Monthly Archives: May 2009

Daily Scribble

Old friends

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It has been many years since I spend time in Toronto.  Last time I came back for my friend’s wedding, I only stayed for a weekend.  I did not even have enough time for my family, so I could not see most of my friends.  I saw many friends in the wedding, but it is hard to talk during the banquet.  It is too noisy and has too much distraction to talk about work, family and life in general.  It takes a relaxing environment to talk about those touchy topics. This time I came back for another friend’s wedding and staying almost a week and I finally have the chance to catch up with them. My schedule is fully booked everyday to have lunch, dinner and drinks after dinner with my old friends.

We went to school together, we are about the same age, we are experience the same stage of life, so we share many common worries. I envy some aspect of their life and they envy some other aspect my life. It seems grass just is always greener on the other side. Some of my friends stuck in a technical job with relatively good pay but not much visibility about the future in ten years just like me. Some of my friends starting start-up to pursuit their dreams. Some of my friends left the industry and working on something totally different. Talking to my friends gives me some thoughts about my life plan and at the same time makes me learn to treasure the gifts I already have.

Out of all my friends, one made a pretty interesting career move. Guess what, he started a condom shop! We are all wondering, does he QA all the products sold in the shop himself? Maybe that’s why he never bring his girlfriend to the reunions. He knew we will ask very embarrassing questions. We are a whole bunch of engineers after all.

Daily Scribble

In memory of Charlie

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charlie

Charlie Chan-Ma (1995-2009), after several months of suffering from cancer, it left us quietly yesterday.  Charlie is the most adorable and most lovely Golden Retriever in this world.  Living with it changed my view on dogs and pets.  I used to hold the traditional Chinese view on dogs, which have only two functions, guard the house and as a delicacy.  Meeting Charlie let me know the love of dogs and learn to be a responsible pet owner.

Charlie was Pat’s dog, it grew up with her and married along with her into the Chan’s family. I became Charlie’s step father and I was helping Pat to take care of it. I met Charlie on the same day I first met Pat. Charlie was our match maker. It was a church group BBQ gathering on a beach. My first impression about Pat was the girl with a big dog. “Does your dog eat chicken wing” was my pick up line. I always had been allergic to dogs since a little kid, but I didn’t have allergy on Charlie. Charlie witnessed me and Pat getting together and walking into the church. We wanted to make Charlie our ring bearer in our wedding ceremony, but too bad it was already too weak to stand up for a long time and walk the aisle along with us.

Pat and I had many memories with Charlie. We went to cycling in Stanley Park with Charlie running behind our bicycle. We had ice-cream in Denman Street and used Charlie as my food stool. Charlie was the perfect foot warmer in a cold winter night when watching TV. We spent many great time walking it in the park, played fetch and caught with Charlie. Charlie also took away many of my first times. My first time picking up his poo; my first time cleaning up his mess on the carpet. It also took away my kiss on my wedding day before I kissed the bride.

In memory of Charlie, I always wanted to turn its body into a dog skin rug, like those tiger skin rug, for our sofa (Pat is dropping sweat while reading this line). Pat doesn’t think it is a good idea plus it is already too late, the body is already cremated. Maybe we could name our future son Charles Chan in memory of Charlie. If there is reincarnation, I believe Charlie will incarnate to be our son to continue the predestined affinity.  Goodbye Charlie, may you rest in peace.

Daily Scribble

Missing chapters in college days

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Block university has a applied disablity study program that is related to Pat’s studies in autism, so we drove to St. Catherine to take a look at the university campus.  Comparing to the huge campus of UBC, Block seems very small.  Even SFU or Waterloo seems big comparing to the several connecting buildings that is all of Block’s campus.  The university campus store can tell you a lot about the character of the university.  I checked out the textbook of the philosophy courses;  I think Block’s philosophy department is much tougher than SFU’s.  The readings are mostly original materials, unlike the comprehension textbooks use in SFU.

When I am browsing the titles in the university bookstore, I realized what I missed in my college days.  Like those portrayed in movies or novels, university suppose to be a place for the quest of knowledge.  Students should carry those thick wordy books around, then they sit under the sun and talk about the wildest ideas.  They would have many complaints against the society, the government, the corporate, basically complain about the adult world in general.  They dream about the future and talk about how they would make a change.  Thinking back what I have done in my university days, it seems my time outside of classroom are mostly wasted.  I just spent endless nights playing Warcraft with friends in the computer lab, went to Karaoke and get drunk on the many weekends.  I should have read more books, pretend to be more intellectual and maybe even join some movement for a noble cause.