Useful (or not) Idiot Awards… (0)
There used to be a British radio show that called people and and tastelessly handed out the “Richard Cranium” award to folks nominated by co-workers or employees You can’t imagine how many people fell for the ruse and were thrilled to get such an honor. Well, I am going to be more transparent: I am going to get Ryan at Dao by Design to make me a snazzy award for an intermittent “Useful Idiot” award. In the interim you can visualize your own trophy.
Today’s dubious honors go to:
New Zealand’s Stuff news online. One the eve of an historic free trade agreement and a visit by NZ leader Helen Clark, with China that will abolish tariffs for NZ exporters Stuff has genius advice–archived stuff from the Cultural Revolution–for Kiwis looking to do biz in China in an article titled, Business in China Will Never be Easy:
*Choose your local partners, go-betweens, staff and translators carefully. The Chinese notion of relationship is complex. Do it well and reap the reward, get it wrong and you are almost bound to fail.
*Have plenty of cash, suppliers in China do not give credit to newcomers but expect it from you.
*Be prepared for a frustrating time with Chinese banks, they are bureaucratic and inefficient.
*Make sure contracts are clear and the English version is compatible with the Chinese.
*Get a good lawyer, there is every chance you will need one.
Early in the article they talked about economies bleeding red ink in some sad warfare metaphor just as the NZ chief spoke of a 5% increase in imports to China over the last year as NZ is now China’s 4th largest trade partner. Then there was the horrible failure of Dunkin’ Donuts in China (in 2000!!) that somehow missed that they are back and planning 100 shops in the next ten years. I have it on good authority–Marc–that DD in Shanghai is doing well. And Marc’s consumption alone could finance the operation of a small store.
The section on the recent failure of Lionsbridge Breweries (2003!) is also a wiener. The company–promise not to laugh–spent $170,000,000USD on a joint beer making venture to create more booze in a country where there is already 600+ breweries. D’oh.
These guys obviously don’t listen to the podcasts about doing business in China at CBN.
The next award goes to Anthony Marx (no relation to Groucho or Karl) the prez of Amherst College in America.
CCTV 9 (CCTV 9 is to TV stations as Macau is to Las Vegas) interviewed Tony today. If you turned down the sound and just watched Tony it looked like Bush reading Horton Hears a Hu to hearing impaired kindergarten children and if you left the sound on it just sounded like Bush.
He got trapped into being an apologist for the racial and economic disparities in American elite schools. Were it a parliamentary debate the resolution” America is racist, snobby, expensive place to get educated–especially at our school” then the government (CCTV–ironic, huh?) won the match. In a country (China) where a qualified student can attend a top ten school for $750 USD a year he spoke to how Amherst is graciously offering the same tuition rates ($45,000 with room) to International students as they do to the kids in their recovering gang members from the Bronx affirmative action program.
I woke up and caught a few sound bites I liked like that alluded to the fact that market forces will lower “elite” school tuition. He said that Harvard and Yale would likely follow his lead to stay competitive. I am guessing that Duke and MIT recruiters also stay awake nights wondering what Marx will think of next to steal the best and brightest.
And then he went on to say that some recent innovations actually allowed his admissions team to actually read more applications submitted and more of of the ones they actually did inspect. So, I will do some recon’ on the prelim screening, but in the interim be sure not to use a hotmail address as they go right in the dumper and for god’s sake use the watermarked paper!
Congrats guys!!!
Posted 7 April, 2008 in American Professor in China, Education in China, Ryan Mclaughlin, New Zealand, Chinese Education, 中国, Humor, China Humor, Intercultural Issues, In the news, Macau
China: The Balance Sheet…. (0)
China: The Balance Sheet differs from most other books we have been reading in preparation for our 22 province journey across China for charity and understanding. China guides to business or living become obsolete almost before they are published. And most of the “expert” commentary on China gives the reader intellectual whiplash: The data contained in strategy texts is often conflicting or out-dated. To offset that problem, this text offers online resources for continuing information and is a testament both to the wisdom and commitment of the authors.
China: The Balance Sheet isn’t so much a book as it is a project that yielded enough information for a book. It is a collection of work, information, and analyses collected by the Institute for International Economics and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and The Balance Sheet is rife with diverse demographics, like statistics about China’s graying population, as well as an informed political discussion on the Middle Kingdom’s long, curious relationship with Russia. Yes, its such dry reading that we carried an Internet canteen–interspersing the book with irreverent spoofs from Sinocidal to keep from humor dehydration–but every sentence, to drag out a metaphor, is an informational oasis for a Sinophile.
One of the more engaging elements of this book is its ability to maintain a separation from the standard strains of China fever: while the book delivers competent, clear information about mainland China, it avoids over-generalizations and makes clear the plurality and multiplicity of a country with 56 distinct ethnic groups, 200 spoken languages, and size enough to make Europe jealous. As Lucien Pye of foreignaffairs.org says of the book: “The main thrust of the analysis is that diversity has replaced the monolithic system that Mao Zedong created. There are, therefore, many Chinas — rural and urban, wealthy and poor, educated and illiterate, international and isolated.” And yes, seemingly benign statements like that one make it unavailable on the mainland, but censors should tale a second look as it is careful to avoid the paranoia about China’s growth that pervades Western news and doesn’t issue dark proclamations about China’s fearsome rise or apocalyptic fall. The book holds to tenets set forth in early pages: “Because we believe that constructive US policies toward China must rest, first and foremost, on a firm factual and analytical footing, this study’s primary purpose is to provide comprehensive, balanced, and accurate information on all key aspects of China’s own development and its implications for other nations.”
Will the Balance Sheet help you understand business culture in China and learn the secrets of guanxi, face, or how to hold your chopsticks at just the right angle to impress the Chinese delegation leader? No. Will the book arm you with a clear understanding of the economic, political, and demographic realities facing China now? Yes. You can find an overview and preview of the first chapter of the book here and a collection of 2007 published addendum’s here.
This ranks high on our list of must-read texts along with Harold Chee’s Myths.
By David DeGeest with Lonnie B. Hodge
Posted 27 July, 2007 in Internet marketing China, Guangzhou, Chinese Medicine, Travel in China, Chinese Internet, The Internet, The Great Firewall, Foshan China, Chinese New Year, India, China Book Reviews, Chinese Media, China Business Consultant, China Expat, Shanghai, china books, Hainan Island, Chinese Education, Korea, Chinese Proverbs, Human Rights, 中文, Wholesale Electronics China, Wholesale Products China, China Expats, Intercultural Issues, Expats, Teaching in China, Japan, Asia, Hong Kong, Macau, Book Reviews, Asian Women, China Editorials, China Business, 中国, Guangzhou China, The Great Wall, Chinese Festivals, In the news, Tibet, China Olympics, Weird China, Confucius Slept Here, China web 2.0
The China Business Consultant (0)
The China Business Consultant blog was created to provide a single destination source for consumers in America in need of assistance in China.
This blog will showcase the best consulting and service talent available in:
- Executive Consultation
- Executive Education
- Product sourcing
- Product packaging,
- Chinese interpretation ,
- Chinese translation
- Search Engine Marketing
- Search Engine Optimization
- Web Site Construction
- Blog Content Management
- Overseas and China-based Education
- China Law Services
- Wholesale Buying Services
- Factory Introduction Services
- Educational Tours
- Expat Services: Travel, Counseling, Employee Assistance…
- More….
Posted 15 July, 2007 in Manadarin Schools, Cantonese Schools, Educational Tours for Schools and Businesses, China Factory Tours, Counseling Services China, China Factory Introductions, Executive Internships in China, China web 2.0, China Product Assistance, Promotional Product Sourcing, Prototypes Made to Order, Macau, Hong Kong, Legal Services China, Expat Services China, China Prototyope Manufacturing Assistance, Chinese Translators, China Product Sourcing, China Consultants Directory, Global SEO Services, China Search Engine Marketing, Chinese Interpreters, Guangzhou Translators, Executive Training China, Inventor Services, Canton Trade Fair Interpreters, Canton Trade Fair Guides, Guangzhou Interpreters, China SEO
The nail that sticks up changes nationalities (4)
I have heard several Americans jokingly remark that while living in other countries they would rather people regarded them as Canadian.
Not unlike my days as a soldier during Vietnam, travelling with a blue passport generates discussion and often heated debate from non-Americans. Our approval rating Internationally may be lower than Bush’s at home, but I haven’t seen anyone hot-footing it to the consulate to denounce their citizenship–and who’d want Chinese students asking daily if you knew Dashan anyway?
Thinking about all of this I was dazed by an article in the Guardian last week that spoke of China’s enormous brain drain. The Sea Turtles (Chinese who have left China for study or temporary work and returned) do not seem to feel a biological or nationalistic imperative to head back to their motherland.
According to the Guardian, “China suffers the worst brain drain in the world…a new study that found seven out of every 10 students who enroll in an overseas university never return… ”
China is an economic eighteen wheeler without brakes and studies show that Despite business booming, government incentives to return,
and the odds of emerging from poverty being greater here than in the US, the the best and brightest are now staying away.
“The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences revealed 1.06 million Chinese had gone to study overseas since 1978, but only 275,000 had returned. The rest had taken postgraduate courses, found work, got married or changed citizenship.” The Guardian surmised it was a freedom issue. Imagine that. I regard it as symtomatic of a privatized educational system, exploding with students, and run amock with greedy carpetbaggers who care little about their charges.
David, the Dreamblogue’s Sancho Panza, asked me during a recent trip to Hong Kong, where the Internet is uncensored, the food and medicine quality less questionable and the burgers not likely to have come from animal that barked during their previous incarnation, “and we don’t live in Hong Kong, why?” It seems a lot of Chinese kids are feeling the same way.
Last year the numbers of students from China headed to the UK to study increased 20% to 60,000 and China has just poured several million into programs to increase overseas opportunities hoping no doubt to increase western trained innovators. But how well that will pay off is questionable because in 2005, 118,500 took to study overseas. By 2010, some 200,000 will be in schools abroad. Like my friend in a very low margin wholesale business once said: “What we lack in profit we make up for in volume.”
There was a very telling student quote in the Guardian article: “I am slightly hesitant because China is developing very fast and by 2030, its GDP will probably surpass the USA. But I am concerned that I might not get a good job if I return. America may suit me more because they judge you according to your ability, whereas in China your background and connections are more important.” In China it is definitely not what you know, but who you know, who your parents are, and where you went to school. And while there are some tremendous schools here like Beijing University, Tsinghua, and other regional institutions of lesser, but honest repute, the fact is that lack of uncensored material, Internet capabilities and abundant antiquated facilities and poor teaching conditions make some, even great, schools a tough sell.
Then, Students who fail or perform poorly in mainland exams, are flooding to newly created degree mills like the profit-mad Macau University of Science and Technology. Some of the degrees are Macau accredited and others are not. If you have money the school will find a way for you to buy a diploma. It’s reputation is failing, but the enrollment numbers are increasing. Students with money will do a year or so at MUST and then attempt more credible pursuits in the US or at more authentic schools in Hong Kong or Macau. This year more than 15% of the MUST’s student body applied for transfer to western schools or other programs and the administration could care less as it continues to cash in on discontent—while creating its own branded version.
Yang Xiaojing, one of the authors of the brain drain report, was quoted as saying in the China Daily. “Against the backdrop of economic globalization, an excessive brain drain will inevitably threaten the human resources, security and eventually the national economic and social security of any country.” His fears are borne out in a survey this year which found that in Shanghai 30% of high school pupils and 50% of middle-school students wanted to change their nationality. THEIR NATIONALITY!
It is time for a Sea Turtle Preservation Society in China. A good start is to re-look at the corruption in newly industrialized mainland and Macau educational institutions, like MUST, who I see, through greed, declining standards, disdain for faculty, and lack of concern for a student’s ability to obtain work upon graduation, remove what should be an innate desire to return home.
Posted 17 June, 2007 in Macau University of Science and Technology, 中国, 中文, Chinese Education, China Business Consultant, American Professor in China, In the news, Confucius Slept Here, Intercultural Issues, Macau, Teaching in China, China Editorials, China Business, Hong Kong
Wishes, Lies and Schemes of Social Commitment in China, Part I (2)
There is a school in America that maintains an “Office of Social Commitment.” Ostensibly, the office is charged with, in part, sending bright, globally aware scholars to regions that can develop and utilize their youthful enthusiasm. Ideally this fosters the “fellows” acquisition of information about local culture and accords them skill building opportunities that can be transferred back to America or generously subsumed into future professional choices.
Here is the rub: The four fellows who come from that particular school are sent to work in two institutions: One is in Macau and the and other is in Nanjing. The former is a third-tier private, for-profit school with most students coming from well-heeled families, and the latter is an elite prep’ school. The fellows in Macau are simply handed a teaching schedule and sent off, without any preparation, to face the Great Wall of Student Silence that is built into most Chinese classrooms. Attempting to scale the Great Wall can repel veteran teachers and injure novices and journeyman alike if they are not well equipped. Chinese administrations will not help teachers to adjust as they have little time and patience for new and, well, expendible teachers. I watched two “fellows” suffer emotional melt-downs (they are somewhat fine now) because they received little or no responsible assistance to problems from their “commitment” office or their Chinese work-site. It seems that social commitment is only an external consideration and does not apply to working field staff.
Dostoevsky wrote: “As a general rule people, even the wicked, are much more naive and simple hearted than we suppose. And we ourselves are too.” Sadly, that used to reflect my world view, but living in China among opportunistic and the ill-intentioned, posing as humanitarians, has altered my thinking. The head of the aforementioned social commitment office has in his website bio’ a telling metaphor: He ends his long list of organizational memberships and awards (Surely proof he is a good guy) with the announcement that he is adopting an Asian child. The child has no name, no history mentioned and upon close examination seems to be there only to add credence to the director’s bid for earthly sainthood–along with his being a “living kidney donor.”
In Nanjing the fellows are a bit better off, but are as essential to the fulfillment of ideologically meaningful goal as an i-Pod in the Gucci bag of an Orange County co-ed. This isn’t the community building your hippie dad knew in the Peace Corps of the seventies when he dug wells and irrigation ditches alongside poor farmers. The only holes that are dug in the examples mentioned are the emotional ones, like above, that once idealistic fellows will spend years extricating themselves from. The Chinese students at both of these schools, while lamenting environmental issues and social ills in the mainland, often come from families that work in government or head up companies that are part-and-parcel of troubling environmental issues and in financial charge of workers that increasingly need more attention than their designer clothed school children.
When I recommended possible educational agencies that might really benefit from the investment of a young foreign teacher, or schools where poor children may never have seen an outsider like those served by Volunteer English Teachers, I was told that it was just too much trouble to negotiate acceptable new contracts. Since when did social commitment get easy?
If you are headed here to help make sure you have the training and support you need to embark on your journey. And be sure you are not just part of your own or someone else’s need to uphold the appearance of humanitarian interests.
In the next installment I will be looking at NGOs, and Missionary Groups operating in Macau and the Mainland…
Coming:
Addicted to Mediocriy II and Dreams, Repression and Violence II….I lost many follow-ups in the server crash and am now reconstructing…
Posted 5 May, 2007 in China-US Medical Foundation, Yangshuo China, 中国, Top Blogs, Travel in China, Human Rights, Macau University of Science and Technology, Heartsongs, Charity in China, In the news, cartoons, Teaching in China, Expats, Intercultural Issues, China Editorials, China Cartoons, Personal Notes, Confucius Slept Here, The League of Extraordinary Chinese Women, Macau
Violent Protests Rock Macau (2)
While literally hundreds of thousand of would-be gamblers stood for hours in line at Chinese customs stations Macanese locals used their May Day Holiday to scuffle with police. Well-armed Macau policemen fired warning shots into the air, but there were no reports of injuries resulting from the gunfire. According to one report: “Chaos broke out when a group of protesters tried to force their way through a police cordon, to access a busy avenue that leads to the Government headquarters. Over a hundred police, in full riot gear, struggled in vain to hold the crowd back.” Some three thousand people joined in the May Day rally to condemn corruption, rises in real estate prices and to call for tougher action against illegal workers. Dozens of protesters and police were hurt last year, when a similar protest turned violent. Some protesters used the occasion to carry placards in Chinese protesting various casinos and in particular the Sands whom some locals blamed for last week’s suicide jump inside the casino by a gambler from Hubei province.
Many official reports are putting the numbers of protesters in the hundreds, The taxi drivers, who took the circuitous route around the center of the ruckus near world famous Senado Square, say the figure was certainly in the thousands.
Posted 1 May, 2007 in Violence, Human Rights, 中国, In the news, Asia, Macau
Dying to win in Macau…. (0)
Simon Montlake wrote recently in the Christian Science Monitor about Macau’s “exhilarating” growth of late. Imagine yourself in a town where the GDP rose 17 percent last year and the law mandated that the highest paying of the thousands of new jobs must go to you, a local resident. Desperate casinos are hiring college students before graduation and they are easy to spot as they doze off even in the midst of exams.
One the face of it Macau, with salaries 3-6 times higher on average than the mainland, has re-nationalized and re-located the American Dream Eastward. And land values have increased some 30% this year and restaurants and service sector shops are packed most days.
But, there is life in the darkness beneath the fresh sod of success: Thousands of illegal aliens, mostly Filipino domestic helpers, Chinese mainland construction workers and Russian showgirls and prostitutes, work for under- the-table pay while living in overcrowded apartments. For every undocumented worker deported there are dozens, from the over 200 million migrant workers creating China’s new skyline, waiting to take their place. And there is no shortage of employers desperate to fill critical shortages or other local needs who are willing to bend the rules for a profit.
Last week a man from Wuhan in Hubei province, reportedly despondent over gambling losses, jumped to his death from a terrace inside the Sands Casino. He landed amid players queueing up for a free million HK dollar pull on a house slot machine. The Sands, who made profits staggering enough to pay off all their debts in only a few months, is building a new 3,000-room Venetian Macau at a cost of $2.3 billion and will likely retire that debt in record time. Mainlanders lose the money that comprises more than 60% of the revenue that has already outstripped the take of Las Vegas. Changes in anti-gambling Beijing’s hands off policy could affect the country’s bottom line and leave a populous, vocationally training to need gaming demands, without a fall-back plan. (Like my Irish mom, who likely spoke Yiddish in a previous life, “You need something to fall back on,” but….
It is not the first time someone has taken their own life after yielding to gambling urges and the mainland authorities, this time, have taken some token measures to curb addiction: Visas issuance, according to an official source in Guangzhou, have been limited in number due to the recent suicide. While I am sure this will do little to stem the tide of players it may be a warning shot fired at the captains of greed steering Macau into waters dependent on the very people Macau scorns with governmental controls. It may well cut down on monetary traffic for the upcoming Golden Week holiday.
The increase in real estate prices has taken place despite a huge surplus of available rental space. Thousand of high-end dwellings are gather dust on their price tags as the asking price is far too steep even for most newly affluent Macanese. Affordable housing for newcomers and is hard to come by and the 9-10 Macanese and Hong Kong families that control the bulk of Macau’s property holdings. The rampant land speculation is making decent housing unaffordable.
In an effort to slow real estate speculation the Macau government abruptly stopped its program that allowed outsiders to invest in homes and then qualify for citizenship. Of course, only non-Chinese qualified anyway unless mainlanders bought a passport from an African, Carribean or South American country selling citizenship. Now, many mainlanders are out the cost of an apartment and a fresh nationality. And real estate developers selling space in dozens of new luxury high-rises are owed millions in unpaid commissions now that the lure is gone. What is most troubling is: the new policy does not look like it will lower prices as the moguls have plenty of cash to park in land holdings while betting on the come of outside cash.
Macau has already surpassed Hong Kong as the top tourist destination in the area, but a quick search for the number of people checking on line for lodging in the area shows Macau getting 2/3 less look-ups. Macau is a Gambling Disneyland and good for a day trip, but not a vacation destination.
The homey, cheap places to eat are giving way to gourmet fare at tourist prices as local restaurateurs cannot afford the rent or compete for service workers with the casinos. The Sands starts their toilet attendants at a salary twice that of a mainland college teacher. Area entertainment magazines, paid for by casino ads, laud the explosion of new chefs and high-dollar meals, but the young, and the low-budget, daytripping retired folks think otherwise.
Right now, Macau is a safe bet for locals. But, as always, for someone to win at the tables, someone else must lose.
Posted 26 April, 2007 in Holidays, 中国, Chinese Festivals, Travel in China, In the news, Personal Notes, China Editorials, China Cartoons, China Business, Confucius Slept Here, Macau
El Encierro is for wimps: Try a Chinese buffet! (3)
The running of the bulls has nothing on the serving line at a Chinese buffet. China is new to properity and the wonders of all-you-can-eat Vegas style grazing. I am sure that, as modernity grows, so will the social graces that accompany it in other parts of the world. But for now, “buffet” remains a contact sport on a par with the Hong Kong Sevens Rugby Tournament.
Here is a video that is virally making its way into the emails of Hong Kong and Macau natives. They don’t seem to think well of their neighbors to the north and this kind of video is all too common.
[youtube]CNVxW-LFEV4[/youtube]
I was taken to a new buffet recently that made the above video look tame. Some sadist designed the serving line: The restaurant is only open for two hours, and it has only a single serving line placed in a narrow hall only about three feet wide with customers moving in both directions. It was a snooze and you lose situation: One blink and that whole tray of beef you had your eye on begins levitating toward a hungry family.
It was easily the best food I had had in ages, but I felt like I had won a challenge on Survivor Island to get it.
*****
A non-China aside: I am a huge golf fan who wishes my play could one day match my enthusiasm. So, of course, I have been reading Yahoo! sports news religiously this Easter to follow Tiger and company at the Masters.
I am also a great fan of good sports and travel writing: Bryson, Albom, Mayle….
Well, Dan Wetzel is getting close with hilarious stories like this one about the Masters. A fun piece on Augusta: Masters of None
Posted 8 April, 2007 in Weird China, 中国, Travel in China, China Editorials, Intercultural Issues, Humor, Videos, China Humor, Macau
Overheard on China TV…. (4)
I have what is known as ‘artillery ears” from my days in the military. It means that I am not looking for particulate stuck in your teeth so much as I am trying to discern what the hell you are saying. I confess to turning on the English subtitles when I watch a show and I am often astonished that what I think I heard that is nowhere to be found in the printed text. So imagine my confusion as I tuned on CCTV News ( CCTV is to TV as Macau is to Vegas or as Hainan Island is to Hawaii or Stanley Ho is to monogamy) and thought I heard them talking about tycoon Stanley Ho’s bum. Sure enough they were calmly going on about the 84th richest guy in the world having been injured in Thailand while getting treatment for constipation. Jeez, there hasn’t been anything nearly as creepy on the news since Reagan had prostate surgery and they showed diagrams that should have been rated. It must have been one slow news day….
Anyway, poor Stanley has survived triads in Macau, four wives at the same time with seventeen kids (that would be a pain for most folks), Steve Wynn out of exile from Nevada and now he might have dodged the adult pampers scene with surgery. But he’s not rich or powerful enough to stop two of his wives from commenting about his posterior. They chatted up the Hong Kong Daily Apple (The Apple is to Journalism as George Bush is to elocution)
and the Ming Pao Daily. The Ming Pao Daily, was there on the scene to ascertain despite one wife’s denial at the hospital that there was not a problem that Stanley was indeed riding side-saddle. The paper claims they heard him speaking loudly (“Rectum Hell!”) in the background as they spoke to his wife. HE IS 84 AND HE CAN’T GO TO THE BATHROOM! OF COURSE HE SPEAKS LOUDLY!
To paraphrase the Anchor-What? Blog: Could there be anything worse than having various newspapers chronicle the internal and external happenings of your hind-parts in three languages?
I am headed home to watch DVDs now: I am on self-imposed news restriction until there is a real disaster somewhere.
Posted 7 April, 2007 in In the news, 中国, Hong Kong Stars, Chinese Media, Weird China, China Business, Humor, China Humor, Asian Humor, China Editorials, Macau
Candy’s List (0)
I managed to recover this from Blogger News archive. It is one of my favorite posts:
Some foreigners are astonished at, and puzzled by, the myriad things that some Chinese, especially older ones, have never experienced. I am in awe of the Chinese who brave new experiences and immerse themselves in change with child-like abandon.
Ms Yue rode on a plane for only the second time in her life and had her nose pressed to the window the entire time like there was a Xmas display on the other side–I suspect there was…
I remember going with her and another teacher to see King Kong in a big screen movie house. I learned later that it was her first time, at age 45, to see a movie indoors. She was mesmerized and would not take her eyes off the screen even to ask the question: “Is this real?”
This week Candy, an assistant in our International affairs office, went on vacation to Canada and America for the first time. She is 24 Years old and has lived most of her life in Macau. I had wrongly assumed her to be more “westernized” and was entranced by the diary she kept of first-time activities, foods and places that particularly thrilled her on her journey.
Years ago there was a book entitled The One Minute Meditator” that gave you hints on how to celebrate and relax into events that we have become deadened to in our daily privileged routines. I have a renewed sense of life and good fortune courtesy of the fearless Ms Yue and Xiao Candy. Here are excerpts from her diary:
Foods:
Maple Syrup
Casserole
Root Beer
S’mores
Subway Sandwiches
Tap Water
Bratwurst
Things and Places:
An American Wedding
Sledding
A Snowball Fight
A Road Trip
Walking on a Frozen Lake
Taking a Sauna in a House
A Gas Station
Crazy Cars
Big Dogs
A Country Cabin
A Glow in the Dark Frisbee
A Big Sky
Ice Hockey
Carrying Wood for a Fireplace
Playing Old Maid
Seeing an Owl