Journal 8 (June 2, 2012)
1. This week I read a paper from a book named “On Record: Rock, Pop & the Written Word”. The title of this paper is “Start Making Sense! Musicology Wrestles with Rock”, and the authors are Susan McClary and Robert Walser, who are famous in the field of musicology. In this paper, the authors mainly analyze the reasons why music is a resistant medium to write or speak about and why there are more obstacles in popular music than traditional music. Also, they point out some pitfalls of pop musicology; one is, for instance, that many analyses of popular music rely too heavily on the lyrics. Moreover, it’s quite interesting to mention that they begin their paper with a comic strip, Bloom Country, by Berke Breath. Actually, there are many new words for me in this paper, and, most importantly, I am not familiar with musicology; therefore, reading this paper is quite difficult for me, which costs me almost two days. However, I enjoy the process of challenging myself, and I do learn a lot from it.
In fact, I wrote about an economic paper before, but this musicological paper is quite different from the former. First of all, instead of directly writing about phenomenon at the very beginning, the authors show us an interesting comic strip first; the authors also mention this comic strip hereinafter several times. It is also a good way, I think, of making readers interested in and eager to keep reading the paper. Second, although the authors show no statistics in their paper, their reasons still meet the STAR principle—sufficient, typical, accurate and relevant. What’s more, they state the five main reasons why popular music is more difficult to speak or write about point by point, using adverbs like “first” and “finally” that can make their writing much clearer. Last, I also accumulate some new words and phrases which can be useful for my academic English writing like, “per se”, “insofar as” and “inasmuch as”. All in all, I do learn something new for my English writing.
2. This Friday night, I spent the Children’s Day with my friends. It seemed ridiculous, since all of us were not children anymore, but we still decided to celebrate this festival, and, surprisingly, a huge crowd of students at our university, dividing into several groups, also celebrated this festival with their friends. In fact, our celebration is simple. We just went to McDonald’s nearby our university for Happy Meals—the meals for kids—and the toys. In its advertisement for Children’s Day, the toys included in Happy Meals would be plastic figurines of Doraemon, who was my favorite cartoon character, so I had looked forward to it very much. However, unfortunately, all of the figurines had been sent out before we went to the nearby McDonald’s, so I didn’t get the figurine of Doreamon; instead, I got a little toy car that I didn’t want. But, still and all, we shared stories in our childhood during the meal and had a good time that night.
On the way back, I thought about the reason why so many grown-up students at our university still celebrated Children’s Day. It seems that we still miss our childhood every now and then, so we still want to celebrate this festival. As we grow up, we face more and more pressure, and, also, being undergraduates of Peking University, one of the best and most competitive universities in China, we find that the burden on our shoulders is quite huge; our childhood, however, comparing to our university days, is much more carefree and full of happiness. I do miss my childhood—including my old yard, my old friends, my teachers and every cartoon character in my childhood—every now and then, and I do wish that Doreamon, the future robot, could give me a time machine, which can send me back to my childhood.
In fact, I wrote about an economic paper before, but this musicological paper is quite different from the former. First of all, instead of directly writing about phenomenon at the very beginning, the authors show us an interesting comic strip first; the authors also mention this comic strip hereinafter several times. It is also a good way, I think, of making readers interested in and eager to keep reading the paper. Second, although the authors show no statistics in their paper, their reasons still meet the STAR principle—sufficient, typical, accurate and relevant. What’s more, they state the five main reasons why popular music is more difficult to speak or write about point by point, using adverbs like “first” and “finally” that can make their writing much clearer. Last, I also accumulate some new words and phrases which can be useful for my academic English writing like, “per se”, “insofar as” and “inasmuch as”. All in all, I do learn something new for my English writing.
2. This Friday night, I spent the Children’s Day with my friends. It seemed ridiculous, since all of us were not children anymore, but we still decided to celebrate this festival, and, surprisingly, a huge crowd of students at our university, dividing into several groups, also celebrated this festival with their friends. In fact, our celebration is simple. We just went to McDonald’s nearby our university for Happy Meals—the meals for kids—and the toys. In its advertisement for Children’s Day, the toys included in Happy Meals would be plastic figurines of Doraemon, who was my favorite cartoon character, so I had looked forward to it very much. However, unfortunately, all of the figurines had been sent out before we went to the nearby McDonald’s, so I didn’t get the figurine of Doreamon; instead, I got a little toy car that I didn’t want. But, still and all, we shared stories in our childhood during the meal and had a good time that night.
On the way back, I thought about the reason why so many grown-up students at our university still celebrated Children’s Day. It seems that we still miss our childhood every now and then, so we still want to celebrate this festival. As we grow up, we face more and more pressure, and, also, being undergraduates of Peking University, one of the best and most competitive universities in China, we find that the burden on our shoulders is quite huge; our childhood, however, comparing to our university days, is much more carefree and full of happiness. I do miss my childhood—including my old yard, my old friends, my teachers and every cartoon character in my childhood—every now and then, and I do wish that Doreamon, the future robot, could give me a time machine, which can send me back to my childhood.
Journal 7 (May 13, 2012)
1. This week I continued to read the third chapter of the novel, Around the World in Eighty Days. As I read more of this novel, I found myself more familiar with the style of writing, and could read faster than before, although I still spend half day on reading this chapter. In the third chapter, the writer continued the story by shifting our focus again to the leading character, Phileas Fogg, who had shut the door of his house at half past eleven in the first chapter. He then reached the Reform Club, enjoyed his gorgeous breakfast, and spent his time on the perusal of an uncut Times. After dinner, he and his usual partners at whist gathered together in the reading-room, playing whist and chatting about the robbery happened three days before at the Bank of England. The conversation about the robbery, however, leaded to a wager, which seemed likely to cost Phileas Fogg dear. He wagered 20 thousand pounds that he could make a tour of the world in eighty days or less. In the chapter, Phileas Fogg, the tranquil gentleman, decided to set out in the very evening of the day, on which he just made the wager. I was so astonished that he could make such a wager, and I was quite eager to know what would happen in the following chapter.
In this chapter, the writer promoted the plot by writing dialogues. By presenting the oral expressions of different characters, their personal characteristics were quite vivid and so distinct from each other. It reminds me that I can write a story by presenting what the characters in my story say, and it is also a good way to describe a person’s characteristic by presenting his oral expressions. Also, after reading this chapter, I accumulated a lot of new words like, “perusal”, “scarlet”, “ponderous” and “stoical”; and phrases like “a morsel of” and “to and fro”. All in all, reading this novel was quite interesting, and was really helpful to my English writing.
2. This week, I just spent an extremely crazy week. I stayed up late every night, and, unfortunately, caught a bad cold on this Friday. What’s more, on Saturday night, I, for the first time, even went to the bar and came back late, despite of my fever. Why was I such crazy this week? All of these, I thought, were due to a competition. Last weekend, a good friend of mine invited me to take part in a case competition held by Bain & Company. It happened that I hadn’t taken part in any of such kind of competition before, and I thought it was a good chance to enrich my personal experience, so I accepted her invitation. In the first round of the competition, we needed to submit our presentation before May 12th, answering three questions by telling a story, which was supported by data and analysis. The time was so tight, so we had to get together off campus every night and stayed up late in order to finish this team task. I was enough busy this semester, you know, and the adding of this competition to my schedule could absolutely drive me crazy. After finishing our task, one of our teammate suggested that we should go to the bar and celebrate the end of our crazy week. I didn’t intend to go because of my fever, but I thought it was a great pity that all of my teammates would go to the bar except me, and I hadn’t went to a bar before, so I finally had a change of mind and went to the bar with them.
It’s an extremely crazy week; however, everything I have done, I think, is really worthy. I obtained quite a lot of experience about how to design a strategy for a company, made new friends, and, more importantly, learnt more about team work. I believe that, sometimes, we just need to be “crazy”. I think, we should not be afraid of being “crazy”, because “crazy”, sometimes, can bring us unexpected reward.
In this chapter, the writer promoted the plot by writing dialogues. By presenting the oral expressions of different characters, their personal characteristics were quite vivid and so distinct from each other. It reminds me that I can write a story by presenting what the characters in my story say, and it is also a good way to describe a person’s characteristic by presenting his oral expressions. Also, after reading this chapter, I accumulated a lot of new words like, “perusal”, “scarlet”, “ponderous” and “stoical”; and phrases like “a morsel of” and “to and fro”. All in all, reading this novel was quite interesting, and was really helpful to my English writing.
2. This week, I just spent an extremely crazy week. I stayed up late every night, and, unfortunately, caught a bad cold on this Friday. What’s more, on Saturday night, I, for the first time, even went to the bar and came back late, despite of my fever. Why was I such crazy this week? All of these, I thought, were due to a competition. Last weekend, a good friend of mine invited me to take part in a case competition held by Bain & Company. It happened that I hadn’t taken part in any of such kind of competition before, and I thought it was a good chance to enrich my personal experience, so I accepted her invitation. In the first round of the competition, we needed to submit our presentation before May 12th, answering three questions by telling a story, which was supported by data and analysis. The time was so tight, so we had to get together off campus every night and stayed up late in order to finish this team task. I was enough busy this semester, you know, and the adding of this competition to my schedule could absolutely drive me crazy. After finishing our task, one of our teammate suggested that we should go to the bar and celebrate the end of our crazy week. I didn’t intend to go because of my fever, but I thought it was a great pity that all of my teammates would go to the bar except me, and I hadn’t went to a bar before, so I finally had a change of mind and went to the bar with them.
It’s an extremely crazy week; however, everything I have done, I think, is really worthy. I obtained quite a lot of experience about how to design a strategy for a company, made new friends, and, more importantly, learnt more about team work. I believe that, sometimes, we just need to be “crazy”. I think, we should not be afraid of being “crazy”, because “crazy”, sometimes, can bring us unexpected reward.
Journal 6 (May 5, 2012)
1. This week I continued to read the second chapter of the novel, Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne. I read it very slowly, because there were lots of new words for me, and I was also not familiar with the style of writing. However, it was the difficulty of reading that made me feel a positive sense of accomplishment as I finished reading each chapter. In the second chapter, the writer continued to describe the leading character, Phileas Fogg, in a different way; then, he briefly described Passepartout, the second leading character, who was yearned for being a servant of a domestic and regular gentleman and living a reposeful life. In this chapter, Passepartout, the new servant, was convinced that he was finally found his ideal. Although it took me almost half day to completely understand this short chapter, I liked this novel and had a difficult time putting it down.
I also learnt a lot of new things by reading this chapter, although it was from the same novel that I read last week. First, the writer described the leading character more vividly in a new way; by comparing him with the wax statues at Madame Tussaud’s and the Leroy chronometer, the writer successfully presented a phlegmatic and deliberate gentleman, or, so to speak, a real machine. It reminds me that making comparison is also a good way to write a person more impressively. Second, the writer promoted the plot development by describing what Passepartout was thinking, which made me feel myself personally on the scene. It reminds that psychological description can make writings more interesting to read. Last but not least, I also accumulated a lot of new words; for example, “scrutinize”, “chagrin”, “rubicund” and so on. All in all, reading this novel was really interesting, and was really helpful to my English writing.
2. This Friday night, I made up a dinner party off campus to celebrate the birthday of our university and invited my fellows at PKU Radio Station. At the dinner party, we shared our stories at Peking University and talked about the history of our school; we played the game named Truth or Dare and made jokes; we talked about our radio programs and shared our experience of making them. After the dinner party, two of my best friends and I went to the café; we sat around a small table, ordered some cold drinks, and talked about what happened and what were in our mind recently. I felt very happy that night, and I did treasure that memorable night.
In fact, I always dream about having a small group of friends, which consists of four or five people. There are not only boys but also girls in this group. We share some common interests in our life, help each other in the study, and do what we like to do together every now and then. What’s more, we can meet each other in the café a couple of times a week, sitting around a table, having some drinks, and sharing the stories of our daily life. I have yearned for such a group since I attend university; however, I have never found it yet. I do have some best friends, but we are not in a group, or, so to speak, I am not in any group. We just meet each other once in a while. Maybe, I was just influenced by the American TV program, How I Met Your Mother. I am really envious of the happy life of the group of friends in the TV program, and I do hope that I can be in such a group. Sometimes I may feel sad about not having such a group, but I do treasure what I have now and still believe that I will meet such a group in the future.
I also learnt a lot of new things by reading this chapter, although it was from the same novel that I read last week. First, the writer described the leading character more vividly in a new way; by comparing him with the wax statues at Madame Tussaud’s and the Leroy chronometer, the writer successfully presented a phlegmatic and deliberate gentleman, or, so to speak, a real machine. It reminds me that making comparison is also a good way to write a person more impressively. Second, the writer promoted the plot development by describing what Passepartout was thinking, which made me feel myself personally on the scene. It reminds that psychological description can make writings more interesting to read. Last but not least, I also accumulated a lot of new words; for example, “scrutinize”, “chagrin”, “rubicund” and so on. All in all, reading this novel was really interesting, and was really helpful to my English writing.
2. This Friday night, I made up a dinner party off campus to celebrate the birthday of our university and invited my fellows at PKU Radio Station. At the dinner party, we shared our stories at Peking University and talked about the history of our school; we played the game named Truth or Dare and made jokes; we talked about our radio programs and shared our experience of making them. After the dinner party, two of my best friends and I went to the café; we sat around a small table, ordered some cold drinks, and talked about what happened and what were in our mind recently. I felt very happy that night, and I did treasure that memorable night.
In fact, I always dream about having a small group of friends, which consists of four or five people. There are not only boys but also girls in this group. We share some common interests in our life, help each other in the study, and do what we like to do together every now and then. What’s more, we can meet each other in the café a couple of times a week, sitting around a table, having some drinks, and sharing the stories of our daily life. I have yearned for such a group since I attend university; however, I have never found it yet. I do have some best friends, but we are not in a group, or, so to speak, I am not in any group. We just meet each other once in a while. Maybe, I was just influenced by the American TV program, How I Met Your Mother. I am really envious of the happy life of the group of friends in the TV program, and I do hope that I can be in such a group. Sometimes I may feel sad about not having such a group, but I do treasure what I have now and still believe that I will meet such a group in the future.
Journal 5 (April 26, 2012)
1. This week I read the first chapter of the novel, Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne. In fact, it was an excellent translated version by George Makepeace Towle. As soon as I read the first sentence, I was dragged into the mansion in Saville Row, where stood the enigmatical personage, Mr. Phileas Fogg. He seemed extraordinary mysterious for his taciturn manner and his superhumanly regular lifestyle; meanwhile, he was extremely strict with his servant. Therefore, James Forster, the former servant, was dismissed due to his negligible mistake, and here came the successor, Jean Passepartout. In the first chapter, Jules Verne did a superb job of describing the leading character, Phileas Fogg; I just felt that he was standing in front of me while I was reading the novel.
It was the first time that I read an English novel; therefore, I felt it a little difficult to read. However, it’s really helpful to me in learning to write better. First, I learned a lot about how to write a person more impressively. By describing what the leading character was like in others’ eyes, illustrating the surroundings in his daily life, and giving details of his expressions and actions, the author made the character quite vivid. It reminds me that except telling the basic information, there are still many ways to write a person. Second, I learned more about parallel construction. In the second paragraph, the author used “nor” and “or” to make his sentences parallel like, “nor had his voice ever resounded in the Court of Chancery, or in the Exchequer, or the Queen’s Bench, or the Ecclesiastical Courts”; and in the twelfth paragraph, the author also made his sentences parallel by using absolute structure like, “his feet close together like those of a grenadier on parade, his hands resting on his knees, his body straight, his head erect”. Last but not least, I did accumulate a lot of new words and phrases, which could be very helpful to my English writing. The words the author used to describe the leading character, such as “tranquil” were somewhat unique; and I also felt it quite novel to use “repair to the Reform” instead of “go to the Reform”. All in all, reading this novel was indeed interesting, and was really helpful to my English writing.
2. Last Sunday night, I met a lovely girl with a sweet voice. We had a dinner off campus together, went shopping for some clothes, and then went to the supermarket, Carrefour, to buy some groceries. We knew each other online several weeks ago, but we had never seen each other offline, so we decided to have a date that night. When I first saw her, she was standing there, staring at her iPhone like reading some news, her hair divided into two bunches, her legs close together like a cherry tree. During the night, she told me that she had a small electric cooker in her dormitory, and she cooked porridge or noodles every now and then. She enjoyed foods, especially making foods by herself, and she seemed to know how to enjoy her life quite well.
I was not only very happy, but also, in fact, inspired that night. She also had a double major, and, so to speak, she was as busy as me; however, her life seemed more interesting than mine. It seemed that, again, I committed the deadly sin, ACEDIA. I was too preoccupied with what I was busy with, but careless about the beauty of life. I was just too lazy to care about other colors in my life. Suddenly, I realized that I had lost many chances to be happy when I refused to take pains to care about other things in my life. After that night, I decided to spare more time to enjoy other colors of my life. And I hope that I can spend more time with her, Lily, for she makes me so happy.
It was the first time that I read an English novel; therefore, I felt it a little difficult to read. However, it’s really helpful to me in learning to write better. First, I learned a lot about how to write a person more impressively. By describing what the leading character was like in others’ eyes, illustrating the surroundings in his daily life, and giving details of his expressions and actions, the author made the character quite vivid. It reminds me that except telling the basic information, there are still many ways to write a person. Second, I learned more about parallel construction. In the second paragraph, the author used “nor” and “or” to make his sentences parallel like, “nor had his voice ever resounded in the Court of Chancery, or in the Exchequer, or the Queen’s Bench, or the Ecclesiastical Courts”; and in the twelfth paragraph, the author also made his sentences parallel by using absolute structure like, “his feet close together like those of a grenadier on parade, his hands resting on his knees, his body straight, his head erect”. Last but not least, I did accumulate a lot of new words and phrases, which could be very helpful to my English writing. The words the author used to describe the leading character, such as “tranquil” were somewhat unique; and I also felt it quite novel to use “repair to the Reform” instead of “go to the Reform”. All in all, reading this novel was indeed interesting, and was really helpful to my English writing.
2. Last Sunday night, I met a lovely girl with a sweet voice. We had a dinner off campus together, went shopping for some clothes, and then went to the supermarket, Carrefour, to buy some groceries. We knew each other online several weeks ago, but we had never seen each other offline, so we decided to have a date that night. When I first saw her, she was standing there, staring at her iPhone like reading some news, her hair divided into two bunches, her legs close together like a cherry tree. During the night, she told me that she had a small electric cooker in her dormitory, and she cooked porridge or noodles every now and then. She enjoyed foods, especially making foods by herself, and she seemed to know how to enjoy her life quite well.
I was not only very happy, but also, in fact, inspired that night. She also had a double major, and, so to speak, she was as busy as me; however, her life seemed more interesting than mine. It seemed that, again, I committed the deadly sin, ACEDIA. I was too preoccupied with what I was busy with, but careless about the beauty of life. I was just too lazy to care about other colors in my life. Suddenly, I realized that I had lost many chances to be happy when I refused to take pains to care about other things in my life. After that night, I decided to spare more time to enjoy other colors of my life. And I hope that I can spend more time with her, Lily, for she makes me so happy.
Journal 4 (April 8, 2012)
1. This week I read a paper from Journal of Economic Perspectives. The paper’s title is “History Lessons: Institution, Factor Endowments, and Path of Development in the New World”, and the authors are Kenneth L. Sokoloff and Stanley L. Engerman. In this paper, the authors analyzed the reasons why the path of development in the United States and Canada were so different with the rest of the colonies in Americas. They partly disagreed with the traditional opinions, which simply attributed it to their differences in conditions of growth or generally ascribed it to the better institutions of British. They found out the root cause by analyzing the reasons why their conditions of growth were different and why the institutions in the United States and Canada were better and pointed out that their different factor endowments were the roots of inequality. In fact, reading this paper was a little difficult for me, and I spent almost a day to finish it, but I did learn a lot from it.
First of all, I learnt about how to write an argumentative essay. In this paper, the author put phenomenon first, and then analysed the reasons why it occurred. In their analysis, they made a comparative analysis by putting traditional opinions first, and then they used facts, statistics and analogies to rebut the traditional opinions. Their reasons were sufficient, typical, accurate and relevant, which followed the STAR principle that I learnt in class. Second, I learnt a lot about how to write compound and complex sentences. There were many long sentences in the paper, some of which were even more than one hundred words, but they are not difficult to comprehend. Last, I also learnt some words and phrases which could be useful for my academic English writing. For example, “virtually”, “straightforward”, “it is evident that” and “at the outset”. All in all, reading this paper was really helpful to my own writing.
2. This week, I just spent almost every day studying on campus and went nowhere, although there was a 3-day holiday and most of my friends enjoyed their holiday by going on excursions. In fact, for me, there was just a 1-day holiday. Because I took the double major in mathematical statistics, I had to spend extra two days on classes for my double major during the holiday. What’s more, because of the holiday, we had to take extra classes at last weekend, so actually I had classes continuously for 9 days from last Monday to this Tuesday. Moreover, I had my final exam for advanced algebra on this Monday, and there would be a midterm exam for statistics on this Saturday, so I had to spend a lot of time on mathematics in order to get a good grade, even on my only holiday, Wednesday, which I could have spent on relaxing myself. In fact, unless I cut some classes or meet some holidays, I have classes every day during this semester because of my double major. And before this week, I had once thought about dropping my double major, and I even had told my parents that I had decided to do so.
However, I didn’t give up finally. Although it’s really hard and sometimes I just felt extremely exhausted, I could not drop what I loved. After ruminating and chatting with my tutor, Professor Ping, I finally thought that mathematics was indeed what I loved since I was a child, and I had spent so much on it since then. I could not quit it in the middle of the progress. If I had done that, I wouldn’t know what will happen after my finishing the double major in mathematics statistics and I would surely regret that one day. After taking the midterm exam for statistics, I suddenly found that I could make it! I was really glad that I have finally persisted in what I loved. I hope that I can keep going, no matter how many obstacles and hindrances are in front.
First of all, I learnt about how to write an argumentative essay. In this paper, the author put phenomenon first, and then analysed the reasons why it occurred. In their analysis, they made a comparative analysis by putting traditional opinions first, and then they used facts, statistics and analogies to rebut the traditional opinions. Their reasons were sufficient, typical, accurate and relevant, which followed the STAR principle that I learnt in class. Second, I learnt a lot about how to write compound and complex sentences. There were many long sentences in the paper, some of which were even more than one hundred words, but they are not difficult to comprehend. Last, I also learnt some words and phrases which could be useful for my academic English writing. For example, “virtually”, “straightforward”, “it is evident that” and “at the outset”. All in all, reading this paper was really helpful to my own writing.
2. This week, I just spent almost every day studying on campus and went nowhere, although there was a 3-day holiday and most of my friends enjoyed their holiday by going on excursions. In fact, for me, there was just a 1-day holiday. Because I took the double major in mathematical statistics, I had to spend extra two days on classes for my double major during the holiday. What’s more, because of the holiday, we had to take extra classes at last weekend, so actually I had classes continuously for 9 days from last Monday to this Tuesday. Moreover, I had my final exam for advanced algebra on this Monday, and there would be a midterm exam for statistics on this Saturday, so I had to spend a lot of time on mathematics in order to get a good grade, even on my only holiday, Wednesday, which I could have spent on relaxing myself. In fact, unless I cut some classes or meet some holidays, I have classes every day during this semester because of my double major. And before this week, I had once thought about dropping my double major, and I even had told my parents that I had decided to do so.
However, I didn’t give up finally. Although it’s really hard and sometimes I just felt extremely exhausted, I could not drop what I loved. After ruminating and chatting with my tutor, Professor Ping, I finally thought that mathematics was indeed what I loved since I was a child, and I had spent so much on it since then. I could not quit it in the middle of the progress. If I had done that, I wouldn’t know what will happen after my finishing the double major in mathematics statistics and I would surely regret that one day. After taking the midterm exam for statistics, I suddenly found that I could make it! I was really glad that I have finally persisted in what I loved. I hope that I can keep going, no matter how many obstacles and hindrances are in front.
Journal 3 (March 17, 2012)
1. This weekend I read the speech given by Steve Jobs at Stanford University on June 12th, 2005. In fact, I had already watched the video record when the sad news of Jobs’ death was spreading all over the world around 5 months ago, and, also, I had been one of Apple’s customers for almost 2 years; therefore, I was quite familiar with the address. In the speech, Jobs told us 3 stories from his life. They are about connecting the dots, about love and loss, and about the death. His stories inspired us to believe that the dots will connect in our future, to find out what we love to do, and to stay “hungry” for knowledge and “foolish” as a humbler. I was deeply inspired by his speech; besides, I did learn quite a little about how to write and present a speech.
First of all, Jobs started his speech with humor by saying “this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to college graduation”, which created a relaxing atmosphere and made some audiences laugh. In my point of view, it was a good way to begin a speech, and it would be really helpful for me to present a speech in front of hundreds of middle school students about my learning skills, which will make the distance between the audiences and me much closer. Second, Jobs presented his suggestions by telling his own stories, which is more interesting and acceptable to the audiences. I thought it was a great pattern, and it reminded me to tell the skills with my personal experiences. Last but not least, I learnt some oral expressions that could be used in speech; for example, “truth be told”, “work out okay”, and so on; I also learnt some phrases which could be useful in my writing, for example, “as the years roll on”. By reading the speech, I gained not only the skills of writing and presenting a speech, but also the inspiration to stick to my dream.
2. Last Friday, I went on a brief excursion at a thermal spring rural hotel named Xueyaxiaozhuang, which located in a small village of Changping District. In fact, it was organized by PKU Radio Station, where I worked as Manager of Entertainment Department, and there were around 30 members in our spring outing team. We set out on Friday afternoon; after taking the subway to the terminus of No.5 line and a one-hour drive by bus, we finally arrived at the hotel in the dusk. Wearing the saffron light of the sunset, we sang together, strolling from the bus stop to the hotel. In the evening, we enjoyed the delicious local food first and then the outdoor hot spring. Sitting in the hot spring, we enjoyed the beautiful starry sky and shared our recent life stories, unaware of the coming of the midnight.
When I look up at the night sky, I felt extremely relaxed and my mind was extraordinary peaceful. I had not felt this way for so long, since I was always preoccupied with my study and work, and barely looked away from my books, my computer screen, or the way under my feet. I suddenly realized that I had ignored my soul, which was connected with nature, for so long. And I should spare some time to look up at the sky and communicate with my soul. After coming back from the village next morning, I felt my whole body refreshed again. All my exhaustion and annoyance seemed gone with the thermal water. I really enjoyed this brief excursion, for it gave me not only the jolliness and relaxation, but also the realization of how important it was to look up at the sky.
First of all, Jobs started his speech with humor by saying “this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to college graduation”, which created a relaxing atmosphere and made some audiences laugh. In my point of view, it was a good way to begin a speech, and it would be really helpful for me to present a speech in front of hundreds of middle school students about my learning skills, which will make the distance between the audiences and me much closer. Second, Jobs presented his suggestions by telling his own stories, which is more interesting and acceptable to the audiences. I thought it was a great pattern, and it reminded me to tell the skills with my personal experiences. Last but not least, I learnt some oral expressions that could be used in speech; for example, “truth be told”, “work out okay”, and so on; I also learnt some phrases which could be useful in my writing, for example, “as the years roll on”. By reading the speech, I gained not only the skills of writing and presenting a speech, but also the inspiration to stick to my dream.
2. Last Friday, I went on a brief excursion at a thermal spring rural hotel named Xueyaxiaozhuang, which located in a small village of Changping District. In fact, it was organized by PKU Radio Station, where I worked as Manager of Entertainment Department, and there were around 30 members in our spring outing team. We set out on Friday afternoon; after taking the subway to the terminus of No.5 line and a one-hour drive by bus, we finally arrived at the hotel in the dusk. Wearing the saffron light of the sunset, we sang together, strolling from the bus stop to the hotel. In the evening, we enjoyed the delicious local food first and then the outdoor hot spring. Sitting in the hot spring, we enjoyed the beautiful starry sky and shared our recent life stories, unaware of the coming of the midnight.
When I look up at the night sky, I felt extremely relaxed and my mind was extraordinary peaceful. I had not felt this way for so long, since I was always preoccupied with my study and work, and barely looked away from my books, my computer screen, or the way under my feet. I suddenly realized that I had ignored my soul, which was connected with nature, for so long. And I should spare some time to look up at the sky and communicate with my soul. After coming back from the village next morning, I felt my whole body refreshed again. All my exhaustion and annoyance seemed gone with the thermal water. I really enjoyed this brief excursion, for it gave me not only the jolliness and relaxation, but also the realization of how important it was to look up at the sky.
Journal 2 (February 26, 2012)
1. This week I read the essay, The Day Language Came into My Life, by Helen Keller. It was an affecting essay in memory of her most important day, on which her teacher, Annie Sullivan, brought her the miraculous gift, language, which connected her soul and the outside world marvelously. In my point of view, the day language came into her life was not the day when her teacher came to her, but the eventful day when she realized that “w-a-t-e-r” was water, and, for the first time, she felt repentance and sorrow and longed for a new day to come. I was deeply moved by every single word in this essay, for I realized that how hard it was for her, a blind and deaf girl, to accumulate such many words and express her feelings, and how hard it was for the teacher to teach her these.
I was astonished by the extraordinary clear and fluent sentences written by Helen Keller. She used many conjunctions and prepositional phrases to make the essay go smoothly like the running water, therefore, the sentences can quickly flow into my heart. For instance, she used “while” and “in the still” in the sixth paragraph. What is more, she also made metaphors. For example, she compared herself to the ship in a dense fog without compass or sounding-line and had no way of knowing how near the harbor was. These were really helpful to me in learning to write essay much clearer and more fluently, for they reminded me of using more conjunctions and prepositional phrases and, if necessary, making some metaphors to make the essay go more smoothly and vividly, and consequently the feelings of the writer can be quickly brought to readers hearts. I really liked this essay, because the essay not only taught me a lot how to write better, but also encouraged me a lot to learn harder.
2. This Thursday, Isabella, a good friend of mine, treated us to her dinner party at Tube Station Pizza, because she had started dating with a handsome guy. She was the youngest among us, but she was the first one among us to start dating on campus. We were surprised but glad to know that. In the dinner party, she and her boyfriend told us respectively the story of their meeting each other and coming together. They met at the supermarket one night on this winter vacation; the boy accidently knocked into her, which created an opportunity for them to communicate. In fact, they were also attended the same cramming school, however, they hadn’t known each other before that night. Their story just reminded me of a series of American TV situation comedy that I had been watching since last semester, How I Met Your Mother.
The TV series told in the first-person narrative mode about an extremely long story of how Ted Mosby, the hero, drove his life on the bumpy road to reach the junction where he and his wife met. I just remembered that Ted once said to his ex-girlfriend Stella that he had been keeping so long in waiting for his “the one” and he was then tired of waiting. But Stella comforted him with an old joke: she once succeeded in getting out of a speeding ticket; the cop sort of swaggered over and said to her that he has waiting for her all day, but she replied, “I’m sorry, officer, I got here as fast as I could.” She said to Ted that “the one” was getting here as fast as she could. In fact, I once thought the same way as Ted; I was wondering who I would meet and when I would meet her, expectantly but vaguely.
I was astonished by the extraordinary clear and fluent sentences written by Helen Keller. She used many conjunctions and prepositional phrases to make the essay go smoothly like the running water, therefore, the sentences can quickly flow into my heart. For instance, she used “while” and “in the still” in the sixth paragraph. What is more, she also made metaphors. For example, she compared herself to the ship in a dense fog without compass or sounding-line and had no way of knowing how near the harbor was. These were really helpful to me in learning to write essay much clearer and more fluently, for they reminded me of using more conjunctions and prepositional phrases and, if necessary, making some metaphors to make the essay go more smoothly and vividly, and consequently the feelings of the writer can be quickly brought to readers hearts. I really liked this essay, because the essay not only taught me a lot how to write better, but also encouraged me a lot to learn harder.
2. This Thursday, Isabella, a good friend of mine, treated us to her dinner party at Tube Station Pizza, because she had started dating with a handsome guy. She was the youngest among us, but she was the first one among us to start dating on campus. We were surprised but glad to know that. In the dinner party, she and her boyfriend told us respectively the story of their meeting each other and coming together. They met at the supermarket one night on this winter vacation; the boy accidently knocked into her, which created an opportunity for them to communicate. In fact, they were also attended the same cramming school, however, they hadn’t known each other before that night. Their story just reminded me of a series of American TV situation comedy that I had been watching since last semester, How I Met Your Mother.
The TV series told in the first-person narrative mode about an extremely long story of how Ted Mosby, the hero, drove his life on the bumpy road to reach the junction where he and his wife met. I just remembered that Ted once said to his ex-girlfriend Stella that he had been keeping so long in waiting for his “the one” and he was then tired of waiting. But Stella comforted him with an old joke: she once succeeded in getting out of a speeding ticket; the cop sort of swaggered over and said to her that he has waiting for her all day, but she replied, “I’m sorry, officer, I got here as fast as I could.” She said to Ted that “the one” was getting here as fast as she could. In fact, I once thought the same way as Ted; I was wondering who I would meet and when I would meet her, expectantly but vaguely.
Journal 1 (February 18, 2012)
1. This weekend I read a commentary of Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson. In fact, I was not sure whether this commentary was written by the author of the book or not. Anyway, it was an essay adapted from a forum address delivered Oct. 27, 2009, in the Marriott Center, which was provided by my teacher, Professor Blake. This essay was told in first person about the story of sticking to a promise, to build a school for the poor children in Korphe, which changed the whole life of the author. I was attracted by the affecting story that the author and an elderly village chief, Haji Ali, left a legacy of education for the children of Pakistan, and wanting to read the whole book in the future.
The essay contained few long sentences, but some short sentences and many sentences of medium length, which made it easier for me to read and grasp the main idea. This may be not helpful to me in learning to write long sentences, but it did remind me of the importance of putting the readers in the first place. In most cases, we write essays not to show off to the readers how skillful we are in writing, in my point of view, but to express what we want to tell others and leave impressions to the readers. In this case, I think that sentences of medium length should be the first choice of writing. Certainly, sometimes advanced vocabulary, complex and compound sentences are needed, which will add more color to our essays and made readers feel the beauty of language. Actually, this essay did consist of some complex sentences and compound sentences, so I still learned some things which are helpful to my own writing.
2. This Tuesday I went to Peking University Hospital to get two of my wisdom teeth extracted. In fact, I had planned to go to see a dentist when my first wisdom tooth appeared last semester, but I was too busy to do it, so I hadn’t went to the dentist until this Tuesday, when my third wisdom tooth had already appeared crookedly. I had a full schedule on Tuesday, except noontime, so I had planned to go to the hospital after lunch to examine whether all my wisdom teeth need to be removed or not first, instead of extracting my third teeth right away. However, when the dentist told me that all of my wisdom teeth should be removed as soon as possible and it would cost little time to remove them, I changed my mind, considering that I had waited for so long and I couldn’t keep waiting all the time, so I removed two wisdom teeth on the left side, which took me around one hour.
I always believe that sometimes we just need to decide things in a very short period and take actions immediately, or we will miss some opportunities when they come to us and keep waiting for the next chance for a very long time. After my wisdom teeth extraction operation, I thought every now and then that what if I hadn’t done it that day? What would happen? Would I do it this weekend? Would I do it before midterm? Maybe, I would keep waiting as last semester with the excuse that I was too busy to do it. Actually, I was not that busy; I was just too lazy to go to see a dentist; I just committed one of the seven deadly sins, SLOTH. However, I had decided to get rid of this bad habit when I removed two of my lazy wisdom teeth. It’s painful, but inspiring.
The essay contained few long sentences, but some short sentences and many sentences of medium length, which made it easier for me to read and grasp the main idea. This may be not helpful to me in learning to write long sentences, but it did remind me of the importance of putting the readers in the first place. In most cases, we write essays not to show off to the readers how skillful we are in writing, in my point of view, but to express what we want to tell others and leave impressions to the readers. In this case, I think that sentences of medium length should be the first choice of writing. Certainly, sometimes advanced vocabulary, complex and compound sentences are needed, which will add more color to our essays and made readers feel the beauty of language. Actually, this essay did consist of some complex sentences and compound sentences, so I still learned some things which are helpful to my own writing.
2. This Tuesday I went to Peking University Hospital to get two of my wisdom teeth extracted. In fact, I had planned to go to see a dentist when my first wisdom tooth appeared last semester, but I was too busy to do it, so I hadn’t went to the dentist until this Tuesday, when my third wisdom tooth had already appeared crookedly. I had a full schedule on Tuesday, except noontime, so I had planned to go to the hospital after lunch to examine whether all my wisdom teeth need to be removed or not first, instead of extracting my third teeth right away. However, when the dentist told me that all of my wisdom teeth should be removed as soon as possible and it would cost little time to remove them, I changed my mind, considering that I had waited for so long and I couldn’t keep waiting all the time, so I removed two wisdom teeth on the left side, which took me around one hour.
I always believe that sometimes we just need to decide things in a very short period and take actions immediately, or we will miss some opportunities when they come to us and keep waiting for the next chance for a very long time. After my wisdom teeth extraction operation, I thought every now and then that what if I hadn’t done it that day? What would happen? Would I do it this weekend? Would I do it before midterm? Maybe, I would keep waiting as last semester with the excuse that I was too busy to do it. Actually, I was not that busy; I was just too lazy to go to see a dentist; I just committed one of the seven deadly sins, SLOTH. However, I had decided to get rid of this bad habit when I removed two of my lazy wisdom teeth. It’s painful, but inspiring.