2008 Beijing Olympics closing ceremony farewell song “Hard to Say Goodbye” ???? by Liu huan, Jackie Chan, Emil Chau and Andy Lau
Today is the last day of 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. Here’s the theme song for the closing ceremony. you can watch the opening theme song “You and Me” here.
.Song Title: Hard to Say Goodbye ???? (Nan Shuo Zai Jian)
Performed by : Liu huan, Jackie Chan, Emil Chau, Andy Lau
Bejing Olympics 2008 - It’s Hard to Say Goodbye Beijing Olympic closing ceremony press conference
The Chinese Olympic team had good results in the Beijing Olympic Games, this excites many Chinese.
In a blink of an eye, tomorrow is the closing ceremony of the Olympic Games and it will be also a gathering of mega-stars. Jackie Chan, Andy Lau, Emil Chou and Liu Huan appeared together at Beijing Olympic Center for a “Goodbye Olympic” press conference.
Jackie wore a “Olympic volunteer” T-shirt as he lead the rest to distribute flowers and applause those workers leaving the Olympic Games.
The closing ceremony theme song ‘Nan Shuo Zai Jian’ (Hard to Say Goodbye) will be sang by Jackie, Andy, Emil and Liu Huan, the song is composed by the Beijing Olympic committee head Wang Pin-jiu whom got his inspiration from the opening ceremony where he saw singers from Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan were singing while the audience are exiting, these popular singers had discard their name and fame, waiting for 7 hours for their performance, watching the opening ceremony telecast on a small TV, all the sportsmen stand up to show their respect during the flag raising ceremony, all these images leaves a deep impression in his head.
When reporters asked the four singers whether they watch the Olympic Games, they gave their answers.
Andy said: “I watched almost all the competition on TV, the Chinese baseball team leaves me the deepest impression, although they are not champion, but can feel their love for this sport. They trained for 9 years, but baseball will not be featured in the next Olympic Games, all of them kissed the ground at the end of the competition, this is very touching.”
Before the era of Web 2.0, musicians have little opportunity to gain exposure. Their option of showing off their talent is quite limited, where they have to perform live on stage or busk on streets to get attention, which can be very inconvenient and time consuming. The chance for them to gain fame and publicity is very slim. (Last time I gave a flower to a violin playing girl in Budapest, Hungary. She didn’t kiss me back)
Nowadays, musicians can post the videos of their performance on their vlogs (video blogs), and distribute them over the Internet. Anyone with internet connection can gain access to their work. Some of the lucky ones gain media attention and become the stars of internet.
One of them is Philip Howells (philipmaestro), a self taught young pianist who makes recordings of himself playing pieces from Final Fantasy and posts the videos on YouTube for people to watch. He marked his first personal achievement on public television when BBC made a report about him on 20th of December 2006, as shown below:
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Unfortunately, YouTube has suspended his account for no apparent reason. Most of the videos were lost. Luckily, he has created a new YouTube account. If you are interested to follow his Vlog, here’s the link.
Music Vlog does not limit itself to private performance at home. Sometimes, public performances are recorded and put on Vlog for people to enjoy. Look at Aerith, she’s playing her own Final Fantasy theme song at a concert:
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Sorry guys, I can’t resist but to post the video of my favourite piano performance: Summer Snow (the original song is sung by Sissel)
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Piano is not the only music instrument featured on vlog. If you have the chance, don’t forget to check out some of the electone (electronic organs produced by Yamaha) performances, which can be quite awesome. The next video is Voyager, which was performed on Yamaha Electone EL-700
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Don’t think that only amateur musicians use Vlog. Nowadays, professional artists have their own video channels to promote their work. The next video features Umberto a.k.a. e-motions, a singer-song writer from Germany. You can dig more about him on his official YouTube channel and website.
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I think there is a need to promote and support our local musicians, so now I want to present you my multi talented blog pal KCLau. He has created a special blog called Klavier Creation to promote his music work. This blog also gives tips on how to produce and market music composition, which is quite useful for some musician wannabes. For your information, KCLau has launched two solo albums before, they are Kite Shepherd (2002) and Simple Melody (2003).
I think his piano composition is nice and soothing. Here’s one of his original songs played on electronic piano, Rose Wine:
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Another talented Malaysian artist is namewee. He makes highly controversial music videos that challenge social sensitivity and norms. Nevertheless, his music and video editing is superb, even my film-making neighbour Lucas praised his video.
It seems like Malaysian government will hunt him down for making ultra sensitive music videos. Here’s one of his famous (controversial) songs, Muar Chinese (warning: the video might not be suitable for minors)
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This week I stumbled upon Blue, a local blogger from East Malaysia. After chatting with her, I learned that she also posts her singing videos on her vlog. She also recommended me to dig Speaking Tomato, another local singer-song writer. Go and have a look and support our local talents
Finally, I would like to conclude that vlogs have revolutionized our experience of enjoying music. Through vlogs, music lovers can find their idols and musicians can share their masterpiece with the world. I hope you enjoyed reading this short introduction on music vlogging. Let’s end this post with a very cute, kawaii music performance (sorry QiaoYun, I can’t resist ).
Should we tolerate homosexuality, transsexuality and adult incest?
I have posted a highly controversial and thought provoking topic on an active online forum, and I got quite a lot of interesting replies. I shall post some of the forum replies here, after filtering off some of the irrelevant, religious, repetitive, meaningless and rude posts.
Here’s the first post:
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relax:
Many people are discriminated just because they live a life outside social and religious norm.
Should they be given a chance of sunshine and live the life they choose without threats from moral police and witch hunters?
So far homosexuals and transsexuals are gaining more basic rights but biological sibling marriage is legal only in Sweden.
Tell me your opinion on this issue. Be rational
(don’t hit me. Hit the message, not the messenger)
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This is the result of the opinion poll, after 4 days of discussion:
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Here are some of the selected replies:
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[Live_Autopsy]:
I wouldn’t really group those three together.
They make an odd batch.
Transexuals and Homosexuals should be free to live their lives.
Nothing about them is harmful to themselves, each other or society as a whole.
However, Incest is illegal for a good reason.
It’s proven that incest causes multiple diseases and deformity in offspring.
Look at the British Royal Family.
Centuries of inbreeding have caused severe issues in the physical and mental health department.
King George III for example.
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DarkKing123:
I suppose if those who desire to participate in Incest made legal contracts/vows/what-have-yous making certain that they would not produce, I wouldn’t see a problem with it from a legal standpoint.
However, I personally still feel it to be wrong, but that’s just my opinion.
I’m sure others view my sexual fetishes and how I live my life to be wrong.
People are innately judgemental, as annoying as it can be, it can’t be helped.
What social norms are you referring to? It is really hard to pin point an exact social norm when society varies from where you live. Since when did “religious norms” become the bar standard for society? By religious norms I assume you must mean Anglo-Christian norms because if you went by other “religious norms” such as Buddhism, then homosexuality or transexuality would not be considered deviating. Of course, if you went by Buddhist standards, then Christians and mostly everyone would be considered wayward xD.
Incest is completely different from homosexuality and transexuality. It has been scientifically proven that incest causes a multitude of genetic problems. A previous poster evidenced the British royal family which is a good example. In fact the whole of European royalty has suffered from inbreeding. Remember the bad case of hemophilia in the European royalty’s lineage? Also look at the Amish, inbreeding there have bred birth defects.
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Grand Inquisitor Squid:
How dare you lump incest in with homosexuality and transexuality…?
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Daemon of Skorm:
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Just a side note: I an undecided on incest. I know I should be very liberal minded, but it just doesn’t quite feel right to me yet. I have no idea how I could love a family member that way. However, like the sign says, I will not try to revoke their rights because of my beliefs. I do not condemn them.
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Triste-chan:
Birth Defects caused by incest are really only likely to occur after many generations of incestuous breeding. If you screw your brother, basically, and he gets you preggo, it’s unlikely that your kids will have eleven toes. But if your kids marry each other, and then your grandkids marry each other, your great-grandkids have a much better chance of getting these defects.
But I don’t see a problem with any of these things, although I think people in incestuous relationships should think long and hard before having any children.
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Karismas:
don’t care about homosexuals and transsexuals. although I don’t support them I don’t have anything against them.
and incest is disgusting.
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error[dot]exe:
[Live_Autopsy]:
However, Incest is illegal for a good reason.
It’s proven that incest causes multiple diseases and deformity in offspring.
Look at the British Royal Family.
Centuries of inbreeding have caused severe issues in the physical and mental health department.
King George III for example.
Do we stop people with genetic diseases or with a family history of genetic diseases from getting married?
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Shaviv:
Triste-chan:
Birth Defects caused by incest are really only likely to occur after many generations of incestuous breeding. If you screw your brother, basically, and he gets you preggo, it’s unlikely that your kids will have eleven toes. But if your kids marry each other, and then your grandkids marry each other, your great-grandkids have a much better chance of getting these defects.
But I don’t see a problem with any of these things, although I think people in incestuous relationships should think long and hard before having any children.
The risk of harmful recessive genes turning up is higher among first-gen consanguineous matings. It’s not a sure thing, but then again, what ever is?
That said, you both have to carry the gene, for the trait to manifest. If neither of you has the gene for brittle bones or hemophilia, children won’t have those problems.
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Happy Abortion Day:
You boring little shit. I thought this thread was a thread saying we shouldn’t tolerate queers, trannies and cousin ********. cry Honestly, who gives a fuck if siblings or cousins want to do the dirty deed? Let them. It doesn’t affect anyone.
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iXenu:
Happy Abortion Day:
You boring little shit. I thought this thread was a thread saying we shouldn’t tolerate queers, trannies and cousin ********. cry Honestly, who gives a fuck if siblings or cousins want to do the dirty deed? Let them. It doesn’t affect anyone.
Except their baby who has 12 toes and one ear. ^^
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Marshal67:
It seems to me that a lot of people are being very hypocritical in this thread.
We should be tolerant of all people, but incest is creepy…that makes a ton of sense now doesn’t it.
As far as people saying “how dare you lump homosexuality and transexuality with incest!” I say why not. They are all three things looked down upon by society, they are in that group together without us doing it.
Now, I do believe homosexuality and trans gendered people should be tolerated and alloted their rights. As far as incest, it is a sin and expressly forbidden in the Bible (see Leviticus 18:6). However I cannot find a condemnation of it in the New Testament, so who knows, under the new laws it might not be a sin. As for me, I will stick clear of it till greater people that I uncover the truth.
This does not mean that it should be illegal though. Just because I believe something to be sinful and condemnable does not mean everyone should be held to the same standards I am.
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Shaviv:
Makes sense to me. I think we should be tolerant of all people, but furry lifestylers are creepy. Would I tolerate them, as in, sit on the same park bench? Well, if they didn’t smell bad, yeah, probably. Do their spiritual beliefs make me uncomfortable, if only for having to restrain my laughter? Yes.
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Ianikha
Do those three things really fit together?
I think that homosexuality and transexuality is perferctly fine. I know a lot of people that are homosexuals and a few that are transgender and they’re all wonderful, brilliant people. Much nicer than most of the population as I find they are the least likely to judge other people.
I’m not really sure when it come to incest as it’s one of those things that you just can’t understand until it happens to you really, I certainly wouldn’t understand what falling for my brother or sister would be like… really can’t, makes me feel uncomfortable I guess… I personally don’t think it’s right but I don’t think I’m anyone to judge if it’s wrong or not.
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Milendil:
There is nothing wrong with trans gendered people, homosexuals, or incest, in my opinion. I believe that people can be which ever gender they feel most comfortable with and that they should love whomever they want. I find none of it creepy or wrong. And I just don’t understand why some would consider all of that creepy or wrong.
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MiniSiets:
I see in this thread that there is a profound misunderstanding of how the genetics of incest work. Incest =/= instant retarded babies with 1 ear and 4 eyes. Anyone who claims this is ignorant. Because of the fact that recessive genes can be overridden by dominant genes, many defective genes can be encoded into your DNA without you even suffering any of their effects. This is because if a harmful recessive gene is introduced into your genome, it can be paired with a dominant gene which is not flawed, and therefore overrides the recessive gene while it continues to remain in your body. Thus, you can carry defective genes for many generations without suffering any consequences from them. The problem is that when you have sex with a close relative, they share many of the same genes as yours including those defective genes, so the fetus often has a more likely chance of pairing two of the same harmful recessive genes together, and then you have a problem.
So the question becomes, how much greater are those chances? Well it all depends on the genetics of your family. The bottom line though is that incestuous sex isn’t inherently destructive simply because that’s the way it is. In fact, if your family has had a relatively clean gene pool for several generations, then chances are you could have sex with your sister many times and still never get a handicapped baby. In most first generations of incest, the chances of birth defects are only slightly increased and still not likely to crop up unless you were to continue through multiple generations where the gene pool becomes more and more limited and the recessive genes begin to appear. In a recent scientific study in fact, it has shown that the percentage of birth defects among first cousin couples is only 4-7% as opposed to a “normal” couple’s 2-3%, which isn’t a significant enough margin to be freaking out over.
Of course, all of these statistics are pretty meaningless anyway because in this day and age an incestuous couple can just wear condoms or take birth control pills and problem solved. There really isn’t any significant justification against it. So I say yes to all 3.
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TheKiy:
I’m of the opinion that the state has no business of the sexual escapades of consenting adults (Incest and Homosexuality).
And transsexuals need to have a psychological evaluation before they have life-altering surgery, so I don’t see any problems there.
Anything that does not cause harm should be permitted. I’m going to regret saying that when some more creative person proves me wrong.
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JettaKD
I think that while people are free to believe in standards of right and wrong, they shouldn’t force those standards on other people (unless the other people themselves are doing something harmful >.> wink That prolly made no sense…
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Cancer Causing Gods:
“FIap”:
Gay is okay.
Incest is kinda gross, I’m not gonna lie.
So are interspecies relationships. (I’m looking pointedly at your sig on this one. Human + vampire/werewolf = fucking gross, man. The one passage in Vittorio nearly made me hurl.)
On the actual topic, I stand by my old, honored philosphy: Whatever gets ya off. What other people do or don’t with their genetalia isn’t my business unless they are or plan on doing it to/with me. Which hasn’t ever happened to me, except with my boyfriend.
On transsexuality, I stand by the right of people to be who they are. I know if it were me, I’d be pissed as hell if people tried to tell me, “No, you can’t do this, because everything you’re feeling is wrong.”
Generally speaking, I don’t tell people that what they feel is wrong, because I’m not in a position to properly examine how or what they feel.
(Unless it’s something like, “I feel that the earth is flat.” Then, of course, I’m going to say, “Well, it isn’t.” But that’s a different story.)
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CrystalStarLight77:
I think just inbreeding not incest should be illegal, because if incest couples that just take the neccessary measures to not have a baby then what is wrong with it? What about lesbian or gay incest couples who are incapable of having a baby? As long as its two consenting adults wanting a caring and responsible relationship, while avoiding inbreeding, I don’t see anything wrong with it. If a couple is really in love, why break up or discriminate against that love over something that can be avoided by using birth control?
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MiniSiets:
And by the way, incest is not a choice. You can’t help who you fall in love with, or who you are attracted to. Sure, you can choose to have sex with them or not, but the same goes for homosexuality or anything else.
Shaviv:
The risk of having a child who will eventually grow up to show symptoms of a chronic psychotic disorder is roughly one in one hundred.
I don’t know you, I don’t know your family, but if neither you nor any of yours is one of those one in a hundred children, then you don’t understand that one in a hundred births is a devastatingly high rate of incidence for a crippling disability. The cost in money is very high, as each person requires long-term care that may cover a decade of life - including inpatient treatment, sometimes, and that is ridiculously expensive. The cost in human suffering… I would compare it to what you would see if one out of roughly every hundred people was simply murdered, a bullet to the temple from someone unseen and never apprehended, while crossing the street.
That is not minor.
Again, read above. And by the way, if we’re going to start outlawing on the grounds of genetic risks, then you’re trudging on slippery ground there. Because in order to be fair on this, you would also have to consider outlawing women over 40 being allowed to have sex, or start requiring everyone go through genetic counseling to determine how close their genes are for an exact percentage of birth defect risks and then deny them the right to mate if they’re too dangerous. Statistics show that women over the age of 37 have increased risk of birth defects just as much as cousin couples, and in some cases, worse.
So if your only other argument against incest besides misconstrued understanding of genetics is that it’s “ewwy” or “it’s just wrong,” that’s not going to cut it either. These are the same exact arguments that have been used against homosexuality, and they outright fail.
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Bacodus:
As far as incest goes:
We don’t legally stop two folks who have a seriously high risk (75%+) of having a baby with down syndrome or MD, so, even if the rumors of high chances of birth defects are true, why should we legally stop a brother and sister from taking the same risk? It’s just inconsistent. And there’s little I dislike more than inconsistency. Hell, there are ethical issues in the world of psychology about stopping people with extremely low IQs (mental retardation, hell, I can’t think of the “correct” term I should be using right now) from having sex, shouldn’t the same issues be there for two adults, sound in mind, who happen to be closely related genetically?
If incest stays illegal, should we be able to genetically test folks to make sure they are genetically different “enough” to be given a marriage certificate?
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Fudejinsu:
I don’t have a problem with homosexuality, transexuality, or incest. And about the birth defects and such involved with incest; if they really want to have a child, they could always adopt or visit a sperm bank. They could also use condoms or some other means of birth control to prevent pregnancies. So, there shouldn’t really be any problem with it.
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Bacodus:
Jhawks93:
I’d have to say that homosexuality is fine in my book considering over half my friends are either bi sexual or homosexual. as for trans sexuality i personally don’t care for the thought of it but if you want to change sexes no one should stop you.incest is another story though it causes birth defects and possible mental scarring of the offspring so I view that as wrong (so do most governments so majority rule on that one).
Just because most people believe it is true does not mean it is right. View my arguments above. Do you think the government should test folks to determine their chance of spawning a child with “birth defects” (whatever that means, specifially) before giving them a marriage license? What about the mentally handicapped? Psychology has shown that depression is at least partially related to genetics, should we ban couples with histories of Major Depressive Disorder from getting married?
Disallowing a biological brother and sister from marrying is a slippery slope. The only reason NOT to allow it is the same reason homosexuals can’t get married in most states, because some people feel that they would be “unclean” if their government allowed them to marry.
I’m just glad that transexuals have finally gotten the rights they deserve.
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demonizedchar51:
tho my religons go against homo, bi, and transsexaulity i find nothing against it. i believe that it is their choice and life. most of my friends are not straight but that does not mean i am not their friend. people judge them for being who they r but those people have a limited understanding there for have no right too. i will fight for my friends right to be who they are.i dn’t care wat they are its who they r that matters to me. people force them to feel bad for being that way but i never will. i fight against my my sub-consious judgement of others to keep this syayement true everyday
ask for insest its the same thing its thier choice to do that. u shouldn’t be so evil taward them for it.
as u said were all human no more no less then u. we’re all equal and should be treated as so
but we are intitled to our own opions on the subject. so i feel no anger taward those who say no. tho i may be angry do to principle.
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Madame Maggot:
I believe that if we truly want equality for all people, that we should let people do what they want with their lives.
It’s really none of our business what people do behind closed doors.
How can one preach equality then bash on homo/transsexuals?
Personally, I am Atheist. So religion means nothing to me.
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I hope we can learn something from these interesting replies.
The discussion does not end here, we are just getting started. I hope you are interested to share your opinion on this issue, so post your comment now.
The title of this discussion is: Should we tolerate homosexuality, transsexuality and adult incest?
Should gays, lesbians, trannies (they are also known as rainbow people) and sibling couples be punished or killed like in Iran, or should they be tolerated and respected as in Sweden?
I wish this post will spawn a healthy and highly interactive discussion.
Finally, I shall end this post with a video talking about “tolerance”. Enjoy!
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Freakonomics is a well known, hot selling book authored by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. I wish to do a book review on it, but not in a normal way, as I wish my readers to see it from a different perspective. Some readers of Freakonomics may feel blur after reading the book, not realizing what the book is really about, other than recalling a few stuffs like sumo wrestler, druggies and child’s name. That is a pity because the essence of the book is not really being absorbed by the readers. Today’s post is here to dig up the essence of this book so that readers can better understand and apply some principles behind Freakonomics.
Freakonomics is about applying some economics principles, the driving mechanism behind most of the things in our life, to analyse various issues such as crime and education. The issues mentioned in the book are quite controversial and “freaky” (it talks a lot about crime) but the truth behind the issues is related to economy. Look at the cover of the book. It shows a green apple with the flesh of lemon. The apple resembles the issues we see from outside based on conventional wisdom, and the lemon flesh is the causes of the issues, which might not be something we expect. This book does a very good job in telling us that conventional wisdom may not be true, and we should study the research data behind the issues to make accurate conclusion.
Here are the chapters of Freakonomics:
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1. What do Schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common
This chapter mainly talks about incentive. People respond to incentives, both positive and negative. Positive incentive, such as reward, prize and toys, can serve as encouragement for people to do something; Negative incentive, such as punishment, high cost and beating, can act as deterrent to prevent people from doing something. If I sell nice laptops for only 50 bucks with free gifts, many people will rush to buy them from me, because the low price and free gifts are attractive incentives and people respond to it positively. Harsh punishment for certain criminal acts will “scare” most people away from committing them (unless they are risk takers) as people respond negatively to such negative incentive.
The Authors of Freakonomics use this principle to show that schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers cheat as they are responding to positive incentive (reward). Teachers cheat by making their students’ grade looks better so that they can get reward for “improving school performance”. Likewise, sumo wrestlers cheat by making complot with other wrestlers as the reward for the winners is very great. The same “incentive principle” can also be applied to explain why people go to the extend of breaking laws, such as politicians going corrupt, companies lying to the public and people avoiding taxes.
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2. How is the Ku Klux Klan like a group of real-estate agents
This chapter highlights the power of information, and how information is abused to benefit certain people. When there is an imbalance of information (which is known as information asymmetry), one side of two parties will gain an upper hand over the other. We depend on the service of experts, as they know more than us in certain field, but how do we know if they over charge us for their expertise? Are they doing their job properly? We can’t know for sure as we are lacking the information that they have.
The authors point out that some real-estate agents abuse such knowledge imbalance. The way they sell the clients’ houses is different from how they sell their own houses. There is no incentive for them to try to sell the clients’ houses with higher price since they don’t get much profit from doing so. In fact they try to persuade us to lower our price. That’s not really a good service but such information imbalance enables them to cheat.
The authors also show that Ku Klux Klan (a group of conservative white Christian extremists) benefits from information asymmetry. They have their secret rituals, which are not known to the public. Their overall secrecy creates public fear, which give them power over common folks. When someone openly exposed KKK’s secret rituals (on radio), KKK suddenly lost their influence as their aura of mystery vanished. Similarly, internet enables information transfer so that people can know more stuff that was once held by “experts”. Such “exposure” of information reduces the information imbalance, and causes the prices of experts’ service to collapse.
Information is power, and power corrupts.
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3. Why do drug dealers still live with their moms
This chapter has two gems.
The first one is that many organizations have pyramid like structure of monetary status. Only the top person, such as the gang leader or big boss, will get a lot of incentives (huge pay), while those low ranking foot soldiers who lurk at the base of the pyramid get very little. That is why many low ranking drug dealers have to live with their moms, because they have no choice, they can’t get their own home because their earning is so low, even though drug business is highly profitable. Most of the money is channelled to the ones on top.
This is the same as in other industries. Big bosses are overpaid, grade-A actors live a luxury life and so on. The people at the top are given so much incentive because such inequality lures people to the pyramid and stay there as people are eying at the top people. These bottom people have big dreams of climbing the ladder to reach the top, for money or for fame, even if that means enduring harsh condition and low pay. Not bad for a motivational strategy, but pity those not so well known actors, office workers, unknown bloggers and drug dealers, their chance of becoming the top guy is very slim, and they will continue to lurk at the bottom thanks to such inequality of incentive, which sucks people into this rat race like a black hole.
The second gem is about further application of incentive. Drug dealers risk their lives (gang shooting, violence etc.) on the street to sell drugs because the business brings a lot of profit (positive incentive), and they think the incentive is worth such risk. However, when crack (a kind of cocaine drug) price falls due to cheaper production, the profit drops and drug dealers think the danger of selling drugs outweighs the profit. This leads to a drop in drug selling activities, so is the violence related to them. This shows that a change of incentive can change people’s behaviour and crime rate.
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4. Where have all the criminals gone
This chapter is about analysing issues based on data and correlations. Tossing opinions on what causes a problem without verification of data is useless and misleading. Conventional wisdom may be based on logic to analyse an issue but data might show conventional wisdom to be untrue. In this chapter, the authors reveal a shocking truth (to the pro-life zealots of course) that there is a strong correlation between legalizing abortion and a steep drop in crime rate. Well, that’s what data shows, which matters more than conventional wisdom and political correctness.
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5. What makes a perfect parent
Again, this chapter uses data to analyse “good parenting”. It lists out many possible factors that influence a child’s school performance, such as “the child has highly educated parents”; “the child is regularly spanked” and so on. One by one, the authors analyse the factors based on data. Some factors cause the child to do well in school; some factors are correlated to the child’s performance, but might not be the cause (correlation does not mean causation, it might just be an indicator); some factors are not correlated to school performance at all, but they are what conventional wisdom believe in helping children’s schooling. Finally, the overall data show that what the parents are is more important than what the parents do, in determining the child’s performance. For example, the parent’s level of education is more important than how often the parent spank the children. That’s a big hit at conventional wisdom.
This chapter also highlights the importance of making decision based on statistics. Parents fear that the child might die from gun accident, but more relax when come to swimming pool drowning, although statistics shows that there are far more children who die from drowning each year than gun accident. We fear the death of gun accident more than drowning because of “outrage” factor, where the sight of a child being shot by a gun is gruesome and horrifying, making us irrational and not taking proper statistic into consideration. It seems like fear kicks away our rationality pretty easily.
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6. Perfect parenting, Part II; or: would a Roshanda by any other name smell as sweet?
The last chapter is about the trend of naming children. Data reveal that how a child is named does not very much influence his future success, and it shows more about the parents. For example, some children with stupid names like “temptress” and “shithead” got their names from (stupid) parents with low level of education. Parents with higher level of education (who are also richer) name their children differently from low-educated parents. The data also show how the naming trend changes in decades, where “richer” names tend to become “poorer” names when less educated parents name their children after popular “rich” children’s name.
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I hope my summary of Freakonomics will help readers to better understand the knowledge behind this book so that we can apply it in our daily life. I think Freakonomics is very practical, only when we understand it well. The good news is that there will be a sequel to Freakonomics called Superfreakonomics and I think we can have a lot of fun reading it. Let us end this post with a word of wisdom from Steven Levitt, the co-author of this book:
Today bb, the blogger who manages the blog mylongkang.com, gave me an award. He has been reading many Malaysian and Singaporean blogs and out of so many of them, he has chosen The Wise Curve as the deserving award winner. I am surprised and happy to receive such an honour. Thank you bb!
Receiving such recognition is really motivating for a blogger like me. I have put a lot of effort in blogging. Each post is like a piece of artwork, which requires me to invest time and energy to create (except for Tiny Tidbits column). A blog post is just like a film, once it is published to the world, people will be reading it for many years, that is why it is important for me to present my articles as near to perfection as possible.
According to the tradition of this blog award, I have to choose 7 blogs that I sincerely feel deserve the blog award. After reading through many blogs in Malaysian and Singaporean blogspheres, these are the blogs that I recognize as the best blogs, from my point of view:
This blog presents a lot of information about personal finance, where I can learn a lot about saving money, mutual fund investing, retirement planning etc. It is a hidden gem in Malaysian blogsphere. The layout is comfortable and user friendly. KCLau is a helpful blogger and quite down to earth.
This blog is surprisingly nice to read. Sheylara is a multi talented Singaporean girl who lives an interesting life. Her blog is very substantial and entertaining, which is not a surprise since she is a certified pro writer. Her Gamer Girl Friday column is very lengthy but super entertaining just like watching TV. The blog layout is superb and the blogger is very interactive, responding to almost every comment, and sometimes giving free goodies to her readers. Most importantly, she is a very charming person.^_^
This Malaysian blogger openly admit his homosexuality on is blog, which is considered a brave act in a conservative country like Malaysia. He posts a lot of pictures of sexy guys to torture straight guys entertain gays and girls. Some of his stories are quite nice tto read. In real life he is an intellectual guy who loves to mix around with other bloggers.
I have been reading his blog for years. It is entertaining, funny and comfortable to read. His blog posts have a balance of words and funny pictures and his blog layout changes from time to time. Unlike other popular bloggers, Kenny is quite nice and does not like to play blog wars.
This is a major political blog in Malaysia. Although the topics RPK blogs about are dead serious, he manages to add humour to his writings. It is one of the best written political blogs that I have read.
This is a unique Malaysian blog written in Hokkien (a local Chinese dialect) with Roman alphabets. It is really funny to read but sadly, it is now idle
The blog posts are quite thought provoking and I like to join the blog discussion. That’s why I visit this blog quite often. The layout and concept of this blog is quite interesting.
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Now, for those who receive this award, there’s a little “reciprocal” rules that you must do. I didn’t make this rules, so it’s up to you to make a link back to me or not.
The award may be displayed on a winner’s blog.
Add a link to the person who you received the award from.
Nominate up to seven other blogs.
Then add their links to your blog.
Add a message to each person that you have passed the award on to in the comments section of their blog.
Congratulations!
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Finally….
An award is not complete without celebration. enjoy this:
Sarah Brightman moved to tears upon hearing Olympic theme
(BEIJING, August 8) – If you watched the Closing Ceremony of the Barcelona Olympic Games, then you’d surely remember the enchanting voice of British singer Sarah Brightman, who sang the 1992 Olympic anthem “Amigos Para Siempre” with José Carreras.
Sixteen years later, her voice was heard once again at an abandoned factory- turned-movie studio in the outskirts of Beijing with less than four days to go until the Olympic Games Opening Ceremony. Inside this worn studio, the music video for the Beijing Olympic theme song “You And Me” was being secretly filmed with Liu Huan and Sarah Brightman as the lead singers.
Although this will be Brightman’s second time singing the theme song for an Olympic Games, her dedication and excitement still remain strong. She was shocked at having been invited to sing in Beijing, not quite believing that she received the honor of performing an Olympic theme song again. Under the instruction of the music video’s director, Brightman tirelessly repeated scene after scene without any complaints.
Regarding the style of the theme song, Brightman described it as sweet, natural, pure, beautiful and very different from the theme songs of past Olympic Opening Ceremonies. When she heard “You and Me” for the first time, she was moved to tears by its graceful yet simple melody and honest lyrics.
Although “You and Me” is very different from the boundless and majestic style of “Amigos Para Siempre,” there is still some common ground between the two. Brightman noted that both songs have a common theme – unity, people from around the world closely joining together.
She also felt that “You And Me” had a very ‘international’ feel to it, which wrapped its Chinese core. Brightman said that she has always liked Chinese music and hoped to bring an eastern feel to the theme at the Opening Ceremony.
Because singers for the Beijing Olympic theme song weren’t finalized until the last days in July, Brightman and Liu had very little time to prepare for their roles. The Brit looked at the bright side of things, saying that the short time frame meant that instead of contemplating too much on her delivery, she was able to perform the song in a natural manner, probably the best approach she could have taken.
On August 8, Sarah Brightman and Liu Huan symbolically performed to the entire world on top of a model of the entire world, an “Earth” that rose up from the ground of the National Stadium. Brightman said that with the immense height of the stage to distract her, she couldn’t solely focus on singing, which minimalized her nervousness.
Having Liu Huan at her side also helped Brightman. The British artist was full of praise for her partner. She claims that she liked him right from the start because he had a very friendly face. Regarding the chosen piece, both Brightman and Liu said that the easiest songs are sometimes the hardest to sing. Therefore, they both worked very hard to understand the theme song in the days leading up to the Opening Ceremony.
Brightman also commented that sports activity, like music, was very pure and can bring together people of various backgrounds. She hopes that all athletes will be successful in this year’s Olympics and enjoy their 2008 Beijing journey.
