things for which I am thankful today

1. A friend brought me a pot of Marmite Gold from his trip to England last week. It's a gimmick but I think it's great. It made me smile all morning!

2. We got a new washing machine and it is so quiet! Our old one was so noisy that even with the kitchen door closed we couldn't talk to each other without shouting. It also didn't spin properly about half the time, which meant that a lot of loads of laundry had to be washed through two cycles. That made laundry take a lot longer than necessary. I am so happy that we have this new one.

3. I complain a bit about the many passwords related to online banking, but I am really very grateful for connected global bank accounts that allow me to shop online in several countries! heehee.

4. Talking to my Grammie on the phone is like a warm hug. I love chatting with her.

5. Having coffee and dinner with my best friend in Hong Kong - she always brightens up my day. I love our mid-week meet-ups.

What are you grateful for today?

Fracking, Bonobos, and the Three Gorges Dam Region in China

My recent reading helped me learn about fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, a method for getting oil out of deep horizontal seams. It had exploded in use in North Dakota since 2006. It has provided huge economic benefits for the area and also put massive pressure on the infrastructure and employment market. It is not sustainable and the boom is due to end within a generation.

 

Bonobos are a species of ape who are separated from chimpanzees and gorillas by the Congo River. They have a distinctly matriarchal society and are much more interdependent than other apes. Bonobos don't have "alpha males", instead mothers and sons remain close and females share power.

 
"Return to River Town" was an article I read about a Western man who taught English in Fuling, China, on the Yangtze River in 1996. He returned there to visit since the town was altered by the Three Gorges Dam, 450 km downstream. The dam's construction raised the water level by 120 m and displaced the city's residents (and had many other impacts). He described an underwater museum where visitors can see a historical carving which is now submerged under 40 m of water.

making a diptych in Lightroom 4

I used this video to help me learn to make a diptych in Lightroom 4. I also enjoyed an Adobe TV video that discussed the aesthetics of pairing images in diptychs.

Photos taken at Uniacke Estate, July 2012.

What new skills have you learned this week?

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua

I just finished this book - you may have heard about it a couple of years ago. It's about a first generation American-Chinese mother who wouldn't allow her two daughters to have free time or go to friends' houses. She forced them to practice music (piano for the elder, violin for the younger) for several hours every day and demanded their excellence in every academic subject.

Her book is somewhat tongue in cheek - and hilarious if you read it that way. But it also makes some valid (and scary) distinctions between Chinese and Western parenting (grand generalizations though they are). Western parents make an conscious choice to allow kids to choose their activities - even if it means Facebook and spending time at the mall. Chinese parents make all the choices for their children and demand compliance. This is why so many Asian children are so accomplished, Chua argues. She speculates that teenagers of both types hate their parents. And she also implies that adults of both types love their parents. So she is proud of her parenting style.

A lot of my students have parents like her, at least to some extent. They are driven by their parents' desires and they make academic gains because their parents ensure that they do. I can really tell the difference between those children and those whose parents acquiesce to their kids' wishes.

The real question is which is the right way (or better way) to parent? And how do you decide which is right? (Fortunately for me, I am only pondering in a theoretical way. Many of my friends and acquaintances are making these decisions every day.) What about you and your family?

Guernsey Island

I recently read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. It's a novel set in London and on Guernsey Island just after World War Two. I didn't know before that Guernsey (in the English Channel) was occupied by the Germans during the war; they were hoping to use it as a stepping stone to occupying the UK. Children were sent away from Guernsey for their safety to live in the British countryside.

This was a brilliant novel, written as a series of letters to and from a young writer in London. She makes friends with the members of a literary society on Guernsey and eventually visits them.

I bought this book at the Oxfam shop in Central HK and I think it came from Costco in Canada - see the bilingual sticker.

what I'm learning: Libya, venom, and Kyrgyzs

I do not keep up to date much with current affairs. I also am terribly bad at the history questions in Trivial Pursuit. You could say I'm a little selfish about where I give my time since I don't often look outside my immediate surroundings.

As it turns out, I will be teaching a course called Theory of Knowledge next year. And it requires a broad general knowledge base. It's time for me to start paying attention to the world around a bit more.
So to start with I picked up National Geographic Magazine. I had about an hour to use in Central. Usually I would go shopping, but this time I decided to get some reading material and a snack and settle down to learn something. And so here are some two (ish) sentence summaries of what I have learned this weekend.

Libya, recently democratic, has a lot of archeological sites from Roman and Greek times and they were neglected, and hence preserved, all through the previous leader, Quaddafi's, time in power. Now they are being rediscovered, and hopefully actively protected.

Venom from poisonous snakes, insects, and reptiles can be used as cures. Researchers are collecting venom sample, analysing them, modifying them, and testing lots of new drugs.

There is a group of about 1000 people called the Kyrgyz, who live in the remote mountain ranges of isolated Afghanistan. They live in extremely harsh conditions but have close, happy families. The article I read hints that they may be connected to medical support and the modern world if a road is built to their area, but this is currently not the case.

sports day

The whole school took part in sports day when we all had to run one lap of the track to earn a "dynasty point" for our dynasties. I am in the Han dynasty and red is our colour. I sported this red wig during our run to show my dynasty spirit. Also, can you see Hanix, our mascot on the right? He won the mascots' 100 m race later in the day!

jewellery storage

I have two empty boxes of Ferrero Rochers that I use as jewellery storage. One is for necklaces and the other for earrings. I have had them for at least five years and they were getting chipped on the edges where the top and bottom touch. So Anthony and I just had to eat our way through two new boxes so that I could replace them!

Voila, my new box of earrings.

"you smell nice"

The person behind me on the bus smells really good. A bit fresh, a little like apples, just enough to notice and enjoy. I wonder what it is that makes me so happy to be near that smell? I want to turn and ask about it and give a compliment.

The bus lurches to the side and my head swivels. I see the shoe attached to the leg of the person behind. It's a man! Ah, no. There is now no acceptable way for me to comment. I run though the options in my mind. Every conversation I can imagine that starts with "You smell nice" ends with awkwardness or embarrassment or both. I also try to visualise what would happen if I passed the man a note saying he had a pleasant aroma - maybe as I exit the bus. No, there is just no way to give a strange man a compliment.

Well, then, thank you strange man, for making my bus journey more calm and fresh-smelling. I hope you have a good day. And I hope someone else finds a socially acceptable way to appreciate you.

feeling happy?

Answer me this: Which of these two options makes you happier?

1. Tidying the living room?
2. Ignoring the mess and watching TV?

As it turns out, I have discovered that a quick way to feel happy today is to get something done. I have realised that I actually feel better after a little tidying than if I ignore it and choose to "relax" instead. Funny, isn't it? And I've been reading a bit about this in the book Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigal: "It turns out that almost nothing makes us happier than good, hard work." She's referring to "work" that we choose ourselves, that has some positive feedback when we've done it. That's because we enjoy the sense of accomplishment of improving something.

McGonigal actually says that things we think of as relaxing, like chilling out, TV, eating chocolate, don't make us feel better. They are actually mildly depressing because they are so undemanding and low-engagement. We are happier avoiding those passive entertainments and seeking out a more positive, active task. "We'd be much better off," she writes, "avoiding easy fun and seeking out hard fun, or hard work that we enjoy, instead."


What do you think? Do you enjoy some "good, hard work"?