出外一條龍在家一條蟲 = Me
 
This is a phrase that my mother used to describe me when I was in Taiwan. She could not understand why I was always exhausted whenever I got home. She complained that I could walk for days leading the hiking group through the mountains, or I could work through several nights to get my proposal completed for work. However, whenever I hit home, I would plop myself on the chair or in bed just like a zombie. Somehow, I could not convince her that I was capable of accomplishing anything at all. She used to say, “How on earth are you planning to manage your own household one day?”
 
I used to work long hours in Taiwan. When I was a student, I would leave home at 7:00 every morning to go to work and then go to school at night. After I graduated, I would work during the day at my office job and then quickly flag a taxi after work to get to Fu Jen or to the language centres for my evening classes. I would not get home until way passed 11:00 at night. On the weekends, I sometimes would have to go to the radio station to record the episodes for the children’s radio program or to prepare for the week’s lesson plans. Once a while, I might meet up with my friends on the weekend as well. I was not home most of the time. Of course, whenever I reached home, I was ready to crash!
 
Home was always the place where I could cut off all communication with the outside world. Now, I still work long hours. I leave home at 7:15 and usually get home after 6:00. Sometimes, I volunteer for programs in the evening. Home continues to be the last resort where I can have total freedom and relaxation. I love to be home where I could coop myself up all day long and do nothing, absolutely nothing! House work can wait. I guess I am just not cut out to be a housewife. Maybe my mom was right after all. I AM 一條蟲 inside and out. Hahahaha…. Shame on me!


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Homeni sent me another survey to fill out. This one is very similar to the one I did a while ago. (Please read the one I posted last: Just for Laugh.) So, I am not going to dwell deep into the questions that I have answered already. You are welcome to check out my previous post for the survey. However, I did a little translation on the following questions based on my own interpretations. The part in English inside the brackets ( ) would be my interpretations.
 
The truth is some of the translation I have read online is not really clear or accurate in my view. Years ago, my professor used to tell us that there are three important keys to Chinese/English/Chinese translation; the translated text should follow the simple principles of being elegant, fluent, and faithful to the original text. Sometimes, the translated version of the text might be too wordy, awkward, and missing the point at times; especially, those ones done by the translating software or online translation gadgets. (I often get a kick out of those translated movie subtitles as well.)
 
I noticed that some bloggers have tried to read my articles using Google translating device. I really have no advice for that other than be careful with what you read. I found that the meanings are often changed or omitted after the translation because the software only translates word by word and it does not read between the lines. Anyway, use those translators with caution. If you have any question about my articles, please do not hesitate to ask me.
 
I am not sending this survey to anybody this time. If you are interested, you are more than welcome to link the survey for your own use. (No royalty for the translation. Hehehe…) In the future, I am hoping to raise some money to help fund the aboriginal children’s education in some remote regions in Taiwan. If any publisher out there who might take interest of my skills, please do email me and we may be able to work out a plan for my goal.
 
01.你認為分手後的男女朋友還能做普通朋友嗎？Why?   
(Do you think that a couple can still be friends after their break-up? Why? Or, why not?)  
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This is the latest headline news hot off the press. Can you imagine that a group of 8 and 9 years old kids are capable of plotting this scheme? I can laugh all I want about their teamwork and organizational skills (the teacher must have taught them well on cooperative learning), but I am not going to! It is a no-laughing matter because I teach this age group. When it comes to school violence, I just shudder!
 
The source of this news article: http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2008/04/01/5164826-ap.html
 
 
April 1, 2008
Police: 3rd-graders plotted to attack teacher
By RUSS BYNUM

A group of third-graders plotted to attack their teacher, bringing a broken steak knife, handcuffs, duct tape and other items for the job, police said Tuesday. (AP/Waycross Georgia Police Department)
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I challenge you! Hope to get you on board!



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Yesterday I went to a dinner function for Easter. An acquaintance who I have not seen for a while greeted me with the comment last night, “So, Taiwan has elected a president.” Honestly, I was so surprised that, for a Canadian senior, a grey hair old lady, who knows very little about Taiwan, she actually read the news about the presidential election. I proudly explained to her all the latest news that I have read about the election.
 
Taiwan is the place that I am very proud to call my motherland because 76.33 percent of the eligible voters turned up at the poll stations to cast their ballot to elect a new president. Listen! It does not matter who your ideal president should be. For all of you, the people in Taiwan, you have exercised your democratic right and also put Taiwan on the stage to prove the democracy at work.
 
Tell that to the world, 76.33% of all eligible voters voted!!!!!!!
 
Now it is about time for all people in Taiwan to show respect to each other as citizens in a democratic world would do to cooperate and help carry out the policies. The government is not going to function properly for you if the political parties could not respect the spirit of democracy, which is the very essence that is significantly different from any country under the communists’ reign. Now it is time for all people in Taiwan to show the spirit of democracy and to live the essence of democracy. Let there no longer be division between brothers, conflict between creeds, and discrimination against tribes. Enough damage and tragedies have occurred but now it is time for healing.
 
I detest people who draw the racial line in Taiwan. For someone like me who have travelled across a couple of oceans, visited a few countries and witnessed discrimination at large, racism is the last thing I would expect to read about from Taiwan. I am not too naive to believe that racism does not exist in Taiwan. I know racism, the root of hatred, is everywhere and this is why, as an educator, I am extremely concerned about this social cancer. Shockingly, I have read so much nonsense online which no doubt (I hope) was all due to the great political divides including the mocking from some of our foreign residents in Taiwan. As the hype of presidential election subdued, I hope people would rationalize their conduct and come to the common senses.
 
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It is your election day in Taiwan. Please cast your vote no matter how busy you are! Your vote is important to Taiwan’s political future.
 
Election is a democratic process for all citizens to exercise their right. It is only fair if you cast your vote carefully to be part of the decision making process. I always have a very strong political sense no matter where I am. Since I can not be there to vote on this special day, I have been keeping my political view to myself for a few simple reasons. (Note 1)
 
First of all, I don’t need to display my personal political opinions since I have no right to vote in Taiwan. As an expat in Canada, I have my own idealistic view about Taiwan’s politics but no matter what, there will always be people who disagree with my personal view. (Note 2) So, why do I even bother to set up a public battle ground here in my personal blog to argue with strangers? (I can do that any time but definitely not before the election.)
 
Secondly, I think there are enough comments said already on TV or in the newspapers about the two major political parties in Taiwan. I don’t carry any party colour and it is damn rude (pardon my language) to ask people about their political party colour. Who cares about the party colour if the political party’s platform has no solidified strategies for their political plan? You are voting to elect a president of the country, not a pop-singing idol! All politicians, in Taiwan or in Canada, should look beyond their time in the office when it comes to planning for a state’s future. You should vote for the candidate who has a vision for more than four years in the office. I am fed up with politicians who are so shortsighted and only go for popularity contest!
 
Last but not the least, it is really up to the grass root citizens, i.e., YOU, to form your own rational judgments based on the political platforms presented to you by all parties’ candidates. So, there is no point for me to tell you what I think because the truth is that you, the educated voters, already know what the best will be for yourself. Politics is the same around the world. There are always political tactics played out in front of our very eyes during every election campaign. People tend to get emotional and even irrational at times. Don’t get caught up in the psychological political warfare. (Note 3) I personally detest all those idiotic tactics. I truly believe that, as a citizen with Taiwan’s future at stake, you need to step back, think with a futuristic view and make a wise and important decision.
 
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The other day, I noticed that my Wretch account is up for renewal. Time flies. I can’t believe that I have been blogging for a year since last March. Through blogging I realized that I have been away from Taiwan for far too long to the point that I often feel like I am reading a new language on cyberspace. There are too many slangs and common usage of vocabulary in the Taiwanese blogging world, which is beyond my comprehension at times. A language evolves through time but I didn’t realize that within the short time of being away from Taiwan, I am no longer up to date, not hip anymore! For the first time, I feel absolutely OLD! Duh!

I came to blogging because I was too lazy to keep all my family and friends informed about my life here in Canada. Blogging is a great idea for me because I only have to tell a story once and everyone seems to be able to jump into the conversation/discussion. Plus, I ended up making more friends than I have ever expected. One benefit that I have noticed through blogging is there is no shortage of friendship out there. I got to reconnect with some my old friends, which is absolutely surprising. I have also established cyber friendship with a few blog friends. I even met a couple of blog friends who are living in this region. How cool is that!

My work takes up a lot of my time and blogging is gradually filling up the rest of my time. I am a busy bee and also a home body. I am busy all day long from early morning till late afternoon outside my home. However, once I’ve got home, I like to stay home and enjoy the immediate surrounding space with peace and tranquility. Blogging has become a way of updating my life and communicating my thoughts to friends who may have shown some interests in my boring life and who live in different time zones and it is hard for us to be in touch. Blogging is also a new learning curve for me to get to learn the latest cyber-techno tools which will benefit me in the long run.

Many blog friends have chatted with me online through a special gadget called Plugoo which is on the very top of my blog page. Plugoo is a very neat invention that shows my online status to the readers. When my blog friends see me online, they could type the message in the Plugoo message box and we could communicate online through instant messaging. I am very grateful to be able to chat with so many polite and sincere blog friends who genuinely show interest in reading my blog and getting to know me as a real person, not a fictional figure online (although I like to be a bit mysterious at times.) Due to my job requirement, I am not allowed to disclose my personal identification freely but I am for real, hahahah…, just in case you care.

Where should I go from now on with blogging? I don’t have talented writing skills to write flowery novels or stories and to tell the truth, I don’t have time at all. In fact, I don’t even have time for myself. I am my own life’s faithful historian. I can only record parts of my personal incidentals to whoever cares to read about me; namely, my family and friends. For the rest of my readers, unless you let me know who you are, I could only consider you as invisible non-existent figures out there. You just have to introduce yourself to me whenever you drop by to read my articles, either in English or in Chinese. 

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I enjoy teaching my students to work on fun projects in class. A project is considered as a special assignment which is different from regular/daily homework. I know some teachers out there like to assign projects for students to complete at home but I don’t! The fact is there is no shortage of enthusiastic parents who would help their child complete the project. Personally, it is great to see how involved those parents are in their child’s school work. However, as a teacher, it is very difficult to assess a child’s accomplishment if the project were done with help at home. When Johnny brings the beautiful castle he has built at home to school, does that castle truly reflect what Johnny can do on his own or how he has applied his knowledge and problem solving skills? I often tell my students, “If the project was done perfectly with help from your mom and dad, should I give your parents an A, or should I give you an A?”

How about those children who don’t get sufficient parent support at home? We have plenty of parents who work so hard all day, sometimes with two jobs, just to support the family. I know for a fact that it is very difficult for these parents to provide any guidance to help their children with the basic homework. It would be too much to ask them if I have assigned something that the child has to construct at home. Many children already have the disadvantage of no home support. Do I just give up on those children’s potentials? I can’t let those children down.

As I was growing up, my parents never had time to help us with our homework. They had enough on their plate already. How could I expect them to help me with my work? Of course, I resented it as a child because I didn’t know better. Now, I can totally understand the struggle some families are going through. Anyway, I always have this simple principle regarding my class projects - I don’t assign any project for home, NOT AT ALL. Every single class project should be and would be done at school. The only project that I would assign to students would be something like the preparation for a formal speech presentation or newspaper report. I would usually teach the students how to do it in class and then they have to practise for their own presentation at home. Parents’ help is not necessary but they could simply be their child’s best audiences at home to cheer them on.

All the projects that I usually assign to my students would be completed in class. Weeks before each project, I would remind the class to bring materials to school. I encourage them to collect, reuse and recycle materials that could be used again for our project. Of course, I usually store these materials in my classroom before any project started, which has earned me a very negative title as the “packed rat” or "Marcos de Education" (Note 1). However, I could careless about what the other people call me. If my students could use the recycled materials to do wonderful things, then so be it! I would be very proud of that.

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(the view of the house with the snow)

The sun finally came out with full force for the last four days. As the snow starts to melt, my body is also recovering and gaining strength.
 
The school is a very dirty environment. Imagine that we all coop up in one room all day long. When it is too cold with less than -20 degrees wind chill out there, children don’t get to go out for recesses. My classroom has two very small to almost non-existent size of windows. The airflow solely relies on the air vents. But, how clean are those vents and ducts? That I don’t know. Children don’t always wash their hands after their sneezes or coughs no matter how many times I have told them. Now I wash my hands like crazy because I don’t want to pass the germs on to other people. It is not fun to have a cold or flu.
 
It is our March Break this week and I have the week off to recuperate. Other than my yoga and Tai Chi classes, I have not done much. It has been a lazy week for me but I think I deserve every minute of it. I will gradually post a few photos of our latest projects at school. It is something quite motivating for students. I definitely enjoy the fun whenever I do it with my grade three students. (Hey, if it was not fun, why would I want to waste my time doing it?)
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When I was young (correction: I AM still young, I am trying to say when I was YOUNGER), I used to get chain letters by mail. Now I get a lot of chain emails all the time but I usually just discard them with a simple click on that delete button. There is always a rule about forwarding it to a number of friends in order to get “good luck” in return. Well, I guess I haven’t been following the rule of chain mails to the dot. So, now I have accumulated too much “bad luck” to the point of no return. Maybe that is the reason why I have not won my million dollars yet. (Hahahaa.) 

This is the first time that I have received this type of “chain blogging”. It was forwarded to me from my blog friend lavienouvelle (http://blog.pixnet.net/lavienouvelle/). So, I guess I should really redeem myself this time and follow the rule for some change of luck.  Maybe if I could get lucky this time, I would be able to see my million dollars in no time. (Hehehe….)

I am sorry that I can only type in English on this computer. I would be able to upgrade my computer if I were to have some luck. So, please help me out here, my blog friends, who are next to receive this chain blogging mail. (hehehe….) Or, any volunteers? Anybody?
The following is my answers. Here you go! 

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