The Life We Can Afford

我在高中时曾深受林清玄作品影响，开始学习品味生活，琢磨道理，发现生活细节中的真善美。

我会捧着一本他的书，坐在家里一个角落里，自己沏一壶茶，非常简陋，一边读书一边“品茶”。

没有风景，没有与大自然的亲近，没有上等的茶叶茶具，不懂得如何体会茶味，我告诉自己，生活不一定要身处上游，得了一切才能美好，简单，无知也可以体会生活的美，正所谓不求甚解。

时常无中生有般地生发感触，开始抒发情怀与感想，最好搭配着最喜欢的最古典的中国风流行乐，非常自得其乐。

如此生活，正是无忧无虑的最好状态。古人大概如此度过了许许多多的日子，可今人恐怕没有这样好的运气来享受悠闲。

悠闲是有代价的。我转身忘了悠闲，忘了细节中的感触，开始关怀实际，关怀大环境，关怀人生宇宙。转头抛弃了打磨筛检过的语言，曾在海边拾贝般地琢磨，都被最后的浪头一点一点吞没，毫无痛苦地。

于是，我过着一种新的生活。向上看着，向未来期盼着，伸手去接着……

I know that life wasn't the one I could afford.

Nokia Lumia 530 -- Review

My older phone has been having problems, it's a small Chinese brand, pretty powerful phone but after two years issues started coming up, the touchscreen keyboard isn't working well, some letters literally cannot be typed, neither can Enter button, then you know it's time to say goodbye to this phone. external buttons are getting old as well, have to push really hard to light screen up. Most annoyingly is that it's Chinese operating system called Yun OS, which is based on Android but many world main stream apps are not supported, especially google's apps are impossible to install on it (because I can't use Google Play Store on the phone).

I went to Mediaworld and I went for Nokia/windows directly, it's been in my mind for quite a while, my laptop is windows 8.1, my tablet is also windows OS, now if my phone is also windows, everything will just match up. 

There were two Lumia 530 respectively labelled 59.99 Euro and 69.99 Euro, but they are exactly the same except one is green another one is orange. I asked the staff what's with the price difference, he told me that there's absolutely no difference, just that the one with orange shell is on promotion, so it's 10 Euro cheaper... What? Just because of the color? Don't people like orange color? 

http://www.microsoft.com/it-it/mobile/telefoni-cellulari/lumia530/?&dcmpid=bmc-src-google.Brand

Here is the link to the official site of Lumia 530, the official price is 79.99 Euro?

Some statistics: 4'' display (fairly small but I don't really mind, I'm not a mobile reader or gamer)

4 GB internal memory (this one looks really humble, although I hardly use even half of the 16 GB storage in my previous phone, this one left me only 1 GB free space after system taking up other 3GB, so I put a 32GB SD card in it)

5.0MP Camera (seriously, I have no idea about this parameter, 5 million pixel, I just looked it up, although it still doesn't mean anything to me. Honestly, the camera sucks, don't count on this camera to snap good photos, it's purely practically functional, but it's enough for me, considering I've got some real good video/photo cameras)

Windows 8.1 OS, love it, I'm a windows 8 fan, it's just so futuristic to see all the colorful tiles on screen instead of traditional matrix of apps. 

So far this gadget just feels so right in my hand, I love it. It's nothing attractive to those of you who are really into those new, powerful, multifunctional mobiles, it's low end, practical, fully functional smartphone, it's just perfect for me, I don't even think about asking for more, there's nothing else I really NEED from a smartphone.

  

Why we work so much? Keynes' 15-hour working week prediction

"Back in 1930, Keynes predicted that the working week would be drastically cut, to perhaps 15 hours a week, with people choosing to have far more leisure as their material needs were satisfied."
However that's so not the case of today, is it? We work from Monday to Friday still, and even more over time working, it's not rare to see in the news that some young talent worked to their death at desk. 
How come? We have achieved way greater economy size and material richness, how come we didn't realize the prediction of Keynes and still work so much that we literally work ourselves to death? 
Essentially it is because of our human nature. 
Wait... isn't human nature pursuing leisurely life? If nobody tells you to, you probably wouldn't go to work, if it's not that you have to feed your family, you probably just want to lay on sofa and watch TV all day long? 
Yes, it is true that we have the laziness in our nature. But there's another side of our nature that can easily be ignored, that is the pursuing of higher level enjoyment and mental satisfaction.
Speaking of higher level enjoyment, we surely can feed ourselves well if everybody just work 2-3 days a week to earn the necessities and never worry about other things. But it isn't what our world looks like. We feed ourselves well, then we would come up with new ideas, new goals, new ambitions, we would try new things, invent new things, create new things, all of these cost times and effort. Getting fed well is never human's main goal, we want to feed ourselves not only food, but also tastes, exoticism, superiority, luxury...  and greed drives us to create more temptation for others while we are tempted by something else, we want more money, accumulate more wealth, so we create stuff we didn't have to own. One shirt is enough to cover your body in summer, but people don't just have one shirt in their closet, that's because they have higher level of demand than just covering themselves. That demand, is the source of endless labor of human beings. One guy created something really appealing, he sets a high price, the others then must work more to get that piece of new item, and in this way our standard of living has been constantly lift higher and higher as economy grows. That's why we will NEVER reach a stage where we'll work significantly less hours than today we do as a whole.
Secondly, there's the psychological thing playing trick on us, we want to be better, not just better than where we were 100 years ago, but better than our peers, as a lawyer, I must make more money than other lawyers, a doctor, I want to be more successful than other doctors... this kind of competition is another main engine drives us working endlessly harder and harder. We are all like the rabbit with a carrot hanging in front of our face, keep chasing, but never reach it. The bigger the carrot is, the faster and more "tiredlessly" we chase after it. Rich people might choose working over enjoying leisure since their pay per hour is so high that they may even consider having some time off isn't worth it. 
And it is fun to do so, it is fun to pursue, to compete, to leave the past far behind, to explore more seeming unlikely and impossible areas. That's human nature, you can point it out, but you can't say, "it's bad", because that's what drives us forward, that's why we human are different from animals, a soul never gets enough of what he has, a soul never gets tired of pursuing.   

Don't buy anything at PC-Click in Venice!!!

I bought a laptop at PC-Click Venezia out of emergence, HP 250 G3, I paid 400 Euro for that, well actually the price is 275 Euro! http://www8.hp.com/it/it/products/laptops/product-detail.html?oid=6732462

You go to PC-Click, tell them what device you want, then they make order online (they have very small inventory, almost nothing significant at store) and once the item arrived they tell you to pick up or send to your door. But wait, what's the point of asking somebody ordering online for you when you can just go to Amazon on your own, and find much more reasonable price. Yeah, PC-Click charge quite a lot of commission, if you compare same items from them and from Mediaworld, you'll see the difference is big.

I once ordered a Canon Legria mini x at the store, I waited whole month but the item was still not shipped yet! And I was in a hurry to use that gadget, I was working on some video projects. So in the end I cancelled the order, the customer service was very nice though, no hard feelings.

It's just unreasonable to shop there, it's expensive, it's slow, unless you are really too lazy to go to shopping malls in Mestre, I don't recommend you to shop there.

Some price comparison:
1.at Mediaworld.it

 2.At pc-click.it

99Euro vs 150 Euro

not just this item, if you don't believe me, go search anything in your mind, at pc-click is way more expensive.
I think Pc-click is treating people like idiots.
Never go there!

Online dates fight on street because the girl isn't as beautiful as in picture

http://video.sina.com.cn/p/news/s/v/2015-07-24/123365043169.html
This is the video clip of the whole incident, a girl and a guy are arguing and having some physical conflicts from time to time.
The girl is from Chongqing and the Guy is from Northeast of China.

After meeting each other in real life, they both got disappointed at each other's appearance. Obviously they photoshoped their pictures during online dating period.

In the middle the man attempted to stop the video taker taking the footage but the video taker didn't give a fuck and said,"fuck you", keep recording.

In the end the man pushed the girl onto ground and left. 

Whose fault is it to find your online "soulmate" turn out to be a ugly frog? 

And by the way, similar news seem come up every now and then, and more people still keep falling in it.

Man Masturbating On Bus Got Caught

July 23, in Mianyang, a southwestern city of China, a man is caught exposing his genital on a crowded bus. The victim found him getting closer and closer to her, she instinctively moved away and touched some liquid on her skirt, turned out to be the man's sperm. 

Now this man is arrested by the police, only be found that he's both deaf and mute, can't even read, it is unknown about his motive behind the disgusting action, but I guess there's no need for an answer, it's quite clear that the inner animal of the man got unleashed in a twisted way as a result of poor education and probably psychological problems. 

source: 绵阳 (微博)广播电视台 

Live-streaming is available for GoPro!

picture from http://www.cultofmac.com/237862/gopro-can-now-wirelessly-transfer-photo-and-video-to-an-ios-device/

We are one little more step closer to the future, GoPro live-streaming launches via Meerkat.

Meerkat is a mobile app that enables users to do live video streamingover the web service Twitter, sending video to their Twitter followers.

check out the twitter account to see the announcement https://twitter.com/AppMeerkat

l GoPro will be connected to the app through bluetooth, and while you taking the adventure, either battling with huge waves or jumping into a cliff, people share the thrill instantaneous with you, it will be like your audience experience your experience, at the same time when you experience it.

Also, imagine what it can do for our benefit, some risky professions may require it as a instant message deliver. A fire-fighter rushes into a huge fire, people can see exactly what's going on in there and even to know the safety of the fire-fighter himself. Sounds like Hollywood movie, right? Special agent crawls into some building's tube with camera on his head and his assistants sitting in a van nearby to monitor the situation.

Beside that, it may help to spread some footages that are not easy to keep in some certain circumstances, like in an accident, people can learn what happened even if the GoPro eventually broke in the accident. There are a lot of scenarios that we can think of already, live-streaming with action camera, very sweet combination.

Let's see how big this thing is going to be.

The Glass Castle - The kid got burnt... amazingly vivid memory makes it unrealistic

So, the second chapter of the book is recalling the girl's experience of getting burnt by fire and sent to hospital, how she spend her days in hospital at the age of THREE!

"The nurses and doctors always asked how I was feeling and if I was hungry or needed anything. The  nurses brought me delicious meals three times a day, with fruit cocktail or Jell­O for dessert, and  changed the sheets even if they still looked clean. Sometimes I read to them, and they told me I was  very smart and could read as well as a six­year­old."

Well... do anyone of you remember anything from your 3rd year of your life? I can't. I had an accident as well, if not later than 3 years old then it would also be around 3 years old, I got burnt on my leg and butt, till today, 20 years later, my whole left thigh is covered with a large scar, yet I don't remember a thing about that incident, everything I know is what my parents told me. Is it possible to remember the details of day to day life at your 3 year-old? I doubt it, so many details only made it unrealistic.

What do you think?

... maybe it turned out to be a dream or illusion of the character's, in that case a vivid memory won't be absurd.

The windows | A short story |

It was a Sunday evening, I was taking a walk along Fondamenta Zattere in Venice, it's a long street along the shore. Some musicians are playing guitar and singing, seem part of promoting team for the famous local drink spritz.
I was on my way to see a friend at 8:30, but it was still early, the sun is setting, releasing comfortable warm light. Walking slowly, observing every notable person on the street, some smiling, some taking photos, some watching the sea, some looking at their phones, some waving, some shouting, some laughing and talking, some walking in hurry, some kids chasing each other, some taking water from the fountain...
And there's this guy I noticed, standing right in front of the library of university, holding a black shirt in his hand, his body was facing the sun, so was the shirt he was holding, but he was looking over the canal, seems looking for something, watching something? All the other people just walked by him. After a while he flipped the shirt around, still holding in the same position. The wind constantly comes from southeast, so his shirt was like a flag in his hands, lifting toward west. Then he turn the shirt around again, still, same position, it's like there's something he wants to catch in the wind, or maybe he wants to catch the wind.
I stopped near him, looked around quickly, nobody else seems notice this guy's weird behavior, maybe it's just me? Anyway, I went up to him and asked:
"Hey, man, what you doing here, is it a some sort of performance or something?" I pointed at his shirt.
He frowned very briefly and turned his face to me slowly.
"If you throw me some coins you can call it performance."
"Well, then... is this some experiment?"
"No."
"Oh, okay, haha..." I faked laughing awkwardly as I always do, "sorry to interrupt you, have a nice evening!" Then I walked away.
"I'm counting the windows!" He said in a high volume, I turned around, I've been a few meters away from him, I quickly looked around, instinctively, still nobody seems notice him.
"Sorry, what?"
"I am counting, how many windows are there."
"How many windows where?" I found the answer quite disappointing, he's counting windows? What... why?
"How many windows are there in my sight," He turned a bit around to me with his feet fixed on where he stood.  "if the number is 999, then something interesting will happen."
"What interesting thing?"
"Look at that yellow house next to the church, I'm there, 893 windows, from left to right, almost to the end." He motioned to the direction he was talking about with his elbow, still holding the shirt. The houses look so small since they are far far away from us.
"Well... okay... then I guess there would be approximately 1000 windows? Or 999 windows, as you said." I was confused, I remember when I was kid, my father asked me to come to the balcony to count how many windows are there on a big building in the centre of the town, I could never get it right, every time I lost my focus in the middle, like "15...16...17...where was I?" So I tried to count the windows on the other side of the canal, without even thinking about a reason why I would do that.
After counting to 50, I already lost my patience , I turned to him:
"Well...."
"Shhh...." he stopped me, frowning, looked very serious.
I just stared at his face, he looked nervous, then I looked to the direction he was looking, it's almost the end, the very right end of the horizon.
Finally he breathed out a long breath with a huge relief. "It, is, nine hundred, ninety-nine windows."
"Whaaat... really?" I looked at him, and then I remembered something important, "hey, didn't you say that something would happen once you counted 999 windows?"
"Yeah, but I can't show you, you gotta see it yourself."
"Well, I technically saw it together with you, I saw you counted to 999."
"That doesn't count, I counted 999 windows, that's my number, you might not find the 999th window, you might find only 998 windows and you'll get frustrated that you miss counted one, then you count it again, it's still 998 windows, then you will wonder what is wrong... well, anyway, you might not find the 999th window.
"Here," he gave me his shirt and stood one step back, "you must hold this shirt like I did, and stand exactly where I am, because this is the exactly right spot."
I obeyed and took the shirt, looking at the very left side, trying to find a reasonable start point, then a question popped up in my head:
"Hey, wait, how long did it take you to count to 999? I got an...." as saying, I turned around and found him disappeared, "...a.. appointment." I murmured the last word. He's gone, nowhere to be found, not on the left side of the street, not on the right side, definitely not in the library, he can't be that fast, it was like only 2 seconds, no one can be that fast.
I took a deep breath and started counting, from the very left side.
I know it seems will take a long time to finish, but hey, counting from 1 to 999, how hard is that, I told myself.
As counting, I smiled to the island, I didn't know why.

Street Life Day 4 End of it

Very little sleep...

It was a local festival last night, fireworks, the noise came to strike my ears from the other side of island, endless boats traffic on canals with loud music and not fading enthusiasm. No place was peaceful.

It's beautiful to see how the sky turns bright from dark at sea. At first it was vague, just swallow some stars, like seeing a little light behind paper, then more and more clear, then the sun shows up, warm color, wind became warmer, then blue sky, a whole new day.

It's impossible to live a life totally disconnected to human society. I tried three days of homelessness but the situation I handled wasn't the worst at all, I had free access to public toilet at university(thank to my student card), free wifi near uni buildings. All these are something I can't live without. I can't pee on street, can't not use social media and network contact people. I lived on street, yet still enjoyed music, podcast from my earphone, watched videos, movies on laptop...
So, what if, cut all the connection with human society for a day? What would happen? No phone, no electricity, no signal, no any affair, just sit there, enjoy the day. What do people do, when they do nothing? What do people think, when they say nothing?

4th day, hung out with friends despite the fact that I haven't had shower for four days and I bet I stunk. After that I went to friend's home, well, here I am right now, took a shower, changed clothes, had a good night sleep, home sweet home. You appreciate something more, things that we usually take for granted, when you have the experience of not having it.

I washed my shirt yesterday in library bathroom, and it won't dry in library, so I took it outside, standing right on the street, holding my shirt in the air, with the help of wind, I looked like catching fish from the air, then flip, turn around, turn over, flip over, keep holding in the sunshine... I must look very stupid there.

Street Life Day 3, ich bin homeless seit schon drei Tage

Heute ist der dritten Tag.

Es ist Sonntag, und Sonntag ist night so gut für mich, eine Person die lebt von öffentlichen Bibliothek. Die Toilett, die AC, die Sitze, die Steckdose, d Wifi, alle brauche ich, aber am Sonntag öffnet die Bibliothek nicht so lang wie andere Tage.

Gestern Nacht hatte ich kaum geschlafen, weiß ich nicht warum aber ich war über-sensitive und fühlte mich ganz unsicher, jeder 2 Minuten müsste ich mal meine Augen öffnen and herum zu blicken, nur dann fühlte ich besser ... für nur 2 andre Minuten.

Ich hatte 4 Episodes von Earbiscuits auf meine Handy heruntergeladen, hörte ich wieder under wieder. Ich habe auch versucht ein Movie zu gucken aber mein Laptop Battery ging aus bevor der Schluss des Films.

Heute war ich in ganz schlechte situation, müsste ich auf Toilett gehen aber keine Gebäude der Universität waren geöffnet am Morgan, dann ging ich auf der Toilett auf Bahnhof, 2 Euro gekostet... ma, besser als ins Shorts scheissen.
Dann... bin ich in viele Geschäfts gewesen, wie z.B Tiger, super schön klein Shop, du findest alle interestante, neugerige kleine Sache. Mein Hauptziel war ein Sunglasses, fand ich so viele und so günstig, nur 4 Euro! Auf der Straße ist so jede Brille zumindest 10 Euro! Hatte ich gar nicht gedacht, dann kaufte ich ein paar. Dann bin ich auch in Buchgeschäft gegangen, ein Französisch Textbuch gekauft, auf Italienisch, damit ich nicht nur Französisch aber auch Italienisch lernen könnte!

Am Nachmittag kam ich in der Bibliothek endlich, habe ich mit meine Eltern gechatted, über viele Probleme gesprochen, sehr mütig aber erfolgreich auch, wir verstehen sich uns besser nach diesem Gespräch, glaub ich.

Ja das ist alles für der Tage Drei, heute Nacht wird der Beginn des Vierten Tages!

--------------------
July 20 2015 add:
this writing is quite confusing... I had a bad morning on 19th, Sunday, not on the "third day" which is actually 18th, Saturday. I started on 16th, Thursday, in the morning I cleaned up apartment and carried a lot of stuff to my friends, then gave two English lessons, moved out in the afternoon, started my first night being homeless. Then 17th, second day, second night, 18th third day, third night,
19th fourth day and ended homelessness. The time was confusing probably because I always write about the previous day on the next day.

Fighting the Venice island | Street Life Day 2

This artificial island under my feet has humiliated me on the very first day I arrived, caused huge misery and trauma to me, and also to my family, on new year's eve it attempted to rob me again but I didn't let it happen that time. Me and this false island, are enemy, you didn't kill me, now it's my turn to conquer you!
Sometimes people ask me, do you like Venice? I usually respond "yes of course, it's beautiful" without even thinking, because it's just a polite saying, I don't want to go into detail about how the island stole my priceless personal belongings and thousands of Euro's worth stuff plus cash on the very first day of arrival to every single person who asked. Seriously, don't ask me again whether I like or not Venice, I hate this island, even though currently I'm having a great life here, I'm getting so much familiar with the name, so much bonded with this name....
So, I show you how I survive on the island, see, I can survive, I step on your head all night long, you can't do me no harm any more!
Every piece of brick and stone need to be overcome by me, you time travelling giant monster, people don't know but you are alive, your old old ghost hiding in every gap of the stone, and I am here to battle you, wrestle you, kill you.
And you shall never do harm to innocent again.

Street Life Day 2

The second night became so much easier, it was unexpectedly pleasant.

At first I tried to sleep, but failed due to the consistent attack of mosquitoes anywhere I go. Then I just open my laptop sitting near campus, using university wifi watched some videos, when watching interesting videos time pass really fast. Downloaded 4 episodes of ear biscuits to listen on phone. Sit at the sea, at the back of San Giobbe University building, clean and open, absolutely good place, with cooling wind from time to time.

Yesterday I spent most of my day in library or Uni building, enjoyed as much air conditioning as I could, there's nothing to complain about at all.

Only last night I got activated by the wifi and wind, didn't sleep 2 hours. Right now, tired.

Humans are avatars of higher intelligent beings | Purpose of life?

Human life is a game designed for a higher level beings, our world is a simulation. Just like movie Avatar, we are all "avatars" of somebody higher than us. Their brain process way much more information that we can't even perceive, they try to talk to us would be like we human try to talk to monkeys. Since they are intelligently higher, why do they come into our life (or design our life form entirely) to live us? (everyone of us has a real controller behind us, they are us in the meantime, they live our lives, or to say we live our lives to let them experience our lives. A higher intelligent being may not be able to understand lower being, like we don't fully understand all the other animals on planet earth. Also, if avatar hypothesis were true, there must be a meaning of this avatar program, these higher beings must want to know something from us(their game), there is a purpose of all these that are designed for the users. What animal would you want to be if you have the chance to experience for a day? A bird that flies high? A fish that swims deep in the ocean? They want to experience something. Being human is not just about flying or swimming or any physical experience, maybe they need some emotional perspective from us, they designed us to learn better about love, emotion, spirit and body relation (suppose they don't have "flesh body" but pure energy existence) etc.
Think about it.  

How To Sell Beer To Strangers On Street #streetlife day 1

First night of my homelessness, I attempted something I'm pretty proud about: selling beer to random strangers on street.
Where does the idea come from? Well, simple, beer in pubs is generally expensive, some even dare to sell at 6 or 7 Euro a bottle (660ml). I studied some brands of beer in supermarket, I can sell smaller bottle of beer (330ml) and also bigger ones (660ml). Smaller bottle costs 0.56-0.8 Euro per bottle, I would sell at 1.50 Euro. Bigger bottle usually costs 1.20 Euro, I'd sell at 2.5 Euro.
I bought 7 bottles of variety of beer and carried to one of the most popular hang-out place to sell. Only one sold, and it's sold to a friend at a discounted price.

                            Santa Margherita Venezia, full of young people every night

Problems: 1.definitely huge trust issues, I wouldn't just buy beer from a stranger on street myself
2.The beer is not cold enough: having difficulties accessing fridge (since I'm currently in homeless situation), I bearly had them cooled for an hour and brought there, the only stranger who showed interested lost it after trying the temperature of the beer.
3.Selling skills. I was far from being a smooth talker when I was selling. I got nervous, my voice turned a little "Jesse Pinkman", sounds like I'm selling meth in Breaking Bag. Oh by the way it's way easier to get strangers to trust the weed you sell than the beer on street.

I invested 7.8 Euro, had only 2 Euro of income, 5.8 Euro loss (me and my friends consumed some of the unwanted inventory)... well, I may be back, brothers, I may just be the no.1 beer seller on street next time, what can I lose, I'm homeless, brother.

Street Life Experience Day 1 --- Soul Exchange With Baby Cat

Over 2 a.m, I was walking in my most familiar alley in Venice, a cat popped up his head in my way, staring at me with his light-reflecting eyes. I've been living around here for a year but only seen him once before, he's got very beautiful fur, on the top is grey tiger pattern, half way down below is white. I approached him, he didn't run away, but meowed to me. When I was close enough, I crouched down, he came to me and rub on the side of my leg, the one which is horizontal at crouching position. I tried to stroke his fur but he was still a little cautious, subtly walked away, and then turn around rub my leg one more time, and meow. When I stood up and walked along, he followed me.

I love cats, since my ex taught me how to communicate with cats.

One of the reason I sensed some amazingly mysterious quality in her was because she attracted cats following when we were just taking some strolls on the street. Not just that, she can communicate with cats, which I couldn't, I had never had contact with cats before, except once when I was kid I put my face really close to observe my aunt's cat hiding behind a sofa and got a good scratch on face from her. Well there was one night me and my ex were sitting on grass, beautiful German night, clear sky, wide open grass field surrounded by some small houses and corn field.
Meow...
We heard something, she motioned me to be silent and following the meowing, she found a baby cat, very little, well, not really a baby that little, but just enough to run and meow around. That was adorable, the baby cat was just sitting at a bit distance from us, meowing toward us. What does he want? Well I don't remember how exactly she cast the magic to tame the cat but after a blink she and the baby cat are already playing together. She even tried to teach him to climb up a little tree: holding him up on the trunk of a tree and the cat a little nervously scratching the tree with four paws. In the end he seemed have learn some techniques, just that once he climbs up, my ex has to help him down. First time climbing up a tree, baby cat.
We played with the cat for quite a while, then we decided to leave, unexpectedly the cat follows us faithfully, running right behind us with little rapid steps. This baby cat is lost and he needs a family.
That night the baby cat stayed at my dormitory room, enjoyed some milk and almost kept me from sleeping all night.
"Cats are evil, when you stay in the same room with them alone for a night, they will exchange their soul with yours while you sleep..." she said.
"Whaaaat?" : O I was like this, me when I never knew how to communicate with a cat.
Obviously I bought it even though she's just messing with me. After treating him milk, she returned her dorm, left me and baby cat alone in my room... hm... looking into his eyes, yeah, there is a little bit evilness indeed, if you think that way, well.. ugh... and he stares at me... for what? The purr, sounds scary.... dang it! I can't sleep with the cat staring at me, he's gonna steal my body and become me tomorrow! I locked him up in the bathroom, well, you know what could happen next, he kept meowing and scratching the door begging to be released, but it all only gave me spooky feeling and goose bumps... I got more and more nervous... No way, don't think about it, You are evil, your crying is evil, you are gonna hurt me if I let you out...
Couldn't really fall asleep with the meowing, poor thing, maybe he isn't one of the soul trader, maybe he's too little, still innocent as a cat? I let him out, he climbed on my bed, silent, only purr......
Don't get too close to me! I pushed him backwards, farther from my head, closer to my feet. Then I fell asleep...

Baby cat.

Last night I was walking in my most familiar alley in Venice, only this time without the key to my apartment, well, not my apartment any more, like the first day I arrived here, didn't have a key.
Emptiness filled inside me. I was looking for a place to sleep, on street, I could come up with a lot of solutions based on my daily observe and familiarity of this area. Like a cat, I've got my territory, I disappear in the darkness, no one shall know where I rest, and I come out into daylight after some restless, alarmed false sleep.
The insects and mosquitoes really disturb me, so I moved from one place to another, and another, and another, there's no other homeless people on the street, not even one, but I met four cats in total.
5 a.m I found the best place next to the "sea", sun is rising, a little wind blowing, cooling down the rest of one day's heat, I had a pretty good sleep there, water traffic started as well. Then 6:30 a.m it got kind of cold, I went to sleep on a bench in the sunshine, there was a Jew in black robe, slowly jogging with one dumbbell in each hand, looked really funny.

The other three cats I met all ran away from me, you see, I don't have the magic, at least not always.

I wish I didn't lock you up in the bathroom, I wish I didn't push you back to my feet side, I wish I hugged you while sleep. Baby cat, have I become you? And you've become me?

oya

we used to be like this

baby cat grew up should look like this

and run, kitten, run

 never look back

A Prolog of Street Life

I went to the beach of Lido, swam, enjoyed sunshine, half buried myself into sand.
Then I went to Casino Venezia had free buffet, danced with friends, played €10 free ticket at slot and won 8 euro.
And tomorrow I'll move out and start my street life for 15 days.

I'll be keeping a diary about my street life in library

I'd have so much time to think about the meaninglessness of my life

                                       maybe I could fill something into the emptiness these days

                                                 see you soon

Should teachers/trainers be tough? Is being harsh on students right? | after watching movie whiplash

The movie Whiplash left me thinking about the philosophy of being a mentor of somebody.
You want to pass everything you know onto your student, you want your student to be excellent, you have high expectation, what if your student isn't as good as you require yet? Should you be touch, be harsh, even abusive like in the movie?
I teach English and Chinese and I mostly compliment and encourage my students, let them know that I appreciate what they are doing correctly and then point out the mistakes as well. After watching the movie, I just wonder, what if I get tough on my students? What would happen? Well, I dare not to experiment at the risk of frustrate them or even entirely destroy their interest in the subject.
English for kids, Chinese for college students, probably not something that they are really passionate about, not as much as Andrew Neiman the main character loves Jazz music at least. Being harsh to a student can work, even work very well, only if the student is the right material, the right person, only if the student has the passion, and you are sure that your being harsh can't diminish his/her passion at all, only make it stronger.
I wish I had a harsh tennis coach, for that's where my true passion is.

How's the life of being homeless?

How's the life of being homeless?
I'm about to experience it.
My apartment contract ends on 15th July (today is 14th July), from 16th to the end of July I haven't found any place yet... it is difficult to find an apartment available for only half month's rent...
and also deep inside I feel a bit resistant to finding an apartment, first of all I don't want to pay any more, second, the idea of homelessness seems quite appealing.
There are quite a lot of fountains scattered on the island of Venice, I can wash my faces, drink, brush teeth, all done in public, problems are, I need internet, I need to teach class online, and where should I sleep at night? I've bought a sleepingbag, ready for the worst, but still, finding a peaceful and safe spot out door isn't easy. First of all I'll deposit all my valuable belongings at my friends' home. Then I'm free to sleep wherever I like. What about mosquitoes and other insects who are active at night? Probably I'm gonna keep a pair of earphones in my ear all night to prevent anything crawling into my brain.
Another solution, go sleep at friends' by turn, 3 days at this guy's home, 3 days that girl's place, and there will be basic supplies like water.
Oh right, if I really sleep on street, where do I cook my meal? How am I supposed to eat? Do I eat only ready food from supermarket? So many puzzles about being homeless. Tell you what, it is miserable yet so exciting.
Let's see, 16th July morning I'll move out, onto the street.    

Greece Bailout Crowd-Funding 2nd Round!

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/greek-crowdfund#/story

so, the first call failed, of course, a goal of 1.6 billion Euro, simply impossible to achieve by crowdfunding, now second round is open, this time the campaign starter set a goal of only 1 million, meant to recollect the refund just got returned to every donor.

#Greecebailout #crowdfunding

so far 157 thousand Euro is raised again, with 8 days left it's not too hard to reach the goal this time however personally it's frustrating to see the first one fail, the goal was too big to be reached, yet now there might just be more frustrated people, feeling powerless in front of the huge number of 1 billion Euro. Also, more people are possibly attracted to this campaign, so, let's see how this will end up.

update on 14th July 2015, I got the 5€ refund.

Greece Bailout by Crowdfunding on Indiegogo, I contributed 5 Euro

I just donated €5.

Since 6 days there have been almost 100 thousand people contribute and raised to €1.7 million but... still, you see the progress is only 0%! 1.7million compared with the goal 1.6 billion is just one thousandth! It's never gonna happen, the goal cannot be achieved. However, I'd be happy to know that my 5 Euro could really be in use, to help it out a little, but it says "Fixed Funding", which means if not reach the goal, the money will be refunded to donors... why? Please don't return it, otherwise this project has no meaning at all except making a generous but empty gesture in public. €3 from each EU citizen will do it, that's not a lot.

https://www.indiegogo.com/greek-bailout-fund.html  link to the crowdfunding page

Origin of money, six theories | Reading "The Social Life of Money"

1. Barter (Menger)  -Metalism
this one is the most accepted theory and is widely taught in all kinds of textbooks. Basically it implies that money originates from barter exchange, some good evolved into a common acceptable good that can be used to purchase other goods.
critics: lacks historical evidences, instead, money's birth may very depends on authority's mandate which is supported by evidences; It cannot explain why all agents choose a particular asset as "money"; Einzig argues that Menger's theory underplays barter's adaptability.

2.Tribute (Laum) -Chartalism
Those payments associated with religious or political functions may be the real origin of money.
Ancient rulers collect tribute long before the use of money as a means of exchange and market emerged. Money originated as a means of payment of sacrificial payment, alongside various debts, fines and tribute...
This theory supports chartalism, which claims that the state is the source of money. (Money originated as a debt to the gods, this debt evolved as a debt to rulers and states)

3.Quantification (Simmel) - Cultural alienation
Deal with the conditions of possibility of money's originating. How is money possible?
Emphasis on the importance of subjective desire in the formation of value. Money represents the generic idea of value. By virtue of its objective and abstract character, money is capable of standing in for any specific, concrete value in the process of exchange.

4.Mana (Mauss) -Human economy
The notion that money is a colorless and anonymous tools for utilitarian economic behavior has been increasingly challenged by studies richly demonstrating that monetary transactions of many different kinds (from intimate domestic exchanges to major business deals) are socially and morally codified.
Money was a gift. (this theory has overlap with tribute theory)
Money's purchasing power is primordial, it is an expression of social power that is rooted in the affective states generated by collective life.

5.Language (de Saussure) - digital money
...money as a symbolic medium of communication that fulfilled specific functions of language...
money is inherently metaphorical as language. Money connects what would otherwise be unrelated.
Capitalism has replaced linguistic signs with code - digital money

6.Violence (Aglietta & Orléan) - social power
as a by-product of gold's historic dependency on slavery....