Elmhurst醫院急診與重傷治療中心 (Emergency & Trauma Center)的霓虹燈掉了兩個字, E, S,結果變成了lmhur t，我受傷了。真巧。

我要娜娜多喝水，说否则会上火的。

一天，我正在厨房里做饭，娜娜在客厅玩。突然她大喊：“妈妈，给我水，我着火了。”

我吓一大跳，慌忙跑出来。娜娜指着自己的肚子说：“这里”，弄得我哭笑不得。

 

娜娜做Brain Quest题，答案经常出人意料。

"What do you stand on to weigh yourself?"

Hannah:"my feet".

 

"If you cut pizza into a quarter, how many slices do you get?"

"25"

自留地真的要荒了，除草先，回头来播种施肥。

娜娜的中文水平人见人夸，但还是时不时搞出笑话来。

 

比如说，我有个口头禅＂一点点＂，娜娜也学会了，并举一反三，认为这是＂许多＂的反义词。今天她说，我有好多的阿姨，可是只有“一点点”妈妈。

娜娜让我抱，我说“没力气”。娜娜走不动了，就说：“我没气了”。

娜娜早上起来，说，我更生病了。她想说，我病得更厉害了。

娜娜幼儿园的老师让小朋友多吃胡罗卜，说可以亮眼睛。娜娜说，我吃这么多胡罗卜，眼睛都亮得睡不着觉了。

娜娜回到家很不高兴地说：“你也是白皮肤。”再仔细看看，她说：“嗯，你是有点黑。但你不yellow，只有怪兽才有黄脸和绿脸。”

娜娜总让我讲故事，有时我就应付她说，这个故事你小时候我都给你讲过。现在我让她复习芭蕾舞动作，她就说，我小时候都教你好几遍了。

娜娜哄妈妈开心，就说：你是世界上最好的妈妈，你的头发是世界上最长的，你的耳朵是世界上最小巧的，你的眼睛是世界上最漂亮的，你的肚子是世界上最大的（这哪里是夸我呢？！），你的衣服是世界上最rainbow的。啊？！她是说妈妈打扮的花枝招展吗？

 

Some folks like to get away
Take a holiday from the neighbourhood
Hop a flight to Miami Beach
Or to Hollywood
But I'm taking a Greyhound
On the Hudson River Line
I'm in a New York state of mind

I've seen all the movie stars
In their fancy cars and their limousines
Been high in the Rockies under the evergreens
But I know what I'm needing
And I don't want to waste more time
I'm in a New York state of mind

It was so easy living day by day
Out of touch with the rhythm and blues
But now I need a little give and take
The New York Times, The Daily News

It comes down to reality
And it's fine with me 'cause I've let it slide
Don't care if it's Chinatown or on Riverside
I don't have any reasons
I've left them all behind
I'm in a New York state of mind

It was so easy living day by day
Out of touch with the rhythm and blues
But now I need a little give and take
The New York Times, The Daily News

It comes down to reality
And it's fine with me 'cause I've let it slide
Don't care if it's Chinatown or on Riverside
I don't have any reasons
I've left them all behind
I'm in a New York state of mind

I'm just taking a Greyhound on the Hudson River Line
'Cause I'm in a New York state of mind

培训开始，自我介绍。

你从哪里来？

我不加思索：中国。

所有人都笑了。

我画蛇添足：originally。

 

后来才醒悟，曼哈顿区已经是默认值。

老师在细问到neighborhood。

其他人说，上西城(UWS)、哈林区(Harlem)、中城(Midtown)。

我的正确答案应该是：上东城罗斯福岛。

 

罗斯福岛严格上说不属于曼哈顿，

它实际上是纽约县的一部分，

但被纳入曼哈顿管辖。

不仅如此，它还沾上UES的光。

 

话说回来，Where are you from？

我想，除非下次特意提醒自己，

我还是会脱口而出中国。

离开纽约，遇到这个问题，说纽约市可能更自然和方便些。

汗，真的写不出＂喷嚏＂的＂嚏＂。最近好想看中文书啊。最近一期的《纽约时报杂志》隆重推荐余华，他的"Brothers"要出英文版了，可是中文版俺还没读过呢。

好了，有兴趣的可以读David Moser的全文：http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html

 

 

经典评论：　这人也太搞笑了，两种语言，哪能乱比？Sneeze才六个字母，“喷嚏”的“喷”有十二划，“嚏”有十七划，按难度算，
好歹也是“白垩纪霸王龙”的水平。问问他这词怎么拼？
答案：Tyrannosaurus Rex of the Cretaceous Period

Plan to Close Chinese-Language Paper Deepens a Shadow Over the Ethnic Press
By KIRK SEMPLE
Published: January 22, 2009

 

There is nothing overt at the modest headquarters of The Ming Pao Daily News to suggest that the 12-year-old newspaper is under siege. In the paper’s small warren of offices in an industrial building in Long Island City, Queens, the advertising and reporting staffs are still working the phones and putting out their scrappy broadsheet as if nothing were amiss.
 
But looming over the entire enterprise is a plan by the paper’s corporate parent, Media Chinese International Limited, based in Hong Kong, to shut it down. Though the plan has yet to be formally announced, and several of the paper’s employees said they still remained in the dark about their future, the paper’s general manager confirmed in an interview with The New York Times last week that the daily would indeed disappear from newsstands, possibly as soon as the end of the month.

News of Ming Pao’s demise has shaken New York’s ethnic press industry, which until recently remained extremely robust but, like many other industries, has been buffeted by the nation’s economic slowdown in the past few months.

In recent weeks, two other prominent ethnic newspapers have also closed. Hoy New York, a Spanish-language daily started in 1998, published its last print issue on Dec. 30, though it retains a presence on the Internet. AsianWeek, a widely respected English-language Asian-American weekly based in San Francisco, published its last print issue on Jan. 2, though it, too, remains online.

Ning Wang, editor in chief of The Sing Tao Daily, one of Ming Pao’s three rival Chinese-language dailies in New York, said Ming Pao’s departure would diminish the city’s Chinese-American community, which as recently as the mid-1980s supported 10 daily newspapers.

“For the community it’s a very depressing thing,” Mr. Wang said.

But in an interview, Ming Pao’s general manager, Thong Lai Teng, said that the news was not all bad and cast the paper’s closing as something of a new beginning.

While the company planned to cease publication of the daily, which costs 50 cents a copy on the newsstand, it would continue publishing a free, six-day-a-week newspaper, called MP (NY) Free Daily, introduced more than a year ago.

The Ming Pao staff has already been supplying most of the free daily’s content, Mr. Teng said. And though there would be some layoffs, he added, most of the workers would remain, ensuring that The Ming Pao Daily News would survive in substance and spirit, if not in name.

He said the shift and belt-tightening were necessary for the company to stay alive.

“We are here to stay!” he exclaimed, with a bit more gusto than the paper’s struggles would seem to allow.

Circulation of the free daily has been increasing in proportion to the decrease in the paid daily’s circulation, propelled by an enthusiastic response from advertisers, Mr. Teng claimed.

Some 35,000 copies of the free daily are distributed daily, he said. Meanwhile, he added, the circulation of the paid daily has declined significantly from about 45,000 early last year, though he did not divulge the current circulation numbers.

News of Ming Pao’s plans have filtered out in a curious way. Two rival newspapers published thinly sourced articles in late December reporting Ming Pao’s closure. Then in an article on Dec. 31, Ming Pao published a vague article about the change.

But when first approached about the plans last week, the paper’s staff members and managers refused to confirm the closing, deferring instead to the corporate parent company for comment. When it was pointed out to Mr. Teng that the corporation’s plans had already been reported by one of his own correspondents, he appeared confused, then insisted that the article had been printed prematurely. “The editor wasn’t in the office that day,” he said.

Analysts of the ethnic news media say that Ming Pao’s plans, and the recent closings of Hoy and AsianWeek, are most likely a harbinger of much more contraction in this sector of the media industry.

Until the middle of last year, analysts say, the ethnic press was largely insulated from the vicissitudes of the newspaper industry, including severe downturns in advertising revenue and circulation, which have brought many mainstream newspapers to their knees.

Devoutly focused on local, largely immigrant communities, ethnic newspapers provide readers with news particular to those populations and reports from the immigrants’ homelands that are hard to find elsewhere. They also address the specific needs of immigrants trying to adjust to a new country and new lifestyle.

“People don’t necessarily see themselves reflected in the mainstream media, so different cultural populations were turning to the ethnic media more and more,” said Cristina L. Azocar, director of the Center for Integration and Improvement of Journalism at San Francisco State University.

In addition, advertisers are often the neighbors and acquaintances of the newspapers’ staff, creating an intimate relationship between the newspapers and the communities they serve, analysts said. Many ethnic papers have not gone online in any comprehensive way, but until the broader economic downturn, that did not much matter since much of the readership, particularly in working-class and poorer communities, may not have been connected to the Internet anyway.

But beginning last year, growth in the ethnic press began to level off and the footing of many papers has not been secure enough to withstand the recession.

Ethnic newspapers are now having to scramble to stay alive, cutting staff, printing less frequently and shifting to the Internet.

“Some are finding very innovative ways to keep afloat and others are committed to operating in the red,” said Sandy Close, director of New America Media, a nationwide association of more than 2,000 ethnic media organizations.

According to several current and former Ming Pao staff members, the paper has always struggled to find a niche for itself in the rough-and-tumble market of Chinese-language dailies.

Ming Pao was founded in 1997 as an offshoot of a well-respected daily in Hong Kong that also publishes iterations in San Francisco, Toronto and Vancouver. It has tried to cast itself as the most intellectual of the four Chinese-language dailies in New York, mirroring the reputation of the Hong Kong paper. But it has not been able to cut deeply enough into their market share, industry experts say.

An employee smoking a cigarette outside Ming Pao’s offices in Long Island City last week said he was unsettled by the possibility of layoffs, but he was also philosophical about the matter. The economic malaise, he pointed out, was ubiquitous. “It’s happening to everybody,” he shrugged. “Not just us.”

金融危机影响：传美东《明报》春节后停刊

Grandma是马克的姥姥。她老人家86岁了，行动虽不够敏捷，思维却异常清晰。她除了喜欢填crossword，另一大爱好是写诗。

这里摘录Grandma写给娜娜的两首小诗：

 

Cot. 30, 2008

 

Since you've become a school girl

I see you so seldom.

I sat outside and watch the neighbors' kids

It's not the same.

 

When they say hello

Hannah's little giggle is missing

So is the kiss on my cheek!

 

Instead of counting the days

I've begyn to count the weeks

Until your mom and dad bring yoiu over

Must you grow up so soon?

 

 

May 29, 2005

 

Yesterday seven pounds nine ounces of bundle arrived

You are now the star around which we stride!

 

I know how you'll look two years hence

Cause the day before you were born

I dreamt we walked together.

A cudly little girl handing my hands!

 

The miracle that you are,

Hannah May, my great grand daughter

今天去投票了，小到岛上社区代表，大到美国国家总统，痛痛快快投了个够．

股市惨不忍睹，关心一下下一代的心理健康。

 

  刚刚在地铁站口看到一个中国妈妈斥责4岁的女儿，孩子的尖叫声在我进入地铁后仍久久不绝于耳。回家的路上，我一直在反醒，是不是自己太多的时候对孩子失去耐心？当孩子无礼取闹的时候，我有没有做到平心静气聆听孩子的需求，然后教育孩子如何表达她的不安和烦躁。

  又想到娜娜另一个同龄的中国小伙伴，小女孩身上有明显的胎记，显然她对此很在意。一天，我们在一起玩时，她突然说，为什么我这么丑呢？她妈妈说，没有啊？！结果小女孩说，我照过镜子了，真的很丑！我连忙安慰她说，每个人都不同，都有自己的可爱点。

  也许我杞人忧天，但是我很担心这两个女孩长大后，她们的自尊心和自信心何以建立？an New York上看到一些关于培养孩子自尊和自信的建议，翻译过来，记录在此，以鞭策自己：

 

• 关爱孩子，让孩子知道自己很特殊。花时间跟孩子一起玩，一起学。将“我爱你”挂在嘴上。
• 不要担心宠爱孩子会使他们丧失自立能力。研究表明，与父母粘黏亲近的孩子长大后更容易适应陌生的环境。
• 树立自尊自信的榜样。如果父母经常愁眉苦脸，焦虑不安，孩子很容易模仿。（第一位妈妈借鉴）
• 不要只表扬结果，对进行的尝试和努力予以肯定。赢了比赛自然要兴高采烈地庆祝，但不要让孩子觉得，只有成功才是重要的和值得表扬的。
• 发掘孩子的长处。有的小孩可以背圆周率小数点后300位的数字，有的小孩可以唱10首儿歌，长处因为其独特而更加重要。外表特征亦如此。（供第二位妈妈借鉴）。

  刚刚看到俞敏洪在北大开学典礼上的讲话，很幽默。搬过来跟大家分享。

 

  另外，最近还看到新东方老师宋昊关于中美思维方式差异的评论，颇有同感。摘录如下：

  在讲到GRE反义词时，宋昊老师说，中文的反义词强调绝对工整，如伟大对渺小，革命对反动。这是因为中国人是聚敛式思维，而美国人则是不折不扣的发散式思维，只要些许相反便可构成反义。如“革命”的反义词包括：

 

不革命：这是干与不干的相反

反革命：这是干与反着干的相反

假革命：这是真干与假干的相反

早革命：这是早干与现在干的相反

晚革命：这是晚干与现在干的相反

猛革命：这是干革命程度深与浅的相反

反动或保守：革命是打碎旧有事物或传统，convention, conventional亦是革命的反义词

 

管它早晚、真假、猛烈还是温柔，将GRE革命进行到底！

 

我们去COSTCO购物，娜娜突然说：

叔叔把头发穿到脸上了！

原来，人家留了长胡子。

娜娜称梳辫子为穿(wear a ponytail)。

 

没过多久，娜娜又兴奋地说：

叔叔把所有头发搬到脸上了！

看，他的头都光光的了。

我在一旁笑歪了，给老公翻译出来，他说，讲中文真好。

 

 

娜娜眼尖，爸爸买了冰淇淋还没放到冰箱，

她就说：一会儿 I Scream了。

为了不让她听懂一些词，我们要拼出来，

听久了，她也会拼了，并干脆将I-C-E cream简化成I Scream了。

 

话说饭后我们一家开吃冰淇淋，

我说，按three bears and the goldilock讲的，

爸爸吃大份，妈妈吃中份，娜娜吃小份。

娜娜却说，我长大了，可以吃中份。

我站起来说，娜娜没长那么大呀？！

结果娜娜四肢着地说，

我的腿没那么长，可是我的胳膊长呀！

 

娜娜不到1岁就学会说"耳朵"，从此她一发不可收拾，爱上了耳朵。两三个月前，她还自创了中英文童谣，歌颂耳朵：

 

耳朵

 

小耳朵，小耳朵，小呀小耳朵，

你的耳朵，我的耳朵，耳朵耳朵多多多。

 

Ear

 

Here is a little ear, there is a little ear,

your ear, my ear, ear ear  everywhere.

马克家的两条小狮子狗年过16.5，估计折算人寿超过100岁。

前年它们15岁生日的时候，我们还颇隆重地开生日派对，纪念了一番。

不幸，Gillian在本周突然心脏衰竭，

昨天接受安乐死，离开了爱它的亲人和亲狗。

 

两条小狗出生不久，就被领养到马克家。

它们相濡以沫，不过，在性萌芽的初期就被阉割了。

因此，做不了夫妻，只好称兄道妹。

据说，小狮子狗每天会流泪的，这兄妹俩就互相舔脸。

为彼此擦泪，从不劳驾“父母”。

 

两只小狗性情温和，知书达理，深得宠爱。

吃的穿的，说句狗不理的话，比我好多了。

它们还经常去美容美发，野营度假。

 

可是，年龄不饶人（狗），G&M行动日渐迟缓。

Milicent在15岁生日前，出门玩耍，遭遇车祸。

不过，大难不死，在父母兄长的照料下恢复健康。

而Gillian今年年初因胃病去兽医检查，发现癌症。

马克家人开始谈论它们寿命的问题。

 

虽说如此，为它进行安乐死后，公婆仍是悲痛不已。

我们只好下班后驱车前往安慰。

我们委婉告诉娜娜，Gillian去医院了，很长时间不能回家。

今天早上才告诉她，医生打电话，说它病重，去世了。

娜娜一脸严肃，不知道对死亡有没有概念。

 

娜娜非常喜欢小动物，对两只小狗更是爱护有加。

她最喜欢给两只狗讲故事，带它们出去散步，

抚摸它们，给它们treat。

希望Gillian的去世不要给她带来不安。

今天她见到保姆，第一时间就汇报了Gillian去世的消息。

保姆说，Gillian去了狗的天堂。

愿它在天堂安息。

 

P.S. 说来也巧，今天看到一篇关于宠物医疗保险的文章。美国人养宠物，在财力和心力上都要付出很多。

娜娜最近中文很有长进，有时候还主动要求读中文故事。表扬一下。

 

累了：

最近娜娜的口头禅是but和累了。

她经常告诉我一件好事，然后口气一转，but。

比如说：我本来想收拾玩具来着，可是我累了。

这也怪我，我经常说，娜娜，妈妈累了，读完这个故事我们就睡觉吧。

现在，娜娜要是不开心，不想走路，不想吃饭，不想睡觉，一律都说，我累了。

 

 

听话：

娜娜跟妈妈胡搅蛮缠。

妈妈说，娜娜，是你听我的话，还是我听你的话。

娜娜说，妈妈听娜娜的话。

然后想了半天，说，我听你的话。

那你说什么？

 

动物打鼾：

娜娜，为什么又跑到爸妈卧室来了？

我床上的小动物和布娃娃太多了。

第二天，我们把她床上所有的点缀都拆掉了。

你为什么又跑来了？

因为小动物和布娃娃在我的椅子上。

对呀？

他们晚上睡觉打鼾。