at FJU

Summer passed by uneventfully, just went to take transfer exams. Wow, that's how I seem to pass all of my summers for college. Got into FJU (Fu Jen Catholic University) and now adjusted somewhat to the environment. Short post, cuz it's bedtime. Will make it longer later. OH, I have a job. What else...going to attend Elva's concert in December !!! Hoot to that. dead tired, must sleep. poem will accompany this post with more updated info too.

at home (looking out from the third story window)

darkness sets in like the endless depths of the ocean
once you go too far it isn't a question of going back
It is.

unawareness seeps far beneath where any physicality can be discerned
from which the reflections become lonely as old souls,
lost on their way with only a penpoint of light.

someone else must be there
behind that glass
watching.

me?

could they be thinking
the thoughts of of how the night eat our humanity?
or how it creeps into all crevices kept lighted only with human ingenuity?

eyes like beetles squinting at me as if trying to peer into my insides to reach my soul and tell me of the plaintiveness that exists beneath the splendours of the world.

New Responsibility, but Old Attitudes

Recently, my mother went to Europe for a vacation. It is her first time there and I am really excited for her and wish her all the best. I am left at home for two weeks with only my brother. however, he has the worst attitude towards me. This has been on-going for several onths, off and on. I am always thinking about what I have said or done to affect hm in sucha negative way. how can I be a good sister if I don't acknowledge and understand how and what he is thinking? It is so difficult to deal with him that sometimes I have suicidal thoughts. He says mean things and I feel that I am tricked into getting mad by him. then, he says" See like this, you always get mad. What is having a sister for anyway?" I know I am complaining right now and I should work on my problems and communicate better with him. I should control my temper more and listen to him, which I always do. I give him choices about what to do, but he still ignores me. Maybe it is better that I didn't exist. I care about him, but he has no idea how busy I am. I hope one day he will realize what his impact on others is. Or maybe he does it on purpose to slight me and piss me off. We both think the other is annoying. Maybe I should ignore him, too, since he is going through puberty. I have to take care f the household, though. I need to think of some way to make him trust me again. I'm still hopeful he will change his attitude and become happy again with those around him. I can't stand that we are always arguing, I always apologize, too. Maybe he thinks I'm weak and won't ever stand up to him. then, when I do he uses it against me... there must be something I can do!!!!!!!

If you read this, my brother, don't be offended. it is how I feel at this time and i hope you can accept how I think on certain things. I never meant to attack you or harm you verbally in any way. After all, we both know we get mad over small things. I f we can work on our communication, then lots of problems can be solved. What do you think? We should work together and live happy lives while Mom is enjoying her vacation. don't be so grumpy, it hurts to hear you say such bad things. Remember, I changed you diapers and taught you lots of things when you were a baby. You might htink I have no right to tell you what to do, and you know what? YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY RIGHT! Mom is not here though, so she put me in charge.

Jonathan Played with... DUN DUN DUN

Makeup! My brother was fooling around in my mother's room and found some eyeshadow. He opened up and suddenly his face looked like and Egyptian cat. At least, that's what he said. To me, it all turned out to be my brother being very effeminate. In a good way though, he even talked with a sweeter, higher voice and blinked his gold eyelashes at me. If his voice had already broken, it would have been very entertaining indeed. OK, to be honest, he looked like a ghoul or um, a beggar on the street. He said he wanted to keep it on all night too until the next morning. why does he want to go to school looking like someone who just got beaten up? I told him there was a reason women washed their faces at night to get rid of the makeup: so it wouldn't get over the bedsheets and it's bad for your skin, to some degree. I think Jonathan gets cuter every day, when he's not yelling at me.

Thinking about graduate school

I've been considering some graduate Creative Writing programs. I've found some cool ones and I think I want to go to hawaii or California. I can't stand really hot desert weather or raining every day. I wnat to be in a place where the sun shines and then only some days it rains. I don't know. It's still a little early to be looking. I just want to keep my options open. I'd really like to get into film, too. Maybe I could do one of those dual programs. Like, writing in film or something. they have programs where you can get a Master's in Film and Creative Writing. I think it only takes a year or a year and a half longer. And of course, you have to have um, more kickass qualifications. i keep wondering if I should have backup majors, but then I mean if I realy want to write, I should take Creative Writing. I guess I shouldn't worry too much. Well, I should, because I need to create my samples for my portfolio. >< Sigh.

More trips to go skiing and other vacations Mom planned

Mom loves to plan vacations for us. We went to Kenting for New Year's, then onwards to Japan in February, and then there's this other place that I think is a farm that we're staying at. She says there will be less trips this year, though, since the economy is in a slump. Her company's GM likes to plan activities for his workers when the company has surplus budget. i guess the company is going to be more conservative in the near future. i agree with my mom. I think companies should start at the executive level in making decisions about firing people. There are a lot of ways to make the company more efficient without firing tons of people. One way is to cut benefits and salary of top-earning executives. Some companies do that and enable people would otherwise be jobless to continue earning a living. Those are the ones with integrity. Generally, a lot of executives choose to lay off people because either the company's even higher up people want to or because they want to still live the way they do without having any conscience for the workers involved. that's when strikes happen. I hope more people in Taiwan and in other places realize that they are being cheated out of their rights as workers in the larger companies. Companies should also screen people based on character and ability, not just ability. That way in the long urn there will be less difficulties and other problems.

funny things said over the weekend

Our family uses two types of major languages, English and Mandarin, well ok and some Taiwanese phrases occasionally. We also use some different types of Englishes sometimes. My mom has a bit of short term memory sometimes, so she misuses words. One time over the last weekend, she kept repeating herself but always using the wrong words. I don't have a recording, so I'm not completely sure what she said. I do it too. Sometimes it's like I can't think of a word in Mandarin so I try to say it in English, but it comes out wrong. It happens from English to Mandarin too. My teacher from elementary school once said that was called a brain fart. It sounds childish, but sometimes I tend to believe it myself. then, last year, my literature professor called that slippages in speech. Like, we slip up between the(any)two languages and we sound goofy speaking a different kind of English than the proper English we were taught in school. I think multicultural literature can teach you so much. It's fascinating. As for the things we said, some of them were a bit uh X-rated. Hee hee, if anyone wants to know I can post it later. :)

Mom being Blog-crazed

Lately, my mother has been creating her own blog. she used to have one, but she forgot what her password AND username was. SO, I think she created a new one. She wants a lot of people to read it and then become a writer. See where I get my asprations from? Well, ok I was influenced by my Creative Writing teacher and class in Sophomore year of high school. My mom went around all different kinds of blog sites, Mandarin and English, to see which ones were more popular. She's becoming like a teenager! She stays on the computer for like four to five hours at a time. So do I...word processors are very important in our lives lately. She wants to read mine and my brother's, but I haven't given mine to her yet. Maybe she thinks I have stuff on here that she shouldn't know about. I do have to say though that this blog is just interest only. I'm going to start posting my writing on here during winter break. I'm so excited to start writing stories and poems on here. Can't wait for break to start. The reason I didn't do so earlier is because I didn't find my older stories until recently. I have some interesting things that I wrote. Perhaps my mom will enjoy it, too.

Elva buying Red wine

There was a rumor that Elva wanted to buy red wine because she was heartbroken. Well, this ties into another rumor of Liou Zhen, who is a celebrity dancer. She dances mostly um, things like cha cha, the rumba, waltzing, etc. Yeah. Well anyways, she is supposedly to have stolen Elva's rumored boyfriend. That's why there was need of a bottle of red from the supermarket. this is quite ridiculous if you think about it, though. Why can't she enjoy wine just for herself? Maybe she's inviting friends over or she's having a nice meal with the family (her brother was pictured with her). People speculate too much (including me sometimes) and it can't be helped. At least I'm not the one following her around and taking sneaky pictures of her. the paparazzi don't even count as real journalists. It's such a shame they can do this to people. Oh well, without the paps, they wouldn't be in the news all the time and then they wouldn't be famous. Ha, there's something to think about.

Elva's friends

I read somewhere that she has over 200 people on her msn! I don't have that many. Well that's because half my friends don't have msn or I didn't ask them what it is. Still, I bet that most of them are other celebrities. Plus, how can you talk to them all? Normal people don't even time to spend with their families. She has a number of very close friends too. One of them is filming this show about a 30-something women who falls in love with a 20-something guy who at the beginning doesn't seem to have anything to his name, so she rejects him. I've never seen it before, though. This is according to a commercial I saw at home. anyways, I saw a few videos of Elva on YouTube yesterday, it was hilarious. It's this cooking show, which I'll find later to post on here. The hosts are sisters. Well, really famous for show-hosting. :)

Elva at concerts

Elva has been seen attending a lot of concerts lately. First one I remember is Avril Lavigne, and more recently is Guo Fu Chen. Ok, I'll look up the Mandarin words later. I want to see his concer t too! There's supposed to be a pool and he gets wet, along with some of the audience. Lots of big stars attended his two concerts.

end of semester nostalgia

I can't believe one whole semester has passed already! It still feels like it should be summer and I'm just coming here from Vancouver after a year of snow, lots of rain, great friends, nice professors, food, and other stuff. There was a bit of drama last year. Some people learned some hard lessons. I think I learned a lot this semester about myself. The learning that occurred in the classroom wasn't really as uh deep as I'm used to, but some subjects were interesting. The teachers work very hard, and we should all be thankful to all teachers everywhere. Well all hard=working teachers everywhere :) I'll miss my friends when they all go home for winter break, especially one in particular who won't be coming back next semester. sigh. I don't want to think about bad things right now. I'm going to concentrate on finishing this week first. :)

My brother is now taller than me!

Yup, it's true! He is almost as tall as Mom now. I'm thinking by the end of the school year he'll be taller than Mom and possibly almost as tall as Dad. Too bad Dad isn't around to watch Jonathan grow. He must miss us terribly sometimes. I hope he gets to 180 cm at least. Then he won't be bullied anymore in class. the problem with him growing taller is that he'll lose his chubby cheeks. He told me he didn't want to lose them, because then "my childhood will be over!" he's so cute! I wish he could stay 5 years old forever. He's like almost 12 now. I can't believe how fast time has gone. Even I can look back ten years! Geez, pretty soon I'll graduate from college and be one of those unemployed nerds with nothing to do. No, if that happens mom will most likely kick me out of the house. Hahaha.

Kenting Trip during New Year's

Omg! I can't believe I didn't publish a post about New Year's! All I can say is that I saw this guy on TV and he is really hot when he dances! I'll look up the name later.

Oh yeah, I ate barbequed squids. Three of them. What can I say? I was hungry, we were on Kenting's Main Street, and there were food stands every two feet! I'm going there over the summer again. I'll plan my own trip. Who wants to go?!! My friends coming from outside Taiwan are automatically included, of course. :)

I think I'm a bit like forest Gump

Simple-minded, follows directions to a tee, worries are few (well actually this doesn't fit me), does what he wants because he wants to. OK, I think that's where the similarities stop. Oh wait, yeah I'd get shot in the butt for my friends, too. the ones who stay and are loyal. The ones you can have long conversations with when you;re supposed to be doing homework or studying for a test because he/sh has a problem they really want to share or you have exciting news. Those are the friends you can get shot for. It's special to have one really good friend. If you have more than one, it's very lucky indeed.

Another similarity is with the following directions. I think I've made myself become a follower. Like, I can think for myself, sure. A lot of teachers think I am individualistic because I'm very blunt and I don't hide the truth. It's very hard for me to lie for any good reason. It shows in my writing. I'm not afraid to tell the truth. Sometimes I feel like a mouse that a lion is going to pounce on just for fun. No one really understands me the way I mean for them to understand me because I always become very reserved and quiet when arguments happen. It seems that I'm scared or afraid of speaking up, but I just don't like arguing with people. It's a waste of time when you can just not get mad and talk about things. It makes me uncomfortable when I get criticized for this because it makes me feel like I'm an idiot or even worse, like I'm useless. I know it's most likely all in my head, but what people think and what people say are two different things. the only people worth trusting are your family. You can't even trust yourself sometimes, because you'll do something extremely wrong and feel like dying. Then, some people really go and kill themselves. I wonder if it's possible to become emotionally neutered.

Celluloid Closet Questions

1. One stereotype that comes to mind of Chinese people in American film and/or TV is the immigrant with broken English. The term FOB generally describes Chinese people. This slang term is an acronym for "Fresh off the Boat," which refers to any imigrant that goes to a foreign land who wears clothing tha tlooks "funny" or "weird." Another common stereotype is probably the grocery store or restaurant owner. Even Taiwanese and ABCs use these stereotypes on stage and in autobiographies. I saw a play recently that used this stereotype of a woman who sold baozhi (包子）and who only spoke Taiwanese, while everyone else spoke Chinese. In Fred Wah's autobiography, he talks about his father being a short order cook in order to raise his family in Canada. Other stereotypes include the effeminate male, the karate/kungfu-knowing male with gang relations, and women as sexual objects or sensualized/exotic beings. We talked about these kinds of stereotypes in my Women's Studies course at UBC. It's surprising how few of us (Asians included) consider how people are portrayed around us until we're asked . I suppose that's partly what a stereotpye is: a representation of a group of people's characteristics that we see over and over again until we take it for granted.

2. Some stereotypes of other groups of people are:
1, Unemployed Mexicans who have moustaches, also they have broken English, wear cowboy hats, driven beaten-up trucks, and drink Tequila.
2. Black characters are usually figureheads or symbolic, for example most are seen as athletes (basketball players) or gansgsters involved in illegal dealings who get into trouble often and go to jail.
3. Blondes as unintelligent but they are sexy and sensuous, or evil and bitchy.
4. Goths: black lipstick, strange hair, white makeup, black clothes, dog collars, chains.
5. Jocks: Letterman jackets, tall, gelled short hair, arrogant, bully others (usually younger, shorter Indian or Asian nerds and other social misfits). This is the opposite of the All-American male who defends his country, normally a cop, family man, etc.

3. I think people can't deal with male-on-male affection because men aren't supposed to be seen as touchy or sensitive in the society's stereotypes of what and how people should act and behave. Women can be emotional and intimate because supposedly, it's hard-wired into them through genetics. Women are considered as showing sisterly affection, and that's ok becuse a lot of people consider lesbianism as a phase in a woman's life. Like, women get over it and eventually will be heterosexual because they want to settle down when they get their nesting instincts. When a man acts affectionate towards another man, though, it's perverse and unnatural. Something is automatically wrong with those men. They don't act tough, the way we're brainwashed into thinking that men should act (ie: strong, defending women, macho, breadearners, etc). We're so caught up with what our parents, society, etc teaches us how things are supposed to be that we forget to be accepting, open-minded people. People in Taiwan are too conservative and uptight to accept homosexuals as just people with different preferences. After all, some people prefer maybe drinking coffee over tea. Why can't we all get along and just acknowledge that some people choose their sexuality, just the same way as when people are out buying ice cream. Vanilla or chocalate? Why not accept that there are both flavors and some choose one over the other?