Monday, December 25, 2006

Peace Christmas Season

Without realising, the Christmas was coming so quite and peace.
Everywhere we went, we saw the christmas trees, celebrating events, SALES and christmas songs in every shopping malls.
This year, I chose to have a warm and peace way to celebrate Christmas.
I celebrated with my whole family and another two half family members :P
During the Christmas eve, we went to the Japanese buffet restaurant to have a family dinner. We thought the environment would be quiet and less customers. Who knew, there were a lot of people there having the same idea as us! The restaurant was full of Christmas celebration and we were warm-welcomed by the people there.
Of course, without any delay, we started to have our dinner!


My parents were so happy to have this dinner as family gathering, felt like a reunion dinner!



During "half time", both of us spent some times grabbed some "Kawaii" photos.


Before leaving the restaurant, we took a family photos as memory.



Since we all ate until "overloaded", we took a walk down to Bukit Bintang there to enjoyed the enviromnment. Really amazing that the view of KLCC during the night time is so attractive. We were so irressistable to take this photo.
After we walked until the legs started "melting", we decided to go back home earlier to proceed our christmas presents exchange time.

Although this year I was not celebrating with friends at happening places, but I felt the peace of this Christmas season.

Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year!

2007 A Better Year To All Of You!

Thursday, December 21, 2006

冬至节......美味汤圆

明天是个特别的日子。
明天是吃汤圆的日子。
明天就是团圆的日子。
明天就是所谓的冬至。


其实,我满期待明天的到来。
因为它让我再次感觉到新年的气氛。
因为它也让我们有机会回家去团圆。
因为他再让我们有机会一起搓汤圆。


其实,年年都庆祝冬至的我们,到底了解它的意义吗?
其实,真的不好意思,我真得不晓得,只知道冬至大过年。


冬至是农历的二十四节气之一。
这一天北半球黑夜最长,白昼最短。
俗称“冬节”、“长至节”、“亚岁”等。

在中国传统的阴阳五行理论中,冬至是阴消阳长转化的关键节气。
在十二辟卦为地雷复卦,称为冬至一阳生。
易复卦象曰:“雷在地中,复。先王以至日闭关,商旅不行,后不省方。”

12月21日至12月22日交节,太阳位于黄经270度,直射南回归线。

《后汉书》“礼仪志”中记载:“冬至前后,加子安身静体,百官绝事,不听政,择吉辰而后省事。”
由此可知从汉代起冬至是国定假日。

在中国北方有冬至日吃饺子的习俗,
南方某些地方有冬至日吃汤圆的习俗,
传说在汉朝的医圣张仲景体念家乡乡民在寒冬中工作的辛苦,
在冬至那天利用羊肉等祛寒的药材包在面皮中,作成耳朵的样子,给乡民们治病补身,
这个药方的名字叫作“祛寒娇耳汤”,娇耳就是饺儿。


中国南方则有吃汤圆的习俗。
中国江浙在冬至吃汤圆外,还要吃桂花酒酿,并祭祖,
苏州还有桂花冬酿酒,只在此时节上市。
汤圆有馅的“粉团”是用于晚上祭祖,而无馅较小的粉圆”用于早上拜神。

祭祖之后还有将汤圆粘在门窗上,称为“冬节圆”,
等干燥以后再给孩子们吃,有保佑健康成长之用。冬至扫墓叫“过冬纸”。


《台湾府志》(一六九六)卷七记载:“冬至,人家作米丸祀众神及祖先,举家团圞而食之,谓之‘添岁’;即古所谓‘亚岁’也。门扉器物各粘一丸其上,谓之‘饷耗’。是日,长幼祀祖、贺节,略如元旦”。

在台湾冬至的汤圆有红白两色,另有较大的汤圆,内包有芝蔴、花生、或鲜肉等内馅。
在中国,人们从冬至开始数九,以九天为一九,九九八十一天,寒冬就会过去,称为九九数尽。




至于作汤圆,要作红、白两色,也有青和黄色;形状有大有小,内包糖料、花生粉等。

吃过冬节汤圆就表示增添一岁,因此有冬节不吃汤圆避免年龄老化的笑谈。
吃冬至汤圆代表添岁的观念,可能源自周代到汉初以冬至为岁首的历制,
南宋陆游(冬至)诗注就有“吃尽冬至饭便添一岁”之说,
由此可见,吃冬至汤圆象征添岁的观念形成已久。

吃汤圆时,还有一种俗信:每匙只舀两粒,吃到最后,未婚者必剩下奇数,已婚者必为偶数。
嗜赌者也会以碗中剩下的汤圆数的奇偶,来预测自己赌运的输赢。
所以,明天终于可以。。。。。。
搓汤圆。。。。。。煮汤圆。。。。。。
吃汤圆。。。。。。大团圆。。。。。。

更多详情

Monday, December 11, 2006

Hip Hop Cultural - From Da East To Da West Sharing(II)

Hip Hop Music
============

Hip hop music is a style of music which came into existence in the United States during the mid-1970s, and became a large part of modern pop culture during the 1980s. It consists of two main components: rapping (MCing) and DJing (production and scratching).

Typically, hip hop music consists of intensely rhythmic lyrical form making abundant use of techniques like assonance, alliteration, and rhyme. The rapper is accompanied by an instrumental track, usually referred to as a "beat", performed by a DJ, created by a producer, or one or more instrumentalists. This beat is often created using a sample of the percussion break of another song, usually a funk or soul recording. In addition to the beat other sounds are often sampled, synthesized, or performed. Sometimes a track can be instrumental, as a showcase of the skills of the DJ or producer.

Hip hop began in The Bronx, located in New York City, when DJs began isolating the percussion break from funk and disco songs. The early role of the MC was to introduce the DJ and the music and to keep the audience excited. MCs began by speaking between songs, giving exhortations to dance, greetings to audience members, jokes and anecdotes. Eventually this practice became more stylized and became known as rapping.
By 1979 hip hop had become a commercially popular music genre and began to enter the American mainstream. In the 1990s, a form of hip hop called gangsta rap became a major part of American music, causing significant controversy over lyrics which were perceived as promoting violence, terrorism, promiscuity, drug use and misogyny. Nevertheless, by the beginning of the 2000s, hip hop was a staple of popular music charts and was being performed in many styles across the world.



Social Impact......

Hip hop music is a part of hip hop, a cultural movement that includes the activities of breakdancing and graffiti art, as well as associated slang, fashion and other elements. The popularity of music has helped to popularize hip hop culture, both in the United States and to a lesser degree abroad.

The late 1990s saw the rise in popularity of the "bling bling" lifestyle in rap music, focusing on symbols of wealth and status like money, jewelry, cars, and clothing. Although references to wealth have existed since the birth of hip hop, the new, intensified "bling bling" culture has its immediate roots in the enormously commercially successful late-to-mid nineties work (specifically, music videos) of Puff Daddy and Bad Boy Records as well as Master P's No Limit Records.

However, the term was coined in 1999 by Cash Money Records artist Lil' Wayne on B.G.'s hit single Bling Bling, and the Cash Money roster were perhaps the epitome of the "bling bling" lifestyle and attitude. Though many rappers, mostly gangsta rappers, unapologetically pursue and celebrate bling bling, others, mostly artists outside of the hip hop mainstream, have expressly criticized the idealized pursuit of bling bling as being materialistic.



Hip hop has a distinctive slang, that includes words like yo, flow and phat. Due to hip hop's extraordinary commercial success in the late nineties and early 21st century, many of these words have been assimilated into many different dialects across America and the world and even to non-hip hop fans (the word dis for example is remarkably prolific). There are also words like homie which predate hip hop but are often associated with it. Sometimes, terms like what the dilly, yo are popularized by a single song (in this case, "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See" by Busta Rhymes) and are only used briefly. Of special importance is the rule-based slang of Snoop Dogg and E-40, who add -izz to the middle of words so that shit becomes shizznit (the addition of the n occurs occasionally as well). This practice, with origins in Frankie Smith's non-sensical language from his 1980 single "Double Dutch Bus," has spread to even non-hip hop fans, who may be unaware of its derivation.

Hip Hop Cultural - From Da East To Da West Sharing(I)

Hip Hop Dance
============
It covers a wide range of styles, including dances that have often been associated with hip hop culture, to those that are merely performed to the music. These styles have grown in popularity over the years, partly due to the rise in popularity of hip hop music. The term most often refers to breakdancing.

Breakdancing, also known as breaking, b-boying, or B-girling by its practitioners and followers, is a dynamic style of dance. The term "B-boy" originates from the dancers at DJ Kool Herc's parties, who saved their best dance moves for the break section of the song, getting in front of the audience to dance in a distinctive, frenetic style. Hence the "B" stands for break-boy (or girl). According to the documentary film The Freshest Kids, a history of the b-boy; DJ Kool Herc describes the b in b-boy as short for breaking which at the time was slang for "going off" also one of the original names for the dance. However early on the dance was known as the "boiong" (the sound a spring makes).

B-boying is one of the major elements of hip hop culture, commonly associated with, but distinct from, "popping", "locking", "hitting", "ticking", "boogaloo", and other funk styles that evolved independently during the late 1960's in California. It was common during the 1980s to see a group of people with a radio on a playground, basketball court, or sidewalk performing a breakdancing show for a large audience. Breaking began to take form in the South Bronx alongside the other elements of hip hop. A "burn" is when you humiliate your opponent. The name of the first B-Boy crew was The Zulu Kings.

"Hip-hop" as a form of dance is becoming more popular. Hip hop dance comes from breakdancing, but does not consist wholly of breakdancing moves. Unlike most other forms of dance, which are often at least moderately structured, hip hop dance has few (if any) limitations on positions or steps.

The revolution begins...

Old school hip hop dances are those styles that evolved in the seventies and were primarily danced to funk and old school hip hop music. Breakdancing is the best known of all hip hop dance styles, and is considered a corner stone of hip hop culture itself. In the 1980s, many funk dance styles that originally evolved separated from hip hop, such as popping and locking, started to be incorporated with the hip hop culture as well, and could be seen danced together with breakdancing.

In the 1990s, as hip hop music evolved and grew further away from funk, it got slower, heavier and more aggressive. This modern hip hop music has given birth to new styles of hip hop dancing partly inspired by the old school styles, many of them focusing on upright dancing as opposed to breakdancing which is better known for its floor-oriented movements. Some more specific styles of new school hip hop are krump,harlem shake, Chicken Noodle Soup, c-walk, Jigging, tone wop, freaking and hyphy.

Classifying these newer hip hop styles as a unique dance style of its own has grown common with larger street dance competitions such as Juste Debout, which includes new style as a separate category for people to compete in. Many of the newer styles of hip hop are a common sight in today's music videos on television channels such as MTV.

Today, many dance studios offer hip hop classes of some sort. They might focus on a specific style such as breakdancing or combine elements of various street dance styles. As hip hop dancing is such a broad genre, the teacher has much freedom and room for personal interpretation, and often mixes various styles freely, even mixing them with other dance forms such as jazz.

Some criticize this type of teaching as being too strict and too choreographed, losing important elements such as improvisation and personal interpretation on the students' side. Because of this, some dislike labeling these dance classes as "hip hop" as it might not actually include all aspects of the traditional hip hop dances, especially when the teacher mixes it with dance styles not originally related to hip hop.

However, despite the controversy, studio-choreographed hip hop is still widely accepted today, especially by the younger youth group.

Yo yo yo~~Wazzup? Hip Hop?!

The term hip hop (also spelled "hip-hop" or "hiphop") refers both to a musical and cultural genre or movement that was developed by African American predominantly in urban communities starting in the 1970s. Since first emerging in New York city in the seventies, hip hop has grown to encompass not just rapping, but an entire lifestyle that consistently incorporates diverse elements of ethicity, technology, art and urban life. There are four fundamental elements in hip hop: hip hop dance (breakdancing), urban inspired art (graffiti), DJing and MCing.

During the early 70s, a Jamaican DJ called Kool Herc arrived in New York City. Herc introduced the Jamaican tradition of "toasting," or boasting impromptu poetry and sayings over Reggae, Disco and Funk records. Herc also was the originator of break-beat deejaying, where the breaks of funk songs—being the most danceable part, often featuring percussion—were isolated and repeated for the purpose of all-night dance parties. Later DJs such as Grandmaster Flash efined and developed the use of breakbeats, including cutting.



DJ Grandmaster Flash, one of the architects of hip hop DJing.


Herc's idea was soon widely copied, and by the late 70's a myriad of DJ's were releasing 12" cuts where they would rap to the beat. Popular tunes included Kurtis Blow's The Breaks and The Sugar Hill Gang's Rapper's Delight.

Hip hop as a culture was further defined in 1983, when former Black Spades gang member Afrika Bambaataa and the Soul Sonic Force released a track called Planet Rock. Instead of simply rapping over disco beats, Bambaataa created an innovative electronic sound, taking advantage of the rapidly improving drum machine and synthesizer technology. Many credit the sensation caused by the track as the defining moment in hip hop music and culture. The mainstream media began to focus on one of the greatest impacts of hip hop; instead of fighting with guns and knives, former gangmembers had a new way of battling--though break dancing, rapping, turntable mixing, and tagging (graffiti). By 1985, youth worldwide were laying down scrap linoleum or cardboard, setting down portable stereo and spinning on their backs in tracksuits and sneakers to music by Run DMC, LL Cool J, the Fat Boys, Herbie Hancock, Soul Sonic Force, Jazzy Jay, Egyptian Lover, Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde, to name a few that I know.

Early hip hop has often been credited with helping to reduce inner-city gang violence by replacing physical violence with hip hop battles. Many believe that in later years (with the emergence of commercial and gangsta rap during the early 1990s) the emphasis on non-violence has come full circle, with many rappers boasting about weapons, crimes and violence. Within this time period, hip hop music has also begun to appeal to a broader demographic.



Within the culture of hip hop, some differentiate between heavily commercialized and "underground" or "alternative" hip hop. Many artists are now considered to be alternative/underground hip hop when they attempt to reflect what they believe to be the positive roots of the culture. Artists such as Mos Def, Talib Kweli, Dilated Peoples, Dead Prez and Jurassic 5 claim to emphasize messages of unity, activism and verbal skill instead of messages of violence, material wealth and misogyny.

Hip Hop is considered as a new cultural appears in this new world, especially in this new generation. There are more interesting to share about Hip Hop, such as the dance, music, fashion, theatre and the beat in my next blog! Don't miss it!

Monday, December 04, 2006

分享爱

人必然是因某种缘而生活着。
与好人交往,会染上好心;与坏人交往,会染上坏心。
不论多麽善的好人,一旦入了恶的世界,两三成会变成恶人。
所以我希望要找好人。
在人间社会里,最根本的是心。
不是金钱,不是地位,也不是荣誉,而是心的世界。
正因为如此,所以我希望要贯彻以真心对真心。

如果真正地爱上一个人,
那就要通过这个人把自己已逐渐地扩大到爱整个人类,
使自己成为更坚强`更高达`更深刻的人。
恋爱归根结底只能是与该人相称的恋爱。
友谊也同样如此。只有磨练了自己,才能结成美好的纽带。

恋爱在某种意义上有着像是乘上没有闸的车子的一面。
你想下去而下不去,你后悔车子也不会停。
自以为是自由的,但往往是自己变得最不自由了。

真正的爱情,并不是互相依赖,
只能在坚定的“自立的个人”之间产生。
浮浅的人,只能是浮浅的恋爱,
要想真正的恋爱,就要认真地建立自我。
这不是跟随对方,也不是追求虚荣`装潢门面。
美好的恋爱,只能在诚实的`成熟的“自立的个人”与“自立的个人”之间产生。
所以重要的是磨练自己。

逃避进恋爱,实际上不尽是快乐,
反而更加痛苦,徒增悲伤。
因为不管你怎么逃避,也逃避不了自己。
如果自己软弱,逃到哪儿也只有痛苦。
自己不改变自己,就不会有快乐。

日常生活是朴实的,平凡的。
每天的努力奋斗是艰苦的,不可能尽是快乐。
相比之下,比如说恋爱似乎又激动`戏剧性,
觉得自己好像变成了小说中的主人公。
但是,如果是“因为没有意思”,而脱离了应走的轨道,
跳进了恋爱,那只是逃避。这就好像做梦。
你在做梦的时候,你会认为梦是真的。

Sunday, December 03, 2006

摩登女子。。。灰色心事。。。

摩登女子。。。

新世纪女性的另一种说法
独立。。理想。。事业。。
坚强信念。。男女平等。。
已是现代女性的主要象征
不再只是妻子和母亲的身份

灰色心事。。。

女人怎样还是不比得上男人
懦弱。。任性。。自恼。。
感情用事。。无中生有。。
表面坚强稳重内心却脆弱
总是有无数的心事埋藏深处

我对D说:我们可以识命,但缺不可认命。放弃就是逃避。
D回我说:虽是女人,可是我们要的生活是在我们掌握之中。

突然想起一首歌:

哦~算了吧!
就这样忘了吧!
该放就放,再想也没有用
傻傻等待,他也不会回来
你总该为自己想想未来。。。

珍惜。。。自爱。。。会让我们生活得有价值和丰富。
瞬间瞬间创造历史。。。让自己生活得更精彩和无悔。

林忆莲…夜色无边

昨晚,双D, Ryan C和我到云顶观赏了这场精彩的演唱会。

没什么办法,能够让我去形容我对此演唱会的感想。。。

只有这几个字。。。


着迷~当她出现在舞台上,散发了帅气和年轻活力。


疯狂~当她接着为我们演唱一连串多首的经典歌曲。


高潮~她把多首的劲歌和热舞一一呈献得十分完美。


迷恋~随意点歌的环节,她的歌声让我们陶醉其中。


演唱会后,我们有如喝醉酒似的,滔滔不绝的离开现场。


脑海里不断浮现她的样子,口中不断唱着她的歌。

Sandy! 为你我受冷风吹。。。将是我们的主要回忆。。。!