Archive for the ‘Life’ Category

New Year...

I'm not the "party type" of person who usually go out and go crazy in holidays. I more prefer to travel around, or at least sit in front of TV and have a lazy ... and a relax new year.

What really saddens me is the programmes on New Zealand Television and radio. Vienna New Year's Concert is a must for my new year since when I was 8 or something.

I don't know how New Zealand TV looked like when I was 8, but for all the years I have been here, I haven't seen anything rather than outdated movies and usually soaps on tv during the New Year holiday.

Even the Radio New Zealand Concert won't play anything impressive for new year.

I don't want download programmes through torrent network, but I'm tired to listen to BBC radio 3 online every year for the concert, without seeing any pictures.

Aussies, even african countries can enjoy the concert live on TV. I guess this is just another reason why the grass in greener on other side of the ditch.

It's Labour Day today...

... But do you know that this year's New Zealand Labour Day coincides with International Stuttering Awareness Day?

Started in 1998, this day is aiming to "recognizes the growing alliance between speech-language professionals and consumers, who are learning from each other and working together to share, give support, and educate one another and the general public on the impact that stuttering has on individuals' lives."

I'm very open about this. I suffered from stutter since the day I started to talk (in Chinese), and still, today, though significantly improved.

In early years I was laughed by nearly every people in my life, even my relatives. I never lable those laughters "discrimination" because it's not their fault: there was very little public awareness on stutter, and people don't treat it as a clinical disorder, especially in a Chinese society where most eldlies (including my grandparents) believe that give their children a slap on the face everytime they stutter will cure the disorder.

This sort of things happended in my life in just about 15 years ago.

I settled right here in New Zealand around 2003. What I really enjoyed about New Zealand society you feel far less discriminated because of your speech difficulty. Most people will wait quietly to let you to finish the sentence without any laughter.

But in most of the cases, people who waitted me to finish the sentence are not awared of that I'm a stutter; based on my Asian apperance, most of people thought that I just have a very bad English.

This International Stuttering Awareness Day is not well observed in New Zealand. Stutter happens only in less than 1% of population. In a small population such as in New Zealand, this 1% can be easily ignored.

However, I'm very grateful that I had the experience of being ignored and discriminated. Because of this, I treat every person in my life, whether they are physically or mentally disabled, fairly, and in the same respect that I would give to everyone else.

How's the weather, Jim?

It's nice to see our favourite weatherman, Jim Hickey back. Was bit nervous for this second "first time", but, hey, that's understandable.

The weather has become the most boring part of the news for me since he's departure in 2003 but that is no longer the case now. Welcome back, Jim.

new home, new start.

I am very excited to see the opening of this new blog with my own domain and space, www.arctosia.com/blog.

Because I still haven't decide what I should put for the arctosia.com, so the domain is temporarily redirected to this blog.

One of the important factors that moved me to have my own domain and space is the word "freedom". Blog in a chinese BSP was such an awful and stressful experience - your blog entries sometimes just simply 'gone' nowhere without any prior and after notice at all, and in most cases, you won't be able to trace them back.

This also marks the reopening of my Chinese Blog, Bear's Blog China, with nearly all previous important posts recoved and moved to the new home. It has been renamed as "Bear's Blog Chinese" since it is hosted outside china, but my mission of provide different views for chinese audiences continues. You can access that blog at chinese.arctosia.com or arctosia.com/blog2.

My blogs are hosted on dreamhost, not a good one, but definitely the cheapest one in next two years. 160G of space is definitely a waste for me(at least looks like it now), therefore if you come from New Zealand, and would like a space to host your blog or a small website, I am pretty happy to provide you that with a small charge to cover part of my overall cost (maybe a dollar or two a month).

Bear’s Blog China forced to close

My Chinese blog, Bear's Blog China, has been closed by the Blog Service Provider, Sohu.com, (NASDAQ: SOHU) for unknown reason early yesterday.

In the blog's short life of 6 month, it has received more than 10,000 clicks.

Initial contacts with its customer services have been proven useless. The customer representative claims that I have published "sensitive" information in my blog, but refused to specify what "sensitive" information I have published.

In fact, I cannot recall any "sensitive" information in my blog as well. Posts in my Chinese blog are very similar to the entries here, except they were written in Chinese. My last post before the closure is same as the one here, my photo of lunar eclipse.

I failed to see how those photos could become "sensitive". Actually I did post some possible sensitive information, i.e. materials blocked by the Great Firewall of China, but that was a long long time ago and those hard-working webmasters deleted them in a speedy manner.

I suspect this is the result of what I have done before. I was frequently translating some news reports relating to the "sensitive" side of Chinese government and add my comment in my blog. I was quite active and I understand that I was on BSP's special watch list for quite a long time.

I am still trying to talk the issue with the BSP involved. There is really not much I can do as one person: Sohu.com will just become another one in a list of websites banned on my computer.

Also, the reason why I put its nasdaq quote there, if you are an investor of some particular businesses, I beg you to consider: when you invested companies with horrible records in China such as yahoo and cisco, or chinese internet companies such as Baidu and Sohu, what kind of things you are actually investing?

And what changes you can make?

However, knowing that people were jailed because their blogs online, I am really really lucky.

Holiday!

There is a change in my life. I would like all my friends to know that I will lose my current columnist job after August, become part of 4% unemployed population.

It's not my fault though : the magazine wants to have more entertainment contents. The 'big brother' ordered me to stop talking about politics and have more like 'which pub is the best' or 'how to play a computer game' thing, and I refused.

That means I need to get a job soon and I am just trying to do that in the holiday. However, I'll be very pleased if, any of you can refer me to any part time jobs avaialable around you that does not require a lot of customer service( I hate to do that).