喜，因为那个人证明你至少没有将气质和爱情一起丢失；悲，因为世事弄人，你爱的人不爱你，爱你的人你不爱。你玩世不恭的说虽没有同意，却也没有拒绝。想看看他会坚持多久，想享受一下琼瑶阿姨笔下被追求的浪漫与幸福。你对我说这些的时候，那么努力地露出那种无所谓的张扬甚至卑鄙的笑容，但不经意间流露出的悲凉眼神却出卖了你拙劣的演技。 如果再让我选择爱一个人，我绝对不会选他，因为痛；我想，如果再让他选择被爱一次，他一定不会选择我，因为累。当爱与被爱成为一种负担与压力时，逃避是在所难免的，而正是这一点让我伤到了极致。曾经我还希望往事可以重来，如今我只想默默的尘封甚至去忘记……没人理解我心痛，因为这是我自己的事。 他可以逃避，可以不接受我，可以不理睬，甚至可以忘记我心中的那些美好过去，那是他的权利，我不曾干涉，不想干涉，也没必要干涉。同样，我可以伤心，可以哭泣，可以同样不理睬，甚至也可以忘记，那是我的权利。爱情的背面，我想，仅此而已。面对感情最后的狼籍，我心中应该有恨意，但是我觉得不论怎样，恨一个人早已没有了意义。选择仇恨的同时也在虐待自己已碎的心，何必呢？！曾经我是善良的，如今，我依然如故，与高尚无关，本性使然。 于他而言，错过我，也许过早，也许过晚，但终究是迟早的事情，对于我，错过他，也许幸运，也许不幸，幸与不幸终归成过去。人总有放任自己的时候，就像他自己所说的：“我是凡人，无法逃脱……”他的每一句话我都记得。其实爱就爱了，与任何人无关，放就放了，结局与爱情也再无关联。记得他曾把我的不再任性与吵闹归结为长大了，看着这几个字，我不知道自己应该哭还是笑。其实我想告诉他，这些和成长无关，我只不过觉得自己在爱情中太悲哀，我越是在乎，别人对我似乎越冷淡，我的爱既然能压得别人喘不过气来，能成为一种负担，我何苦死死挣扎呢？原本的自尊所剩无几，我就不要再轻易丢弃仅有的了。

&S226; An excuse is a polite rejection. Men are not afraid of "ruining the friendship."

&S226; Don't get tricked into asking him out. If he likes you, he'll do the asking.

&S226; If you can find him, then he can find you. If he wants to find you, he will.

&S226; Just because you like to lead doesn't mean he wants to dance. Some traditions are born of nature and last through time for a reason.

&S226; "Hey, let's meet at so-and-so's party/any bar/friend's house" is not a date. Even if you live in New York.

&S226; Men don't forget how much they like you. So put down the phone.

&S226; You are good enough to be asked out.

Our Super-Good Really Helpful Workbook

Hey, what's a self-help tome without a workbook? Our chapters will all be so brave and wise that we want to make sure you retain as much of the brilliance as you can. So for all of you who feel the need to get out of your problems and into your crayon box, have at it.

Love,

Greg and Liz

Remember in grade school how they told you not to write in your textbooks? Screw that! Grab a pen and list five reasons why you think you have every right or good reason to call him.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Put the book aside and wait an hour. Or at least ten minutes. Then ask yourself: Do I seem pathetic? Do I sound like someone who doesn't trust my own innate hotness? Yes,you do! Now put your dialing finger away, get out of the house, and go find some fun.

P.S.: You just did a workbook exercise about a guy who hasn't even extended to you the energy of a phone call. Why would you want to chase that down?

一部旧电影有这样的场景：她走进酒吧，引起所有男人骚动，其中一个问：“她有男友了吗？”另一个回答：“你开什么玩笑，这种女孩，天生就有男友。”事物总有两面性，于是，我想，会不会有种女孩，天生就是单身？

如果我不是阴差阳错进了男女比例7：1的学校，我想，我会单身很久很久，差不多就是那种“天生就单身的人”。我现在工作的部门有3个单身女人，分别是55岁、50岁、34岁。事实上她们并不是打死也不屈就的人，就拿34岁的姐姐来说，随着年龄增长，她不但有约必赴、有亲必相，选择对象的标准也调降了不少，她慨叹：“我已经尽量放水了，可是，对方还是不肯埋单。”

或许她们没有电视影集“欲望城市”里那几个时髦、犀利的纽约单身女郎那样频繁的罗曼史，但她们至少也有过约会、有些拍拖的经验。多年单身下来，想要有个归宿的，也都像个尽责的业务员，不放过推销自己的机会，也不拒绝外面的询价。但是，她们愈努力约会、拍拖，青春、婚期好像也都离她们愈来愈远，始终开不了花、结不了果。

 

2005年元月纽约时报畅销书排行榜第一名《他其实不爱你》（He\'s Not That Into You）书中有一些警语让人开窍。我发现，一个单身女性，不论在工作、职场上多么聪明干练，情场上，对男人其实并不了解，甚至不知道该如何跟他们打交道，才能造成双赢的局面。

 

警语一：他说他不想结婚，其实，他是不想“跟你”结婚。

 

多年前一个深夜，我接到朋友的电话，她情绪激动，鼻头带着哭音：“他要结婚了，刚刚打长途电话给我，他希望我祝福他……”我心想这是什么狗屁男人！三更半夜打电话给旧情未了的前女友，不但炫耀了自己的新恋情、新行情，还涎着脸要吃憋受伤的对方说一句恭喜你！

我来不及表达我的愤慨，朋友已经话锋一转，声音忽然变得很甜蜜：“也许，他希望我阻止他，或者，他根本不想结婚……”天啊！婚礼即将举行，加上时差，我的朋友只需要挂上电话，睡一觉醒来，那个跟她分分合合、纠缠苦恋多年，始终拿不定主意嫁娶，早就分隔两地的前男友，已经是别人怀抱里的新丈夫了。

但是，我的朋友坚持这通婚礼告知电话绝不单纯，她像调查一起谋杀案，抽丝剥茧，分层分析，终于得到结论，她惊呼：“会不会？他想暗示我，他最爱的还是我！”哎啊！女人好像永远都学不会教训！对象都要跟别人结婚了，还在自问自答：“他到底是什么意思呢？是表示爱我呢还是不爱我呢？既然爱，为什么要跟别人在一起？既然不爱，干嘛又打电话给我？

我真的希望，那时候我已经读过《他其实不爱你》这本书，我就可以单刀直入，用跟作者一样毫无商量余地的口气，当头棒喝一下我的朋友：“拜托，别再自做多情了，他就是不爱你！”

多年后，我的朋友提起那晚的电话，显得很不好意思，她说：“当时，我真的疯了，像个超级大傻瓜！”

警语二：男人就是男人，跟男人打交道，别美化了他们。

我不知道是女人太傻？还是太多情？再精明能干的女人，遇上自己喜欢的男人，好像都变得糊涂起来，再也听不见、看不见男人对你说的或是对你做的那些事。

明明知道他在拒绝你、欺骗你、拖延你……，女人还是一厢情愿，以为只要再多一点耐心、多一点迁就、多给他一点空间、一点时间……，男人迟早会改变，他迟早会被自己的爱心“感化”或“改造”。

关于这一点，《他其实不爱你》作者以男人的身份警告你：不论是他推说最近太忙、忘记打电话给你，或是马上要出差不能跟你见面，甚至他还没预备好要跟你定下来……，不论是哪种形式的回避，全都是屁话，因为真相只有一个：“他就是没那么爱你。”

若是你还记得那种被爱的经验，那是大家喜欢用“像苍蝇一样，挥都挥不走”来形容的被依恋、被围绕的密度与浓度。但是，若是你现在的感觉，像你是那只苍蝇，他想办法挥走你，简单一句话：不要再浪费青春、生命，在那个若即若离的人身上了。

也许他们偶尔，还是会想到你一下，但请你务必相信，一个真正爱你的人，他的态度应该是明确、热情、积极的，照理说，他天涯海角都应该想办法找到你，怎么会因为开会太忙忘记你正在等他的电话呢？

法国知名女性主义《第二性》作者西蒙．波娃曾说：“我们不是身为女人，我们是逐渐变成女人。”她的意思是女人之所以沦落两性的弱者，成为次于男性地位的第二性，多半是因为女人容易放弃争取自己极大的权益，反而常常成为男性优先的支持者。

 

女人常替男人漏洞百出的托辞找借口，有时候为了不想“说穿了、撕破脸”，女人暗夜神伤，甚至忘记自己之所以还在单身，都是因为眼下这个人，既不懂得好好珍惜你，又一直挡着路，让你错失多少机会，遇见那个真正适合你的人。

 

记得多年前《男人来自火星、女人来自金星》一书出版，很多女人都忽然松了一口气，以为原来自己长期跟男人“沟通不好”，完全是因为两性基本结构如此不同。我的一个女朋友甚至郑重告诉我：“我以前常常不知道我男友在想什么？原来，我说的话，他根本听不懂。”

是真的听不懂？还是“不愿意”听懂？我的看法是，男人也跟女人一样，他们也会爱也需要爱。当他推说很忙、不打电话给你、不约你出去，或是根本避而不见，这跟他是不是火星来的一点关系也没有，你不需要帮他的借口合理化，一如你不需要美化他的谎言。当他显得意兴阑珊，就是你该拍拍屁股，走人的时候了。

 

警语三：重新设定你的标准。

 

前不久，我的一个还算年轻的单身朋友告诉我，一个结了婚的男同事常常在MSN上跟她没完没了的搭讪、调情，直到某一次，不知是基于好奇决定搞个清楚，还是她当下也真有些心动。她敲下键盘说：“哪天，我们单独聚聚。”话一按钮送出去，对方就沉默了，好像忽然中了奇毒，从此在MSN排行榜上永远消失了。我的朋友露出苦笑，调侃自己说这个男人肯定被她吓跑了。这让人想起一些相亲、约会的夜晚，结束前彼此交换了电话号码，礼貌地说“再连络”，却从此没有下文，约会过的男人，都像失踪人口，连当初帮忙介绍认识的朋友，都忽然记不起他的存在。

 

当一个女人到了某种年龄，常常会问一句：“我这辈子，还会遇见某个人吗？”“遇见”两个字意味深长，因为到了某种年龄，女人清楚明白，必须先遇见某个有交往发展潜力的人，才会有机会约会、拍拖、恋爱，甚至走上婚姻那一条更遥远的路。

有时，为了摆脱单身，女人努力让自己的遇见“宁滥勿缺”，女人心中原有的标准，完全被焦虑感搅乱了。

 

34岁姐姐就曾在一个晕黄灯光的西餐馆里，被一个她连面貌都没有看仔细的陌生男人，搞得对自己信心大为低落。原因只是这个男人送她回家以后，就再也没有连络。不论是受邀相亲，或是自费相亲，很多时候女人发现一点也不浪漫；对方不但来意明确，还打着一手如意算盘。年轻的想找“性伴侣”、年老的想找“女看护”，一个年薪几十万的朋友，相亲后再见面，对方就公然希望她借款投资。

 

其实，四下瞧瞧，婚姻幸福的伴侣何其少，离婚率的高涨又何其迅速。单身应该不只是一种等待的过程，而是享受自由选择的态度。

 

一个专栏作家说：“世间只有已婚女性和单身男性是真正快乐的人。”我想西蒙。波娃一定很不以为然。我的看法是，不论单身、已婚，爱的标准，不该打折，哪怕注定要单身一生，女人对于爱的标准，不能轻易放弃。

 

警语四：因为我值得！

 

这真不该只是一句化妆品牌的美丽宣言，“因为我值得！”应该是所有单身女人，每天晚上睡觉前必须进行的洗脑记忆训练；应该不断告诉自己，你值得一个你爱也爱你的人！只要你愿意，你也值得一段美满的婚姻。

而且，如果能够爱自己，即便单身，一样可以快快乐乐的，多做一些让自己觉得“因为我值得”的事，而不是为了约会、拍拖，赔了岁月又折了志气。

It’s a speech free campus and you do get a lot of good series of talk from all kinds of guest speakers such as Michael Moore with his Fahrenheit 911 and Michael Gallagher – a conservative speaker for Republican giving talks on the same day. And the audience is not necessarily Republicans to Republican and Democrats to Democrat. People are willing to hear what the other side says. There is also another interesting talk given by a former CIA staff and he exposed some facts about how the government manipulated intelligence to justify the war in Iraq. It’s such a bold and sensitive topic, yet it’s openly discussed in public.

Football is really a big thing here. Penn State is playing in the Big Ten and the Lions (a symbol for Penn State) used to be legendary team dominating the championship for almost ten years! His coach Paterno is well known for this and in his name, a library was built. (Of course, he is the fund source). Although the legend is gone forever, the enthusiastic for football remains a tradition. Every year, there is an event called Homecoming, when Penn State’s alumni come back to the campus, networking, looking for old buddies. You do see a lot of couples all white walking on the campus…so nice! On Friday night, there comes the Homecoming parade followed by a Homecoming football game on Saturday. The photos I have uploaded to the Webshots are about these events. They also have volunteers to guard the Lion Shrine during Homecoming because it was vandalized by a PSU student some 40 years ago and it has become a tradition to guard the lion since then.

Maybe it’s not unique to Penn State campus; however I would like to mention the clubs and societies in Penn State. It’s another vivid reflection of American values: emphasize individualism and people can do whatever they want. The social clubs are very diversified…you can find all kinds of clubs because they are formed solely due to people’s interests and needs.

Serious types: Student Union, Business Clubs and Law Association, Religious groups.
Stereotypes: Sports, Women rights etc, culture groups.
Fun types: Harry Potter Fan Club, Horse Riding
Haha type: Alpha Beta Phi; Miu Delta Khi – these strange names are for Sorority (You will be mistaken by the Chinese translation “妇女联谊会”, they are really party girls…making up every now and then and dressing up really sexy) and Fraternity (a guy counterpart – by the way, Bush was the president of Fraternity in his days at Yale)
Weird type: LGBT (Lesbian Gay Transgender and Bisexual) Wow…really nothing is impossible!

Recently, the University was sued by a religious society. The reason was the University has been too liberal and is requiring an undiscriminating policy on selecting members. The society feels that the policy has made its selection of members difficult and the University is enforcing on their management of their own society. Really strange hah? Anyway, as long as you have your own standing, you can do it whatever way you like. Who knows what decision the judge will make!

It’s been a long time since I last updated my blog. Sincere apologize for my faithful readers…haha. Special thanks to all friends who are supporting me in one way or another.

Time flies. I have been in Penn State for more than half of my duration of my program. Where shall I start? I have really seen and experienced a lot here.

Academic Life:
It is far not that easy as maybe most of us have expected. That’s the main cause that prevented me from updating my blog. The mid-terms kill! The Engineering department is quite competitive here. I have met and made friends with many intelligent students. They are very active in class and you guess what they do raise intelligent questions, some of which I have never considered. Em…that makes great sense. I also have some really interesting and excellent lecturers. The instructor for my Embedded System course is really a funny guy. You can’t imagine that I even expect to have his class. He explains extremely clearly, allows maximum and natural class interactions – basically he encourages any questions and any question is deserved a praise. He is very humorous, you bet! He makes me laugh every class.

The instructors here are very generous in giving marks. Really! Give you some example: in one exam, I actually got a totally different solution because I have a different perspective from the instructor. I thought oh that’s it! However, I got really surprised and dumb when the instructor congratulated me. You guess what? He only deducted one mark off. I feel that it’s good that marks are given based on your working and the instructor is really understanding and fully respects different perspectives of the same problem. They are also good score pullers and simply give away free points. There was one quiz which everybody did badly for a very tricky (unnecessary or actually badly set) question. The lecturer said that during the quiz that he set two secret bonus questions. You can never guess. They are the two blanks you need to fill on each page of the test paper – your name! Five points each. If you happen to miss one, you get less give-away bonus points! Other dummy questions can be “The lecturer is tall” “I want to pass this course with a grade C or better”, T or F?

I feel American students and teachers don’t take things too seriously. These can be reflected in many ways. In short, I feel they are very optimistic and they have a spirit that maybe today was the worst day in your life, but they will give you a pad in the shoulder “hey, buddy, still there is tomorrow.”

Travel:
I have been to day trips like Washington, Niagara Falls and weekend outings in Finger Lakes, Watkin Glens State Park, Hershey’s, Whipple Damp, Spring Creek and Mt. Nittany. Photos are already uploaded to http://community.webshots.com/user/batesyoung
Of course, that is not enough! During this Thanksgiving, I will be going to New York and Philadelphia. I am planning to visit Boston and spend Christmas in New York and have a short trip to Atlantic City to visit the famous casinos there. However, there are not many places to visit on the East Coast, all the fun places are on the West Coast…considering…constrained by budget.
Entertainment:
It’s called social life here. However, according to their definition, social life means two things only: alcohol and parties. In American culture, if you don’t do either of the two, you are asocial, so quite easy to be a nerd ya? My roommate called me a party pooper, so what? I have tried drinking in a friend’s birthday party. Just two small cups…I like the Barley and Mud Slice. However, I am frankly not a boozer. Yahong and I have thought of trying out once in the bar downtown…anyway that’s a part of their life and we should get a taste of it on SEP.

To balance work, I did try my best to set some time aside to reward myself. Apart from the weekend trips, I go to gym regularly. I can run 2.41 miles now! Amazing, initially I think it’s only 2.41 km, just recently found out that I can run so far. Wow…that’s called hidden potential hah? I have also tried out some aerobic class, Yoga is nice but Butts and Gutts is simply not my piece of cake. I had a scattered body for nearly one week after attempting only one period. I also enjoyed the Sauna.

In Singapore, too many commercials, so you don’t really have chance to calm down and appreciate a piece of film art. To my great joy, there are a variety of choices of films shown by different societies for free. They are all copy right movies which societies have to pay a lump sum to the distributor out of their funds. I am really impressed to know that copyright is well enforced here. I like the Big Animal and Une Femme de Menage (the Housekeeper). I will watch more during my stay here.

明知道这么说了，就更容易“失去”你。可是，这种失去又未尝不是一种获得。因为其实很多人就是不愿承认失去，而一无所有。而有些人就是承认不曾拥有，而真正获得。我选择后者，因为我选择真实，而不是虚假的自欺欺人。

如果你是我大脑里的一条虫，那就好了。
可能已经在脑子里了，不知道能不能在心里。

School has started for about one week and it was really busy. The class duration here is 50 minutes and you just feel that you got to meet your professors too often, usually four times a week. In NUS, you might only meet them once or twice. They are very kind but most of them are not young. Can you imagine that they are still using blackboard and I am just so unused to taking notes!

All their assignments need to be marked, so you cannot really skip tutorials like you do in NUS. There are so many mid-terms, on average two for each class and they are crazy to be held as late as 10pm, but your final only counts to 25 to 30 percent. Hence it’s really trivial and they only give one study day for preparation.

There is one thing that I don’t like about classes here. I am already a Junior so most of my classmates know each other and you know when people become old, they become dumm in making new friends. So I feel a bit uneasy…but never mind…I will try my best! And for engineering, there are far few females. I am usually among one or two girls in my engineering classes of the size about fifty. So, guys, you are really lucky in NUS!

Well, if you ask me whether Americans study…I’ll say there are extremes. Some are really nerds and working hard…others (maybe most) seldom study at all. I am living in the hall which most girls joined the Sorority and they party EVERY NIGHT. It’s true…party and party every night. They all look very pretty after make-up and surely have great figures. They go out every night.

I learned from my roommate that party is really a big thing for college students here. If you want to go, there will be parties every night. I was persuaded by my roommate to go to one party held in school (not in those clubs, which involves drinking). I tried my best to stay there for one hour and could not stand any more. It was really HOT stuff! Far from your imagination, which I don’t see to be my cup of tea…hehe. However, I was lucky to find my niche in a Salsa (Latin dance) party and I got a nice guy from Gostaliga to teach me. A guy from Argentina also tried to teach me Argentina dance, but it was too fast! I am planning to go for the dance classes. By the way, Yahong joined the ballroom dance course and you get CREDITS for it…haha.

So far, I think that it is a really free country. Everybody does whatever he wants. Nobody will judge or restrict you. There is a good side of it when people are more encouraged to develop their talents, in the meanwhile, it can go to extremes which you see here. One of the problems is drinking. I was quite shocked when so many people say what they do in their spare time is drinking.

In order not to put on too much weigh because their meals really contain a lot of fat, I started to go to gym regularly to sweat off extra calories. Besides that, I will also join some classes such as Buts and Guts and Yoga. I found that Americans love this style of living: when eating, just eat to the fullest, calories…forget it! (They love desserts and ice cream) as long as you exercise and get balanced!

Any other things…emmmm…definitely there are more handsome guys and pretty girls on campus. There is one guy in my class who looks like Prince William and there is another one in my friend’s class who looks like Beck Ham. Wow…

We started out 10-hour journey to State College. When the bus was driven out of the Big Apple, it was 2:30 am in Aug 17. The whole city was silent and streets deserted except the homeless. Our stay in New York wasn’t fun in a normal sense, but was definitely unforgettable. Bus trip is much easier compared to flight trip. I was able to fall in sleep much better. This bus was going to take us to Harrisburg in 4 hours and there was a very long layover time of 4 hours at the station, then we would be transferred to another bus, which took us to State College in 2 hours. It was on this trip that we met a funny guy called Sam and we were still in touch with each other until now.

Americans are really easy to approach at first. We talked about movies and our studies. He even gave us his contact number and address. Later, we found out that most Americans won’t mind giving their contacts to people they just met.

Another group of interesting people we met were so-called Amish people or farm people. I wish I had taken a picture of them. They are wearing traditional costumes, boys in string trousers and girls in skirts and hats. It’s a family with two couples and five kids! They told us they have 13 kids! They were so traditional and we learned that actually a lot of farming people still keep this tradition in the west or middle part of the country.

I enjoy meeting all kinds of people, which, you really got the chance to meet a lot in America and from other countries!

                            The woman arrived
                          At an airport one night
                          With several long hours
                            Before her flight.

                           She hunted for a book
                           In the airport shop,
                          Bought a bag of cookies
                        And found a place to drop.

                       She was engrossed in her book
                          But happened to see,
                     That the man sitting beside her,
                           As bold as could be,
                         Grabbed a cookie or two
                         From the bag in between,
                         Which she tried to ignore
                             To avoid a scene.

                        So she munched the cookies
                          And watched the clock,
                         As the gutsy cookie thief
                          Diminished her stock.

                     She was getting more irritated
                         As the minutes ticked by,
                      Thinking, "If I wasn't so nice,
                         I would blacken his eye."

                        With each cookie she took,
                             He took one too,
                          When only one was left,
                     She wondered what he would do.

                         With a smile on his face,
                          And a nervous laugh,
                          He took the last cookie
                           And broke it in half.

                           He offered her half,
                           As he ate the other,
                         She snatched it from him
                       And thought... ooh, brother!

                          This guy has some nerve
                            And he's also rude,
                          Why he didn't even show
                              Any gratitude!

                            She had never known
                       When she had been so galled,
                          And sighed with relief
                        When her flight was called.

                        She gathered her belongings
                          And headed to the gate,
                           Refusing to look back
                         At the thieving ingrate.

                          She boarded the plane,
                           And sank in her seat,
                         Then she sought her book,
                        Which was almost complete.

                      As she reached in her baggage,
                         She gasped with surprise,
                       There was her bag of cookies,
                           In front of her eyes.

                             If mine are here,
                          She moaned in despair,
                           The others were his,
                          And he tried to share.

                         Too late to apologize,
                         She realized with grief,
                        That she was the rude one,
                          The ingrate, the thief!

How many times have we absolutely known that something was a certain
way,
only to discover later that what we believed to be true...was not?

" Keep An Open Mind And An Open Heart, Because...... You Just Never
Know...... Ya might be eating someone else's cookies!"

New York is not fun at all! You have to deal with the hidden dangers and the unexpected possible at any time. As I have done a little homework, I decided to take the Airport Express Service to the Upper Manhattan. It was $13 dollars on the internet but we found out that it went up to $15 and you know, we couldn抰 complain, inflations are everywhere. When we were about to go out of the airport to the bus stop, a black guy in suit seeing us holding the flyers approached right at the gate. He talked to Yahong and I couldn抰 hear them talking as I was separated from them by the glass gate. It seemed that another guy, the bus driver, was leading us the way to the bus. We followed him, but I suspected him very much. By the time we reach the parking lot, I knew it was not right. It was a small van and the bus driver started to charge us $97 dollars. What the hell is going on! Even a taxi won抰 cost that much. It is a flat rate of $45 to Manhattan! So we swiftly rejected the guy and got away from the scene ASAP. It was after we left the guy that we started to fear! Not trembling, but really careless of us! What if there were several guys waiting there or he was fierce, having a gun? Luckily, these did not happen to us, but we should have been more cautious. This taught us a good lesson. New York is not always that nice as we thought. Always be cautious when you are away from home, in a foreign place.

We eventually found the right guy who sold the tickets. It is pretty strange in US that you don抰 have a ticket office or a bus driver selling tickets. You buy them from a MOBILE conductor. From 2pm, we had a one-hour bus tour from the suburb of NYC to the heart of it ?Manhattan. . I saw the most crowded cemeteries I have ever seen. Every piece of land is precious even for the dead. I saw the area changed from an abandoned 80s industrial town with dirty tunnels, oily streets, scrawl paintings on the walls and rusty bridges to a highly advanced business district with jungles of skyscrapers, beautiful skyline and all colors of people.

We were dropped off at the final stop at 3pm ?Port of Authority at 42nd Street ?the largest bus terminal, which is just next-block to Times Square, Broadway. And on the famous street are the United Union, Grand Central Station and Rockefeller Center just a few blocks away. The following story, which I think I should share with all of you, tells a true side of New York besides its glorious look. It抯 a part of the unforgettable memory which is to be presented fully to you. It抯 not meant to let anyone worry, anyway we went through that and we were safe after all. It was just an entire new experience that we tasted the first time in our life and we got to unveil another side of New York.

I just couldn抰 help feeling helpless when we confirmed from the Greyhound staff that we couldn抰 store our luggage in the station nor anywhere in the Big Apple. Since Sep 11th, all the lockers were removed and any luggage unattended would be removed immediately. The staff was also incapable of doing anything for us, from her look, I could tell how deeply and severely the tragic in Sep 11th and subsequent anti-terrorism campaigns have influenced the life and work of American people.

揗u Yi Chen Zhou? not to discourage ourselves, we just tried to make our remaining 13-hour stay in NYC, most important of all, SAFE! Yahong looked for our heavy luggage and I went to buy our tickets to State College. As scheduled, I bought two tickets at 2:30 am in Aug 17. I applied for two Student Advantage Cards and enjoyed 15% off discounts straight away on the spot. That抯 something cheerful at least卙aha! What was really funny was that I got the chance to see how poor Americans are at Mathematics. The lady at the counter had to divide the simple transaction into four parts and asked me to pay for each of them separately! I asked if they could be combined together, but the reply I got was that in doing so, she would get messed up. We each saved $7 dollars for this single trip and I am sure we can make up for the $22.5 card fees as I am going to travel a lot!

Actually, I really missed the good services we got in Singapore. We should not have complained before anyway. The services here were very bad and the staff was too busy to waste any time on you and got to the next customer right away. So if you have any questions or enquiries, ask them quickly, otherwise you gonna join the end of the line.

Journal taken in Aug 22 at night

TO BE CONTINUED!!!

Looking at my watch, it was only 4pm in Aug 16, still 11 hours to kill. With all our luggage, every single move is difficult. Finally, we decided to stop at a cafeteria called Green Trees where we ordered some coffee. There was a yard outside the cafeteria and only a few chairs. It looked very scary at first when we dragged our luggage to the place. All but two customers were black and we seemed not to be in tune with the environment. I felt quite nervous as it was the first time for me to be a minority. I tried not to be bothered by the loud talk from those black guys and dared not look into their eyes. I looked at the crowds of people rushing from the subway to another destination. There were really all colors of people from all works of the society. One common thing they shared was that they were all busy, without a single second to spare.

Oh, let抯 do something to kill time! I really appreciated to have an accompany so that we could cheer each other up. We told amusing stories, recalled our experience so far and started planning for our days in PSU. As time goes by, we were able to make ourselves easy. I even found the black guys?chatting quite comfortable. Their talks really sound like pop and R&B卙aha! We were especially glad to see a tall and tough policeman standing only a stone抯 throw to our cafeteria. Great! It抯 much safer now. I suggested playing poker which we kept from our flight with Korean Air, but Yahong was convincing enough to let me give up this idea. There were quite a number of black guys around and poker might draw their attention unnecessarily. Guess what we did next? 揥u Zi Qi? Yahong drew a board on a piece of paper and we started playing. Obviously, this was not a game at the right time as we were both dozing off. We called it an end after three rounds.

We needed a walk badly, so we took turns to go around. I got myself pretty familiar with the stores in the terminal and had a little walk outside the building towards the Times Square. What the hell are we doing! We are supposed to be touring around this exciting city! But thinking on the other side, if we are to tour around, what we will see is just the glorious look of the city. I will never get the chance to experience the life of normal or even lower-class people.

We tried to have some conversation with the locals, but unfortunately, they were either engaged in their own business or too indifferent to start a talk. We saw many kinds of people passing by this cafeteria, working people who simply dropped by to have a simple meal made up of a few pieces of bread or sandwiches, travelers like us who wanted to kill time with a cup of coffee or those guys hanging around doing nothing. I feel strongly in this city that the price it pays for high advance is that the relationship between people becomes fragile ever.

It went smoothly until 9pm, an attendant came to us and announced the closure of the store as well as our comfortable stay there. I packed a box of fruit which I desired badly. Well, where are we going to stay? We decided to shift back to the Greyhound ticketing office which is safe. Great! Here goes the life of drifters, the homeless and backpackers. We started the poker game: 24-pt and Black Jack! We enjoyed the Black Jack very much as we were both not very sure about the rules. We modified the rules such that it became fair to both the banker and the player. We found that according to our rule, the banker was actually at a disadvantage. At least, whoever played as the banker lost. There must be something wrong with our rules卙aha. But we just didn抰 have enough time to perfect the rules that we were asked to go downstairs to the waiting area as the office was shutting down at 11pm for the day.

Journal taken in 23 Aug 2004

TO BE CONTINUED!

THE FOLLOWING EXPERIENCE THAT WILL BE UPDATED SOON WAS THE RUDEST OR WORST THING WE EVER HAD. KEEP TUNED TO IT!

There was a huge crowd downstairs. It was nearly 12 midnight. We squeezed to the check-in point to have our luggage weighed. It was a tough black guy. He asked our destination and said very rudely like screaming at kids: 揋O TO YOUR GATE!!!?I tried to ask him: 揂ren抰 we supposed to check-in our big luggage first and it抯 not our bus at the gate right now??However, what we received was rude ignorance and he proceeded to the next fat white lady. Well厀e were like kindergarten kids, following whatever instructions, went to our gate. However, we found out that we were supposed to check-in our luggage and it was not the right bus for us yet. Therefore, we dragged our luggage back to the rude man. This time, he simply weighed our luggage and put on some tags. THAT CAME THE BEGINNING OF THE WORST! He was supposed to sign our tickets and when he realized that we asked him before, his eyes were filled with flames. He took out a huge knife and cut the tags which were already on our luggage. We were so shocked at the scene before we realized that our luggage was thrown back to us. THAT扴 NOT THE END YET! He stared at me right into my eyes and scolded word by word: 揝weet heart (damn it! How dare he called me like that!), what did I tell you to do.?揋o to your gate.?I whispered, not knowing why I answered his rude question. 揧ou didn抰 do as what I told you hah? Now go to your gate!?He almost shouted.

Oh my God! What an experience I had! I am pretty sure that we didn抰 do wrong as later when they changed shift, the other staff just welcomed us kindly and checked in our luggage. He even gave us tips to queue up at our gate earlier as the Greyhound oversold the tickets and we might not be able to get on the bus if it was full.

I felt that the rude service we received was a kind of insult and more or less discrimination. It really showed to us that it is not always only nice people that we are going to meet. We should be prepared to deal with mean people and learn how to defend ourselves. As just now, we were obviously inexperienced and didn抰 fight for our rights.

My heart is so heavy now after sharing this awesome experience with you, but that doesn抰 mean that it spoiled my traveling mood and entire impression about US yet to be discovered. The rest of the journey was full of lovely memories and we met some really nice people.

Journal taken in 26 Aug 2004 at night

NEXT TOPIC COMING SOON?
?Bus Trip to State College