Today a childhood friend of mine came over to my house. She has been living in Shanghai ever since she moved away many years ago. I haven't seen her for a few years. She's in California now because she's attending a creative writing summer camp (I believe it lasts for three weeks) at Stanford.

I'm afraid I'm not very good with people. Although my zodiac sign, Leo, says I'm supposed to be extroverted, strong-willed, ambitious, and a born leader, I don't think those things are true...Maybe I used to be more like that, but I've been changed by my experiences. (Or I happen to be unlike most Leos.) A person once said I was more like a Virgo. Virgos are shy, meticulous, intelligent, analytical...as well as being perfectionists and worrywarts. Maybe I was born at the wrong time. (But I was actually born a little bit late, so maybe I'm meant to be a Leo with a Virgo's personality?)

I'm not a very good host, and I couldn't really say much. There were things I wanted to ask, but I couldn't really express myself because I thought the questions would be too blunt and rather strange... And I couldn't really say what kind of things I do when I'm at home during the summer because it might take a lot of explaining. Nor was I able to properly tell her how video and computer games that I was playing worked. (I guess it's partially because I don't know what to say exactly and partially that I've usually figured out how to do things on my own or by reading instruction manuals, so I'm not so familiar with giving people verbal instructions...)

She did say that the Korean boys at her school were quite fond of Starcraft, and it occurred to me that some member of the Korean boy band SS501 had become a Starcraft programmer or something of that sort.

Anyhow, though, that's not really important. I'm sorry, I got sidetracked again. (I apologize for my disorganized posts recently. My thoughts are a bit...muddled.) To me, living in Shanghai is a foreign concept, even if I've visited the city several times. Through listening I've noted various differences between the city where I reside, in California, and Shanghai, China.

- SH: Hot and humid in the summer
CA: Hot, but apparently not as hot as SH (both my friend who lives in Shanghai and my friend who lives in Taiwan say that here is cold, comparatively. I was horrified. XD)
- SH: Friend gets on the bus at 6:45 am and rides it for an hour to get to school
CA: I leave for school at 8:00 am, about an 8 minute ride
- SH: A polluted city with weak sunlight
CA: Bright sunlight (but in my town, you can't see the stars that well at night. Yosemite, on the other hand, is just splendid for stargazing.)
- SH: No wildlife, except in zoos.
CA: Birds (mostly pigeons, crows, and seagulls) and squirrels. (Stanford University, as I just discovered today, has so many squirrels in this one area. It was amazing.)
- SH: 8 classes at the school my friend attends (which is an "international" school that teaches by USA curriculum.) 4 classes in one day, then the other 4 the next day. (It's a good idea. You would have 2 days to do your homework so you can manage your time. And if you have trouble with it you have one day to ask your teacher for help.)
CA: 6 or 7 classes, daily. (It's predictable, but I want to try the 8 class system.)
- SH: Many students use Skype.
CA: Kids are more likely to chat through Gmail.

I wonder if I would come to like Shanghai if I went there. Maybe I could have a dog, like my friend does, if I lived in Shanghai. But I have very little grasp of Chinese (at least as a written language - I can speak Shanghainese somewhat better than Mandarin, so maybe that's okay) and I like my big backyard and getting to use the Internet freely (in China, you can't access Facebook, Youtube, or Blogspot, as well as other thinsg). Perhaps trying out the lifestyle is the only way to see.

Labels: atmosphere, california, china, comparison, friends, inability, instructions, internet, korean, language, leo, lifestyle, school, shanghai, squirrels, stanford, starcraft, temperature, virgo, zodiac

Do not be alarmed. The sky is not falling. Your hair is not on fire. Your family and friends are all alive and well. The world is not ending.

The running that I am referring to here is not running for survival, but as part of a chosen lifestyle.

Judging from what I am hearing and seeing at my school, being a teacher can be a really great job. Sure, you might catch colds from the kids, have to deal with rude and overly talkative children, and complain about not being paid as much as you deserve, but teaching has its perks, too. You receive pension when you're retired, and you can go to school with your kids, if you're like my math teacher (his kids are in middle school right now, so he gets to go to school and leave school with them!). You also get to watch kids grow up and have a hand in how they turn out. It must be really cool seeing your students come back many years later, mature and successful.

The PE teachers have a nice time. They can be outside in the fresh air and have less grading to do than other teachers, but they are paid the same. They can exercise if they feel like it or they can just stand and order the kids to do something. And I don't think you would normally have to work overtime. (My parents still do work at home after they get back at work. I think it's more lax if you're a PE teacher.)

I heard that one of the PE teachers injured his Achilles tendon and it was driving him crazy because he couldn't run. I'm very fearful of getting my Achilles tendon hurt because of how important it is - you could be out for a year, depending on how bad the injury is. It's pretty important in walking and running. It was already bad enough those times I sprained my ankle and kept getting left behind when I tried to run in PE.

I just really wish I could live the active lifestyle. Even the non PE teachers have the chance to pursue athletic hobbies. One time, during PE class, I saw my history teacher jogging on the track. Maybe it was his prep period and he didn't have anything to do so he decided to enjoy the nice weather. I wish I could be as lucky as him, doing a job that I like and also doing one of my hobbies at work.

I am sad about going to high school because I don't think I'll be able to take PE every year. I know I will take it for at least two years, one time in 9th grade, and the other not determined yet. I really want to take PE every year because I fear I will not exercise enough without it. But I don't know if I can. We can only take a certain amount of classes. And it really saddens me.

Labels: achilles tendon, classes, family, health, high school, hobbies, injury, jealousy, job, life, lifestyle, mature, overtime, PE class, pros and cons, running, school, teacher, time, wish

That kind of rhymes, considering the way that Yosemite is pronounced.

I've been wondering for a while now why Yosemite is pronounced the way it is. It's pronounced like "Yo-seh-mi-tee". I think that's rather misleading. On the lost and found sign for the Yosemite trip, Yosemite was misspelled "Yosemity". So wouldn't it make more sense to pronounce the name "Yo-seh-mee-teh"? But I suppose what makes sense isn't necessary how things work out.

While I was at Yosemite, I led a very different lifestyle from what I live at home. I spent much more time outside moving around. I almost always wore multiple layers to keep myself warm (except for the times that I became hot from hiking and skiing). I had to get used to having a heavy backpack on my back (I know you're not supposed to pack a lot, but I brought anything I thought I might need, like extra socks, a rain poncho, and gaiters - I never even used the gaiters), since usually I use a roller backpack. I had to adjust to having little sleep and to constantly having dry skin. (But some of my skin problems weren't as bad at Yosemite. My mom says it was because I took short, cold showers, which is better for your health, not like the warm, long ones I take at home)

And all this exercise was a good thing. It helped me build more strength, and I was surprised at how long I lasted, even if I wasn't a fast hiker. It's weird, but I had a different sort of appetite at Yosemite than I have back home. At home I get hungry quite often and I end up eating too much (better keep me away from the almond crunch!), but at Yosemite I sometimes lose my appetite, while at other times I am just moderately hungry, and don't eat very much, but it's enough. And I had to eat celery, which I never ate back home (it's not too bad, I guess, I always thought it must be terrible since people eat it with PEANUT BUTTER and I'm allergic to that). All this exercise made me lose some weight and made me feel better about myself since I could eat more and know I would burn it off, so I wouldn't have to worry about rationing myself (which I've been doing unsuccessfully, I always end up with too much food in one way or another. Eating is something of comfort, after all).

When I got back home, I realized how little exercise I do in comparison. In Yosemite, we might stop once in a while, but other than that we spend a lot of time standing or walking or climbing up something. At home, I am indoors a lot, sitting down, doing some work that requires me to stare closely at something, rather than getting natural light, which is better for my retina or something like that (I can't say I know the specifics about eyes, so don't ask me). And I actually eat more at home, or at least it feels like that. I wish I could always live the kind of lifestyle I had in Yosemite, being active, and being in the outdoors. That's where we are all supposed to be, but us humans have built walls around ourselves, put roofs over our heads, surrounded ourselves with technology to make our lives easier. In some ways this is good and in others it is quite saddening.

I hope that I never forget the experiences I had at Yosemite. I think it may have been one of the only times I ever really got close to nature. One day, when we were hiking at nighttime, a chaperone told us all to turn off our flashlights, be quiet, and stand still. We looked up at the sky, and it was amazing. The sky was really dark, and it was speckled with beautiful white stars. I have never seen so many stars at one time in my life, because in the town where I live, you can't see so many of them (unless you go out late at night, which I don't; in Yosemite it was only maybe 9 pm when you could see all those stars). Humans have affected the world so much that it becomes harder to see stars, but at least now I know there are still havens, still precious places where you can see night the way it is supposed to be seen.

I'd like to get a telescope. With one, I could take a much closer look at the night skies. I have heard that there are times when you can see other planets, such as Venus, and I want to try that. And there's eclipses, too; I didn't pay all much attention to them in the past. But now I think I'd like to see one sometime.

There are so many marvelous spectacles I have yet to witness in the world. I wonder if I will ever get the chance to see them all. I once heard that there were two people who were hospitalized because of problems with their noses. One had his/her problem fixed, and left the hospital. The other had some sort of terminal illness, so he/she traveled and did things that the other person didn't do (and probably never would). Sometimes you have to realize how little time you really have left on the Earth to make full use of it.

Labels: appetite, backpack, change, eating, health, humans, indoor, life, lifestyle, nature, night, outdoor, pronunciation, shower, skin, sky, stars, time, weight, yosemite

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