I’m so proud of the superb performance displayed by the three Asian football teams, the South Korea, Japan and North Korea. The first two teams set up the stages early in the games and beat their opponents convincingly. The North Korean team, had the first show in the World Cup after 44 years, fought relentlessly against the five-star Brazilians in an honorable 1:2 loss. The striker Jong Tae-Se, nicknamed "people’s Rooney", is weaponed with both great strength and pace, who won a header over the Brazilian defender Lucio in the game and contributed an assist to the team. In the second round of group stage, the South Korea and Japan are going to meet Messi’s Argentina and Robben’s Netherlands respectively, two first-seeded teams in their groups, and the underdogs are ready for bigger upset.

While the underestimated teams like South Korea and Japan give the World Cup a new look, some of the traditional great powers lost their groups in the first round. Spain, the European champion, who had not lost any single one in their last 32 games, was defeated by the Swiss. And Italy, on the soaking field, the champion defender came back from behind against Paraguay in a bored draw. Similarly, France and England both leveled the games with Uruguay and the US.

The first round of the football feast held every four years became a little disappointing to many fans. Hope the better teams could find their rhythm in the later stages and contribute more goals to their fans: if they do not got eliminated.

I will still sleep at the old room, tonight, at least, have moved my furnitures and most things to the new place which looks bigger and is more compact. Yes, I miss the old one already.

In the evening, when I went back to get some staff in the old room, I looked up, seeking for the window that belongs to my old room. It probably was the first time I looked at the window from such perspective. It is so plain that even I’ve spent one-year time there, I hardly recognize it. At the window, I used to extending my eyeshot to the people in the street, the tinkling tram decorated by lovely sunshine in the afternoon, or the places as far as my eyes can reach melted amid the dazzling colors at night.

Outside the window, it is the one of the busiest areas of Hong Kong. Inside the window, it is an original place where my happiness sprouted, which perhaps is everlasting to where my memory goes. Everyday, checking text or email is the first thing after opening eyes; saying goodbye on msn is the last thing before closing eyes. There were also tears and sadness, yet it made the feeling more concrete only. The past 223 days are the most delightful moment in my 24-year history. And the room is the witness.

There are lots of things inevitable and out of my control. I don’t even know how long I will stay in Hong Kong, but I do know and remember, at some corner of the fast-pace city, there is a tiny room facing sunshine and carrying imagines.

38th parallel north. last time, it was more than 10 years ago that I crossed from this side to the opposite side. At the time, my deskmate drew a line in the middle of our desk, and we cannot elbow across of the line. I was in the primary school, and had no idea about the Korean War.

On the third day of the trip, I arose at 7 in the morning. After another cold breakfast, we headed for the famous 38th parallel, which is more accurately described as a line through the middle of a 4 kilometer wide demilitarized zoon rather than the border of the North and South Korea. The Korean guide told us there are large amount of wild animals in the demilitarized zoon, because of less human interventions in nearly 60 years.

Apparently, we found other things besides wild animals. Before entering the demilitarized zoon, two North Korean soldiers got on our bus, and the guide explained they were going to protect us. Driving along the walled path, there were deep trenches covered by steel plates running across the path; there were numbers of  boulders fastened on the two sides. In the cold war, the North Korean soldiers could release and drop the boulders to block the path and stop the invasion from their enemy. Military forces withdrew behind the 38th parallel in 1953, but the frozen tension has never thawed.

After a short quick visit to the house in Panmunjom where lots of negotiations were held in the wartime, we arrived at the 38th parallel.

Seven white or blue houses were built on the border of the two countryies, and the buildings at the two sides contrast the current situations of the two countries. Before we came, the place bathed in absolute silence. Birds made piercing noises that disappeared in the siege of cypresses. After the only one or two impluses have been absorbed, the empty sky was again filled with gloom. Both North and South Korean soldiers stood like ice-cold statues and kept straight faces. Later, another group of western tourists appeared at the South Korea side. All the tourists were chatting and taking photos, and the air went slightly amused. This was the only point of vigor in the 4 kilometer wild demilitarized zoon, but the soldiers kept cool.

The second day, I woke up in the caress of sunshine. It was North Korea time 6:30 in the moring, one hour earlier than the Beijing time. The sun had fully risen and was sponging the mist that had filled the upper space of the Taedong river. Our hotel was located on an island of the river. The view out of the window was great, fresh air flowed into the room with warmth. A river makes a city vigorous, even though it is Pyong Yang.

The first breakfast in Pyong Yang was as disappointing as yesterday’s dinner. I asked the waitress for a cup of coffee after I found the German guy beside me was drinking one. She denied. “It is just a cup of coffee!”I insisted. “No, he paid more than you did.” Later, when I chatted with the German guy, he told me he paid almost 5000 Yuan to the travel agency for the trip and it was as twice as my payment.

After breakfast, we got on a bus. There were four Koreans with us: one Chinese guide, one English guide, one bus driver, and one camera man who makes DVD for the entire trip. “You really cannot tell if one of them is from the ministry of the national defense.” One murmured into my ears. The bus took us to all kinds of halls, statues and monuments in the city. Without those landmarks, Pyong Yang is a clean and quiet city. Adding those landmarks in, Pyong Yang is the capital city of DPR Korea.

The rest trip of the day defined North Korea. We first went north to the Exhibition Hall of International Friendship where all the gifts received from other countries, the third world countries, were stored. The exhibition hall was built in the Mountain Myohyang. We skipped the peaks, the valleys, the streams, the caves, the rocks, and the waterfalls, but glanced over the paintings and calligraphies from China, the ivory and furs from Africa, oh, and the wax figure of Kim Il-sung. What’s more? Take a bow!

……

In the afternoon, I was listening to the chorus of a group of school girls in a daze. It reminded me of those footages captured in the Culture Revolution of China in the 1960s. Their facial expressions looked alike and their performances were extremely well-organized but artificial.

This is just weird sometimes. The more you want, the less you gain, regardless of the effort you have ever made, although “nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion.” And later, you start to question your method to finish the goal, and feel you are not as gifted. This sort of spirit slashes yourself, even though you achieves something occasionally. Because a surge of self-confidence does not constantly propel you forward, and when the surge wanes, fades away or plummet for some causes, the disappointment sets in.

These are not all you feel. There is another voice coming from the mist of disappointment, whispering into your ears, “You made a fuss. The only thing you should do now is thinking bigger and trying harder and dedicating more time to the goal you want to achieve.” A beam of light sticks out from an attic window contained in a remote tower. The mist is being sponged from the skyline.

But you will never run your fingers along the edge of the light and feel the warmth of it before you really reach the tower. You knew it well.

Pieces of good and bad news have been rushed into the office in a sudden. The guy sitting in front of me became a father on Sunday, the traditional Chinese Yuan Xiao Festival. He and his wife got married in 2008, and now had their first child. Another typical Chinese family was created. The guy sitting behind me is doing another thing that a typical Chinese family should do: paying mortgage. I saw him searching for different house types for quite a while. Now he finally paid the first installment, and started the marathon of monthly payment, whcih will largely limits whatever activities he wants to try. For him, maybe owning a house is really what he needs, but, in exchange for it, life is going boring. I wonder if it is the price I would like to pay.

Where good news is, where bad news is. The guy sitting next to me is suffering the biggest lost in his life. His mother passed away two weeks ago. I wonder how he handled the pain when we were still rehearsing the fast-paced and joyful Bollywood dance. It reminded me that once he came late for the rehearsal and said he had been in a hospital. He was too honest and nice to be promising. Everyone can see it from his daily actions.

I’ll be 24 in two months. I’m an analyst doing tedious works in the most dynamic industry. Look at my skills and experiences, I hardly find a thing which is outstanding. I have to return school to equip new weapons, and have to polish my English. That is the way I shall start my career with, and hope it is not too late to start now.

* I just told Kane that I will blog in English from now on, and hope she and those people who speak English as good as have a middle name could help me through.

终于在一片哄笑和尖叫声中，摆好最后的pose，我的第一支在舞台上表演的舞蹈完美收场了。我觉得我无比热爱跳舞；我无比享受全场漆黑只有台上明亮的感觉；我无比享受观众的尖叫，分贝越高我就扭的越high，超爽的感觉。当我在台上看着台下一片黑暗中所有观众一双双关注的眼睛中吃惊和喜悦的内容时，我朝观众笑，做各种欣喜的表情，并且明白这支舞是如此成功。其实从技术角度说，这次表演的水准还不如之前的练习，但有什么关系呢，观众喜欢，我也很享受这个舞台。

练习这支印度舞，确切的说是宝莱坞舞，整个1月份的每个周末几乎都会搭进去几个小时，最后一周每天下班之后都会练到10点多。虽然挺辛苦的，但带给我的快乐是无法代替的，每次被叫去练舞之前都是一万个不情愿，可是一到了studio，随着音乐的节拍摇摆起来的时候，舞蹈的节奏让身心充满能量。

有机会的话，我还会试的。

Overweight, a fact that my grandmother’s known for more than one decade, is the only bad news after body check that costs me 2500 hk dollars.