Potpourri...

It is almost like a potpourri of very interesting events today that I have to write something about it.

Things have been going very well for the new class (at least I think) today until some communication problems popped up among the colleagues. Without naming names and specifications (I have learned my hard lesson from my blog here) some people's Chinese old school cultural revolutionary mentality totally drives me nuts. Being Chinese myself, I really can't stand many of our "mainland comrades" of their self-centered "biggest gains with the least effort" type of attitude at work. I was treated like their best friend if their benefits/rewards are at stake but I would be shown a "bad face" when I am asking someone to carry out their responsibilities. I feel like a work environment of "everyone eating from the same pot" is encouraging and nurturing this kind of work ethics that I despise the most. The biggest home to this school of thought once again is the PRC government that its people are being fed with propaganda of such kind subconsciously. It goes along with my puzzlement that why the independence of Tibet is such a taboo and evil thing. Why is Dalai Lama treated like a demon? The tactics of vilifying the person that voices a different opinion of yours is so typical of the communist word games that it takes simple logic and education to counter the arguments. I wonder how many people have really studied the history of Tibet. I admit I haven't until these past few weeks to realize what a beautiful culture and religion is being jeopardized in the name of economic prosperity. If displaying my love/heart for China on my MSN messenger means I am a supporter of such irrational ideology of many Chinese, sorry, I DON'T LOVE CHINA (no offense to many of my friends with the display on their MSN). I know I probably would be labelled as a traitor but I don't feel like I am not patriotic at all. I think many people do get the concepts mixed up.

While I was still upset about this, I am glad I got to attend my German class right after work. What a huge contrast it was to see my lovely teacher and classmates all contribute to the party today. Many of us did not just bring the minimum amount of food but it turned out to be a huuuuuge feast in class! And I was thrilled that my German sketch performance with my cute partner worked out great that I got compliments on my acting. I never thought I would be a good actor but I start to develop a fondness to it. Anyways it's a great class because everyone was very into what they are doing and bring out more than a 100%. I keep thinking if every single person of the billion strong population in China can do something like this without being selfish, how much nicer the world would become. And here is the evidence of the pretty dessert my classmates made. And I could not help to take the cupcake with the word "lehrer" which means "teacher" in German...
And the last thing is a very good college friend of mine whom I reconnected with through facebook and talked on the phone for 1.5 hours (which is extremely rare in my case) agreed with me that the "magic of facebook" has worked wonders on strengthening our friendships and relationships, even crossing the boundaries of places and times.

Gute Nacht!

This week...

I love sumptuous brunch on a weekend...
I love Mariah Carey's and BYU Vocal Point's new CDs...
I love watching news lately (world economy, olympic controversy, US presidential campaign, etc.)...
I love the freedom that I enjoy these days in choosing when, where, what, and how I watch movie and TV shows (DVDs, Comcast on demand, Netflix, Azureus, internet)...
I love being reconnected with so many long time acquaintances in the virtual world...
I love attending school and learning a new language with virtually no pressure...
I love seeing the funny and adorable wild sea otters float and sunbathe in the ocean while the mommy seal teaches the suckling baby seal how to swim and survive... (click and enlarge the image to see those cutey creatures in the sea)
I love the lovely spring/summer weather in Cali...
I love the opportunity to travel with my fam all over again this summer...
I love my new smaller but comfy office...
I love my old students and the fact that I failed to take pictures with them two days in a row due to a colleague's "magic touch" on my camera that it kept dying on me...
I love having more say in my work and teaching now and the anticipation of the new students coming in tomorrow... stay tuned...

My organizational behavior (MOB)

Ended up not going to bed as early as I wanted to so this morning I was off to a weird start. First I felt bloated probably because of the worsened metabolism of the sugar intake from last night as reported by 60 minutes of the effect of sleep deprivation. I literally gained a few pounds over one night just because of the fries, a Carl's Junior Teriyaki burger (which was yummy!), and my fav peanut butter cookie! Yeah so much for my indulgence on gluttony. Then since I didn't have early morning class until 10 I moved a lot slower on my way to my car for work. As I was trying to grab a bottle of water from the trunk my car key slipped off of its key chain and without thinking I pulled out the key from the key hole, dropped it in the trunk, grabbed the bottle, and closed the trunk... Oh wait a minute! That means my key is now in the trunk and I have no way to get into the car. What was I thinking (or the lack of it)? Once again I can blame it on my sleep deprived dysfunctional brain. I was thinking if I should call my insurance company for the auto service to help me out. Then I decided to give it a try to locate my spare key. It has actually mysteriously disappeared for a good few months and I have no clue where it was. I flipped my drawers, desks, and closet over to look for it and at the same time I gave my supervisor a head's up that I might end up missing work for the morning. My neighbors could see me running back and forth a couple times between the apartment and the car for using the wrong keys attempting to pop the car doors open. I then regret my total lack of organizational skills that my drawers and closets are plain messy war zones that it was difficult to reach in, let alone finding the spare key comparable to finding a needle in a haystack. Miraculously I had a great feeling when I saw a tupperware box that I put some of my bookmarks and memorable show ticket stubs (I know how random and dorky it sounds) that the key was gonna be there. Tuh-duh! When I saw it it felt like I had struck gold! In no time I was back in the office and my supervisor was quite amazed (and relieved) that I was back this soon.

Now my next goal is to "establish a house of order"!!!

Happenings

My dated and almost vintage DELL laptop has finally given up on IE7 and I can no longer access any secured websites (which require passwords) or even use messengers. So I'm ditching IE!

So from now on you probably won't see me around on MSN or YIM for a while. This blog or my email probably are the best ways to get in touch with me in cyberspace now. Anyways, I switched to Firefox and I am loving it. It works even faster and smoother than IE.


Last Friday I had one of the most memorable teaching experiences of all time. We were going through routine grammar drills and it was the last class of Friday. I was getting tired of the text book exercises myself so I asked the class if they felt the same. Of course the response was a unanimous "yes" (whey did they ever say they were NOT tired anyways?) I decided to do an impromptu game activity "Big Wind Blows". For you Hongkongers you know what I am talking about. The class sits in a circle and one person stands in the middle and gives a statement. If the statement is true to anyone in the group those people are "blown by the big wind" and they have to find a new seat competing with the person in the middle. The person that is left without a seat becomes the new spokesperson and so on. We were learning the Chinese perfective so it is a nice game to practice through playing. Well, they made quite a scene and lots of noise in the game. It was almost funny to see these soldiers in uniform in action (pun intended) during the game. But boy, didn't we all have fun. We were so loud that it concerned our department chair and the MLI that they stopped by and checked on what we were doing. By the time the dept chair got here we were done playing and all she saw was a messy classroom while the class was trying to catch a breath and working on their grammar again. I was both embarrassed but proud by the scene! I felt like I had my "Dead Poets Society" moment of my life! :)


Another random quote of the day:
Whatever product you're putting out, make it the best product you can make. Whatever your job is, [try] to challenge yourself every day.
~Ellen DeGeneres