dumpling-induced thoughts

Ten or more Japanese people got terribly sick in their stomachs after eating prepared dumplings made in China. Pesticide was found in those dumplings.

Somehow this is a headline on Taiwanese news today. This is not news at all. It's something expected.

I have tried my best to avoid taking in or applying anything made in China since probably 1987 when the Taiwan government started allowing people to go to China and to take things back.
There have been no good stories about made-in-China food, medicines (internal or external), detergents, soaps, shampoos, etc. Recently, I heard less because the US seems only caring about toys. The bad story line is more or less the same: poisonous. The poisonous or health threatening source can come from pesticides, rodenticides, heavy medals, fluorescence, or simply poor-hygiene factories.

I have access to more made-in-china food in the US than in Taiwan. In Asian or Chinese grocery stores, most of dried or canned or frozen food is from China. I could not bring myself to touch it just for saving money. Who knows how the food was dried, preserved, prepared, or wrapped? Scary news reports teach me something: be scared.

Now Japanese should learn the lesson too. We and the world already know the equation: made in Japan = excellent. The world should start to know the other one: made in China = cheap and poor.
They should not trust Chinese anyway. People in China dislike Japan a lot. Some of them still hate Japan.
I don't hate Japan. And I love Taiwan. And I am proud of my cultural root: Chinese. I know what happened in World War II. I watched documentaries on the Nanjing holocaust. Many women, Chinese and Taiwanese and from other occupied-by-Japan countries, were forced to "comfort" Japanese soldiers in the war. But I don't hate Japan. For the fact that even now China still violently threatens Taiwan, I don't hate China either.

Actually I do not think this health-threatening dumpling event is directly related to the tension between China and Japan.
No matter how evil Japan or China could be, there is no justification for poor-quality food or food-related product (such as utensils or toys or anything you may put in your mouth). In particular, the poor quality is nothing about being tasteless but everything about the health.

Kim said there are just too many people in China so that the China government or business owners do not care if they kill their people. Direct or indirect, rapidly or gradually killing tens of thousands won't hurt the number of 1.3 billion. It's a shame that they think people in other countries would not care either.

I hope China will change in all respects. It is a great country. It should earn its respected reputation. It provides almost everything to almost every corner of the world. It should be responsible to what it is doing to the world.
Before it changes, think twice before you put anything made-in-China into your body.

Organic, local, fresh, minimum processing are the keys for good tasty food anyway. You want dumplings? Eat them if you witness how they are made. Or get some made-in-Taiwan.

cubicle fridge

I’m typing with gloves on. In the mid-afternoon. In the middle of the office.
I am not wearing those spa/moisturizing/massaging gloves that make my hands and fingers beautiful.
I am wearing the gloves that are the same ones I wear when walking outside where the temperature is at the freezing point. That is, it is freezingly cold right now in my cubicle, at my desk, on my keyboard.
It is so cold that I cannot concentrate on the grant application forms and instructions.
(I cannot post entries on my blog now actually. The company blocks many websites from our access for security reasons. So I am typing in Word and will post it once I get home)

It is a fun process going through the instructions online. One page of instruction is full of 15 links to 15 plus pages of instructions. After clicking on three consequent links, I get totally lost where I was and what I was looking for. And the freezing temperature is not helping.

What’s wrong with the central AC? No one knows.
I find the answer “no one knows” very interesting. Unlike downstairs (where I am), upstairs is too warm to keep sleeves long. The two-floor research center is like the two-hemisphere earth, and the sun only warms one hemisphere at a time.
Because no one knows, I do not know whom I can complain to. Interestingly and importantly, life always finds its way. I wear gloves and scarf. Floor-mates place a heater at their feet. Just some minutes ago, I got a heater at my feet too. Once I cannot stand it anymore, I will simply call it a day and go home.

Why do they treat us like this? We are the assets of the company! We apply for grants so that the company can earn money. We do research so that we can publish papers so that we can apply for more grants so that the company can earn more money.
No one knows.
Everyone is in the competition of guess-who-is-tougher. You whine, you lose.
I don’t whine but appear in gloves and scarf. So everyone who walks by me will ask “Are you cold?” and I will answer “Yes.”

If you want to change the system, you have to get into the system.
But do I want to get into the system? I am thinking this question seriously these days.
The morale is pretty low now. We should go on strike like what the Writers Guild has been doing. Postdocs are a low-paid population with a great productivity because somehow we believe what we are doing something good for science and for future career.
Really? I believe we are doing something good for science and for knowledge passing on to next generations. But career? Anyone cares? They hire us because we are cheap. Because we don't fight back even in the situation where we are left to sit our warm butts in a freezing cubicle.

If all postdocs go on strike, what will happen to scientific research, to high education organizations, or to the future of mankind?
The answer is postdocs will not survive before anything profound happens. Before we can afford strike, I'll keep myself warm and keep my blood circulating.

Kristen walked by my cubicle and said "Oh, how nice! Your heater does not make loud noise. Mine is so loud that I couldn't concentrate on work."
Yeah, we are so enjoying the "guess-who-is-tougher" competition.

robbery

I walked home from the train station as usual.
This 5-block walk was well lighted.
That night, I actually did not stay until the end of the milonga. Somehow I decided to leave earlier and arrived at my apartment building 5 before midnight.

The entrance of the building was not right beside the street but kinda hidden in the front yard. The yard was well lighted too.

As I was about to insert the key to open the door, a "medium black" guy (using police's way of description) ran towards me. I thought he was a resident of the apartment and I thought he was in a hurry or something.

He grabbed the handle of my bag and said "give me the bag."
I was not sure what he meant and still held the other side of the handle tight.
He said it again "just give me the bag."
So I realized what exactly he meant and he meant it.
I saw a car waiting for him and knew he was not alone and knew I was in trouble.

I let go. He ran into the red old 4-door car, and it disappeared from my view.
I did not dare to chase or look where it went. I just rushed into the building and into my room and turned on the computer to call police. Well... obviously can't call 911 via skype.
I knocked on a neighbor's door and borrowed the phone.
Police came in 5 minutes. The police station is just two blocks away.

That's what happened.
I was robbed in front of my apartment in a supposedly safe neighborhood.
The super said it had never happened since she lived here for 7 years.
Police said last robbery in South Orange was last November. Comparing to East Orange or Newark, it is a much safer area.

I was traumatized. Now it's been a week. I stayed with Kim for two nights. Actually I am posting this entry in Kim's place now using her computer.
My heart rate went up when walking towards my apartment even during daytime. I should be able to overcome this fear. It takes time though.

But life is still good.
Tango is still wonderful.
Just can't walk alone at night anymore. At least not until I move to somewhere even much safer than South Orange.

life is still good

I'm about to leave to work now. This is a quick post. I'll post a better one later :p


I am fine.

Physically, I am fine. The robber did not attack me.

Sorry that I have not had time to tell everyone that I am fine. Sorry if you have worried.

In a day, with the help of the police report, I got my driver's license. I canceled cards. I re-did things. I called thousands of places to get information and advices. I put a note at everyone's door in my apartment. I finally started meeting neighbors.

The world may not be as peaceful as I thought, but I believe most people are good people.

And I still believe tango is one of the greatest things in the world. I will NOT give up tango because of the robbery (I came home late because of tango. But you cannot blame me for being robbed. I am the victim! Stop blaming victims for the bad guys' behavior!)
I will change my returning time from tango. I will wait after sunrise.

I am fine. Thank you :)

car thing - part 5

Please read car thing - part 1, part 2, part 3, and part 4 before reading the following part 5.


IX. Neverwhere

Have you read Neil Gaiman’s book or watched the TV show “Neverwhere”?
I felt like being the protagonist when coming back to Kim’s car from the post office.
I had parked her car right in front of my apartment before going to the bank. So of course, I remembered where I parked it. There were three cars on the side of the street. They were all different makes. I would not miss her car.
When coming close, I pushed the open button at the remote key. The car did not beep. The door was not unlocked.
I looked inside the car and was darn sure this was her car.
I looked around and felt someone was playing a trick on me. Was there a camera hiding somewhere?
Inserting the car key to the key hole, the door was unlocked. I sat into the car and, by habit, I pressed the door lock, but the door was not locked. I had to manually lock the door.
Weird, I thought. Was I still in reality? Or did I accidently go to some underworld like what happened to Richard Mayhew in Neverwhere?
I pushed the emergency blinker. Normally, at least in Bungbung, the blinker would blink even when the car was not started. The blinker did not work.
Fine, I thought. Maybe Kim’s car worked differently than mine. So I inserted the key and tried to start the car.
Nothing happened.
Nothing.
Nothing. Tried again. Still nothing. No buttons worked. No sound from the engine.
This is not my car. Kim has been so nice to me. She let me stay with her. She took care of me. She is a great company. She is as cool as Alex and Zabeth. She makes me laugh. She lent her car to me. And her car just died in front of me. I cannot believe this. I cannot believe this.
All I could think of was “I cannot believe this.”

Did the battery just run out? Or something wrong with the engine?
Kristen the research assistant had just got her car back from the body shop a week ago. Her car suddenly stopped on highway at high speed. The diagnosis was a lemon – her engine was a false one. Having driving the car for 5 years, she could not believe it was a lemon. But shit happens.
Shit. This fresh event simply made me feel even more horrified.
I did not dare to mess things around even if I were some automobile expert, which I was not. I needed to call Kim.

I called Kim. Of course she did not pick it up. I knew her duty did not end this morning until noon. I called Millie to page Kim for me. But Millie did not pick it up. I called Kristen. Kristen did not pick it up. We were throwing a farewell party at noon for Siby. Millie and Kristen probably were busy managing the party thing.
What could I do now?
I left the car and went back to my place. I took a pen and post-it notes back to the car, sitting there and waiting.
On the street, a car without a parking permit can only stay for two hours. It had been more than two hours. I could not let a cop give me a ticket.
Soon, Kristen called. My boss called. Siby was on the phone too.
“Please find me Kim.” I said to them.
Siby went up and down stairs to find Kim. Someone paged her for me.
Kim called me back finally.
I told her about the situation. Kim called AAA, a road-side assistant company. But AAA would not come to rescue me and Kim’s car because I am not the owner of the car and because I do not have AAA membership.

Therefore, Kim asked Kristen to drive her to me. I felt bad that not only me would not make it to Siby’s party, but also Kristen and Kim would not make it because of me.
Kristen said Millie would not make it either because Millie took today off for personal emergency.
Kristen also told me that my boss tried to find her husband to help me out. My boss lives in South Orange too, and her husband works at home. However, her husband’s car suddenly got some problem and would not be able to come to me.

What are the odds that all these could happen on the same day?

We waited for AAA until 2pm.
The first thing we could guess was no battery power. So the AAA guy jumped jacked it, and the car was started!
I had no idea why the battery was out of power in less than an hour. I couldn’t believe it.

Even now I am still shaking my head when thinking back. I cannot believe this.


X. Return

“When is Geico going to see my car?” I asked the body shop on Jan 17 after Kim’s car came back to life.
“We hope he will come over tomorrow.” The body shop answered.
“When are you going to see my car?” I called the Geico person.
“Tomorrow.” He said.
“Tomorrow when?”
“Late morning or early afternoon.”
“I will call you tomorrow.” I was not polite on the phone. Politeness had already run out during the 3-week long wait.

On Friday morning, Jan 18, I was on time for my appointment, but the doctor was not. He did not see me until three hours later. No matter how many times I have waited for different purposes in different situations, I can never get used to waiting.
I told the receptionist that I needed to do some errands after 30 minutes of waiting. She took a note of my phone number and let me go.
I went to the South Orange Parking Authority and got my parking permit.
While I was in the examining room, waiting again, I got a call from Geico and another from the body shop. Both of them told me, I could go get Bungbung back!

By train, I went to the body shop, Bungbung’s smile came to my view. It smiled as a beetle could smile, as a new beetle could smile, and as a brand-new new beetle could smile. Oh my bug.
Dennis the technician walked me through what had been repaired and changed. He assured me that he test-drove it, and that it was like new.
He also put on the New Jersey plates on it for me.
Happily I sat into the car. It was a sunny wonderful day. Very wonderful. Sunny and warm. My heart was warm.

Now Bungbung is parked in South Orange legally with a registration card. Things are sorted.

At least, that was what I thought.
15 hours ago (now it's 3pm on Jan 21), I got robbed and lost my driver’s license and other IDs and other important documents and dance shoes and other personal stuff and my cellphone.
Without my driver’s license, I cannot drive. Bungbung is safe and sound now. I am not.
I cannot believe this. I got robbed right before midnight in front of my apartment.
It was cold. Very cold. I am trapped in fear.
Email me your phone number because I don’t have yours anymore. And pray for me.