The translated version of previous story blog post.
_______________
Last year, a friend of mine committed to suicide. He is a young Phd holder, employed by a very good company. His wife is a Phd holder in Psychology. I cannot understand the reason he put a full stop to his life. His medical records revealed his serious depression problem. A normal human like me and others, live every day; but there were people who holds to their strong believes and dreams, either continue to chase it, or suicide.
Frequently, there were friends advices to hold a Balanced Life, between life and career.
If you work for 14 hours, seldom talk to your family after that, do you think that is a balanced life? Luckily I don’t. I always feel a walk with family, watch TV together, cook for them and etc are the most precious and enjoyable moment.
Yesterday, a friend forwarded me story. In a temple, a senior monk always offers food to a dog named “Let go” every 6pm. When the sun is almost set, he will always call Let Go and offers the food. The junior monk was puzzled about the dog’s name. They approach the senior and tried to get the answer. The senior just smile and want the junior to find out the answer by himself. After few days, the junior found out after senior offers the food, he will do some Tai Chi Quan exercise; take some walk, instead of keep reading chants. The senior is glad about the findings and explained, “I am so glad you realize it. Whenever I call Let Go, I am also asking myself to let go, let go of some works. A human cannot finish everything in a day, but we should have completed the most important thing in that day itself, and that is good enough.”
Human is getting to more competitive life, which on the other hand shows the importance of Let Go. Whenever you face a problem, just put your hand back, the sky won’t fall, the earth keep spinning and life goes on. This is not lazy, but people who know how to Let Go at right timing and appropriate situation, will be the life winner. In contrast, a man who busy for whole day, usually brings only tiring and worries with him along.
This reminded me on another stories about African.
A western research team went to Africa and hires few locals to be local guide. They need to rush for the journey. Fortunately the locals are fit to walk fast while carrying heavy luggage. The progress went well for the first three days and everyone are happy. On the fourth day morning, the locals refused to continue the journey, no matter how the research team requested. The research team wondered if they offense the locals, or they want a raise in the fee? The locals explained, according to their tradition, if one rushed for journey for three days, he must stop on the fourth day, to let the soul to catch up with the steps.
In this modern world, this seems to be a superstition thought. But I was touched deep in my heart. We are all busy with life. Works and pressures chase us to rush for our journey, caused us seldom stop and leave our soul far behind.
Without our soul, we are just controlled by the outside world, where goes our inner world?
Weekend is coming soon, shall we give ourselves a break, wait for our soul to catch up with us?
In Chinese writing, busy 忙 consist of two parts: 心(heart) and 亡(perish).
A ‘perished heart’, is equal to a human without a soul.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
“心”己“亡”
A meaningful story from forwarded e-mail. Translation version will be uploaded soon :D
去年，我的一個朋友也選擇了結束生命。
他是清華大學的博士，年輕，而且一畢業就進入了非常好的公司工作，妻子在讀心理學博士。
從我的角度看，實在不知道能有什麼想不開，但他的病歷明確地告訴大家，他有很嚴重的憂鬱症。
但像我這樣的庸人，往往會看還有比我更不如意的，然後就心滿意足地洗洗睡了。
而對自己的理想很堅持的人，要不就繼續與現實衝撞下去，要不就選擇結束生命。
其實，不時地有朋友發信過來，叫我注意，生活與事業的平衡，也就是Balanced Life。
如果每天工作14小時、回家跟親人說不上幾句話，你覺得生活平衡嗎？好在我不是這樣。我一直覺得業餘時間在家陪親人散步、看電視、給親人做飯等是最大的享受，因此覺得自己的生活還是平衡的。
但前天我讀MBA時候的同學發來的信還是叫我感慨不已：
一间著名的寺院裡住著一位非常有道行的道長。他每天都要在傍晚6時去餵他的狗。狗的名字很奇怪，叫做‘放下’。每到日落時分，靜修道長就為‘放下’送飯了，嘴一邊呼喚著：“放下！放下！”
小弟子覺得很奇怪，就問道長：“為什麼要給狗起這個奇怪的名字？人家的狗都叫阿黃、來福什麼的，為什麼您的狗叫‘放下’？”
靜修道長不語，讓他們自己去悟。小弟子就觀察老道長，終於發現：每天當道長餵完狗後，就不再讀經書，到院中打打太極拳，散散步。小弟子到道長面前，訴說了他們觀察的收穫。
老道長微笑地點點頭說：“你們終於明白了。其實我在叫狗的時候，其實也是叫自己‘放下’，讓自己放下許多事情。因為人們不可能在一天內做完所有的事情，你只要將一天中最重要的事情做完就已足夠了。”
在人們越來越習慣動輒高呼殘酷競爭時，其實學會‘放下’的意義就越大。正仿佛當你自覺遭遇滅頂挫折時，不妨手搭涼棚，你一定會發現：天並不會塌下來。這並不是不求上進，恰恰在於懂得放下的，才最終會贏；而整日忙碌不休的人，收穫的往往只是焦慮和疲憊。
就在今天，在我看到這位女記者的事情之前，我又看到了這樣一個故事：
有一支西方的考察隊深入非洲腹地考察，請了當地部落的土著人做背伕和嚮導，由於時間緊，需趕路，而這些土著人很吃苦耐勞，背著幾十公斤的裝備物資依然健步如飛，一連三天，考察隊都很順利地按計劃行進，大家都很開心。可是第四天早上，考察隊準備出發的時候，土著人們都在休息不走了，好說歹說就是不願出發。隊員們觉得很奇怪，這幾天大家相處得很好啊，是不小心觸犯了他們，還是要坐地加錢？
這時，土著人的頭領解釋道：
按照他們的傳統，如果連續三天趕路，第四天必須停下來休息一天，以免我們的靈魂趕不上我們的腳步。
這個現代人也許看來很難理解的解釋，讓我很受觸動。我們的生活太忙碌了，工作和生活的壓力，讓我們日復一日地在趕路，以至於我們很少停下來，思考一下，就不斷地被很多東西推著走，或者追逐著眼前的東西而去，而我們的靈魂早已落後在我們匆匆趕路的身影後面，無影無蹤。
沒有了自己，我們的生活就交給了外物去控制。
又到了一周，我們是不是也放緩腳步，等一等我們的靈魂？
~~~忙~~~
如同…“心”己“亡”。
也如同…一個人沒了靈魂。
去年，我的一個朋友也選擇了結束生命。
他是清華大學的博士，年輕，而且一畢業就進入了非常好的公司工作，妻子在讀心理學博士。
從我的角度看，實在不知道能有什麼想不開，但他的病歷明確地告訴大家，他有很嚴重的憂鬱症。
但像我這樣的庸人，往往會看還有比我更不如意的，然後就心滿意足地洗洗睡了。
而對自己的理想很堅持的人，要不就繼續與現實衝撞下去，要不就選擇結束生命。
其實，不時地有朋友發信過來，叫我注意，生活與事業的平衡，也就是Balanced Life。
如果每天工作14小時、回家跟親人說不上幾句話，你覺得生活平衡嗎？好在我不是這樣。我一直覺得業餘時間在家陪親人散步、看電視、給親人做飯等是最大的享受，因此覺得自己的生活還是平衡的。
但前天我讀MBA時候的同學發來的信還是叫我感慨不已：
一间著名的寺院裡住著一位非常有道行的道長。他每天都要在傍晚6時去餵他的狗。狗的名字很奇怪，叫做‘放下’。每到日落時分，靜修道長就為‘放下’送飯了，嘴一邊呼喚著：“放下！放下！”
小弟子覺得很奇怪，就問道長：“為什麼要給狗起這個奇怪的名字？人家的狗都叫阿黃、來福什麼的，為什麼您的狗叫‘放下’？”
靜修道長不語，讓他們自己去悟。小弟子就觀察老道長，終於發現：每天當道長餵完狗後，就不再讀經書，到院中打打太極拳，散散步。小弟子到道長面前，訴說了他們觀察的收穫。
老道長微笑地點點頭說：“你們終於明白了。其實我在叫狗的時候，其實也是叫自己‘放下’，讓自己放下許多事情。因為人們不可能在一天內做完所有的事情，你只要將一天中最重要的事情做完就已足夠了。”
在人們越來越習慣動輒高呼殘酷競爭時，其實學會‘放下’的意義就越大。正仿佛當你自覺遭遇滅頂挫折時，不妨手搭涼棚，你一定會發現：天並不會塌下來。這並不是不求上進，恰恰在於懂得放下的，才最終會贏；而整日忙碌不休的人，收穫的往往只是焦慮和疲憊。
就在今天，在我看到這位女記者的事情之前，我又看到了這樣一個故事：
有一支西方的考察隊深入非洲腹地考察，請了當地部落的土著人做背伕和嚮導，由於時間緊，需趕路，而這些土著人很吃苦耐勞，背著幾十公斤的裝備物資依然健步如飛，一連三天，考察隊都很順利地按計劃行進，大家都很開心。可是第四天早上，考察隊準備出發的時候，土著人們都在休息不走了，好說歹說就是不願出發。隊員們觉得很奇怪，這幾天大家相處得很好啊，是不小心觸犯了他們，還是要坐地加錢？
這時，土著人的頭領解釋道：
按照他們的傳統，如果連續三天趕路，第四天必須停下來休息一天，以免我們的靈魂趕不上我們的腳步。
這個現代人也許看來很難理解的解釋，讓我很受觸動。我們的生活太忙碌了，工作和生活的壓力，讓我們日復一日地在趕路，以至於我們很少停下來，思考一下，就不斷地被很多東西推著走，或者追逐著眼前的東西而去，而我們的靈魂早已落後在我們匆匆趕路的身影後面，無影無蹤。
沒有了自己，我們的生活就交給了外物去控制。
又到了一周，我們是不是也放緩腳步，等一等我們的靈魂？
~~~忙~~~
如同…“心”己“亡”。
也如同…一個人沒了靈魂。
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Food is back
It has been a while for food :D I will slowly upload those :)
One of the nice Japanese food we had is at Matsuko.
Let's do some light reading today, from left -> right, top -> bottom.
1) Egg roll - The roll melted in your mouth :) Not really sure what is the filling but it is soft and taste good, except the fish roe is a bit salty (well, most of the fish roe we had here is salty, regardless the size)
2) Cold appetizer - I did not tried anyone of those, the dinner mate said the tofu is good.
3) Tepanyaki beef - Taste okay, although it is a bit well cooked but we wish it to be medium well. (Here they use number to represent cook level, 1 to 10 with 10 is well done.)
4) Ramen - The soup base is nice and not salty.
1) Stuffed shitake mushroom with chicken - A bit different from Yong Tao Fu, this is more Japanese style grilled, not fried.
2) Pumpkin ball with almond - Very nice with sour plum sauce :)
3) Tiramisu cake - I grade this as good here in Beijing thus far, with some alcohoc taste at the bottom :D, better than a French restaurant we took at SanLiTun
4) Apple cheese cake - Not much apple.
On our way back, we saw the lady appeal for money again. She looks young and always hiding her face. The first time we saw here was at the pedestrian flyover, about 1 month ago. Apparently I would categorized this as fraud case now as she is still here after few weeks.
Anyway, I wish not to disclose her information by highlighting herself in a black box.
Can you see the white color words in front of her? In short it means: "I am in trouble, hope to get your RMB 8 donation, so that I can eat and go back to my hometown" Those are the same words we first saw her at the flyover, except this time it specify RMB 8.
Will you donate? ;)
One of the nice Japanese food we had is at Matsuko.
Let's do some light reading today, from left -> right, top -> bottom.
1) Egg roll - The roll melted in your mouth :) Not really sure what is the filling but it is soft and taste good, except the fish roe is a bit salty (well, most of the fish roe we had here is salty, regardless the size)
2) Cold appetizer - I did not tried anyone of those, the dinner mate said the tofu is good.
3) Tepanyaki beef - Taste okay, although it is a bit well cooked but we wish it to be medium well. (Here they use number to represent cook level, 1 to 10 with 10 is well done.)
4) Ramen - The soup base is nice and not salty.
1) Stuffed shitake mushroom with chicken - A bit different from Yong Tao Fu, this is more Japanese style grilled, not fried.
2) Pumpkin ball with almond - Very nice with sour plum sauce :)
3) Tiramisu cake - I grade this as good here in Beijing thus far, with some alcohoc taste at the bottom :D, better than a French restaurant we took at SanLiTun
4) Apple cheese cake - Not much apple.
On our way back, we saw the lady appeal for money again. She looks young and always hiding her face. The first time we saw here was at the pedestrian flyover, about 1 month ago. Apparently I would categorized this as fraud case now as she is still here after few weeks.
Anyway, I wish not to disclose her information by highlighting herself in a black box.
Can you see the white color words in front of her? In short it means: "I am in trouble, hope to get your RMB 8 donation, so that I can eat and go back to my hometown" Those are the same words we first saw her at the flyover, except this time it specify RMB 8.
Will you donate? ;)
Beijing air
I am sure most of you know Nike Air. But today we are looking at Beijing Air, not Nike Air :p
I heard few places at Malaysia rain for the past few days too. It is similar here in Beijing, hazy with some rain sometimes. An hourly update of Beijing air quality can be found at https://twitter.com/beijingair . Although that doesn't represent all area in Beijing, but look at pics below:
Second picture reminded me of Rohnert Park's winter foggy scenery. Of course I prefer latter one with fresh air :D
Any external human-wear-able air filter for sale? ;)
I heard few places at Malaysia rain for the past few days too. It is similar here in Beijing, hazy with some rain sometimes. An hourly update of Beijing air quality can be found at https://twitter.com/beijingair . Although that doesn't represent all area in Beijing, but look at pics below:
Second picture reminded me of Rohnert Park's winter foggy scenery. Of course I prefer latter one with fresh air :D
Any external human-wear-able air filter for sale? ;)
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Food is not all, episode 3
Welcome back. Welcome to mk channel on Not Only Food of Beijing. Today we will be watching episode 3. Today there are 3 highlights after catching with more information on Beijing with local colleague after lunch:
1) Buying asset in Beijing.
All houses in Beijing regardless landed or not, are Lease hold. Yes all are lease hold. What number would you guess for the lease period? 99? It is 50 or 70. Surprised? Assuming you buy a house at age 25, if you live longer than 75 years, what will happen? Nobody know for now, as no real case has occurred. We will know after more tenth years :) Renting a house in Beijing could be cheaper than buying it, although you rent it for whole life. But people are still urge in getting own house, mostly due to family and children education registration.
2) Nursery
Guess how much a 3 years old kid nursery cost? A colleague spend RMB 1900 every month for his kid. Not only that, every year need to pay sponsorship fee, in his case is RMB 10K, some is RMB 20K. Expensive isn't it. This could be due to the marketing strategy that newer generation family can only has 1 kid, thus the parents will spend as long as they can afford, although a bit more expensive.
3) Fraud case
"Congratulations Mrs A. This is B from XX Bank. We are glad to inform you that you had won a 20K prices from our bank ...." Sounds familiar? This kinda fraut case are common here. My colleague were surprised that those call reach oversea to Malaysia when I told them. With the ease of communication nowadays, everything can happen 'globally' :p Of course, there are more incident of fraud case. For example, don't ever reply to any miss call, you will get charged a lot. And also, if you get any banker saying that your recent transaction has failed, and need to do something, better go to the bank branches to verify instead of talking on the phone. Some even use voice encoder/decoder to mimic other's voices.
Thank you for selecting mk channel, stay tune.
1) Buying asset in Beijing.
All houses in Beijing regardless landed or not, are Lease hold. Yes all are lease hold. What number would you guess for the lease period? 99? It is 50 or 70. Surprised? Assuming you buy a house at age 25, if you live longer than 75 years, what will happen? Nobody know for now, as no real case has occurred. We will know after more tenth years :) Renting a house in Beijing could be cheaper than buying it, although you rent it for whole life. But people are still urge in getting own house, mostly due to family and children education registration.
2) Nursery
Guess how much a 3 years old kid nursery cost? A colleague spend RMB 1900 every month for his kid. Not only that, every year need to pay sponsorship fee, in his case is RMB 10K, some is RMB 20K. Expensive isn't it. This could be due to the marketing strategy that newer generation family can only has 1 kid, thus the parents will spend as long as they can afford, although a bit more expensive.
3) Fraud case
"Congratulations Mrs A. This is B from XX Bank. We are glad to inform you that you had won a 20K prices from our bank ...." Sounds familiar? This kinda fraut case are common here. My colleague were surprised that those call reach oversea to Malaysia when I told them. With the ease of communication nowadays, everything can happen 'globally' :p Of course, there are more incident of fraud case. For example, don't ever reply to any miss call, you will get charged a lot. And also, if you get any banker saying that your recent transaction has failed, and need to do something, better go to the bank branches to verify instead of talking on the phone. Some even use voice encoder/decoder to mimic other's voices.
Thank you for selecting mk channel, stay tune.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
A surprise :)
Today the 'surprise' has finally reached my apartment :) The person who sent me the 'surprise' was wondered I didn't receive anything for more than 1 week, thus I know that I'm anticipating a letter of surprised :p
Well, I seldom post personal item, but today I just would like to share another surprised come with the 'surprise' :D Look at picture below. It is opened by post office of China, because there is something inside the envelope.
This is the root cause:
The root cause is cute ya. But this cutie has caused the greeting card got tear, luckily I am not expecting cash/cheque :p (I know it is not advisable to send cash in mail :) ) Could this be the reason for the delay? Well anyway, now we learn, security here in China is really tight :)
Last but not least, thanks a bunch to the sender :D Arigato, terima kasih, duo jie, xie xie, ng goi sai, kam siah (hmm, I only know to speak thank you in 7 languages, have to ask friend how to speak that in hakka and other languages :) )
Well, I seldom post personal item, but today I just would like to share another surprised come with the 'surprise' :D Look at picture below. It is opened by post office of China, because there is something inside the envelope.
This is the root cause:
The root cause is cute ya. But this cutie has caused the greeting card got tear, luckily I am not expecting cash/cheque :p (I know it is not advisable to send cash in mail :) ) Could this be the reason for the delay? Well anyway, now we learn, security here in China is really tight :)
Last but not least, thanks a bunch to the sender :D Arigato, terima kasih, duo jie, xie xie, ng goi sai, kam siah (hmm, I only know to speak thank you in 7 languages, have to ask friend how to speak that in hakka and other languages :) )
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
QianMen 前门
Using MRT, I stopped at QianMen station. Coming out from the station, I first saw the JianLou 箭楼 and Railway Museum at not too far.
In front of QianMen, there is this Dang Dang tram 当当车. This tram is currently out of order.
I was impressed when I first step onto QianMen main street. The road is huge, can imagine this is a busy road in the past. But I was wondered the building are mostly grey color, looks a bit dull especially it was a hazy day. Probably in the old time, most bricks are grey in color? As you can see from picture below, the street is quite long and straight, with buildings on both sides.
There were a few nice and old building at this main street called QianMenDaJie 前门大街. For example, QuanJuDe roast duck, which is since 1864. I took the picture but do not intend to upload here, because I think building below is more unique in carving :p
Most of the famous building will have description and sculpture in front, thus it is easy to spot :)
After walking at main street for a while, I turned into DaZhaLan 大栅栏, which is another smaller street famous for buildings as well.
There are still few renovations going on at some HuTong (alley) and also DaZhaLan.
For some of the route, we had to use the narrow walkway at the side of construction work. After that, I turned into those HuTong, and it looks like below in general.
Beijinger still lives at those HuTong :D The clothes are real :p Here is the route I follow as recommended by a magazine (Highlighted in green). Some of the HuTong are closed, and I skip some of the HuTong as I guess they probably looks the same :p By the way, map below is a snapshot of ditu.google.com except the green line I added.
In fact, this is just another attraction similar to WangFuJing, shopping with traditional buildings. But I felt the items here is cheaper compared to WangFuJing, maybe due to the renovation has not done. After that when it get more and more popular, maybe the price will rise :p
In front of QianMen, there is this Dang Dang tram 当当车. This tram is currently out of order.
I was impressed when I first step onto QianMen main street. The road is huge, can imagine this is a busy road in the past. But I was wondered the building are mostly grey color, looks a bit dull especially it was a hazy day. Probably in the old time, most bricks are grey in color? As you can see from picture below, the street is quite long and straight, with buildings on both sides.
There were a few nice and old building at this main street called QianMenDaJie 前门大街. For example, QuanJuDe roast duck, which is since 1864. I took the picture but do not intend to upload here, because I think building below is more unique in carving :p
Most of the famous building will have description and sculpture in front, thus it is easy to spot :)
After walking at main street for a while, I turned into DaZhaLan 大栅栏, which is another smaller street famous for buildings as well.
There are still few renovations going on at some HuTong (alley) and also DaZhaLan.
For some of the route, we had to use the narrow walkway at the side of construction work. After that, I turned into those HuTong, and it looks like below in general.
Beijinger still lives at those HuTong :D The clothes are real :p Here is the route I follow as recommended by a magazine (Highlighted in green). Some of the HuTong are closed, and I skip some of the HuTong as I guess they probably looks the same :p By the way, map below is a snapshot of ditu.google.com except the green line I added.
In fact, this is just another attraction similar to WangFuJing, shopping with traditional buildings. But I felt the items here is cheaper compared to WangFuJing, maybe due to the renovation has not done. After that when it get more and more popular, maybe the price will rise :p
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