Blog 10: My favorite novel

Among the novels I have seen, the Note Book of Robbing a Tomb is my favorite one. Though it is neither written by a famous writer nor be widely advertised, it stands out in the ocean of contemporary Chinese Internet novel. It is because it has so many unique advantages, Firstly, the description of people’s mentality and language is very appropriate and vivid. The novel is based on modern society, so it is easy for us to know whether what the people think and say is proper. When reading it, I can hardly find out what is improper or false. Conversely, I was totally attracted into the plot of the story and felt as if I was beside the stars experiencing the adventures together. I also admire the writer’s intelligent mind because the relationship of gains and losses between different characters in the stories are very complex. So the writer has to think out what the people may think in different situations. Secondly, the imagination of the writer is very excellent. The writer combined the history and imagination perfectly. He used some Chinese ancient mysteries, such as Nvwa, Chiyou and Huangdi’s stories and the real history of Country Lu in Zhou dynasty and Wang Canghai in Ming Dynasty which makes his imagination seem very rational and convictive. He also creates many different kinds of tombs with ingenious and grand designs with many kinds of zombies and many different ways to defeat them that you can never think out. Last but not least, the story is not superficial but has a very big hidden truth. The thought of the writer is so grand that I can hardly recognize it at first. The writer gives us clues in many details and lets us guess the truth gradually. Actually, after the first time of reading it, we will have a lot of questions so we have to think and infer through what we have known. This strongly increases the interest of the novel. That is some reasons why I love this novel very much. Actually, it has many other advantages that need you to appreciate. Only if you read it by yourself, can you feel that. Hope you can read it and have a good time.

Blog 9: An Amazing football match

I saw the final of the UEFA (the Union of European Football Associations) Champions League on the morning of May 20th from 3 am to 6 am. You may not know what it means. I will make a comparison to explain it. If the winner of the World Cup is the best football team with players from the same country, the winner of UEFA Champions League is the best team with players from the same club. So the final is very important for football fans and the two teams actually gave us a great treat both in sight and in thought. The two teams were Bayern Munich and Chelsea. On their way to the final, they defeated many strong teams, such as Real Madrid and Barcelona at the cost of losing many important players, especially Chelsea. Four important players could not get on court, so the experts all thought that Bayern would win the match. Actually, they guessed most of the game correctly. Bayern controlled the match from the beginning to the end and they got a goal at almost the end of the match after wasting a lot of good chances to goal. After seeing the goal, I almost wanted to go to bed because Chelsea could hardly get any chances to goal. However, the scream of the football announcer told me that Chelsea had made a marvel that they drew the score at the end of the match. So I had to stay up. Actually, in the overtime, Bayern got a penalty, but Robben wasted it. After that, they had to play penalty to decide who the winner was. You can hardly imagine that four years ago, Chelsea was in the same situation, but they lost the shootout. However, this time, they won with great morale and confidence, though they did not have any advantages through the match. From the match, I know that even if you have great advantages, you are not bound to win the match. The one who can seize the few chances but not the one who wastes a lot of chances is the real winner. The one who drags himself out of the tragic history and cherishes today’s opportunity can win. Because of the persistence of Chelsea, it became the champion and made me go to sleep 1 hour later with a wonderful dream

Blog 10:When you meet mean people

There is an element of truth that we need to believe that a lot of nice people are around us. However, we also have to admit there is a time when we meet those mean people.When it  happens, we need to know what is the right way to do.

There are people who come with their words like knives and they use them against us. There are people who come with their voice like nails on a chalk board calling us out. There are people who come with their switching sides and their wildfire lies and their humiliation. They like to point out our flaws again and again as if we have not seen them yet. I try to block them out because I know I can never impress them. Sometimes I may even come up with the idea that they will be scolded and will feel cold, but the cycle should come to an end. I do not want to be turned into a mean person like them.  All I need to do is to be strong enough so that they cannot hit me anymore. I just need to prove that they are wrong and that they know nothing about me.

This is how I should fight back.

Blog 9: When We Meet Aliens for the First Time

Blog 9: When We Meet Aliens for the First Time

Curiosity is the nature of human being. Columbus finding the new land is an exact case. When the technology develops into a new level, human cannot satisfy with the cognition of earth. The exploration of universe is a consequent trend. The complex feeling of curious and fear cannot stop the temptation of unknown space and the possibility of the existence of alien life. Movie is a way to spread the imagination of aliens.

I have watched the District 9 these days. The movie is set in a situation in which an alien space ship comes to the earth. The space ship stays in the sky of Johannesburg. It is convinced that that space ship is for mining and because of lack of energy and the wrong guide, it fell to the earth. The phenomenons on the ship almost die out and the survivors are most unwise labor. After human cannot bare the curious, they try to connect the aliens actively after the waiting of three months without any action of alien. It is absolutely out of imagination that the aliens are like refugees and stay in a really unhealthy status. District 9, the refugee camp, has finally been build up under the space ship.

Endless non-reward help and the disturbance of aliens make people there cannot stand them. The most important part is the discrimination of alien that the alien gain in vain. There must be a reason why aliens can stay here. That is benefits. A big company MNU wants to gain the weapon technology from aliens.

Aliens in the imagination of human ether from movies or novels are magical and with high-level civilization and high tech. But it is thoroughly not the same in the movie. The figure of alien in the movie is completely a socially inferior. In this situation, abomination, aversion and disdain spread among people. Thanks to the “human right advocates”, these prawn-like aliens will not go through the same disaster like Indian.

Scientist Hawking once has predicted what aliens will be like and said human should not explore the universe blindly. Only if the aliens who we find are with high level of intelligent, they may treat human as slaves. However, nobody knows when the best time to get contact with extraterrestrial life is.

Same as dreaming of flying, human are “lonely” now and are eager to find partners. At the same time, we had better to improve ourselves first. No one knows what the universe is like and whether there is alien. What will happen when we know the whole universe and what will us curious about?

Like many extraterrestrial theme films, District 9 is just an imagination. Without stars in it and take the form of interview and reports, District 9 achieves great success. If you are interest in it, it deserves to be seen.

blogger 9: Initial D----Jay's show

     Last weekend, I watched a famous film called Initial D, which tells a story about car racing and the development of a genius car racer. In fact, as a fan of Jay Chow, it was a pity for me to not see the film entirely before, although I have listened to the theme song. The name of the film may sound strange at first. The Initial D refers to the word Drift, which means a kind of driving technique---passing the turning without the revolving of the back wheels. This can help racers drive at a fast speed, even at turnings without lowering speed.
      When it refers to "car racing", people tend to think of the charm and excitement as well as danger. The main character in the film is a school student who helped his father send tofu early in the morning in his adorable car---AE86. Somehow like Jay, the character was a shy and humble boy. He never boasted how great he could drive although his talent was excellent, and even when he faced the girl he loved, he was too nervous to say a word. He led an ordinary life before he digged out his potential, and he was often beaten by his drunk father who was also once a promising car racer but he gave up his career and started selling tofu.
      The fisrt time Jay drove  his car sending tofu was when he was only a secondary student. He had to drive across a mountain which had a lot of sharp turnings. Gradually, he could master one of the hardest driving technique---Drift and spent less time finishing his task. When some part-time car racers came and  competed with him, he won by his outstanding driving talent. However, his fame spelt some professional racers who had much better cars. Jay was so anxious as he could not catch up with them that he drove his car breaking down. His strict father taught him that the most important thing for a racer is never to mind competing with others but yourself. If you want to win, the first and the last one the beat is yourself. This may sound contradict but it quite true, as if one always focus on winning other, he may be distracted by the results.
      After enlighted by his father and learning some professional knowledge, Jay managed to win those arrogent all-time racers. However, he found that his girlfriend was not perfact and even committed something that was not so graceful, he was so frustrated. Maybe this is the true feeling of youth, full of happiness and sadness, excitement and disappointment.
       When watching the film, I could still see the unmature big boy--Jay, who now is a 33-year-old super star. Recently, in the film---Green Hornet, Jay showed his talent in music and performing to Americans. Likely, in Initial D, I want to taste the authentic feeling of youth---challenging the extreme of myself.

Blog 8: My Favorite Card Game

When it comes to card games, I will think of the Chinese famous card game---War of Three Kingdoms, which is also my favorite card game. In three years, the game has been very popular in China or even some other countries. Why is this game so popular? Now, I will introduce it to you. It is a perfect card game with a wonderful combination of history and game. The game has four kinds of cards, which are character cards, identity cards, life cards and fundamental playing cards. As for the character cards, their designs are based on the historical incidents and stories and the characters are the famous historical people in the last few years of the Han Dynasty and the time of three kingdoms. Moreover, every character has its own special skills according to the history and even between characters there are restrictive or beneficial relations. Thus, when playing the game, we have a lot of fun because of the complex relations between different characters and in the meantime, we can have a much deeper memory of the history and greater respect and pride for our culture. There are two kinds of characters, which are civil officers and military officers. Civil officers usually have three lives and two skills and military officers have four lives and one skill. As you can see, the game is well designed to keep a good balance between characters. The fundamental playing cards are including equipment cards, basic cards and scheme cards. The variety of playing cars of fundamental cards strongly promotes the strategy and the interest of the game because which character uses which kind of cards at what time all needs your careful thought. Apart from the cards, I will tell you some other fantastic features of the game. There are four styles of games, which are identification game, one-to-one game, three-to-three game and one- god-character-to-three game. Among these styles, the most popular one is identification game because in this kind of game, every character has its own task. What they should do is to guess others’ identification and try to win with whatever ways. So it strongly increases the game’s enjoyment and usage of strategies. To play the game, we have two ways. One is to play online and another is to play with friends face to face with cards. Both ways have unique advantages. The online game has good background music and characters’ dialogues. Face-to-face game gives us opportunity to communicate with others and have fun. From the game, I have learned a lot of wonderful strategies which can also be used in real life. There are two things that make me love this game more. One is that I received a set of complete edition of cards on my birthday. Another one is that I gained a wonderful victory with my friend online to celebrate my birthday. I love this game so much. Do you love this game now?

Blog 9: Love Actually...

Love Actually…

Love actually is fearless. Love actually is an apology. Love actually is forgiveness. Love actually is inspiration. Actually, “Love Actually” is a Britain movie I have just watched.

This movie is composed of ten stories. It describes love from many aspects. A stepfather encouraged his little stepson to chase after the lovely girl whom the boy liked. A wife forgave her husband for his affair with his secretary. A man who was attracted by his friend’s wife buried his love deeply in mind. A British man fell in love with a Portuguese girl who cannot speak English. What is amazing is that the two, who had the language barrier, had communication in mind. All the ten stories seemed to be independent, but they are somehow related to each other.

What I have learned from this movie is that love actually is all around. Nowadays, with the tremendous pressure, people seem to be colder and are growing apart from others, and the world seems to be full of complaints and hate. However, when that disaster descended on September 11^th, 2001, people in the building, who clearly knew they were dying, did not leave any words of hate to this world. In their last calls, they told their friends and families how much they loved them and how much they appreciated this world. This has inspired me a lot and has made me believe that love actually is all around.

Blog 8: My Reflections on Genetic Selection

This week we have discussed about whether genetic selection should be allowed. There is a situation like this: the male members of a person’s family often suffer from a rare and unpleasant disease. That person would therefore like to make sure she has a baby girl. Personally, I think it is reasonable for her to conduct a genetic selection if the modern technology allowed her to do so.

First of all, it is different from knowing the baby’s gender through test. This case assumes that she can choose the gender. Therefore, there is nothing to do with abortion which people sometimes do when they do not get their babies of preferred gender.

Secondly, people want a girl or a boy for certain reasons. If parents want a girl only because they think a girl is quieter, the reason is surely not strong enough. However, in this case, genetic selection is for medical rather than for social. Surely there are people who can accept this kind of disease. I admit this is a very noble thought and I appreciate them, but we cannot require everybody to be noble. Wanting a healthy baby is not an immoral demand but a reasonable request. And if we can have one without hurting anyone else, why cannot we accept it?

People who disagree may argue that genetic selection goes against nature. I am not sure whether this is right, but I want to compare genetic selection with the law that does not allowed close relatives get married. This is common sense that close relatives cannot get married so that people can avoid some diseases. And most of us accept and follow this idea. Similarly, the purpose of genetic selection is also to avoid inherited diseases. To some extent, avoiding marriage between close relatives is just a kind of genetic selection. This law does not allow people to select directly, but it encourages people to exclude some genes combination. Now I want to ask, does this ban go against nature?

In conclusion, I think genetic selection should be allowed in the above situation.

Blog 7: Kindness

Last Sunday, I went to my host family’s house and then went out to fly kites on the Marina Barrage, went to the Botanic Garden to have a picnic and went to eat dessert and ice-cream on Orchard Road. I was glad that I successfully flew a kite and learnt to control it. I was also satisfied with the delicious dessert and ice-cream. However, what impressed most was the kind heart of Singaporeans. When we went to the Marina Barrage by taxi, we had to put our small handcart into the back trunk of the taxi. However, when we arrived, none of us remembered to take the handcart out before the taxi went away. After we realized it, we found that we knew nothing about the taxi and could not contact with the taxi driver. When we were all in desperation, the taxi came back and the driver returned the handcart to us. Without a word, the driver drove away with a wave and a smile. Another scene that impressed me a lot was the altruistic behavior of the hostess of my host family. When we went to the Botanic Garden by bus, it was raining. When waiting for the passengers getting off the bus, my hostess initiatively went forward and helped the people getting off block the rain by opening her umbrella between the bus and the bus stop. I was deeply impressed because this scene could only be seen in the movie for me before. What she received was a lot of “Thanks!” which I thought was the most valuable thing. What I gained was not only the great impression on my heart, but also the selfless spirit to others. I have been in Singapore for around five months and I have received a lot of help from many Singaporeans during this time. I might not familiar with some of them, but they still gave me a hand without asking for reward selflessly when I was in trouble. Because of their positive effects, I have learnt to be a kind-hearted and selfless man in the daily life. I think what I should do is not expect to receive but to give. I will try my best to do useful things to requite Singaporean’s kindness and love from now on.

Blogger 8：the cost of growing up

       this wednesday, we visited the science centre of singapore after the english progress test.after watching an imax film about the history of arabia，we wandered in the exhibition hall by ourselves. in fact, most of the things on display were not so attractive to us because we all have learnt about the principles of these basic science. therefore, most of us felt bored about the science show.

       when we were wandering aimlessly in the science centre, a group of primary school students rushed in noisily and messly. they were so excited that they kept running in the hall, touching anything that was within their reach. some of them found a set mirrors standing against wall forming a triangle， and they looked into the mirrors and saw so many figures that were doing exactly the same with what they are doing. when these pupils observed the amazing scene, they could not help screaming and laughing out, which made other pupils ran to the mirrors. one of my classmates saw this, and he just shaked his head slightly, signing：they are so naive and innocent that they should get excited about simple phenominon of reflection of light.
  
        his explanation was absolutely right according to what we have learnt in physics class, however, i felt somewhat at a loss when hearing it. i still remember that when i was 9 years old, my mother took me to nanjing science and technology museum. that trip gave me the first chance to see so many intereting and amazing things and it really impressed a lot. during the whole trip, i did not feel tired though i never stopped running and climbing, and everything was so attractive to me. it has been ten years since that trip, and now, i can hardly get curious about the things around me. if i have learnt about one.thong, i explain it. if i have not learnt it, most of the time, i just ignore it because the knowledge is not included in the text, and there is no need for me to learn it.

       i feel a little restless and even ashamed of my too proud thinking. in a famous book,
sophie's world, it is said that the fundamental element for becoming a philosopher is curiosity, that is to say if we want to learn and find more, we must keep curious about new things. unfortunately, we have grown up, and many a time in our daily life, we take all this as granted. when i was a pupil, i admire those university students, but when i have really become a university student, i have lost many things which i once have when i was a pupil.

       we cannot blame that the education we have received because the progress and process growing should be learning knowledge, perhaps, what we should do is to keep the curiosity we had when we were young, and i think that is the inner motivation to push us move forward.

Blog8: To Be or Not To Be

         Today we read an article Medical Technology and Bioethics. The problems of medical technology come into the picture and some moral and philosophical problems are brought up.

As the development of human society, the average life time of human beings extend to be much longer than just little more than twenties. Even if our ancestors live in the most environmental friendly circumstance, we still live longer now.

Perhaps this phenomenon is because of evolution but it is not important. Here comes another point in which we have modern medical technology to make us live healthier. The time of expend human life even longer is around the corner and we have the hope to keep longer life with the help of medical technology. In the way of living longer, matters like clone and maybe euthanasia (end life with medicine legally with the help of physician) appears. These issues were discussed among our group. Whether one have the right to decide when to end his or her life in the situation of one is suffering from serious disease which is hardly to be cured.

How long we expect to live is another issue we think about. In my view I do not want to live to long like hundreds of years or even more because I think it is too boring while Miss Waheeda came up with a new point that the living condition affected. This is the key element which influences the result that I draw. I regard long life is boring because that when I am old and useless, life does not make too much sense.

It is really good thing to think about it, only think can lead to improvement.

Blog7: I and Debate (including debate tips)

  I like and dislike debate at the same time. The first time when I came across debate was in my grade three, primary school. Although debate is not a formal one, I still find the happiness in it. Gone are the days. When I meet debate again is in the college.

  Debate is a kind of art in form of language, logic and team work. One must have the ability of logical thinking and is able to react in a short time. During the debate the debater should combines what he has prepared and what the opposite debaters say, finds out the weakest part of the opposite side, gives a heavy strike on the other side and then achieve the final success. I enjoy the logical thinking in it and prefer to defend and attack in language. The process of finding weak points is similar to solve a puzzle. The happiness is in it. A brilliant debater can not only win the debate but also give an excellent performance in the debate. He may use vivid analogy, site the history or story of famous people and persuade you in an invisible way.

  As I mentioned in the forward, debate is an art but there are something can ruin the art. The origin of my dislike is the topic itself or the debate. The topic of the debate must be a controversial one or there will be no sense to debate on it. Unfortunately I have the personal tendency to one side of the topic some time or even the majority agrees with one side. In this case, it is not interesting. Another point is that the debate does not have success or fail on the topic because the topic is debatable. There always be the case that one side does find the weak point of the other one and has given a fatal blow but the opposite side does not want to die because they have to insist. When things like this happen, the debate becomes bland. The third point is that debate is not a quarrel. It is much more like a hot discussion. It is a sad to debate with someone who is not polite as if he wants to eat you. These are the reason why I dislike debate.

  After all debate is a fascinating activity, hope everyone enjoy it. Meanwhile I will enjoy watching it.

  Here are my reflections on the class debate. (Personal opinion)

1.      In the statement affirm your point firmly without so many questions is better.

2.      It is a helpful way to take down note on what everyone says.

3.      Do not ignore opinions from opposite side, they will show you their weak point.

4.      The time when you do not have to speak anymore is not the end of your task. Write down helpful information including powerful ideas to fight back and opponent’s mistakes and pass down to your teammate, this will help.

5.      Summarizing is to take an overlook of the whole situation including contradict opposite side and confirm your stand. In this occasion, examples are not powerful enough and take much time.

6.      Langue is your weapon not the gesture. Show respect to your opponent.

7.      How to speak is important. Speed, tone should be proper.

Blog 7: Sociable or Sincere

Although I do not use my English name now, I do have one which have accompanied me for over five years. I have chosen Vera as my English name for it symbolizes sincerity. This is the character which I attach most importance to. Moreover, I used to think that sociability was always to the contrary. As a result, I found it hard to choose majors that are closely related to sociability.

I still remember that Xiaoxu once did an oral report about high EQ. At that time, I asked her a question whether it is good for people with high EQ to hide their true feelings and opinions. I always thought that these people, to some extent, were hypocritical. In my view, I thought they led a tiring life wearing their masks. However, the answer from Ms Waheeda and Xiaoxu changed my opinion. They said that sociable people do not hide their feelings but express them skillfully and gently. This is totally true.

Now I am on the crossroad of my life. I do not know to choose Faculty of Science which is more relevant to doing researches or other faculties which focus more on practical skills. I am still confusing. However, the fear of being sociable is not a block in my way anymore. I know that sociability and sincerity are not opposite. People who are sociable are just showing their sincerity to keep friendship.

blogger 7: One Person Can Really Change the World------iGenius, How Steve Jobs Change the World

     Today,I watched a documentary called "iGenius,How Steve Jobs Change the World". It is a comprehensive review on the short lifetime of one of the greatest man in the world--Steve Jobs, and the title of the passage is a comment on him which has really impressed me a lot. After watching it, I really feel inspired and motivated by his splendid experiences.
     At first, I just thought that Steve Jobs was only a successful businessman whose company has designed many popular products. Perhaps, it is also a coincidence that the research topic of our group is "the popularity of Apple products". However,the program has told me that Steve Jobs is definitely not only a businessman but also a genius who has changed the world in his own unique way. His success is based on his character besides the fashion of computers. He is described as "focused, intense, driven", and some even say "mean", but his aesthetic view point has spread throughout the world--simple.
    The most impressive description of him is "he cannot tolerate mediocrity"; I love this phrase"cannot tolerate mediocrity" because it explains why Steve Jobs pushed his team to the edge and beyond, and that also really motivated me. I learnt that I should never compromise with laziness and excuse; all I need to do is to spur myself up to keep looking for what I really love and insist on my dreams.  Just as he said on the graduating ceremony of Stanford University: "As with all matters of the heart, you will know when you find it". If one wants to be outstanding, he must say no to mediocrity.
     Another inspiring spot is his words: Stay hungry, stay foolish. Here, "hungry" does not mean the feel of one's stomach; it refers to the desire to learn knowledge as one is hungry. "stay foolish" also asks us to "stay humble", to learn from others. It is a fact that Jobs did not invent computer or MP3 player, but it is he who has managed to make the device more user-friendly, and this is the revolution of computer all about--touching people. By learning from others, he got the idea of promoting mouse and the pattern of listening to music. When he knew the serious disease in his body, he knew the limitation of his life, so he put more effort in designing and developing new products.
         Now he has left us but every time when we use iPhone, iPod, iPad and Mac, we should pay our respect to the iGenius--Steve Jobs, a genius who has changed the world by his own. Everyone can learn from his inspiring story; not tolerate mediocrity, stay hungry, stay foolish.
         

Blog 6: My Discovery in the Singapore Zoo

Last Sunday, we went to Singapore Zoo to have our study of service learning program. At there, I gained not only the primary methodology of a successful service for others, but also a new realization of a wonderful zoo.
I found many differences between most Chinese zoos and the Singapore Zoo. However, I think the biggest and the most important difference is the distance between people and the nature. The difference is shown in many aspects.
First of all, Singapore Zoo provides more possibility for people to communicate with animals. Sometimes, it seems as if we are the ones being watched by animals but not the animals, especially when we walk on a narrow road through a jungle or a bush because most of the animals are living in habitats free and comfortably without a limitation of a cage made of iron wire. For instance, when I got out the lecture hall, I amazingly found that there were many bats sleeping soundly above my head. When I went across a bridge, I saw some crocodiles having sunshine bath comfortably. I also saw some orangutans doing some difficult movements like some gymnastic athletes on a rope above. Two Great Tortoises were lying on the ground without any movements like big stones near us. Some small kangaroos were palying and taking photos with people. Two white tigers were having a bath in a pond not far away from us. The natural and relaxing environment really impressed me a lot. I could imagine that if the tigers do not have danger to us, we could even take photos and play with them. To sum up, the zoo gives people more chances to be in touch with the nature and close to the animals.
Moreover, many buildings in the Singapore Zoo mix well with the nature. I saw that many houses were made of wood and had the same colors with the surroundings. What impressed me most was the toilets because they were well decorated in many details. The washbowl looked like a root of a big tree and the partition was like a fence made of small trees. There was even a fish pond in the toilet. All of them made us feel as if in the wild nature far away from big cities without noise and pollution.
As we can see, the Singapore Zoo makes people closer to the nature and let people enjoy the experience of communicating with animals. Actually, these are what we really want in a zoo. Thus, there is no doubt that the Singapore Zoo is so popular.

Blog6: Who Watch Who

  Have you ever noticed that when you go to the zoo to observe animals, some of them are observing you too? Perhaps this idea is amusing, but it is the truth. When we regard ourselves as the most important, we will ignore many important things.

  Today I went to the Singapore zoo to see the animals. One of impressive things was that most of the animals were not in the cases and live freely. They should live in nature more freely but as a zoo, it had shown enough respect. Animals lived on an island and were separated from us by a small river or the distance in space. There was an area in which orangutan can play freely without limits of space which is unique in the world. I have heard about a kind of zoo in which human is in a car and animals are outside. All of this kind of zoo shows the harmony among humans and animals. However I do not want to share this point with you here, for there was already a blog in which the point was stated.

  What I noticed today was a lion, which stayed outside the house that I was in. The lion looked gentle and did not move too much. The reason why I noticed it was that it was looking at people in the house. This causes me to think. I go to the zoo to observe the animals and saw only a few, but the lion stays there and see large amount of different people every day. Perhaps it is the nature reaction of a lion to watch the living things or moving things. Assuming that the lion has a little intelligent, it also observes human. We cannot regard ourselves as the owner of the nature. We are merely a part of nature. Human does have intelligent but it is just a feature of human. The lion interesting for us and to the lion, we are also interesting.

  We, human, are consuming nature resources and have made huge improvements in building a civilization. We hardly cannot do anything and have achieved a lot already but we do not show enough respect to nature which we rely on. Along with the development of human beings, here come a lot of problems. It is time for us to think about the behaviors of ourselves. Although there are still suspicions towards whether the human activities affect the nature environment, we do have had adverse influences on nature. The reason why we still damage nature is that we regard human as the highest class feature.

We are not special and we are only the result of nature. Show respect to nature and we will live better because we are a part of nature.

Blogger 5：Youth

    Today I read a passage on the Internet. It is written by a teacher focusing on how to spend our youth. At first, I thought that the teacher might just remind their students to make good use of time and put all their efforts into study just as what our teachers had told us in school. However, what he said is really beyond my expectation and has impressed me a lot.In the passage, he simply tells us to live our youth in what way we want.
    One day, one of his student who has graduated from school for many years wrote a letter to him to ask for his advice. Although the student performed very well in school and has a good job in a company, he still feels that he cannot get true happiness in his life and he even does not know the meaning of life despite the wealthy and successful life he is leading now. In the letter, he told his teacher that when he looked back on his youth he spent in his middle school and high school, all he could remember are study and the pressure put on him by his parents and teachers. After hearing this ,the teacher fell in deep thought: Is it right to ask all teenagers to spend all their time in study? Is it the only way to pass one's youth which is the most valuable period in one's life?
      It is undeniable to admit the significance of education but significance does not mean necessity. The teacher thought about the question which had also puzzled him for years.As last, he draw this conclusion: you have plenty of time to compensate for the crazy things you did in youth, so why not enjoy your youth by living an ideal life you like? Frankly speaking, such thinking has really shocked many netizens so people begin to think over the old topic: How should we spend our youth that we will not regret later in our life?
      As far as I am concerned, there is no absolute right answer for this question and it is extremely difficult to lead a life that one will not regret. In fact, all we could do is to make full use of our time we are spending now but not only spend it on studying. Do the things that you think is worth of the time and effort that you put in it.Although we have youth only once in life, we can keep young as long as our minds are energetic and full of fresh ideas. This is the life that I am looking forward to live.

Blog 5: My Reflections on the Personal Space

Recently, Ms Christine asked me a very interesting question. She asked me whether I would allow Xiangyu to whisper something in my ear. At that time, I said that I was ok with it. To my surprise, my answer aroused controversy. Some classmates found this action,which is quite common for me, might be too intimate.Therefore, I have thought a lot to find the reason why we have this divarication.

As far as I am concerned, it is about the personal space. Everyone has his/her own opinion about personal space. Some people demand greater personal space,which means they will be bothered if people come too closely to them. But we do not share the same feeling.That is why we sometimes offend others without being aware of it. For example, in China, many people believe that the more hospitable they are, the more satisfied their guests feel.On the contrary , guests will become unconformtable if hosts give too much concern. It is because some guests may think their own spaces suffer from invasions when people pay much attention to them. Therefore, to avoid such embarrassment and trouble,we need to be considerate. We should never take what we think is right for granted because it may be offensive in other people’s view.

In general, being aware of the personal space of those around us and being considerate of how our actions may be intrusive is a golden rule of the social life.

Blog 4: Cycle and I

There is a saying that ‘Life is based on sport’ and I like sport. When I was three years old I began to ride a tricycle and at the age of 4 I learn how to ride a bicycle.  From then on, bicycle became one of the most important parts in my life. I love cycling because it feels like fly. I began to go to school by bike from grade three in primary school. Till now I have ever had four bikes and the last one is Giant, a Mountain bike. In my 10s, my father ever rode with me to my grandmother’s home, nearly 20 km away from mine. When I’m in high school, it takes me about 10 minutes every day to cover 2.2 km, as I measured accurately, from home to school. Cycling is also an enjoyment for me. I ride along the river feeling the fresh air and viewing green plants. One time I covered 36 km to get to my friends home. I feel great except for pain in my butt. Also in a hot noon with strong sunlight, I covered 40 km without having lunch. In my memory, I have ever felt angry and went for a ride to release myself, for it makes me happy. Bike is my best friends. I love cycling. I love sports.