Two and a half weeks later...

After a serious two-minute ocnsidation of what my blog topic should be, I decided to use this opportunity to conclude my two and a half weeks of learning Japanese by practing to recite my activities of the day.  =)

So let's see...

をたしは　けさ　じゅうじに　おきました。
じゅうじ　から　じゅうにじ　まで　surf online-ました。
ごごいちじ　から　さんじ　まで　はたらきました。
さんじい　went to ゆうびんきょく。
よじ　から　ごじはん　まで　べんきょうしました。
ろくじ　から　じゅうじはん　まで　はたらきました　(AGAIN!)。

I have to say, as a graduate student, I do have the best time of my life right now.  I don't have a set working hour.  As long as I get my work done, I can come and go as I want.  I am a night owl.  I like to work at night.  I used to say it's because there's no good TV programs on at night.  But more importantly, there's no one around to bother me.  ;)  Hehe...I still remember those days when I used to stay up all night studying and then go to sleep at 6am after I checked out the morning news.  I don't do that anymore.  No more homeworks to keep me up late!  Hooray~~~  But I still like to enjoy a peaceful quiet night once a while.  What can I say?  I guess the lonely night just fits me better...

ノルウェイの森

I think the first time I've heard about it was on a late night Chinese radio show.  The host shared a passage from a book called "挪威的森林" and I immediately fell in love with it.  That year, I was 12.

As time passed by, I forgot all about it...


Until several years ago, after finishing reading a book given by my brother that I realized it was the very same book that I loved more than a decade ago.  I know maybe this doesn't seem to be so important or significant to you.  But I think it means something...  Exactly what?  I can't tell.  It's only the feeling I get that counts.

So here is my favorite passage from the book for sharing...for those who have read the book to remember...for those who haven't read the book to discover...


"...It seemed to work at first. I tried hard to forget, but there remained inside me a vague knot-of-air kind of thing. And as time went by, the knot began to take on a clear and simple form, a form that I am able to put into words, like this:

Death exists, not as the opposite but as a part of life.

Translate into words, it's a cliche, but at the time I felt it not as words but as that knot of air inside me. Death exists - in a paperweight, in four red and white balls on a billiard table - and we go on living and breathing it into our lungs like fine dust.

Until that time, I had understood death as something entirely separate from and independent of life. The hand of death is bound to take us, I had felt, but until the day it reaches out for us, it leaves us alone. This had seemed to me the simple, logical truth. Life is here, death is over there. I am here, not over there.

The night Kizuki died, however, I lost the ability to see death (and life) in such simple terms. Death was not the opposite of life. It was already here, within my being, it had always been here, and no struggle would permit me to forget that...

I lived through the following spring...with that kind knot of air in my chest, but I struggled all the while against becoming serious. Becoming serious was not the same thing as approaching truth, I sensed, however vaguely. But death was a fact, a serious fact, no matter how you looked at it. stuck inside this suffocating contradiction, I went on endlessly spinning in circles...In the midst of life, everything revolved around death."

ノルウェイの森 by 村上春樹

一休さん!!!

今天早上做功课的时候突然想起了“一休”。小的时候就是看着他长大的。于是便到Youtube上找到了opening。没想到我竟然能看得懂底下的日文字幕！すきすきすきすき...  哈哈！！！=D

Self Introduction

There isn't really much I can say about myself.  I am a fourth year graduate student at Columbia engineering school.  I am from China.  I like to read.  Oh yeah, and I always want to have a dog.  =)

I guess I can elaborate on my Chinese heritage a little bit more.  I came to the States when I was 16 - just in time for high school and the theatrical lives of the American teenagers.  But don't worry, I missed all of that since I was living with my Chinese grandma.  She's actually from Taiwan.  But trust me, she knew every bit of Chinese tradition you can imagine, and she made sure that it was well followed in our house.  Don't get me wrong.  It wasn't anything abusive or horrifying.  In fact, I actually appreciate for all the things she taught me and had me do.  They helped me grow and showed me who I actually am (of course, that's another topic for later discussion...).

Sensei said that we can write the blog in our native language if we want to.  I actually had a little hard time deciding what I should do - write the blog in English or Chinese.  My Chinese isn't bad.  I can read, listen or speak in Chinese fluently.  After all, it is my native language.  But writing is a whole totally different story.  After spending a good part of my life here, I am starting to lose my Chinese writing skills (not to mention that it was not that good to start with =\ ).  Of course, I can blame the wonderful Bill Gates for inventing Microsoft so that people like me don't have to actually know how to write any more.  I can just type and the characters will just magically appear on the computer screen for your pleasure to read.  But once a while, when I am having one of those self-realization moments, I can't help but feeling guilty that I am losing part of my culture.

Oh well, it seems that I am starting to have one of those moments right now.  I guess I'd better stop right here.  Otherwise I might have to question myself how come I am not taking a Chinese class this semester...

わたし の さいしょ の blog！

This is my first blog entry.
kore wa watashi no saisho no blog entry desu.
これ　は　わたし　の　さいしょ　の　blog entry です。

I am from China.
watashi wa Chugoku kara kimashita.
わたし　わ　ちゅうごく　から　きました。

I am a 4th year graduate student at Columbia University.
watashi wa Koronbia daigakuin no yonensei desu.
わたし　は　ころんびあ　だいがく　の　よねんせい　の　がくせい　です。

Thank you very much.
Arigato gozaimasu.
ありがとう　ございます。