To 'E' or not to 'E'

I am currently reading this book.

A friend passed it to me before we left Beijing, together with its sequel.

I was initially reluctant to bring it with us to HK given the amount of stuff that we already have & the limited storage capacity of our current abode

And also, I have, for some time now, with the MANY books that we've accumulated over the years, and the lack of shelf space in our bookcase, switched to electronic books in order to appease my never ending love & thirst for reading.  How about libraries, one may ask.  Well, libraries stocking English books in Beijing are not exactly easy to find, let alone bookstores with good stock of English books.  And besides, for me, a book is not just a book, but most of the time, it becomes an old friend that one wants to tuck away with the intention of re-visiting again sometime in the near (or far) future.  

Hence our problem with the overstocked book shelves.

In any case, I am glad that I did keep this book gift as it is an engrossing read (so far).  And there is something about reading a good old made-of-paper book that feels familiar & friendly, like putting on an old comfy sweater.  

Outlander

Help!

I am hooked on to this "Outlander" series of books by Diana Gabaldon! I can't stop myself from wanting to read more & more about the relationship between a time-traveling surgeon (Claire Randall) & the Scottish Highlander (Jaime Fraser). Not the typical romance, this epic (and I mean EPIC! Each book ranges from 600+ to 1000+ pages!!) has love, fantasy, mysticism, history, science fiction, and a bit of medicine all rolled into one.

I just finished the 4th book, The Drums of Autumn, and can't wait to start on the 5th one soon.

I love my e-reader :) .

Three Cups of Tea

This is a must-read for everyone - the story of this amazing man who made a difference to thousands of children in one of the poorest parts of the world.

Greg Mortensen, ex-mountaineer turned humanitarian, is an eccentric character, to say the least. The book is written (by Mortensen together with David Relin) in a captivating narrative which captures the reader & refuses to let him/her go till the last page is read.

The roadblocks faced by this man as he tried to build schools for the voiceless in Pakistan & Afghanistan would have stopped the average person. But (I think) because of his eccentricity, and a huge amount of persistence, with perhaps a bit of recklessness (or stupidity, depending on whom you are talking to), he literally built his first school stone by stone.

His achievements are inspirational. This should be mandatory reading for The Powers That Be who sit on the governments which send troops to the Middle East or Afghanistan.

This paragraph sums up quite neatly why the war on terror is not being won by the politicians:

"We only stayed a minute, while I was introduced," Mortensen says. "And I wish I could tell you I said something amazing to Donald Rumsfeld, the kind of thing that made him question the whole conduct of the war on terror, but mostly what I did was stare at his shoes.

"I don't know much about that kind of thing, but even I could tell they were really nice shoes. They looked expensive and they were perfectly shined. I remember also that Rumsfeld had on a fancy-looking gray suit, and he smelled like cologne. And I remember thinking, even though I knew that the Pentagon had been hit by a hijacked plane, that we were very far away from the fighting, from the heat and dust I'd come from in Kabul."

His work has inspired me.

This book has made me see that in the greater scheme of things, we need to appreciate what we have instead of focusing on what we don't, and yes, it is cliched, but there are always others MUCH less fortunate than us. Oh, I have known it all along, but reading about the people in Pakistan & Afghanistan & how the live has made me appreciate this so much more.

It has also shown me that sometimes, we need to take small steps at the beginning to reach a seemingly unreachable destination.

I think I will take my first step now.

Man's Best Friend

Reading the book Marley & Me was like picking a scab off of a wound that had not quite completely healed.

It had me laughing then crying then laughing again, over the antics of a mentally subnormal (the author's words, not mine) yellow Labrador retriever, who was lovable, destructive, loyal, slobbery, devoted, hyperactive, & most of all, a beloved family member.

I saw so much of my old dog in Marley, and as I read, I thought, "Oh my God, this all sounds so familiar!" The incessant shedding, the jumping, the highly dependent personality (read: leech), the eager desire to just BE with someone (24/7 if possible), the undying devotion, the insatiable appetite for everything & anything (from pebbles to mulch to plastic bags)...all this described my old dog to a T.

It was re-living heartbreak again, when the author described the problems that came with an aging big dog & the eventual decision to let him go as humanely as possible.
When I picked up this book to read, I thought that I had gotten over what I had gone through almost a year ago. For many months, I distanced myself from dogs. When previously, I would have gushed over & cuddled a cute little puppy, I would instead walk away, for fear of stirring up unwanted emotions.

No, the wounds have not healed yet. Maybe another year. Maybe not ever completely.

The End

I finished reading the final installment of the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows last week.

Spoilers ahead...
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I've always enjoyed the Harry Potter books. I think JK Rowling is a wonderful writer, managing to capture her readers' imaginations & drawing them into the story so that one is loathe to put down the book until the end.

It was the same with the Deathly Hallows, although I got rather frustrated with Harry's reluctance to let others in on his secret mission just because Dumbledore said so. And this despite his own doubts about Dumbledore's sincerity & truthfulness. These people- Remus, Moody, the Weasleys - were willing to sacrifice their own safety to save his life, for crying out loud! So I didn't quite get Harry's very child-like loyalty to Dumbledore's confidence.

The final battle sequence was enthralling although Voldemort's demise was quite anti-climactic...downed by a reflection of his own Killing Spell??? I wonder if Ms Rowling's creative energy was running out of steam at this point.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed the book overall, & is quite sad to see it end. I hope Ms Rowling will change her mind about not writing anymore about the Harry Potter universe, as I am sure many fans will wonder at how the various relationships develop (i.e. Harry-Ginny, Ron-Hermione) between the time when this book ended, to the Epilogue of Nineteen Years Later.

A Little Book with a Big Heart

I read "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd in just one day. I just couldn't put it down.

It's a story set in the South (of the USA) during the fledgling days of the Civil Rights Act, when racism was rampant against the African-Americans. It tells of a motherless girl, Lily, who discovers that family ties can transcend man-made barriers like differences in skin color, and can form even between non-related individuals. She discovers the strength of the human spirit through trinkets of advice from black beekeeper August Boatwright.

Here are some excerpts:

"Well, one time Big Mama told me she went out to the hives on Christmas Eve and heard the bees singing the words of the Christmas story right out of the gospel of Luke...

...What I mean is that the bees weren't really singing the works from Luke, but still, if you have the right kind of ears, you can listen to a hive and hear the Christmas story somewhere inside yourself. You can hear silent things on the other side of the everyday world that nobody else can...."

"You know, some things don't matter that much, Lily. Like the color of a house. How big is that in overall scheme of life? But lifting a person't heart - now, that matters. The whole problem with people is-"
"They don't know what matters and what doesn't," I said, filling her sentence and feeling proud of myself for doing so.
"I was gonna say, The problem is they know what matters, but they don't choose it..."


Cynics may find it cliched...but I found it inspirational.

English Lit.

The movie adaptation of Jane Austen's "Pride & Prejudice" will hit the local cinemas in December. I have already asked a couple of my ex-schoolmates if they would be interested in coming along with me to watch this chick flick (hubby had resignedly said,"If you really want to watch it, I will accompany you." Sweet intentioned that he is - hee hee - I won't submit him to the torture of sitting through 2 hours of Jane Austen's dialogue).

Reason why I am so keen to watch this is because I remember reading this book for English Literature, one of my favorite subjects in Secondary school. What made it even more fun was that some of us were assigned "roles" (characters) from the book, & we read out the dialogue as if we were acting out the book in a play. Reading this book brings back many enjoyable memories of reading & learning to appreciate the beauty of words & what emotions some words can evoke in me. I remember reading Poetry which could stir up emotions in me that I never knew existed!

Admittedly, Jane Austen's austere & rather long-winded writing style frustrates me immensely at times; and yet, I am still drawn to reading her books (as a matter of fact, I have all her novels); perhaps I am a masochist! I even have some of the previous movie adaptations (Sense & Sensibility, Emma) as well as the TV series version of Pride & Prejudice in which Mr Darcy was played by a rather wooden Colin Firth (highlighted in Bridget Jones' Diary).

Literature is no longer a compulsory subject in local schools, which is a pity. It is a shame that many of our children will not know writings of Shakespeare or Bronte or Austen, nor the poetry of Yeats or Keating. It is obvious that the standard of written & spoken English locally has deteriorated tremendously in the last decade or so. Someone in the Ministry of Education should realise that the study of a language does not comprise solely of filling in the blanks of Cloze passages (what the h*** does Cloze mean anyway??? Can't find it in any respectable dictionary!) & answering multiple choice questions. Children need to be exposed to the different forms of writing & not only will they grow to appreciate the power of language, but at the same time learn so much more about the world around us.

When my older son first transferred to the international school system after spending 5 years in the local system, he struggled with Reading & Language. Yes - this despite the purported high standard of English in the local schools. He realised that what he had been doing previously was just skimming the surface. In his new school, he had to actually read books, analyse paragraphs, and learn to use different tools in writing. It took him a couple of months to change his mindset as far as learning the language was concerned. And it is only recently that I see a change & vast improvement in his language skills when he had to review a poem (below) by Langston Hughes called "A Dream Deferred".

Not bad for a 13 year old, eh?

A Dream Deferred:
Why it’s Memorable

“A Dream Deferred” by Langston Hughes is very memorable because of its vivid, detailed imagery. His use of pauses and hyphens causes the desired, unsteady beat to create stress in the poem. For example, he put “Harlem” at the beginning, asks a question, and he has an off-beat question at the end and they all don’t follow any steady rhythm like the middle of the poem does. He probably did these things in this poem to show that a dream deferred is random and out of place. Hughes also used harsh “st” sounds and “s” alliterations to create undesirable images and slithering, flowing sounds to show slyness. For instance, he wrote, “Or fester like a sore – And then run?” this creates an ugly or even painful image of a sore in the reader’s head. Another example: he wrote, “Or crust and sugar over – like a syrupy sweet?” which creates an encroaching, slithering manifestation of a rotting candy. Using all kinds of devices, Hughes creates a lasting impression in the reader’s mind.

Of Witches, Wizards, Magic & Hogwarts

What is it about Harry Potter that draws grown-ups into his world & his adventures? We bought advance tickets for Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire last week when the tickets first became available for sale. I am probably more excited about the movie than my sons! I have even marked the date on which we are watching the movie in RED on my calendar, that's how excited I am!

I bought the first Harry Potter book (Sorcerer's Stone) out of curiosity about the hoo-ha that surrounded its popularity. My older son was not even old enough to appreciate it at the time. My husband soon got drawn into it by the time the 3rd book came out.

I guess part of the appeal is the fantasy world of magic, where bones can be mended with a potion, or time can be relived using a magical necklace. It's a form of escapism from the real & often mundane world. Something about living in a boarding school also appeals to the teenager in me, who used to read the Mallory Towers series by Enid Blyton, wishing that I, too, could do the same.

I know that come Nov 18 when we are watching the movie, I will be on the edge of my seat with anticipation as the scenes unfold and JK Rowling's words are transformed into the images on the big screen. I also know that I will wish that the movie will never end - that's how it's always been in all the Harry Potter movies- and that the magic will somehow continue...but it never does, and eventually, it has to come to the bittersweet end.

Short takes on...

...the Da Vinci Code Debacle:
Hello, people!!! This is a work of fiction! I thought the book burning days were long gone.

...American Idol technical problem:
I wonder how this will affect the results. My fave is still a tie between Bo Bice, Carrie Underwood & Anwar Robinson. :)

...the Aids issue brought up by Dr Balaji:
Lets hope that the hoohaa about whether this is a homophobic statement or not will not cast a shadow over the larger problem of keeping the transmission numbers down, hopefully with Public Education programs to BOTH hetero- & homosexuals.