Growing Up

“In the chaos of my thoughts I discovered the mystery of happiness. I still hold firmly to it today; it is to love life unconditionally, the good and the bad.”

“I don’t consider myself to have any particular constitution or strength of mind, not even the ability to laugh in the face of misfortune. On the contrary, I am just as prone to nervous depressions, fits of rage and moods of impatience as everybody else, with the sole difference that I can recognize in them the unavoidable reverse side of the state of euphoria.”

From then on Rubinstein cultivated that special and wise philosophy which can be summed up as “The will to be happy,” by which one has to recognize that happiness only comes to those who look for it. The key to his existence had been found.

Depicting Artur Rubinstein by Bernard Gavoty (1978)

It rained a lot this week. The sky was always cloudy and dark, with thunders and rain flapping the roof. It's typical summer climate in Texas, hot and humid. I used to hate rainy days when I was in Taiwan, because I couldn't play basketball that day and I had to wear a raincoat when I rode my motorcycle. However I loved rainy days in Texas. It's too hot here and even standing in the sun light for a while is unbearable. Besides, I played basketball indoor and I didn't ride a motorcycle anymore, so I started to love rainy days. I especially liked the splendid color of sun light reflected by the cloud, and enjoyed the scene that the first sun light passes through the gloomy sky when the rain is about to stop.

Ironically, even though I've been here for two years, I never went to North Gate, the club area, until last night. It's Saturday night and there were full of people. We wandered in the street, picked a club, drank some shots and beers, and moved to the next and kept drinking. It was great to sit outside the club, drinking beer with friends, and feeling the wind blowing on my face. I met Amy, who used to live next to me, in one club. Then we shot pool together. When I couldn't remember how many shots I'd drunk, I started to feel dizzy. I asked Amy for cigarettes to keep myself sober. Then I continued drinking, shot by shot; it made me more dazzling, so I had to keep smoking cigarette, one after one. When I was too drunk to shoot pool, I lay on the sofa, chatting with friends, staring at the ceiling, listening to the loud music, and smoking. We left around 1:30am and stumbled to the parking lot in the moonlight.

“What a night!” my friend said. “We should hang out like this more often”
“Sure!” I was drunk, I thought.
“What a great night!”

It's really a bad idea to stay at home when you want to do something on Saturday. Actually I had set the clock at 9:30am Saturday morning in order to get up early and start to work, but when the bell was ringing this morning, I lay on my bed and thought, “What the hell. Today is Saturday!” Then I turned the ring off. I didn't get up until 11:30am and I started to prepare lunch. After I finished lunch I sat at my desk for one and half hour and then I felt sleepy. Maybe I ate too much food, I thought, “Since the bed is beside me, why not taking a nap?” So I went to bed again. When I got up it was already 5:00pm and my friend asked me to go out. Damn! I ruined my day again!

The number of my blog's visitor declined largely ever since I had written almost all the articles in English. For me, however, it doesn't matter, because the reason I wrote in English is to practice the language and record my own life. I don't care who and how many people will see my essays. But if you are logical enough, you could find an obvious bug in my explanation. Since my articles were written for myself, why did I publish them in public? On the one hand I want to keep the privacy, yet on the other hand I want to share my life with others. My life is always full of contradictories, such as I enjoy the time to be alone but I also want to be accompanied, or I hate the country life in a small town but I have to complete my education…etc. Therefore I always need to compromise, and that's life. Isn't it?

I am tired today.When I am tired, I always miss home so much.

It's weird, so weird. Even though I just had dinner with my friend, when I was back to my apartment alone at Saturday night, I felt lonely. It's weird because I shouldn't feel that way. I even had dinner with lots of friends last night. But why did I feel so lonely? Suddenly I realized it's reasonable enough to feel that way. I felt lonely because I was actually, physically alone.

In order to expel the loneliness from my mind, as usual, I turned music aloud and tried to make some phone calls to my friends. But when I was about to make the phone call, I hesitated, because I couldn't think of anything to talk about, and the rational part of me knew that it did nothing but helped me feel better. The reality, loneliness, remained the same. I'd already known my family and my friends love me, and there was no need to prove that again. When I had that thought the loneliness just disappeared. I was cured. I thought it's just the lonely night that wore me down.

It's inhuman to be alone, I thought, and it's even more inhuman to have long distance relationship. Watching love faded by the long desistance is even crueler than separating two people who love each other, and the fact that you can do nothing about the distance makes people even more depressed. If it seems not much future for the relationship, how can you give yourself confidence to hang on? I am sorry for my friends who suffer from it. I know it is painful, but it's hard for me to imagine how painful it is, nor how to cure it.

“There is not much future in men being friends with great women, although it can be pleasant enough before it gets better or worst.” I read this form The Moveable Feast and felt it's damn right. I had several female friends and the reason I became friends with them was that I treat them like sisters, not girlfriends. If I am affectionate to someone and our relationship can't get better, I would rather not be friends with her anymore, but I'll bless her to find her true love. Likewise, I could understand why certain people can't be friends with me. That's how “The Game” plays.

I had a thought recently. Although love always makes us suffering, it's not a totally bad thing. Somehow we need to find the right person and learn how to love. Nobody is born for it, right? So we need to keep trying and learning. We might fail sometimes, of course. But as long as we learn something from our failures and mistakes we can make ourselves better people, people who know how to love and appreciate. Then it'll be worth experiencing all the pain and loneliness.

I believe that day will come, sooner or later.

Shrek, a giant monster, had an ugly face but a kind heart. Although he was a nice guy, villagers thought he was dangerous due to his frightening appearance. Due to fear of being harmed, they tried to drive him out of the swamp despite the fact that he had not hurt anyone at all. Disappointed, frustrated, and tired, Shrek had no choice but to scare them away. Shrek, who pretended to live happily, longed to be accepted by others. However, everything changed when he saved a donkey from being captured by the prince's soldiers.

This talkative and obnoxious donkey, named Donkey, always considers himself popular, but he is actually a troublemaker. He was hunted by Lord Farquaad's soldiers because Lord Farquaad, who was the ruler of the kingdom, wanted to get all the fairy tale creatures out of his land. Shrek saved Donkey's life, so Donkey hoped to accompany Shrek to pay him back. But the truth was Shrek couldn't find a way to get rid of him, and neither could he make him shut up. Besides, all the fairly tale creatures escaped to Shrek's swamp, and the swamp became noisy and crowded. To expel the squatters, Shrek made a deal with Lord Farquaad. If Shrek saves Princess Fiona from the castle which was guarded by a fire-breathing dragon, then Lord Farquaad will get the creatures out of the swamp. Therefore, Shrek and Donkey started their journey to save the princess.

After a long trip, Shrek and Donkey arrived at the lava-surrounded castle where Princess Fiona was. Although they entered the castle secretly, the guarding dragon was aware of their invasion. The dragon breathed fire at them and Shrek, who was almost killed several times, waved his sword to fight back. After a severe fight, Shrek beat the dragon and freed Princess Fiona. However, seeing Shrek and Donkey for the first time, Princess Fiona was extremely disappointed, because she expected that it should be a handsome knight with his gallant horse coming to save her, rather than an ugly ogre with a stupid ass. But on their way back to the kingdom, she gradually found out that Shrek actually had a sincere heart below his ugly face. She fell in love with Shrek unconsciously.

Although Princess Fiona loved Shrek, they couldn't be together because a princess was supposed to marry a prince, not a monster. Besides, Princess Fiona, a beautiful and charming lady, had a secret that nobody knew. She became an ugly ogre after every sunset due to an evil witch's terrible spell, which could only be broken by her true love’s first kiss. Princess Fiona believed that Lord Farquaad was the one who loved her, so she promised to marry him although she loved Shrek. However, Lord Farquaad didn't love her at all. He only cared about marrying a princess in order to become a king. Knowing the truth about this, Shrek interrupted the wedding and told Princess Fiona that he loved her, which he didn’t have the courage to admit before. Princess Fiona was glad to hear about this, and she decided to show everybody her secret.

Finding out Fiona's secret, Lord Farquaad was very angry and canceled the wedding immediately. But Shrek, who truly loved Fiona, didn't care about what she looked like. He kissed Fiona even though she had become an ugly ogre. Suddenly, Princess Fiona was magically lifted into the air with glorious light shining around her. It seemed that the spell was going to be broken. But a strange thing happened, instead of becoming beautiful as before, Fiona remained an ogre! But no one would care about this, because she had already found her true love. Finally, Fiona got married to Shrek and they lived happily ever after.

I saw Ms. Pulak, my former English teacher, in the restaurant China King this evening. She just sat on the table not far from ours. I recognized her when I first saw her but I was afraid she didn't know me anymore. After all, I am only a student she taught last summer, and we haven't seen each other since then.

But when she walked by our table, I smiled at her and I knew she recognized me immediately. I was so surprised that she still knows me although she might forget my name. Then she chatted with me for a while, asking my recent life. She is really a super-nice teacher I have ever seen. Before she left, she even gave me a hug. Her hug was so warm that it seems conveying her kindness and happiness to me and cheering me up. I didn't feel this for a long time and I was glad I met her today.

On my way back to Houston, as usual, I opened my carry-on book to read. I love reading. Each time I read, not only can I admire the beauty of literature, but also learn the authors' experience and the knowledge they try to convey. Sometimes, the problem they thought and tried to figure out is exactly the one that I encountered.

“A Movable Feast?” asked by an old man who sit next to me.

“No, it’s The Old Man and the Sea.” I smiled.

“Do you like it?” He kept asking.

“Yes, especially his concise description. His word is really powerful and impressive.” I said. “Did you also read this before?”

“Of course, many times. I also like it.”

The old man was gentle and friendly. He is a retired professor and was on his way back to Paris. We talked a lot in the following four hours.

“Do you like to live in Texas?” he asked.

“No, of course not. After I visit here I realize that I like San Francisco more.” I said, “In the past week I stayed in Stanford with my friends.”

“I taught literature and art in Stanford for a while.” He said. “But it’s not an easy job. You know. There are full of eccentric geeks.”

We both laughed.

Then I asked him the life in Paris, a city I desire to visit, and the places he had ever been to. I was acting like a child full of curiosity. He told me San Francisco is the best city he has ever lived in the U.S. He also encouraged me to find a job in CA after I finish my degree.

I even didn’t know his name. But we had a happy conversation. When arrived Houston, we shook hands and said goodbye. Then I watched his back disappeared in the crowd. In this trip, I met several different people and got several valuable ideas. It’s so nice to travel around. I love travel!

The Island is a movie which combines sci-fi and action. It describes the year 2020, in which an insurance company provides people with health insurance by making identical clones of their clients for the purpose of providing organs. Those clones are imprisoned in a big underground stronghold, and there is only one way to get out: win the lottery to go to a tropical island. But the lottery is rigged. If a clone wins the lottery, it means his real world double has a health problem and needs an organ transplant. The clone will be killed to provide the needed organ. One day, a clone discovered this fact and tried to escape………

But in the real world, this scenario would not happen, because there is no need to make a clone for the purpose of organ transplant. By cultivating embryonic stem cells, scientists can grow the cells into any tissues or organs. But embryonic stem cell research still has a long way to go, and Bush's veto of federal funding for it stymies progress.

It has been five years since the terror attack on the World Trade Center, but conspiracy theories have become widespread on the internet. Someone even clipped a video to show footage of the World Trade Center's collapsing. It showed that in the moment of collapse, there were also puffs of dust erupting from the side of the tower. People asserted that the collapse of the buildings was not only due to the impact of the airplanes, but also the detonation of explosives planted at the bottom. They thought the Bush administration deliberately conducted or assisted in the attack in order to provide the pretext for the invasion of Iraq, just like it falsely accused Iraq of having weapons of mass destruction.

These conspiracy theories, however, depend on circumstantial evidence only and lack solid evidence. But these theories are not totally bad things. From some points of view, they provide people with psychological consolation that helps them cope with the tragedy.

The war between Israel and Lebanon has already caused the death of hundreds of people since the first conflict exploded on July 12, 2006. War is nothing new for Israel and the surrounding countries. Since Israel was established with the help of the United Nations in 1954, peace has never come to the Middle East. Twelve days ago, a Lebanese paramilitary group, called Hezbollah, made a raid on the Israeli border. Eight Israeli soldiers were killed and two were kidnapped with the intension of exchanging them for three Lebanese held by Israel. Then the irritated Israeli government sent ground troops and bombarded the strongholds of Hezbollah, while Hezbollah launched missiles toward cities in northern Israel. So far, several cities have been ruined due to military operations and many innocent civilians, both Israeli and Lebanese, have died. This is the biggest issue happening in the world right now and the United Nations is considering sending a peacekeeping force to that area.

Compared to the intense atmosphere in the Middle East, My fellow Taiwanese and I seem to live happy and carefree lives in our own small island. Being isolated from the international community for more than a half century, what happens in the world seems none of our business and we can do nothing about it either. We are not a member of the United Nations, nor can we join most official international organizations. Does Taiwan have a say in a decision to send peacekeeping force to the Middle East? No!! Absolutely not!!! Our representatives and reporters are even not allowed to step foot into the U.N. building. This exclusion makes the Taiwanese people nonchalant toward worldwide issues. Most Taiwanese people are unaware of the issues on the UN and WTO agendas and even don’t know where the U.N. headquarters is.

Well, if we Taiwanese can live on our own, is it all right to ignore what's happening in the world? Unfortunately, it isn't. Our economy depends on trading and we need to compete and cooperate with other countries. Even thought we lost our position in the international community, we still have the right to pursue our national interests!

There are many differences between Asian and American cuisine, such as food ingredients, eating utensils, eating habits and so on. It is interesting to compare the differences between them.

The food ingredients are very different between Asia and America. The main food in Asia is rice. Asian people eat rice almost every day, and there are many styles of rice, such as steamed rice, fried rice, and rice porridge. However, American people usually eat bread, mashed potato, hamburgers, fried chicken, steaks, salad and so on. Animals’internal organs never show up in western meals while they are common food ingredients in eastern cuisines.

Asian people and American people use different utensils to eat. In Asia, people use chopsticks to eat almost everything. They use chopsticks to eat rice, fish, chopped meat, and even use it to pick up peanuts. After meals, it is formal and polite to use a toothpick in Asia. American people use totally different utensils to eat. They use forks and knives most of the time and foods are always served on dishes instead of bowls.

Asians and Americans are also different in eating habits. If you have ever been to a Chinese restaurant, you might notice several differences. For example, soup is served last and tea is served first, while it is soup first and drink last in America. In traditional Chinese restaurants, most of the meals are shared among individuals, but every individual orders his own entrée in western restaurants. Sometimes, people share their table in Asian delis but this situation never happens in western delis.

Although western and eastern people have a lot of differences in terms of eating style, a delicious meal is always worth eating no matter if it is eastern or western. Sometimes you might be surprised by trying different kinds of food, and you might discover that you love to use chopsticks.

I am going to talk about Superman. I went to see the movie, ”Superman Returns,” last weekend. It continues from episode four of the previous series, and describes Superman's return to earth from outer space. He finds out his ex-girlfriend, Lois, is engaged to someone else and is raising a little boy. Like the previous films, Superman saves Lois and the world again, but this time he is almost killed. Basically, Superman is invincible and his body is like steel. But when he touches kryptonite from his planet, he becomes a normal person with flesh and blood. His adversary uses this advantage to beat him. Superman is wounded seriously and is sent to the hospital. He is almost dead but he recovers miraculously. It has a happy ending. Frankly speaking, the scenario is a little bit weird and drawn out. The slogan of the movie is “Superman is always around you.” When I hear that slogan, I think it's kind of stupid . But in spite of the strange story, the animation in the movie is magnificent and exciting. It's still worthwhile to see it in the theater.

Superman, also known as “The Man of Steel,” is a fictional character created by Canadian artist Joe Shuster and American writer Jerry Siegel in 1938. Superman has since become one of the world's most recognized superheroes along with Batman and Spiderman. Even now, the character's adventures are still published in a number of comic books. It is so successful that even if you have never read the comic, you still know the story of Superman. Superman is strong, powerful, and bulletproof. He can fly in the sky and he is faster than a bullet. He wears a blue costume with red underpants, red boots and red cape. He always protects human beings and fights against evil. In the daytime, he disguises himself as a reporter, Clark Kent, and works at a newspaper, The Daily Planet. But when he knows there is someone who needs help, he will put on his costume immediately and become Superman. Sometimes the case is so urgent that he changes his clothes in a telephone booth.

In addition to comic books, Superman has made transitions to radio, television, movies, and Broadway. Among these, people think the most definitive interpretation of Superman was the one performed by Christopher Reeve. He played Superman in the movie “Superman” in 1978 and received great critical and financial success. The movie was so popular that three sequels were made. But unfortunately in 1995, Christopher Reeve was seriously injured in a horse riding accident. He was paralyzed from the neck down and was confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life. In his autobiography, he admitted that he briefly thought of suicide after realizing the extent of his disability. But he eventually changed his mind due to the love of his wife. After that, he devoted his time to rehabilitation therapy. He became a spokesman for disabled people and a vocal supporter of stem cell research. He also set up the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, which funds research on paralysis and works to improve the lives of the disabled. Christopher Reeve died on October 10, 2004, at the age of 52 due to cardiac arrest, and his wife, who took care of him without regret, died one and a half years later.

After he died, a lot of editorial cartoons were drawn to commemorate him. Several cartoons depicted him flying away from his wheelchair in his superman costume. One picture showed Batman and Spiderman arriving at Reeve's grave with Batman commenting, “He was really a superman.” Another picture depicted him arriving at heaven, wearing superman costume, refusing the wings offered by God, and saying, “No, thanks. I prefer to walk.” People will remember him not only for his role as Superman, but also as a fighter in life.

In the end, I want to use Christopher Reeve's own remarks to define superman. He said “A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” From his case, I realize that Superman is not a fictional character anymore. He has become a real person in our life.

I didn't do anything today. It is unusual, because I usually fill up my free time with activities, such as playing basketball, cleaning my room, reading books, going to restaurants, hanging out with friends and so on. But today I just didn't have the mood. I still felt uncomfortable with my foot. Although I could already put some weight on it, it was still swelling and with blood inside. I needed to escalate it once in a while or the pain will become so severe. Therefore, I just lay in the sofa, lifted my foot and watched TV all day. It was boring and I felt empty.

I went to Houston with my friends yesterday. It is not far from here and the route is direct. It just needs to go south along the high way number 6, turn east when it meets high way number 290, and then go straight. The total time is about one and half hour. We was supposed to watch the 3D movie,” Superman Return,” at 12:30am but when we arrived, the tickets were all sold out until 10:30pm. Oh my God! Watching this movie is the main purpose of this trip!!! After a short discussion, we decided to change our plan and stay at Houston until night. Whatever happened, we had made our decision to see the movie. We will not give up easily.

Then we went to the restaurant, “Ocean Palace”, at the Hong Kong town to have lunch. I had been there once last semester. We had nine people this time so we ordered a lot of cuisines and shared the money. I was satisfied because I love to eat Cantonese snacks and I don't have so many chances to eat those foods in town. After lunch, we went to Frys to take a look at electronic devices. I couldn't walk for a long distance so I just waited in the car. But one of the newcomers bought a LCD TV and it cost US$600. He got a very good deal because the original price was US$1400!!! He was so lucky and, of course, rich!! We ate hot pot in Vincent's apartment in the evening. After taking a short break, we went to the movie theater. We went there a little bit late and the whole theater was full of people!! It was hard to find an empty seat!! Last time I saw a movie in the U.S. was eight years ago and I totally forgot there was no specific seat number on each ticket, so we had to find seats on our own. We should go earlier if we want to see a movie next time.

To be continued.

Then we saw the movie,” Superman return.” Some scenes in this film were claimed to show as three dimensions. That is, the objects in the movie will look like real things. I had seen such kind of movies several times when I went to Disney World. I remembered the animals in the movie were so real and they even jumped out from the screen. You would try to catch them unconsciously. Sometimes you might smell the fragrance of flowers, or you might be splashed by the water in the movie. But I was somewhat disappointed this time. The animation was not so real in “Superman return”. The things just looked more cubic. That's it. Maybe they used more advanced technology in Disney World.

The scenario of this movie is not so compact either. It continues from episode IV of the previous superman series, describing that superman returns to earth and finds out Lois is engaged with someone else but she is raising superman's child. This story is awful! Then superman saves the world again and again, as usual. It has a happy ending and the slogan of the movie is “Superman will be always around you.” Suddenly I didn't know how to make a comment. But in spite of that, the animation is magnificent and still worth to watch in a theater when you are…boring.

Although the actor who performs superman is handsome, but the ideal superman model in my mind is Christopher Reeve, the former superman who died two years ago. He is handsome, tall, and strong. And he is the only actor who can perform superman so well. In the real life he was a superman as well. He got paralyzed after a horse riding accident but the tragedy didn't knock him down. In spite of the severe pain and disability, he was still active in several public welfare activities and cared bout other handicapped people. I believe he is also the superman in everybody's mind. He is my hero forever!!

“A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to preserver and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” ------- Christopher Reeve

Here I am! Force myself to write English articles again. Well, honestly speaking, sometimes writing in English is torturing, but I think I should keep writing in any case. It forces me to think in English.

Although I can only walk on crutches right now, this morning I drove to the airport to pick up Tose, who is a newcomer for the Fall 2006 semester and my classmate at the university. His flight arrived on time and I picked him up successfully. His appearance had not changed at all! I recognized him easily even though we had not seen each other since graduation. Then I took him with three other new comers to go apartment hunting and apply for student IDs. I left them to go to my class at noon but Shawn took over everything. He helped them to setup new accounts at Citibank and buy beds. In the evening, I invited them to eat dinner in my apartment. Tony and Stanly prepared the food for us and it was delicious. It was such a pity that I couldn’t drink the beer because of the injury.

During the dinner, I asked the newcomers to join our trip to Houston on Saturday, because we had planned to watch 3D movie in Houston for a long time and I thought it was brutal to leave newcomers in their apartment during their first weekend in the US. They are so auspicious! Nobody treated me like this when I arrived here. Looking at them reminded me of myself last year, when I came to the U.S alone and didn't know anybody. Everything was new and was so unfamiliar. I struggled to get used to the environment and it seemed that I could only depend on myself. So I told myself that I needed to be strong and I tried to handle everything alone. I believed those newcomers would understand that feeling sooner or later. It's the reality. You can not expect that someone will always be there to help you.

By the way, it is such a relief that I don’t need to go to the lab every morning. Since the injury, walking through the campus has become difficult for me. However, tomorrow I am going to meet my conversation partner, and then meet Randy at my apartment to discuss the project after then. Life is still not easy.

I sprained my left ankle when I played basketball yesterday. I tried to make a turn around jumper but I landed on Albert's foot. In that moment the pain was so severe and I knew this time the injury was serious. I have played basketball since I was in junior high school and I am an experienced “ankle-sprainer.” I could tell how badly my ankle had been hurt. This time my left foot had been swelling immediately even though I had put some ice on it, so I knew something had gone wrong. I still could walk a little bit by myself so I drove home alone from the recreation center. But today my whole left foot is plump like a pear and it hurts a lot when I put weight on it.

Reluctantly, I cancelled all the classes today and went to see a doctor. After looking at my X-rays, he told me that most of my ankle is fine, just sprained, but a bone of my ankle has a small crack. So strictly speaking it is a broken bone, which takes time to recover. He patted my shoulder and said I was lucky, because that little bone holds most of the pressure and only has a small crack. If that bone had broken, my ankle would now be sprained more severely. He suggested that I put on a special boot to immobilize my ankle, and gave me some pills to ease the pain. I also rented a pair of crutches from the student health center, all with the cost of US$136!!Oh my goodness!! I almost fainted when I saw the bill. I hope my health insurance will cover part of the payment.

After getting my prescription from the doctor, Stanly drove me to the County Tax Office to apply for a handicapped parking placard. When I tried to climb the stairs to the office, it was so painful that I clenched my teeth. A kind lady told me that I was using crutches incorrectly. I should first put my crutches on the step and then lift up my body. Likewise, when I go down the stairs, I should always let my body go down first. She is so nice!!

Well, now I can park in any handicapped parking spaces on campus. It's good news for me because I still need to go to school everyday and it really takes a long time to limp on crutches. From now on, I have to stand on one foot, walk on one foot, drive on one foot, eat on one foot, take a bathe on one foot, and pee on one foot……Oh Gosh!! It is so inconvenient!!! Now I realize how handicapped people feel.

I can envision how miserable my life will be this week.

I promise myself to write an English article a day, basically, but sometimes I just can not think in English when I am tired or upset. For me, however, practicing English is a long, continuous process and it never ends. You can not expect to speak or write English fluently after one night, or one week. The only thing you can do is to pick up the vocabularies day by day, try to use English all the time, and rectify the faults you make. It is not easy and needs the determination.

I met Ms. Pulak in her office last week. We looked the videotape of my presentation together and discussed my problems. It was a little bit frustrating because my speech still had several unexpected defects and they were more than I think. I always erased the voiceless consonants such as /t/ and /d/ and I didn't close my lip when I said /m/. My pronunciation of /e/ was not exactly right. Besides, the content of my speech had some problems as well. Sometimes I misused the vocabularies and the grammar, even the simple one, especially when I was nervous. And my speech was too short. I need to use more adjectives to enrich my sentences.

I am used to be confident on my oral skill more or less because I almost passed the ELP oral exam last time, and I believe I could pass all of them if I was well prepared. I choose Ms. Pulak’s class though people say her course is tough. But right now, my confidence seems to be totally ruined. After we finished my videotape, Ms. Pulak. told me I was O.K. but she would not let me pass easily because I still had several works to do. Besides, she had the responsibility to hold the standard and ensure the teaching quality of TA.

She thought I might be sad to hear this but actually I was not. I also want to improve my English ability. Although I can speak and write in English right now, sometimes what I say or what I write are just weird to those native speakers. Unfortunately I just know that, I can see that through their eyes. However, the most important reason for me is that I firmly believe what a person says could reflect his educational background, knowledge and his ability. That’s why I practice English so hard right now because I want to be a decorous and well-educated person. Having good English ability is also helpful to my research as well.

After all, Ms. Pulak is really an experienced teacher, and she might be the best English teacher I have ever had. She is even better if she lets me pass.

I start to clean my room because some new students will arrive next week, and I am going to host them. They are so carefree. I remember last year I still worked at this time. However, I am busy yet right now. In the past I am used to feel sad when I am busy, but suddenly I realize one thing. The reason why I am always busy is because I want to be, and I want to do things in this way. I am so aggressive that I want to do every thing as quick as possible. Realizing this truth is such a relief, and right now I start to get used to a busy life. Having a brief respite is enough to make me a good mood and revitalize myself. Anyway, I think I also need to vacuum the carpet and sweep the rest room, because they are ….mm… dirty.

Generally I don't like to talk about the politics, but I am a little bit annoyed when I hear President Chen speaks Taiwanese in his official speech. Hey, you are the President of Taiwan, and the official language of this country is “Chinese”!! If there is a president and his mother tongue is Hakka, then should he speak Hakka in such a formal address? What are you doing? Only speak to those pan-green supporters? How about the other half of Taiwanese people who don't understand Taiwanese? They are not citizens of Taiwan and should be exiled? Right now you are Mr. President. Please, please respect the official name of our nation, national flag, national song and official language. If you don't like them, please change them. If you can not change them, please follow and respect them! How can you expect the international society to accept us if we don’t respect our own country?

I am a quiet student in my English classes. Although taking English class is fun, I am really tired after working in the lab from 9:00 am every morning, and attending English class until 3:00 pm. I am willing to talk with other students, but sometimes I feel so tired and just want to finish the class.

Today Ms. Pulak asked us to role play. We were dived into groups and were told to act out a short conversation and let the other classmates guess the meaning of the words. I was paired with a cute Russian girl and our vocabulary word was “supplicate.” At first, my idea was that I would ask her for a date, but that was more like “cajole”. “Supplicate” is more like a servant begging to his master, or an inferior making a request to his superior. Well, finally I had an idea. She would pretend to be a princess and I would be a hobo asking her for food and money. To have more fun, she would stand on the stage and I would kneel in front of her. She would refuse me the first time, but I would keep begging her and present her with a flower. So I will buy a flower when I go to school tomorrow. It is a little bit embarrassing but it is fun. We'll see.

I meet Ryan all the time on campus in the gym. At first we didn't know each other. The only thing I knew was that he liked to play basketball a lot. We played basketball together often so eventually I learned his name. Today we even encountered each other in the computer center. This is the first time I met him outside the gym, so we have a short conversation. He said that he was taking 10 credit hours during the summer because he wants to receive his B.S degree within three years and start his own career. He even took 24 credits last semester. It's unbelievable. It is really a heavy load.

I don't think I could make good friends with foreigners, or more specifically, people who don’t come from Taiwan. You might be able to find friends here, but not true friends who understand each other. The gap between cultures seems too huge to span. But on the other hand, the true friend is hard to find even in your normal life, not to mention in a foreign country.

I spent the whole weekend writing a computer program. Although the due date is in September, I want to build a prototype as soon as possible, because this project is not so easy to implement and there are a lot of things waiting for me when the semester starts. I even didn’t drink with Tony and Stanly on Sunday night, which we always do every week.

By the way, I might not able to go back to Taiwan this summer because of my tight schedule, though I miss home so much.