how a snowstorm in new york can affect affect chinese people
sober this christmas
     Christians and others who hear voices in their heads spend absurd amounts of money gratifying themselves, hundreds of foreign and Iraqi journalists are continuing to put their lives on the line every day to cover the war in Iraq. strongly oppose the war because it was started against international consensus and as a result of false intelligence, and why some government officials in my country are not standing trial for their negligence against humanity I don’t know! ournalism can be a noble profession because it seeks to inform and enlighten. Journalists can expose the ugly truth and that disturbs some people, but if our behaviour is ugly, then we should consider why we allow and tolerate such ugly behaviour, instead of condemning the messenger.ere’s a link to a disturbing yet sobering Reuters website that honours their Iraqi staff killed by US Military forces.www.reuters.com/iraq |
圣诞节跟我父母 christmas with my parents
I was home in 2007 to visit my parents. I made this short movie to share the happy experience.
(The music is a traditional Polish Christmas carol.)
YouTube video below for those outside China.
they say
I don’t usually write about my students because this is a private blog and I am thoughtful about how I affiliate others with my opinions and commentary here. Typically litigious American.
There’s an exception to every rule. This week my students performed a speaking activity where they write and perform their own soap operas. The performances were what I expected but the plots and stories were nothing short of shocking. Amidst the ever-present happy family scenario was drug and human trafficking, homosexuality, infidelity in marriage, sex and gender roles, political and police corruption, polygamy, incest, and domestic violence. Often enough, the students also dramatized the heartbreaking costs a culture pays when pressured by “modernization.” Amazing.
These kids and their performances were small but substantial proof that there is more to China than meets the public eye. In what some might criticize harshly as a closed, oppressive environment, there is evidence of nothing but the contrary.
It also goes to show that, given the right environment, tools and privilege, even the most disruptive and disturbing taboos can be presented and discussed in this vast, magical mystery tour of a superpower. Art (through theatre) can be a socially accepted platform to address the topics that would strain and stress any large country in great transition.
My review: bravo.
Education can be so cool.
campus autumn scenes
Here on the BLCU campus, it’s easy to appreciate the play of sunlight on the trees.
The photographs practically take themselves.
Click on the pics above to have a closer look.
Better yet, visit one of the smallest yet greenest and most beautifully landscaped university campuses in Beijing.
ancient ufo civilization
China remains the world’s single most popular UFO.
It’s true.
Who doesn’t see this country’s rise to great new heights, yet what does anyone really know for sure?!
How about this:
the world’s largest army,
nuclear weapons,
the one Communist superpower,
a tonal language with no alphabet,
and 25% of all human population that until very recently didn’t mind living as quiet strangers to the modern world.
“ET phone home,” baby!
yes, yes! oh god, yes! i’m gonna religion!
| I tend to think of people who hear voices in their heads and see things that aren’t there as emotionally unstable and/or mentally ill. Actually this perceived stigma is a shared belief and a mutual demerit for each of us. What we have in common is the inclination to look down on each other. |
| I consider my religious friends as having a dangerous mental illness, but it’s a 2 way street, since my religious friends are not allowed to see me as a complete human either. My authority to claim them as members of our species naturally affords them the ability to assume to have the authority to pity and judge me. Because I’m not baptized nor born again nor have submitted to Allah nor consider myself one of a chosen people or whatever, I am not a person as they are a person. I am lacking; deficient. I may be likable and worthy of being friendly to, but my friendship is limited by their mental illness, as their friendship is limited by my sub-human status. |
| And we can be friendly, but never true friends, if only because my life is not valid in the way that they see their lives as valid. Because I am defined by their self-image of ideological divinity, I am less human. They see me as somehow missing something–a lesser being. A sick animal. Maybe something to pity a little bit too. |
| Ironically, this timeless division and mutual condescension is in the name of a god that I don’t recognize. An opportunity for me to bridge myself to my morally superior religious friends is a no-no intrinsically written into religious beliefs. Love this or that above all others, or–god forbid!–end up like me. |
| What’s more, where humans often look to religion for answers to life’s most profound questions, religion insists on perpetuating their ignorance. So forget trying to discuss information outside any delusional religious assumption. If God hasn’t said it, it simply isn’t important enough to matter. |
|
As much as I pity your mental illness, I am kind and friendly to you, my self-serving religious zealot. Additionally, you and I are friendly, but your religion will never see me as your valid (and therefore) true friend. |
what it feels like for a boy
I said, “being a member of this species.”
And I’ve never met anyone who’s OK with that thought, let alone thought about it, which makes me even more sad.
Additionally: isolated and lonely.
fa-la-la-la-la
