This morning, I rushed to the classroom, but the door was not open when I arrived. Ru and Yo were waiting outside and we wondered why Q didn’t come to open the door. Then H called K, and K came quickly. I went to get coffee downstairs at 7/11 while we were waiting. K told me that F told her that he wanted to come to our lesson, but he was sick and went to the hospital, so we worried about him a little.

My students surprised me because they bought and/or borrowed books on their own. They are all so hardworking, and everyone is good at something: Ru is good at intuiting what new words mean; Yo is good at listening and pronunciation; H is good at practicing and research. I learn so much from my students. They’ve always been so patient with me, and they give me so much support and encouragement.  

Teaching is the best way to learn. Now I know simplified Chinese characters which I didn’t know before. I also learned from my mistakes in Japanese when I was teaching. What more could I want? Should I go to the orientation for teaching kids English? I thought that maybe another teaching job would give me an opportunity to learn more, but I am not sure if I would like preparing for events such as Christmas and Halloween if a language school asks the teachers to. I am selfish with my time, and see no point in participating in activities I am not interested in.

Do I like what I write? I checked the blogger who gave me a like today. I don’t find her writing interesting, but her writing is similar to my writing.  Or I just don’t like to see a person write the same way I do. I started to follow her anyway because I thought it’s good to read other people’s writings.

The recital is coming up; I have to practice until I get it right. I want to work on the rewrite of my old script too, but when will I ever finish it?

S is going back to Taiwan tomorrow. I forgot to pay her the money for the dictionaries she bought me. I feel bad because I asked her to bring six dictionaries for my class, but I forgot to pay her!!! I feel so stupid and I hope she still has enough cash and will get home safely.

I don’t know why I feel I need to read Kant, but I just feel it’s okay to read him and fail than not to read him at all. I asked R to help me with a translation of Kant’s book yesterday, and he replied to my message this morning saying “You must be very ambitious!” What does that mean? Because I don’t feel I’m being ambitious. I just want to know how Kant did it, how he came up with the understanding that what we interpret in we see is not real unless it’s justified in a scientific system.

I will go to bed early today! Then I’ll know what I should do with my “ambition” tomorrow after I have a good night’s sleep. I know I have overextended myself, but I will not whine. I’ll just take my life one step at a time, and try to remember one irregular German verb a day.  I will tap dance it.

The three books I bought today were: a book about Mandarin used in Taiwan which Ru recommended, a German phrase book, and a book on photography. I like the photography book that talks about the basic stuff LB told me about.