little Ptolemy's Gate-colored frame on my wall in a place where I can always see it from my desk or my bed.      I’ve been planning to get the Bart drawing tattooed for a few years now, and in May 2022 I finally did it! The lovely @leslieyoungism inked this on me, and now I have a little guy with me at all times.      It turned out that I was not satisfied with a single Bartimaeus tattoo, so I went on to get a mostly Bartimaeus-themed sleeve tattoo from the amazing @geigerobjects . Featured Bartimaeus guises: a desert cat, a crested lapwing (rekhyt), and the infamous blue-beaked raven. (It also features the pagoda from the Orisinal “Rain” webpage, which I loved so deeply for so long that I can remember the accompanying poem almost word-for-word despite not having seen it in years.) We started the sleeve near the end of October 2022, and we finished it at the beginning of March 2023!     No filter, final session two weeks healed. I love everything about the placement of each element.     I love this sleeve so much. It is so beautiful, and I feel so cool and happy having it. Thanks so much to everyone involved in the making of it! I love tattoos, and I love Bartimaeus.   #bartimaeus #bartimaeustrilogy #tattoo

I'm actually a pretty earnest believer in being obsessed with your own creative work, so I spent the last few days hand sewing these bound copies of my favorite fanfictions that I wrote last year to keep for myself and give to friends. It was fun, it kept the misery at bay, and the results are very pretty. Cardstock, embroidery thread, 24lb printer paper. Everything written, typeset, cut, folded, and stitched with my own two hands. 🙂‍↕️ Letterhend Studio makes my favorite fonts of all time 🙏 not to out myself on the grid but if you like toxic yaoi and deranged evil homosexuals hmu I guess

happy 420 🌿 RIP Roy Earle you would have loved disposable vapes and all the toxins they deposit directly into your lungs cheers to my old friend @hija.ck for drawing this a couple years back, sorry (or you're welcome?) for shittily editing a vape into your illustration

Of all the tattoos that I have, I think this is my very favorite* one. I daydreamed about it for years before finally getting it, and I look at it every day with hearts in my eyes 😍 I also forgot to put it on the grid for over a year. CLASSIC This is, of course, my L.A. Noire piece. The Blue Room is the most iconic location that they created for the game, in my opinion, and that first cutscene where Roy Earle takes Cole Phelps to The Blue Room to meet Elsa Lichtmann and Dr. Harlan Fontaine sure does set up the back half of the storyline! 🕵️‍♂️ This design features the wallpaper from The Blue Room's entryway and the light fixture on the stage in the main room. It was STUNNINGLY executed by the incomparable @jessydtattoo . I will always fondly remember @tattoosbyjaclyn calling you a sicko for saying you loved all of the straight lines on it. I love L.A. Noire. I love tattoos. I love my tattoo artists. I'm so lucky to get to wear such beautiful art pieces that are tributes to things that I've loved for so long!! 💙🧡🩶 *I also love my sleeve with all my heart, but it's less "my favorite tattoo" and more "the tattoo that makes me feel the most like me," so it's kind of a separate category. 💖 #lanoire #artdecotattoo

3/20/26 to 3/22/26 - @angelcityderby Rocket Queens take third place 🥉at @cactuscuptournament 😳 It was a million degrees in Phoenix, and I had one billion migraines, and I took a very hard hit to the face and could only play a couple jams each on days two and three. But the vibes were ✨ immaculate. ✨ I want to do the rest of this season with this team and this jammer bench so bad. Please let my body hold up 🙏 Also, I got to spread the good word of Call Me By Fire to my fellow jammers 🔥 if you want to watch gay puppet stage performances please hit me up because I am probably the biggest CMBF fan in America and I have dozens of recommendations

Beyond the Track: A Conversation with @bermudabiangle369 “Creating the Rice Bowl wasn’t just about a tournament; it was about carving out a space that didn’t exist yet. It’s about who shows up when the track is empty.” Read the FULL interview and high-res pix link in my Stories today. 📖🛼 Also available through the link 🔗 in my profile. @angelcityderby @teamvietnamrd #rollerderby #grassroots #womensports #skatephotography

I used my first and last headache-free evening (Thursday, the day before our first game of Cactus Cup) to finish the frames for these tiles. They're very simple, just chair rail from Lowe's cut to size with a miter box, mounted on plywood, then painted antique gold with a little bit of brown for weathering. But they came out soooooo good 😍 Like many things I make, these too are L.A. Noire. Tell me they ain't gorgeous, though!! (Tiles from Tilebar!)

Team Korea & Team Vietnam mini highight at the Rice Bowl Tournament. The very first all Asian Tournament. Thanks @bermudabiangle369 for pulling this all together #rollerderby #skate #ricebowl2026 #Asians #aapi

Cosplay boots so good I'm putting them on the grid 😎 These are not for Lestat, but they wouldn't exist without him. Fun shoes for evil white men 💅

10/25/25 - @angelcityderby Sinners vs. Conclave mash-up. 🦇 a very happy SINCLAVE HALLOWEEN to you all! 🎃 the spookiest thing about the first photo is that BOTH @fabulez_617 and I are SMILING. we must have been possessed. . my household worked really hard on the shirts for this bout (which we screenprinted at home), and we collectively had about 1700 breakdowns over them. But you know what? Everything worked out, and everyone had SO MUCH FUN at the bout! Thanks to @jasonsandwich for capturing these smiles 😊 😁 . The only thing I'm missing is a photo of @rachtilldeath using the five seconds before the first whistle of the bout to tell me "YOU'RE NOT ALLOWED TO NOT HAVE FUN!"