whit meets world

This morning, I woke up with a feeling best described by the first few lines of this song. I couldn't stay in bed~ too many beautiful things await me today. I don't always feel this way. But it's a feeling to strive for, each day of our lives, as we open our eyes to begin each beautiful new day. Just think of all you can do with a gift called today.

The Taiwanese are definitely influenced by American pop culture, but they're probably more interested in other Asian pop culture than they are in American pop culture (probably with the exception of movies). Taiwan adopts a lot of Japanese fashion trends. Among my age group (20's), Japanese music/shows are more popular. Taiwanese teens right now are probably equally interested in both Japanese and Korean pop culture. (The popularity of Korean TV shows, music, etc. has really surged here within the last five years.) There are Japanese and Korean shows on television all the time.

This fascination with pop culture influences kids to learn other Asian languages.

This Korean song ("Sorry, Sorry") was all the rage last summer, and every kid here knows the dance. Even little five year-olds at our English school know the moves.

This adorable child is in my 2nd grade class. Today, we were going over our spelling words for the week, and one of the words is curly. So I asked them what curly means, and Wesley's hand shot up in the air. "It's when it's like this!" he said as he used his finger to show me. "When the hair is crazy, like a tornado!" :) Oh how he melts my heart...

My sister writes a blog each week for the Mormon Times, and I thought you might be interested in reading this one. It is particularly touching and really makes you think about how you want to live each day.

The Taiwanese aren't big on muscles. Girls aren't supposed to have muscles, especially leg muscles, and more specifically, calf muscles. When Taiwanese girls want to lose weight, they go on a diet and try to eat the fewest calories possible. They will exercise a little to lose weight, but they try not to do exercise that will give them muscles, because in their culture, that definition is not necessarily admired. To an American eye that is so used to seeing muscles, and has been taught to perceive muscle as beautiful, it’s strange to see these girls' legs with such little definition. (Click here to see what I mean.)

For guys, it's a good thing to have some muscle. However, it's not important to have really big muscles, just to have a little definition. In general, Taiwanese women are not attracted to big, bulky men.

Thankfully, the teachers from last semester did our lesson plans for us for our first week of teaching. It can be overwhelming to get to Taiwan, get accustomed/trained to teach, do all your lesson plans before the first day of school, and keep your sanity. So today, I was following the plans for my 2nd graders, and my students had to write five sentences about their teacher.

I asked my kids, "What color are my eyes?" I was standing in front of one of my students, Wesley (who I also taught two years ago), and he got this shocked, wide-eyed look and shouted, "Green! Miss Whitney, you're a monster!!" I guess the only time they see green eyes is on monsters. :)

Another student wrote, "Miss Whitney has yellow hair." :) Another wrote, "Miss Whitney has brown hair." Closer!

We were talking about my eyes, and Wesley was like, "Miss Whitney, Taiwan eyes have two colors and America eyes have three!" I asked him what he meant. "Taiwan eyes have white and black. America eyes have three - white, green, and black!"

(He was basically trying to say that on Taiwanese people, there's no noticeable difference in color between the pupil and the iris, while with many Americans, there is.)

It's interesting to live in a place where everyone has such similar features. Everyone has the same color eyes (they say they're black), everyone has prettymuch the same color hair, etc. So if you're "not like the others," you really stick out. And people stare. When I came to Taiwan for the first time, I remember thinking, "This must be kinda like how it feels to be famous." Some kids will just stand there and stare at you. They've never seen the likes of you before, and they're not quite sure what to think.

(One of the sentences Wesley wrote about me was, "Miss Whitney was my last mester mester mester teacher." He was trying to say that I was his teacher three semesters ago. Adorable. As you can see, although they can say a lot, they don't always know how to say it. We have our work cut out for us in helping them improve their English. A couple of the kids' sentences were, "I think Miss Whitney is very nice" and "Miss Whitney is very pretty." Melt my heart. I love these kids. I love my life here in Taiwan. Love it, love it, love it. So glad to be back!)

In Chinese, when you sneeze, they don't say "bless you." They say, "Put on your coat!" :)

Last night, I was at my friend Fenny's house, and her adorable little cousins ran in giggling and jumped on her bed. We were just playing around, tickling them, having a grand old time. Fenny told me that some older Taiwanese people wouldn't approve- they believe that if kids laugh too much, they'll have nightmares. :)

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation -- think of Psyche!
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough --
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!!!

-G. Nolst Trenite
actual title: The Chaos of English Pronunciation