sallyshek’s blog

One thing I was surprised in the States was how people are NOT aware of environmental protection in their daily lives
In HK, we’re so used to individual efforts to protect the environment
But they’re so wasteful… waste a lot of food, a lot of food leftovers,
layers and layers of packaging even just for a loaf of bread
waste a lot of bags and everything….

I was pretty surprised… we always think Westerners are more civilized & educated
turned out, they dont really have the awareness of protecting the environment…

Looks like, HK’s not bad in environmental protection comparing to the West…

Hmm.. So this summer I changed a lot in my attitude to pursuing..

I was g-chatting with my sister about her failing exam
She doesn’t have to say anything and I believe I understand what bothers her.
Not that failing the exam itself is a defeat to her,
not that failing exam would bring anything bad to her.
It should be about what she achieves as a person, in terms of materialistic property,
in terms of job advancement or accomplishment and so on
In my understanding, it’s about being a successful person or not  (I hope I got it right)

and I feel that I changed quite a lot after this internship
Well. not exactly the internship on its own.
Mainly was that I missed the application for writing thesis becus of the job.
This kind-of blows off all my beliefs my plans and aspirations of my ‘achievements’
All of a sudden, I feel like ‘achievements’ might not be that important to a person

I still remember how I came up with the decision of giving up my aspiration
I remember how I wanted to write thesis, uphold my dream and pursue master in psyc
but it didn’t work out since I was so so worn-out by Dragon Boat Internship

Yes. It is good to pursue your dream.
But now I thk maybe we should just take things easier,
if you tried and you couldnt get what you wanted, that’s it.
move on and live on.

It’s just a very limited life. Maybe we could treat ourselves better,
Pursue with the time and energy you could afford,
but we do need to make judgment what is the upper limit you want to throw in

Now, I do want to leave more spaces for myself,
to live life, enjoy and not be a slave of chasing goals

Just don’t get me wrong, I won’t be a lazy useless pig..  I’m not that extreme ok?
What I meant is… I feel like living a simple life with less forcing myself
I would think it’s good to take work, study or anything easier.. it’s not the world

Reason why I didn’t update my blog for so long is that my internship has been really harsh
work load is huge, work hour was long, stress was huge…
I wouldnt say it’s extraordinary since everyone knows being event organiser is always
a very tough job in terms of time urge and all the tedious things you need to take care of

Perhaps the stress comes from being a newbie in the whole environment,
while people will expect you to work like you know everything there….
Indeed no one treated you as newbie

It got so tough in the last few weeks, OT a lot, rushing around in the office w/o a break..
There seemt to be infinite things to be taken care of, with deadline pressing closer & closer

and it was sad that no one will ever appreciate what you did
work only follows by criticism
and even worse, not even monetary or material reward came after work, let alone compliments or recognition…

And even worse was… I gave up writing thesis, while I’m qualified to, because of this job..
since it has been too hectic for me to squeeze extra time and effort to research on
what I wana write about…
so I didn’t make it to apply before the deadline…

Everyone tells me, it’s not worth devoting so much, sacrificing even your thesis and dream
for this non-rewarded and harsh internship
I know, but so what? ‘There’s no turning back’ Isn’t it?

no matter what, all is set and done.
The work would officially end this Wed and
all that I could miss because of this job was missed.

I just moved on.

Aspiration is after all synonym of ‘dream’ that could be unreachable, isn’t it?

It is not rare to have a cultural norm of perceiving the westerners
as all clean, civilized and educated, well mannered and kind.
Not until you live in a country full of all westerners,
would you realise it’s all but a stereotype.

In terms of cleanliness, many of those living in hostels do not wash their
hands after using the restrooms.
I had once the girl showering next to me pee-d in shower.
They eat on subway while leaving many leftovers on the floor
You can easily find litter around the city.
When you say Chinese is nasty because they squat, people sit whereever they want too.
and, I had encounters with some unfriendly and weird people here too,
just like anywhere else in the world

I’m not saying westerners are bad. It’s just that to be fair,
there’re goods and bads in all kinds of people in the world…
I used to adore the west a lot, believing all is best in the West
But now I’m able to see through a pair of fairer glasses
I guess it’s fair to say, building your own perception of someone after you truly
‘experience’ that, is more mature

the first thing that speaks about the city is its subway…
and the subway in US sucks…
its so old and stupid. things are all man-opereated…
and dirty and noisy… and i ALWAYS get lost…
and yay… bad things happened too in subway….

when you’re in HK you dont realise how good MTR is..
and now that you’re away
you just LOVE MTR. and i truly appreciate the efficiency and pleasant env of MTR ^^

It’s the 20th day that I’ve arrived NEW YORK CITY
much has been going on, gotta catch up with posting here : P

but here’s the cool thing.
there was this Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender’s PRIDE march in NYC
You’ll be amazed by the number of people in the parade
and more surprising was the nature of teams that participated:

They could participate in the name of big companies like JPmorgan, mastercard etc
It’s pretty much different from HK where no one would like to be associated with LGBT

and signs like ‘god created me’, ‘god loves all’
triggered thoughts about the constant stalemate between churches and LGBT

the way I see religion might be too light
but I do think religion could be as simple as how you love and treat your fellow mankind
Isn’t the biggest and foremost principle of religion is love?
Why would sexual orientation be a matter?
and why would the division of christianity and catholicism or orthodox whatever be a problem if they believe in the same Jesus Christ?
hugh… going too serious on blogs now : P
let’s look at something more fun