Somewhere out there

If you do believe that people having their past lives is true, then you are not alone. Since the beginning of my teaching career, I have seen people come and go all the time. Some of them have made an impression on me. However, it is hard to explain the feeling but I just feel like I must have seen them somewhere in the past, or even earlier than that.

One hypothesis is, that we might have been acquainted with one another in our "last" life. I might have been a teacher already then, and these people used to be the students of mine. We just gather around again for some reason in this life. Though reincarnation can't prove itself to be true to science, I will say I still persist my intuition that life is eternal.

Betrayal

She is a teacher. She has been in this line of work for years. Her teaching style has overwhelmed other teachers wherever she is at -- cram schools, language centers, and even after-schools. Students all like her because she has a thoughtful mind when solving their problems and never refuses their requests. Over time, she is getting popular so that more institutes would like to offer her a job. Even so, she still sticks to her philosophy which is not to monopolize her life by teaching day and night. She wishes to spare enough time with her family. She isn't the one of ambition, not a go-getter either.

One night, she met a man on internet and this guy is one of her students. He confessed to his teacher, the woman, that he had a crush on her and wished to keep a good relation with her. This guy has a handsome face and charm that no women can resist. She is in dilemma now whether she has to be in touch with him while she felt like having betrayed her family already. She still doesn't know what to do....

Reposted: Sandra's Writing --by Bruce Lin

It's very difficult to teach Sandra. She did not think like normal people. When she told me things, it was hard to understand her. Worse, when she expressed herself in class, she babbled on and on and on, and no way to stop her. Another teacher told me that Sandra's husband left her and this might explain her restlessness.

Afterwards, Sandra stopped talking; she didn't even listen. She just came to the class and started to write hoping that her writing could improve. Again, it's difficult to make out her writing. When I asked her what she was trying to say, her explanation would confuse me further, and I could only pretend I understood. When I explain English grammar to her, she did not grasp it. So I just edited her writing and tried not to edit too much. She was very happy because she thought she had improved.

In fact, she had not.

Her writing did improve after 6 months. Gradually, I understood her writing – her words started to make sense and the organization of her writing was also improved. This was amazing, considering that she just sat there and wrote. One day, Sandra wrote: “My husben to china, he not back, I vary mess he.” (My husband went to China and he has not come back. I miss him very much.)

Maybe it took her very long to learn to express herself in English. It was good that she finally did.

Weijen
2005 June 9

*Sandra is not her real name.

Website update notification

It has been half a month since I last updated my personal Website, nor have I posted my writing here. Sorry for the delay since I am quite busy recently. Bruce asked me to subsitute for him for the class tonight. I feel like being a bit nervous, and I always feel the same way when he asks me to do it from time to time. He is such a learned teacher that I am worried if his students would compare my style in class to his. I know, I know. I think I am just too humble the way. Hey! Sometimes it is better to play it down for that matter.

Didn't I tell you that I went to an interview at another school the other day? I can tell you now it was a real nightmare to me. The interviewer, a lady in her late 20's I guess, really was hard on me. During the interview, she tried to find fault with everything I did. I think something she did to me was rediculous, but I still can't speak ill of her becasue after all it is not a virtue to do so. The question is, why would she have called me for the interview if she hadn't liked me to teach there? Too weird to figure it out, I think.

Reposted: Media, Distraction, and English -- by Bruce Lin

“And now here is my little secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

- the Fox in The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

The Representation and the Represented

Two things to consider when an idea is being presented: WHAT is being represented -- the real meaning? And HOW is it being represented -- the representation? It seems the current trend is moving toward playing with the representations – TV shows with talking heads talking a lots when actually little message is being carried; movies saturated with special effects and breathtaking actions that the storylines hardly matter. We've watched so much on the assassination of President Chen and so much of our time has been spent on it and in the end so little was revealed. We naively think we are free to choose what to see. Sadly, not so. Our choices and senses are railroaded by the media industry, whose major purpose is to make a quick buck, and we are spending our precious time helping them.

The other day, a student told me a good movie she'd just seen. When asked what the movie was about, she had hard time expressing herself: “I don't know how to put it…you have to see it yourself.” I wonder whether her senses have been bombarded by too much media stimulation that they no longer function well. It'd be great if we focus on seeing things as they are, rather than on the representations.

What Does It Mean to You?

When the representation dominates, our senses would have hard time to reach out – you watch news for 24 hours and gain very little; you have all kinds of books to read but you read very few; you read thousands of product catalogs and still don't know what to buy…. We are constantly distracted by the complicated sign system technology brings. The purpose of this short essay is to let you be aware of this phenomenon and hopefully you can be in control of what and when to learn.

Weijen