Reading List

The truth is that I never understood - and I still don't understand - Shakespeare.

It's actually quite embarrassing. I never "got" the language of his plays or why someone would read plays at all. Isn't the point to see it performed?

I do remember in English class, when my teacher said that "even if you never ever take English again, you must read Shakespeare. It's the sign of a cultured individual and you will be terribly embarrassed at a cocktail party if you have never read Hamlet."

Darn it.

Well, reading is a bit different from understanding it, right?

One of my goals is to become more well-read. There are so many references to famous novels everywhere and many things in arts, humanities, whatever you're studying becomes easier if you've read more books. I looked up (on Wikipedia) the list of the best 100 books picked out by authors and my goal is to read them all before I graduate :)

1. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
2. Fairy tales – Hans Christian Andersen
3. The Divine Comedy – Dante Alighieri
4. Epic of Gilgamesh – Unknown
5. Book of Job – Unknown
6. One Thousand and One Nights – Unknown
7. Njál's Saga – Unknown
8. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
9. Le Père Goriot - Honoré de Balzac
10. Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable (a trilogy) – Samuel Beckett
11. The Decameron – Giovanni Boccaccio
12. Ficciones – Jorge Luis Borges
13. Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë
14. The Stranger – Albert Camus
15. Poems – Paul Celan
16. Journey to the End of the Night – Louis-Ferdinand Céline
17. Don Quixote – Miguel de Cervantes
18. The Canterbury Tales – Geoffrey Chaucer
19. Stories – Anton Chekhov
20. Nostromo – Joseph Conrad
21. Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
22. Jacques the Fatalist – Denis Diderot
23. Berlin Alexanderplatz - Alfred Döblin
24. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky
25. The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoevsky
26. The Possessed - Fyodor Dostoevsky
27. The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodor Dostoevsky
28. Middlemarch – George Eliot
29. Invisible Man – Ralph Ellison
30. Medea – Euipides
31. Absalom, Absalom! – William Faulkner
32. The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner
33. Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
34. Sentimental Education - Gustave Flaubert
35. Gypsy Ballads - Federico García Lorca
36. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
37. Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel García Márquez
38. Faust – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
39. Dead Souls – Nikolai Gogol
40. The Tin Drum - Günter Grass
41. The Devil to Pay in the Backlands - João Guimarães Rosa
42. Hunger – Knut Hamsun
43. The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway
44. Illiad – Homer
45. Odyssey – Homer
46. A Doll’s House – Henrik Ibsen
47. Ulyssees – James Joyce
48. Stories – Franz Kafka
49. The Trial - Franz Kafka
50. The Castle - Franz Kafka
51. Shakuntala – Kālidāsa
52. The Sound of the Mountain - Yasunari Kawabata
53. Zorba the Greek - Nikos Kazantzakis
54. Sons and Lovers – D. H. Lawrence
55. Independent People - Halldór Laxness
56. Poems - Giacomo Leopardi
57. The Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing
58. Pippi Longstocking – Astrid Lindgren
59. A Madman’s Diary – Lu Xun
60. Children of Gebelawi - Naguib Mahfouz
61. Buddenbrooks – Thomas Mann
62. The Magic Mountain – Thomas Mann
63. Moby-Dick – Herman Melville
64. Essays – Michel de Montaigne
65. History – Elsa Morante
66. Beloved – Toni Morrison
67. The Tale of Genji - Murasaki Shikibu
68. The Man Without Qualities – Robert Musil
69. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
70. Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell
71. Metamorphoses – Ovid
72. The Book of Disquiet - Fernando Pessoa
73. Tales – Edgar Allan Poe
74. In Search of Lost Time – Marcel Proust
75. The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel - François Rabelais
76. Pedro Páramo - Juan Rulfo
77. Masnavi – Rumi
78. Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
79. Bostan – Saadi
80. Season of Migration to the North – Tayeb Salih
81. Blindess - José Saramago
82. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
83. King Lear - William Shakespeare
84. Othello - William Shakespeare
85. Oedipus the King – Sophocles
86. The Red and the Black – Stendhal
87. Tristram Shandy – Laurence Sterne
88. Confessions of Zeno – Italo Svevo
89. Gulliver’s Travels – Jonathan Swift
90. War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
91. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
92. The Death of Ivan Ilyich - Leo Tolstoy
93. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
94. Ramayana – Valmiki
95. Aeneid – Virgil
96. Mahabharata – Vyasa
97. Leaves of Grass – Walt Whitman
98. Mrs Dalloway – Virginia Woolf
99. To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf
100. Memoirs of Hadrian - Marguerite Yourcenar

The more that you read, the more things you'll know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go. 

-Dr. Seuss

Summer's Almost Over?!

It's been a while since I've written or posted anything but I really don't want to just give up on this blog! I'm much less stressed in the summer so that's been my excuse for not writing as much, but I have just as much stuff to think about. I recently finished my internship at the Church of the Redeemer's Drop-In Meal Program and it's been quite the experience. You can read more about it here:
http://www.theredeemer.ca/Page/LunchProgram.html
My supervisor asked me to write a reflection for the monthly newsletter and I didn't know what to write so I ended up whipping something together last minute. So, here is a little bit about my summer:

I remember stepping into the Drop-In Centre for the first time at the beginning of May. Having grown up in a suburban, middle-class neighbourhood, I really didn't know what to expect in the next two months. I was extremely nervous on my first day. Sitting at the first table—the one second closest to the door—I asked a man if the seat beside him was taken and he had said, “No, it’s for you.” Seeing the amused expression on his face, I wanted to say something more, start up a conversation, but I just couldn't think of anything to say. What if what I said was offensive or ignorant? What do we even have in common that we could talk about? Instead, I kept quiet and just observed.

What I came to learn during and after that first day is that the people I met at the Drop-In are extremely honest and open. “I have a drinking problem.” “I have a mental illness.” “I used to be a painter.” I came to realize that none of the people I met wanted my sympathy or pity; they simply wanted a friend—someone to listen to their stories, opinions and ideas because there are so many. Never before had I been to a place where people are so open to chat with strangers and so passionate about what they cared about. I chatted with people about the same subjects that I’m studying, but I had never felt as excited about the same topics when I chatted with classmates. I also learned—about history, politics, art, sports and cultures. I've learned to start up conversations with strangers and to just listen.

One morning, I chatted with a man I had never seen before. He could seem to remember my name but all he said to me before leaving is that even if I have a terrible rest of the day, I should know that I have made one at least one person’s day better and that should be enough. The past two months have been an extremely rewarding and inspiring experience and I have learned so much more than I could ever give back.

“I think there's just one kind of folks. Folks.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

Here are some photos from the book sale fundraiser as well:

Psalm 143:8

I came across this verse this past week and really at the right time.

Let morning bring me word of your unfailing love,
   for I have put my trust in You.
Show me the way I should go,
   for to You I entrust my life.

Psalm 143:8

Here again

I'm here again. Sitting at a desk at Robarts on a Sunday afternoon. Trying to think up the words to type. For the right ones to appear on my computer screen.

Here's the first piece from this school year.

Let's go back.

Happy Studying Everyone!

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Somewhere like this

So, Wongfu Productions released a new video on Monday called "Somewhere Like This." It's beautiful, thoughtful and, as usual, drew me into the story of these two people. The short film was written and directed by Wes and the shots are stunning and kind of nostalgic.

Anyways, enough of my crappy reviewing, take some time to watch it :)

"Across clear skies. Among glowing stars. That's where I'll find us."

Let's pretend

I wanted to be someone different tonight. I tried something new.
A short draft turned into a long one.
More words than I had anticipated or predicted.
This is the first "piece of writing" that I have formally written not for a school assignment.
Although I suppose blog posts count, so it actually isn't.

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Feeling good and looking up

And knowing that everything

everything has its purpose and its time

and God--

He is the most perfect writer of all stories.

As for God, his way is perfect:

The LORD's word is flawless;

he shields all who take refuge in him.

Psalm 18:30

Today is just one page of mine.

I must say that on days like these, I am sure that He has a wonderfully plan for me.

Trust in the LORD with all your heart

and lean not on your own understanding.

Proverbs 3:5

For there really is a time for everything.

A perfect timing.

Thankful for my team.

Thankful that I can't get too cocky about today.

March Break...

I admit I slept in this morning.

Not that late though.

It's now 1:16pm and I feel like I've already been up for ages.

If you're wondering, I got up at 10am.

but

only because I slept at 2am. So I think that's a good excuse.

On Saturdays, the dining hall has a lazy feeling. There is less chatter, less students and food is less appetizing. Orange juice cartons are always frozen on Saturday mornings.

Not completely. But thawed just enough to sound like a slushy when I shake the carton. I also found a piece of hair in my pasta at lunch. That's exciting. At this point, nothing that has to do with food on the weekends can surprise me now.

As I head out to Hart House to study. The back field is crawling with guys in blue shirts running around and throwing footballs in the snow covered grass.

Not to mention that they have music blasting from a bright blue Buick that has its doors thrown open.

I keep walking towards Hart House and one of the guys walks past me.

Tall.
Asian.
and wearing a frat shirt.

That explains everything.

As I keep walking, music becomes ridiculously loud as I'm passing the car.

I hear you.
No need to be so arrogant.

I finally walk into Hart House and expect to find the quiet, soothing, babbling noise usually found there. Instead, as I open the door to step inside, a campus tour guide walks out. I let her pass by and as I prepare to step inside, two more people come out and then two more and more and more people until her whole tour group is outside the side doors and in the archway. Blocking the entrance.

And I am still standing there, waiting to take two steps to go inside.

Awkward...

When they finally move aside to let me in, I stop by the side of the narrow hallway to let another tour group pass by.

As I walk to the Map Room, a third is stopped in the middle of the hallway.

And I'm thinking
it must be March Break.

Running long enough

Last Sunday I pushed myself to get up early at 6:30am to go running and do my laundry. I needed to get some exercise, especially cardio. Things had been moving so fast, I hadn’t had the chance to stop and reflect yet. I planned to run for an hour, but cleaning up and getting there took a bit longer than I had planned so I only ran for 45 minutes.

Hart House was basically empty other than a few people on treadmills. As my feet hit the track and my music started playing, I felt my thoughts begin to pour out. It seemed like despite how fast I was moving physically, my mind slowed down; the kind of feeling you get when you’re lying in bed thinking those thoughts you do right before you fall asleep.

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Trains and summer runs

I'm not sure why, but I can never do homework on the train. Not a lot anyways. I don't get severely carsick or anything; only a slight queasy feeling if I stare at a screen too long or try to read. Perhaps it's only an excuse because I really want to sleep and not think about things that are to come or things that have passed.

Every train ride feels different. Or maybe my memory only allows for so much. This time, I don't think I'm as sad as I am stressed. I only wish I was able to spend more time at home creating moments that I would remember with family I hardly see.

Another note is that this is the first time didn't print out my train ticket. The printer at home wasn't working and my brother was on the computer connected to the printer all the time anyways. So, I took the risk and found the ticket on my phone, hoping that it will work.

And it didn't. Shoot. This would happen to me.

The ViaRail employee asks me to make the screen brighter.

He turns back around and it works. I'm extremely relieved.

And with terrible transitioning, here is another piece of writing. I assure you, everything I right is only half true, because the best stories are 50% real, 50% dramaticized.

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Overwhelming love

Do you ever have times in your life when you realize, when it hits you hard in the face and knocks you out, that you are so unbelievably loved?

I don't mean romantically or friendships.

The kind of love where you feel as if you're drowning. But in the best way possible.

I'm talking about family.

It's funny how family makes one feel.

Sometimes, I want to yell and scream Why doesn't it get through your head?! or Stop telling me what to do! or Why do you not try?


Mom, why do you keep acting like we're so close, when we hardly speak the same language?
Mom, stop telling me that we used to play together when we were four. I'm not four anymore. And we never got along anyways; not one time, except last summer, did we manage to stay out of a fight.


Sometimes, I want to cry. Why are things the way they are? Why did you have to tear things apart? Why can't you be here when everyone else is celebrating with their families?


What will happen to us when we're grown?
Will we stay in touch when it's not up to our parents to bring us to visit?


Seldom do I feel in touch.

But through the joyous screams of "It's Jia Jia!," my grandma's content chuckle and chattery background; I felt in touch.

In between my uncles' jokes and my aunts' worrying, I heard my cousins screaming in the background, asking me about school. And I screamed back, asking about those roses she received for her birthday and how his high school exam preparation is going and how her studies are.

Xin nian hao Jia Jia jie jie! I hope you have a blessed year and grow more beautiful!

You too, dear. Please don't grow up too fast.

As I stood in the stairwell, the phone at the other end of the line was passed from Shu Shu to Da Ye, from Nai Nai to Ting Ting jie jie, from Rui Qi to Hao Yi, from little Xing Xing to Ting Ting Jie Jie and back to Shu Shu and then to Xiao Shen and Da Niang, from Gu Gu to Xiao Gu Ye and, I think, to Da Gu as well.

It struck me suddenly that I wanted to be there too.

As people walked through the doors to go up or downstairs, I wanted to scream.

Look at me. I am so blessed.

Fix me

*Note: I wrote this one on January 26, but I was too scared to post, but now that it's been some time, it's not as hard to post it nor as meaningful  In another sense, it's not as fresh as it was the day I wrote it, so I feel less vulnerable. Please forgive the lateness and the cheesiness, I was never quite finished with this one.


Goodbye.

I feel like all I've been saying lately are goodbyes.

Today it was "Goodbye J."

Goodbye J. When will we be in the same country again? I miss being in kindergarten.

Bye. Don't cry, I'll be home in a month. I miss your cooking.

Bye. I hope you have a great birthday. I miss our two hour car rides every day.

Bye. Don't grow up too fast. I miss you telling me how I suck at using technology.

Bye. Sometimes, I wish I didn't leave. I miss being close.

Bye. You amaze me. I miss seeing your stylishness each Sunday morning and your cakes.

Bye. I do wonder what it would be like to go to school with you. I miss teaching with you.

Bye. You are blessed with so much potential that you have yet to realize. I miss you driving me crazy.

Bye. You have blossomed into a beautiful dancer and young lady. I miss our early morning talks.

Bye. I am still astounded when I think back to that insane month of February. I miss rehearsals with you.


Most of my goodbyes are for a distance of 452 kilometres.
Compared to some people, that's nothing.

But, sometimes, it doesn't matter how far. Being separated at all is hard enough.

This time was different.

I didn't want to come back here. I didn't want to say goodbye.

And as I sit here with your suitcase, I wish you had come along to  deliver it.

So I could say-

Goodbye.
Don't leave.
Come back.

I miss you.


Lights will guide you home

And ignite your bones

And I will try to fix you

Someone, fix me.

Jasmine tea

*Just a note: I wrote this post a few weeks back, but I was hesitating on whether to post it or not, but it's been a while and I haven't read it over again, but I'm thinking "Whatever, why not?"


There are moments when I feel like everything will be alright.

I can't decide if I like warmer weather and less snow--if I miss the cold and the snowstorms.

When I was younger, I used to love thunderstorms.

I loved watching from the window as the water pounded the ground and listened as the sounds thundered throughout the house. I would look out in the distance for lightning and count the "one-thousands" before the thunder hit. I marveled at the astounding power.

But, my favourite kind of weather is the kind of day when the snow floats down lightly in generous, fat flakes. I used to not put my hood up on purpose, leaving my hair uncovered, just so I could imagine that it looked magical, and I still don't--for the same reason. When it snows like that, everyone comments about how it looks like Christmas. It does.

I like tea. Tea is calming, mild and has just the right amount of taste. Coffee, on the other hand, I find too bitter. But sometimes, I drink it anyways, just to feel like something can be normal.

Yesterday afternoon, I walked to Robarts while the snow was falling and both my hands holding a cup of jasmine tea. And I knew that everything would be alright.

Happy New Year!

Wishing all of you a very happy Chinese New Year!

I hope you have many blessings in the year of the snake :)

Spend time with your family, call your parents, grandparents and relatives. They really do appreciate it.

Have you ever thrown a fistful of glitter in air?

I have.

This is a song I've been listening to a lot recently and I thought I would share:

P!nk is truly amazing.
Singing upside down, wearing heels and doing acrobatics. It's crazy.

Enjoy :)

Wedding Stories

Hey S,

Remember that night you showed me that wedding video?

I suppose the idea of weddings has floated around my mind recently. There are so many weddings happening in the next year for people we know and quite a few in the past year too!

I have never been as interested or crazy about attending weddings or weddings themselves, but I can see where some of your excitement comes from now. So, while reading some blog posts online via a link posted on Facebook by Brett Ullman (...do you remember him?!) I came across this one.

I think you'll enjoy and I hope you get a laugh out of it.

Wedding Season Singleness

Love,
J

PS: Thanks for the late night chats :)

Writing centres...

This morning, I had an appointment at the University College writing centre in Laidlaw Library.
Here's a photo I took this morning on my way back to res.

The work I brought in this time was not an essay for a school course, but two pieces of writing I'd like to enter in a contest or possible to be published in a school magazine this year.

(...if you would like to skip my commentary, scroll down to read the piece of writing)

It's funny because whenever I'm confident enough to have a piece of writing edited or read by someone else, it means I'm feeling pretty good about it. So, I pulled out two of my better pieces, fixed a few things and brought them in.

Dr. P is only person I have met who seems to purposefully make me feel uncomfortable about my writing. Purposefully. But, that is one of the reasons he's my favourite writing instructor. He holds nothing back as he criticizes and fixes my writing. He asks me what I'm trying to say in every. single. sentence. Not only does he completely take apart the content, but he dissects the grammar as well.

I mean, how scary is it to have someone read your part of your diary and then ask what you mean by "I thought he was cute because he had blue eyes." Did you think he was cute because of his blue eyes? Did you think he was cute then you noticed he had blue eyes? Why did you think he was cute? Does being cute really have to do with his blue eyes? Or was it something more? Why did you notice he had blue eyes? I'm not following your train of thought!

Terrifying.

It really is.

What I mean to say is...Everytime I go to the writing centre with a piece of work, it (what a vague usage, we talked about this, I'm supposed to explain "it"-alright, what I really mean is, "the session") makes me feel terrible. It does. Going the the writing centre, I needed the assurance that it was a candidate to be published. Then as I'm trying to explain my emotions that I've written down on paper, I feel like I have no idea what I was thinking when I had typed it out.

It's as if he took apart my life in ten minutes and teaches me to put it back together in the next forty.

Nevertheless, I love going there.

Ironically, I always feel like the best writer I could possibly by the time I leave.

Going there I feel confident. Being there makes me feel like crap. But, before I leave, Dr. P always tells me that my writing is...good.

I suppose, that's why I keep going back. I'm always left with some renewed confidence and optimism which makes me forget that being there makes me feel quite terrible.

Despite all that, here is the piece we spent most of the hour on. It did have a title, but only because I needed one for it when I submitted it, but I prefer to have untitled.

Oh, just one last note:

A piece of writing is always a work in progress.


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Blue Monday, nice ladies and Ballet class

This past Monday is supposedly called "Blue Monday."

It is calculated to be the most depressing day of the year.
You can read about it here: http://www.squidoo.com/depressingday

I suppose you could say I was feeling a little under the weather on Monday, but it was a bit more than that. With combination of dramatic news and cold weather, my head was buzzing by the afternoon. Not the nice kind of buzzing that I hear a good dose of alcohol gives you, but a warm, sluggish, nothingmakingsense kind of buzzing.

I wasn't quite feeling all that active. What I really wanted to do more than anything was crawl back into bed, curl up in a ball and sleep.

Being let out about half an hour early from management class was nice, but walking to the streetcar stop was nothing more and nothing less than cold. Frigid, windy, cold. For once, I wish I had one of those embarrassingly puffy coats that go down past your knees.

As I walked down Jarvis, I noted that Tuesday must be garbage collection day.

When I walked into the studio, my head cleared. Just a bit. Or I'd like to think so at least.

I'm still afraid of disappointment, my extensions that now barely reach 90 degrees, my centre is soft, my feet are now weak. But, I was already there and all I should do is to take it as it is. Then came warm-up, tendus, pliés...and at the end of the rond de jambe, we posed: Arabesque à terre with arms reaching back just a little.

The teacher asks me to demonstrate it. Feeling a little awkward and a little déjà vu, I plié and chassé into arabesque.

The lady behind me at the bar leans over and whispers, "your arabesque is gorgeous."

Just a little more of a little bit of everything

I'm starting this blog to get a little more of many things, since it's the details that matter. That being said, these are the details of my thoughts, imaginings and everyday living.

Goal setting theory states that if one sets SMART goals, one can accomplish them.

Therefore, I will write a little bit of everything.

I suppose it will be like talking to myself. Thoughts, pieces of writing, everyday observations. Fascinating. Which brings us to the real reason I'm writing. There are much too many thoughts dancing around my head. Most of them don't belong there.

Thus, I will begin. Today is Tuesday. A wonderful, wonderful Tuesday. Two types of tea and lots of nostalgia kind of Tuesday. Cold, wintery, snowy. The Tuesday after Blue Monday.

Thank you for the push, J.