1. I didn’t get the internship I wanted so I’m not going to Nanjing to teach English this summer. This means, I need to start applying for other internships… now. FML.
2. I watched Hachiko: A Dog’s Tale which is an excellent movie, but a complete tearjerker. I was anticipating that since I knew the story [...]
My mom has been teaching my fourteen year old sister Chinese (Mandarin) with Jay Chou songs.
Now if that’s not hilarious by itself, I’ve discovered that my mom has accidentally taught Tiffany the wrong lyrics because Jay Chou mumbles.
I love my family.
I’m home!
And stuffed with Chinese food. :D
Apparently since I’ve been gone, my family has acquired a “pet rabbit”. It lives under the shed in our frigid wasteland of a backyard. My mom is still traumatized from finding the frozen carcass of a baby bunny from the Winter of 2008, so she’s determined to keep this [...]
So it’s “holy shit midterms and tests and everything is due” week. I’ve skipped a couple of classes and meals and have become an insomniac. I also managed to lose my voice for a couple of days (by ‘losing’ I mean that my voice alternated between sounding like that of a pixie fairy and that [...]
I plan on bottling all my anger and rage into being productive– so I plan on studying my ass off (with breaks for food and my PE class) for my Chinese test tomorrow, starting now.
I have Chinese children songs stuck in my head. Unless Chiang Laoshi is easily impressed by kid songs about frogs, I am so screwed for my oral test tomorrow.
Andrea: I really hate how hard it is to get to the new Chinese classroom. You have to wander through the labyrinth, only instead of a minotaur you have to face CHIANG LAOSHI.
This was the funniest thing I heard all day which speaks volumes of how terrible today was. :(
The pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis of the Chinese written language.
Also see: Stacy’s worst nightmare.
PLANS FOR TODAY (in no particular order):
Reply to emails.
Pack.
Wander off to do other things.
Panic.
Pack some more.
Rewatch Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad in between panic sessions and packing. (I totally marathoned 9 episodes instead of sleeping. My priorities.)
Watch Taiwanese dramas in between Beck sessions because ohmygod, three weeks of slothitude and the occasional Chinese characters practice session [...]
I’m listening to Mandarin and Canto podcasts (because hi, I’m a dork) and trying to convince myself that no, I can barely handle Chinese (and my French has deteriorated from near-fluent in reading and writing from three years of no practice) so now would be a terrible idea to tart learning Japanese.
… All I know [...]
Aaand, it appears that my mom has decided that my sisters and I are unworthy. So, no bookstore and Chinese review session for me! (I can’t study Chinese at home. It’s ridiculous, but true. It’s like there are crazy forces at work in the house.)
Next best thing: Taiwanese dramas.
I doubt Chiang Laoshi would approve, but [...]
Bryn Mawr’s honor code about grades is so vague that I always feel a bit uneasy when discussing them. (When I talk to friends from other schools, I always have to remind myself that it’s normal to talk about them.)
In any case– here’s to being vague!– this was the hardest semester of Chinese yet and [...]
I’m currently sitting in Magill and getting distracted by the wicked cool Chinese calligraphy exhibit instead of, you know, actually being productive1. I am actually really impressed by some of the scrolls– one of them looks to be a scorpion and the tail is made up of Chinese characters. Another one like it is a [...]
Two things unrelated things that give me butterflies
1. Crushes/infatuations
2. Chinese oral exams
I feel like I have a colony of Monarch butterflies in my stomach.
MY LIFE MAKES SO MUCH MORE SENSE NOW. (Well, sort of.)
I finally decided to google “Malaysian Cantonese” since I speak Cantonese with a very heavy Malay accent. (When I was little, I had a Malaysian Cantonese-speaking nanny and I interacted with her more than my parents due to their work.)
I came across this page and [...]
(Credit: thatsparklychick on Flickr)
I have this insatiable craving for peppermint hot chocolate right now. Last year my parents got a pack of Stephen’s Gourmet Candycane Hot Cocoa mix from Costco. For some reason, no one else in the family liked it which meant I brought all of it to college with me! It was so [...]
Okay, so I’m looking over my Chinese 2nd Midterm test and noticed that my professor wrote “sorry” above one of my short (60-80 characters) answers. Upon closer inspection, I realized it was for the question “What do you look for in an ideal boyfriend/girlfriend” and I had written “我以前的男朋友對我不好，要是我新的男朋友是一個好人，最理想不濄了“(translation: my ex-boyfriend didn’t treat me very [...]
Listening to Chinese oldies and feeling a little homesick.
I grew up listening to songs like Yue Ding/約定 and Zhu Fu/ 祝福 and while the music isn’t exactly my cup of tea, it makes my heart ache. My dad is big on music so he had tons and tons of Chinese CDs and karaoke music videos [...]
