by personal | Jun 22, 2011 | Opinion
I made a post yesterday talking about how I didn’t get the interview that I suspected I would get. I just came back from a long, long road (Metaphorically) and it seemed that there were a few bumps and a few nervous tendencies but one thing that was apparent was the amount of doubt that I had about myself.
I feel this “interview” went okay. I don’t think it was a serious interview as it was done in front of the bosses wife who wants me to have a job at this place. If she doesn’t like the person who was interviewing me, then there could possibly be consequences for him. So I feel under different circumstances, I doubt I would have been able to attain a job at this place.
I tried hinting that I liked typing, so if they needed any manuals typed for their products or whatever I could do that. But the boss literally said “they will find something for you to do here”. So I really don’t have a clue what type of job this is. All I know is that the job title could be “assistant engineer”. I will admit that I did not come across as nervous. I felt I was quite confident. I may have not talked much, but I said things in a very “tidy” way. Or I said things in a smart manner if that makes sense.
The atmosphere looked great I guess at this office place. It was quite an office though. So this is some serious business, not just some small family business. But it looked good. The boss said the only problem was transportation to and from this office. He has never used a bus, since he is some rich guy who can afford a brand new Mercedez, but he was nice and said that someone would be able to take me home after work.
Hopefully this turns at good. But like most things in my life that usually is never the case.
I had a quite different day today, it was unusual for me. I took the bosses son out for just a kick-around of football (Or soccer) and that was quite good for me and my exercising regime. I also did around 1 hour and 30 minutes of constant rowing around this park. That was pretty decent exercise right there. I had fun with the son, I made sure he got wet along with myself when the water fountain erupted. You could tell he had fun which was good. But I’m not sure, if I don’t like this job, I won’t do it, simple as that. Hopefully the pay is decent. I think I would move closer to my University and perhaps buy a bike if at-all possible for me.
But I won’t be too hopeful about this job, if I am too optimistic and too pretentious about this job then it will suck when it turns out that it isn’t what I expected or feel like doing.
Hopefully this will be a new chapter in my life, who knows?
by personal | Jun 20, 2011 | Opinion
This is probably a post I regret or come back on in a few years and probably look at and ridicule myself for this.
But would it not be so much easier to just to have not been alive or just to be dead. I mean, I don't know, I am not enjoying life too much right now. I should really be enjoying it. Who else gets the chance to go to other countries, speak to and make friends with foreign people, learn a new language in University or experience things which you would never have if you stayed in your original country. (For me the UK)
The future
Is life really worth living? I just wish I could find out by going into the future. If my life was pretty bad, I think I would have to end it before I could go through anymore suffering. If you knew what your life was like in the future you could ask whether it is still worth living for, if the future is bad then you know just know it isn't. – Perhaps you can change it, but if you can't what's the point? I mean not to be totally negative, but if my life was really nice and I had a beautiful family, then for me, it would be worth living for. Or if I found out I had a kid or kids then for me it would be worth living. As I would want to do my absolute best for them and make sure they did not grow up the same way as I did. I would have got them into education early and made sure they were learning from the start and I would have treated them like no other. But if that wasn't the case, and I was just purely a bum on the streets and that is the way I died, I don't think I would go on living.
Since the future is uncertain and the many variables that we change when we make decisions, it kind of is worth living for just to see "what happens next?". I mean I have been depressed and at a lot of times suicidal since I was 14, but throughout the years I have come the realization that finding out through life what will happen in the future is worth living for. You might find someone happy, someone who you connect with or something that just purely makes your life happy and worth living for. I think suicide is more importantly a dis-service to your potential future-self which of course is yourself. So I don't think that route should be explored, even if your situation is the worst. You just need to have that certain motivation. I have felt that motivation before when I was excited to learn Chinese. Even though I have lost that and I probably will gain it back once I gain confidence in my learning abilities, I have no doubt that life in the future is a possibility of which it could turn out quite well. In this world you purely just have to make something of yourself. "Don't get left behind…" my teacher told me in class today and she is exactly right.
Maybe life sucks right now and maybe you just don't feel right. I think everyone should give themselves a real chance at their potential and that means trying to the highest of your ability even if you are depressed, upset or suicidal. Just do what you think feels right which will change yourself. Do something rash and out of the ordinary. Scream in the park and let your voice be heard. In fact I might just go do that tomorrow when I go for a run. People have all this energy and power stored inside them, and that to me is potential and people can use that for the betterment of themselves. So never give up. It has been 6 years since I first was suicidal. I have not had the best experience in life that I could have had, pretty much life has sucked up to now. But I'm still going on. I may falter at times, but I'm still going and moving.
by personal | Jun 20, 2011 | Opinion
So I am studying Chinese right now in Taiwan. (Mandarin) It is as if everyone is better than me. In fact they are better than me. I won’t kid myself. I thought I would be able to learn Chinese (Mandarin) really fast or at least pick it up easily. I can only really remember half of BoPoMoFo. I was kind of depressed in class today and wasn’t so excited in learning the language As at first I was quite motivated and excited about learning the language. Now it is just one of those ‘meh’ things which I don’t really have any motivation for anymore. I mean at least if someone else sucked badly like me, I wouldn’t be alone, but it seems everyone is decent for a beginner learning Chinese while I still suck.
I understand that people will say that no one is better than one other person, but in this case it is proven fact. It is as if I can’t remember or I don’t have to brain to learn this language. Basically what I am saying is that I am dense when it comes to learning this. Probably most other things as well. The funny thing is when doing computer science I excelled in front of everyone else. Here I am the last guy to complete tasks, the last guy to understand, the only guy who doesn’t understand, the nervous guy, the freak from my own perception or the dumb ass (Idiot).
Recently I posted a bit of text on Facebook saying “One day you will be able to download Chinese into your brain..”. I am afraid I probably won’t ever see that, but perhaps one day it will happen. It is just so frustrating how others can pick up what is said and remember them without any detriment to the pronunciation of the symbol.
I just wish I was smart enough just to learn something in my life that would be useful for my future. Maybe I will crack learning Chinese one day, but why am I the one that is so behind in the class. The teacher even said to me that I’m not stupid, as she saw that I was upset or in a bad way, but that is what you expect others to say when you are actually dumb. So that really didn’t help.
If there is one thing I’d ask to a greater power, it would be to give me money. If that wasn’t an option, then a brain would be pretty nice. Or a brain that could at least remember stuff as opposed to losing information as soon as it is said to me. I don’t know. I thought I was out of this depression, but from my stand point, bad things keep happening and I try… but it never works out.
by personal | Jun 15, 2011 | Opinion
If you have been reading my blog well, I am currently learning Chinese and boy is it hard.
It seems I am the least articulate person learning Chinese in the class when in comparison to everyone else. I try to revise and study. I have got used to some of the words, but the characters can become very confusing.
Currently I have learned ba-pa-ma-pha… but I'm not very good at memorizing these symbols or characters. The one thing I have learned is counting. I can say my whole mobile phone number in Mandarin. However because there are 4 different tones in Mandarin, one slip up of the tone can either mean you are talking gibberish (i.e. it doesn't make sense) or it means something else. I'm pretty sure in my head on the tones, but it memorizing the symbols that gets me. I am also depressed at the fact that it seems everyone can remember the symbols, while I can't. I usually get laughed at, at the way I say the words or when I get uneasy and don't know what to say at-all.
Don't get me wrong, learning the language is fun, but when it feels like you are lower than everyone else, then it makes you feel bad, especially when you come in 5 days a week. It is basically your life for a year like this if it continues this way.
Today I just bought 2 books, which are pretty decent in explaining things. I bought an illustrated Chinese dictionary, which comes with a CD and it obviously has English and pying (sp?) and the ba-pa-ma-pha 'techniques' as well.
I am hoping to do a lot of revision today with these books and hopefully I will learn something from it. 🙂
by personal | Jun 7, 2011 | Opinion
Since I’m living in Taiwan, I’ve started learning Chinese. Officially I’m starting tomorrow, which is when I had my first class. I met the people in the class and we were kind of separated by country or continent.
I have to say though, that there were many American’s there, I would probably guess and say around 20 American’s. There were people from all over the world however. From the United Kingdom of which I only saw another guy, who was on the American table because he had dual-nationality and was listed as American, even though he sounded more British than American. You had people from Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Vietnam, Indonesia, Brazil and probably one more other country I have likely forgotten. (Maybe the Netherlands)
It seemed okay to be honest. A lot of them looked older than myself, I’m only 19 and the rest probably were older than 20 and maybe a few my age. I made an attempt to try and talk to others but it was very pretentious and odd which seemed as if we were all nervous. (In our own rights since we had never seen each other before)
To get back home, was a mess up. I nearly got on a bus at the wrong stop (Going the other direction). I was with this Brazilian guy and in the end we split a taxi to get home.
Overview
I’m not sure I got much out of it in terms of friends. I know you can’t just make friends in one day that are your real buddies the next day. It takes time. I need to realize this. Time.
I’m nervous about tomorrow. I’m not sure how things are going to turn out, but the one thing I don’t want to do is humiliate myself. That is one thing I don’t want to do. I have a feeling I will. Luckily the other guys I’m with don’t know a word or lets just say they aren’t that good at Chinese in fact they are probably at the same level. Which is a good way to start as equals and just progress from there. Luckily I have the luxury of a partial family in Taiwan that speaks Chinese (Mandarin). I’m also taking free piano lessons. I said this to the Brazilian guy (Renato) or the guy named Brazilian Dragon (For some reason or the other) and he said I’m too old to learn the piano and I should have learned at 5. I kind of agreed I should have learned when I was younger, but I have come to the conclusion that it is never too late to have a hobby or to focus on something.
I thought when after I broke my leg I would never get my fitness back. I didn’t after several years. Here I am in Taiwan and I am focusing and improving everyday when running at the track and going for the fitness level I was and I will eventually surpass that. Whatever the case I’m here today after the all the stuff I’ve been through. If I told all my story in truth, people would not believe, so I have told a partial story on this blog, which I don’t mind others seeing. I will make it in life and that is my goal. I may not have direction, but I now know that I have purpose.
by personal | May 31, 2011 | Opinion
I don't know but I feel a little homesick. I had friends in the UK whereas here I hardly have any. Though I didn't have that many friends in the UK, I have almost none in this country which are around the same age as me. I think I need people my age to talk to. When I went out with my cousin who took me to a barbecue (He is around my age, a year younger) I talked to his friends and him, it felt like home. Once I get into University, I'm hoping I can make friends and go out a lot more with other people and generally socialize a lot more.
It kind of hit home as my friends who I used to work with posted on Facebook saying they missed me along with the rest of the guys. I miss them too. I miss their charm, the fun we had, their character and just the way things were. It was like working with brothers and sisters, we all got a long and sometimes there would be disagreements, but it would be sorted. We would support each other if anything went down and it was generally great talking to those people. I miss that. I don't have that here. I don't really talk much to my family. If my sister was here with me it probably would be different. Though I hardly talked to her when in the UK, though it would be different as she would only have me to talk to. But she would probably feel extremely homesick considering she has a lot more friends than me.
But whatever the case I miss my real friends back at home or my work friends. We had really good times and they were really good people too. I just wish I could have at least hugged them before I left. Anyway's time to move on in life and make new friends. 😮