Showcase Update Notice

Remember I have a showcase Web site which posts sentences I have made for your reference? Please go take a look right now and see what you may learn from them. I usually update my showcase on a weekly basis. If you have any question, please don't hesitate to ask me. Thanks. My showcase's Web address is: http://aboto1.myweb.hinet.net/

showcase 百寶盒, 展示箱
post 刊登
for one's reference 給某人參考
update 更新
on a weekly basis 每週定期
hesitate 猶豫
Web 網路(全球通訊網)

Free English Podcasts On-line (Part I)

Like I've told you before, there are many many free resources for learners to learn English on the Internet. Among them, using Podcast seemes to be the trend now. More and more people and organizations are publishing their own programs as a Podcast format online. If you don't know what Podcast is, please go and read my another article here at: http://aboto1.blogspot.com/2005/11/learning-with-podcast.html to get a overall understanding about Podcast.

resource 資源
among 在...之間
Podcast 一種網路的廣播節目模式, 以mp3格式製作供使用者下載至電腦播放或再傳輸至mp3播放器播放, 任何人或團體皆可自製廣播節目放在網站上供人下載.
seemes to 似乎
trend 潮流
organization 組織
publish 出版
program 節目
format 格式
online 網路上
overall 整體的

Now I would like to highly recommend you some useful Podcasts online.

highly recommend 高度推薦

ESL Podcast and English Cafe
The two Podcasts are provided by the Center for Educational Development. To download their programs, just click the following link and once you are on their Web page, you can download their up-to-date mp3 files and save them into your computer and later they can be uploaded by you to your mp3 player too. Their mutual Web site is: http://www.eslpod.com/scripts.html.

provide 提供
download 下載
up-to-date 最新的
upload 上載
mutual 共同的

TOEFL Podcast
This Podcast is also served by the Center for Educational Development. The purpose of this Podcast is to help people improve their ability for TOEFL preparatoin. Its link is: http://www.toeflpod.com/

serve 提供
improve 改進
ability 能力
preparatoin 準備

Englsih Teacher John's Show
Usually you can download the English teacher John's Podcast through iTune. However, considering people like you who don't use eithter iTune nor iPod, you can go directly to his Web site and look for useful Podcasts you need. In fact, on his Web site you may find more fun stuff about his show. http://englishteacherjohn.com/index.htm

however 可是, 然而
considering 考慮到
neither...nor 既不...也不
directly 直接
look for 尋找
in fact 事實上
stuff 東西

Next time I will introduce more wonderful Podcasts to you. Enjoy listening to them now!

A trip to Dongyan Mountain

In the middle of April, my family and I took a hike in DongYan mountain in Tao Yuan county. It took us about an hour and half to get there by car. Travelers may run into congested traffic condition on their way there during the weekend rush. If you drive down from Taipei, you may consider taking the province road #7 starting from Sanxia so you can avoid the probable traffic jam in CiHu by taking #4. The admission to the recreatoin park is 100 NTDs per adult plus an extra 100 NTDs for parking inside. You may pull your car somewhere outside the entrance to save some money on that.

take a hike 健行
DongYan mountain 東眼山
congested 擁塞的
weekend rush 週末車潮
consider 考慮
province road 省道
Sanxia 三峽
avoid 避免
probable 可能的
jam 擁擠
CiHu 慈湖
admission 入場費
per adult 每一個成人
plus 加上
extra 額外的
pull 停(車)
entrance 入口

You will get a map when you enter the park (for inside car parking only). Following each trail on the map will take you to different places, but here I strongly suggest that you try the one for getting up to the top mountain. Not only is the view along the trail pretty, but what is on the highest point of the mountain is also fantastic. Don't miss out! I took some beautiful pictures of the sight and they really look so picturesque.

trail 步道
sight 景點
picturesque 風景如畫的

If there is God...

God please don't make our kids suffer from our lousy education system any more. Don't you ever see tons of pressure having been placed on these young faces yet? Do something about it please, God... if you are there observing us.

suffer from... 受...之苦
lousy 糟糕的
tons of pressure 大量的壓力
observe 觀察

We wish them to learn wisdom of life, not the knowledge out of math and science. They are not supposed to be born to the world with the view to taking those crap while given education at shcools. We just simply want them to learn to share things with their peers, not to train how to fight their rivals as they grow up. We want them to realize that competition is not the only way for them to get ahead in their future but loving and helping each other is the best thing to do.

wisdom of life 生命的智慧
be supposed to 應該是
with the view to 為了
crap 垃圾
peers 同儕
rivals 對手
competition 競爭
get ahead 成功出頭

We all want our kids to live a happy life without having too much burden given to them. However, there always seems to be the murphy's law-- things always ended up at the ironic end. God, tell us what to do now. We have been tired of blaming our kids for their poor calculating skills on math problems. We have also been feeling guilty for nothing we can do for them. As the father of my just-first-grade-in-the-elementary son, I beg for your help. Amen*!

* Though I am not a Christian, I still believe that everone can for God's help.

burden 負擔
murphy's law 莫非定律(事情永遠朝自己不想得到的結果呈現)
end up 到頭來
blame 責備
calculating skills 計算能力
guilty 有罪的, 不好意思的
Amen 阿門

New Links Available

Dear freinds,

Should you pay attention to the right column of this page, you will notice that several new links have been added here. That's right! These new links include a very useful Website, the English Forums, where learners like you and me are able to post questions regarding your problems in learning Englsih. Once a question is posted, some experienced teachers from all over the world will take notice of it and then join in your thread of the message soon. Accordingly, your question can be answered in less than an hour. You should not miss it out.

Should you = if you
column 縱列
Forums 論壇
post 刊登
regarding 有關
take notice of 注意
thread of the message 串聯訊息
Accordingly 最後

Furthermore, the other link goes to the thechatpage.com which is also part of the features of EnglishForums.com and I just intended to seperate it from its frong page. Now try your guts chatting with other learners the world over and you will get addicted to it sooner or later.

Furthermore 再者
intended to 故意去...
frong page 首頁
try one's guts 試某人的膽量
chat 聊天
get addicted to 對...上癮
sooner or later 不久之後

Good luck and start checking them out right now.

check something out 看一下

TV Turnoff Week

I read that the week after next is the so-called "TV Turnoff Week (April 19-25)". I guess the advocates for this movement think people waste too much time watcing TV. Technically speaking, I think it is hardly to ask all of us to turn off the boob tube for a week, let alone keeping up doing it forever. I can't even imagine what our lives will be like without TV because we have already centered our lives around wathcing it.

so-called 所謂的
advocate 提倡者
Technically speaking 技術上來說
boob tube 電視機
let alone 更不要說
to center one's life around 以...為生活重心

Here I want to share a true story about myself. As my kid grew up, I found he had spent too much time in front of TV. At his age, he watches a lot of cartoons on number of channels. One day I told him if he kept watching them without taking a break, I would disconnect the service. My warning seemed not to work very well as he always turned a blind eye to me. Few days later, I called the cable company to call off the service. After about a few days whining, he eventually found other way to entertain himself creatively such as reading and studying. I supposed that my strategy had really worked.

disconnect 中斷
turned a blind eye to me 沖耳不聞
call off 取消
whining 抱怨
eventually 最後
strategy 策略

Ironically, I ended up getting my wife's complaint about no good TV programs to watch. We only had four channels to watch then since they were all wireless TV programs -- free for antenna users. I started to realize that there was no free lunch in the world. You just got what you paid for. From time to time we even turned this into arguments, which was the outcome beyond my expectance.

Ironically 諷刺的
ended up 到頭來
complaint 抱怨
wireless 無線的
antenna 天線
turned something into arguments 造成爭執
outcome 結果

Therefore, it was time that I must find an alternative solution to the problem. Frankly I was kind of reluctant to re-subscribe to the cable TV after it had been phased out by me. I really wanted my kid to live healthier and do better in school. We still couldn't live without TV, however. Eventually I turned to subscribe to a digital TV service powered by my ADSL provider. The technology behind it is that all the TV program get signals from the internet modem-- both the TV and ADSL share the same cable. Good news that it offers only one cartoon channel and some other programs are mostly educational-- at least not that violent now compared to the cable TV before. Plus, I nearly pay no extra fee to the digital TV service since it is bundled with in the internet sevice. It really pays off, I will say.

alternative 替代的
reluctant 勉強的
subscribe 訂駛hased out 淘汰
signals 訊號
modem 數據機
be bundled with 與...結合
somthing pays off 某事是值得的

Watching no TV really makes me feel like I'm missing out on something. I have given up on the idea of being without it because I couldn't go cold turkey.

miss out on something 錯過某事
give up on something 放棄某事
go cold turkey 戒掉習慣/cold turkey 另有冷傲之人之意

Apology, apology, apology

Hello folks,

I really got nothing to tell you except for the apology for not having posted any articles here in such a long while. The thing is, my schedule is really filled to capacity. I realize I may be losing my loyal readers if I don't make an immediate announcement now to you.

Speaking of the progress delay, Amber, a good freind of mine who used to take my class in Xindian GV, called me the other day asking why she hadn't seen anything new on my blog. I felt so sorry about that. Since I had to take care of lots of personal stuff, I've barely had no time to drop a line here. I feel like buring the candles on both ends.

Don't worry yet! I am still in good shape as I was. I just sometimes couldn't believe that time really flies, does it? Catch you later my friends. I promise I will never forget you all. Best wishes.