birthday wish lists

Here's an idea to make the world a better place: birthday wish lists!

Cyrus's family is genius - they just ask each other what they want, and then they get it! I've done this with Jenny a couple times, too, and it's so fantastic! I get something I actually want, and the person who gets it for me doesn't have to waste time and money trying to figure out what I might want. Another way to be more efficient!

You might argue that this takes away from showing someone you really know them or that it takes the thoughtfulness out of thoughtful gift-giving. But if you already know that your friend/family member/significant other does care about you, then why do they have to show it with gifts?

So here's my proposal: public wish lists for all! All year long! When you see something you might want but wouldn't buy it for yourself - those cashmere socks! That designer umbrella! - add it to the wish list! Then, when the time comes for someone to buy you a gift, all they have to do is look at your wish list and choose.

It's going to make everything better! I promise!

deleted!

I've started unfriending people on Facebook, but only because a) I have no idea who in the world they are, or b) they swear too much, and their status updates are usually an assault on my eyes.

I've also become a lot more discriminating when it comes to accepting friend requests on Yelp. I coldly press "ignore" if a) we have no reviews in the same region, b) you have 293409203 friends and 0 reviews or c) you seem kinda weird.

Do you guys have any other criteria for unfriending people?

music monday: she & him, "volume two"

I want to be Zooey Deschanel! She's strangely beautiful, she can act, she can write songs, she can sing, and she's just...interesting! She completely breaks the mold for what one reviewer called the "actor-turned-singer-turned-punchline" phenomenon.

Zooey Deschanel (she) and M. Ward (him) released their second album last week, and it's a step above their first album. Whatever the first album gave us, the second album gives us more. Imagine the kind of music you might hear playing in the background in a movie where Zooey is wearing a frilly dress on a sunny day, sitting in the passenger seat of a car with her feet out the window on a long road trip. That's the kind of music this is!

I especially like "Don't Look Back," "Thieves" and the ethereal lullabye "If You Can't Sleep."

I think these guys describe the album much better:

"The duo's impeccably assembled retro pop is unmistakably regional, with puckish hooks and reverb-heavy production that recall California dreamers like the Mamas and the Papas...It's the sunniest sad record you'll hear all year."
- Rolling Stone 

"[Ward] dresses her songs in deceptively simple SoCal folk rock, dusty cowboy-trail country music, and crisp Brill Building pop."
- Pitchfork

Check them out!

MySpace
Buy the MP3 album for $7.99 on Amazon

american idol judges

The top five most annoying criticisms of American Idol judges this season:

1. It was kinda pitchy.
2. It was really pitchy.
3. That song didn't have a "wow" moment.
4. I didn't feel like you "owned" the song.
5. It wasn't believable.

I wonder how much they get paid to say the same vague things over and over again...

By the way, I voted for Crystal Bowersox and Siobhan Magnus on Tuesday. Who do you love?

efficient conversations

Why do we assume that when people ask us to repeat ourselves, we think that they only missed the last part of the sentence? That's why this kind of conversation happens all the time:

Friend: "I saw Avatar the other day and it was so amazing!"
Me: "Sorry, what'd you say?"
Friend: "It was amazing!"
Me: "What was amazing?"
Friend: "Avatar!"

He could've just repeated the entire sentence, and we would've saved an entire two lines of dialog. Here's another more annoying example:

Friend: "I was in New York last weekend and we went to this fabulous restaurant called Balthazar."
Me: "Sorry, what'd you say?"
Friend: "Balthazar!"
Me: "Huh? What's that?"
Friend: "It's a restaurant!"
Me: "Okay..." [awkward silence] "Why are you talking about it?"
Friend: "I went there last weekend!"
Me: "Oh, cool." [awkward silence] "How was it?"
Friend: "It was great!"

Me: not interested anymore.

See how much time and awkward silences could've been saved if she'd just repeated the entire sentence after I said "What?" And in this situation, I didn't even get to find out that she was in New York the past weekend!

Wouldn't this have been so much easier?

Friend: "I was in New York last weekend and we went to this fabulous restaurant called Balthazar."
Me: "Sorry, what'd you say?"
Friend: "I was in New York last weekend and we went to this fabulous restaurant called Balthazar!"

Me: "Awesome!"

So I'd like to propose that whenever anyone asks us to repeat ourselves, we repeat the entire sentence we just said, or at least a summary of it. You might think that it's a bother and would take more time than is necessary, but I disagree completely. Efficiency is a value that belongs in all arenas of life.

Does this annoy you as much as it annoys me?

the hiccup cure

I don't know why, and you're gonna think I'm crazy, but I promise that this has worked for me every time I got hiccups in the past six years except for maybe twice. And I get hiccups a lot! (Credit for this cure goes to Dave Yi from BU who I heard this from way back in college.)

All you have to do is close your eyes for up to a minute and envision a white horse. I like to think of a scene from the first season of Lost where Kate sees a horse (I think it might've actually been black) in the middle of the forest. I've also envisioned riding the horse (awesome), which also works.

Cyrus believes in the power of the white horse, but we started experimenting with envisioning different things. "What would happen if you thought about people without hiccups?" So I tried it-- didn't work. I also tried thinking about tomatoes. Also didn't work.

So the next time you have hiccups, close your eyes (as long as you're not walking or driving!) and envision the most beautiful white horse.

Let me help you...

 Source

category game: restaurant memories

Do you remember the names of all the restaurants you and your significant other have eaten at? Ever?

Cyrus and I were taking a long, long drive the other day and to amuse ourselves, we started playing the "category game," which I think my brother invented. Name a category (cities in Europe, fruits) and name everything in that list.

After some pretty boring categories, we decided to list all of the restaurants we've ever been to together! I didn't think it'd be so hard, but we were naming restaurants for a good 30-45 minutes, and even a day later, we're still running up to each other and saying, "Tasca!"

In honor of our game, I thought I'd tell you about some of my favorite restaurant experiences we've had together.

- Maneki: Seattle, WA. Izakaya-style Japanese restaurant we scoped out while we were in Seattle for a wedding. An oasis in a weekend full of traveling and grogginess.

- Ten Tables: Jamaica Plain, MA. Intimate, romantic, and tiny restaurant we went to for Valentine's Day 2009. One of my best meals ever.

- Hungry Mother: Cambridge, MA. Every meal we've had here has been amazing! Southern inspired upscale food in a comfortable setting with very reasonable prices! Amaaahzing cornbread!

- Ray's the Steaks: Arlington, VA. Back when Cyrus was more of a carnivore, this was the only meal that Cyrus smiled all the way through.

- Tapas24: Barcelona, Spain. An everyday tapas eatery, which was the only restaurant we visited that had fewer tourists than natives. (This was also the only restaurant where the server didn't immediately switch to English when they realized Cyrus wasn't comfortable speaking Spanish. It was a total surprise and embarrassment when she switched over to English near the end of our meal!)

What are some of your most memorable restaurant experiences with someone you care about?

music monday: melody gardot

I can't remember how I discovered Melody Gardot (acoustic/indie/blues), but I think I was drawn to her album cover when she was featured in the iTunes store. You see her wearing a black trench coat looking very smart but kinda sad, with huge, blonde Tami Taylor curls going all the way down to her belt and, of course, those black-rimmed glasses. I knew she'd have something interesting to say. So I sampled some of the tracks, read through some lyrics and glanced quickly at a Wikipedia bio, and saw that this girl is interesting!

She was born in 1985 and became the artist she is because of music therapy. She was hit by a car in 2003 and had to relearn how to walk and brush her teeth, and even communication became difficult. But through music therapy, not only did she get better, but in the midst of her rehabilitation, recorded some songs that eventually ended up on some of her albums!

Pretty amazing story. Pretty amazing album!

And check out this glowing review from Billboard:

The distinctive talent that Melody Gardot displays on her remarkable sophomore jazz/pop outing, "My One and Only Thrill," is a rarity. Her hushed, velvet-smooth vocals evoke a noir yearning and forlornness, her slow-burn delivery enraptures with a torch sentimentality, and her support team shines: her simpatico touring band, arranger Vince Mendoza's organic orchestration on some of the tunes and producer Larry Klein's knack for enticing heartfelt soul from a singer. But foremost is Gardot's songsmithery that ranges from bossa-tinged to low-lights balladry. Highlights include the lushly skipping opener "Baby I'm a Fool," the finger-snapping jazzy blues "Who Will Comfort Me," the gently swinging chanson "Les Etoiles" and the softly stormy "The Rain." Her only cover is a dangerous choice: "Over the Rainbow." But Gardot completely re-envisions it with a Latin tinge. —Dan Ouellette

So check her out already! :)

Amazon
iTunes
MySpace

no more buzz

For those of you who read my blog through Google Buzz, I'm going to stop linking my blog with Buzz, which means that they won't show up on Buzz anymore.

So if you're interested in following, come visit the blog itself. Thanks!

Also, I've changed the settings so that anyone can leave a comment. So if you have some feedback, feel free to leave a comment!

spring has sprung

I'm on vacation in Maryland! Here's what on my mind...

Weekend Forecast for Silver Spring, MD (20905)

Friday Mar 19  Sunny High 70°F Low 46°F Precip:   0% Wind: WNW at 6 mph UV Index: 5 Moderate Humidity: 43% Sunrise: 7:13 AM Sunset: 7:19 PM Mainly sunny. High around 70F. Winds WNW at 5 to 10 mph.

Saturday 20  Mostly Sunny High 73°F Low 50°F Precip:   10% Wind: SW at 8 mph UV Index: 5 Moderate Humidity: 44% Sunrise: 7:12 AM Sunset: 7:20 PM  close  details More sun than clouds. Highs in the low 70s and lows in the low 50s.

Sunday 21  Mostly Cloudy High 63°F Low 50°F Precip:   20% Wind: S at 11 mph UV Index: 4 Moderate Humidity: 64% Sunrise: 7:10 AM Sunset: 7:21 PM More clouds than sun. Highs in the low 60s and lows in the low 50s.

Have you seen anything more beautiful?

Our visit to Maryland has been so relaxing. Maryland weather, Maryland friends and Mom's cooking... SO GOOD!

testing, testing

The job search starts all over again (for me) as we prepare for our move to New York in the fall. Hurdle #1 has been accomplished: registering for the three (yes, three!) exams I need to take to get certified to teach ESL in New York public schools. After grad school, the main reason I was so happy was because I thought I'd never have to study again! But now, looking at these test prep guides, I'm really gonna have to hit the books again...

This is how I feel:

How have you adjusted to a life of not studying to a life of studying again?

the post-it, explained

Yesterday I posted a picture of a little reminder I have stuck to my laptop. Here's the story behind it...

Someone wrote a piece of advice in our wedding guest book: that in our marriage, I will be right 99% of the time. It turns out they were 100% wrong! Most of the conflicts that have come up in our marriage are because of the way I've held on to my singleness without knowing it.

I'm so used to trying to be as productive as possible, replying to invitations and emails the second I get them, committing to dinners and get-togethers without having to consult anyone. Even while we were dating and engaged, doing these things didn't cause any problems because Cyrus and I were long-distance.

But now that we're married, I keep forgetting to consult Cyrus (very different from asking for permission). I thought I'd learned my lesson when we had a chat about this after I spent money on some sweaters. Then I learned it again after I said yes to having dinner with some friends on our behalf. Then I learned it yet again after I assumed that we'd meet up with these friends while we had the chance.

So I said "enough!" I realized that this wasn't an easy thing to learn and that I constantly had to remind myself. That's when the Post-It happened.

The issue of consulting each other about decisions has come up in subtle ways. Some magic phrases that have helped me are:

- "What do you think about...?"
- "How do you feel about...?"
- "Feel free to..."
- "Let me know if..."

A lot of these phrases are really useful when I'm trying to offer help, too. Phew, offering help. I could write an essay about that! 

Anyway, I've been learning a lot from Cyrus about how to communicate better. Thank goodness one of us is good at it!

the post-it

This is the Post-It that is stuck to my laptop. I shaved off the bottom a little so that it wouldn't block too much of my screen and tempt me to take it down.

This Post-It has a long history and has been and will be a very important part of our marriage.

More about the Post-It to come.

music monday: favorite albums

New idea! I really want to write about some of the music I've been listening to, and artists that I think more people should know about, but unless I limit these kinds of posts to, say, once a week, it might get a little monotonous.

And what better day for these music posts than New Music Monday, when new music comes out!

I couldn't decide on just one artist to uncover this week, so I thought it might be fun to list some of my favorite albums. I had to narrow down my criteria for "favorite" because there are just so many! So these albums are albums that I think can be listened to from start to finish without wanting to skip a single track. I also decided not to include holiday albums just because...it's nowhere near Christmas. Unfortunately. Lastly, I decided not to include albums that seem kinda dated, which took Boyz II Men's "II" off the list. Yes, they're great and wonderful, but some of those songs ("Thank You") sound very early 90's.

So I was left with a very even 11 albums, in alphabetical order.

Dashboard Confessional, "A Mark, a Mission, a Brand, a Scar"
I know some people hate this guy's voice, but I fell in love with this album in college and screamed them on long trips in Hsiehdy's car! "As Lovers Go" and "Hands Down" are some of my favorites.

Death Cab for Cutie, "Plans"
About 15 seconds after Jenny played the first track of this album, "Marching Bands of Manhattan" to me in the car one day, I knew I was going to be a fan of DCFC. You don't see a lot of lyrics that are poetic and subtle as Ben Gibbard's anymore these days. I also love the tracks "What Sarah Said," "Summer Skin." Did I mention that these guys are crazy awesome live??

Jack Johnson, "Sing-a-Longs and Lullabies for the Film Curious George"
I was a little surprised at this, too, but this album is so much fun! "Upside Down," and "Broken" are some of my favorite tracks.


Jimmy Eat World, "Futures"
I'm sure you guys probably like other albums better, but this one is my favorite! "Kill" is my absolute favorite track from this album. So complex! Such yearning! "Polaris," "23" and "Futures" are also fantastic. These guys are also phenomenal live.

John Mayer, "Room for Squares"
I hate myself for liking John Mayer. A lot of names come to mind when I think of all the stupid things he's done and said, but I have to admit, his music, especially his debut album is awesome. My favorite tracks: "Back to You," "St. Patrick's Day" and "Why Georgia."

Keane, "Hopes and Fears"
This album is a little more obscure than the others, but I love it! Every track! I can't believe they can make such different-sounding songs with a keyboard, bass and vocal. Pretty amazing. I love "Somewhere Only We Know," "Everybody's Changing" and "Bedshaped."

Lauryn Hill, "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill"
Do I even need to describe this album? ... ""Ex-Factor," "To Zion," and "Sweetest Thing" wreck me.

Rachael Yamagata, "Happenstance"
What an artist! Rachael has such a unique style. I love her smoky voice and how she paints such vivid emotional pictures with her lyrics! Also fantastic live. "Letter Read," "1963," "Meet Me By the Water," "I Want You," and "Reason Why" are my favorites.


Sarah McLachlan, "Mirrorball"
You might see Sarah as the queen of soft rock, but this live album is absolute perfection. Even weirder songs like "Fear" sound amazing. I love "Vox" and "I Love You."

Switchfoot, "The Beautiful Letdown"
Maybe it's the fact that I saw these guys live so many times... but this album's anthems and songs of longing and yearning reach something deep inside, you know?? "Dare You to Move," "On Fire" and "More Than Fine" are my faves.


U2, "The Joshua Tree"
No description needed. Best album ever. "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" is my favorite song ever. Other greats on this album are, "With or Without You," "Where the Streets Have No Name."

mistakes in engrish, part 2

Either he's very honest, or he can't pronounce /m/ and /v/. :P

Question: What are the advantages of seeing movies at the movie theater instead of at home?

Answer: The theater is very wide...and...we can see the new boobie at once.

jhump for jhumpa!

What a treat! Ollie and I went to see our very favorite author Jhumpa Lahiri speak at Babson College last night.

Here's how it looked when I took off my glasses:

Actually, without glasses, it'd probably look even worse. Anyway!

She talked a lot about her writing process, being an author compared to being an "interpreter" for her characters, and lots of other good stuff.

I brought The Namesake and I had to buy a copy of her Pulitzer Prize-winning Interpreter of Maladies so that I could finally have all of my Jhumpa Lahiri books signed by the amazing woman herself!

It's too bad I left my already signed copy of Unaccustomed Earth at my parents' house. :( But these three books together will be yet another family heirloom! (I'm on a mission to create lasting heirlooms that our great-great-great-great-great grandchildren will treasure! I will be a legend! So far I have a music box, a pearl necklace and these Jhumpa books! Classic!)

More Jhumpa pics...

Here she is not smiling. I think her writing genius takes up too much of her mental capacity to be friendly to her biggest fans... Hmph. She was not very friendly. :P

My books!

you are no match for my bearpaws! roar!

Check out my new heavy duty winter boots!

 

Yay for spring sales on winter stuff! $29.99 for Bearpaw M405 (sounds like a Mercedes SUV!) boots on Amazon. Notice the "Lugged Sole with Rugged Tread" (TM?) for walking in the snow. No more falling! Also notice the smile. Hmm...also notice the lack of flexibility. (I'm holding my leg up with both hands.)

Fuzzy boots are THE BAST!

mischievous penguin

Look at the surprise I found waiting for me when I got home the other day!

 

Since Cyrus is in school and I work part-time from home, Cyrus is rarely ever home alone. So on the one rare night when my burgeoning social life here in Boston called me out of the apartment, I found our mischievous penguin wearing my slippers and welcoming me home!

But how did he type the message with his big flippers?

mrs. kwanzaa

Funny kid quotes! I borrowed these from some of my old Xanga entries. These all came from my teaching days at Jackson Road. ESOL kids are the funniest!

Me: Hi, Jocelin! (first grader)
J: Hi!
Me: Do you know who I am?
J: Yeah, you're the ESOL teacher.
Me: Yep! Do you know my name?
J: Uh-huh.
Me: What's my name?
J: You're Mrs. Kwanzaa!

Cheick-Oumar: How come all teachers have the same first name?
Me: What do you mean?
C-O: Why is everyone's first name "Ms."?
Me: Well, that's just a respectful way to talk to adults.
C-O: ??
Me: When you get older, people will call you Mr. Toure.
C-O: ?? But my name is Cheick-Oumar!

Cheick-Oumar: Ms. Kwon, do teachers sleep at school?
Me: No, we go home and sleep.

Me: Needs are things that are important for people to live. What are some needs that people have?
Kid 1: Food!
Kid 2: Water!
Kid 3: Jesus!

more cantaloupe, please!

My tastes have been changing lately, and I can no longer stand cooked salmon or quinoa. But for some reason, I have started to love cantaloupes! And I mean loooove! They are my new favorite fruit for sure.

After doing some research on cantaloupes, I found out the most astounding fact:

Cantaloupes are rich in vitamin A. One serving (1/4 of a medium melon) provides more than 400% of your daily vitamin A.

So kids, don't listen to your parents when they tell you to eat your carrots because they have vitamin A. Throw the carrots away and ask for a cantaloupe instead! :)


Some more fun/useful facts about cantaloupes I found through my extensive internet research:

- They originate from Cantalupo, Italy where historians say this species of melon was first grown.
- A cantaloupe is also called a muskmelon.
- You'll know a cantaloupe is ripe when the skin underneath the webbing is golden, not green, and when the cantaloupe smell comes out quite strongly from the stem end of the melon.
- Cantaloupes are rich in folic acid, antioxidants and potassium.
- Cantaloupes are considered a beneficial component in the diet of a pregnant woman. This fruit relieves water retention by helping the body to excrete the excess sodium.

Do you know of any other interesting food facts?

no chad kroeger, please

I've been following American Idol this season because of John Park and to see some good singing, but I don't think I can take it anymore. If Lee Dewyze, who sounds like an exact copy of Chad Kroeger and everyone who tries to sound exactly like Chad Kroeger (and why would they??), is praised as being "head and shoulders above everyone else in your side of the competition"and "definitely the best singer," I cannot, in good conscience, follow this show!

Seriously. Chad Kroeger, lead singer of the worst band ever, Nickelback, is like sandpaper - or a cheese grater! Ow! - on my ears. Same goes for the Hinder guy, whose song "Lips of an Angel," Lee Dewyze sang this past week, just screams and has the most one-dimensional voice I've ever heard on the radio!

I know I can attribute some of my dislike for recent pop songs to my getting older, but Chad Kroeger, this Hinder guy and Lee Dewyze are just abuse to my ears!

For you masochists, take a listen to Lee Dewyze's performance and get ready to drop your jaw when you hear the judge's praise.



It's too bad about John Park. His audition was great, but his performances were seriously lacking. At least his a cappella group at Northwestern will be glad to have him back! Maybe we'll have an Asian-American American Idol next year. :P

happy birthday, jenny

Today is Jenny's birthday! Happy birthday, Jenny!

For those of you who were at the wedding, let me tell you about the REAL first time we met! ;)

It was the first week of school at Boston College, and I slid my card to get into our dorm. I noticed I was walking behind an Asian girl going up the steps. When we reached our floor, she opened the door, turned around and asked me, "Are you Korean?" I said that I was. END of conversation!

And that's when I knew we would be besties! Hahaha! :)

Happy birthday! I love you and I miss you!

Do you remember the first time you met Jenny? :) Tell, tell!

all by himself

Do you wanna hear the saddest thing ever?

I'm reading a book about whales (This is not the saddest thing ever. It's coming.) which I heard about through NPR, and it's awesome! I've always been terrified/amazed by whales, and now I'm starting to fall in love with them.

Here's a sad story about one whale that The New York Times reported about back in 2004, an excerpt from the book I'm reading:

Twelve Years of Tracking 52-Hz Whale Calls From a Unique Source in the North Pacific was the result of research on a whale cruising from California to the Aleutian Islands off Alaska, 'calling out with a voice unlike any other whale's, and getting no response'.

'The call, possibly a mating signal, suggests that the animal lives in total, and undesired, isolation.' The sound had been tracked for more than a decade, and in that time its timbre deepened, suggesting that the whale was still maturing. One scientist thought it might be 'miswired, broadcasting on the wrong frequency but listening on the right one'; another considered that the caller could be the miscegenic result of a liaison between a blue whale and another species, 'and hence truly alone of its kind'.

Isn't that so sad?

Anyway, I totally love this book. It's called "The Whale: In Search of the Giants of the Sea" by Philip Hoare. He weaves literature, history, personal account and zoology together to talk about his most favoritest animal!

This post is best when read while playing Celine Dion's "All By Myself" in the background. It'll make you cry!

More about whales to come.

beliefs about intelligence

I got a lot of feedback about this morning's post about the effects of the kind of praise you give a child after he succeeds. In short, when a child is told, "You must be smart at this," he's likely to choose an easy task the next time, as opposed to a more challenging task, for fear that he might not look smart. On the other hand, attributing the child's effort to success ("You must have worked really hard") yields more desirable results.

Here's some more about where this research comes from.

In addition to that interesting study in New York Magazine, Carol Dweck's theories on intelligence are really important to know. Basically, there's an entity theory of intelligence, and an incremental theory.

1. Entity theory. If someone has an entity theory of intelligence, that means that he thinks intelligence is fixed--that what you get is what you get, and that it's an unchanging internal characteristic. Now just imagine how damaging that is to a kid who isn't doing so well in school. She might never try any harder because what's the point? She's not going to get any smarter, and intelligence is what makes you successful.

2. Incremental theory. On the other hand, if a student has an incremental theory believes that his intelligence is malleable and can be increased through effort. How empowering! One of my professional development classes really drilled this in our heads. We did an entire project where we worked with one student and told them in as many ways as we could, "Effective effort leads to success." You wouldn't believe the stories we heard after this project was over! Students were attempting tasks a lot harder than they did before, they believed that they could try harder or use a different strategy the next time after they failed...it was magical.

So if you're working with kids or if you have kids, think about what messages you're sending them, even if you're not talking about this kind of stuff explicitly. This is why we don't say, "You must be smart at this."

Okay. Class over.

"you're smart" vs. "you worked hard"

A must-read for people who are involved in any child's life!

The New York Magazine wrote an article about this issue and talked about Carol Dweck, a researcher who does a lot with motivation. Must read!

"For the past ten years, psychologist Carol Dweck and her team at Columbia...studied the effect of praise on students in a dozen New York schools. Her seminal work--a series of experiments on 400 fifth-graders--paints the picture most clearly.

Dweck sent four female research assistants into New York fifth-grade classrooms. The researchers would take a single child out of the classroom for a nonverbal IQ test consisting of a series of puzzles--puzzles easy enough that all the children would do fairly well. Once the child finished the test, the researchers told each student his score, then gave him a single line of praise. Randomly divided into groups, some were praised for their intelligence. They were told, "You must be smart at this." Other students were praised for their effort: "You must have worked really hard."

Why just a single line of praise? "We wanted to see how sensitive children were," Dweck explained. "We had a hunch that one line might be enough to see an effect."

Then the students were given a choice of test for the second round. One choice was a test that would be more difficult than the first, but the researchers told the kids that they'd learn a lot from attempting the puzzles. The other choice, Dweck's team explained, was an easy test, just like the first. Of those praised for their effort, 90 percent chose the harder set of puzzles. Of those praised for their intelligence, a majority chose the easy test. The "smart" kids took the cop-out.

Why did this happen? "When we praise children for their intelligence," Dweck wrote in her study summary, "we tell them that this is the name of the game: Look smart, don't risk making mistakes." And that's what the fifth-graders had done: They'd chosen to look smart and avoid the risk of being embarrassed."

I hope you've made it this far. I hear so many parents and teachers telling kids, "You're so smart!" which can sound encouraging, but if emphasizing effort in this tiny little experiment makes such a marked difference, imagine what would happen if a child's life was full of these positive messages about effort! Gahh!

What do you think??

mistakes in engrish

I'm working right now as a rater for a test of spoken English. The majority of our test takers are Korean, and I have a long list of the most common or frustrating errors Korean speakers of English make. Here's just a taste:

zero = jeh-roh
best = bast
energy = anerj
problem = frovlem
prepare = frefare
woman = ooman
city = shitty
sitting = shitting (these two are the most unfortunate...)
www = double double double
12 (twelve) = twenty
1:29pm = one hour and twenty-nine fee.m.
zoo = joo
enjoy = enzoy (why the switched /j/ and /z/ sounds??)

The absolute most confounding mistake is frovlem. I don't understand why the /p/ and /b/ in "problem" are substituted with /f/ and /v/; why two sounds that do exist in the Korean language are substituted with two sounds that don't exist in the Korean language. Why???

Just for fun, here are some quotes from Monday:
- "This concludes our shitty tour for the day."
- "In local news, shitty officials have announced a new energy saving plan."

carrot help

http://no-carrots-please.blogspot.com/

We have a bag of about five carrots in the fridge. I bought them to put into a bourguignon I made last week, and now I don't know what to do with them! So here's an actual post about carrots.

Any idea what I can do with these guys?

Here are the criteria for ideas that I'll actually consider:

1. The recipe must involve cooking the carrots so you can barely taste the carrot.
2. The recipe must involve cooking the carrots so you can barely feel the texture of the carrot.

Difficult, huh? Welcome to my life. :)

yul kwon, part 2

http://no-carrots-please.blogspot.com/

Happy first day of March!

Last Saturday's Harvard dinner with keynote speaker Yul Kwon was really interesting. It was hosted by Harvard Law School's APALSA (Asian Pacific American Law School Association) where Cyrus is a board member. (Guess what vegetables were served for dinner? Cauliflower and...carrots!)

He talked about his motivation for going on Survivor, which, when you look at his career, isn't a likely choice. He didn't even actively try to get on the show; he was recruited. They were specifically looking for Asian Americans, and after a very shocking interview with Mark Burnett, a powerful TV exec who asked Yul the same kinds of ignorant questions about Asian Americans that my second grade peers asked me in elementary school, he got the offer. Yul decided that there needed to be more Asian Americans who were breaking the mold and confounding the stereotypes of Asian Americans, and it was really interesting to hear all about the challenges he's faced and how dedicated he is to his cause.

But then I think about myself, and I wonder if I'm perpetuating the stereotype that Asian women are submissive, won't rock the boat or cause problems, etc. But the stereotype must have started somewhere. This is what my upbringing has told me to be like, and I fully accept the way I am (well, mostly). Or, am I this way because I'm meeting society's expectations of me? And maybe I have some inner Aggressive Ina who is a natural leader and wants to change the world? ...Or maybe something in between? :)

So I felt a little out of place at a dinner full of motivated, highly intelligent Asian Americans in law school who nodded their heads vigorously when Yul said that we must break these stereotypes!

I don't think about my Asian Americanness much, but maybe I should...