I believe that if someone says something like "I used to think beauty is only about looking pretty, and now I'm older I realize that it's about the inside as well," (most recently heard from Zhang Zilin, Miss World of 2007) it's bullshit. They either had always known that true beauty is about both inside and outside or they still think the outside is the dominant factor.
This I believe.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Why?
Yesterday I told (actually Amy did) Arod about my childhood fascination about and fervent desire for toy cashier. Why? Well, I said, I like to count money, it makes me feel good. Why? He asks. Well, I like to earn money. Why? Well, of course I'm not wanting the money just for the sake of it, I argued as he brought out the example of his brother again (all this grudge)--that his brother likes money just for the sake of it. looking at it. or whatever it is. No, I say, I want to buy my own house (I really mean apartment), and design it myself. So? He asks. What? So? Are you kidding me? Well, I thought for another moment. After I have my own little house, I want to travel all around the world! I said. And I want to eat all kinds of food too! Home, travel, food=that's gonna be my life. That's why I want to earn lots and lots of money.
Monday, June 22, 2009
FORGET IT.
I often come across some really embarrassing things. Sometimes I just can't get my mind off them. How could I do this?! I can't believe it! Oh my GOD this is so embarrassing!...etc. At that point my self-esteem just flushes right down the toilet, no, I mean the abyss, in a more delicate way. When it comes to the point I just can't handle the thinking and rethinking anymore, I tell myself this magic phrase: FORGET IT. And more often than not I forget about it. Not in the physical sense that I just totally forget about what I've done. I forget about the shameful part of it. I try to overlook my mistakes, pretending that it never happened. I'm still aware of the fact that what happened happened, but after telling myself to FORGET IT, I forget about the shame, the burden. I don't know what this says about myself--selfish, self-centered, whatever--but it does make me feel A LOT better. I don't know. but that's all it matters.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
A Manhattan Lullaby
Nighthawks by Edward Hopper
A Manhattan Lullaby
A glass of Champaign,
A gorgeous suit,
A smirk and a smile.
You won me over.
Under the flickering neon signs,
I said yes, to the gentle question,
and opened the door
to a new world that I barely knew.
How romantic!
How courageous!
How—
foolish.
Once a charming young man
You were—
I thought I wasn’t good enough.
I wonder what you thought of me—
Sugar,
You used to call me.
I love you,
you said.
Honey,
I do too.
But not in a wordless house,
Not with the soulless eyes.
Honey, please,
Yell at me!
Hit me!
When I made—the mistake.
I still remember that blank stare,
You didn’t even give me a frown.
Where was the love?
I failed to find.
Silence—
hurts,
You know?
Thursday, June 11, 2009
On Writing
I enjoy reading good writing. I’m often at awe of what good writers can do with the syntax, the rhythm, the diction. I love the cozy and nostalgic mood in Amy Tan’s novels and am impressed by Hemingway’s ability to make simple language so powerful. But this is where our (my and writing’s) chemistry ends. Writing has never been easy for me. To me, reading a good writer’s writing is like window-shopping—I can watch, but never can I own.
I used to love writing straight-forward research papers because I didn’t have to scratch my head till it bled just to come up with one good metaphor. I used to loathe poetry because it’s so abstract and so full of clever imagery. I never understood why poetry has to be so abstruse and, sometimes, so convoluted, like the lyrics of “Fly Me to the Moon”: “Poets often use many words: to describe a simple thing.”
Last June I had a choice on whether or not to take AP English Language and Composition. I almost dropped the class, but—maybe I was just following the crowd, maybe it was the desire to impress college with one additional AP class—I decided to take the challenge, knowing I was expected to do well on something I had so little knowledge about: writing. What I did not know at the time was how much this ten-month experience would change me. It has changed almost everything I know and think about writing.
I still scratch my head, but only more frequently and with greater intensity. I find myself hunting down literary techniques and rhetorical strategies whenever I read or write, and mulling over the minute differences between “on” or “at.” I finally realize what “writing conscientiously” entails and how much effort I must dedicate for even a remotely good piece of writing. It was this year when I started to take writing (and reading) as a serious endeavor. It was this class that broadened my understanding of English and led me to view language as a form of art for the first time.
Most importantly, I begin to perceive writing as a mirror—a mirror of the writer’s personality, character, and nature. Through the use of syntax, punctuation, rhythm, I can see the writer, hear him talk, and feel him breathe. As I read, a writer’s inner self leaps out of the page and his deepest thoughts become evident between the lines, among the words, and inside every period and comma. Reading one’s writing is like meeting a new friend, and writing is like introducing oneself to the entire world. Although I’m still quite frustrated with creative writing and figurative language, I now take pleasure in the creative process with much greater enthusiasm. I enjoy exploring the world of language and introducing different sides of me to my readers. I learn to write with honesty and plainness, for this is who I am.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Birth.
June 06, 2009, sometime around 10PM, my baby brother was born.
Surprisingly it wasn't as exciting as I'd imagined to be, probably because I wasn't there with my mom. I was rather unemotional. After a few "yays" I went to clean the baby's bed and wash dishes.
And it's just like that.
Surprisingly it wasn't as exciting as I'd imagined to be, probably because I wasn't there with my mom. I was rather unemotional. After a few "yays" I went to clean the baby's bed and wash dishes.
And it's just like that.
Thursday, June 4, 2009
endless
I feel schooling is eating away my life. Every time I revisit the thought of college being another four year, I cringe back in fear. And after college it's another four year, and then another, another......I'm almost 18 and yet it seems as if I'm still a million light years away from the real world. I am. And it's sickening.
Matthew Crawford talks about how the people working in the cubicles are distant from the reality because their work have little direct result. I think student represents this type of work better than the cubicle-workers. Our effort have no result. None. I feel powerless. I can barely do anything to influence the world, or simply the people around me. I am fully aware of the fact that students can do a lot of things, and that without basic education there's no way I am going to pursue what I want to pursue. But how long must I wait?
Matthew Crawford talks about how the people working in the cubicles are distant from the reality because their work have little direct result. I think student represents this type of work better than the cubicle-workers. Our effort have no result. None. I feel powerless. I can barely do anything to influence the world, or simply the people around me. I am fully aware of the fact that students can do a lot of things, and that without basic education there's no way I am going to pursue what I want to pursue. But how long must I wait?
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
The Figure at the Balcony
She was just an ordinary woman.
Born in the forties, Grandma survived the tumultuous years of a fast-changing China—from the birth of a new republic to the chaotic and ultimately destructive Cultural Revolution.In the late sixties, Grandma and Grandpa moved from their village into the city of Fuzhou with only a few yuans in their pockets and some ragged clothing, characteristic of their humble origins. Not long before I was born, they were able to move into a four-room apartment in a four-floor building, guarded by old, eroded red brick walls and surrounded by little gardens of grapes, cucumbers, pumpkins, and wild clovers.
A narrow, crudely constructed entrance joins a similarly narrow and muddy road to the gardens hiding inside the red brick walls—hiding, from the world outside. A canopy of leaves, vines, and fruits dangling from the trellises tames the blazing sunlight and gives the gardens inside a heart-warming hue. Facing the muddy road, the balconies jut out from the building. The top-floor balcony is where Grandma used to linger, at times tending her night-blooming jasmine and milk-white daffodil, at times doing nothing in particular. I still look for her on the top balcony. I’m used to looking for her. She was always there. She is still there.
Grandma had a prominent rotund belly just like a pregnant woman. It didn’t take long for one to wonder how the two small, disproportional legs magically supported the upper body. She used to walk up and down the stairs every morning to the markets a couple hundred meters away, but she had to walk down one step at a time, putting one foot down and then the other on the same step, and to climb back the same way—with occasional resting periods to catch her breath. I used to mimic the way she walked, just like a crippled person; I used to rush down the stairs just to mock her slowness.
Then I grew up and she grew older. I began to help her walk down the stairs and through the gardens as I supported her arms with mine. A smile often silently dashed across her face, and she would push me away, and say, Shayatou, silly girl, you’re only going to make things harder for me.
And then she began coughing. A retired pharmacist, she thought the coughing indicated nothing more than a cold. She gave herself a few pills once in a while and never really paid attention to her deteriorating condition. As the woman of the household, she had too many other things to care about—the two teenaged granddaughters and three adult children, each with their own problems. Everyone else, except her. Over the next few months her voice grew gradually coarse. When Grandma could barely speak, she finally decided to see the doctor.
She was diagnosed with gastric cancer around the same time my mother brought me to the America for a new life.
Two years later, I returned to China during winter break. As I approached the familiar four-floor building, I immediately spotted a familiar figure on the top floor balcony, leaning against the railing, accompanied by the night-blooming jasmine and milk-white daffodil. As I walked along the winding path that led to the stairs, I saw the familiar grapevines, the trellises, and the wild clovers. The tranquility of the little gardens helped to prepare me for the worst—for the pale face, the emaciated body, and the telltale thinning hair.
However, when I showed up at the front door, what I saw was nothing like what I had imagined. I was welcomed by an old but energetic lady with a wig so full of hair that she actually looked younger than she did two years ago. Grandma smiled enthusiastically and grabbed one of my suitcases quickly and covetously as if competing with Grandpa, my aunt, and my cousin who were standing beside her.
During the time of my visit, Grandma not only cooked our meals everyday but also woke up early in the morning a couple of times and walked down the stairs—the same way, like a crippled person, one foot down and then the other on the same step—to the market a couple hundred meters away to buy my favorite foods. She was always there on the balcony, leaning against the railing, when I returned from shopping, friend-visiting, or sight-seeing at the end of each day. There were times though when I saw her through the narrow gap of the half-opened wooden door sitting before the mirror without her wig, combing the hair that she was once proud of—the few hairs that were still left—with an unfathomable expression on her worn face.
She died shortly after I came back to the United States. Later my older cousin told me, crying hysterically, that Grandma could not even get out of the bed before I went back to see her. No one knew where she got the energy to cook, to walk, to carry my suitcase. Shortly after I left, Grandma told the family that it was enough—the chemotherapy, the pain, and the suffering. She had lived long enough to see the reunion of all her children and grandchildren, completed by the return of her youngest granddaughter.
That was enough. She was just an ordinary woman.
Born in the forties, Grandma survived the tumultuous years of a fast-changing China—from the birth of a new republic to the chaotic and ultimately destructive Cultural Revolution.In the late sixties, Grandma and Grandpa moved from their village into the city of Fuzhou with only a few yuans in their pockets and some ragged clothing, characteristic of their humble origins. Not long before I was born, they were able to move into a four-room apartment in a four-floor building, guarded by old, eroded red brick walls and surrounded by little gardens of grapes, cucumbers, pumpkins, and wild clovers.
A narrow, crudely constructed entrance joins a similarly narrow and muddy road to the gardens hiding inside the red brick walls—hiding, from the world outside. A canopy of leaves, vines, and fruits dangling from the trellises tames the blazing sunlight and gives the gardens inside a heart-warming hue. Facing the muddy road, the balconies jut out from the building. The top-floor balcony is where Grandma used to linger, at times tending her night-blooming jasmine and milk-white daffodil, at times doing nothing in particular. I still look for her on the top balcony. I’m used to looking for her. She was always there. She is still there.
Grandma had a prominent rotund belly just like a pregnant woman. It didn’t take long for one to wonder how the two small, disproportional legs magically supported the upper body. She used to walk up and down the stairs every morning to the markets a couple hundred meters away, but she had to walk down one step at a time, putting one foot down and then the other on the same step, and to climb back the same way—with occasional resting periods to catch her breath. I used to mimic the way she walked, just like a crippled person; I used to rush down the stairs just to mock her slowness.
Then I grew up and she grew older. I began to help her walk down the stairs and through the gardens as I supported her arms with mine. A smile often silently dashed across her face, and she would push me away, and say, Shayatou, silly girl, you’re only going to make things harder for me.
And then she began coughing. A retired pharmacist, she thought the coughing indicated nothing more than a cold. She gave herself a few pills once in a while and never really paid attention to her deteriorating condition. As the woman of the household, she had too many other things to care about—the two teenaged granddaughters and three adult children, each with their own problems. Everyone else, except her. Over the next few months her voice grew gradually coarse. When Grandma could barely speak, she finally decided to see the doctor.
She was diagnosed with gastric cancer around the same time my mother brought me to the America for a new life.
Two years later, I returned to China during winter break. As I approached the familiar four-floor building, I immediately spotted a familiar figure on the top floor balcony, leaning against the railing, accompanied by the night-blooming jasmine and milk-white daffodil. As I walked along the winding path that led to the stairs, I saw the familiar grapevines, the trellises, and the wild clovers. The tranquility of the little gardens helped to prepare me for the worst—for the pale face, the emaciated body, and the telltale thinning hair.
However, when I showed up at the front door, what I saw was nothing like what I had imagined. I was welcomed by an old but energetic lady with a wig so full of hair that she actually looked younger than she did two years ago. Grandma smiled enthusiastically and grabbed one of my suitcases quickly and covetously as if competing with Grandpa, my aunt, and my cousin who were standing beside her.
During the time of my visit, Grandma not only cooked our meals everyday but also woke up early in the morning a couple of times and walked down the stairs—the same way, like a crippled person, one foot down and then the other on the same step—to the market a couple hundred meters away to buy my favorite foods. She was always there on the balcony, leaning against the railing, when I returned from shopping, friend-visiting, or sight-seeing at the end of each day. There were times though when I saw her through the narrow gap of the half-opened wooden door sitting before the mirror without her wig, combing the hair that she was once proud of—the few hairs that were still left—with an unfathomable expression on her worn face.
She died shortly after I came back to the United States. Later my older cousin told me, crying hysterically, that Grandma could not even get out of the bed before I went back to see her. No one knew where she got the energy to cook, to walk, to carry my suitcase. Shortly after I left, Grandma told the family that it was enough—the chemotherapy, the pain, and the suffering. She had lived long enough to see the reunion of all her children and grandchildren, completed by the return of her youngest granddaughter.
That was enough. She was just an ordinary woman.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
This I believe
Before I first arrived in the America, I had never given any serious thoughts to the term religion. To most Chinese people, religion is a vague remotely relevant to their everyday lives, and gods are worshipped only when they are needed, usually during times of hardship. In the America, my most shocking realization was that inside the hearts of an overwhelming number of people, there was something called God. Moreover, what God says in a normal-looking book serves as their moral foundation. As one can imagine, I was soon forced to find my own place in this highly religious—and diverse—society.
Never having believed in a god of any form, I became an even stronger atheist here in the America. I never understood the contradictions and conflicts between various religions. How could the universe be both monotheistic and polytheistic? How could the same world be created both by God saying “Let there be light” and by Pan Gu, the creator of universe in Chinese folk religion, with a gigantic ax? If gods indeed exist for everyone on earth, why does the Chinese gods look Chinese, Hindu gods look Hindu, and the Christian God look Jewish? Why does the evil so often prevail, while the good suffers tragic ends? Nothing made sense, so I turned to science.
Darwin’s theory of evolution practically tells us that we are products of randomness, just like mushrooms and flies. Our ancestors mixed and matched with one another, and the strongest remained, evolving into who we are today. I was first stunned by such a dreadful revelation and saddened by the same notion that saddened Max Weber—that there is no meaning to life. But soon I remembered the words of Sherlock Holmes: “once you have discounted the impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” To me, the “impossible” is this collective term religion, and thus I am left to deal with the distressing Darwinian theory.
And I learned to deal with it. I learned to be fine with the idea that the Homo sapiens not only evolve the same way as the cockroaches do, but also are as insignificant as the cockroaches are. Really, it’s fine—there’s no one noble cause to our existence, that no one has ever bothered to draw up some kind of master plan for us, for me. What troubled me was, however, if there was indeed no meaning to life, to our continuous reproduction, to the entire universe, then how do we live? How can I still be happy, and sad, about the things around me? What keeps my life going, knowing the end will be invariably nothingness?
Luckily, it did not take long for me to find my answer. What I learned about the existentialist philosophy, in a way, filled the vacant holes in my belief about the world around me. Existentialists believe in decision-making and dealing with the consequences of those decisions. They believe that the choices we make determine who we are and what we worth. Although this particular idea does sound clichéd nowadays, it was nonetheless a “Eureka” moment for me. So we make meaning. Our decisions give meaning to our lives and shape who we are. It’s nice to know that although our lives have no meaning, we can still have a goal—to make, and continue to make, good decisions. But again, “making meaning” from decision-making is an incredibly abstract idea. For what do we make our decisions? What do our morals serve?
To find the answer, I revisited my memory and I remembered how my grandparents used to tell me that when I grow up, I will be responsible to support my family, which gave me food, shelter, love, and life. And so I became a believer in nature. I believe that the only reason we are here today is that nature has provided us with a rare environment that allows for life. I believe that the doomsday will not be brought about by God but by nature, just like how it brought about our birth. I believe that if we want to continue to make meaning for our lives, we must first serve the nature, and not the other way around.
Never having believed in a god of any form, I became an even stronger atheist here in the America. I never understood the contradictions and conflicts between various religions. How could the universe be both monotheistic and polytheistic? How could the same world be created both by God saying “Let there be light” and by Pan Gu, the creator of universe in Chinese folk religion, with a gigantic ax? If gods indeed exist for everyone on earth, why does the Chinese gods look Chinese, Hindu gods look Hindu, and the Christian God look Jewish? Why does the evil so often prevail, while the good suffers tragic ends? Nothing made sense, so I turned to science.
Darwin’s theory of evolution practically tells us that we are products of randomness, just like mushrooms and flies. Our ancestors mixed and matched with one another, and the strongest remained, evolving into who we are today. I was first stunned by such a dreadful revelation and saddened by the same notion that saddened Max Weber—that there is no meaning to life. But soon I remembered the words of Sherlock Holmes: “once you have discounted the impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” To me, the “impossible” is this collective term religion, and thus I am left to deal with the distressing Darwinian theory.
And I learned to deal with it. I learned to be fine with the idea that the Homo sapiens not only evolve the same way as the cockroaches do, but also are as insignificant as the cockroaches are. Really, it’s fine—there’s no one noble cause to our existence, that no one has ever bothered to draw up some kind of master plan for us, for me. What troubled me was, however, if there was indeed no meaning to life, to our continuous reproduction, to the entire universe, then how do we live? How can I still be happy, and sad, about the things around me? What keeps my life going, knowing the end will be invariably nothingness?
Luckily, it did not take long for me to find my answer. What I learned about the existentialist philosophy, in a way, filled the vacant holes in my belief about the world around me. Existentialists believe in decision-making and dealing with the consequences of those decisions. They believe that the choices we make determine who we are and what we worth. Although this particular idea does sound clichéd nowadays, it was nonetheless a “Eureka” moment for me. So we make meaning. Our decisions give meaning to our lives and shape who we are. It’s nice to know that although our lives have no meaning, we can still have a goal—to make, and continue to make, good decisions. But again, “making meaning” from decision-making is an incredibly abstract idea. For what do we make our decisions? What do our morals serve?
To find the answer, I revisited my memory and I remembered how my grandparents used to tell me that when I grow up, I will be responsible to support my family, which gave me food, shelter, love, and life. And so I became a believer in nature. I believe that the only reason we are here today is that nature has provided us with a rare environment that allows for life. I believe that the doomsday will not be brought about by God but by nature, just like how it brought about our birth. I believe that if we want to continue to make meaning for our lives, we must first serve the nature, and not the other way around.
AWOL Airplane.
This news is scary. It's more than news. It's telling us that we have no control over our lives. We can die any time, at any place. It's telling us that hard work and conscience alone do not mean anything. It's telling us that TO LIVE encompasses not only watching after ourselves but also luck.
I don't want to die. But even if, let's say, I'd mastered my driving skills, I still could be killed by a drunken driver stupidly crushed into my car. Idiots take away people's lives all the time. So do nature. So do the victims themselves.
I don't want to die. I'm young. I have a to-do list longer than the Great Wall of china. But I want to get out of this constant fear of dying as well. At the end of each day, I don't want to be afraid of tomorrow.
I don't want to die. But even if, let's say, I'd mastered my driving skills, I still could be killed by a drunken driver stupidly crushed into my car. Idiots take away people's lives all the time. So do nature. So do the victims themselves.
I don't want to die. I'm young. I have a to-do list longer than the Great Wall of china. But I want to get out of this constant fear of dying as well. At the end of each day, I don't want to be afraid of tomorrow.
Nostalgia.
There were times when I could literally smell my hometown, especially on days like today--humid, raining. So familiar, it's so familiar--rain drops splashing onto my face, wind brushing lightly against my hair. I hated this weather, but now I miss it. I can see myself--yes, I can--leaning against the railing on the sixth floor of my elementary school building, frowning at the pouring rain. Wait, no. I did not have time to stop and frown. I had to move on. I had to run across the field under the pouring rain. I had to get to the car, the bus, or the bike. I had to go home.
And then a new day began. But the rain was still pouring, and the wind blowing.
And then a new day began. But the rain was still pouring, and the wind blowing.
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