Bessie

This article describes a social phenomenon regarding talents demand in modern China. The phrase "hai gui" was coined at the end of 1990s. The literal translation of "hai gui" is "returning talents from overseas", At the end of last century and the beginning of the new era, China's economy was burgeoning after a decade of "reforming and opening up". Particularly after joining WTO, China had a high demand of talents with western education. Some people, nicknamed as "hai gui", captured this opportunity, returned to China, and became successful entrepreneurs. Among them are the CEOs of some top IT and ecmmerce companies. Back then, only a very tiny percentage of young students, the best among their peers, were able to go overseas for an advanced degree and they were true talents. However, China has had a big changeover after another decade. Its economy has become the second largest in the world. Some home-grown companies have become strong competitors on global market. Domestic education institutes have grown to be able to supply China employment market with highly qualified talents, thus diminishing the demand for West-educated talents. Also, a lot of young students, most of them are just average or even lower among their peers, are no longer competitive in China after a Western education because they are not true "hai gui".

Hi, Catherine! I am so glad to see you, a Chinese female, is posting here while browsing the site today. I learned from your posts that you work for a public school as an ESL and math teacher. That's incredible. You should be so proud of yourself and not so critical of your "accent". However, I can really relate to your frustration. My worst headache is the "r" sound, followed by the "l" sound and the "w" sound.

Gentlemen, appreciate your still remembering me. I've been doing just fine, with some ups and downs, and some quite stormy and trying times -- the stories of my life. Indeed the work here has been impressive. Kudos to the admin team for a job well done. It seems to me that the transfer of domain or ownership could be very easy or near impossible, depending on whether Carl had a will which clearly designated a beneficiary to this site and the monetary value the beneficiary could demand. I think the ideas and spirit of this site have the potential to venture into a far bigger social platform like FaceBook, etc. Have the team considered out-of-box solutions? For example, you could get a new domain, establish a new site, and place a link to this site. On the new site, you could include more sections, such as old forums for discussions, blogs to tell stories of pre-and-post marriages, translation/ interpretation services, periodic offsite gatherings, etc., just to name a few.

Greetings to old friends who are still active on this site. Surely you all still remember me? Received an email about domain change of the site and came back to check it out seven years after my last visit. Saddened by Carl's passing. May the good man RIP in a good place. Glad to see the site had been thriving till this critical point. It seemed the good man Carl passed all admin work to the current team but forgot to transfer the domain or the ownership. It also seemed Carl did not include the site in his estate planning. With his passing away, the current admin team has been placed in an unexpected predicament. Given the legal intricacy, I wonder if the current admin team is open to think out of the box?

How can I do that? Help!!!

Hi, Tonny, I have similar opinion of Unions. Anytime I do not want to join any Organizations nor Unions. But currently, I have no choice. It's my first job in USA. It's very difficult for me to get a start of a new career in USA in the first place.

Personally I do not want to join any "Union" or "Organization". The total amount $468.83 includes monthly memeber dues, initiation fee and administrative fee. I am required to be finished with the payment in three months. And, I need to pay monthy due every month. I called the Union yesterday. I was advised that joining the Union is a condition of employment. I will get some information from my managers or co-workers tomorrow as I am working tomorrow. I hope I could get enough money to do the payment. Or, I maybe lose the job.

Oops!! Just today, I received a letter again. I am told to make $468.83 payment. My Goodness!!!

I just received a letter with forms from this Union asking me to fill out these forms as soon as possible and send the forms back to the Union office. My question is I do not know what this organization is for. Is there anybody can help me?

A noble man This morning, I took a walk to the shopping center of our neighbor. On the lawn in front of a McDonald's, I saw a scene which did move me. An old man, very short and thin and weak, was standing beside the lawn, with a hand holding an empty McDonald's cup. A begger. A man, was just walking to him from his car which was parking on the other side of the lawn. I heard the man spoke to the old man, "............ Wait a moment, I am buying breakfast for you." Then the man walked back to his car, taking out of his jacket and wallet, turning off the engine, and walking into the McDonald's. I belive he bought the breakfast for the old man. Seeing this, I was really moved. Noble man. Yes, he is. Action. Action is more persuasive and forceful than any beautiful words. Yes, Action.

Hi David, I am getting very confused. Do we need to bring "Birth Certificate of any child"? they are not children of this marriage, and we do not have the custody.

Hi Joanne, you gotta be carefurl of washing clothes by hand. I used to do same but stopped a couple of weeks ago, as my left thumb developed a big sore and felt like disabled after I finished some hand-washing. This thumb still hurts now.

On my ICE Speaking/Listening class yesterday, we watched an episode. A 60-years-old man, Nicolae, just comes to NY from Romania to partner in a restaurant with his brother Victor. But soon after he gets home sick badly. He feels he was a fish out of water without Romanian cutural surroundings. He can not adjust himself to the way of an America. Finally, he decides to go back home. Upon this, the teacher was supposed to have us to discuss the topic of adjusting to a New Culture. But we all turned to the other related topic, the reason you coming to USA. One said, for freedom. One said, no reason. One said, for joining parents. Two said, for loving $$$! ...... The teacher said, "As I was in love with my ex-husband. I had to come here. Yelp! No reason! But after I came here, I realized I was so stupid coming to USA!" ...... Then it's my turn. Then I realized I got quite stuck and confused. Just like there were handreds of thousands of words piled up in my throat racing and arguing one another. For a moment I felt like I had so much to say with a stuffed throat and nothing to say with a blanked mind. I heard a voice speaking, "As I was dying and suffering over there. Everyday life was just a stagnant repeat. It would not change or just inflow some nagtive stuff, till I died. I wished to refresh my life."

Personally I started learning English in High School for three years, then continued two years in college and came to a halt after passing a nation-wide college English level test. After quite a long time interruption, without consistently practice and futher study, I felt like I forgot plenty of it. But shortly I picked it up quickly. It's true that Chinese college graduates can read or write English much better than they can understand or speak English, due to limited opportunities to practice spoken English. My husband told me that he used to be warmly welcomed by some Chinese and people always wanted to talk to him, face to face, or on the telephone. I told him one big reason was they caught you as a free spoken English teacher. My husband laughted, "Of course I knew it!" He told me sometimes he even got dialogued on the street or at shopping centers by strangers speaking broken english.

Hi mercator, I finally called my mother and other family members this afternoon, my time 2:00 p.m., their time 8:00 a.m. It¡¯s a big joy! I believe your wife has been looking forward to your call. It¡¯s very very important for Chinese to convey and receive greetings to and from their dearest persons. It's a trdition. Enjoy it. Happy New Year!

Chinese Lunar New Year in Chinatown It is the first Chinese New year I have ever had in USA. I had been getting more and more home sick in the recent days. I woke up before 6:00 a.m. this morning in order to call my mother, but unfortunately the line kept busy. What a pity! So I decided to go to Chinatown in hopes of seeing some traditional New Year stuff. Chinatown looked like as usual. But there did have something different. Groceries looked more busy. The streets looked more crowded. I saw some small golden orange trees on sale in front of a small store. Some people walked down the sideways with flowers or vegetables on hands. I was a little bit disappointed. Suddenly, I heard some noise of gongs and drums. I got excited immediately. Lions performance! There were altogether three lions dancing actively. They were in bright red, yellow, golden and black color fabric. They all have big eyes and big mouths opened. Interestingly, I saw some people were feeding them dollars! And the lions were eating the dollars hungrily! The lions performance didn't last too long time. But I was quite satisfied already. And, I gotta go home, as I needed a restroom.

Hi, Gipsy. You needn't say sorry to me. I am glad you like my writting style. Go ahead! You are doing good!

Dennis, Oh... My!!!! I found it this morning. I was sort of shocked at the first glance on it this morning after I came back home from my ICE class, as I could tell that some guys here might conclude something according to the writting form and style. If you did not mention it here, I was supposed to pretend that I did not see it. But now, I do not know what I should do. I just read her new post. It's an excellent writting. Far cry better than mine. It's also a touching story. She is just telling about her story. I hope we both give her some slack.

Hi Dennis, I Same here have big difficulty to pronunce R correctly. My husband also tried a number of times to help. Still I am doing not that good. You know, we have a R in Chinese, which is similar to English R. We have been used to it years. So it's very very very difficult for us to change it to another very similar way. The point is that we can not position our tongues correctly. When I read a single R, I did good. But when I read some words, especially some words I haven known for quite some time, I went back again. It's a good topic!

Joanne, I feel so sorry for you. I guess that time you must be feeling very down. I can tell. Some people just do not care other people's feeling. Just not willing to do a little bit favour to others. What I saw today really made me feel no good.

Bus Courtesy I don¡¯t think every American has the experience of bussing, as there are too many cars in the States. Maybe only the ones who can not drive or can not afford cars take busses. I am one of them. I do not have a car. Due to my ICE Listening/Speaking class, I¡¯ve got the chance to take American busses. But my bussing experience here sounds not very pleasant. In China, buses are the most common transportation. The bussing service is also very thoughtful. You can find route boards at each bus stop, indicating the names of all the stops. So it is very convenient and easy for passengers to find out right route number to reach their destinations. But I could not find any direction information at bus stops. There is nothing but only a post with words of ¡°TheBus¡± and its service telephone number on it. My husband and I had to access ¡°thebus¡± website and call the service phone number to find out the right bus route number from our residential area to the school. It was the second time for me to take a bus today. At a stop, boarded three persons on my return bus ride. One out of the three is an very old man. But there was not any available seat. The priority seats in front of the bus were all occupied. I noticed two younger persons sitting there coldly or chatting to others happily. On the window right behind their heads, pasted a note saying ¡°Yield these PRIORITY SEATS to elderly and disabled passengers¡±. The old man had to move towards to the bottom of the bus slowly. The bus was about to drive into a freeway. So I standed up and motioned him and helped him into my seat. Now there were only two passengers standing in the bus, a young man in a red color T-shirt and me. The young man moved back a little bit to give me some room to stand. Just awhile, I found a seat just under my eyes, but a man was sitting on the outside seat with a bag besides him. Then I understood why the young man did not take that seat. I did not take it either.

Intercultural Misunderstanding On my last ICE Listening/Speaking class yesterday, we watched a video stuff. Rosa, originally from Mexico, has been living in the States for many years. One day, her boyfriend Miguel comes to see her on his way to New York for an international conference. Miguel is from Rosa¡¯s hometown, Puebla, Mexico. Miguel wants to marry Rosa and take her back to Mexico. Rosa agrees and stays up late to write plans for their future, happily and excitedly. But unfortunately finally they break up because of some disagreement, which is caused by intercultural difference. However, it¡¯s just a fictional story. But from this episode, I learned a new sentence that Miguel asked Rosa, ¡°Don¡¯t you get home sick?¡± At first I did not understand it. I said to myself, ¡°What? Rosa gets sick for having been staying home?¡± But soon I figured out it means ¡°Don¡¯t you miss your home country or family¡±. It was the first time I heard this sentence in my life. I thought it was a good expression about missing something. Today I asked my husband if I could say ¡°I really get Chinese homemade foods¡±, I mean, ¡°I really miss Chinese homemade foods sick¡±. My husband laughed at me awfully. So, that is the difficulty about learning a foreign language. You express something grammaticaly same way of an example but using different words. Which you think it is correct. But it expresses totally inversely. Sometimes maybe cause laughs, or, troubles. I remember one day, around 1 month later after I entered into the States, I felt sort of headache, so I went downstairs to air my brain. There I saw two small boys on the sidewalk. They were throwing small pieces of rock onto the street. It was dangerous as it would hit passing cars. So I stopped them. I tried to talk to them in English. They were six years old and nine years old. They had a basketball. Then I must said something stupid about that ¡°big ball¡± as the two kids started laughing wildly and one of them patting in between of his legs with one hand. I was so embarrassed that I slunk away home quickly. That night my husband told me why the kids laughed at me. I gotta be careful of my spoken English!!!

Obese America Before I came into USA, my husband used to urge me to try to gain several pounds of weight, as in his eyes I was kind of "small". Anyway I did not want to gain weight but to lose some. I stand 5'6'' and weigh 130 lbs. Compared to normal Chinese women, I was quite "big"! But my husband told me that there were many very big persons. I doubted. After I came here, I changed my mind. Oh, My, they are really HUGE! Utterly out of my imagination. Some of them even two or three times my size. One day, I saw the first huge man since I came here in a shopping center. I dare not say he was five times me. But he was moving like a hill. I did take five minutes to be aware of the discourteousness with my eyes widened and eyebrows raised at him. I don't know if there is a statistic of obese American of the total American population. I feel like one out of five persons I ever saw are over-weighted, and many of them, obese. Surprisingly, many of these over-weighted or obese persons are small kids and juveniles. But later on I found out American people are very concerned about nutrition facts in their everyday diet. For a fact, there are a great deal of low or zero calories, fat, sugar and cholesterol foods on sale. I also saw a lot of people exercise themselves hard by riding, surfing, swimming, running, jogging or walking. I wondered why there are still so many obese persons in America?

P. R. China is a big country with big population as well as 56 minorities. Natively, the largest minority, Han, speaks Chinese. Nevertheless, there are a variety of Chinese dialects within geographicaly different areas, such as Cantonese, Shanghainese, Minnanese, Shandongnese, Sichuanese, and so on. But there is only one official language in China, Mandarin, which is strongly and widely commended by China government. The official definition of Chinese Mandarin is a general speaking Chinese based on Beijing accent, Northen-China dialect and general Mandarin grammar. This Chinese word, Jun, in my opinion the best pronunciation for it should be June. You can hardly pronounce this word exactly as the way in Chinese, so you have to make a compromise. Don¡¯t be lost!

Who ruined American pure English I took my first ICE Listening/Speaking class on Jan. 17th. To my surprise, the instructor Ms Kool is a non-native-English-speaker who migrated into America a score years ago. She speaks English fluently and writes very beautiful handwritings. But still I can tell sort of foreign accent and tune with her speaking. We learned a "new" word on our first class which I have remembered it by heart long time ago, delivery-man. Then Ms Kool led us to read this word together with other new words. She articulated the seventh letter ¡°r¡± of ¡°delivery¡± as ¡°l¡±. I was afraid I misread her, so I listened hard, yes, it was ¡°l¡±. I got so confused, as according to alphabet rules and phonetic rules this ¡°r¡± absolutely should pronounce as ¡°r¡± not ¡°l¡±. Later on I questioned my husband about how to pronounce this word and this letter ¡°r¡±. He told me Ms Kool was wrong. My husband told me that there are many of his colleagues speak English with heavy foreign accent that he a native English-speaker sometimes even has difficulty to catch on them. I myself also have listened too much foreign-English since I came here, at the airport custom, at super markets, at post offices, everywhere. Most students of my class has been living in USA for years, still they can not speak English better, even worse then me, without paying attention to grammar. I met an old lady at a bus stop. She has been here for 10 years, and she can only speak several English words. I used to listen to beasutifully articulated English video or audio materials while I was studying in the college. Although I myself could not pronounce English words as beautifully as these materials, but my ears are quite particular. Increasingly, I am getting concerned about the pure American English, though it is none of my business. Now I am one among non-native-English-speakers. I hope I will not add to ruining pure English. I purpose I will never study and improve my English as long as I am alive.