haoyando

[haoyando]

Voice Beyond Voice

I was reading “Salt” by Nayyirah Waheed, and was struck by this poem: when you are strugglingin yourwritingit usually meansyouare hearing one thingbut writing another I am just wondering if I “am hearing one thing and writing another”, or seeing one thing but pretending I am not seeing it, or seeing something and thinking I’ve seen something but it’s actually just an illusion. Another poem…

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[haoyando]

The Invisible Weight

I just read the poem “moles don’t think about space or small talk” by Savannah Brown. It is so good that I have to pause and think and taste the moment of thrill. I just don’t want to let it go. It is said that one is allowed to quote more than 25 words if one is writing a review. I know I am not good at writing reviews, but for the privilege of quoting the poem, I am going to make this a…

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[haoyando]

New Year Resolutions

It is said that only 8% of people can keep their new year’s resolutions. I definitely belong to the 92%, but my unfaithfulness to my promise has never prevented me from making new promises each year. Probably I am hoping to be a different person even if I know it is a false hope. I think I want to do the following for 2024: At Least One Metaphor I tried to write one little poem everyday for…

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[haoyando]

Cultural Differences In Our Stories

The Location of Love Stories I watched a movie and read a book last week. It just so happened that both are about people escaping from the big cities and find love in small towns in Midwest or North Carolina. I can’t help thinking that small town love stories can very well be its own genre of romantic books or movies. I wonder if small-town-love-story is uniquely American or ubiquitous…

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#cultural difference #culture

[haoyando]

Dusk Is Always Perfect

The dusk descends, the sky dims,the air haunts, the laptop screen illuminates, the distant street lights glow. My perfect dusk again. I only wish it is longer, but that's too much to wish for. A thousand shades and shadows play by the window sill. It's an overture to an evening of moon and stars, but I haven't seen stars for years. Ever since I left my steppe home and moved to cities, I said…

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[haoyando]

Holiday Reminiscences (Continued)

My Mother During Holidays Although my mother was usually happier than usual during holidays, she never shied away from telling me and my father that she was overworked and overstretched during holidays. She cooked too much and didn’t even have a minute to enjoy herself. Once I saw a dirt mark on the back of her hand as we were having one holiday lunch together. She snapped and said that she got…

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[haoyando]

Holiday Reminiscences

Have you ever found that a missing front tooth makes a kid look cuter? I was just at the store and a kid like that smiled aimlessly around, revealing the little gap in his mouth. Kids are always cute, no matter how awkwardly they walk, how impertinent they speak. An adult can never get away with it, but kids can. Anyway, this time of the year always brings back memories. I don’t know why, as if…

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[haoyando]

My Favorite Book 2023 (Continued)

Yesterday, I started to leaf through the pages again. I had reread many books before, some more than two or three times, some once every year. However I had never reread a book as soon as I finished it. This book was the first. I reread the first twenty pages and tried to savor what I had missed the first time around. Then I reread the last twenty to thirty pages, during which I felt that I had…

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#book lover #Canadian Writer #Dionne Brand

[haoyando]

The Language Lesson (Flash Fiction)

Flash Fiction #174 I’ve been watching his lessons on social media for years. He is the best teacher–he speaks clearly, slowly, simply, with very few difficult words beyond the range of English cognates. I guess that his clear voice is partly due to his high quality microphone. Of course I am not suggesting that he doesn’t make a conscious effort to pronounce every syllable distinctly. He does,…

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#narcissism #narcissist

[haoyando]

My Favorite Book 2023

“Theory” by Dionne Brand is my favorite book and I just finished reading it. I feel sorry that it is not longer, it doesn’t have a real plot, it talks about relationships but steering away from feelings. Despite all these, I love and admire the book so much that I am probably going to reread it before the new year. I was thinking that I wanted to read all the books by Dionne Brand in the…

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#book lover #Canadian Writer #Dionne Brand

[haoyando]

Inspire Somebody Unexpectedly

“Has she been living in a cave somewhere, not listening to the news, too busy toeing the real or imagined line?” I ask myself this question while smiling at her sweetly, the kind of smile that mixes business acumen with personal relationship. However recently I have started to doubt my ability to reach an ideal mixture. I suspect that, most likely along the way, I have lost both business…

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[haoyando]

Being Thankful 2023

A holiday cleanup reveals a book under the sofa-- the worn out pages curvy and dusty, presenting a story half read, long forgotten. The movable tents called "ger", the exotic boots called "gutal", in the frozen world of northwestern Mongolia, where Tuvans, who are Mongolians, and Kazaks lived side by side. The riverbed is a nature-made road for winter travel by jeep; The weather is so harsh…

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#Asian

[haoyando]

I Just Need One More Idea

I really don’t want to say this, but last night I was in a desperate search of an idea to tie several experiences and thoughts together with certain degree of coherence. I didn’t think there was a real cohesion in it but an semblance of it was essential. Yes, the more one doesn’t have it, the more one needs to build up the appearance of having it, at least in this case. I remember I read this…

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[haoyando]

Battle For Schools And Grades

I was trying to explain to someone about the schools in Central Jersey area and I said, “it is a little crazy, right? Aren’t you surprised?” “Oh no,” she said, “I was expecting something like this. I had known about the craziness of schools here before we came.” It was my turn to become surprised. And things are really a little crazy here. As you know, Middlesex County has 26 school district,…

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#asian immigrants #education #New Jersey

[haoyando]

Friday Before Thanksgiving

I am already planning what to buy tomorrow, which is the last day one can get quality groceries from mainstream American stores. After tomorrow, one has to wait until after Thanksgiving for the stores to refill its shelves to the normal level. This year will be the first year in my life that I encounter the shortage of rice flours, rice noodles, and sticky rice products, except my years living…

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#Food #holidays

[haoyando]

Open A Book Find A Quote

I just turned on my Kindle Fire tablet, pressed the first downloaded book, flipped through the unread pages casually. And this poem jumped into my view: “…drunk so deep the cup of bitter fateAs that poor wretch who cannot, cannot love:He bears a load which nothing can remove,a killing, withering weight. He smiles–his sorrow’s deadliest mockeryHe speaks–the cold words flow not from his soul;he…

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[haoyando]

You Have To Look Like You Know What You Are Doing

Time flies when one’s having fun, but actually time flies whether one’s having fun or not. Suddenly, Thanksgiving is around the corner again. Somehow I feel like I just had the previous Thanksgiving a month or two ago. In a short span of one or two months, a whole year has passed by, leaving me thinking that I am not one bit wiser but very much one year older. It’s all because I have been doing…

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#interview #Thanksgiving