Jackie Chan

Here comes the end of this semester, I’d like to post some “interesting” stuff here. Don’t get me wrong, I do love to write about education, and I’m passionate about it. Just at this moment, I really don’t feel like want to think or worry too much about it, because my brain really needs some rest, and I hope you can relax yours while reading this.

“I’m not a superman,” he says. Forty three years, more than one hundred movies, Jackie Chan has broken his nose three times, injured his hands countless times, and lost track of how many times he has injured his knees. Indeed, he is not a superman but a tough man—a tough man who pursues the realest scenes with perseverance, who bravely performs his own stunts with courage, and who cares about even strangers with a warm heart.

Began with being a stuntman in Bruce Lee’s films at the age of eighteen, Jackie has devoted his life to Chinese movie industry. Since he determined to be an actor like Buster Keaton, who was also known to perform his own stunts, Jackie has insisted on producing the realest scenes for the audience. Till now, he is sixty years old, but his spirit of perseverance has never changed after all these years. Early when he was filming a stunt in 1986’s Armor of God, he almost died from missing a branch and falling 40ft to the rocks below because he wasn’t satisfied with the first shot. However, he didn’t give up but kept performing dangerous stunts himself and keeps risking his life as well.

He always pursues the perfect effect when he’s performing in a movie, though he is just a vulnerable human being. But still, he has been brave enough to bring his audience the best stunt. There was one stunt that actually froze his blood—it took two weeks for him to ease his nervousness. But still, he ended up succeeding and even making it more dangerous and challenging. It was the climax of the movie Who Am I?, Jackie slid down a total of 21 stories of a building on its slanted profile that travels from the roof to the fourth floor at a 45-degree angle. However, he was not satisfied with sliding just on his posterior, so he tumbles and even stands up and walks down it before falling forward and sliding head-first.

He is shooting a TV show recently, in which people who practice Kongfu compete against each other to be his students. Even though he has never known anyone of them, he shows care and love for them, he is like the big old tree who is concerned about those little trees that are growing up.He is a compassionate man with a warm heart. Every time he sees a candidate do a dangerous stunt, he looks worried. Every time he is told about how much time and energy someone spent in practicing Kongfu, his eyes are moist. Every time he watches a candidate get hurt from an accident in the competition, he bursts into tears.

As time goes by, deep winkles smile and cry with him, and his perseverance, courage and compassion have been doing the same.When the accident happened to one of his cameramen a few month ago when they were filming his newest movie, Jackie jumped into the sea to save him without hesitation. The man died, he cried and got injuries too. He was so sad and said, “I wish I were a superman as my fans always say, so that I could save him.” Don’t blame yourself, Jackie, you’re not a superman but a tough man— a tough man with a soft heart.

A Dying Tiger—moaned for Drink

This poem below is my favorite poem, I’d like to share with you here about how I view it as an excellent work.

A Dying Tiger — moaned for Drink —

A Dying Tiger — moaned for Drink —
I hunted all the Sand —
I caught the Dripping of a Rock
And bore it in my Hand —

His Mighty Balls — in death were thick —
But searching — I could see
A Vision on the Retina
Of Water — and of me —

‘Twas not my blame — who sped too slow —
‘Twas not his blame — who died
While I was reaching him —
But ’twas — the fact that He was dead —
(1863)

The first stanza describes the circumstance of the speaker and the tiger in the desert, which corresponds to her realistic life. After “I hunted all the sand”, “I” only “caught the dripping of a rock”. The fact is that the rock is less likely to have water dripping out of it if it’s in the sand. This indicates that even there’s only a small chance, there is still hope in the speaker’s mind. And when Dickinson wrote this, She was in her mid-thirties, and met the key medical concern of her adult life — eye affliction (qtd. in“Emily Dickinson’s Health”). Also, that is the most prolific time period of her poem writing. She might sometimes felt lost, but she continued writing. This shows she didn’t want to give up through it was hard to live without the use of her eyes, because it’s like walking and seeking for water in the desert. And this is exactly what she in the first stanza of the poem wants to express.

In the second stanza, the elaborate description of the dead tiger’s eyeballs corresponds to Dickinson’s attitude towards the disease. His “thick” “mighty balls” are a symbol of being strong in front of death, since its hardness is emphasized here. However, “I could see” but only “a vision on the retina of water and of me.” The Retina serves as a mirror in which “I” see the water in “my” hands and myself. It’s ironic here that the speaker could see while Dickinson couldn’t. Through she hasn’t give up, she is fighting alone. Because writing poems is the very one thing she enjoys a lot doing, it was “a kind of self-therapy” to her, according to Alfred Habegger who wrote My Wars Are Laid Away in Books: The Life of Emily Dickinson (Benfey). But her doctor’s orders for confinement in dim light, no reading, and writing only with a pencil explain why she called her first Cambridge siege “eight months of Siberia” (Sewall 76). This might be where her loneliness and helplessness came from. Yet she managed to write letters (in pencil) and confessed that despite the deprivations, “I work in my prison, and make Guests [poems] for myself” (qtd. in “Emily Dickison’s Health”).

Not until I read the last stanza did I realize this poem may also express her sympathy for people who died in the civil war. And she might be inspired by the death of Frazar Stearns, son of the Amherst College president, whose death at the Battle of Newbern, North Carolina, was a blow to the whole town (“Emily Dickinson and the Civil War”). The repetition of “’Twas” is actually Dickinson trying to explain who should be responsible for the tiger’s death even with water close at the speaker’s hands. She made a comparison between the death of soldiers in the civil war and the death of the tiger. The reason is neither “[I] sped too slow”, nor “[the tiger] died [before I got him the water]”, but “the fact that he was dead”. This reveals that in Dickinson’s opinion, it’s no one’s fault that the civil war broke out, that numerous soldiers died, because sometimes only circumstances can be blamed for a disaster. The sense of helplessness about the war is not only felt by Dickinson but also by people who barely have anything to do to stop it right away or bring their lost ones back from death.

Writing Outside Your Comfort Zone

I was copying and pasting all titles and links of my blog posts, and the number of them doesn’t seem right, then I went to every folders and found one that never gets published in the draft box, see what I mean? I really forget things a lot. Sometimes I feel that blogging is a great way to help me talk to myself and reorganize my brain. Okay, enough words, let’s take a look at what I wrote 25 days ago.

To be honest, this book impressed me.

Or, more specifically, this creative thought of writing in different formats impressed me. Probably because what I’ve been taught about writing is severely limited. I’m like a child who has spent her past 20 years in a remote small village for the first time stepping on the ground of a big city. In the view of this country girl, this book must be another boring one that keeps mumbling about taking the risk of using big words and writing long sentences. Now I’m worried about students who get education in China, because I came from that “remote small village”. It’s not that bad through, the education there just lacks creativity. And what I learned from this book is not how to write in different formats but the passion of creating new things. Also, not until now have I realized why only the “outside” is red while the other letters are black. Because it’s not just getting outside of the house, but the earth! I feel lucky that I was introduced to this book and I truly enjoyed reading it and keeping being inspired by it. The only thing is the design of its cover, it could be as creative as what’s inside it.

I’m Afraid I Get Lost

The final is coming, but I feel that I’m lost, perfect timing ever!

I thought I know what I truly want, but when what I thought I’d never care disappeared, my brain was blank and the only word I could find to describe myself was Pathetic.

After all that have happened, I still don’t learn the lesson.  Every time I fall into something slowly, yet I don’t see any sign of it. Even if I see something, I convince myself that it’s not true. And when I realized it, I want to slap myself for thousands of times for keeping myself from seeing the truth and being too confident about how much pain I can bear.

You see, time changes a lot of things, no matter how deep something is, it gets more and more shallow, and at the end, it surfaces.

I lost something before I got lost, and it was one month ago. During the past 30 days, I’ve kept my routines, and I got everything under control, but I really didn’t realize the quality of everything is lowered, not until this moment. Is this a normal thing that every human would do? I left my coat on the chair in the classroom, I couldn’t sleep at night, I make mistakes more often, I screwed my exam up……. The influence it has on me is unbelievably huge. And the question is how could I feel good all the time and fail to realize it?  I have been through worse, but the more I don’t want to fall in, the faster I fall in. My fear is keeping me from seeing the truth, which makes it harder for me to accept it when I have to face it. But I’m still afraid of a lot. I don’t even dare to talk about it, which is why I just wrote everything down and I hope I’ll feel better soon.

Technology in Students’ Hands

As I go to Preston Middle School to practice teaching, I notice that almost every child has a cellphone, a laptop, or an Ipad. I had none of those when I was at their age, and not until I graduated from high school, I got the first technological device in my life. Simply because they are banned in Chinese schools and are thought as tools students use to cheat. Also, the educators are worried that they will distract students from studying and keeping students from thinking, since they would directly go online and get the answers to tough questions given by their teachers. But here in America, kids are free to use the devices in their hands at early ages.

I think it depends on how the kids use the technology and their ability to control themselves. I suppose most of you would hold the same opinion, but another problem I want to present here is that how do we make sure the students are using the devices in their hands properly? How do we know they won’t wake up after everyone goes to sleep and play App games? We won’t be watching them sleeping. How do we know they are not searching for answers to the questions to get their homework done quickly? Neither teachers nor parents can watch them 24/7. I don’t think it’s a good idea to let kids access to technology before they understand the purpose of doing homework and taking exams. Because most of them really don’t. On the other hand, they like toys, cartoons, games and other fun stuff. Therefore, they also need help finding the balance between entertainment and studying. They need to understand why they are following the rules. And to reach that goal, the cooperation between teachers and parents are crucial.

My Shoes

I recently read a poem named “My Shoes”, its metaphors drew my interest at the first place. Walking humbly as the shoes do is the theme of it, and I’d like to share with you my understanding of the connection between its tone and the metaphors, and also how does Simic expresses his desire of walking humbly through it.

In his poem “The Shoes”, Charles Simic addresses his admiration for the shoes’ quality of being humble by comparing them with his “inner life”, and expresses his pursuit of “the only true likeness of himself” in the spiritual world.

The first stanza begins with an extended metaphor followed by mixed metaphors, through which the certain condition of the pair of shoes is emphasized:

Shoes, secret face of my inner life:

Two gaping toothless mouths,

Two partly decomposed animal skins

Smelling of mice nests. (1-4)

They are neither two mouths with sharp tooth, nor new products with the typical smell of leather. In the second line, Simic de-familiarizes the image of the shoes by comparing it with “gaping toothless mouths”, since it’s not a conventional comparison, it makes them animated and gives the readers a new sense of their images. Thus in the readers’ mind, the images of them is depicted visually as old men who don’t have teeth. This statement is not literal while the statements in the third and forth lines are literal, which helps to reach an effect of emphasizing the shoes’ worn condition and also how ordinary they are as other old pairs of shoes. Because they are made of animal skins as any other shoes are, and smell as bad as they are usually thought to be. However, they are still the “secret face of my inner life”, and this metaphor is extended in the following stanza since“My brother and sister who died at birth/Continuing their existence in you” (5-6). But more in a spiritual way, because their existence in the shoes “guiding my life/ Toward their incomprehensible innocence”(7-8).

The extended metaphor in which Simic compares his “secret”life (soul) with the shoes is crucial to the tone of the poem. Throughout the third and the forth stanzas, the way of extending it is developed from a material level to a spiritual level. In the third stanza, Simic compares the use of shoes with the use of books, in which his soul is “possible to read”(10). Because they are like “the Gospel of my life on earth”(11), which records his life from birth to death, “And still beyond, of things to come?”(12). Therefore, not only “my life on earth”, but also “my life beyond the material world” is recorded. Furthermore, the quality of being humble is made clear in this progress, and the tone of the poem also surfaces the water. The tone of admiration becomes obvious in the forth stanza:

I want to proclaim the religion

I have devised for your perfect humility

And the strange church I am building

With you as the altar.(13-16)

The shoes are compared with the “altar”, and a religion is also “devised” for their “perfect humility”, through which the extended metaphor is raised to a higher spiritual level. Since religion is what people deeply believe in, here creating a religion for the quality of being humble strongly expresses the tone of admiration for this quality. Similar to the comparison with the use books, in which “my” soul can only be possible to read, only when the old shoes are as a “altar” can “I” find the lost part of “my” soul back. And only by sacrificing “my” “inner life” and believing in the religion of the divine quality of humility can “I” form the “only true likeness of myself”(20) — humbly walking in “my” spiritual world as the pair of worn shoes.

In the last stanza, specific characteristics of being humble are concluded and reinforced, so is the tone of admiration:

Ascetic and maternal, you endure:

Kin to oxen, to Saints, to condemned men,

With your mute patience, forming

The only true likeness of myself.(17-20)

The extended metaphor continues by complementing the shoes as the “altar”. The simplicity and motherly protection echo to the shoes’ certain worn condition that is described in the first stanza. And what the shoes endure are actually what “I” desire to endure, because “I” want to be as patient as the shoes are and sacrifice “my” soul to form the “true likeness of myself”. This also reinforces “my” admiration for the quality, and my desire of having “my” soul filled with it. Because only being humble is “the only true likeness”in “my” mind, and only “me” walking humbly as the shoes do can the book of “my” soul be shared, can “I” find the lost part of myself back and can “I” form “my”pursuit of “the only true likeness of myself”.

Throughout the poem, Simic keeps making comparisons between the worn pair of shoes and his “inner life” from the material level to the spiritual level, in the process of which he expresses his admiration to the quality of being humble, and what it means to his pursuit of forming “the only true likeness” of himself.

Renee! Sweep Your Complicated Thoughts Away!

   This blog post is written to remind myself of stopping making things complicated. Because it’s sooooo wrong to even think of the possibility of kids doing something intentionally to take advantages of me.

I said in one of my past posts that I consider every kid as an angel, but sometimes they confuse me a lot, because I look at their behaviors depending on my 21-year experience as a part of the society. I couldn’t stop analyzing the ways they act and talk, and I keep thinking deeper and deeper. Here comes tons of questions, why did he whisper to her? Did he say something bad about me? Why did she ask me that question with a weird smile on her face? Was she trying to embarrass me? Why did they keep asking me random questions?

Renee, you really need to stop pretending that you consider every kid as an angel, because you don’t really think they are. Renee, you really need to get rid of doubting that the kids don’t like you. I know you’re a foreigner, I understand you’re not confident because your English is not the best among your peers here, and I get it that you’re worried that the kids may never like an Asian teacher. But stoooooopppp!!! You should have faith in both yourself and the kids. You said you believe that the kids are able to understand what unconscious racism is, and you succeeded talking about it with them in an interesting way. Why do you still not trust them? They might really don’t know what they are doing, or what their actions might mean to a foreigner who has a different culture. Now you are the one who failed to find your original self—-an angel. You don’t instinctively see the good side even in a group of kids. So seriously, stop, and I’ll keep reminding you of this.

Broader Sex Education

I was born and grow up in a country (China) where people are thought to hold more traditional views about this “hot” topic —sex. My parents had never talked about sex in front of me until I turned 18. And all I had been taught about sex at school was what male and female genitals are consist of in biology class. No one has ever taught us that using a condom is necessary or how to wear it. According to Chinese National Health and Family Planning Commission, on average, there are 13 million Chinese females accepting abortion every year, 1/4 of which are teenagers. The United States, however, as one of the developed countries, and is usually thought to be the symbol of freedom and be open to sensitive issues, hasn’t been open enough to handle this “hot” topic, either.

With concerns about teens’ health and curiosity of sex education in America, I started researching.

As the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) pointed out in its latest survey, nearly half (46.8%) of American high school students have had sexual intercourse, 34% of which during the previous 3 months. And 40.9% of them said they didn’t use a condom last time they had sex, which means high risk sexual behaviors are happening to a good number of adolescents. Either in China or America, these data terrify the parents and people who are concerned about adolescent health and the prevention of sexually transmitted infections such as HIV. And according to unpublished tabulations of data from the National Survey of Family Growth, many sexually experienced teens (46% of males and 33% of females) do not receive formal instruction about contraception before they first have sex. Yet still, sex education has never been  part of the Common Core curriculum.

  Backed up by sources I found in my research, I wrote a magazine article and in which deeply analyzed why sex education should be part of the Common Core curriculum. Here’s the link of it, I hope you enjoy reading it.

Broader Sex Education, Too Hot To Handle

The Angels in the Classroom Laughed at Me.

    Every kid is born as an angel. They instinctively see the good part in others, which I believe is true. Because they’ve never got to know how it feels to be hurt by others either mentally or physically, neither have they had a sense of how to hurt others. As they grow up, everyone and everything aroud their lives has been influencing them gragually and “quietly”. They don’t even know when or how they were changed. Therefore, I don’t blame any of the kids who made fun of me, a Chinese pronouncing “fifty” wrong. I felt shamed, and even humiliated though. I’ve learned English for 12 years, even though this year is the first year in which I literally started to speak it, I shouldn’t have made a mistake like that. However, I did expect the kids to understand that I may make mistakes, because I asked them to be my little teachers too when I first met them.

I had been disappointed since they did that to me, but I also felt that they are able to understand it’s not respecful to do something like that. I decided to try to teach them and remind them of who they are. I held a competition among them, and I told the winner would be the student who can memorize a short Chinese poem the fastest after I read it for three times. They struggled with it, and some of them failed. I asked, now you understand how hard it is to learn a second language, especially when none of your parents knows this language?  And then I told them what I saw in my physics class, that one of my classmates laughed at our Korean professor saying the atoms are totally small. They all agreed that this is not right, and became more concentrated on the class. It was a huge success, none of them asked me one random question as they usually do. They are still angels who maybe have been changed a little bit unconsciously,  and this is exactly what we as future teachers should do, we help them find themselves back.

In My Cultrue, Parental Control over Mate Choice Exists.

A lot of people have asked me, “why did you choose CSU?” My answer surprised most of them — “for my ex-fiance who had to break up with me because his mom doesn’t like me coming from mountains, because my home province is around by mountains as Colorado is, and mountains = poverty.”

It’s 21st century and I wonder how many couples were broken up for ridiculous reasons like this? It’s important for us adult children to understand whether parental control over mate choice is a good thing or not?

According to an article titled “Can Parents Decide Your Choice of A Spouse?” parents play a big role in our choice of partners. From the second a baby is born, there’s nothing that can be compared to parents’ unconditional love, and no responsible parents would want something bad to happen to their child.

Also, parents can see things children can’t see in a person.

Because children are easily to be blind because they think they are in love; Parents have experienced the same thing before us, and might have made mistakes that they would never want us to make. Their advice is worth listening to with patience(Amaraegbu). Little details that children fail to see before marriage usually become threats to the success of their marriages (Amaraegbu).

In a scholarly journal named “Parental Influence on Mate Choice Criteria”, Professor Sandhya reports that 63.91% of adult children who were their “respondents clearly state that they would prefer their parents to do mate choice for them”(3).

Children who listened to parents’ advice on mate choice feel happy because they think they paid back sacrifices parents have made for them.

Most of them ended up with living happily with the spouse parents chose for them.