http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/rss soft's latest journal entries Lang-8 Inc. Wed Jun 19 04:28:59 UTC 2013 Wed Jun 19 04:28:59 UTC 2013 Lang-8 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Lang-8
Quincy Davis is a basketball player who is playing in SBL, a semi-professional basketball league in Taiwan.

He said he wanted to naturalize as Taiwanese and played for Taiwan.

Now he is the first naturalized Taiwanese basketball player and will play for Taiwan in 2013 FIBA Asia Championship.

Although Taiwan government will pay him 20 grand USD per month besides his original salary, I think waiving American nationality to be a Taiwanese is not a smart move.

At least in Taiwan, many people are struggling for and dreaming of being Americans.

Still, Davis' fans are all happy to his passionate to Taiwan.

Posted at Tue Jun 18 13:36:07 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/9972593394721574697643483955565889317 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/9972593394721574697643483955565889317 soft Tue Jun 18 13:36:07 UTC 2013
Taiwanese Oolong tea boasts great quality and flavor so many foreign visitors will buy Taiwanese Oolong as the souvenir.

However, Taiwanese young generation prefer the coffee to the tea.

Compared to the coffee, the tea is cheaper and healthier, but young people like to line up for Starbucks' coffee.

Oolong tea can help us lower blood pressure, blood sugar and blood fat and is also good to our cardiovascular and metabolism.

Starbucks' coffee is expensive to Taiwanese, because the cost of a cup of cappuccino is equal to two boxed lunch here.

In my opinion, perhaps Starbucks is a name brand and supples consumers with comfortable environment.

People here have a bias that drinking Oolong is old people's habit.


Posted at Sat Jun 15 14:04:20 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/161386454613973585387095321792500003718 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/161386454613973585387095321792500003718 soft Sat Jun 15 14:04:20 UTC 2013

According to lunar calendar, today is Chinese dragon boat festival.

Once upon a time, there was a loyal minister named "Qu Yuan" who was beloved by the king.

However, he was slandered by other ministers and got exiled from his country.

Desperate, he drown himself to death in the river, and no one could find his body.

So folks thrown zongzis at the river to prevent his body from being eaten by fishes and played the dragon boats to drive fishes away.

As times went by, eating zongzis and holding dragon boat racing have become a tradition on lunar May 5th.



Posted at Wed Jun 12 12:49:01 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/155171992763804845439309169342640092038 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/155171992763804845439309169342640092038 soft Wed Jun 12 12:49:01 UTC 2013
Thus, I was sort of discouraged and lost the motive to learn English.

I understood what the speaker was saying in the listening test but I easily forgot part of the contents when answering.

Reading test didn't bother me, but I didn't read fast enough to answer questions in time.

Lately, I find I've forgotten many vocabularies and always made the same mistakes again and again in English.

I used to spend five hours or so to learn English a day.

Perhaps it is time to brush up my beat-up brain.

Posted at Sun Jun 09 13:39:03 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/323209129281924558214088188077490737360 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/323209129281924558214088188077490737360 soft Sun Jun 09 13:39:03 UTC 2013

Made of jelly fig, aiyu jelly is a very popular Taiwanese desert to refresh our body in sizzling summer.

Its translucent yellow color is appetizing.

We like to throw in a bit of lemon juice and honey when eating aiyu jelly.

Sometimes you can choose aiyu jelly as the topping on the shaved ice.

Low in calorie, aiyu jelly is also very popular among dieters.

Posted at Thu Jun 06 13:25:53 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/208067203564197111599811290727493639780 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/208067203564197111599811290727493639780 soft Thu Jun 06 13:25:53 UTC 2013
The Exchange, an American a cappella band, was invited to make a tour in Taiwan.

They took MRT to the hotel the night before they left Taiwan.

They made an impromptu to cheer up the passengers who were numbly played with their smartphones.

Their performance was so good that many audiences asked for an encore.

Here is the video their fans post on the youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saos0Ci7kV4

Posted at Mon Jun 03 14:10:26 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/115382425402849499358299933082662143781 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/115382425402849499358299933082662143781 soft Mon Jun 03 14:10:26 UTC 2013
Even though it is boisterous, young students like to study at fast food restaurants.

As a matter of fact, not all of them really concentrate on reading.

Most of them will be chit chatting, playing games and hanging around to occupy the tables.

Summer is on its way, more and more youngsters will go to fast food restaurants to enjoy the free air conditioning.

Many foreign visitors may feel strange at this phenomenon in Taiwan.






Posted at Fri May 31 14:00:56 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/174887917358077792525523273350904782436 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/174887917358077792525523273350904782436 soft Fri May 31 14:00:56 UTC 2013
Today I went to Tasty, which is one of the most famous steak houses in Taiwan, with my family.

Tasty is one of the few steak houses that serves vegetarian like me set meal.

The entree was sweet pepper and risotto, which was a hollow sweet pepper with yummy stewed mushrooms and rice as the stuffing.

You can see the baking cheese seal the sweet pepper like a lid.

I seldom eat rice by knife and fork so I found it was sort of hard to scoop up rice by fork.

Most important of all, I was reluctant to eat such beautiful entree.



Posted at Tue May 28 14:01:22 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/27080204231632749491958925446928637540 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/27080204231632749491958925446928637540 soft Tue May 28 14:01:22 UTC 2013
Japanese Macdonald's rolled out gigantic French fries named The Mega Potato on May 24th, which is twice the amount of averagethe French fires.

According to the official statistics, it is 350g, 1142Kcal, costs 5USD and contains 30.4g fat.

The number of the average sticks in a box is about 167 or so.

I think Macdonald's French fries is the only one that is yummier than other fast food restaurants' foods.

If the Macdonald's French fries become cold, it tastes terrible.

Only crisp French fries is worth savoring.

Posted at Sat May 25 13:39:10 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/163434455706783771705841792977527086692 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/163434455706783771705841792977527086692 soft Sat May 25 13:39:10 UTC 2013
He listed ten most delicious instant noodles in his blog but none of them came from Taiwan.

Many Taiwanese exploded his blog with opposite opinions, thinking that his personal rank was unfair and subjective.

It is so shame of these irrational messages.

Taiwanese instant noodles have been cost down for many years.

Although there are various flavors, the flavors are not as good as they were.

I think we should respect the rank he made.

Posted at Wed May 22 13:16:52 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/295005534254962500476299307772363277989 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/295005534254962500476299307772363277989 soft Wed May 22 13:16:52 UTC 2013
If the number of the petition were up to the threshold, the official will answer people's question.

Many strange ludicrous petitions forced White House to raise the threshold from 25000 to 100000.

I also found one argument about " Is the tofu salty or sweet ? ".

I seldom eat tofu plain but I think tofu is nether sweet nor salty.

It just tastes good.

Posted at Sun May 19 14:06:45 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/115512588396657695943819659462287793764 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/115512588396657695943819659462287793764 soft Sun May 19 14:06:45 UTC 2013
Two nations' relationship now are seriously tense.

Both Taiwanese and Philippines' crackers hacked and paralyzed each other's official webs.

Some irrational people even hope our government can trigger the war.

I don't think we have to use the war as the last resort.

Any civil countries who obey the international marine law should not use the war to take revenge.



Posted at Thu May 16 13:21:11 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/161949844168833497874154834414648925796 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/161949844168833497874154834414648925796 soft Thu May 16 13:21:11 UTC 2013
I had been bedridden and didn't have any appetite to eat anything.

Old people say when we are on the verge of dying, your lifetime memory will like slide show airing in your sight.

That was what I felt.

Many memories I have nearly forgotten emerging in my mind.

After taking two-day rest, I feel much better now.



Posted at Mon May 13 13:39:36 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/187857983822047567361614643230034337380 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/187857983822047567361614643230034337380 soft Mon May 13 13:39:36 UTC 2013

Have you ever seen or tasted water chestnut, which looks like bull's horn ?

Sometimes you can see vendors vend cooked water chestnuts in Taiwanese night markets.

After peeling off their hard crusts, you will find white pulp, which tastes like the chestnut.

Now, water chestnuts are often used to cook soup, brew wine and make sugar.

Cooked water chestnuts are very delicious.

However, peeling the crusts is really annoying.

Posted at Fri May 10 13:29:40 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/227517751206080561429543550698197159709 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/227517751206080561429543550698197159709 soft Fri May 10 13:29:40 UTC 2013


This abandoned European-style building was built in 1931 and it distinguishes itself from the other modern buildings.

In 1966, Robert Wise, a famous Hollywood director, led his staff to find the sets in Taiwan for the movie "The Sand Pebbles" .

This abandoned house and many Taiwanese views all appeared in this movie.

Because it is has been abandoned for a long time, rumor has it that there are spirits haunting in this house.

Every time I see it, a reminiscent mood sometimes springs up in my mind.

Just like time shuttles between time-spaces.

Posted at Tue May 07 13:25:58 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/222225002068757982051134049200823574116 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/222225002068757982051134049200823574116 soft Tue May 07 13:25:58 UTC 2013
On the heel of Will's visit, John Cusack will also come here to propaganda his new film "The Numbers Station" on May 6th.

Zac Efron and Dennis Quaid are slated to visit Taiwan on July.

I'm surprised that Hollywood doesn't ignore Taiwanese market and has arranged so many hot stars to promote their movies in person.

The population of Taiwan is about 23M, which is way less than China, Japan and Korea.

At least over past 10 years, we seldom have chance to see Hollywood stars in person.

Posted at Sat May 04 13:23:12 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/262406597347007160586585717019332432866 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/262406597347007160586585717019332432866 soft Sat May 04 13:23:12 UTC 2013
Tim Berners-Lee, the father of the website, built up the first website " http://info.cern.ch/" in 1991.

The website was running at NexT, a computer designed by Steve Jobs.

Now you can see what the first website looks like and experience how rapidly the web has grown.

http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html



Posted at Wed May 01 15:08:38 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/544956076184839392207872245466373732 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/544956076184839392207872245466373732 soft Wed May 01 15:08:38 UTC 2013
Because it is a one-way trip, it is crazy to the applicants who put their lives on a mysterious land.

I just think that I get stuck in a rut in life and am sick and tired of everything.

Yet I know I am not able to make the cut.

The company will make a live open audition to pick the explorers.

They asked the applicants to have a decent skills in survival, and the entry fee is only twenty-five USD.

As of yet, there are more than ten thousand applicants, including me, who are interested in participating in this migration program.

Posted at Sun Apr 28 13:51:08 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/230930345530230099031956997047170238117 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/230930345530230099031956997047170238117 soft Sun Apr 28 13:51:08 UTC 2013
Mars One, a nongovernmental organization , announced that they will recruit a volunteer squad to explore the Mars.

Every person on the surface of the earth are qualified to apply for this job.

If you really make the cut, you have to be trained for eight years.

This squad is slated to leave the earth in 2022 Sep and arrive at Mars in 2023.

The company will afford the fee about the training.

However, this is a one-way trip.

The company said that nowadays technology can send us to Mars, but to get people back is still a problem.

https://apply.mars-one.com/

I have singed up.

How about you ?







Posted at Thu Apr 25 13:24:41 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/165813706892665299894759198400998672037 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/165813706892665299894759198400998672037 soft Thu Apr 25 13:24:41 UTC 2013


Average rive is brown rice peeled out of hulls, which contain lots of vitamins, minerals and cellulose.

However, because brown rice is more expensive and tastes sort of bitter, it has not replaced white rice yet.

Still, more and more brown rice cuisines such as brown rice roll, brown rice porridge, brown rice syrup are served at many Chinese breakfast shops.

Actually, average brown rice is cooked by the ratio which proportion is four cup of brown rice to one cup of white rice.

It tastes a bit less bitter by cooking this way.

I think you can give it a try even though it looks and tastes sort of acerbity.




Posted at Mon Apr 22 13:11:12 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/35929231286828336136913418602941122213 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/35929231286828336136913418602941122213 soft Mon Apr 22 13:11:12 UTC 2013 Spade 2 3 4 7 8 J
Heart 4 Q A
Diamond 4 5 6 Q K
Club 5 A

We drew one of sixteen cards and told A the number and then told B the pattern.

We ask them if they know which card we had.

A : I have no idea.
B: I know that A don't know.
A: Now, I know the answer.
B: So do I.

Do you know which card was the one we drew?



Posted at Fri Apr 19 13:34:50 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/310101253652205395964059574783368103589 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/310101253652205395964059574783368103589 soft Fri Apr 19 13:34:50 UTC 2013
Both the male lead and the female lead came down with mental disease, and their love were full of defective.

However, our imperfection might be their perfection.

Perhaps people we think they are abnormal just understand something we don't know.

Perhaps we live in a world where they view it as a ridiculous land.

I recommend this movie to people who are hit a pitfall in life, like me. T_T



Posted at Tue Apr 16 13:11:54 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/71339658922385700410618419117695147620 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/71339658922385700410618419117695147620 soft Tue Apr 16 13:11:54 UTC 2013
Sometimes it rained in the morning but was sunny in the afternoon.

Moreover, the temperature surged to 88'F in the noon but nosedived to 55'F at night.

The average temperature in April is even higher than it was in March.

Sunny rain is also very common in Taiwan in the spring.

In Taiwan, rumor has it that sunny rain will make our hair gray, which deeply scared me when I was a kid.

Do you think this superstition is very funny ? I do.

Posted at Sat Apr 13 13:50:21 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/28273817212240059697440931911968988772 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/28273817212240059697440931911968988772 soft Sat Apr 13 13:50:21 UTC 2013
I used to have a crush on a girl and waited her to log in MSN every day.

One day my computer went haywire and I desperately went to Internet cafe in order to meeting her online.

I preserved all the message history and her every icon in my disk.

I think what I had done for her was very stupid.

Although she has a boyfriend now, I still not want to delete these records that I have never brushed up for a long time.

MSN replaced ICQ but now it is substituted by another popular software.

Posted at Wed Apr 10 13:03:09 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/337777051570156980914802212264729353828 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/337777051570156980914802212264729353828 soft Wed Apr 10 13:03:09 UTC 2013


Tom Cruise was in Taiwan to promote his film called Oblivion, and Taiwan was the only Asian destination on his promoting tour.

It has been twelve years for his last time to come to Taiwan.

Wanting to experience local culture, he went to Din Tai Fung, a renowned restaurant here, to learn making small steamed buns.

His kindness impressed me very much.

He patiently responded to every fan who wanted his signature in the drizzle at the premiere.

The premiere had since put off two and half an hour.

Posted at Sun Apr 07 13:19:26 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/262135376522443144598608059544531240613 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/262135376522443144598608059544531240613 soft Sun Apr 07 13:19:26 UTC 2013
Still, I like the movie cast very much because Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe and Anne Hathaway are all very outstanding actors.

Many Taiwanese viewers blasted Rusell for his terrible singing, which made the movie more miserable.

Some people didn't understand why they were singing all the time----even just a plain line.

Recently, I fell for a rising Holly wood star Amanda Seyfried and searched all the movies she staring.

She is so glamorous and her singing in this movie was surprisingly great.

Posted at Thu Apr 04 14:32:37 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/169606851826298350133338311013293491877 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/169606851826298350133338311013293491877 soft Thu Apr 04 14:32:37 UTC 2013
Have you ever seen this kind of red eggs ?

In Taiwan, pregnant women will send friends red eggs within a month after giving birth.

Red eggs are boiled eggs dyed with red pigment extracted from flower so actually they don't have any different flavor.

The egg white is the same as usual.

We think that red means luck and egg symbolizes perfection and fertile.

The new mother will send odd number of red eggs if she gave birth to a baby boy.

On the contrary, If she gave birth to a baby girl, she will send even number of eggs to friends.




Posted at Mon Apr 01 14:20:55 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/124728525823239124996447180125937213964 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/124728525823239124996447180125937213964 soft Mon Apr 01 14:20:55 UTC 2013
The average rice we can see don't have any important nutrition we need other than protein and calories.

Therefore, people start to use black rice as our staple to substitute common rice .

Black rice is said to be a precious rice dedicated to Emperor in the old days, and it has many minerals, vitamins and amino acid.

Rice ball, made of rice with scrambled eggs, deep-fried dough stick and vegetable as the stuffing, is a common Chinese breakfast.

Now, because of health and nutrition, you will see more and more black rice balls serving for customers at Chinese breakfast bars.


Posted at Fri Mar 29 13:34:25 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/127017825162914598566251296818633246373 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/127017825162914598566251296818633246373 soft Fri Mar 29 13:34:25 UTC 2013


This was my dinner, which is a kind of common snack called steam-fried baozi or pan fried bun in Chinese speaking countries.

They are made of thin doughs with fried cabbages, fried Chinese chives and fried fried bean noodles as the stuffing.

The cook will fried, steam flip them on a big flat pan so that's why we call them steam-fried baozis.

The size of a steam-fired baozi is no bigger than a kid's fist so a single one is hard to satisfied me.

Every time I see and smell the steaming coming off the baozis, my mouth is always watery.


Posted at Tue Mar 26 13:21:24 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/19413839544188542125774491120894451300 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/19413839544188542125774491120894451300 soft Tue Mar 26 13:21:24 UTC 2013
Taiwanese President, Ma, was invited to take part in the Pope's inauguration at Vatican.

Our delegation sent Pope a porcelain with magpie pattens on it out of courtesy, which was criticized by Taiwanese opposition party.

In Chinese, magpie is said to be a bird that can bring luck and blissfulness.

Legend has it that magpies would gathere up in the form of a bridge on Chinese Valentin's day for lovers.

We call it magpie bridge.

However, magpie is an ominous animal in many European countries, but the new Pope said he don't care.


Posted at Sat Mar 23 13:59:49 UTC 2013
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/315595252773139418096865484189929021028 http://www.lang-8.com/34193/journals/315595252773139418096865484189929021028 soft Sat Mar 23 13:59:49 UTC 2013