Magic

The baby was born deaf, but got a cochlear implant. This is the first time in his life that he can hear. Look at how he reacts! Immediately turns towards his mommy, stops sucking, drops the thing from his mouth and starts smiling and laughing! =)

Life is fragile.

A family of three.  Mom, dad, both professionals, and their little boy.

A few weeks ago the dad got sick.  Every time he tried to eat, he would throw up.  Seeing how weak the man was, the doctor arranged for an ambulance to take him to the hospital right away.

After a bunch of tests, the man was diagnosed with stomach cancer.

Last week, the man went into surgery.  But the cancer has already spread everywhere.  The doctors couldn't do anything for him.  His last chance is chemotherapy.

He has 3 months to live.

*pray*

If you had 3 months to live, what would you do?

20 Years

So this past week was the orientation for the incoming Class 2012.....

When I stepped into the washroom during break on Tuesday, there was surprisingly lots of of people there.  Some (random) person was nice enough to tell me that all the empty stalls were out of order.  Seeing that all those girls were dressed in rather formal business attire, I realized that these were some of the new students to our program.  So I introduced myself and made conversation.

(Now that I think about it, this whole situation was quite strange on my part.  I am not the type to start random conversations with people.  Even if I know who they are, I don't usually bother.  So why the hell did I do that that day?!  I don't know.  Strange.)

Thursday comes along.  My class is on break again.  The new students are having their outdoor activity session.  All of us are standing by the window watching them, talking about how we did the same thing a year ago.  When those students took a break, some came inside.  All of a sudden, somebody taps me on the shoulder and pulls me aside.

At this point, I'm trying to remember if I met this person the days before.  Probably.  But I couldn't remember her name.  Out of the blue, she asked me if I went to some particular school.  Huh?  What?  How does she know that?!  Who the heck is she?!  And then she says we used to go to the same school.  What?  I went to that school for like a year.  And that was 20 years ago!

I was totally confused, trying to think who she is.  Eventually, I had to ask for her name.  C.  That rang a bell.  Standing in front of me was one of the first people that I met at school when I first came to Canada twenty years ago.

*shock*

Some person that I knew for a year 20 years ago still remembers me?!  Wow.  (Okay.  My name is super easy to remember.....as in if you get it, you'll probably never forget.)  But she said I look familiar.  LOL.  So I guess 20 years later, I still look the same as when I was 4 years old?!

To be honest, I never would have recognized her.  Even if I met someone with the same name, I would never even consider that it was someone I knew a long time ago.  And plus, she looks totally different.

It's pretty cool (and strange) to meet someone again 20 years later.

So.  My kindergarten classmate is classmates with me again.  20 years later.

Makes me think......

If I lost contact with all the people I know right now, and then met them again 20 years later, would I still recognize them and be able to connect with them again?

20 years later, who would still be in my life?

20 years later, what will my life be like?

360

As part of this year's orientation events, tonight we went to the 360 Restaurant at the CN Tower....

The view was awesome.  Unfortunately, the pictures didn't turn out any good.

(Side Note:  Last time I brought a camera to an event, I forgot to charge the battery.  This time, I forgot to switch the memory card, and ended up only having 128 MB of memory. -_-'')

As per Ms N's request, I took pictures of the food....

The bread...

360 Caesar Salad.....

Black Truffle Honey Glazed Boneless Half Chicken......

Hazelnut (I think) Ice Cream & Cake

It was pretty weird to see our program logo on the screens inside the CN Tower.  The food was good.  And like all of our events, there was some free drinks.  Unfortunately, we kind of ran out of time and didn't get to go walk on the glass.  What a waste!  I would think that the program office is paying around $100 per person for tonight's events.  (Yes...this is where our tuition money goes....lol)

Through the course of the evening, I finally had a chance to chat with some of the new students in our class.  And of course, I met some of the Class 2012 students.  There was a huge surprise also.  But more on that later.

Failure

A year ago today, May 24, 2009, I told myself to start over....

FRESH START

A year ago today, I was about to begin something new in my life (i.e. the grad school program I'm currently in).  Seeing that it was almost like a "next step" in my life, I told myself to put things behind me and start over.  I promised myself I would let go of all the relationship issues and move on.  I promised myself I would not write anything related to X on this blog anymore.

Quite obviously, I failed miserably.

And a year later, here I am at my desk tonight, reading up for the upcoming test, and listening/watching the V Day fireworks outside my window thinking of her again.....

There was a time when we made a list of things that we wanted to do together.  Watching fireworks was one of the things I (eventually) put on the list.

But it never happened.

Forty-Five Sunsets

'You know, when one is that sad, one can get to love the sunset.'
'Were you that sad, then, on the day of the forty-three sunsets?'
But the prince made no answer.

-from The Little Prince

The forty-fourth sunset came and gone.  The stars appeared and the sun rose again.

But only ever so briefly.

Waiting for my forty-fifth sunset...

Salute

While clicking around on Google News today, I found out that this past week was National EMS Week.

And I never even knew there was such thing until now.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/paramedics-job-proves-no-easy-task-for-reporter-94685264.html

http://www.torontoems.ca/main-site/news/news-video.html?page=773

Whenever people start talking about paramedics and EMS, I start getting tense.  Somewhere along the way, I realized I get rather protective of medics and their work.  I guess it's just become somewhat of a 'natural' reaction for me.  Partly because having done first aid work myself, I know how hard the work is.  Partly because I've watched someone very important to me go through the EMS training, certification and work.

So please...

If you're a driver, please get out of the way when the ambulance is trying to make its way down the road.

If you're a doctor/nurse, please don't look down on these amazing medics.

If you're a patient, please show some respect for them.

Little Prince

From Chet Lam's forum (http://www.chetlam.com/community/viewtopic.php?f=54&t=15147&p=33893#p33893).......

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返回星空

你我都曾經遇到過這樣的人：不明白他在想什麼，但你看見他的眼睛會說很多東西；有時他會做一些令你不明所以的事，說一些讓你摸不著頭腦的話，但會把你的思想搖撼，要不就決定拂袖而去，要不就重新估量自己一直相信的所有。

小王子就是那種人。他會問你一些直接從腦袋跑出來的問題，若你用慣常的生活邏輯去拆解，他會把你的安全島直接撞碎。面對這樣的人，我們當然會害怕；不是害怕他，而是他會讓我們害怕自己，面對一直不敢正視的問題，反思讓我們安於現狀的處境，什至選擇放棄那不敢承認的、用妥協換回來的生活滿足感。

他為何有這種能力呢？會不會就是因為他曾經看過一些我們沒有看過的東西？我們也看過一些他沒有看過的，所以這優越感應該可以互相抵銷掉；那會不會是他經歷過一些天外的故事，讓他變得跟我們不一樣？但我們在自己的世界裏得到的領悟都是獨一無二的，沒有人比自己更清楚學到些什麼。

那會不會只是他從一開始就沒有變的執著？他的感性超越了我們的理解，穿透地看到了一切，一直抱著初衷不放，而那種感性不是練歷而來的，卻是從一開始就存在；原來就是那純淨的、未經污染的、對快樂的價值觀與理解。這一切並不婓夷所思，因為我們在被規矩和系統訓練成為成人之前，就一直擁有：一種直視到底的能力，在每個人心裏都有的、天賦的、對純綷夢想嚮往的本性。

小王子，他並不是有什麼特異功能，他只是讓我們自己看到自己，或是看到自己不敢再面對的自己。

總有人拂袖而去。那些點燈人、國皇、會計師、醉漢、地埋學家…… 他們遇到了小王子後都照樣困在自己的世界裡，一秒復一秒，像鬼魂停留在還不放手的某個空間瞬間裡彌留著。

亦總有人忽地醒覺。選擇面對的人，會透過他的角度－自己的深層意識－重新瞭解自己的機師、玫瑰、小王子、 狐狸、蛇：原來內心被喚醒的機師還是不能放開小王子的離去，就像我們初次嚐到真實卻短暫的幸福後，忽然一切被奪走一樣；不懂珍惜被愛卻沒有選擇的玫瑰，就是我們向對自己很好，郤對他沒有感覺的人說抱歉；小王子一直深愛他的玫瑰郤非走不可，眷戀讓他執著，距離令他成長，就是我們學會接受現實和體諒別人的開始；深諳感情來龍去脈郤甘心被困其中的狐狸，就像我們愛上一個不應該愛的人，但仍然有意識地看著自己陷下去；只依本性行事的蛇是沒正沒邪的獨行俠，我們不能怪他的坦白，同時不能愛他的自由。

忽然，一直鎖在眉心的遺憾都好像有了註腳，我們不再不被瞭解，不再感到那麼寂寞……

暫時不再感到寂寞。要知道，當你開始醒覺，就會像Matrix裡Neo從虛擬空間回來時，駭然發現身旁滿是被蒙在鼓裡，軀殼在不自覺地餵飼吃人中樞機器的朋友；醒覺的路更難走，而你又會不斷嘗試找另一個層次的答案，更孤獨，更寂寞。

……之後呢？

狐狸親手闡釋了感情的進行式，為何他還選擇再冒險？玫瑰和小王子之間的信任問題解決得了又如何？我們對戀人和朋友的苛求、渴望、遷就、妥協都適應了，又能逃過機師或蛇的宿命嗎？愛一個人為了什麼？ 為了什麼？

日落是通往另一個世界的一扇門。小王子選擇不再追逐日落，而是踏過去，並且讓蛇把他帶走，除了天上的星星，什麼線索都沒有遺下；我們永遠不會知道他有沒有回到玫瑰身邊，還是開始了另一個旅程，發現了另一個層次的意義；但至少他讓我們重遇了自己，讓失落在年月裡的心活了過來，尋找下一個答案。

返回星空，旅程才剛剛開始


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Have you met your little prince yet?  That someone in your life who changes the way you look at the world and look at yourself?


This is exactly the way it is.  Somewhere and some time in your life, you meet someone who gives you a whole new perspective of everything in the world and somehow teaches you to understand yourself more so than ever before.  To some extent, this person wakes you up and makes you realize how the way you'd been living before was wrong.


For better or for worse?  I don't know.  All of a sudden, because of the little prince, life seems to have become a million times more complicated.  But at the same time, everything seems to have simplified, because you realize it's all a matter of going back to the very basics.


If only everyone could see things through the little prince's eyes......

5/21

Random things today......

First class for one of my courses.  The prof was quite energetic.  Except I think the stuff he taught confused the heck out of most people.  But, the material was highly mathematical, which is, of course, to my advantage!

Finally had the chance to chat with one of the new students in our class over lunch.  Learned that he's also originally from HK.  I don't know why, but this guy looks very familiar to me and I keep wondering if I've met him before.  But he's lived in Vancouver most of his life, so it doesn't seem possible.  Strange.

OM class was weird.  Guest speaker seemed kind of pointless.  Rest of the class was not the most interesting.  Having said that, I guess I should be thinking about these things for the simulation.

The drive back to TO was amazingly smooth.

Dinner and bubble tea was good.  Always nice to just hang out, chat, laugh, eat and drink!  And for whatever reason, time passes really fast even though you're not really doing anything in particular!

Some interesting conversations today......that made me think about a lot of things.....because everybody seemed to be talking about their ex's today. -_-''

MM told me how she felt guilty that MS was always driving in to sauga so that they could spend time together.  I understand why she would feel that way, but I would think that it's not really her fault considering she only started driving a week ago.  That made me think about my time with X.  I always felt guilty that she was always going downtown to meet me.  It really wasn't fair because it was like she was doing all the work and I was doing nothing.  A lot of times I wondered if she thought that I didn't care.  But, at that time, a lot of things were out of my control.

Had a brief chat with CC.  She mentioned her ex also.  It seems our circle of friends are starting to overlap.  But the most interesting thing was that when I asked her what she's been up to, her answer...."Nothing much.  Just being in love."  LOL!  Nice to see someone loving life so much!

V talked about her ex a bit tonight.  That got me thinking about things also......

So many things on my mind......

Somewhere Down the Road

Two months ago, I saw Amy Grant's new CD "Somewhere Down the Road" listed on somewhere.  Naturally, questions popped up in my head....

Why Amy Grant?
Why this CD?

For the past few weeks I've listened to this CD quite a few times.....

It all makes sense now.

This is so you...

Searching...yet humble, faithful, courageous and confident.

God bless.

5/20

Today's Organizational Behaviour class was about learning and perception. Naturally, one of the topics discussed was stereotypes. To add to the class, the prof showed a video...

The Office, Season 3, Episode 1: Gay Witch Hunt

This is the ending of the episode...

http://www.nbc.com/The_Office/video/gay-witch-hunt/116299/

It was quite awkward.  (But maybe you need to see the whole episode to really see.)

And even more so when my friend/classmate (who I know is suspicious of me) later sent me a message saying that she felt uncomfortable about today's class.

So does this really add something of value to the lecture?  Or just give people a good laugh?

at17 - Paranoid Android

May 15 2010
亞洲女子搖滾音樂祭
Rock'N Girl Festival Live @ Taipei Legacy



Reminds me of the 2005 show they did here in Toronto with Chet Lam. Paranoid Android was my favourite part of the night. Too bad I can't find a video clip of it now. This song is said to be one of the hardest songs to play on guitar, but they did an amazing job. Guess I haven't watched that many live shows, but that was definitely my favourite.

So many memories...

Rock Goo!

*faints*...can't get enough of this....lol

When I saw this video on fb, I re-posted it.  As expected, one of the replies I got was from B.  (I met B in one of my classes, but the reason we did strike up was because of the forum.)  B's comment....."we all miss rock goo".

And here is the die-hard hocc fan in me....

We all miss rock goo.  That is probably true for most people that have been following since the beginning.  Nowadays, whenever hocc does a rock performance, that's the most common comment.  What's interesting is that hocc no longer makes any replies to these comments.

A few years back when hocc first started straying away from this rock style, a lot of people would comment about how they like the rock style more and that hocc was going down the wrong path.  At that time, hocc would get pretty angry and, in response, leave some pretty psyched up replies about how music is not just about rock and that the fans can't expect her to stay the same forever.

Now, hocc doesn't react or reply to these comments anymore.  Why?

Because she doesn't care?  Because she's too good to reply now?  Because she doesn't see them?

I don't know.

But to me, there is no need for her to reply anymore because the meaning has changed.  Back then, when people said they want "rock goo", they meant it.  They wanted hocc to stay a rocker.  But now, all it means is that we still love seeing the rocker.  I think over the years people have started to appreciate hocc for more than just the (then) distinct rock style.  She's proved herself with all her unique and meaningful projects and music and most fans have a certain amount of respect for what she does.  It's not just about the rock anymore.

(If you're not a hocc fan, then you probably think that I'm totally insane.  Oh well.  That's okay.  As I said to my Korean friend who noticed via fb that I'm really into hocc, you have to be me to understand.)

Chance Encounter

Went out to buy stuff tonight...

In front of me in the line was a uniformed, asian, female paramedic.

Clash of the Worlds

Things that happened yesterday made me think of this video clip. Alice Wu talks about Saving Face, mentioning how in the movie Wil has compartmentalized her life.



The first time I saw this clip, I thought...that's exactly what I've done with my life...compartmentalized.

Family..
High school friends.
Undergrad friends.
Current classmates/friends.
Volunteer friends.
'Other' friends.
Work.

And even within those groups, there are further divisions.

Except for a few odd friends that have met my family, I have never let these different groups of people mix. Why? I don't know. That's the way it's always been. And I guess between some groups, there is potential for conflict.

Yesterday, two of these groups clashed. While hanging out with R (classmate), I ran into V and W (other).

I really wonder what R thinks. Seeing that my other friends are even more boyish than me must raise some questions in her head. It's pretty obvious. Why would me and my friends be dressed in a boyish way?! (Although that is a stereotype) I'm sure she's already made some conclusions about me. But regardless of what R thinks, I trust that she won't say anything to anyone else.

(Thankfully M decided not to come. If she did, she would ask me a million things AND go spread it out to the world. And ironically, she is now sharing an apartment with someone who she thinks is les.)

On the other hand, I still feel bad for not inviting V and W to dinner with me and R. I guess I've neglected them for the sake of 'protecting' myself. To me, it seems like I've just discriminated against them, when in fact, I am the same as them. Totally doesn't make sense.

But the thing is...

I've had different parts of my life clash before. And it wasn't pretty.

Different groups of people know me in different ways. Some know more than others. Some see sides of me that others don't. Am I being fake? Maybe some people would say that. But at this point in time, I don't know how else to make it work.

I'm already playing with fire. Don't want to make things more complicated than it already is.

Pairs

It's amazing how much can happen in the four months that we all went our separate ways for the work term......

C got married.
J got engaged.
M and M broke up and are back together again.

Every now and then I look at the people around me and realize that probably 80% of them are either married, engaged, or have a steady gf/bf.

*sigh*

And here I am......

Depression is contagious.

It seems like some of my friends are having a hard time recently......

A lot of people are starting to stress out about school.  There's lots of new material to read and learn and lots of work to do.  And this is only the beginning.  It'll get to me too, eventually.

M seems to facing a lot of pressure from the family.  About school.  About work.  About the future.  About marriage.  This is what got me off track tonight, but I'm glad that she told me about all this stuff.  I don't know how much I can help, but at least I can be a good listener and give her some support, because I am totally on her side!

J recently broke up with her bf.  She hasn't told me directly, but I've been seeing it on her fb/blog.  After all these years, it seems this time it really is the end for her and T.  This is so sad.  I still remember the days when me and R would help J send stuff to T.  I know it's been on and off for the past few years, but now it seems to be over.  J seems really upset and I've never seen her like that.  Kinda gets me worried.  Hopefully I can chat with her in the next few days.  Not sure if she'll tell me stuff, but it's worth a try.

Myself.  Same old.  Sad?  Not really.  Happy?  Wouldn't say so either.  Just...somewhere in between...as usual.  Just trying to survive.

But I hate seeing my friends unhappy.

=(

Bad Start

Fifth day into the term and I'm already procrastinating.....

About a month ago I started thinking about the fact that I need to hand in a work term report this week.

And here I am starting to write it tonight.  Two days before it's due.  And I'm still not very motivated to do this.

Awesome.

Side Note:  At this moment, while I write this, I'm listening to hocc's Dress Me Up album.  Almost forgot how much I love this album.  I think it was in 2002 that I started listening to hocc.  But it was this Dress Me Up album from 2003 that made me fall in love with her music.  (And now my mind has gone off on a tangent to think about things I shouldn't be thinking about......sigh.)

Darren Hayes - Walk Away

A song that makes me think...

Perhaps a little too much...

It's all because of these few lines....

Walk away now and be gone
You don't have to want to go on
I can see it's killing you
You don't always have to be so strong for me

Is it wrong to tell someone to walk away from you because you know you're hurting them?

If there were no words...

Heard this song while in the supermarket today......



Old old song from 1997.  But it means so much to me.

If all those seemingly impossible things in the song happened, can I still count on you to be there and understand everything that's inside?

Small small world

Once again, I realize how small this world is.

You can branch of into different directions, but in the end it always comes back to the same place.

5/1

It's absolutely amazing how some people will do anything to get back at you for something they don't agree with.

It's absolutely amazing that someone I've worked with for three years and thought was pretty nice can turn out to be so low.

I really hope that in the end everyone will get what they deserve.

The End and Beginning

Today marks the end of my first tax season, the end of my first work term, and the end of my first year in this graduate program.

Quite frankly, we pretty much did absolutely nothing today.  There was the odd times when we went over to the CRA or to the nearby banks.  But that was all good considering the great weather today.  Other than that, we sat around and just chilled for the whole day.

For some reason, today I really started to realize how much I enjoyed working here for the last few months.  I didn't like having nothing to do at the beginning.  The long hours and three weeks of continuous work wasn't exactly fun.  But overall, this is a great place to work.

The most stressful and happiest thing of the day was meeting with the manager and partner for evaluations.  Stressful because I really didn't know what to expect.  Happy because the result is that I've pretty much secured a job for the next work term and for when I graduate in about 15 months.

Originally I really wanted to sit down and reflect on both the last four months and the last year.  But I no longer have the mood to do so.  So forget that.

Now....this marks the beginning of another stressful school term....