Friedrich Schillers politisch-poetische Analyse des Bürgerkriegs in Libyen und ähnlichen Blutvergießereien

Wo rohe Kräfte sinnlos walten,
Da kann sich kein Gebild gestalten,
Wenn sich die Völker selbst befrein,
Da kann die Wohlfahrt nicht gedeihn.
Weh, wenn sich in dem Schoß der Städte
Der Feuerzunder still gehäuft,
Das Volk, zerreißend seine Kette,
Zur Eigenhülfe schrecklich greift!

Da zerret an der Glocke Strängen
Der Aufruhr, daß sie heulend schallt,
Und nur geweiht zu Friedensklängen
Die Losung anstimmt zur Gewalt.
Freiheit und Gleichheit! hört man schallen,
Der ruhge Bürger greift zur Wehr;
Die Straßen füllen sich, die Hallen,
Und Würgerbanden ziehn umher,

Da werden Weiber zu Hyänen
Und treiben mit Entsetzen Scherz,
Noch zuckend, mit des Panthers Zähnen,
Zerreißen sie des Feindes Herz.
Nichts Heiliges ist mehr, es lösen
Sich alle Bande frommer Scheu,
Der Gute räumt den Platz dem Bösen,
Und alle Laster walten frei.

Gefährlich ists den Leu zu wecken,
Verderblich ist des Tigers Zahn,
Jedoch der schrecklichste der Schrecken
Das ist der Mensch in seinem Wahn.
Weh denen, die dem Ewigblinden
Des Lichtes Himmelsfackel leihn!
Sie strahlt ihm nicht, sie kann nur zünden
Und äschert Städt und Länder ein.

(Vollständiger Text)

a thought to be explored

Emigration to another country is an intrinsically egoistic act. Leaving family and friends behind, separating children from their classmates and grand parents just to accomplish one's own goals. Unsocial and egoistic. (I am excepting those, of course, who are emigrating to save their lives.) For people from poor countries it is often the only way to get ahead, but for those from well-developed countries it is an all the more individualistic act.

Egoism alone is not a problem. It is a natural part of human character and live. But if you have a regular instream of egoists into one country (all leaving their social networks behind), then it's no wonder that this country creates a very individualistic and less social culture.

what's wrong with North Americans?

I don't know if the following is specific for North American dating or just a byproduct of a global trend of superficiality.

From another Blog: Man fells for woman who turns out to be a liar.

Here's the comment which I left on that blog:

I am here as a foreign observer to find out what’s wrong with North American culture. A culture in which people fall in love with what other people say, instead of falling for what they are. It is our greed which enables such exploits. Not a greed for money, but a greed to be awesome, be superior and to be around awesome and superior people. Attraction based on the other’s rank in society (be it their job or education) cannot be true attraction.
Usually the North American system of being confident and showing off one’s awesomeness works pretty well… (and it discriminates against foreigners who have been raised to see modesty as a virtue)… it’s only in cases like this, when we can see that something’s fundamentally wrong with this society. Not just something wrong with the liars, but also with those who go for the superficial awesomeness, instead of profound goodness.

I hope nobody is thinking that I hate Americans. While being critical of many things here, I also enjoy many other things. I've met many people here whom I like. I just point at some of the off-putting situations to find what is wrong. Things which I think do not go as wrong in other cultures as they do here. But since evidence is very anecdotal, what can I say? It is well-established that many immigrants prefer to make friends with people of their own cultural background, but the differences in the cultures are very hard to pin down. As one acquaintance put it Yesterday: "I just find that I am most comfortable in this group of people." And she was referring to a group of people with different Eastern and Western European backgrounds. Not people from one specific culture, but none of them grown-up in North America. Is that my new culture?

life goals and self-worth ~~~ memories from Taiwan

When you think about whether you are successful, whether you are a good individual, whether you are proud of yourself, what are the things you look for, what are the MEASURES that you judge yourself by?
I would guess that for most Western people what they want is the respect of their peers and most people think that financial independence (i.e., having a proper carreer) and a similar life style (i.e., consumption) are the way to be accepted. Increasingly there is also a trend of people identifying themselves with their looks, which can be seen in the rise of beauty surgery. I recently came to think about the cultural difference of life goals and self-image, when I saw a documentary about Africa that stated that for many Africans the number of children they have is the most important thing in life... (which is probably part of the reason that economic progress in African countries is so slow compared to many Asian countries).
Thinking about all this I remembered my (and fellow traveller's) experience with Taiwanese people. It seems that for the Taiwanese, learning is a central part of there self-esteem. In Taiwan you find people working sixty hours a week, but still taking time to study. One of my class-mates (Indonesion of Chinese descent) worked seven days a week to earn money and still came to take classes five days a week. Our teacher, her age not much short of retirement, is still studying for a graduate degree.
Additionally I noticed that while in the West, many things involve quite a lot of technology, in China many things involve a lot of skill. Technology can be bought, but skill has to be aquired.

When I think about my own life, I find that I am also very much attracted to learning and improving skills. I am among those who don't need an iPod or iPhone, who are still working with a five year old computer.
What I value in myself and what makes me happy is what I know and what I am able to do. In that sense, I am a little Taiwanese myself.

Motivationsschreiben einer Freundin

Einfach nur, weil sie es so schön geschrieben hat:

Oktober 1999 war ein kritischer Wendepunkt in meinem Leben. Denn zu dieser Zeit begann ich meine Ausbildung zum Englischlehrer und fing an, Deutsch zu lernen. Anfangs betrachtete ich das Deutschstudium lediglich als eine persönliche Herausforderung. Jedoch mit fortschreitendem Studium wurde mir mehr und mehr bewusst, dass ich nicht einfach nur eine Sprache lerne. Vielmehr erlangte ich neue Erkenntnisse und Einblicke in ein Land gefüllt mit Kultur, Kunst und Geschichte.

Deutschlernen und Lehrkarriere erlaubten es mir, nicht nur die Welt mit einer neuen Perspektive zu betrachten, sondern auch mich selber. Ich bin der Überzeugung, dass man jede einem sich bietende Gelegenheit nutzen sollte, um sein Wissen zu erweitern. Ferner bin ich stets auf der Suche nach Möglichkeiten, die mir helfen mein Potential auszuschöpfen, meine Ängste zu überwinden, meine Grenzen auszuloten und dazu beitragen, mich als Persönlichkeit weiterzuentwickeln. Das Studium an der Sun Yat-sen Universität und im Ausland ist nach meiner Meinung bestens dazu geeignet, all dies zu erreichen.

tear down those hoary relics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_spelling_reform

More on this topic to follow.

the wicketh language

Dear audience,

for today's course, please read the paper Advice for Foreign Students Wishing to Pursue Graduate Study in Computer Science at UCSC by Jim Whitehead.

This paper is only the top of an iceberg, the big issue that I am thinking about. So let's just grab the main points:

• the department of computer science at UC Davis receives many hundred applications from foreign students each year (my remark: so does the University of Toronto and many other schools in North America)
• it is a lot of work to select students out of these masses and that's why students should write applications that make the selection fast and easy
• taking international students is more expensive for a professor and demands more advisory work and more reviews of the student's writings, but still the finished papers of international students are usually not as good as those of domestic students.
  

You might feel that I am misrepresenting these points, but if you read the paper you'll see that he actually repeats them in the paper, so it can't be too unimportant.

Now, an emotional reaction to the paper: If I am, as an international student, going to be an extra burden for my advisor, taking up his precious funding money and his scarce working time, but my work will be worse than other student's work anyway, why then should I go to that great foreign university at all?

Of course, I see that for many students in many countries, going to an international university is seen as a way to get them a degree that will assure them a well-paid job and a save future. And I think it is okay for him, to inform those people about his side of the equation and encourage them to be more responsible when doing their applications. But has he ever thought what impact his writing has on the average shy genius, that wants to go to an international school just because that's the best place to nourish his interests and his talent? Won't that poor shy guy be quite scared by reading such a statement?

Okay, this was the top of the iceberg. When you've finished thinking about it, come on and dive into the deep water.

Imagine you are an international student doing PdD research in a great international university. What do you think about the suggestion that your research will be worse on average than that of domestic students? How important do you think is language for research?

For my part, the researches that I admire most, are also Great Masters of their language. And in Computer Science that means: Great Masters of the English language. Several people come into my mind whose writings I adore for their clarity and also their imagination when it comes to including "real-life" analogies or even making word-plays on idiomatic expressions. And it's true: most of the people that I remember for doing this are native speakers of English. Although there is one exception that I cannot forget, one French engineer who became not only a Great Master of Computer Science, but also a Great Master of the English language. Perhaps the latter is easier for life-savouring perfectionists. Like Bertrand Meyer.

I just can't stop wondering how people like Bertrand or some of my friends who are foreigners in Germany can achieve such a mastery of the language, being better writers and better talkers than many native speakers, while others can spend years of the life in a foreign country and still have some problems with basic communication!

Well, I see that not everyone can be as talented for languages as a Bertrand Meyer and Pavol Kurina. And I know that some people just get frustrated at some point, being misunderstand so often they perhaps give up on improving their language? And if I tell them how important language is then they feel even more bad about themselves and rather want to ignore the subject.

Okay, I know that I can write a positive ending here, but not at this time of day. Thanks for reading up until here and please come back soon to read my optimistic outlook which I'll hopefully write until then.

Yours sincerely,
Jack the foreigner