My 30-Day Challenge (latest update: 4/12)

My 30-Day Challenge is to get out to my garden for a couple of minutes to get some gardening done. I tend to go all out and dig for hours on end, or do nothing at all and watch the weeds grow out of control from the comfort of my living room. The former causes me terrible muscle aches after a session, whereas the latter causes me feelings of laziness and frustration. I have aspirations of getting out into the garden to combat its overgrown look, make it manageable and grow produce to feed my family and others in my community. The link to Farm Bot below, a garden set up that is productive, yet autonomous, would be perfect for my young family. Sustainability at its best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r0CiLBM1o8

Until I can afford to by and maintain this type of set up, I will most likely start with removing some of my camillia bushes, and in their place erect a small glasshouse:

https://edenlite.co.nz/glasshouses-greenhouses/small-range/

Day one: dig a weed out and cut a branch!

Day 3: Since I last posted, my son's school were selling some seedlings at his school, so I purchased 5 of them at 50c each. I cleared a small corner of my veggie patch last night and planted them. I now have butternut squash, beetroot, coriander and sweat pea flowers (which I mistakenly thought was a green pea plant), in my veggie patch, and basil in a pot on the deck outside the front door. I watered them and managed to pull a few weeds up out of other parts of my garden on the way back inside. I am more than a little embarrassed of my veggie patch with all its weeds, but I am excited about the prospect of producing food, so will take a pic in the next day or two to show you...grow, little seedlings, grow!

My 30-day challenge

My 30-day challenge

     What I really want to do for 30 days is to write an essay about my life. It doesn't need to be serious subjects. A few days ago, we studied about 'The Chocolate Meditation' which is a concept of mindfulness. I sometimes think of my surroundings which are so precious to my life such as my family, gentle breeze, home-cooked rice with rolling up steam or beautiful flowers in the garden.  However it is likely to forget them easily in daily life because we are just human beings. If I wrote about mindfulness of my surroundings, I would be more thoughtful and optimistic person. Or I could be a life critic. Unfortunately I'm not ready to write an essay for 30 days! I bet I will fail this project within one week! I think I'm having very busy life at the moment. I don't want to make myself disappointing. Perhaps I could try just a tiny and sustainable thing. However, when it comes to challenge, it is worth in itself as only brave people can challenge regardless of success or fail. I think I should try writing challenge after Maori group project! 

My 30days challenge

Read everyday!

While time is always a constant struggle, technology isn’t. Wait me rephase that. Technology abounds as does time, so leverage the accesibility that mobile apps and e-readers provide by downloading newspaper, magazines and cartoon book to your smartphone and reading whenever you can. Waiting in line for Chatime or Starbucks? Read. Waiting in line anything.Read. In other word, look for the little silver of time throughout your day when you can optimize.

My Favourite Work of Art

The most stunning art in the gallery for me was makimono art of that a young woman’s shedding its skin in black and white which reaches to and spreads their drawing on a wall. The reason I prefer it is that includes stillness and motion. Although the design was quite simple, regarding its scale, which was wide boldly. Despite these mention, if someone encourage me to purchase this work, I would be unlikely to get this because it is so huge for my room!

30days challenge

In my case, I would like to try to cook something by myself for 30 days and hopefully, after that, this small-daily challenge will become my new hobby. As I said during class, cooking skills are going to be very important when it comes to living alone in the future, so I committed myself to practice cooking, however, the main reason of this decision is to be attractive more than before. Seriously, someone who is good at cooking is thoroughly attractive for me. Perhaps you can enjoy my cooking!!!

My Favorite Piece of Art

Who does not love van Gogh's "Starry Night" one of the most recongnizable masterpieces in the world . It is based on van Gogh's direct observation as well as his imagination , memories , and emotions .The dark spires in the foreground are cypress trees , plants most often associated with death. this connection gives a special significance to this van Gogh quote :


" looking at the stars always makes me dream .Why , I ask myself , should not the shining dots of the sky be as accessible as the black dots on the map of France? just as we take the train to get to Tarascon or Rouen , we take death to reach a star "

Although I know that it might look depressing but somehow I can still see the beauty in it.

Favorite historical movie

I recommend you to see The Last Emperor. When I was a junior high school student, my music teacher showed this movie in a class. This is a story about the life of  Puyi who is a last emperor of Chinese last dynasty,  Qing.
He became an emperor at a young age. Of course he did not know anything, so he could do only he was allowed.He believed he is an emperor, but in fact it was just a formality. He was seen miserable because a lot of people took advantage of him. At the last scene, he found the emperor's seat and sat after abdication. It was poignant.
                                        

My Favorite Art

My Favorite Art 

Natsuki 

           I'm not good at art since I was a child. To be honest, art is often difficult for me to understand. There are many arts in the world and each of them, artist gave their passion or something that has meaning. It is hard to know artist's idea, but I always try to find it.

          When I went to he Dunedin School of Art to see some exhibition, there amwere many arts. I took a photo may favorite art. It is like was written sky in many different situations. It was so beautiful and I thought I want to see sky like this.  

My favourite work of art

My favourite work of art

    To be honest, I'm not so keen on art. To be perfectly honest, I'm not gifted at art.  I want to confess something embarrassing for me that I was awarded a prize of painting ,which I picked up after being thrown away from my older sister, who was very talented in art. Visiting galleries or exhibitions is one of my least hobbies. Anyway I'm the one who thinks that everyone can be an artist. We have freedom of express ourselves.
    It's been a while to have a chance to see beautiful modern art works.(except for the one that our class went together to Hocken library!) A lot of fine art were exhibited there. Some arts were beautifully impressive. For me, painting with water color was the highlight as I got a warm and comfortable impression.  Using of sharp color would be nice sometimes, but I prefer seeing something cozy and snug so that I wouldn't be tire of it. I wish I had an aptitude for art!!

TALK TO ME MAKKAH

Talk to me Makkah

Makkah is one of the most multicultural cities in the world due to its religious part. Many people love to live there, therefore people are friendly. people don't find it strange to talk to them.

In my opinion despite the positives of the talk to me organisation I would not be involved because I find this way strange in other words having a badge to tell other (talk to me) is just uncomfortable.

any way people will do what they want if they want to talk they can without an organisation.     

 

My Favourite Work of Art

For me the highlight of our guided tour through the Dunedin School of Art today was being able to speak to many of the artists themselves about their art. In the past, I very rarely had the opportunity to talk to the artist in person regarding their work. This is due to a number of reasons, one of which being that I have only recently wanted to approach artists to discuss their work and learn about who they are and their creative journey. My mother started painting for a living when I was 10 years old. Observing her all-too-common bouts of absolute frustration with her works of art discouraged me from wanting to talk to her about her art and her reasons for being an artist. Needless to say, I am extremely proud of my mum and all that she has accomplished with her work. It's very hard for me to choose a favourite piece of hers, but I quite like this one! 



Her website:
http://www.dudsonscottgallery.nz/

One of my favourite exhibits from today's tour, and one that links nicely with our Maori Project work on Fridays, would have to be the one found in the first gallery on the back wall of the five sensor-illuminated masks. The artist has combined sculpture and technology to incredible effect, whereby the moko on the chins of these five casts of notable local Maori people are only revealed once the mask is back-lit. I interpreted the sensor's role in lighting up the face, (literally and figuratively!) letting the culture and personality of the people shine through. This close, you actually see the person for who they really are, the moko an indication, or acknowledgement, of their ancestry. However, when you walk away from the casts, they return to being dark, a nameless, faceless person waiting for the next person to approach them to discover them and appreciate them for who they truly are.

Talk to me Gifu

Gifu is not famous or popular prefecture in Japan, yet it is quite popular for foreigners. There are 47 prefectures in Japan and surprisingly Gifu is the 7th most popular for people from other countries.
If there was an opportunity of “Talk to Me Gifu”, I would participate this event. I wouldn’t have said that before I came here. However I realise that communication with people from other countries is really interesting so I’d like to do this event in some sightseeing places.

Favourite work fo art

Regrettably, I am not a fan of art like painting or something, so I afraid I am not able of sharing the best piece of artwork of my version this time and I am sorry about that. Especially at this moment of the wee hours of Monday that I just recalled there are several blogs were waiting for me to finish, and making comments. But still, if literary film can be thought of a kind of art, then the post concern about film that I just made is written around a literary film by coincidence.

If I may invite you to browse the post about Dogville of mine.

Talk to me Henan

My hometown Henan is a province has biggest population and famous by its agriculture, so correspondingly, there are load of farmers. As we know, farmers are not work at the whole year, yet while they are workfree, they will enjoy life relaxingly. So it is no hard find someone sitting on the lawn and talk to them, but this only suit for folks live in countryside. People in city live in a fast-paced life, they are too busy catching their next working opportunity or a business connection to have a unknown and probably a pointless conversation with pedestrians. 

Well, if this kind of campaign held in my hometown a lot of people would try it I assume, but not for me. Simply just I don’t like keeping a properly smile in my face which is considered the essential manner of talking with someone you hardly know.

pictures of my hometown taken by my father.

English in my country

English in my country is a quite interesting topic, since English has been chosen to a global common tongue, there are so many foreign accents come out, as Chinglish is one of those. Mostly it been blamed on the English education of China which is ridicules. Students usually would get over English after their CEE as if they have never been taught, cause initially it is not their choice learning it. And the way of teaching it which is basically a collocation of grammar and vocabulary is even getting vast criticism from different way of the society, well, but it just hanging in there, whatever you say, whatever you do. 

Historical film!!!

Hi, fellows, here comes my post of the best historical film of my version. Honestly, I don’t really watch this kind of movies often, but I got one film that is good enough to be a recommendation and the name is “Dogville”.
 The film was filmed on a modern drama stage which means there is not much property to support the acting, like all the walls and houses are the combination of audience’s imagination and actor’s performance. So, this is a story about a noble young lady happened to stumble into a small town on the run from of her bangster father and reluctantly accepted as a fugitive. In exchange, she does some work for them. As each time a research come into town, they ask for more since they find how much she needs them, the price gradually turns into the original desire form townspeople, she start trying to escape………

talk to me Jeddah

      Jeddah is one of the biggest, most diverse cities in Saudi-Arabia with a population of 3.431 million people. Just by simply walking down the street you will find many people with different backgrounds. With that being said, it is considered unusual if you were extra friendly, since we are a muslim community it is not acceptable to talk to the women there too. and most people do not like talking to strangers.

I think if there was such a campaign a lot of people would be interested to try it. but to be quite honest I will not participate, simply because I do not like talking to strangers.
     

Talk to me Miyazaki

I think I would join this activity, if my home town have it, because I want to make more friends. Also, I want to gain more confidence.

By the way, I noticed one fact. I often see elderly people are talking on the roadside while walking. Also, when I was waiting for the bus, I often was talked to elderly people. I think it is impossible for young people to happen this. I don't know why these things happen. In my opinion, young people don't have confidence of talks and they think troublesome to talk to strangers, so they tend to avoid stranger. On the other hand, elderly people have a lot of experiences throughout their life and can accommodate various people.

Thank you for reading :)

My Favorite Work of Art

Unfortunately, I am not very keen on arts since I am quite energetic and much prefer playing sports to attend art galleries or exhibitions, so I can not share or discuss interesting opinion with friends.  However if I had to choose one, I would say that Indian ink paintings are my favorite kinds of arts. That is not specific one art work, though, which are painted by only Indian ink, thus basically, the color of paintings are totally black but somehow they are very intriguing. If you have not looked at any of them yet, please check out on the Goggle.

Talk to me about the Onnuch road area

Onnuch road seem slightly Americanised with large avenues and overhanging traffic jam lights, and it is a wonderful place if you love oriental food. There ia an abundance of Chinese, Japanese and Korean restaurants, as well as a few Idian ones. Onnuch road itself can be travel in 15 minute by Airport rail link. There are quite a few high rise hotels in this area and this part of the city is known as business area. There are miracle amount of tuk-tuk drivers offerring to take you for 40 baht but difinitely ignore this offer, futher away from the Onnuch sky train.

Talk to me Seoul

Talk to me Seoul

     If I were given a choice to participate in a Talk to me Seoul campaign, it would be a nice experience to meet someone who I don’t know. As we know, some big metropolitan cities such as Seoul, Tokyo or Beijing, the chances are that we can come across a lot of different people if we have this special campaign. However no matter how wonderful the challenge is, I wouldn’t sign up the campaign. Because I think there are too many strangers nowadays especially in big bustling cities, so some people may come up to me on purpose with bad intention. I do like talking with people. Furthemore, I tend to talk to others first. But in this case, I wouldn’t accept to be spoken by strangers even if they were wearing a talk to me badges.

Talk to me Wakimachi

Supposing we had a "Talk to me Wakimachi" which is my hometown and the back of beyond, I would say that would not work very well because as I described, my hometown is quite small and very remote from urban places and everybody already knows each other, furthermore, it has been reported that Wakimachi is less-attractive for tourists or visitors by fairly well-known Japanese travel agency, so there is no stranger. As you might expect easily that in our small community, we do not only have to plan that  kind of champaign, but none of us also would sing up if we had a chance to do.

Talk to me PARIS

I probably won't participate to this initiative because I don't need a badge to speak with people. More precisely and according to my experience it can be dramatically detrimental to talk to strangers in big cities ( once I was chased till my building by a crazy man !). The other thing is that we have an explosive issue with beggars in Paris, consequently it's common to be asked at least 5 time a day to give money, cigarettes or other things. To conclude: people are not always unfriendly, they just protect themselves and tend to adopt a cold attitude not to be disturbed or aggressed.

Talk to me Indonesia

It is an interesting campaign as a matter of fact, it is going to be spectacular. The certainty of me to join the  is quite controversial. But, it seems enjoyable to have someone to  talk with although I may already have  got the attitude of approachable I reckon. The Indonesians will join with gusto because we are known for being friendly not the friendliest though.

Talk to me Kasugai

Talk to me Kasugai

I’m very interested in this activity, so I’d rather participate in this if it would be held in my home town.

I’m frequently spoken to by stranger, some people ask me a way to somewhere even when I was tourist also, others just want to make a small talk at ease about a sort of common, light topic. Also, I’m willing to chat with them because I believe that it certainly helps my connection spread. Regarding this program, I’m pretty sure that if I would join this, most people who I talked to were linked with me through my friends or something since I grew up in cozy town. That’s why I have an interest in it.

To sum up, ‘Talk to me’ event will surely promote energy of city and I hope that people keep going on this practice after finishing it.

Talking to me, Seoul.

We have a special term 'Azumma' in Korean, which refers to middle aged women. They are sometimes identified that they poke their noses in everything and look slightly audacious.
As getting older, I feel like that I am becoming an Azumma, if I haven't been an Azummma already.
For talk to me campaign, if I were the 20 years myself, I would definitely not join it. However, I could find myself that I would join it as an Azumma in my late 40's. Why not?

Farewell My Concubine

Farewell My Concubine, is a Chinese film set in early 1930’s in China. The film spans 53 years which is through the Nationalist government, the Japanese occupation, the Communist takeover, and the Cultural Revolution.

The film is the story of two Beijing Opera actors who are Douzi, played by Leslie Cheung and Shitou, played by Fengyi Zhang. Dousi is pretty and feminine featured boy, but Shitou is a strong and manly boy. As they spend their childhood together and go through the harsh and intensive training of dancing and singing, they feel very deep and strong brotherly affectionate each other.

           They both become very famous actors, and play king and queen in their trademark performance Farewell My Concubine. They are maintaining a good relationship for a long time, however when Shitou get married a prostitute(Ju Xian played by Li Gong), Dousi feels extreme jealousy to her, starts drugs and ruins his own life.

The film shows their heydays and tragic endings of their careers following political and social changes in China.

The film is one of the first Mainland Chinese films to feature homosexuality and gender identity as a central theme, and Chen Kaige(the Director) personally considers it his apology to his father, whom he had publicly denounced during the Cultural Revolution. It's also considered one of the finest films of modern Chinese cinema.

My favorite historical movie

 My favorite historical movie is Schindler's List. The story is about the Holocaust in world war 2.And the main character of the story is Oskar Schindler who known as a person who protect a lot of Judaic people from the Nazis. He was the owner of a factory which many Judaic people worked. 

Firstly, he just taught money. As he related to people he made a list to protect Judaic people.

 This movie is more than 3 hours but once I started to watch, I could not to stop. I like the music of the film. A melody is very sad. However this melody stay in my heart.

My favourite historical film

My favourite historical film is "The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas". the film is based on a novel by Irish novelist John Boyne.  The main character Bruno lived in Berlin, Germany but he moves to the middle of nowhere.  His father was a professional soldier and promoted to one of the troops' boss.  when Bruno moved to new house, he found a facility like a farm.  However that was a concentration camp for Jewish people.  He went to there secretly and he and a Jewish child became friends. Then, he tried to enter this facility because he thought it was farm. 
This film makes me sad and think about racism. 

My favorite historical film

                                                                       Eternal 0

Natsuki 

            In this film, the truth of people living in war period is drawn. It is said that it was natural to give a life for Japan during the war. A man who wants to come back from the war alive for his daughter ultimately chose the way to enter suicide attack units. Suicide attack units is people suicide bombing with an airplane carrying special weapons, so they surely die. This film taught me the importance of life. Although this is a little sad story, I recommend you to watch it.

Cold Mountain

My favourite historical movie is cold mountain, nominated for total of 7 academy awards,  which is based on a fiction novel by Charles Frazier and the main character although W.P Inman is a real person who is an ancestor of author.

This is a love story during the American Civil War that the main character, W.P Inman who is a runaway soldier with wound struggles to return to his beautiful girlfriend, Ada Monroe, waiting for him in cold mountain.

There are a lot of great scene which make you not only thrilled but also impressed, especially the conflict between Inman and the army who chase him persistently to excuse him as  betrayer.

In addition to this brilliant plot, the players, for example Jude Law, Nicole Kidman and Renee Zellweger, are so splendid, also it is worth checking their realistic performance.

In the last, could Inman survive and meet Ade again? Please see what happened in the final scene with your eyes.

Life is beautiful

Life is beautiful

I would like to introduce my by far the best movie I've ever seen

 'life is beautiful'.  

The movie starts from the time the World War II broke out. 

Many Jews are forced to be sent to a concentration camp. 

The main character Roberto benigni was also jews but his wife wasn't. 

When Roberto and his young son were sent to the concentration camp,

 his with Dora willingly went to the camp to find her family. 

In the camp, we can see how tragic the holocaust was 

but Roberto didn't want to show this tragedy to his son 

so he hid the true situation to his son with full sense of humour. 

This is why I love this movie so much. 

Even though it is sad movie and the plot is terrible historical set, 

he(not only the main character but also the director of this movie) tried to show paternal love. 

You may be lauging while you watch this movie, but you will end up crying.

Regarding holocaust, 

it’s inevitable to think of it as a terrible and unforgivable history. 

Nevertheless, this movie is about love and humanity in the middle of inhumanity.

<This is the beautiful OST of this movie>

https://youtu.be/C96FWo3TMkk

UNBROKEN

UNBROKEN

A movie was done in 2014 about Louis Zamperini who is an Olympic champion in running.

Louis is from Italy but his family migrated to the USA. Louis Zamperini was born in January 1917, in Olean, New York. Raised in California, Zamperini joined the track team in high school. Excelling at long-distance events, Zamperini competed in the 1936 Berlin Olympics and was set to compete again in the 1940 games in Tokyo, which were canceled when World War II broke out. In May 1943, the Olympic athlete turned airman Louis Zamperini's bomber crashed in the Pacific. He reached land after a harrowing 47 days on a life raft, only to spend two tortured years as a Japanese war prisoner. 

My Favourite Historical Film ( Braveheart )

It's an epic war film directed by and starting Mel Gibson . who portrays William Wallace . A late 13th century Scottish warrior who led the scots in the first war of Scottish independence against king Edward I of England .

the film was nominated for ten academy awards and won five : best picture , best director , best cinematography , best makeup and best sound editing .

my favourite scene will always be the freedom speech scene . where he says ..

                         Fight , and you my die
                         Run , and you'll live ...... at least for awhile
                         And dying in your bed many years from now
                         Will you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that
                         For one chance ....... just one chance
                         To come back here and tell our enemies
                         That they may take our lives
                          But they will never take OUR FREEDOM

His performance (Mel Gibson ) was so powerful during the whole film . the way he showed William Wallace the worrier and the loving husband , and how he fought for what he believed was his right .
 

My favorite histrorical film

My favorite histrorical film is Titanic. It is an American romance film, was written and produced by James Cameron. The story of sinking of Titanic, it stared by Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet who were members of different social classes, had fallen in love aboard the ship. My favourite scence is the last scence, After Titanic had crahed with iceberg and it was seperated 2 part followed by herizontal boat. Meanwhile, he found the part of ship and tightly catch it, Winslet stayed on the part of ship. He want her to be survivor but DiCprio can’t stand to live because cold water and had passed away. She took something from his neck and blowed the whistle. fortunately, someone heard the sound of whistle and help her in time. In my feeling, it’s so regretfully.

(One of) my favorite historical movie

The last Emperor was directed by the famous film-maker: Bernado Bertolucci in 1987. It's a Italo-sino- british production.The movie is set in China. Principally based on the autobiography of  Puyi, the last emperor of China. It covers a period from 1908 when his coronation took place at the age of 3 to his death at 62 years old. The tragedy began when he was inhumanly separated from his mother to become the emperor.In 1912 the Republic of China was proclaimed by Sun Yat-sen and Puyi was just authorized to keep his title as a symbol, without any power, captured within the 'golden-cage' of his stunning palace called " the forbidden city" where he grew up ignoring everything about the outside world.He received a western education through his Scottish teacher: Reginald Johnston ( performed by the great peter O'Toole) who, later, wrote a famous historical book ; twilight in the Forbidden city.Puyi had hardly try to change protocole and rules but to no avail. In 1925, Tchang Kai-chek overthrew the government and China sank into turmoil. Puyi coped with deportation, he had a superficial life during some years in Tianjin, occupied at this time by the japonese forces. He decided to be allied with the japonese.Naïve, Puyi realised too late that he was manipulated for strategical purposes. He was arrested by the soviet forces in 1945 and released to China authorities in 1950, then jailed in a re-education prison by the communism government where he had to confess his faults. After 10 years, in1959,he was finally released et became a gardener.
This movie is one of the greatest I've seen  due to stunning sceneries, particularly: architecture, costumes, hairdressing, music and an introduction to Chinese culture and history, events which took place during world war 2 ( opposed forces and points of view). That is also a personal, deeply sad history whose principal lesson is that conflicts or revolution generate atrocities, massive abominations to humankind.

Hotel Rwanda

I vividly recommend the Hotel Rwanda for people who are history geek, also this movie has humanity values which something you should consider it. Additionally, the story was based on true story and therefore it is going to be mind-blowing you. How the director set the movie was another thing to be appreciated it. Have a great time watching it...👌☺☺☺❤

My favorite historical film

Personally, I highly recommend that friends watch "Letters From Iwo Jima". It is not only very poignant but also quite historically significant. This film describes the battle which happened in Iwo Jima in 1945 between Japan and the US, specifically, at the end of the story describes trembling Japanese soldiers in battlefield who had to make a dash for enemies even though they understood that  they were almost defeated at the moment. Especially, I suggest that Japanese should watch this film and have respect to those who fought against enemies in order to protect our nation.

Lost in translation

English in Indonesia

I personally don't enjoy English in some circumstances due to its influences upon Indonesian. Yet,  there are words who consequently apply in Indonesia which come from English. Still, it takes into account for gradual decline of the native tongue. Furthermore, English sometimes rephrase the origin meaning of the word and injected new idea in it. 

japanese english

An education of English in Japan has been often criticized in point of that they attach importance of grammar and vocabulary. Of course, both are necessary for learning English but quite passive. Therefore, it is significant for the Japanese student to practice authentic English, especially speaking. After I came to this country, I have hesitated to talk with foreigner in English and been irritated with myself for not being able to explain something well. That’s possibly because there were few chance to speak in English in our school days. Overall, ‘active study’ ought to be introduced, for example English speech or conversation in English classes, which could send much more students to abroad easily if it was adapted.