Cherry Blossom on UW Campus

Accents

I just read an article on British accents from BBC News. If I read this article five years ago, I wouldn't appreciate it. Surprisingly, how much I enjoy it now.

If you have read my blog, you might remember that I was asked if I was from China first time I talked to my former landlady on the phone for two minutes. Then I heard people said Americans love accents, more accurately European accents. I thought that was very strange. A few years later, I watched the movie "Love Actually", and found the story about a young British fellow who couldn't attract women in UK became very popular in the US because of his British accent very funny. I thought it could only happen in movies. How could it possible American women be attracted to men just because of their accents? I realized I was wrong very soon. One of my American girl friends told me that she liked this guy from Europe and he had a very cute accent!

Ironically, I started to notice accents last year. I have to admit it is pleasant to listen to BBC. However, I do find it more difficult to understand.

Catch up with the trends in China

Team shopping has been popular in China recently. It seems like there are quite a lot of new things coming out each year in China. Every time I visited my parents in China, I felt like I was "刘姥姥进大观园"--everything was new to me.

Google

I have used "Google" a lot, from Email, blog, calender, photo, maps, search,.... I added one more thing yesterday called "Google Reader". I have to say I like it.

There are only a few other things I use on the Internet not "Google" related, including music (I use Pandora), school email (I still keep my school email), and messenger (I have a MSN account). I can't image the life without "Google" functioning.

I'm not sure if the rule of investment (diversifying investment) should be applied here. For now I'll just "consolidate" for the sake of convenience.

The Relationship between Student Government & Government

I wish I remember the name of the program from NPR last November just right before the general election. It reported a student election in a high school in the US. Student candidates were campaigning for the election by doing fund raising, posting ads,... Everything was just like what the candidates of the senators and the congressmen were doing for their elections. At the end, student candidates with highest campaign money won. Those student candidates who had brilliant ideas and presented majority student interests did not get elected due to lacking of rich friends who were willing to denote money for their campaigns. Their ideas and agenda could not reach out to majority of the students. Surprisingly, this was similar to the results of all the president, senator, and congressman elections in the US.

Isn't it wonderful? We can see the US political system in the student government in the school. However, I didn't think about looking at the Chinese political system in the Chinese student government in the school until recently. I was chatting with my PhD adviser about the school syllabus in the US and China. Some public schools in the states cancel PE class due to lack of funding. I said my high school also canceled PE class for all seniors, however, my schoolmates protested and we got PE class back. Among all the schoolmates who were protesting, none of them were "student leaders" (I mean student president, anyone from the student government). Why they didn't say anything? I realized that those "student leaders" were appointed by the school or the teachers. Appointed by the school or the teachers meant working for the school or the teacher. Thus, it shouldn't be surprising to see that none of "student leaders" take part in the protest.

The different processes of forming government might be one of reasons that representatives in the US "aim" for the public, while their counterparts in China "aim" for the government--the Chinese government is cleverly defined for the public "people's government".

I bet

I bet US will withdraw troops from Afghanistan earlier than from Iraq. I found this piece of news from NYTimes.

Mountaineering

I plan to climb to the top of Mt. Rainier (Elevation gain 3,200 m/10,500 ft) this summer. I signed up a 11-week mountaineering training course and went to the orientation last night. I should come out a training/exercise plan soon.

Following is my hiking resume
2004 Mt.St.Helens (Elevation gain 1 700 m/5,600 ft)
2005, 2006 Mt. Dickerman (Elevation gain 1,200 m/3,900 ft)