Sorry-ology

 It had to be a short read the other day as I was working with another mother for a session of 15 minutes. I was not aware of time much in the past and just chose whatever book I wanted, but for two or three times my reading left no time for my paired partner. My late knowledge about the situation left me very embarrassed and apologetic always.  This time, I chose by length. The Wonky Donkey is a fun and simple verse to read, and its rhyme and the donkey's bray are entertaining sounds. As I had to keep the melody of the lines, I realized that my muscles quaked and my heart beat faster afterwards. I knew that my body and mind had enjoyed the excitement deriving from the process of reading, too. I have always loved rhymes. When I used to write poetry, I remember there is a period of time that finding rhymed words to put them together was a pleasure. However, rhymes seem to be considered childish and immature to "modern poets". I remember in a poetry group that I accidental...

My young little daughter blasted at me in a rage and left scratches in my forearm.  I just let her scratch me as she needed.  I understood that as a child, when she could not control the way of her life as she wanted it to be, the nearest exist is anger. The same can be said about adults, too; especially me, since I am not that sophisticated about containing my own emotion either. People might say that I am not a good parent, and that she just needs more practice and knowledge to manage herself.  The scratches hurt in many ways. The scars look still ugly now. I wonder sometimes how I would have let others done such injury to me. Parents are the most convenient targets at which children can fire their outburst, and the targets are easy as they have to remain passive and receptive and as they are the Parents.  Parents are equally made of flesh and bones, tissue and blood, but their feelings are not as important as others. It is an extensive time of injustice that they ...

Around 4 pm yesterday afternoon, Y asked me if she could have snacks and watch TV. I gave her a negative answer, given that she had watched a movie with her dad in the early afternoon. Her TV allowance had been spent for the day. She was persistent, begging, nagging, complaining, and then blaming in the end. Our conversation went on and went astray as below.  -------------------------------------------------------- Y: Why can't I watch TV?  Mom: You've seen a movie with dad today, and the movie was about 2 hours. You can have snacks though.  Y: Mom is stupid!!! （ママはバカ！） M: I don't think so. I am probably the smartest in this household.  Y: Mom is stupid!　（ママは「ㄅㄨㄣˋ」（笨）蛋） M: Ok, let's see. Who can drive a car in our family?  Y: Mom. (Emphatically.) M: Who can cook in our family? Y: Mom, and sometimes dad.  M: Who can speak mandarin? Y: Mom and I and T.  M: Who takes you to ballet lessons?  Y: Mom.  M: Who takes you to piano lessons?  Y: Mo...

  Surtout N’entrez Pas Dans Le Sac In the regular events of the Reading to Kids group in the spring term 2025, one of the books that I read to children was a picture book in French, Surtout N’entrez Pas Dans Le Sac , or, Never Ever Should You Enter into the Bag , by a Togolese author, Gnimdewa Atakpama.   The story is about a lion and a goat, both of whom want to build their respective homes on the same piece of land. The two animals, one herbivorous and the other carnivorous, resolve the conflicts by some violent means in the end. A perspective lens of the illustration helps distance the dramatic moment of physical force. My audience, including the two classes of the 5th- and 6th-graders and their homeroom teachers, gasped at the resolution. Although the climax is meant to be witty, funny and surprising, each time when I read up to the moment of climax, I somehow felt that I was obliged to apologize for the development, so I made a comment, “sorry” (ごめんね!).   Why did I h...

  Today is the first reading-for-kids event this academic year. I did not go to T's class but ventured into a different group.  I chose to read "Monkey Puzzle" by Julia Donaldson. The story has been a superb delight to me since I first read it. The twist in the story is a smart scientific turn.  I even gave it as a Christmas present to T's cousin, but I wonder if she and her dad appreciated the humor in the story. Just like today, every audience seemed to have followed along to know the fact that the kind butterfly continues to make mistakes, but I couldn't be sure whether the audience understood the reason behind the butterfly's mistakes.

  I had kept this mattress cover for about fifteen or sixteen years. It was acquired in a traditional market near my maiden home, when I returned to Taiwan for the first time after my partner and I purchased our house in the current place.  My mother and I went grocery shopping in the traditional market as we would do usually, if I was in Taichung. Traditional markets are wondrous places where one can get everything for his/her everyday life. It was a place where my mother would shower her love on me by answering whatever needs I had; it was also the only place where I could express my affection to her by accompanying her in the lonely journey that she made everyday.  After my partner and I were able to settle down in a house, it was the first time for us to have a double bed. My mother and I went into the market and searched for some bedding fabric to furnish the marriage bed. My mother loves exuberant colors, and we agreed to get this set of a mattress cover, a pair of ...

  24/Jan/2025 Zodiac Animals of Lunar Years , by Lai Ma I am not very sure if this was a good choice this time. Listening to an well-known oriental folklore in a new language can raise the level of comprehension of young audience. However, I think I was somehow lost in the middle of the reading event this time, forgetting what I wanted to do through the monthly reading events.  When I newly joined the group, I set the goal for myself that I would read to children in an unknown language, even if they do not understand, it is ok to just enjoy the sounds. However, when I read Lai Ma's Zodiac Animals , I was burdened with a cultural mission (the Lunar New Year was near) and constrained by the anxiety over the audience's comprehension. I added my awkward Japanese translation here and there, and I also gave a small quiz about different zodiac animals in different Asian cultures. All of these efforts went fine, but I felt quite lost and disappointed by myself somehow.  Reading i...

 6/Nov/2024 I Want My Hat Back, by Jon Klassen

  July/2024

May/2024 I joined a read-for-kids group in T’s elementary school last month. It is a group of parents volunteering to read to school children in the morning once or twice a month. Last Wednesday, I read Ten Eggs, a picture book in Taiwanese, for my debut. The choice was not casual; on both language and identity front, it was a thoughtful pick and a political one. I also wished to make the occasion a window for children to hear a world of many languages with a hope that they will develop a friendly awareness of a world of different people, especially people of minor languages. Reading in a language that is entirely alien to a class of 9-year-olds was a challenge, so I told them to just listen to the sounds. The children were more receptive and welcoming than I had imagined, and their ears were not yet fossilized by the consciousness of meanings. They even started to imitate the sounds I made toward the end of the session. Meandering through the languages in my linguistic repertoire, I h...

  T began to practice calligraphy in elementary school this year, 2024. He is a third-grader now. 2024 is the year he had the homework of "the first writing" (書初め) for the new year's day.  He was more excited about choosing a case for calligraphy kit than the writing itself. The lack of patience in whatever that requires time naturally renders calligraphy a torture to him, I feel. He did not know how much I had looked forward to the day that we would sit side by side, write calligraphy together and chat like two normal human beings.  For several years in elementary school, I commuted to a calligraphy school in a home classroom near my maiden home.  I can still recall the smell of ink, the green space outside the house, and the sensory experiences of writing in a square space hearing the sound of rain drops. I remember the classroom was always quiet. It is never like the noisy chats and complaints that T made next to me. In those years when I was practicing calligraph...

  11/07/2024 A belated post but a necessary memo for myself. My second reading for the Read-for-kids event is an English poem by Thomas Nashe, Spring, the Sweet Spring. An unseasonal choice of a season-specific poem in a rainy time (July 2024). Given that the young audience is not entirely familiar with this foreign language, my approach is to make pleasant melody of sounds to appeal to their audio memory. This poem serves the function to me. I first came across this poem when I was seventeen when an English tutor "sang" the refrain to me. Since then the melody of birds' sounds in Spring has stuck in my mind even though it took me another 10 years to recall and identify the poet again. It has been one of my favorite melody of words. In preparation for the reading to allow the audience to visualize the sounds, I tried to identify the kinds of birds participating in the line "cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo!". They are cuckoo, nightingale, lapwing, and owl. B...

I purchased eyeball marshmallows for Halloween 2022. Marshmallows are not common sweet given to children at home; therefore, it’s quite an effort to consume them.  The second day after Halloween, T had a marshmallow toast for breakfast then

  The Year of Magical Thinking , by Joan Didion I read Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking because I was looking for something to read to give to a friend who just lost her husband.  He passed away in an accident, and I do not know what to do to console my friend seeing her losing weight and facing everyone in the farewell event.  The book consists only of Didion's monologue, which records how she thinks and suffers after having lost her husband to a sudden heart arrest. It was until the end that we knew that she also lost her daughter eighteen months afterwards. What she reveals in the book is heart-breaking.  Some readers complained that she is narcissistic because there is no one else in the narrative but herself, her thoughts, her anxiety, and her calmness. I would think, however, that of course she has to be narcissistic. The dead have left, the living are alone to figure out what has happened. Of course, one has to focus on him-/her-self, and no surrogate can...

Lunchboxes continued in the summer vacation.

 A new lunch box today for T. A pie of coconut milk curry plus veggies.

El Deafo , by Cece Bell A friend mentioned this graphic novel to me, when I told her that my daughter has microtia in one of the ears.  The heroine in El Deafo loses her hearing at the age of four after having been infected with meningitis. The ups and downs in her social life from kindergarten to elementary school in the book show what a world with little sound is like, and what anyone with hearing need is special and different at the same time just like all other people. I like the point she makes that when people with normal hearing ability try to "help" those with hearing need and to be over-cautious of the difference between them, they usually fail to see how they are all the same and how people with need "wish" to be treated. This is an important reminder to me, who tend to be very imposing in many cases in good or bad ways.  My friend also bought my daughter another picture book, Rebekah's Superpower . The author wrote this book for her daughter, who has ...

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