Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Back on, LIVE!

Image
Holy moly macaroli. The powers that be are pretty fearsome these days in the land of the non-free press. Fortunately there are ways to deal with it and so I hope with all my heart that this fix will last me until I am not a resident in Shanghai any more. If you are living in China and need a way to your beloved sites, just drop me a line and I will give you free advice that works for me and others. Knowledge, now more than ever, is power! Numbers seem a bit down for enrollment in the school I teach in but that just means a smaller student to teacher ratio and a better deal for those kids. Every day of work in this institution I feel grateful to have a job and that it is an important part of this international community. It's about the first job I have ever been in where I feel all my colleagues are pretty much team players and even have a good working relationship with all my superiors. So despite missing family and friends back home I am very happy. And Skype is a beautiful thing....
Read more

Waterfalls

Lately I have fallen for music composed by the living artist Yann Tiersen, a Brit living in France.  He wrote the score for the movie Amelie , perhaps most famous for the piano piece Comptine d'un autre ete L'apres  but I just love Sur le fil which is for viola, as well.  I love the emotional intensity in his work.  He has some other cool stuff, like Le Train and Rue de Cascades , which made me think about the meaning of the word 'cascades' as we have the Cascade mountain range in the western part of the U.S. and crossing them is a rite of passage for me, a wintery routine we must pray that the weather gives us passage through during the winter.  Cascades literally means "waterfalls."  
Read more

composed by Dennis Ming Nichols

Image
Letter to the Boss: Thanksgiving Day "Work from Home" Dear Laoban, Thursday, November 25th is Thanksgiving Day, a very special holiday for Americans. Even though I am (insert nationality), Thanksgiving still represents a time of gathering among friends and families and celebrating what's important, the food in our bellies and the people we share it with. As you may not celebrate this holiday in your Glorious Nation, you might be unaware of its importance thus not understanding why granting my request to "work from home" a significant gift. Please, allow me to share the history of this important holiday. In 1620, some religious separatists ("The Pilgrims") left England in search for new land and religious freedom. They found themselves in present-day Massachusetts where they set up a town called Plymouth. However due to lack of experience with the foreign soil and a bad growing season, they spent th...
Read more