Yesterday I went to Ikea with my friends. It was the second time that I went there since I moved to Philly. In my hometown there is an Ikea too, nor far from my home, so I used to visit it a lot, sometimes with my mom and sometimes with my friends. Ikea is such a cosy place that once I entered there I couldn’t get my eyes off the beautiful furnitures and home-decorating goods. Because they are so well designed that I can’t help praising the designers’ wonderful ideas.
It funny to discover that the word “Ikea” looks much like “Idea”, which is also the main point that Ikea represents. I know there are many other places such as Pottery Barn and Metro that also sell home supplies, but I am still fascinated by Ikea. I won’t tell you I am fond of the food there but it is a key point though. Anyway, to me the most fascinating part of Ikea is that I never get bored in it. Every time I walk between the shelves and inside the model houses, I am impressed by the different subtle details. Sometimes it’s just a small cute mirror or a well-designed cup, but I’m still enjoying finding the elements that is not discovered last time. Those products are amazing. You’ll never know them well in Ikea.
Boys seem not so interested in finding those perfect feelings as we girls do. So yesterday the boys just found what they need and checked out far beyond us. But they still had to wait for us to finish our lovely Ikea Trip, that’s the most interesting part of the journey I thought, lol. Maybe next time they could go to the Best Buy to shop electronic things, instead getting bored with the Ikea goods, which I guess will be more appealing to them. But I’ll still stay with Ikea, ’cause my favorite place will never change!
Month: October 2012
College Students was fined $675,000 for illegal downloadings
I was checking my weibo (a social network like twitter) when I found a piece of news saying that an American college student was fined 675,000 dollars because he downloaded 31 songs from internet illegally. I am so surprised. Not just because of the severe penalty but the fact itself that differs a lot from the situation of my home country.
Actually things are different in different countries. In some countries, it is illicit to download files from the internet without the authorization of the owners holding the copyright. But in China, it is a aquiescent practice to download files without permission or giving credit to the owners. Thousands of Millions internet users download songs, pictures, documents, videos everyday, the majority of whom are college students. Just take me for example. When I was an undergraduate student, I often participated in student activities in which I have to catch different kinds of information from various sources of course including the internet. I sometimes downloaded songs, pictures and videos online and used them to build my own work. Just a few years ago, I never realized it is improper to download from the internet without being authorized. You know, it is something that you often do but don’t know it is wrong. This sucks. I wish I had known that and try not to do that any more. But the more important is, I should ask others to do the same things in order to make a better world without infringment and plagiarism.
Something Fun
This photo is downloaded from the Internet. It comes from a comedy TV play called Ipartment (3rd season) in China which is very popular among the youth this summer. Actually the former two seasons of the play were both popular … Continue reading
The Election
I am that kind of person who doesn’t want to show his or her opinion of the candidates if he or she is not qualified to elect. Since I am a Chinese who is studying in the US, and both of the countries are walking through the period of presidential alternation, I want to say something about the eletion, just from my personal point of view.
Yesterday I saw a friend tweeted on Weibo.com saying that he supported Obama because his policy is more friendly to China. I laughed and showed this tweet to my friends here, and said that friend who posted the tweet is so childish that I hope he is not serious.
I have no idea about whom to support between Obama and Romney because I said I am not the persons who will share their political opinion even if they are not qualified to vote. I am not an American citizen so I am not able to vote. Every time I walked past the vote table on the road, with people saying “Registered to vote?”, I’ll sigh because I feel voting will be fun. Back in China, some of my undergraduate classmates told me that they were preparing to vote. I don’t have to ask them who they decided to vote for because the answer is quite explicit to almost all the Chinese citizens. But things are very different in the US. The two candidates are making their best efforts to impress the voters to give them the vote. Just take the first presidential debate for example. I saw an agressive Romney, throwing all the knotty problems to Obama, who has struggled for four years trying to solve all the problems. They are actually competitive, not just act in front of the camera. We’ll see, the big result will remain unclear until the last moment in November.
That is the fascination of the election, I guess. It seems that 2012 is a key time point to the world. Not only the rumer of doomday, but also a big change of the whole human world.
Great tired but FUN week with friends
I have been stayed up for almost a week. Not didn’t sleep at all but everyday I just slept for 3 or 4 hours. There is so many fun things to do that I always forgot the time to go to bed.
Just like last night when some of the girls living in my apatment gathered to have some chitchat, I felt as if I were back to the undergraduate, lying on the bed, chatting with my roommates. It was great fun. Actually when I talked about my roommates I can’t help missing the friends I just waved goodbye three months ago. Thank god I don’t feel lonely now because I made new friends here.
In fact, the neighbor guys and girls are my mental supporters in the US. I remember this Tuesday when I had a very bad day and felt depressed, it was them who gave me courage to cheer up. They accompanied me to play games, sang songs with me, and chatted with me, which really helped me swept the bad mood away. The most impressive night we spent together was last Saturday when we watched dracula movies at home. We watched The Grudge, Goasting, House of Wax, which were very horrible but appealing. Since we watched together, I felt less scary than I wathced them myself. This is what friends for, right?
Thank you my dear friends.
Economic Pressure on Politics
It seems the dispute of the islands between China and Japan will never end. When I was having breakfast this morning, I glanced at this piece talking about China’s officials canceled the attendence of the international financial meetings in Tokyo, which was believed to be a action to show the displeasure with Japan’s handling in the disputed islands.
It said, “The stakes are particularly high for Japan, whose long stagnant economy has become increasingly reliant on China as both a manufacturing base and a high-growth market for Japanese goods. On Wednesday, Japan’s leading stock index fell 2 percent after Japanese automakers reported a large drop in sales in China, the result of consumer boycotts of Japanese products.”
As a Chinese citizen who is living in the US, I can only have access to the latest news through the internet. As I menioned in an earlier blog, when I knew the tension between China and Japan has arised recently, I felt a little worried. This is actually a matter of history. When it dates back to the year 1937, all the Chinese will recall the day of September 18th, which is regarded as a national humiliation day for China. Japan began all-round invasion of China that day thus planted the seed of hatred between these two countries.
Though time has passed for more than half a century, the dispute between China and Japan has never ended. Many patriots in China tried to wage a war to settle the problem but it was so radical never approved by the government. Seeig from all the practices these years, the best and only way to solve the dispute is peaceful negotiation. Two sides should discusse their positions respectively and positively try their best to reach a consensus.
I am so hopeful to see both of the two neighbor countries to step on a tranquil way to make a longterm cooporation and to have another blooming economy era together.
My First Homemade Pasta!
I went to the grocer yesterday with my friend Debbie. We searched the grocer to find what we’d like to cook and eat. Then I saw the spaghetti on a shelf. I remembered last time when I had it. It was almost a year ago on my last birthday. I asked a few close friends to a rented house to celebrate it. We cooked together and have some fun playing games. My friend Catherine made us wonderful creamy mushroom pasta. It was so good! So I took a box of spaghetti and guess if I could make a yummy dish.
Today I got up a little late, ’cause I hanged out with some friends last night and slept late. With the appetite of delicious pasta, I decided to cook it myself. Of course I was not that confident, so I searched online and found a recipe that appealed to me. It said I should first boil the spaghetti until it got soft. I did so and cooked it for 10 minutes or so. Then I followed the directions of the recipe to stew the sauce. I used onions, tomatoes, minced pork and ketchup to cook the sauce until it looked pappy. Then I put the sauce onto the boiled pasta to finish this dish. Yay! It’s done! I told my roommates and asked them to have a taste. I have to say, it is soooo good that I can’t wait to tell my mom that I successfully cooked my first pasta and it’s dilicious!
It is really enjoyable! And now I am still smiling. 😀
Memory of Napa Valley
It is a cloudy day today. Nothing special in my schedule. I just got up and made a pot of coffee. Oh, by the way, I just bought a coffee machine yesterday and this was the first time that I made a coffee in my life.
Then I went online to see if there was any intriguing news. The piece that talked about teenager drinking caught my attention.This reminded me of last year when I traveled in California.
Last time when I came to the US i was with a bunch of students who came from different colleges in China. We went to San Francisco, LA, New York, Washington D.C.,Philadelphia, etc. , for a trip about half a month. It was a wonderful trip and the most impressive place that I remembered was the Napa Valley in CA.
Napa was a chateau which produces great both white and red wine. When we arrived at Napa, the tour guide asked us to carry about our passports for identification because according to the law in the US, no one is allowed to drink unless he/she reaches the age of 21. Lucky me, already 21 at that time. Some of my fellows were not so fortunate that they should just stay in the hotel.
Anyway, I entered Napa Valley’s bodega, and found, “wow”. I had never been to a chateau before. Everything seemed appealing to me and I was so excited to explore it. I asked for a trial of the most famous wine. I can’t remember all the names now but all I can recall is: they are SO bouquet! Even though I didn’t like some of the taste, I must say the smell was undeniable. It’s also the first time that I recognized the charm of wine, in a enjoyable way.
I bought 2 bottles of wine back to China and had them with my parents and friends on Spring Festival. They also appreciated the wine and we had a really wonderful time together.
This gives a feeling to me that wine can be good and bad at the same time, especially for young people. As a young adult, I like to drink sometimes, but if I have to drive or have other important plans I will definitely keep an eye on my beverage. Just offer a mutual encouragement. 🙂
Reuters. (2012, Oct 03). Fewer teenagers are driving after drinking, study shows. New York Times. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1081849917?accountid=14270; http://vv4kg5gr5v.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info:ofi/enc:UTF-8&rfr_id=info:sid/ProQ%3Anewsstand&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:journal&rft.genre=unknown&rft.jtitle=New+York+Times&rft.atitle=Fewer+Teenagers+Are+Driving+After+Drinking%2C+Study+Shows%3A+%5BNational+Desk%5D&rft.au=Reuters&rft.aulast=Reuters&rft.aufirst=&rft.date=2012-10-03&rft.volume=&rft.issue=&rft.spage=A.20&rft.isbn=&rft.btitle=&rft.title=New+York+Times&rft.issn=03624331
Ruby Han 