A Negative Rambling...

Hello. I hope you're having a great day or week, life, whatever. lol Ugh, I really hate the fact that I haven't been able to come here so often compared to what my situation was a few months ago! I have been failing to upload even once a week, and I hate it. I don't really like being busy (I sometimes do... Only sometimes...), and I don't like people who almost brag about how busy they are either. What I'm trying to tell you though, is that I've been busy! So ironic.

Well, job hunting is supposed to be the time when you meet different people, get to know different industries/companies, search for your future career path (i.e., your "bright" future!), etc., and it should be uplifting. But I feel like I'm at the other end of the emotion scale; I'm depressed, basically. Other people may be imagining their future selves, and thinking how wonderful their lives can/will be. Joy of life? Not for me, really. I feel like my life is draining. Haha, that was kind of an exaggeration. 

Alright, today's post doesn't have any topic or theme or whatsoever. I just wanted to sit and write. ...Write about me being pessimistic. lol It's not like I'm sad; I'm just pessimistic. And being pessimistic and being sad are different. And I'm not mad or angry either. No, I don't feel anger. You could ask me if I'm happy. The answer is, to be honest, I don't know. I don't really know what happiness is, to begin with. If you cannot define happiness, then you cannot tell whether you're happy or not, right? I know, happiness is a state of mind, and everyone has their own definitions of happiness. Some people may define being rich, and having an abundance of money as happiness, whereas others may value different things. But in the first place, you cannot define happiness so easily. There are different and many factors that can affect happiness (e.g., money, human relationship, environment, etc.), and I think it's the combination of these various factors that people refer to when they try to define what happiness is. So, then, I guess that in a way, happiness is your life goal, and if your current situation is somewhat close to your life goal (i.e., what you want and what you want to be), then you're happy. 

Ok, now I'm going to make a new paragraph because nobody likes big, long and dull paragraphs. So, if you desire to know whether you're happy, you need to have a goal, at least. And I think I am having a (major) problem here. Currently, I don't have a goal. I'm not really sure what I want, what I want to achieve, what kind of person I want to be, etc. The more I learn, and the more I read, the more I'm confused. I want to reach out to the truth (if there's any), but it's like trying to catch smoke. I can't be sure about anything. 

Hmm, I guess I'll just stop writing here for today. My writing spirit(s) went away, and doesn't seem to come back anytime soon. Thanks for reading this depressing post if you happened to make it this far! See you next time! 

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Hi! It's been two weeks since I last posted... But this was not because I was busy, to be honest. I had much time especially the last weekend of April and the first few days of this month. But I had been out of my house, and spent time doing different things which aren't worth mentioning here. lol

To tell the truth, I am so glad that I didn't quite blogging. I say this because I'm really bad at keeping a journal. At first, I never fail to open my notebook at night, and write a few paragraphs or so, but unfortunately, this good habit doesn't live long in my life. I have tried to keep a journal several times throughout my short lifetime (It's an ongoing process, of course; I don't have any plan to pass away at this point.), but none of the trials ended successfully. Well, in the first place, think about it. I wouldn't have to have my own blog if I were a capable person who makes journal entry everyday. What I write here are merely my soliloquies. The only difference is that whether the writings are public or private.

Ok, so that was my casual talks before I get right into business. lol As it says on the title, I am going to talk about a book called "Animal Farm" which was written by George Orwell. Yes, it is a fairy story about animals on a farmland, and yes, it may sound like a happy, peaceful story, but it is not. Oh, before I go in, please just let me remind you that I will reveal the basic outline of this story. If you do not wish to know anything about the story line, I have to suggest you to stop reading this post. Alright, so I read a copy of the book published from Penguin Books, and on the back of the book, it says:

"When the downtrodden animals of Manor Farm overthrow their master Mr Jones and take over the farm themselves, they imagine it is the beginning of a life of freedom and plenty. But as a cunning, ruthless elite among them starts to take control, other animals find themselves hopelessly ensnared as one form of tyranny is gradually replaced by another. Orwell's chilling 'fairy story' is a timeless and devastating satire of idealism betrayed be power and corruption." 

Yup, that's how basically the story goes. The animals on the farm were living a miserable life, and that was Mr. Jones and all other humans' fault, they thought. Or at least some of them strongly felt that way. Others were just not clever enough to think critically, and process their opinions, or just weren't that interested or enthusiastic, but took part in the rebellion as a result. Humans have been dominating their life, abusing them, and exploiting them, and they have come to think that they didn't have to let it be that way. And that ended up being a rebellion against humanity, and the couple who owned the farm (Mr. & Mrs. Jones) were exiled from their own farm.

Soon after the rebellion, the farm seemed to won peace and freedom. But it wasn't long before one specie (i.e., pigs) started to take a lead of the entire animals. They were doing all the "brain-works" for the animals and for the farm, and didn't engage in labor as much as other animals did. And among the pigs, two leaders emerged: Napoleon and Snowball. The two was always disagreeing with each other on every discussion. And the rest of the animals were mostly not clever enough to think which side to take, and they seemed to go with the one who was present in front of them and speaking. When Snowball was presenting his opinions, they thought he had a better idea; when Napoleon was preaching to them, they thought they should agree with him over Snowball.

But on day, to their surprise, Snowball was exiled by Napoleon, and Napoleon have come to become the sole leader of Animal Farm. From that time on, whenever bad things happened, Napoleon claimed that Snowball was the mastermind. You wouldn't really know whether Napoleon was correct, and Snowball was actually the bad guy behind the scene, but the pigs always found ways to convince their comrades. And now you already see the way the rebellion is headed. Now it's hard to see the goals and ideals that animals had imagined before and at the beginning of the rebellion.

There was a set of rules which was called "The Seven Commandments," and it was supposed to function like a constitution. The commandments were set right after the rebellion, and those were the rules upon which all animals should live. But the commandments were "adjusted" whenever the pigs wanted to, and the adjustments were always done at night when the farm is asleep. For example, one of the rules was: "No animals shall kill any other animal." But one day, Napoleon massacred animals who planned to set up him or had thoughts of treason against him by secretly allying with Snowball, in front of all the other animals. The next morning when they saw the commandments, it read: "No animal shall kill any other animal without cause." Of course, the animals do feel like something has been changed (The commandments are written on the wall with a white paint, and can be read from a distance.), but one of the pigs named Squealer who is really good at giving speeches and convincing people to believe what he says, always made sure to convince the animals that they had false memories by asking them, "Are you REALLY sure you didn't memorized it wrong? Can you prove that it was different before?"

There were many times when the animals didn't get enough food because of the harsh weather. But Squealer always reported them that they were having more harvest and food than previous years, which false statistics, but the animals couldn't tell the the reports were false because they couldn't really prove it, and the pigs knew it. Even during the hardest season, when the animals was starving and hadn't had enough food, the pigs and the dogs (i.e., the guard of the pigs) had plenty of food to eat.

In the end, the pigs had become just like human being, the ones toward whom they had the greatest hatred. They started sleeping in bed, wearing clothes, and drinking alcohol just like humans. When the animals witnessed the pigs partying with humans, they now couldn't really tell which was which. ...And that's the end of the story.

The book was published in 1945, and Orwell wrote this story to tell people the real situation of Soviet Union after the Russian Revolution. I am glad that I read this book since it's very alarming. From the third person's viewpoint, it is always clear that the rebellion is starting to head to a weird and dangerous direction, but the animals do not have ways to stop that even if they noticed that something was wrong. For them, it is impossible to point out the problem with full sentences, and they don't even know when and why exactly the rebellion went wrong. It just happened, and they had already become just a small fraction of the entire system and the events. The books was published more than 70 years ago, but the it doesn't sound like an old story from the past, which is surprising and frightening. This can really happen! And it is an important thing to keep in mind. Totalitarianism is not the story of savage, inferior countries of the past or far away from yours. It could happen anywhere, and yes, even today. I feel like more and more people have become aware of this, and been feeling cautious about our societies due to the current political situations we face today.

Again, I am really glad that I got the chance to read the book. I wanted to write about Orwell's life, but I won't at least in this post since it would take up too much space, and it's actually impossible to sum up his life in just a few sentences. I will just say that he had an extraordinary life.

Thank you for reading, and I hope to see you in my next post! Bye!

The Middle Way...

Hey, everyone! Seems like I can upload a new post once a week lately! I wish I could post twice a week, but I guess that's impossible for me at least for now... *sigh*

Alright. In this post, I am going to write about balance. Life (and all the facets of life) is all about balance (= moderation). Sounds so simple, doesn't it? But it's easier said than done actually, at least for me!

I am pretty bad at keeping a good, healthy balance in many aspects of my life. For example, I am a hard worker. It might sound strange to say something like this about myself, but I truly am. lol I don't try to find a way to look like I'm working hard when I'm just sabotaging. When I have a homework assignment to do, I really work hard on it. I don't write trashy papers. When I have to write a paper, I always do my best to write a good one, one that is interesting enough for the professor to read it. I would hate myself so much if I did try to write a boring one just to finish the paper more quickly so that I could free myself from the duty. Moreover, I don't want to waste the professor's time by forcing him to read my meaningless paper. Isn't it rude, don't you think?

I know, it's good to be hardworking; it should be encouraged. But sometimes, it gets too much and too intense. Sometimes (or more than sometimes...? lol), I even feel guilty about taking a break. I feel like I should be studying more, instead of watching Netflix (Oh, by the way, have you watched Iron Fist? I highly recommend it! If you haven't watched it, stop reading this blog, and go watch it right away! lol) or reading comic books even when I deserve a good break. There are other examples like this. When I assign myself a rule, say, "I am going to eat healthy," I need to eat 100% healthy 100% of the time. I would eat lots of vegetables, no junk foods, and I would not have snacks or desserts at all. I would be so strict to myself, and make myself suffer. I also tend to work too hard on my romantic relationship. I am a girlfriend to an amazing man, and I always want to be the perfect girlfriend. I force myself to be nice, kind, and pretty all the time, to cook a lot for him, to help him with his work, etc., and tend to wore myself out. But I can't do that permanently, and so, I sometimes "fail," which leads to self-hate. And when I feel depressed, both of us are unhappy.

So, the point I am making here is: being hardworking is good, but when you start to work hard too much, and work too hard, you start to suffocate yourself, and that's when things become problematic.

This semester, I am taking a class called "Japanese Thoughts and Religion," and in this class, we are learning about Buddhism, especially Zen. The semester just started this month, and we've had only 2 classes so far since the beginning of this semester, so I still have so much more to learn obviously, even though I have already learned new things. I hope I can share more by the time the semester ends in July!

In the last class, we briefly learned about Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha, "the awakened one"), and his life. He was born in a royal family. After he was born, a holy man prophesied that he would either become a great king or a great monk. His father wanted his son to be a king just like himself, and decided that he would provide anything to keep his son in the palace. He thought, if his son is satisfied with his life in the palace, he would not be interested in the world outside of the palace (= the real world where people need to experience suffering sometimes, if not all the time).

But as you've probably guessed, he couldn't cover up the truth like that forever. Siddhartha Gautama became interested in what and how would the world outside of the palace be like, and one day, he got a chance to get out of the palace, and see the real world for himself. Of course, he was shocked to see how the real world looked like. He had never suffered; everything in the palace was so beautiful. Everyone in the palace was young, healthy, and beautiful. He encountered old people, ill people, and also dead people for the first time in his life. He returned to the palace, but his life in the palace wasn't the same anymore. He decided to leave the palace to go on a journey to find the truth, and did so when he was 29, leaving his duty as the price, and the future king, his wife, and his new born child behind.

This is the story that I heard in the class (I heard the same story in another class that I took last year.) of the life of Siddhartha Gautama before he started his journey to the enlightenment. And from that time, it took 6 years for him to achieve the enlightenment (= nirvana). First, he tried to achieve the enlightenment (= to be released from suffering, because according to him, life is suffering) through tough training which made him suffer physically, such as starving himself for days. But it didn't bring him any good outcome, and he wasn't satisfied. It didn't work. And one day, he realized that he didn't have to choose the extreme way; he could choose the middle way. I had to go through this part rather quickly and briefly because I do not know much in details yet... Sorry.

Too less is not good, too much is not good either. The moderate amount is always good. And this principle applies to everything. I know this principle, and I understand what this principle means. But for me, it's not so easy to practice it in my everyday life. If I wish to release myself from suffering (because I am suffering from doing too much!), however, I need to practice it, and learn to balance myself. It took Buddha 6 years to learn that it's all about the balance, and I'm wondering how many years it'll take for me to learn that. Definitely more than 6 years! lol

I hope you enjoyed the little story about Buddha. Try not to push yourself too much! Keep in mind: a good moderation is the key! See you in my next post!

Excuse My Complaining! :P

Hello! I hope you all are doing well! I just got back to school this week, and so far, all the classes I am taking this semester seem exciting and interesting! I do see that I am going to be very busy with schoolwork, but it's going to be so much fun, and I'm happy to think that I'll have learned lots of things at the end of this semester. 

Ugh, but it sucks that I will definitely have to miss some classes because of the notorious job hunting! I see a major contradiction here. We're students, right? As students, our first priority should be school, classes, and studying. Why do we have to miss a class to be at a particular place at a particular time for a job interview? This is so strange. If all companies do job interviews on weekends, that really helps! But most companies don't... Well, you can tell the interviewer (the company you're applying for) that you won't be able to come because you have a class, but the company would simply reply, "Oh, we're sorry, but we need you to come here like any other candidates." *sigh* In my opinion, students and companies should be equal. Job hunting should not be just about us students seeking opportunities. It should also be about companies seeking good human resources. Job hunting should not be just about us students go meet companies, and plead. "Pick me! Pick me!" It should also be about companies approaching students they want. "Pick us! Please join our company!" 

So, all the companies out there! If you really care about students (aka your future or potential candidates), you'd better be more flexible! Your job interview dates should be negotiable! Let students be students, and let students do what students are supposed to do while they're students. What's normal isn't always the best, and by the same token, what many people do isn't always the right thing to do. I mean seriously, missing even one class really hurts. Professors and lecturers understand that students have this issue, and many of them kindly excuse our absences when we have to miss their classes because of job-hunting related events. So, we may not lose our attendance points. BUT. You cannot listen to the lecture if you don't show up. And I don't like that. I would always want to listen to lectures directly by myself, and take notes directly from what I heard in lectures. That's the point of lectures and schools in general in the first place, isn't it? What's the point of showing up to lectures and school if you can just pass the class by getting copies of your friends' notes? I go to classes because I want to learn. I want to listen to what lecturers are saying, and interpret what they are saying by myself. Borrowing my friends' notes isn't the same as listening to lectures myself. 

Alright, so... since this post came to be about complaining, let me complain about one more thing. lol Some students just cannot shut their mouths even during classes! This phenomenon tends to happen more frequently in large classes. And those who do not keep their mouths shut tend to sit not near, but far from the lecturer. Well, first of all, how disrespectful! They're being so rude to the person who's speaking. I mean, how would you feel if people are paying no attention or whatsoever to you, and talking with each other about things that are completely unrelated to what you're talking about when you're standing in front of the class doing a presentation? That's not very comfortable, isn't it? Then why do you dare to do that to other people? Please think. PLEASE. 

Moreover, those noisy people are violating other people's right to listen to the lecture. You may think you and your friend(s) are more like whispering to each other than talking. But in almost all cases, you're not the only ones who are doing that, and believing the same damn thing. Students who are actually listening to the lecture feel noisiness behind them because there are lots of whispering going on simultaneously. And we who take classes seriously really dislike those disrespects to classes, lecturers, and learning. A classroom should be a sacred place devoted for learning and motivation to learning. It should not be violated by those noisy, immature students. 

We're collage students; we're all at least 18 years old or older (because you can't skip grades in Japan). And lecturers still have to ask the class to be quiet. They should be ashamed of themselves. And really, nobody's asking you to participate. You can decide by yourself and for yourself whether you want to be in the classroom or not. So, if you want to keep talking with your friends, just leave. Go elsewhere. Go to the cafeteria. And talk as much as you want. I mean, you're so uncool because you aren't cool enough to work hard on your schoolwork, and you don't have the guts to not showing up to classes at all either. So, make up your minds, please! I'm tired of having to be irritated by this problem. Don't be an adult who really is just a baby with a body of an adult. 

Can't We Have Peace?

Hi, everyone! It's been a while since I last uploaded a post. To be honest, I haven't been able to have time to sit down alone in front of my laptop to write a post because I had been with people a lot this week. My sister visited me, and stayed at my place this week, which was so much fun, and also, I was at my boyfriend's place for the past few days. It's been a while since last time when I was at my house alone actually!

Oh, by the way, it's the cherry blossom season again in Japan! This spring, it came a little late that usual, but I was lucky enough to have a full day to walk around, and see those beautiful pink flowers since the school hasn't started yet. It actually started today, but I don't have any class on Fridays this semester, so basically, I am going back to school from Monday next week! I am so excited about my new classes because I am mostly taking the ones that I really don't have to. I am almost done with all my required classes for my major, which means that I can take extra classes because I have more time than previous years, when I had to spend my time taking required classes. I am so hyped up!

Ok, so this time, I am going to talk about a sad thing that happened recently. And I am so sad that I have to talk about this. Because... seriously, when we can say that we have a peaceful world? We human beings have had two major wars. But sadly, it seems like those aren't enough for us to really learn that we shouldn't rely on violence anymore. I feel like people want peace, but not many people actually believe that we can really achieve that with everyone working together. People want peace, but they think that's too difficult and complicated. Or maybe they think there's no such thing as peace. They may think that they want to have faith in people and people's good will, but too many times their hope has been betrayed.

I was watching a news program the other day, and when I heard this, I was speechless... because I was so shocked to hear the news. Japanese government said that it would not participate in the negotiations on a treaty to ban nuclear weapon. I will link an article from The Japan Times, so that you can read it. I was shocked because Japan should be willing to talk about this. Japan is the only country that have suffered from attacks using nuclear weapons. We should be the first country to raise our hands, and say, "Hey, we should work together to make a better world." I see that Japanese government is making a political move. They stepped out of the negotiations because Japan is "under the U.S. nuclear umbrella," as it says on the article from The Japan Times. Japan can't really say the world doesn't need nuclear weapons, huh? This is really frustrating. I think those people who actually was there in 1945, and experience all the damage and sorrow brought by nuclear weapons are also frustrated.

I know we can't just say, "Alright, so all kinds of nuclear weapons are banned from tomorrow, so let's just dump all the things we have now." We need a steady plan, and follow it step by step. But rather just trying to find a way to achieve the world without any nuclear threat, Japan just simply stepped out. Easy as it is.

I mean... what are we doing?! Is this the peace we want? Maybe it's the peace we deserve. "Haha! We have this deadly weapon here! You see that? You know what? This one can be really bad! You don't wanna see me fire this, do you? No, you don't. And we don't wanna do that either. Alright, so we don't fight." So we live in a peaceful world where people still need to fear somebody may fire nuclear weapons someday. Is this peace? Are we happy?

I feel like this is the same as gun control. People always say, "But what if...?" "But how would you protect yourself and your family when things happened?" So, maybe we want to, but apparently, we don't believe in the theory of innate goodness of human beings. We have been living on the peace based upon the idea that we human beings are fundamentally and inherently evil.

Well, living in Japan is easy in terms of not having to live with fear of civil wars or bombings from foreign countries. But in many places around the world, people have to and forced to live with fear. I see innocent people getting injured, being killed, crying, and suffering on the television, and it hurts to watch those pictures. I can't stop myself from crying. I want to switch to different channels, but I always don't because for those people, that's the reality they cannot escape from. And then I get angry at myself for enjoying this ordinary life. And... our leader announced that they were refraining from talking about the treaty to ban nuclear weapons? I am so ashamed.

The world free of nuclear weapons might sound crazy in this world with nuclear weapons. But you can't make things come true if don't believe you can. I don't have any kids yet, but when I do in the future, I want to tell them people can have a peaceful world with confidence. I don't want to feel like I'm lying to them. I don't want to tell them we can't have a peaceful world because we're all too scared. I don't want to tell them it's better to be armed than to have faith in humanity.

I know this is a complicated, difficult issue. But we all want peace. It's simple; we all want peace. Can't we have it?

Reference:

• A treaty to ban nuclear weapons. (2017, April 1). Retrieved April 7, 2017, from http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2017/04/01/editorials/treaty-ban-nuclear-weapons/#.WOd5zoiGNPY