Author Archives: Rayne

A Pain Reliever

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I was expecting a somewhat lecture-like ppt show to take notes and stuff which I should add to my “advice from seniors” packet. Instead, I was greeted by a warm and casual talk which really did open up my view of life.

I come from a country where people just compete to be “successful” and “intelligent”, and we just go degree after degree after degree before we consider the job market. Due to my status as a transfer student and my change of major, I will have to spend one more semester at Cornell and another semester of gap year before I move one to graduate school, which I have been feeling “ashamed” and “lagging behind other people” for a very long period. I was more than surprised to hear that many people in this seminar, including the professor, have gone through detours that would sound “far more severe” than what I did.

Indeed, I have not seen the world. I don’t know what it’s like. I have been just living in my little world and my little family, trying to read all that would “teach me the most profound things in the world”, but still confined to my stereotyped views. The idea that “do whatever that you are passionate about” was reinforce again, so was that “concentrating on what you are doing right now instead of worrying about the outcome”. But clichés as they look like, examining more closely I hardly really lived like that. I entered a field that I thought is “sacred” in search of the beauty of nature, and although I don’t do everything so passionately like what I would do in some other fields, I still find I am reluctant to leave it at least in the next several years.

However, the seminar did not pass me a message of criticism, but rather gave me some new insights: that I could try to find an aspect that I might be really passionate and excited about in my field–for example, my major could relate to a lot of different things to do, and I can’t say that I don’t like my major just because I am not attracted to some certain aspects to it; there are things that I might find it hard to sleep for! And also, that I could keep an open mind–not entering into academia is not anything to feel ashamed for (at least for myself); I’ll just hang on to what I “currently” want to learn, and “see what happens later”. It is also funny to discover that what professors seek in most undergrads doing research is their reliability and diligence rather than super talents.

Although this is just a mini-seminar and one small source of information (in fact, I am still not totally convinced of what this seminar tells me), but it is definitely a pain reliever to help me get rid of the pressure on me and better live out my life positively and creatively instead of just “dragging along”. Thanks a lot!

 

Humanity repeats itself

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Surely, as a film about the Holocaust, there are plenty of scenes that lingered on in my mind for a few weeks. The arbitrary slaughter of a whole family with no reason, the “line-up and be killed game” happening at every second, the hunger that turned an old man into a robber and made him lick the dirty ground when the food was spilt during the fight, the tears that burst out of Szpilman’s eyes when Hosenfeld hid him instead of shooting him…I didn’t cry as Mag did when she saw the film the first time, but the scenes haunted me on and ever.

However, the greatest sighs this film suggested, for me, is that humanity repeats itself over and over, just like history. The simple but staggering fact was that the Soviet people treated all the Germans very similar to, if not exactly like, how the Germans once treated the Jewish. One might argue that there had not been another bloody massacre, but alas! How many things are underneath the hood that history did not record. Failing to be released by any of the Jewish people he once helped, Hosenfeld died after harsh labour and torture from from a rupture of the thoracic aorta in the Soviet Captivity.

Admittedly there are something that rules the wars in general, which way they’re “good”, and which way they’re “bad”, etc.. But by some analysis, those rules can possibly all be deducted by the conflicts, the battles, and the balances of interests. We appreciate and cherish the fact that there are many people who are kind and sensible, but we also have to see that human minds are easily distorted, and every human being doing horrible things believe nearly 100% that they are righteous and just. We have to admit that there are some corners in every human’s deep recesses of mind that hides a Satan, and once our minds were distorted to the extent that we let them out, they would bring us strange pleasure of attack and hurting. We cannot really define this as anyone’s “fault”, however, since this is how humanity is. In a “less bloody” example as on today’s social media, there are billions of people who, once think they are “at the right side”, and more importantly, “will do all these things anonymously and still retain the interest of themselves”, slander and hurl malicious abuse all around, and–every day. These people, who don’t carry guns or swords, are actually killing, since we cannot hear about too many cases that people die from public rumours–but we cannot just be looking at “these people” in contempt, because anyone in us cannot assert that we are not doing such things ourselves sometimes. The pleasure of hurting, once triggered, could turn a normal person into a devil. And this “hidden evil feeling” is omnipresent, regardless of nationality. But we can’t say arbitrarily that “we must tame and eliminate it to make this world a better place”, because in some extreme cases this devil might be useful–that’s how we live in this world. Like Sisyphus, we are just constantly wrestling with our inner evils, and sometimes disasters happen because we lose control.

We earthly creatures!

One other thing that makes me feel bad about this film was that Szpilman seemed to have forgotten Hosenfeld really quickly and didn’t bother much to search for him. But upon some further research, this might be just how the film was–Szpilman actually searched really hard and still couldn’t change the tragedy; he did many other good things instead. But that’s another story. History is just like a sieve that rushes through every human being, and there are souls who shine after this cruel process, although they may or may not win over the fate that is looming large, which is determined by the behaviour of the mass, rather than the individual.

Painting? But it taught me something

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This activity gave me the chance of realising one of my ideas. I had some arts idea in my mind before, and in this activity I started my project right away.

The most important lesson it taught me was just to keep moving and things might be better at the end. As I set forth a few brushes, I suddenly felt that all that I was doing was utterly disgusting. I felt the urge of discarding it right away. But my dear friends told me to have confidence and move on. I tried my best to mix the colors in my palette and add to the canvas what I thought might be good. I found something beautiful that I have done accidentally. So I went on with the new direction, magnifying the ‘accident’, and my total expectation of my work has changed.

Finally when I stopped painting, the work doesn’t look so ugly as I thought it would before. But it is a completely new outcome from my original imagination. Maybe it is the same with my current career, I thought. Right now I’ve been struggling with the self-perception that I am doing quite badly in the program I am attending. Although my grades are not that bad, I could not see beauty as I thought I would in what I am working on. I am feeling self-hatred sometimes. But maybe it’s just the beginning. Maybe later I would suddenly find something so beautiful that I never discovered in my life, and my direction to go as a career might change–but for good purposes. Maybe I’ll just carry on and try, and something unexpected might emerge.

Finally really thanks to the organisers of this activity. Music and snacks were prepared, and they took the responsibility to clean up the mess–the dirty brushes, the colourful tables, and the like, after we’re all done and gone. This is really not easy.

Looked at them

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This is some introductory show into a discipline I’ve never touched on before. Members of the Cornell raptor program showed us hawks, falcons & owls of different kinds one by one and talked about their various biological features, habitats, diets, etc.. A fact that surprised me is that the raptors were not just randomly collected and kept as zoo animals. What the program members keep are all birds with unknown injuries (that they attained before being collected) that are not suitable for returning to the wild.

Owls particularly attracted my attention for I’ve always heard of owls under some magical and legendary context, whether the famous Harry Potter series or the less-famous ones. A stunning fact was that the size of the eyes of an owl to its skull is similar to a human fist to a human head. That was the result of their being able to turn their heads almost 180 degrees around, since they cannot really turn their eyes so easily. Indeed, every advantage has its reason, and usually it is accompanied by some setbacks…

When an owl was standing for the show, it turned its head just right back and stared at the people taking photos of him. This aroused laughter among us–it’s just peculiarly that we humans find it funny and cute. My wild imagination started to take place, however–they once had stories too. They, as individuals, must have had their legends and romances before they retracted to the organization. Maybe they were nearly dead during a heroic fight. Maybe they determined to give up their lives trying to protect some other important beings. Or maybe they had simply been another victim of the expanding human race. And the features of their body, once so powerful and awe-inspiring, became on display. You can say that this is an inevitable tragedy, but it can hardly be criticized. This is the outcomes of comparison of civilization…

I would guess what the birds are thinking about. Maybe they are secretly weeping about their lives. Or maybe they were laughing at the dramatic situation that they are in–this is so much like the plot in Catch Me if You Can, where the hero soaring in the wild ended up in some sort of demonstration position (except that the birds are not criminals). Or maybe they didn’t really think about anything, just feeling ok to have survived and lived well.

Anyways, thanks to the Cornell raptor program for keeping the wild spirits from other possible unimaginable situations. It is good that we can know more about the birds and at least try to communicate with them.

Peculiar feelings for the pumpkin

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As usual I was attracted to the pumpkin carving activity, for it is in the ‘artsy’ category.

But when the little girls in our group happily stuck the carving saw into the pumpkin, I hesitated.

I felt pain.

It was really sad at this scene. I myself can’t stab the knives into a pumpkin. I felt that it was flesh, fresh, dripping, and even pulsing with all those circulation of cell fluids.

But I did it anyway. I tried to make some nice carving, and made a smiling face on the pumpkin. My friends and I stood before the camera, holding the pumpkin. Cheers.

A pumpkin, unlike clay sculptures, cannot be stored long, and will attract flies. As the only one person living in Rose Main (which is the nearest to the dining hall) in our group, I offered to dump it.

The pumpkin was heavy. When I carried it upstairs it sit in my arms like a baby. It kept the big, carved smile, but it eerily reminded me of the Black Dahlia.

I thrusted it to the trash tunnel, saying ‘sorry buddy’. Dong.

I returned to my room, feeling sarcastic about myself that although I could not even bear carving a pumpkin, I had just failed in my trial of going vegan several days ago.

Sloppy, I called myself, sloppy.

But the mood is far too blue for Halloween. I shook my head, not wanting to continue criticising myself as I had always been doing, and sat down for my homework.

Time with art always flows fast

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Okay, I know my creation from the short 1 hour in Johnson Art Museum could hardly be called ‘art’.

But it’s definitely an immersion. And, although I complained to my friend how ugly my pen pot was due to the fleeting time that I could hardly do any refinement, I still cherished my work and took it back to my room, bought paint and sandpaper, looking forward to doing more things with it.

There is something peculiar about clay. When you see that wet, soft texture, in the prospect that it will become dry and permanent after you do something with it, you feel that you can see everything ahead of you. Everything, birds, flowers, trees, cloud, stars…the ability of creation gives you power, as if you yourself called out “Lux!” at the first day of chaos.

When our instructor started to show us how we could slap the clay onto the table to make a nice smooth slab, in the absence of a clay wheel that we generally see in workshops, my mind wandered back to somewhere around the Palaeolithic era. I imagined myself living in a surrounding with no complicated technology and life was as simple as it could be. I imagined myself being someone in a tribe who particularly makes pottery for a living. New things every day, each piece adding some color and usefulness to life itself.

The imagination could only be a window to touch upon the past. But buried in numbers and data, we seldom sit down and contemplate, trying to touch the texture of life. I have always been a huge fan of various handicrafts, and there is one favourite thing about them that I came up myself the other day. We are curiously fond of making and often making things that would seem permanent, at least compared to our own lifespan. That is probably because our life is too fleeting, and sometimes there are only memories that support us, which could fade. Creating things and letting them stay is like the process of grasping hold of a handful of flowing time and trying to make them frozen. For every piece of handicraft, there is time woven into it, and they support in some sense an evidence of that we had lived, and lived vividly.

Religion and faith from an outsider’s view

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I am a person not affiliated to any religious group. I tried to respect people with religious beliefs, but never with any true understanding. I was shocked by how religious faith could outburst one’s physical and mental strength just out of altruism, in this movie based on a true story.

The power of his religion mainly was represented in two moments on Desmond Doss: the refusal of touching the guns (or, this might also be rooted more from his terrible experience in a family with a father who had traumatic pain due to having been at war), and the super-humanly grit in rescuing his comrades at the Hacksaw Ridge. I could not believe how a man could survive extreme weariness and injuries (Mr. Doss’s hands were blurred with flesh, blood and dirt due to repeatedly sending the wounded down the ridge by simply pulling on the ropes), and bear more than a few times the horror of being killed right away (stabbed by the japs’ bayonet without moving in the process of pretending dead camouflaged by a dead body, running away from a grenade and hiding from the japs in the underground tunnel without a weapon at hand (this theme indeed frightened me), etc., etc.). Mr. Doss was not someone not afraid of death–he was extremely horrified in a number of cases and woke up from nightmares but still tried his best to survive and to save others, and God played such an important role in it.

In my opinion God mainly served as an accompaniment and source of strength. The hardest moment for a human to stick to what he/she is doing is when he/she realised being alone. But provided Mr. Doss’s firm faith, I think he actually believed that God exists, and when he was facing all the difficulties alone, he actually felt that God was looking over him, accompanying him, giving him guide and strength, for he always murmured “God, help me get one more” when he felt that he was almost dead spent in the rescue. No matter how terrified he was, he always smiled and said “Now I get you, it’ll be ok” when he approached the wounded just like he was God himself. It is cliché that human potential can be invoked in extreme situations, but that is especially in the case when someone firmly believes to be accompanied, supported, and given strength by a higher being than the world itself. By inheriting God in one’s heart, one becomes nearer to God.

Not afraid of ‘stalking’ anymore!

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Tonight’s Email Etiquette proves to be really useful. I am recently stuck with finding undergraduate research, because although I am used to ask professors questions after class and build a good relationship with them, I was really intimidated to reach out to professors that never knew me before for a research opportunity. I would like to learn more about the professors, and the usual way I did was to check out the official school website, check out on arXiv, or just search randomly in google. Sometimes I would consider Facebook but I got really nervous of the possibility of intruding into other people’s privacy and leaving a bad impression, since I am not too familiar with the U.S social media system and the usual norms people follow in social interaction.

But today I really learned some useful websites: LinkedIn, Research Gate, and Google Scholar, especially the latter two which I had not even heard of before. Those websites make ‘professional stalking’ safe and welcomed, and could provide information that I had not found previously. Moreover, I learned that looking at other people’s Twitter account when not being their friend is not that ‘bad’ at all, so I can even consider more interactions online when I am doing the ‘stalking’. As for the emails, I personally think I am doing pretty well so far in being polite and nice to others–but one big problem is that I have to learn to be more concise, which I am training myself. The most reassuring technique I learned is about follow-up emails–such a wonderful trick of following up without worrying about possibly annoying others!

Certainly gained more confidence in my research-hunting preparation. Gotta try it out soon!

Far into the deep recesses

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I do not know why I still chose to linger in the Botanical Gardens with so much work on hand.

Maybe it’s the longing to commune closer with nature, even though it’s half man-made.

The most impressive part of the guided trip was in the herb gardens. For the first time in my life I got to go near the herbs that I’d only seen on the scent bottles, in poetry, or in ancient myth. It was a strange feeling, as if the fairy-tales are actually tangibly true, and as if the herbs acted as an Einstein-Rosen bridge (forgive me on the somewhat fancy words, but I really prefer a bridge than a hole here) that connected the ancient times to what we are in now. For the first time I got to pick some tips of the leaves (after begging the pardon of the poor plants), crush them between my fingers and savour the scent. Through the scent my mind wandered to what the ancients thought when they are facing the fragrant herbs.

I came to the Botanical Gardens for the love of plants. But this trip brought me to history. The words from one of my professors were right. History is not just a process of accumulating knowledge. We were just like the bear in the cornfield, gaining as we go along, but losing in the same time. The plants, exploited by us, have stored their memory from generations to generations, but they still grew so tame–but maybe this is another strategy in the battle of survival. This conflict! This co-existence of law of the jungle and so-called poetic beauty! Lost pondering on our reasons of being born.

Quite unsure what I have been writing. Let these insane little articles exist.

Mind wandering astray on life

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On my way back from the Farmer’s Market I read from my WeChat Moments that a senior college student in my neighborhood, on the far other side of the earth, had disappeared, leaving a note saying that he was committing suicide.

I was holding this postcard, full of harvest and vividness, in my hand. I was breathing the cold fresh air. And although I did not speak much during the whole journey with Rose Scholar program members due to the shyness as a newcomer to Cornell, I enjoyed the trip.

The fragrance and juicy sweetness of the fruits are oozing out of the postcard. They are, however, made purely of flame-worked glass, which was something I hadn’t expected prior to visiting the Farmer’s Market as I had thought only fruits, vegetables, food and stuff were sold there. A fan of handicrafts as I myself am, I was more than amazed at the sight of the real artwork on display, far radiant than on the postcard per se.

I was about to sigh “what a sad contrast” concerning the incident happened just far away where I was from. But I held back, too afraid that this would give out an air of schadenfreude, which I meant nothing about. Sorrows happen not only back there, but in every corner of the world. And in the same time, joy and brightness is scattered around the Earth too. The feeling is too complex to depict by words.

I watched people coming and going by the little market pavilion. They are off their separate ways, minding their own business; they are living out their lives, and there was at least an air of calm and contentment on their faces, if not happiness. They are having fun, at least in this transient moment, with life. I guess that the artist doing the flame-worked glass must be loving her job, and in fact I had sometimes thought of making a living by designing and making dresses, rather than going my track on becoming an astronomer, which I always call as being “my dream”.

It was not because of I preferred artwork than astronomy; it was perhaps the difference in pressure. I am new, struggling to keep up, looking for research opportunities, worrying about graduation and PhD degrees, and often hating myself as not talented enough and sometimes even clumsy. Although I always tried to chin up and would not kill myself in any situation right now, I might render myself as slightly understanding what the senior student was suffering from.

This was life. Different life for different individuals, and sometimes resulting in striking and lamentable contrasts. I often genuinely feel that people here in Ithaca reaches more closely towards the essence of life itself. Living, doing things one enjoys everyday, and carrying on as the second hands tick on the calendar. Living with other people in peace and evolve in pleasant conversations, rather than regarding in fear the surrounding as full of predators and competitors. Completing works that one feels satisfied with and displaying them for admiring eyes, instead of toiling under pressure and hurling oneself towards the social-standard ‘success’.

I envy this mode of life. I will try to adjust my life philosophy more to the simplicity of this little town closer to nature. I feel helpless to the young man who was hopeless with life on the other side of the world–I now feel joy and pain mixing together in my heart and the feeling is hard to deal with. I can only hope that all is still well with the young man, and may nature bless Ithaca residents.

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