For those of you I have already shared this with, better luck next post! :) I realize I'm living in France right now, but since I slacked off in the blogging department while I was living in Taiwan, there are some things I just have to share. Better late than never, right?
五月天 (Wǔ Yuè Tiān), otherwise known as Mayday, is a hugely popular Taiwanese rock band. And do they know how to rock! They're considered one of the best bands in the Chinese music industry. In fact, Mayday is to Taiwan as the Beatles are to America. Why, do you ask? #1: Because of their popularity. To give you an idea of how popular they are, back in 2004, they broke the record for most concert-goers at a concert- nearly 400,000! And who held the record previous to that? Only Michael Jackson. #2: They are among the pioneers of rock music in Taiwan. However, Mayday is much more recent than the Beatles: late 90's-present. I went to their concert, and was super impressed. They are fabulous entertainers- they give their ALL to their audience. They give you your money's worth and more! They performed for FOUR hours at our concert. FOUR HOURS! That's unheard of! We were exhausted after three, and we were just watching them perform!
I'll let you check them out for yourselves. This is probably my favorite song of theirs. And you HAVE to read the lyrics...I think they're ingenious. They're DEEP- Ashin, the lead singer, had to really think to put this together. And they contain a good moral, if you really think about the message of the song.
Presenting.....MAYDAY! (The song is way cooler if you read the lyrics while you watch the video, I promise!)
PS. The material that's floating around represents this girl's perfume. If you check out the lyrics, you'll understand what her perfume represents. :) Cool concept, huh?
If you want to check out another of Mayday's songs, this is a fun one: video, lyrics
Monday, February 23, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
17-24 of "24 Things You May- or May Not- Have Known About Me"
17. I am a recovering perfectionist. When I was a child, everything had to be perfect. I remember making puff-paint shirts with my best friend Becca, and messing up one of the letters on my shirt. I was devastated and ran upstairs to my room, bawling. I think it was in high school that I began to realize that doing everything perfectly just wasn’t reasonable. But to a certain degree, that perfectionist mentality is still a part of me and always will be…
18. I love almost all fruit. My favorite fruit in the U.S. is raspberries. My grandma makes the most amazing raspberry freezer jam-it's to die for. My favorite fr
uit in Taiwan is mangoes. Ohhh la la la la la…you have never put such a piece of heaven in your mouth. When I go back to Taiwan, I will do everything in my power to go back during mango season.
19. I am excited to learn more about my ancestors. A lot of family history has been done on my mom’s side, but not much has been done on my dad’s. He is Swede-Finn (Finns who moved to Sweden- in my family’s case, it was because of a war with Russia) and Irish (hence my last name!). The ultimate goal there would be to learn about those who have lived in America, and then to travel to Finland, Sweden, and Ireland and go back even further! On my mom’s side, I am most English and Dutch, with a tiny bit of Danish and Scottish in there…and one French woman that I know of! But honestly, I’ve started to look at my mom’s family…you are a result of so many people, it’s not even funny. On my mom’s side, I’m related to Captain Cook- who is credited with discovering the Sandwich Islands, aka Hawaii. I’m also related to Queen Victoria of Holland. There is royal blood running through these veins! =))
20. One of my favorite things is to talk to people. I love meeting new people and finding out who they are. I love talking to people on planes. If I’m sitting next to you on a plane, I will have a conversation with you, unless I'm so tired I'm going to pass out, we don't speak a common language, or I can tell you are not in the mood for conversation.
21. When I was younger, I was be pretty shy. And you can probably still see that element in my personality. I used to be more of an introvert. When I took the MBTI (a test that evaluates your personality and tells you what jobs you would be good at/enjoy) when I was 19, I was close to the middle but more on the introvert side of the line. I took this test again a little over a year ago, and I was close to the middle on the extrovert side of the line. It has to do with discovering how much I love people. =) I especially love meeting people from different countries, because oftentimes, they have had very different experiences from you and see the world from different eyes. And it’s fascinating to learn about how other people see the world. It expands your vision.
22. I am a not a picky eater. Although I was a vegetarian for 14 years. You see, when I was seven, I asked my parents what meat was (I didn’t know!), and they told me. I thought that was pretty disgusting, and I would gag every time I would eat meat. It was a psychological thing. I was tired of gagging, and my parents weren’t necessarily fans of it, either. So I decided to become a vegetarian. I didn’t eat meat again until I was 21, in Italy. I had always wanted to start eating meat again, but I was scared that the same thing would happen again. But to my surprise, it was fine. And I’m glad I did it.
23. My eyes are blue-green: blue on the outside and green around my pupils. I was born with fairly deep blue eyes, but I think they began to change when I was a teenager.
24. One of the coolest experiences of my whole life was hiking Jade Mountain, the tallest mountain in Taiwan. You can check it out here.
18. I love almost all fruit. My favorite fruit in the U.S. is raspberries. My grandma makes the most amazing raspberry freezer jam-it's to die for. My favorite fr
uit in Taiwan is mangoes. Ohhh la la la la la…you have never put such a piece of heaven in your mouth. When I go back to Taiwan, I will do everything in my power to go back during mango season.19. I am excited to learn more about my ancestors. A lot of family history has been done on my mom’s side, but not much has been done on my dad’s. He is Swede-Finn (Finns who moved to Sweden- in my family’s case, it was because of a war with Russia) and Irish (hence my last name!). The ultimate goal there would be to learn about those who have lived in America, and then to travel to Finland, Sweden, and Ireland and go back even further! On my mom’s side, I am most English and Dutch, with a tiny bit of Danish and Scottish in there…and one French woman that I know of! But honestly, I’ve started to look at my mom’s family…you are a result of so many people, it’s not even funny. On my mom’s side, I’m related to Captain Cook- who is credited with discovering the Sandwich Islands, aka Hawaii. I’m also related to Queen Victoria of Holland. There is royal blood running through these veins! =))
20. One of my favorite things is to talk to people. I love meeting new people and finding out who they are. I love talking to people on planes. If I’m sitting next to you on a plane, I will have a conversation with you, unless I'm so tired I'm going to pass out, we don't speak a common language, or I can tell you are not in the mood for conversation.
21. When I was younger, I was be pretty shy. And you can probably still see that element in my personality. I used to be more of an introvert. When I took the MBTI (a test that evaluates your personality and tells you what jobs you would be good at/enjoy) when I was 19, I was close to the middle but more on the introvert side of the line. I took this test again a little over a year ago, and I was close to the middle on the extrovert side of the line. It has to do with discovering how much I love people. =) I especially love meeting people from different countries, because oftentimes, they have had very different experiences from you and see the world from different eyes. And it’s fascinating to learn about how other people see the world. It expands your vision.
22. I am a not a picky eater. Although I was a vegetarian for 14 years. You see, when I was seven, I asked my parents what meat was (I didn’t know!), and they told me. I thought that was pretty disgusting, and I would gag every time I would eat meat. It was a psychological thing. I was tired of gagging, and my parents weren’t necessarily fans of it, either. So I decided to become a vegetarian. I didn’t eat meat again until I was 21, in Italy. I had always wanted to start eating meat again, but I was scared that the same thing would happen again. But to my surprise, it was fine. And I’m glad I did it.
23. My eyes are blue-green: blue on the outside and green around my pupils. I was born with fairly deep blue eyes, but I think they began to change when I was a teenager.
24. One of the coolest experiences of my whole life was hiking Jade Mountain, the tallest mountain in Taiwan. You can check it out here.
Monday, February 16, 2009
VOTE 4 NICOLE!
I'm a huge Nicole Sheahan fan...and let's be honest...who isn't?You may have already heard about this contest. There are 3 rounds to it. My sister is one of only 12 artists who made it to round 2! Now we have to help her be one of the 6 artists who make it to round 3 (the finals) so she can perform in a really cool concert and have the chance to win $1,000-$5,000 to put towards her next album! She deserves it!!!
Here's the info:
Round 2: February 16th-March 2nd
THE RULES:
~ It will be a blind tally (we won't know how many votes the artists have until the semi-finals are over).
~ You can only vote ONCE per account per IP address (i.e. per computer) PER DAY. Vote, vote, vote (every day if possible!) because the other contestants have lots of people voting for them too!
VOTING LITERALLY TAKES 30 SECONDS. Please help her win! And then you can be the beneficiary of more fantastic music. =)
TO VOTE:
1st time only: Go to: http://music.mormontimes.com/signup.php?nocache=1 & create an account.
1. Go to: http://music.mormontimes.com/contest.php?id=1361&nocache=1
2. Sign in with your e-mail address and password.
3. Click on "Vote for this song."
To check out more of Nicole's music:
1. http://www.myspace.com/nicolesheahan (All 5 of these songs are among my favorites, but #5 is perhaps my most favorite- check it out!)
2. http://nicolesheahan.com/ (You can buy her CD at the store. She's also on iTunes! Cool, no?)
Your support is much appreciated. If you get other people to vote for Nicole, let me know, and I'll make sure you get a reward for helping out! (For example, you could do a blog post just like this. ;) )
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Bonne Saint-Valentin!
Valentine's Day 2009.
Love.
Friends.
Breakin it down.
Moves you've never seen.
Laughing.
Being whisked around the dance floor.
Floating on clouds.
Just dance. =)
Love.
Friends.
Breakin it down.
Moves you've never seen.
Laughing.
Being whisked around the dance floor.
Floating on clouds.
Just dance. =)
Saturday, February 7, 2009
9-16 of "24 Things You May- or May Not- Have Known About Me"
9. I play the piano a LITTLE. It's a talent I'm currently working to develop. I get such satisfaction from being able to play what I can play, and look forward to being able to play more complicated pieces in the future.
10. I LOVE to dance. Love, love, love it. Why? Dance has a strong connection to the soul. It's a physical activity, but it's so closely intertwined with your soul and your deepest feelings. I love ballet, ballroom (the cha cha is lots of fun, swing, too- I want to learn more!), and jazz...I've done some of everything, but more ballet than anything else. I also love to get down with my friends. In high school, my friends and I would just turn on the music and dance all the time. My sister is my favorite person to dance with- we know a lot of the same moves (especially to *NSYNC songs =)).
11. I enjoy skiing. I enjoy running a lot, too...but my knees started hurting me, so I don't think I can run anymore. Sadness! =( I have beautiful memories of running in gorgeous Taiwan with my friend Tammy. It's because of her that I learned to love to run! And I used to hate running with a passion! It goes to show that just because you don't enjoy something, it doesn't mean you can't learn to love it!
12. If I could participate in any Olympic event, it would have to be figure skating. It's a sport AND an art.
13. One of my favorite things to do is teach in church. I love preparing for lessons because I gain so much in the process. I love this quote by Dieter F. Uchtdorf- it describes perfectly why I love to teach: "The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul...we each have an inherent wish to create something that did not exist before."
14. Building on that quote, one of the most satisfying experiences at BYU was writing a paper on "Au Bonheur des dames", a French novel by Emile Zola. In English, it's called "The Ladies' Paradise." It takes place in Paris. Did you know that the concept of the department store originated in Paris? "Au Bonheur des dames" is a fictional story, but it's based on that time period. It is the story of Denise Baudu, who works in one of these original department stores. The first time I read the book, I read it in English, at the same time I was discovering the beauty of shopping in Paris (while on Study Abroad). It was fascinating to think about the development of shopping as we know it today, and all the tactics that they use to lure us in... The second time I read this book was back at BYU in a French literature class. I chose to write a research paper demonstrating that "Au Bonheur des dames" is a social commentary on creating order and eliminating disorder in modern society. It was a fascinating process to research, analyze, and then organize my thoughts. My paper was 14 pages ALL in French and I just felt so accomplished when I handed it in. My teacher (who I admired a lot) had a lot of positive feedback for me, which made me feel all warm and fuzzy. Again, it was that process of creation which was so very satisfying.
15. I LOVE snow and I love central NY- the two go together. I grew up in a town called Baldwinsville, which happens to be part of the metropolitan area that receives the most snow in all of the United States! I'm not surprised. I loved growing up there. Where we lived, there was just such a great community atmosphere. I loved my school and my friends. It was amazing to grow up an hour away from Palmyra. NY is just gorgeous...it's so green and in the fall, the leaves are to die for! Plus, there are just so many cool historical places to go see in the East.
16. When I lived in Taiwan (January-June 2008), a scooter was my main form of transportation. =) My friend Tammy and I bought one together (they're not all that expensive- and the gas is cheap, too!), and then we sold it back before we left. We learned to drive Taiwanese-style. For example, when you make a left turn, you just have to hurry and go for it before the oncoming traffic makes it into the intersection. =) It's quite the adventure! How I miss those scooter-riding days. But one thing I don't miss all that much is helmet hair. =)
Friday, February 6, 2009
Road Trip to Switzerland!
I spent Tuesday in beautiful Switzerland
with three fabulous new English friends
and their delightful accents.
I rode in the passenger's seat of their English car...
on the left.
A first for me. =)
Isn't this church charming?
These pictures don't do the view justice.
But when I see sights like these, I want to live in Europe forever...
Monday, February 2, 2009
Happy Crèpe Day!
February 2nd is a fabulous French holiday called "Chandeleur." Why do they celebrate it? My roommate doesn't really know. But the important thing is that they eat crèpes. And tonight was a very important milestone in my life: I flipped my first crèpe ever. I was scared I'd drop it. Attempt #1 was a success in that the crèpe did not land on the floor~ but it folded in half, so not a complete success. Attempt #2 was perfection. Like a pro, prettymuch. Maybe I should just live in France for the rest of my life and get into the crèpe-making industry. Not a shabby idea! =)
PS. My roommate, Laurène, and I were discussing February 2nd holidays the other day. In France, they eat crèpes. In America, we have a groundhog that peeks out of his hole. I think we could do better.
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