很久沒在這裡寫東西了，2014和2015發生了許多事情，所以連每年都會寫的生日快樂也不想寫。
今天突然想寫些東西，但要寫什麼我也不知道。
其實年紀越大反而越不敢說出自己心中的事情，擔心和顧慮總讓我選擇把事情放在心裡，所以連網誌我也越來越少更新。
還好以前有寫東西的習慣，讓我有時候可以回頭看看自己以前的樣子，然後羨慕著那時候的我，因為快樂的、傷心的，現在回頭看都是豐富自己人生的回憶。
2014和2015年發生一連串的事情，曾經一度讓我壓力非常大，是漫長且痛苦的過程，現在這件事暫且告一段落，但仍然在進行中。事情的細節烙印在我的心裡，不過不適合在公布在公開的空間。
- Jun 14 Tue 2016 14:00
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好久不見
- Feb 24 Mon 2014 14:27
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Things I'm not good at
I'm not sure if it's an old saying or it's simply a common thing that happens to most people, but I've experienced it a lot, which is "things you're not good at will always come back to you."
Now I think back to those things I couldn't do well, they almost always come back to me at certain points, and I wished I had put more effort to learn it thoroughly. However, time is not going to roll back for anyone. Did you ever feel that you have the same situation like me?
When I encounter something I don't feel comfortable to work with, or when I feel like giving up acquiring new skills, I have to remind myself if I don't learn it now, I will regret in the future, and even worse, I still need to face the same problem later on.
There are a lot of things I'm not good at. Here are just several of them.
I wasn't good at math when I was in Taiwan, and I was afraid of calculus. However, I had to take calculus in order to major in economics/business, so I took four calculus classes, which took me two years to finish all of them. Fortunately, I had very nice calculus professors, and the way they taught enlightened me and brought my logistic thinking to next level.
- Oct 16 Tue 2012 00:01
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生日快樂
如同往常，今年也要寫一篇祝自己生日快樂。
上一篇的生日快樂都還在同一頁，我還真是很懶得更新部落格。
今年發生了許多事。
六月份畢業，這一張畢業證書想不到我讀了七年才拿到，前陣子才收到學校寄來的畢業證書，一張有點質感又有些厚度的紙，有一個金色的校徽，加上四個「重要的人物」的簽名，我的名字印在上面，看著它感慨的想「原來我花費的時間和金錢就是為了這一張所謂的文憑」。我看完後把它放在早就買好的木框裡，本來想把它掛在牆上，但後來還是把畢業證書連同木框放回紙盒中，然後又把它擺在書桌的桌腳旁。
畢業後收到了一位教授的email，Paris教授（他的姓的確是「巴黎」）教的課正是系上最難的一堂課，而他又是這門課的權威教授，一開始時我也是讀得焦頭爛額，但到快期末考時反而是最不用擔心的科目，在之前的網誌裡我也有提到過這位教授。Paris教授寄的email大意是想跟我見見面，因為我的期末成績是A+，他以為沒當面見過我，但我其實去過他的辦公室幾次，也許是他無法連結我的名字和臉。
- Sep 13 Thu 2012 15:06
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鉤針娃娃與我
- Sep 01 Sat 2012 05:11
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Next step
I moved back home to Oakland yesterday, and I immediately felt the pressure about staying home jobless.
This is what the reality is: people judge you by your job, your title, your income, but seldom your true value within you.
My parents have rarely pushed me about anything, but my grandfather seemed not satisfied with me studying for such a long time and not being able to find a job right after college. He didn’t even know if I was younger or older than my younger cousin, who is two years younger than me. I just graduated this year, but she has been working for almost two years; I guess that confuses my grandfather.
While we were eating dinner yesterday, my grandfather asked me what my next step was. I remained silent. He continued saying that my cousin is now “making money,” and she is younger than me. I replied “If I were in Taiwan, I could definitely get a job, no doubt, but I don’t want to work in Taiwan.” He said “So many people want to come to the US for jobs, and so many people envy legal residents in the US, only silly people want to go back to Taiwan.”
I didn’t talk back anymore. If what he said was true, why would he go back to Taiwan frequently these years? Why wouldn’t my other uncles come to the US having such a wonderful life in the US instead of us coming here? The answer is obvious. The so-called wonderful American dream is not attractive enough for many people to leave their comfort zone.
- Jun 09 Sat 2012 03:04
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病毒
果真是一年一次。去年五月電腦中毒，今年則撐到了六月，哈哈哈。
這次的症狀比較輕微，更新了RealPlayer後，大部分的中文網頁都出現亂碼。不管是Chrome、IE、Firefox都一樣，但奇怪的是PCMan卻沒有問題。把編碼從UTF-8換成Big5也是一樣亂碼，還更亂！ XD
這次非常機伶，發現異樣後馬上就把重要的東西備份起來，其實我電腦的東西非常少，重要的東西也只有學校的功課和一些照片、文件，如果有電腦風格這種東西（像是房間風格那樣），我的電腦絕對是走簡約風，桌面上的捷徑也沒超過10個，我非常喜歡輕鬆無負擔的感覺。雖然說電腦本身16吋而且很重，攜帶起來一點也不輕鬆就是了…
一直懷疑是病毒造成的，可是用了小紅傘和MSE都沒掃到，但是某次在看youtube的時候，Chrome跑出了有病毒的警告視窗。後來想說免費的小紅傘不夠用，於是下載了試用30天Promotion 版本的小紅傘，可是安裝之後，反而無法上網。掃描結果也是沒有病毒。
然後試了系統回復到上個星期，所有問題都解決的，可以上網，網頁也沒有亂碼，然後有重新安裝了小紅傘，結果又不能上網了… 跑到安全模式裡也一樣，無法上網。本來才高興說問題解決了，結果還回到原點。大概是病毒跟小紅傘不和吧（？）
- May 26 Sat 2012 15:12
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鄉愁
鄉愁不單單只是「我愛台灣」這樣簡單而已。
來美國將屆滿五年的這個時候，我第一次寫鄉愁。並不是以前從沒有想念家鄉的感覺，而是那種感覺好複雜，好難去描述，所以我一直沒有辦法清楚寫出我的想法。
經過五年後，想念家鄉的心情從來沒有改變過，可是對於鄉愁這兩個字，有了更深一層的想法。
前兩天看了張小燕訪問蔣勳的節目，蔣勳講了他自己對於鄉愁的看法。他在去法國巴黎後才發現他的鄉愁是台灣，他覺得童年和青少年的記憶會陪伴你一生，然後到某一個年齡會不斷的讓你知道那是最初滋養你的東西。在他散步在巴黎街頭的某天，聞到了泥土和青草被太陽曬過的味道，突然有種想哭的感覺，然後他想起了台灣。
我也常常在某些生活中的片刻想念起台灣，也許是快下雨前低氣壓的空氣混合著柏油路的氣味，也許是某個人跟我說的某句話讓我想起在台灣的某個人也說過一樣的話，也許是偶而聽見青蛙鳴叫聲的夜晚，也許是汽車喧鬧的路口。常常在這些微小的生活片段中發現在台灣的記憶，然後回想當時的我正在做什麼事情，跟誰在一起，快樂或是悲傷，為了什麼而努力著。
- May 20 Sun 2012 02:09
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讀書
上學讀書這件事情從四、五歲上幼稚園後就佔據了大部分的人生，也成為一件再理所當然不過的事情。但再過一個月，我就要正式脫離學生這個身分，心中充滿了複雜的情緒。
不知道這樣算是幸運還算是不幸，我雖然不是特別聰明但還算會讀書，從小學三年級之後就一直有讀書的壓力，父母從來沒有要求我的學業表現，但是我倔強又好勝的個性成為我努力讀書的動力。我努力拿名次並非為了實質的獎勵，因為我的父母很少會因為成績而給我獎勵，所以有很長一段時間，我是為了愛慕虛榮以及不服輸在讀書的。
也還好我會讀書，所以在台灣這個重視學業成績的國家，我安穩地度過。沒有經過太多大風大浪，也沒有經過所謂的年少輕狂，我被視為擁有美好未來的「好學生」給對待著。讀書變成我唯一會且唯一能做的好的事情，而我也就一直待在這「好學生」的安全範圍內。
我問過自己不只一次，到底我讀書可以做什麼？到底當個「好學生」對我的人生會有多大的幫助？但這些問題是很難找到答案的，尤其在那個每三年就大考一次的國高中時代。我無法思考太多，因為讀書考試升學就是我當時應該做好的事情，我也選擇不去思考太多，因為除了讀書之外我也不會做什麼。於是我安份的做好我學生的本分，盡我最大的努力，對我自己負責。
上師大之後，好像突然沒了升學壓力就不再緊繃神經念書，所以我幾乎是以交差的方式在唸書。考試前才K書，對於學科都似懂非懂，但也覺得無所謂，即使我還是維持中上的成績，但我心裡清楚明白自己開始對讀書這件事情不負責任。
- Apr 15 Sun 2012 08:31
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Marketing and selling yourself
I went to Student-Alumni Career Day this morning. It was great, and because I attended last year, I knew what it would be like and what I should dress, act, say etc. Also, I knew more people this time, which is a sign of being senior, so I felt more comfortable being in such an occasion.
Networking is important, I know it, and that’s why I attended the Career Day even though I didn’t like to socialize with people. Yeah, I’m socially awkward. But I told myself I had to do it.
One thing I brought back home was that, finding a job is all about selling yourself. I know finding a job is really about marketing and selling myself, but for some reason, I don’t really want to “sell” myself. Unfortunately, in the business field, everything is about sales, so I better get over the word “selling.”
I’m not good at marketing, and I assure this after taking marketing class. I find it difficult to put my life in just one sheet of paper and get people’s attention. I do have my life story, but it’s not much relevant to business career field, I suppose. And I’m definitely not outstanding comparing to people who have 4.0 GPA or tons of internship and working experiences. This is going to be challenging to sell myself.
So with quiet personality and no prominent characteristics, how do I sell myself?
- Apr 02 Mon 2012 15:04
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Crime and Guilt
After reading Crime and Guilt by Ferdinand von Schirach, I confirm two things. One, being simple is the most difficult thing. Two, I am very lucky. Ferdinand von Schirach is a Germen defense attorney. Crime and Guilt are the collections of his cases. The stories are interesting; however, they are sad most of time. They are “stories” to us, but they were some people’s life. Many stories were touching and heartbreaking. At some point, I had to put the book down for a while and then continued.
- Mar 06 Tue 2012 12:37
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尋找自己
人生最難的課題，就是尋找自己。
尋找最適合自己的主修，最適合自己的工作，或是最適合自己的人生伴侶，都不是簡單的事情。於是，每個人從出生就開始尋找自己，有的人很幸運很快就找到自己的道路，而有些人經過波折後才找到，也有人一輩子都在尋覓卻找尋不到。
我從很久以前就一直在思考這樣的問題，但對六月份即將畢業的我，這個問題讓我開始慌張了起來。
從台灣到美國，從地理系到經濟系，這過程中我沒有後悔過，實際上我很喜歡我目前所學的一切，但似乎我越學越多只是發現自己不適合什麼，而沒有發現自己適合什麼。
如果說，每個人都有每個人的人生步調，我的人生步調應該是極為緩慢的。
