today i baked..... a french apple tart, choc chip cookies and decorated a gingerbread house... had a rich but delicious dinner and strawberry jello cream cheese dessert.... AND... am gonna have a piece of tart and pumpkin pie and ice cream for dessert in a while.... how many calories!!!

Happy Thanksgiving

this shall be my first (but also last) truly American Thanksgiving here, cos i'm gonna head down to LA tmr morning to stay with my UCDC roommate (and her family... and her cats!) till Saturday =) and am going to go to Disneyland for the first time ever (so suaku right haha) and of course, will get to see Courtney again. kinda miss her actually, though i'm also reminded of the occasional 'harrassment' i received throughout the semester... =P sigh, it's actually a break i can ill afford, but perhaps really do deserve and really need. i shall toss away everything's that bothering me for 3 days... hopefully.

though i've tried quite hard this sem to not get upset too easily, i sometimes feel like my self-comforting mechanism gets overused... and breaks down from time to time. and sometimes at the most untimely moments, too. yet i prob only have myself to blame that i also wun want to cry on any available shoulder kind souls might be willing to offer...

"You visit illegal websites"

sitting in VLSB and just finished most of my history response paper. and just got this seemingly intimidating email with the above title. it's obviously some kinda virus email, but perhaps i'm exceptionally wacky after 2.5 hrs of writing or so and decided to look more closely at this virus email...
ok so the sender is "Department@fbi.gov" and so just these two bits of info made me 10% scared when i first got it. but as i thought a little more about it, it seems almost laughable that they think their recipients would fall for their ploy. Firstly, if i really committed some crime visiting "more than 30 illegal websites" why would FBI care about such petty crimes and why would i be so 'easily let off' by answering the questionnaire they attached with the email? Secondly, Department@fbi.gov actually makes little sense.... so vague, so many depts... highly unlikely that any or every dept's gonna give a damn (i dun usually use such phrases, but just for the sake of flow for this sentence =P) whether you surf illegal websites? What's interesting though is that they included a Washington DC address and phone number... i wonder how authentic that is. but aiyah what i mean to say is that if you invest so much energy creating some lethal virus, at least invest more time in making it sound authentic right? else waste so much energy and no one gets the virus cos it seems like a horrible joke....

alright i'm officially bo liao. i should take a break and go for lunch..... =P

i just spent most of the weekend trying to learn about 2 decades of Chinese history in order to piece together yet another history response paper... though eyes feel extremely strained, i feel extremely happy and def less ignorant about 2 of the most interesting decades in twentieth-century China... and if anything, it also made me realize the havoc bad government policies can wreak... though consequences were mostly unintended. and i dunno, i think i really have a 'soft spot' for good English... i also liked the book partially because the writer writes really well... =P hopefully one day i can unabashedly say that about myself...
i'm really spending a disproportionate amount of time on my history class... but i also feel like in history i learn a lot more on my own. these days lectures have somehwhat deteriorated into watching documentaries in class and everything i've learnt recently about the Mao era i picked up from the readings assigned... whereas for things like Econ, i really do learn most of the stuff in class; somehow i cannot imagine myself spending hours and hours reading up on free trade agreements etc haha. i dunno, for history i really process a lot of things on my own whereas for Econ it's more passive; i'm told a lot of things but haven't spent that much time thinking over deeper stuff on my own.... i'm such a bad Econ student =P

my previous post led me to think randomly about religion; it seems like ppl who are religious set the percentage for 'fate' (or in this case, their faith?) at a pretty high level? not to be offensive to anyone, but i just don't see how one can live thinking your whole live is planned out by some 'higher being'... well maybe i have some fundamental misconception about religions cos i don't really care much for it at this point and consequently never bothered to really delve into it; but you know, it really beats me how some ppl can be SO religious.... it becomes kinda freaky.

on the other hand, even though i believe that perhaps 5-10% of stuff you attribute to fate, isn't it so sad that you just can't change that 5-10% of the things you wish you could change and you're just powerless to influence... but i guess it's a really bad idea to get really sore and upset over that 5% of stuff though it's so tempting to. such is life. =( and then there are things lurking out there, out of that 5-10% that you don't know exist that will one day turn your life upside down... and cos we don't constantly think about that we think it doesn't exist.... alright, i'm getting carried away.

just wrote a paper analysing this Chinese film in which fate seemed to be the ultimate determinant of one's lot... and argued for it so much that i suddenly am led to believe that it really is true. some things just aren't fated to be.... and no matter how well things are going, everything can just disappear overnight. well but of course we should prob attribute say a 5% chance to fate. but always bearing in mind the small possibility... and i guess it's also good to designate say 20-25% to variation of innate characteristics/abilities across individuals... then remaining 70% or so bear in mind we have the ability to change... if the former two percentages are too high it's probably rather tempting to grow lazy or gradually lose control of our lives/lose motivation...

actually feel quite lost and tired and am freaking out as propspectus deadline draws near. but will try hard not to give up... sigh it's not like i haven't been working on it; i think i have been counting too much on what resources other ppl can provide me with; or reading papers with studies too complex for me to undertake and really not spending a lot of time on thinking over what I can undertake nor spending enough time thus far to hunt for data available for that purpose. sigh. i really am not very good at this...

hmm on a lighter note, i finally have enough miles to redeem a flight to Europe! and encountered the most amusing Mileage Plus representative ever; esp when he ended the conversation with something like this "we're open 24 hours; we don't sleep you know, faster that way" or something in his thick Hong Kong accent (or something similar), i really felt like cracking up but had to suppress laughter cos it was obviously quite rude... and he really tried to be as helpful as possible.... i really have nothing against ppl with Hong Kong accents, nor do i want to intentionally ridicule ppl with HK accents, but cos usually these reps speak with either Indian or American accents it was just kinda funny cos i felt like i was talking to some elderly, fatherly Asian person... and at times he did seem to display such mannerisms too... like gently reminding me what i ought to do, what i ought not to do... and getting 'audibly' irritated that i didn't seem to understand certain letters he tried to pronounce when giving me the reservation code( i really tried... and was quite embarrassed too that i took a long time to get F for France.. i kept saying... S for Swank? till he was F for France, F for Friend! etc etc.... bleah)

ps: actually i'm to blame too lah. my brain prob wasn't working properly... who thinks of S for swank?!! =P

am confronted by numerous deadlines and readings this week and i'm not in good shape... it seems to always be the case that when i have the most work i am also not in the most studious of moods...
nor the most awake of persons ha. (if there's such a phrase) but despite being not very on task, i feel extremely human.

the little fella turns 4

it's a challenge to get kids to keep still and so i can never get a good picture of Kai... and so the usually handsome him turned a little double-chinned jumping up and down in this picture... anyway, i got him the Cal hoodie he's wearing! =P

i did a lot less work this weekend than what i had planned to thus far... but an evening out with good company and a night wasted online yesterday made me really happy... if only everyday were like that... sigh, i seriously have self-control problems.

2nd babysitting experience today....

Shi Min: hey you want to go out for a stroll?
Kai: yeah.... i need exercise...... let's take the stroller!
Shi Min: (in questioning tone) the stroller..?! can't you walk?
Kai: nah.... (hmm whatever happened to acknowledgment that he should exercise...)
and so it ends up that the guy who wanted to 'exercise' sits comfortably in stroller i spent ages trying to open, while Shi Min wheels him around neighborhood for a while, at times giving in to his whims (eg. hey let's go fast down this ramp!) and naturally, ends up getting ALL the exercise... even though at times he tried to trick me into going to get candy (hey... why don't we go to the gas station?) certain things he says are just so cute it's just so funny =P

somehow, while watching pride and prejudice today, i also couldn't help noticing all the high-waist long dresses the girls were wearing, esp those Keira was wearing... they actually look kinda plain, but at times they really do look just so simple and elegant... then bunch up hair with tiny white pearls in head... aaah so sweet. hmm but of course you hav to hav the right figure, the right looks etc etc..... else might turn out looking er.. rather odd i guess. =P

though i foresee a weekend of work ahead, little treats shall serve to motivate me. shall try to catch the new Pride and Prejudice starring Keira Knightley (who looks so charming in the movie poster...) and cos it was one of my favorite Jane Austen novels... ya lah. back then i really bought into the Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet romance, though i dunno what i think now. i'm prob very cynical haha. anyway shall try to reread it one day.
and i'm gonna try two new restaurants over long weekend. and i just made myself very happy by redeeming my $25 Amazon certificate 1 hr ago. and just received an email from an elated sis (because she got selected by NIE to be a primary sch Chinese teacher) and i really do share her joy...

guess trying to delight in such simple pleasures can make me a happier person...

Nerdy unhealthy Shi Min (eww. sounds gross haha)

ha so i've been accused of being nerdy. ya, i'm kinda nerdy these days. and i have to be, really, else i will prob accomplish nothing and graduate with no honors at all... and.... the scary thing is... i kinda enjoy being nerdy! i feel happy when profs email me back, telling me to go for their office hours. ha. well... i think it's tiring though. i'll be SO happy when i'm done writing my prospectus.... then i will have to hope very very hard that it gets accepted. in the meantime, it's still more reading and narrowing down of topic...

decided to be healthy and turned up for this "Abs and Back" class at the RSF today =P and it really lives up to its name...the baffling thing is everyone else seems to be able to do all the exercises with relative ease... and i seriously think that ppl who go for these classes really exercise regularly and so it's not surprising that they can keep up with the routine... and they prob do so to look good rather than to lose weight or something, cos almost everyone was slim and toned! felt so embarrassed haha. i'm prob one of the few i-feel-flabby-today-so-i-shall-do-25 min-of-exercise-today type there. nmind good thing i didn't know anyone there. though somewhat strenuous for me, it was kinda fun actually cos the instructor's this big black guy and he comes around 'intimidating' you (in good humor) when you don't seem to be pushing yourself hard enough.

i just sat in an interesting book discussion, well worth the 30 min or so spent trying to find a parking lot near campus in the rain and another 3 min or so of humiliation and extreme guilt when i finally discovered a spot and then did an illegal turn to secure my spot (holding up traffic for like 2 min or so cos visibility was low and i suck at parallel parking.....)

so. anyway, i thought Jung Chang was an interesting character... and somehow Westernized Asian ladies are especially unpredictable (as in you can never really tell from their looks if they are totally Americanized/"Britainized???" (Since JC lives in London) or still fobbish or in between, just like how i mistook my History Prof for some housewifish figure in my first lecture). hmm ok i've digressed again. back to JC. anyway, when she first stepped in she reminded me of a Chinese version of a local female politician, with her straight, waist-length tresses...ha. the most interesting parts, for me, was how despite moderator Orville Schell's attempts to tease out something new and perhaps more neutral from the authors, I don't think I recall any occasion where they deviated from the argument they made in the book... even when JC was forced to acknowledge that women won more rights under Mao's regime, she had to add that that's cos the ultimate aim was to make them available as laborers... there was also some obvious tension towards the end after the Q&A session started.... and i thought one of Jung Chang's responses really dented her credibility.... i think at some point she really tried to defend her book, and almost insisted that what she presents in the book is "the truth" and that she felt obliged to present the "truth" to the people...just as what the moderator tried to hint at, if her documents are really as authentic as she claims they are, and that all of them lead to the conclusion she and her husband eventually arrives at, perhaps there's no need for them to reiterate the point over and over again? hmm i mean i'm sure not everything in the book is fabricated... but i thought it seemed pretty clear that she has personal grudges against this man...

just spent a good 2 hrs preparing dinner and trying out a new baked salmon recipe =P also ended up having so much (rich) food to myself that my landlady couldn't help remarking, "you're having quite a gourmet dinner there.... is it your birthday or something?" haha. that's prob cos i dun usually cook very fancy stuff and can easily whip up something (i myself find) edible in 30 min or so... =P i've been pretty adventurous with my meals the past few days... really want to make chawan mushi one day... unfortunately fancy home-cooked dinners take up time and money... =(

Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, authors of a new biography on Mao, will be at Berkeley tmr evening! (ok dun think it's that NEW; it's new in the sense that it only hit the stores in the US prob a couple of weeks ago) Here are the details, if anyone's interested. think the name 'Jung Chang' should be pretty familiar to many ppl, cos she's the author of Wild Swans (a novel that was pretty popular about 7 yrs ago and which seemed like a must-read novel for many RGS girls then... it was on my reading list some time ago too but cos it was like four five hundred pages long i never got down to reading it... =P) anyway this new biography is apparently very controversial, for painting (according to critics) an overwhelmingly negative picture of Mao... the general take was that it's well-researched, yet it's such a shame that the authors (once again, according to 3 reviews i came across) seemed only bent on using all these documents to convince their readers that Mao was 100% megalomaniac, discounting whatever notable achievements he did also make... doubt i'll hav time to read it myself, but anyhow, it should be interesting to sit in the session tmr. =)

i turned a 3-hr "Ma-Ri-A!" this evening when my landlady and landlord decided they needed to talk and so went out on a "date"... wah, shouldn't' it be the other way round?! haha no lah. i'm too unhappening. and they wanted to get a surprise birthday present for Kai...
so i watched this funny kids video and a sled dog movie, which i actually quite enjoyed ha. but what i found funny was that in both videos, there was some 'side-kick' character... speaking in some funny Indian accent... aiyoh. wonder if that was intentional or something or am i just too sensitive... hmm i feel like these days i hang out with kids more than i do with adults... and you realize they aren't just 'kids'.... every single one of them has his own character... and autistic kids are especially interesting to work with (though i really haven't had that many chances to work with them)
yesterday i did a home visit with a kid tutors have described as hyperactive and more 'violent' but surprisingly i found him pretty mellow and sweet. and whenever he wanted something, though he doesn't know how to tell me, he just picks up my hand and puts it on whatever he wanted to get... and then think his toe was itchy or something... then he just led my hand to his little foot and wanted me to squeeze it or something... u know sometimes i think nonverbal cues can express so much more than words...yet it frequently gets 'overshadowed' by 'loud' and attention-grabbing vocalizations... only after observing and working with autistic kids was i reminded of the power of body language... at this stage, i think i'm totally over this "oh kids are so cute" phase... if anything, i've learnt that they can be rather bratty and annoying if they really want to be. but it's their frankness, innocence and lack-of-fakeness that draws me to them... dunno.. ok this sounds a little strange but consequently they are just easier 'humans' to deal with sometimes...

i found it really coincidental that one day after i decide to change topics, an article highly relevant to my new topic appears in the NY Times... =) printed like at least 6/7 papers to read, and 2 of them seem somewhat dubious and crappy but i can't tell if it's cos i dun understand what they are trying to do, or are they really kinda crappy? sigh anyway hav to go revise my 171 stuff in order to make better assessments of all these things. and so i'm going to have a nerdy weekend.... =P

and it's starting to get cold... and heater's not on except for like 15 min in the mornings... i'm so tempted to get a down comforter to snuggle under... well not like my bed isn't comfortable enough.... but it's even better to have a comfortable AND warm bed right. =P but they are ex. =(

a morning at the Center for Chinese Studies Library made me pretty convinced that it's probably impossible for me to get hold of any statistics on unrests and things of that nature from official statistical yearbooks... and i prob have to switch topics.... there seems to be data however on rural and urban stuff and i foresee myself doing something on rising income inequality in China instead... prob focusing on the hukou system that dates all the way back to the decade after the founding of the People's Republic in 1949. sigh. but that's still pretty vague and i'm starting to read up on a totally new topic. luckily it seems pretty interesting, and more econ-ish, less poli-sciencish. i now officially have 1 month to the deadline for turning in my 20-30 pg thesis prospectus... and given that everyone has abandoned me (my fault!) and that i prob irritated half the profs i tried to get help from for being so vague..... i'm really left on my own =( but somehow, my new topic seems more tangible than the one i was stuck with the past couple of months or so... so hopefully that's a good sign? and hopefully a sense of impending doom and failure would pressure me to be super disciplined =P

Happy Halloween

hmmm. ok a quick post then i'll have to get out of the house before all the trick-or-treaters in the neighborhood all come knocking on my door =P just gave some cookies away, but then shall be left speechless when i'm left with no treats for these enthu kids...
baked cookies for Halloween yest cos 1) saw these really cute orange and brown choc chips and 2) decided that I had enough of work for a while.... =P hmm.. still have things to say but sadly i really need to get out of the house for a few hours..... will continue later.

CONT'D

so i wanted to give some credit to Kai for trying very hard to be useful while i was baking. while at times i got really exasperated, (cos he's really not the most obedient kid...) he also got me into quite a few laughing fits... so when i told him to pour the brown sugar into the bowl, he wasn't very successful cos the brown sugar was kinda clumped tog. so i wanted to make a bigger opening to make it easier for him to pour. but he wanted to do it. so ok let him do.... then just like how sometimes when we try to open packets of titbit with a little too much force and prob 2/3 of the contents end up on the ground, the sugar packet kinda 'exploded' in his face and he ended up with a lot of brown sugar in his face and shirt... on the table.. on the floor... but he was so nonchalant about it and then proceeded to scoop up all the sugar, with all the dust and what not on the table back into the bowl.... at this point i had no idea how much sugar we had in our mixture already but was just like heck lah.. whatever =P then he wanted to crack the egg... ok so let him crack. but he practically crushed the whole egg, tried very hard to get its contents out later, then at the end of it all, absent-mindedly thrust all the eggshell into the bowl of batter.... dunno.. i just couldn't stop myself from laughing he prob thought i was a bit kuku. well, anyway, with a little salvaging, everything still turned out fine in the end, with Kai and I (and even my landlady) "pigging out" on bits of the delicious uncooked batter.. and yes, so ends my slightly traumatising but pretty erm... refreshing experience of baking with Kai.

Dinosaur Mugshot

Height: abt Shi Min's handspan
Weight: abt 80 grams?
Age: unknown
Crime: Scared Shi Min twice by lying in her path on the night of 10/28/05, by resembling a giant lizard
hahaha. poor thing. it's innocent lah. imagine committing a crime just cos you look scary, or cos someone is just blur...