Class Task: Paraphrasing --The Hazards of Moviegoing

Main Text (One-paragraph Essay):          
           Although I love movies, gong to see them drives me slightly crazy. First of all, getting to the movie can take a lot of time. I have a thirty-five-minute drive down a congested highway. Then, with a popular film, I usually have to wait in a long line at the ticket booth. Another problem is that the theater itself is seldom a pleasant place to be. A nusty smell suggests that there has been no fresh air in the theater since it was built. Half the seats seem to be failing apart. And the floor often has a sticky coating that gets on your shoes. The worst problem of all is some of the other moviegoers. Kids run up and down the aisle. Teenagers laugh and shout at the screen. people of all ages loudly drop soda cups and popcorn tubs, cough and burp, and elbow you out of the armrest on either side of your seat. All in all, I would rather stay home and wait for the latest movie hits to appear on the TV in the safety and comfort of my own living room.

Notes:
-take a lot of time
-wait in a long line for popular films
-a nusty smell suggests no fresh air in theater, seats failing apart, floor has sticky coating
-kids run, teenagers laugh and shout, people drop soda cups and popcorn tubs
-stay at home for safety and comfort


Paraphrase:
            Cinema moviegoing can be irritating with long time consumption as the top main factor. For hot movies especially, long queue is expected. Moreover, many cinema have poor maintenance of infrastructure such as bad ventilation system, spoilt seats and dirty carpeted floor. During a show, audience might also get interrupted by the running kids in the cinema, laughter if teenagers and dropping of soda cups and popcorn tubs. Hence, it is advisable to stay at homr instead of going to cinema for movies to ensure maximum enjoyment of the film.
 

Expertise in The 21st Century Modern Workplace

               

             As Paul J. Meyer mentioned, “Communication - the human connection - is the key to personal and career success”. It is surprised that with the presence and assistance of abundant science and technology means, multiple unexpected problems, errors in operations or even accidents appear to take place in the 21^st century modern workplace, which seem to not promoting, but deceasing the productivity and efficiency of the workers or employees. In view of this paradoxical situation in contemporary workplace, one of the major contributing factors may lie on the ineffective or lack of communication skills possessed by the employees. Undeniably, communication skills are an essential component of a productive workplace, allowing employees to work together cohesively and professionally. Yet, such soft skills are most likely to be ignored or neglected both during the time as a student as well as in the real working environment. Without effective communication routes, there is a high possibility for all kinds of errors to arise, regardless of the level of advanced infrastructures available. In solving this particular issue, improving the employee communication skills through series of trainings and behavior crediting or modeling might give a company a competitive edge. Introducing the fundamentals of good communication, including listening skills, the concept of encoding and sending information interpersonally or impersonally, to any new employees during the initial training program and frequent team-building programs seem to be the most basic mode of action to be enforced. To motivate the employees in long term, communication skills can be further included as a major aspect in performance appraisals in the company, in which incentive awards are encouraged to be associated to enhance the attention focused by them on the often neglected communication aspects. Despite incentive, a better form of award might be promoting those effective communicators into supervisory positions, which seems to also, set the tone in a company by motivating the employees to model the effective communication skills.       

Researching – Physical or Virtual World?

          

           Have you ever experienced getting lost in the shelves of books or have yourself buried in the dozens of pages of reference books through days and nights searching for relevant materials for assignments? Otherwise, are you the one that experience more frequent of surfing the web blindly or end yourself in a confused state, holding multiple sources of supporting materials and busy evaluating which to be use? Conducting research is a task that is closely associated with a student’s life, regardless of which course you are pursuing and almost every single moment, new academic or research papers are produced and published. Have you ever read any academic papers and wondered where on earth that the authors are able to obtain such concrete evidences, examples or convincing information that are able to persuade you to trust the results of the studies conducted? Undeniably, a credible research stems from and is backed up by credible sources of information and at the stage of being a college or university student, the two most common sites to obtain resources for research projects are the physical library and virtual world of internet. Now, let us evaluate both the pros and cons of each source.

            From a more physical and surface aspect, the cost-concern and environmental factors play a major role in determining the types of source a student would choose to find information from. As we have come to understand, library is the traditional place to conduct research for an academic work, whereby it contain a large collection of books, periodicals and printed journals, that provide the students with the opportunity to read hardcopies of the reference materials instead of being extensively exposed to harmful radiation while researching online, which may destroy the eyesight and cause dyspepsia. However, what if you are bound by the operation hour of the library but you need to bring home some information in certain books or journals, which you cannot borrow or can borrow only for few hours, for further research? Then, you would need to make a copy of those pages with the photocopy machine in the library where you require information from, which can be extremely costly sometimes as you need to secure information from not only one books or single pages but multiple sources in the library. In contrast to that, internet will be a better choice in this context because internet provides you to surf through millions of webpages and you can simply bookmarks the pages of information that you feel to be needed and even highlight the important points in the documents or files downloaded from internet. Also, in view of the environmental-concern issues, we, students are taught to be more environmental friendly and conserving paper by limiting printing or photocopying is one of the essential ways.

            Next, the easiness and efficiency of accessing and obtaining the desired information is a factor to be considered as well. Students’ life is bombarded with multiple assignments at a time and the time factor judged by how quickly and effortlessly the desired or targeted information can be found will greatly affect a student’s choice of the sources of information they long to use. In view of the source of library, knowledgeable and friendly librarians are available to assist with locating information in person, chat, e-mail or telephone. A student can request assistance at the beginning of your research and spare valuable time spent on the Internet, being confused by too much information depicted simply by typing a key word. We even have things called “OPAC” in either school or public libraries where students can easily locate the books they wish to find through the library own digital computation system. Unfortunately, the downside of library is that most of the librarian todays are lack of the responsibility and readiness to lend a helping hand to students in locating the information they want and the OPAC search engine are not being kept up-to-date to provide assistance to the students. In contrast to that, internet is a powerful searching engine in which, just by typing the keywords of topics of research, one will get uncountable sources of information online. The tools available for college students online include multiple thesaurus, dictionary, grammar and study guides, and research databases. E-mail, social networking sites, online forum, and social media, such as educational video, are also channels available online which allows students to exchange or discuss opinion and information obtained simply by sharing the link or copying and pasting the raw data to filter and obtain the most accurate and relevant information.

            On reviewing the two factors mentioned above, it is seemed that internet has appeared to be a more outstanding source of information for students, yet, the third factor of reliability explains why such wonderful virtual world of supply of information cannot substitute a physical library. Printed materials are more credible in the sense that all the authors and publishers of the books or journal studies are clearly stated and can be cited as strong evidence while presenting an academic paper. In contrast to that, information on the internet is hard to tell who’s telling you what and where is the location of the information. When you use information in your paper from the Internet, you may appear to find that most of the sources you cited from are anonymous or unknown of the authors. Though this is allowed in citation and reference of an academic paper, your work of studies or investigation will later appear to be less credible or reliable. 

 

            The debate over which method of research is better, either through a physical library or the virtual Internet remains a negotiable. Some students find it easier to conduct their research in a library because they can physically search through a reference source instead of having to search it digitally. Others are more comfortable working on online materials when they are conducting research since it is more convenient and environmental friendly. In short, both sources of information have their pros and cons and cannot be substituted by one another. 

My So-Called Adulthood: Top 10 Crisis in The Problematic Transition

Chronologically, a span of life between twelve and eighteen years welcomes the most wonderful period of age for “being young and youthful” and concludes with maturity of early adulthood. To aid in adaption to the challenges and growing responsibility burden in future adulthood, the years of adolescence, which is often known as a time of “stress and storm”, prepare us well by exposing us to numerous contexts in reality, change in perceptions, authority and freedom issues, and most importantly, own emotional responses in different situations. It is clearly shown that with the onset of puberty, an adolescent is challenged to make a number of adjustments to conform into the society.  

Now, let’s check out the top ten crises that our adorable youth need to undergo during the process of conforming to their peers, family, and general public’s interaction and expectation for them while maintaining their own identity! See how relevant is it applying to your children or you – teenagers who are reading this article.       

Crisis No. 1: Lappy Lagging

“Oh my God, why are you so ‘lag’?” It is common for teenagers today to engage in such self-talk session with their laptops or computers, especially when they are rushing their assignments or school tasks. The slowing of the response time definitely lead to a muscle-tension in teenagers especially when the laptops “lag” until they cannot move the cursor but to force shut down and restart the laptop again. That is the moment where they question why the laptop cannot function as efficient as how it was while first being purchased.

Suggested Solution: Do not download or install free softwares online which carry “TROJAN” that causes your laptops’ function to decease.  

Crisis No. 2: Planning Fallacy

“I thought I can finish on time!” The unrealistic optimism of the teenagers often lead them to a tendency of believing that they can get more work done in a given period of time than they actually can. Therefore, they tend to procrastinate and delay their work until the last minute, while indulging in the positive illusion or convincement that they can finish the assigned tasks in few hours’ time and they should be confident about their abilities. Such overoptimistic predictions always make them have difficulty of meeting deadlines, causing extensive stress.

Suggested Solution: Always look backward in time to see how long similar tasks took in the past and be more realistic in future estimation of time for completing the task.    

Crisis No.3: Resisting Temptation  

“McDonalds, Sushi King, Starbucks – I’m loving it” but would the problems of meeting the budget of the month ever make you hold a step back before entering those shop lots? Teenagers are bombarded with dozens of temptation each day, especially where food is concern as seemed their stomachs bottomless pit. “What is the point of living if you do not enjoy food now?” Such statement often leads to insatiable desires which burn the pocket of the young without them realizing.

      

Suggested Solution: Come out with a budget list planning of the month to balance between the input pocket money and output spends on desired food. Postpone the wish-to-have meal to next month if over-budget.     

Crisis No. 4: Counterfeit Omniscient

“I know…I came across this…I get what you mean.” Omniscient is one who perceived to have great and unlimited boundary of knowledge. Teenagers tend to act if they know everything that their parents, teachers and most commonly seen - their peers talking about, even though most of the time they don’t. Such behaviour is pursued automatically to obtain the attention, affirmation and good impression of others towards them, for they believe that this stems and represents a good interaction with all. Pretending to “know” can be rather stressful for them as they might feel they are not themselves.

Suggested Solution: Learn to say “I don’t know” while asking for guidance of others humbly and take action to build up general knowledge which enhances interaction.

Crisis No. 5: Self-shot Syndrome

“One more shot, please!” Surrounded by camwhore peers, teenagers would undeniably conform to the influence and trend of taking and posting photos online to get attention of not only the peers but general publics. They tend to have think that even if their looks are just “so-so” in reality, with the advancement of technology nowadays, like the photo editing tools, and the good skills of self-shooting, by catching the nicest angle of own looks, they can at least look nice in the photos. Self-shooting is becoming an essential skill that seems to associate with every teenager and it somehow causes inferiority for those who possess a poor skill in this aspect.

Suggested Solution: Do not be shy to ask help from your peers and rehearse repeatedly to train up your skills. Practise makes perfect.     

Crisis No. 6: Nomophobia

“Where the hell is my phone?” Living in a cellphonic society where losing one’s phone is perceived to be more dramatic than losing one’s virginity, people are at a relatively-high potential risk of engaging in such psychological-concerned syndrome, that is nomophobia – fearing of having the mobile phone out-of-sight. It is a navigable myth of the reasons with some saying that they cannot afford to lose such an expensive cellphone while others fear of losing contact with others or are just too indulge in the games of their smartphones.

Suggested Solution: Buy a cheap 1950’s Nokia phone instead of a costly smartphone which strike your fear of losing it. Learn that there are a lot of people in real around you and it is extremely hard for you to lose contact with others. Channel your addiction to games in smartphones to other beneficial academic or cocurricular activities.    

Crisis No. 7: “Like” Urging

“Let see, how many ‘Like’ has I got?” Nowadays, instead of focusing on likeableness of others in face-to-face daily interaction, teenagers are urging for a virtual and vague form of affirmation by simply viewing the amount of “Like” given by others on the most popular social networking site – that is Facebook. They tend to have the perception that the amount of “Like” clicked by others reflects how popular one is in the social circle and it can be quite inferiority-striking when a teenager is comparing and competing with other peers who sometimes getting more amount of “Like” simply because they post more statuses or confirm more number of friends on Facebook.  

Suggested Solution: This is just a matter to do with the teenagers’ cognition and false perception. Do understand that likeableness during face-to-face interaction is more important and realistic than worrying over the abstract “Like”-ableness on Facebook with people you sometimes do not ever meet.

Crisis No. 8: Friends-Dating

“We are just friends.” It can be quite tiring to build on a strong and intimate friendship with the opposite sex peers, especially when a scandal starts spreading among the ingroup friends which your explanation about the relationship just fall on deaf ears of the friends. The process of defending and clarifying can be somehow exhausting and frustrating. This can even happen among same-gender friends-date sometimes in the homosexual-prominent society. Yet, self-disclosure is a good way of enhancing friendship and it is best to be carried out during a one-to-one friends-dating.     

Suggested Solution: Bear in mind that we cannot control others’ mouth and speech and just continue to date with your friends if you feel comfortable to be with him or her.

Crisis No. 9: Keratin Upkeeping

“Wow, nice manicure and new hairstyle”. Instead of paying attention to the face which is frequently exposed to pimples-attack due to hormonal change that is out of the teenagers’ control, they focus on their nails and hairstyles, which are synthesized by tertiary protein called keratin in the body, by ensuring they are up-to-date. Failing to match the nail-polished design with clothes worn or suitable hairstyles that fit the shape of the face can be a form of stressor for the teens.

Suggested Solution: Read and surveyed through the abundant fashion magazines in the markets to do some homework before you deciding for a certain haircut that suit you. Go for simple manicure courses or simply interact with peers to acquire new skills of designing the nails. 

Crisis No. 10: Mindfulness-Lacking

"I don't know whether it's me or the world around me that has gone wrong". Teenagers are often indulging in the cycle of stressful and problematic consequences caused by the above nine crises by attributing the incidents or problems faced to external factors or others’ fault. As a result, they end up trapping themselves in the same problems regardless of how they struggle to change the situation.

Suggested Solution: Acknowledge and do take time to reflect your own behaviors and thoughts which lead you to the crisis. Meditation can be a good alternative in this context. Finally, transform your thoughts into actions to eliminate the crisis eternally.

Age of Composition: Is Writing An Arduous Task?

Graham Greene, a well-known English writer as well as a literary critic once mentioned, “Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write or compose can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation”. “You will have a story in there, or a character, a place, a poem, a moment in time. When you find it, you will write it. Word after word after word after word,” said Patricia MacLachlan, one of the bestselling American children’s authors. Both Greene and MacLachlan share a similarity in their quote that is – writing seems to be an enjoyable spiritual or holy soul journey which allows us to be expressive by shaping and organizing our vague thoughts and abstract feelings into concrete evidence of words.  

Especially for societies today, the rise of globalization flow and online media has helped to raise a new generation who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than the predecessors did. As Grabill from Michigan State University Writing in Digital Environments Research Center explained, “In order to interact on the Web, you have to write.” By simply browsing through the most widely used social networking sites – Facebook, we are depicted with infinity number of posts, messages, comments and statuses to describe ones’ current locations, emotions, states, thinking and actions. It is witnessed that technologies are driving people to compose whatever they wish to convey with written words instead of speech to express their thoughts, feelings and even doings and Yancey, an English professor from Florida State University named the current period as “Age of Composition”, whereby writing and composing plays an extensive important role in ones’ lives.

However, according to surveys conducted in various universities throughout the nation, it is surprised to discover that many students find writing a difficult, boring and tiring job to be done. The question aroused is why people writing every day complain writing as an arduous task for them. Isn’t writing a pleasurable therapy or simply a flow of ideas and thoughts that one can write “word after word after word” as mentioned by Greene and MacLachlan? A study conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project in 2008 found that sixty percent of teenagers today did not consider text messaging and other forms of electronic communication to be real writing. This study highlighted one of the most significant reasons – that is people’s preconceived notions of associating writing with formal academic purposes only, which most of them are inferior and less competent in.

Definitely, writing does not happen only in classroom or workplace settings, but acts as a variegated social communication tool as well nowadays. However, from the perspective of academic writing, it might be considered onerous with the negotiation of whether e-communication enhances or contributes to the decay of critical and creative writing skills arises. A study conducted in Britain's Coventry University found that texting does not adversely affect students’ linguistic abilities but help to develop their word and vocabulary recognition. Yet, Humphrey argued in article published by The Daily Mail in 2007 stating that text messaging does deteriorate English Language by “pillaging our punctuation, savaging our sentences, raping our vocabulary” and allowing informal language such as emoticons and internet abbreviations such as “LOL” to slip into the in-class writing. For instances, have you ever come across a situation whereby you want to type a “you” in a formal letter but unconsciously, you represented it with an abbreviation  “u” until your friends notify you about it. This shows how great is the impact of e-communication as a threat to formal writing for academic purposes, for it will instinctually shape a habit of ignoring the syntactical and grammatical rule as what e-communication always does.

In addition to that, students always complain about the lack of idea and difficulty of organising their ideas into written words when come to academic writing. Research has proven that internet has indeed ‘rewired’ the way our brains retain and retrieve information. Try reflecting how long will you spend on a single page when you are browsing through the Web normally? The internet offers so many gateways to infinity number of pages, that it has made it difficult for us to focus on one piece of information at a time. Such convenience provided by the Web is very destructive to writing skills at the same time, for it causes people to be less focus or mindful to their inner thoughts and ideas but continue indulging in the momentum of finding information through browsing others’ opinions on the internet. Hence, people often find it difficult to structure their thoughts into written piece, concluding that writing is an arduous task.          

Supported by those downside factors highlighted above, I would suppose that writing for academic purposes is an arduous task challenged by e-communication but this obstacle can be overcome if one put in hard effort into learning the formal manner of composing despite the informal writing style for socialization through internet. Although students nowadays are more interested and impassioned about the writing they pursue out of class, class time is essential to draw distinctions between different types of writing, so that both formal and informal writing can be acquired in the learning process for different purposes. However, writing itself is absolutely not an arduous task as one just has to stop worrying about whether their writing makes sense or not and let their ideas, feelings and imagination flow to the tip of the pen. An expression from the bottom of the heart will certainly create a splendid, magnificent and heart shaking piece of written work.

  

    

De Facto Marriage: Trend of Generation-Y before Marriage Dissolution

The traditional concept of marriage is in a chronic state of decay. According to the survey report published by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research (2006), which looked into the issue of family and marriage’s perception of Generation-Y – those who born in era of globalization between 1980 and 2000, less than half of the surveyed population perceived marriage as one of the most important institutions in life. Instead, fifty-nine percent of them viewed cohabitation as a legitimate process or stage, known as De Facto marriage, in an intimate relationship. There go the days with conservative sequence of courtship rituals in which a man and a woman will go out for a few dates followed by more frequent dates that gradually build the base of the two into an exclusive relationship, which eventually ends them up in a formal engagement followed by marriage dissolutions. Modern dating has a new step now that comes before engagement as an essential way to test-drive the relationship, that is shacking up under the same roof or in simple words – living together.

According to McManus (2010), Census Bureau recently reported that 7.5 million couples were cohabitating, which shows a great leap with seventeen-fold increase from 430,000 in 1960. This prominent statistic has drawn us into concern about the roots of the issue. One of the main reasons that drive cohabitation trend among Y-generation is the traits associated with these echo boomers nowadays – that is open-mindedness, bewilderness, flexibility and authority-challenge like behaviours (Yuphaphann Hoonchamlong, 2006), which eventually alter their concept of marriage. Quoted from a survey done by University of Hawaii cited by Tinus (2013), Y-generation seems to be more culturally tolerant than the past generations and more open to new ideas and alternate lifestyles. They are not afraid to speak their mind and challenge the norm with emphasis on self-fulfilment and individual happiness (Yuphaphann Hoonchamlong, 2006; Tinus, 2013). Such attitudes and characteristics are believed to play a crucial role in causing a shift of marital concept in them from “Till death us do part” to “as long as I am happy” which then lead them into cohabitation (Institute for American Values, 1995).

With this marital concept as the roots, people tend to act according to their instincts or feelings to ensure happiness by opposing the custom of courtship ritual. For instances, many have given the similar statement that they live together simply because they are deep in love with each other for the present moment and cohabitate is a witnessed evidence of how they treasure and maintain the relationship as future cannot be predicted. The present joyfulness is what concerned them more and they seem to take advantage of cohabitation as a non-legal institution which still retains their “single” status even if the couple find them not suitable after the living together. With that, all sorts of reasons, or might as well be known as excuses, appear to support cohabitation such as saving money for dating, determining the compatibility of the partnership, getting use to daily life habit of partners and so on (Alternatives to Marriage Project, 2013). In support of that, an interview with Generation-Y cohabiters (Yuphaphann Hoonchamlong, 2006) also stated that most of them choose to engage in cohabitation due to uncertainties of whether their partner or they themselves are able to show consistent commitment in the relationship, which eventually leads them into this “test-drive” before marriage. From such reasons provided by the Y-generation cohabiters, the tendency of running away from responsibility of lifetime commitment to marriage is not hard to be identified, which is the main cause explaining why most studies term cohabitation as bad for not only it is against the custom, but leads to premarital divorce most of the time.  

     

In short, the concept towards relationship and marriages of Generation-Y are clearly being redefined to make space for alternatives and whatever direction that they are heading to in the society, this new trend of cohabitation performed by them is getting into an uncharted territory with many pros and cons being negotiated as the same time. Quoted from the saying of a famous writer named Milan Kundera, “When the heart speaks, the mind finds it indecent to object”. It is understandable of the boldness of love concept displayed by the Generation-Y today with cohabitation as a practical way for them to express sincere love to the other half as well as making absolute certitude that the one that touches or moves their heart will guide them towards a happily-ever-after relationship but not divorce in the end. However, the public doubt on maturity and rationality of the young cohabiters of whether they treat cohabitation as a “marriage of convenience” or a trial “marriage of commitment” remains a navigable myth.  

                           

                                                                               References

Alternatives to Marriage Project. (2013). Cohabitation F.A.Q.. Retrieved from http://www.unmarried.org/cohabitation-f.a.q.html

Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research. (2005, September). Gen-Y on marriage: Triumph of hope over experience. Coming of Age in America: Part 2. Retrieved from http://gqrr.com/articles/1010/2618_COA20905.pdf

McManus. (2010, October 26). Divorce, cohabitation cost Maryland millions and should be part of the gubernatorial debate. Retrieved from http://articles.baltimoresun.com

Institute for American Values. (1995). Marriage in America: A report to the nation. Retrieved from http://www.americanvalues.org/html/r-marriage_in_america.html

Tinus, D. (2013). Characteristics & traits of generation-y. Retrieved from http://www.ehow.com/info_8469348_characteristics-traits-generation-y.html  

Yuphaphann Hoonchamlong. (2006, May). Reaching Generation Y: Integrating pop culture and technology in language instruction. Paper presented at the 1st World Congress on the Power of Language, Bangkok, Thailand. Abstract retrieved from http://www.yhoonchamlong.net/e-present/pop-tech-thai-2006.pdf

   

Regards and Farewell from The Guardian (OPEN IMMEDIATELY)

Sweetheart,

       Take it easy, my dear and thanks for clicking the "Wait, it's safe" button to move this mail from the junk site to your inbox. Congratulations, the moment you opens it up has created a third-dimensional communication bridge between your future self, that is me who is sending this mail, and the present existential you as well as the past me! Despite your laptop frequent suffering from virus attack due to your carelessness in downloading unnecessary software or opening of junk mail, once again, I salute your courage and naivety which make my intention to interact with you a success.

       It is one of a million possibilities for this miracle to take place with many guardians from the future have tried to use their one and only chance to communicate with their past self but ends up in failure most of the time. Many people simply treated such mail as a prank. However, I am confident that you will get to read my message and hereby, I am telling you that this is not a prank mail but a message from your guardian - the future you. Why am I so confident about it? Well, simply because I had existed as the past me - that is present you before and understand how naive you are of believing in guardians and miracles, despite the strong and wise image that you always put up in front of people.

       I guess you have lots of "W-H" questions puzzling in your head now about me and the mail. Don't worry, what you have in mind can be sensed by me and I shall answer them in the following part of the mail for the next five minutes. Let go of your fear but retain the curiosity and continue reading with a relaxed soul.

       So, you asked me what I meant by I am your future self as well as guardian? Well, sweety, just like how you believe that there is always a genie or guardian watching over and support you in needy, I am the one that always there by your side to provide you with the hint of life and monitor your growth secretly without you knowing.

       When and where do I come from? Well, as I have mentioned earlier, I came from the future perspective of time and exactly when I am not sure too. Where? You just have to know that I am always beside you and might appear in whatever form to hint you when you need me.

       You are wondering why I want to communicate in such a way through words instead of continuing through hint which you will never know about my existence? You might be overwhelming over confirming my presence now as your guardian angel but I am sorry to let you know that this is the first and last time for me to say "Hello" to as well as to bid "Goodbye" with you, for after 20 years of careful monitor and observation since you are born, I am now very sure that you have found your way of life and have determined what you want and what you should do as well as how you want it to be, especially after browsing through the ten resolutions stated in your blog.
     
       Though some of the statements are quite vague and abstract, I understand that you have already got your big plans to carry out and realize them in actions which I might never know even if I am your future self - as a person of different time range and dimension appears to have different pathways and endings in that particular lifetime depends on how he or she makes decision to choose how it wants to be. Hence, I guess it is the time for me to end my guardianship with you, for you already possess the vision, ability and toughness to face whatever it comes later in your life.You know what you want and I should not disturb the flow by giving you anymore hints or advices.  

       This e-mail is sent just in hope that you will gain motivation from, be firm with your beliefs regardless of the sarcastic tease from others and persevere until the last breathe of your life in run of your goals and final destination of this lifetime. You might treat it as a unbelievable dream later but just stay determined with your happy*lucky virtue and I believe you will find your destiny like me sooner or later. Lastly, I want to say that parting is not an ending but a refreshed beginning like 2013 and my spirit will always be with you to support you from the inner soul of heart.

With love and happy*luckiness,
Ying Xi ^^

                         

Fortitude & Resolution after the Doomsday

     
       The Mayan doomsday have passed without incident. Though many archaeologists claimed that it has been rescheduled, being one who dodged and was not bound by the doomsday paranoia, I shall be thankful for whether the end of the world will come true to be witnessed or not in future, for I am satisfied and appreciated everything that I had came across in my life for the past twenty years. Quoted from an Indonesian author, " When you are at peace, you embrace the eternity. When you are confused, you be dazzled by doomsday". That was exactly how I feel after surviving through the apocalypse.

   
        Doomsday prophecy is constantly on the count since the early 19th century but what I believe is - there is no doomsday scheme made specifically for mankind but miracles and many possibilities for human beings who are continuously undergoing evolution and progression towards a better living with evident actions and goals.

      With a sense of gratitude, here are the top ten things I wish to achieve or fulfill in welcoming a refreshed year of 2013.

Firstly, learn to love myself more and accept the different sides of me instead of indulging in denial and rationalization.

Secondly, establish and strengthen quality circle of friends, regardless of the quantity.











Thirdly, boost up the courage to interact and communicate with people of different backgrounds, for anyone that passes by my life is a fate destined by God to assist my growth.






Fourth, to enhance my sense of gratitude and widen the heart capacity with generosity which contributes to mental toughness. Expose myself to those extra blessed one through community service.
- get to gain weight and donate blood
- acquire sign language

Fifth, to spend more time with family members and become a more considerate daughter as well as sister.


 
          






Sixth, learn to study smart besides hard with good taking care of my health condition especially sleep quality and daily diet.  





Seventh, persist the determination and perseverance to achieve the sixth resolutions stated above and stay positive and happy*lucky everyday. 

The last three resolutions are concerned with studies' goals for all academic subjects besides expository writing class.

Eighth, train up critical thinking skills while acquiring new knowledge besides scoring well in the exam.

Ninth, improve creativity in assignments and writings.

Tenth, take extra effort to acquire knowledge outside the classroom which enhance studies such as reading journal, flipping through newspapers and attending beneficial workshop or conference.  

       Whatever target will only stay as an abstract and unrealistic target in the absence of the willingness to accept change and effort for transition. Hence, I hope that I will gain the courage to be ready for every occurrence in a brand new year and with the ten resolutions stated above, I welcome every challenge that I am going to face in year 2013!

Happy*lucky ^^