Fiji

最近盯著電腦看的時間
一天至少十二個小時吧
沒辦法,出來跑遲早要還
桌面是XP提供的帆船加三棵棕櫚樹海景
跟紐西蘭一樣,斐濟也離我好遙遠了

為什麼會去斐濟勒
說來話長

忘記最初是在哪聽到的,一堆背包客在離開紐西蘭之後都要去斐濟渡個假
享受sunshine才能解凍紐西蘭的冬天
那,有機會就去斐濟吧~~
我是完全聽到別人怎麼玩就跟著怎麼玩
(其實那時我腦海中響起的是大溪地這首歌)
(可是要簽證,消費又高)
(還是找到人一起住在漏水的公寓後再去吧)

再來,在Te Puke工作的時候,有一位斐濟來的歐巴桑跟我們同住
我們都叫她Fiji Mum
FijiMum 邀我們去斐濟過聖誕
我就跟隨Mei的腳步去了
(Mei也是台灣來的,也是在Te Puke工作的時候認識)
(一直想寫在奇異果包裝廠工作那段時期的事)
(每每寫到"離開我在Nelson心愛的前樓友來到灰暗的北島"這一句之後就卡住了:P)

這中間其實是很曲折的
一開始是簽證問題,在網路上看到有人雖然NZ簽證還沒到期
可是要再入境卻不行,好像是快到期的原因
因為我簽證2月底到期,對於1月中回來這件事感到有點擔心
後來寫信去問移民局,他們又說簽證還沒到期前都可入境,就隨便啦
上網刷卡買了12/19~1/14的機票,還真是一點感覺都沒有
隔天一早打開報紙,竟然有斐濟的新聞
啥!!!!!好像是政治情況不穩定,一堆軍隊的照片
挖哩勒....想著離出發時間還有兩個月
希望到時就沒事了

Qoo~~
發音跟以前一種飲料的名字很像的單字:
"coup" 政變!!
就在即將出發的前一個禮拜
斐濟發生政變,軍隊佔領首都Suva
有沒有這麼巧啊,FijiMum就住在Suva
我們就要直搗這一切混亂的核心啊XD

FijiMum保證絕對沒問題
網路上lonely planet討論區裡一堆文章也說斐濟的政變跟老百姓沒關係,治安還變好了,因為路上有軍隊駐守
可是還是接到家裡的奪命連環call,想要阻止我
早知道就不要說溜嘴說要去斐濟了=_=

買了比基尼和夾腳拖^O^
來去享受陽光和沙灘囉

The rule of four

好看耶
可惜我是看原文的
很多東西都沒看懂囫圇吞棗的翻過去
可能要借中文的再看一次

看小說學英文
可是遇到好看的小說
又覺得沒全看懂實在太對不起它了

我的讀書心得永遠只有好看和不好看兩種
不好看的會稍微抱怨一下
好看的大部分只會寫好看兩個字

game and education

I'm sorry I was getting lazy. I haven't written down anything about the subjects we have talked for two weeks. One is “Sudoku.” I want to discuss why it's common for Western people to do something like reading or solving puzzles when they take the public transportation and we just sleep. Maybe none of us get enough sleep? Actually, It's just our culture.

The other is about “general education”. I know general education is important for universities. I regret I didn’t get much from taking those courses because I was busy at my professional courses. What's the purpose of education? To make us successful, I guess. Has the education we had made us successful? I don't think so. However, this just means we need more education to get what we need. So, what’s the point? I don't know. I can't get it. ^^;;

Mother's Day

5/17 study group

Actually, I feel uneasy about this topic. It reminds me how bad the relation between me and my parents was, and I don’t want to talk about that.

Now a day, Mother’s Day becomes more and more important and commercial. There are big sales everywhere and mass media keep reminding us we should do something to our mother on that special day. It’s not a bad thing. Families have a reason to get together. Mothers can get some luxurious things they won’t buy in daily lives.

The meaning of Mother’s Day has been talked too much, so our group changed to discuss “will you want to be a mother?” However, we all more care about the willing to be a wife. Maybe as time going by, the question of being a mother or not will become more urgent than being a wife because of the age. XD

It seems that our society pay more attention to Mother’s Day then Father’s Day. The first reason is that it’s easier to sell gifts for mothers than for fathers, so the businessman will push Mother’s Day more than Father’s Day. Second, the intimacy between mothers and children is stronger than fathers and children. Third, Father’s Day is on summer vacation. There are no teachers to ask children to make cards and teach them the meaning of Father’s Day.:P However, I think the most important reason is that we chose a special day to honor a great character and we all think mothers are greater than fathers because they devote more and sacrifice more. On the other hand, fathers already get all the resource and power in a family, so it’s not necessary to treat them special on Father’s Day.

Vegetarian

Study Group 05/10

Our human beings are an omnivorous species, so I think being a vegetarian is a little bit unnatural. Many experts said we can get all the nutrition we need from vegetables, if we have well-planned diets. However, why should we choose those substitute nutrition from vegetables instead of just eating meat?

We read three articles this time and they provided three different reasons.
First of all, those slices of meat we ate came from the animals which were treated cruelly. They were crammed into tiny spaces, drugged to keep them alive or to grow faster, and slaughtered in pain.
Second, vegetarians are less likely to develop heart disease and to be obese. In other words, they are healthier.
Third, raising animals for food wastes more resources and produces more pollutions than growing vegetables.

In my opinion, we can choose to eat meat from animals which are treated well and slaughtered humanely. By doing this, we can encourage those factory farms to adjust their balance between low cost and high quality.
Concerning the second reason, I think people who choose to be a vegetarian (no matter out of health or religions) more care about their health than other people. That’s why they are healthier. XD
Going to the third one, we should turn off the light, use the public transportation system, not waste food, not waste paper …etc. to protect our environment. However, changing to a vegetarian? I don’t think it’s necessary to put it on the list.

We also discussed about the inconvenience of being a vegetarian, how people who have different diet habits can get along well…etc. and had a simply conclusion: the diet habit is an import parameter to influence our daily life, and it’s hard for everyone to change their own diet habits.

日本,搭個便車吧

我又開始看遊記了
之前在圖書館總是跳過這一區
深怕我看一看又想幹麻幹麻

這種想法其實也很奇怪
好像是要用一種認命的態度來過自己並不樂意過的生活,所以拋棄了一切會讓自己改變主意的東西

其實也沒辦法啊,東碰西碰之後還是在原地
只能換個作法
可是啊....憂鬱的快死掉了
所以(反覆記號,請跳到第一行)

日本這個念頭最近突然跳到我的腦袋裡
免簽證耶,去日本找masako, misa, yuri....吧
kozue不知啥時回日本
總之啊,我在圖書館裡就拿起這本書翻了

寫的很無聊的遊記很多
這本倒是挺好看的
搭便車這種方式可以遇到很多當地人,發生很多故事
在加上作者是個"老外",又有更多的衝突可以描述
重點是作者粉幽默,如果換了其他人可能會寫出完全不一樣的感覺

P.S.這本沒有讓你馬上開始查詢日本機票價錢的危險性
不會擾亂你過日常生活的步調,可安心服用

Comfort Women

當作參加5/3英文讀書會的homework吧

I must say that I haven’t studied this issue or even thought about it before. After our group discussion, I realize that this issue is not only about the existence of comfort women or they need an apology. It has very complicate aspects include politics and human rights.
It started from a piece of news. The Japan’s leader, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in his visit to the United States offered an apology but used pointedly vague language to sidestep the issues of Japan’s responsibility toward the comfort women. He said he had ”deep-hearted sympathies that the people who had to serve as comfort women were placed in extreme hardships” and expressed his “apologies for the fact that they were placed in that sort of circumstance.”
It was very weird that Mr. Bush said, “I accept the prime minister’s apology.” Is he a comfort woman?
I think no one will doubt the existence of comfort women, but one of us said some Japanese do. They have no idea what was going on during the World War II. Their government didn’t put those things into their history textbooks. However, comfort women were not ghosts lived in the pass, some of them are still alive and they open their stories to public. Therefore, I think those Japanese can say they don’t know but they can’t say they don’t believe.
Why can’t Japan just say they were wrong and give an appropriate apology? No one will blame them. However, the victims’ countries especially China may ask huge compensation and use this issue to get political benefits. That’s what Japan want to avoid. I think that’s why they choose to give apologies in the United States instead of the victims’ countries.
Another debate is Mr. Abe claimed there was no evidence that the Japanese military had coerced women into sex slavery. In my opinion, no matter those comfort women were volunteers or coerced, the fact is they became sex slaves instead of just providing sex service. There were many sex providers during the wars, but they didn’t become sex slaves. I think this proved Japan lacked human rights during that time and this comfort women issue will always be a prickle on their back when Japan talk about human rights.