My Accent

I'd been getting quite a bit of comments on my English accent recently, but well, it really had been quite complicated. I'm not sure myself where my accent came from now.

Although I'd been from China, people don't identify the Chinglish in me anymore. There was once two ladies asked to guess where I was from before I was introduced, and the first thing they say is "definitely not Chinese".

From my middle school back in China we've been having foreign English teachers for our English speaking. I think the first foreign teacher that influenced my English accent would be Jim when I was like 14. Jim's from the US and the Chinese English textbooks are written in American English so it sort of makes sense. I've also had Australian and New Zealand foreign teachers back then but I don't think that they'd influenced me as much as Jim. I think he was pretty proud of me as his student as I ran into him on the streets of Guangzhou in 2008 (almost 10 years after he left that school, and I was visiting back China from Australia after my first year study in University of Melbourne) and he still recognized me.

The so-called 'Crazy English' frenzy back in the late 90's also influenced me I guess. And the Chinese founder of the method was also promoting American English. What I was asked to do was listen to a cassette tape of famous American speeches such as 'I have a dream' by Martin Luther King and try to speak like they do, then record your own version and listen to them to find the difference.

Before I came to Australia I attended a course in which the majority of subjects were taught by foreign teachers, and most of them English. I don't really know but I didn't seem to pick up too much accent from them. But at the same time I started watching 'Skins', which was played in quite strong a Bristol/Welsh accent, I didn't think I was affected by that that much either.

And there I was hitting Melbourne in early 2007 and without spending a single day in the US in my entire life I was identified with a nasty mix of American and Chinese accent. People did comment on my American accent then and I was quite embarrassed when I was working in the market people misunderstood my 'can't' as 'can'. Through working though, I've learnt how Kiwis have that funny way to pronounce 'thank you', which annoyed me for quite a while.

I think living for a while in a city does changed my accents too, by the time I moved to Adelaide people started to comment on my 'Melbourne accent', I didn't really know what Melbourne accent is at all, and I could tell very little even by now.

My accent seems to have taken an English turn from here. And I think the main influence was YouTube. I'd subscribed to so many youtubers from the UK now. While some of them has a relatively mild British accent such as charlieissocoollike and kickthepj, there are nastier accents by the likes of jimmy0010 and nostrilshorts. And when I start speaking these days I almost say 'say' as 'see' now. I've even got comments that I got 'received' accent, well I guess I did 'receive' a lot of accents...

And here I am.

The Dirty Money Talk

I still remember when I was little and went to the market with mom one day, I saw her give out money, take the grocery and money (change) back. I didn't have the idea of change. I thought that people earn money by buying stuff until my mom told me otherwise. She also kept emphasizing that money is hard earned, and money has forged in my mind as something precious. Of course I was raised up being told money can't buy you everything, but the other half of the saying is more important: but you can't live without money.

I started to get allowance from the age 9, like, 1 Yuan (~A$0.15) per month. I think I spent the most of them on snacks available from tiny stores around my school. That much would probably buy me an ice cream or a medium pack of potato chips. Of course that wouldn't be enough for me, but I get money on other occasions such as doing chores around the house.

But the big thing would be Chinese New Year, I'd get lucky money (that's exactly why Chinese kids all looking forward to the Chinese New Year, it's like Christmas in the western world) from parents, grandparents, other relatives, family friends, business partners of family members etc. This figure easily runs into thousands Yuan each year. But of course my parents wouldn't let me touch the money that easy, because they need to give out lucky money to kids of the family and friends and business partners too. What they did was starting from age 9, they set up a bank account for me and put a portion of the lucky money I got each year in there, usually only a few hundreds, until when I was in high school I put basically all I get in there.

The first time of course dad took me to the bank and taught me how to write the slip for deposit (that was back in the early 90's, of course now they're all computerized and not needed anymore), I was lucky to have known how to write those very traditional (very complicated) Chinese characters for numbers beforehand (I learnt them from a calender which marked months with those characters), they're not really taught in schools because they don't really have a use outside of the banking system these days. I got a booklet instead of a card as record for savings (those booklets are still being used alongside cards in China these days). My parents keep the booklet. So the money has my name on it but it's not really accessible by me.

Ever since I'd go to the bank alone and fill those forms out and make those deposits every year, when one year I started a debit card with the bank for this account and hid the card from my parents, guess what, I have the access to my money now! I had been a bit reluctant to use the money because even for me it doesn't come easy (only once a year!).

I get more allowance with age, so when I am in middle school I get like 50 Yuan per month. But problem is I'm not content with snacks anymore. I started to buy music, and lots of them. And I only buy them genuine. I started off with cassette tapes, which costs like 10 Yuan each so I could afford them. But then there comes the CDs, which are usually imported and over 100 Yuan each, pretty expensive for my allowance. What I did was saving up from my lunch money, putting only half of whatever I get for lunch money into the card for the canteen, then use the rest to buy CDs. I could only afford one or two per month (of course unless it's Chinese New Year), but I'm happy with that. The sad thing is none of my classmates really respect that I only buy genuine music and they voted me as the 'most extravagant' in the class. I don't think I deserve it but well who cares. But thinking back it actually sort of contributed to who I am now.

The greatest discovery of my life so far had to be those 'recycled plastic' stores. There are heaps of excess or pre-release samples of foreign CDs, DVDs and the like shipped into China for disposal treatment. They are all supposed to be punched and then go through treatments before going to the landfill, however these guys that run those stores had some sort of links to the customs and they are able to grab those things before they are destroyed and sell them. As mentioned before most of them are punched but you can always dig deeper into the piles and find some that escaped it. These things are sold cheap, starting from 10 Yuan you can get a pretty decent CD not punched. Of course some of the big name artists are still sold quite expensive, but I just enjoy digging into them and always find something new. I got the whole discography of some of my favourite artists simply by digging into those piles. I got so many priceless and rare founds in them. This habit dramatically increased my CD collection to over 400 by the time I left for Australia to study.

I started earning money when I started uni in China (the one that I dropped out after a year). The thing about earning money for me is that I found the more I earn the even more I spend. I suck at saving money. Even now I'm still the same. Of course now I need to rely on myself while not earning much at all. For the moment earning for me only means the ability to loan more, because my material desire cannot be satisfied from what I get from my job. Is there a balance point that I could earn enough for what I want? I hope so. Would my desire grow with it and always outweighs it? I tend to consider myself as not having to ambitious material needs, I only want to be good enough to myself - good food, good brands on everyday supplies and appliances, music, games, independent branded stuff and innovative electronics. When I get a bit more I'd like to spend more on photographing and travelling around. I don't want a property for myself, probably not for quite a few years even if I had that money, because I don't really know how long will I stay in any place at all. What made it worse is that I believe there's a huge bubble in the Australian real estate market at the moment, that I'm waiting for it to burst any time.

Now the problem is how I achieve that balance point that I wanted. Well I sent out a few job applications today, not sure how well they'd go but I'll have to find out I guess. Wish me luck.

Memoir (Elementary School)

Let me continue my story.

Immediately after I entered elementary school I stopped all my acting jobs, partly because it wasn't that exciting anymore and partly because my family didn't want me to continue on, they want me to focus on study.

I was like a good for everything kid when I first entered my elementary school. I love all the teachers in my class and they obviously loves me too. I feel like I got some sort of previlage and extremely honours when my Year 1 maths teacher gave me some pictured story books privately and exclusively for me to read. I got full marks on like every subject. I was selected into the choir and the athlete's team (I know). I sang solo in front of the school...

Until like Year 3 things changed. I quitted the athlete's team because I'm not performing well (expected :P), I don't like the new Chinese teacher (which I think it's only because the first one was too good, and thinking back, she did actually pay a lot of attention to me and gave me enough effort) and I even started a fight with her at Year 4. I quitted doing homework at some point, from when she had to take me to her place after school and I had to finish my homework there before allowed to go home. I start fights with like every single classmate back then, and some of them actually went quite violent and caused injury to another kid when I was Year 5.

Back home I was changing too. I do remember we used to have a fold up dinner table in my grandfather's house, and that table was for me to study before dinner, quite a slippy surface and I usually place two sheets of newspaper on the table while I　was studying. And gradually I actually started reading the newspaper when I'm bored of the homework, and I love tearing it after reading too, pinning the paper with my finger nail and rip it so the bit of paper folds back beautifully under it while tearing away.

Back in those days there was so many 'game houses' around where arcade games are available, and they were described as the place where all evil incubates. While we were warned strictly never to enter those places I started playing them anyways when I was Year 4, but stopped at Year 6. Samurai Showdown IV was my absolute favourite back in those days and I later become quite good at it attracting other people in there watching me play. I still play a bit of it sometimes on the emulator in my computer. My grandfather started tracking me down those places and if he found me there he'd be absolutely furious. Once I was caught in a game house and on that day the dinner was my favourite steamed pork ribs, my grandfather didn't shout at me but he just keep taking all the ribs from the dish and I had to do the same to protect my share, the result is the rest of the family just watched us and there hadn't been any left for them as we took all of them within 1 minute, including the juice.

In contrast with my athlete's adventure me in the choir actually went quite well and the music teacher actually referenced me for a place in the "youth's palace" choir of the city, which is quite an honour given that there was only two people in my school selected in. What I did quite wrong that I still regret was that after I was selected into the youth's palace choir I stopped going to the training in the school choir, throwing an attitude on it which made my music teacher quite sad. After I graduated I had visited the school once but I didn't see that teacher and failed to say all those thank you's and sorry's. I started learning piano when I was year 2 too, not being exceptionally good and eventually dropped it when I was in middle school, focusing back on the choir.

soccer was the favourite game amongst the boys back in those days. As we have an early finish every friday the gang would head to a lawn in a nearby museum and kick it off. We don't have a proper field or even a proper ball. An empty bottle is out ball and two bags laying on the ground indicates the goal. That lawn is actually overly grown for our purpose as soccer but we had heaps of fun until dark or the security kicks us out, whichever comes first. I usually don't need to do much as I am just at the back, mostly chatting to the goalkeeper and when the ball comes about kick it out. Seems like we won most of the time against another class.

Later there was a hype in table tennis and we are all crazy of it. While I don't have those quite expensive bats and stuff and I actually played quite crappy. There was a guy in other class though, quite good at this and actually won a few tournaments in the city level. He taught me some of the tricks and I got a bit better, but only at serving. Eventually table tennis didn't get to me that much.

Back like 30 years my father was actually a traner in badminton so I actually played quite good badminton under his training, sometimes on the weekends we go out to rent a real badminton field in the Sports University where my other grandparents live. I still have the bat with me which is more than 10 years old now but I haven't been playing it for a while.

Sex started to become the topic of our talks around Year 5 but back then no one actually knows what happens, we are just all curious and tend to laugh at funny names relating to sex. Rumours are around that this guy is going out with that girl and stuff and they do admit it, just not that sort of going out though. I myself didn't have an "official" "girlfriend" back then but rumours are out there anyway and my friends actually know that there was a girl that I've been getting on well with in the class for years. And my friends are like quite happy for me when that girl was randomly selected to sit beside me by the supervisor of the class. Nothing happened between us though, but I do steal money from home and buy her birthday presents back in those days.

Today is her birthday.

Memoir (Childhood)

Just seen someone talking about his childhood, reminding me a lot here, so here I am. Before I forget more of them.

I have not had much memory about my pre-kindergarten life. I remember living in the second floor of a pretty old house facing the street, when mum cooks in the kitchen I would usually be put on a cane chair surrounded by a table tennis net. I remember I often fall off that chair and got my head hit on the floor, then no doubt started crying. I remember I play often in a neighbour's house and sometimes have dinner with them. Mum told me it was because they are worried that I often fall and took me there while she's cooking.

I have no memory of my first kindergarten but mum told me it was pretty sad memory to her, that when she picks me up after work she often found me tied on a urinal because there are too many children that the workers are too busy to take care of everyone.

When I grow up a bit to like 4 or 5, I was transferred to another kindergarten, and lived there. I remembered crying every Monday morning and finally found that it is actually more like a ritual than real mourn. I was special in that kindergarten. Everyone takes a nap in the afternoon according to the timetable but I could seldom sleep in the light. The teachers/nurses in the kindergarten would then tells tales to me or make me help them a little bit sometimes when other children are sleeping.

And I was even special in terms that I was like a star at the moment. I was acting in various commercials at the time, and once attended a fashion show last for months. And there was a time that I went to Jiangxi for a film shooting and stayed there for like one month, but the film is eventually abandoned because the scenario didn't pass the censoring. I remembered the weather was extremely hot that we have to pour water outside our doors to ease it, whereas the watermelons there are fabulous and incredibly cheap.

Yes, they are all memories now. Memories fade, don't want it that quickly though.