It is not the first time I hear the phrase “Music is an elite art.” My first reaction was always that of aversion, even though it has been said by some of my most respected mentors.

I don’t know about you, but the word “elite” is not a commendatory word in my world. It embodies the subtle kind of social segregation, an attitude of the superior, the stance of an arrogant. After all the equality in artistic expression as well as the status of a musician’s intellectual output Beethoven had fought for with his life and music, to hear that music is the art of the elite is almost blasphemous.

In my recent stay in this silence yet magnificent snow land, I have come to arrive at the polar side of my earlier feelings about this phrase. I have come to understand that the word “elite” signifies rather a conflicting state of being for a musician, rather than that of an arrogant attitude.  To say that music is an “elite” art, it really means that whoever decides to serve it must bear the burden of being lonely.

Loneliness has been my companion ever since I moved to Canada about eleven years ago. I was a child, I did not speak the language, and did not wish to speak my mother tongue with other children just because I needed friends. So it was loneliness that became my good friend, when music was not around. As I finally came to understand what piano playing is really about (that is, not related to any technical display of competence, not for the pleasing of others, and certainly not for fame or honour; but for the love for music and the need for artistic expression), loneliness accompanies from dawn until dusk, often presses its hand on my heart, seizes my breath.

Undoubtedly, I do have some of the best friends I could ever ask for, the most wonderful companion for life, and a few dearly loved mentors who always supported and encouraged me. They, too, know that such loneliness is what comes with the “profession” (if we can even call that) we chose, because the great population is not capable of understanding and appreciating this kind of art.

There, that last sentence sounded exactly like how I thought “elite” meant before.

In all actuality, I think that it’s really not that classical musicians are anymore well-educated or artistically endowed than the rest of the population. I think that “elite” means a state of being, but anyone potentially can achieve this state – that is, to fulfill and culture oneself to become capable of appreciating and understanding this “elite art”.  It is only a sad reality that not very many people have the urge to do that.

Why do you do what you do? If what you do is understood by so few, would you still continue doing that for the rest of your life? If you lose a physical ability that is instrumental in doing what you do – like losing hearing for a musician – would you continue to do what you do?

Beethoven did. And as I was reminded by a true musician just very recently, we live in that tradition of artistic integrity. I would say that I will do the same, even though the burden of serving such elite art is that of loneliness and constant dissatisfaction.

Beethoven composed some of the most glorious music in his complete lonesome world. In this superficial world, perhaps it is rather a blessing.

This is a peaceful cemetery in the town of Banff, I fell in love with it the first time I came here. It is located by the foot of Tunnel Mountain – a small mountain, on which the Banff Centre lays (this is where I am currently staying). To take a sojourn into town, I must pass by this cemetery. Therefore, after taking a few trips every week wandering into the town of Banff,  I would say that the cemetery and I are well-acquainted.

Now, just a note on the title of this entry: I chose not to think of an euphemism for “death”.  This is partly why I am writing this entry – I think with the improvement of human rights in the modern world as well as the development of technology and medicine, we are less in contact with death (at least for those of us who are able to turn on a computer and write a blog entry sitting comfortably in a roofed house, stuffed with food we just ate, hearing no over-head bombs splashing all around us). I was watching The Pirates of the Caribbean on the plane and I cannot help but to gasp at how easy it was back in the days to kill someone. Famine and disease killed so many people, no matter if you were royalty or otherwise. Also, people’s lives just seemed so much cheaper back then. You can be killed simply by the unhappiness of another. Death was not a stranger to each individual.

But I, however, have not dealt with death at all. And I do admit that I dread the very thought of any of my close family/friends dying. Some times I dream of them dying in my dreams that I cry myself awake.

When I walk pass this cemetery, however, I always find a sense of peace within me. I think being aware of the end of our journey in life – death – helps us to live much more meaningfully (at least for me). To be concerned of our fame, success, gain is really useless because no one can guarantee tomorrow we will be able to wake up again, let alone continue to have all these extraneous things take effect on us.

No matter what small or menial task is at hand,  do with great care and joy is a way of rejoicing in fact that we are able to breathe.

I am of the opinion that women (and men) look most beautiful (handsome) when they are healthy, and this salubrious consciousness doesn’t just display on the outside, but more importantly, it should be felt inside. So goes my personal story about a very fascinating (to me anyway) journey in the vicissitude of weight.

I was actually very lucky to be born with a fast metabolism which enabled me to eat anything to my heart’s content without gaining one single pound. So the whole weight gain/loss issue was something co-existed with my world in another parallel universe – until about a year ago. I still haven’t figured out why this happened, but I’m guessing being a woman in her mid-twenties, the age definitely has something to do with it. In any case, I gained about 10 pounds and because I had always been skinny before, my friends and family (especially my mother) were very happy to hear about this change in weight. I absolutely didn’t mind to begin with – as I stated earlier, I think as long as women feel and look healthy it’s all great. But after a while, sometimes I realized I eat too much before I go to sleep that I cannot sleep well, consequently the next day is met with less energy. The “Michelin” is starting to beckon at me in my abdomen area and of course this is not attractive and I didn’t feel good about it.

One day I met up with my good friend Effie who has begun her vegetarian diet a couple of months earlier, and I was telling her about my fascination regarding the weight gain originated from not eating well (remember this was never an issue for me before, so to see my body actually do that is somewhat of a slight miracle to me) as well as some of my concerns. She mentioned about her diet and her friends’ “success” stories in losing weight (I cannot deny that some of them are a bit too extreme for me, losing weight drastically just to look super skinny) by implementing a vegetarian diet.  Right then and there,  I listened to it as a story from one of those magazines – after all, what does vegetarian diet have to do with me anyway? I am world’s last carnivore standing and am proud to eat meat every meal, three or more times a day, even for breakfast (I’m not just talking about sausages, I’m talking about red meat, that’s right) because I don’t consider a meal without meat a “meal”.

But one thing I did remember was that she said, give it a try for a month and just see how it goes, you have nothing to lose.

For the next few days, I still kept on eating my usual meal until one day while watching this Chinese TV dating show for fun, I saw a guy who came on stage and introduced himself as a vegetarian and talked about the pros of a vegetarian diet. I remember some of the things he said – which were the things that attracted me the most about a vegetarian diet – one being that it enabled him to think more clearly and move more swiftly and lightly (even though this sounded a bit like some zen exercise for me) and cultivated a good daily habit of treating things with equilibrium.

I don’t know how, but this along with Effie’s advice all came together and gave me the thought of starting to eat vegetarian meals.

Of course, the first few days were a little bit difficult to get through, but nothing so dreadful I couldn’t handle. Today I was digging out my fall/winter clothes from the closet, which included a few pairs of pants that I buried deeply underneath everything else because I just could not fit into them anymore. I summoned up the courage and tried them on – the zipper closed effortlessly! What can I say, 1.5 months of vegetarian and abstemious diet later, I am 6 pounds less and I feel great.

Some of my friends were asking me how I did it; honestly, I don’t exactly know how other than not eating meat. I guess this proves that it really wasn’t a big effort for me at all – at the same time, it worked. So here are some of the things after looking back, I realized what I had changed, and I’d like to share them with all you lovely ladies and gents out there.

(proclaimer: I never starved myself, because I am grumpy when I’m hungry. But of course don’t eat until you can’t walk either – you won’t feel good afterwards anyway)

1. As an Asian I eat a lot of rice, so whenever I made rice I added mixed grains (buckwheat, oat, mung beans, etc) to my white rice.

2. I stopped eating meat but ate lots of shrimp, and some fish. I still consumed milk and eggs (in moderation, of course)

3. I tried to have my dinner before 7pm and not eat anything after that (this one was actually the only difficult thing for me to do, more than not eating meat. but you’ll get used to it after a few days)

4. I ate a variety of veggies (this is really great because I never appreciated nature this much). Think green leaves taste bad by themselves? Try a light stir-fry with shallots and oyster sauce, works for me!

5. Tofu is good.

6. Fruits are good (apples!)

7. I had a lot of congee (again mixed grains) and soup (with mushrooms, tofu, etc.)

the next two are just things I think might also contribute to weight loss:

8. I was naturally born without a sweet tooth for chocolate, cookies, cakes, brownies, etc. and I don’t munch on junk food (I have no craving for it) so I eat nothing outside of my meals.

9. I don’t drink coffee (again it’s not a choice: my stomach feels weird if I drink it). Tea, however, is wonderful to drink. :)

The result? Well, more than the happiness of feeling great about my body, oddly I do think that I think more clearly. I believe more than anything it is also an attitude towards life, to give up something that is a cupidity frees up our body and soul and therefore we can act and think with a lucid mentality.

My dear readers out there, in my friend Effie’s words: give it a try for a month, you have nothing to lose (exception maybe a few pounds, if you don’t terribly mind ;) )

青春太美好，但走得似乎有些太快；我的心总是跟不上岁月的脚步，虽然自己已经快活了一个世纪的四分之一，心里上好像还停留在18岁。10年前我上小学，那时候看《还珠》憧憬的是等以后我有了爱人，一定要怎样怎样对待他爱护他；有那样能与之策马奔腾的朋友一定要珍惜和信任。而现在，确是看着《新还珠》自己在做检讨，要怎样更珍惜眼前人，呵呵。10年前的小燕子和紫薇都是姐姐们，现在她们都是妹妹辈了。

网上看到很多很恶毒的攻击《新还珠》的言论。其实我觉得不欣赏的东西没有必要公开地谩骂得如此入骨 -说实在的我一开始也不习惯这些新演员 – 但是很多事情如果我们给予机会，都能够小小欣赏一下。欣赏一件事情比批判一件事情更省力，不是么？我觉得《新还珠》拍得雍容华贵多了，也更加注重亲情和人情；其中很多关于子女的教育到是对眼下中国父母的一种很好的劝解。琼瑶阿姨不愧是催泪弹的制造者，缠缠绵绵的情谊在这冷漠的世道中却带来太多的温馨。

我希望将来我的孩子在长大的过程中也能接触到这样一部电影、一部影视剧、一本书、一首曲让她/他懂得青春的难能可贵，懂得对爱情的坚贞不渝，懂得对朋友的重情重义，懂得对亲情的温情婉婉；还有最重要的就是对自己追求的勇往直前，勇敢地活出生命的潇潇洒洒。

Since returning from Toronto, I hadn’t hopped around town in NYC until today. I remember how refreshing it was to walk in my rain boots and umbrella in the spring rain in May, seeing all those beautiful architecture as I walked around in Upper East Side – New York to me is never the city with a Times Square, but a city in Franck Sinatra’s songs and Hepburn’s Breakfast in Tiffany. It is a place for the multitude of people to pursue their dreams, but also a city immersed in history, art and culture. For this I am forever mesmerized by this behemoth of a city, even though there are the inevitably negative sides to it.

One of the errands I had to run as I hopped around today was to fix my Nikon lens – the one I broke while horse-riding in Yun Nan province in China.  I took it to Phototech down near Union Square after reading some quite positive reviews of this place and of their wonderful service. The customer service person was indeed very kind and helpful, and told me he will send the lens to the manufacturer and  could try to get my lens back to me by tomorrow afternoon (!). It’s slightly difficult to believe, but I will let you know how my lens is doing tomorrow after I pick it up.  :)

Secondly, my wonderful fiancé came home and surprised me with an iphone! Sure I’ve heard a lot about how amazing the phone is, and even though the only two cellphones that I owned are all free that came with the contract (because I for some reason have not much desire for high-technological gadgets) but this is definitely a gift highly treasured! (and hopefully will be an aid to my lack of blogging and photo-uploading etc.)

Tonight, as a gesture of gratitude, I made spinach pesto pasta with shrimp and a touch of almond essence (as inspired by Olivier a couple of days ago!).

In any case, a long and complicated story short, they let me cross the border into the States and prior to coming back to the big apple, I had taken a week off to spend at a wonderfully cozy cottage at the shore of Lake Eire. Magnificent sunset accompanied by wine on the private beach, my heart was filled with so much thanksgiving for the obvious luxury of being set in such a poetic scenery, but also, above all, the mere fact of living. What a month of lesson-learning and soul-detoxing.

—————

When I came back, half of my plants already died (my heart cringed at the sight of lifelessness); however, my mettlesome congo pepper produced a fruit! I was elated. :)

And with my first pepper, I created this dish which is light for the summer, but super spiecy.

I came back to Toronto for two days to visit my mother, and as I was crossing the border back into the States, I was denied entry by the border patrols and their callous demeanors. They accused me of overstaying my student visa – which wasn’t true, because I had actually another month of grace period – and of course of illegally staying n the US. All in all, they had to send me back to Toronto where I have to stay until I get a visa (which might take weeks, or even months).

Aside from their axiomatic boorish attitudes (by the way, what’s up with that? blasé because of their power to humiliate and embarrass? ) and my brazen disgust of being accused of doing something illegal, I am not all that traumatized really. Yes it sucks, a lot, because some concerts I was planning on doing with friends in New York I can no longer do, some important personal projects are put aside, plans to hang out with friends are now abandoned, can’t take care of my plants personally anymore.. I don’t have my own laptop with me, no ipod, none of the books I wanted to read and none of the scores I am currently learning – I didn’t even bring clean clothes to change into for that matter! It is not an overstatement to say that I should feel like a fish out of the water. But I feel more like my life at this point (which is centered in New York) has been put on a very abrupt halt – like a train trying to break after seeing a person lying, tied to the tracks; so abrupt it could potentially come into a disastrous crash.

On the brighter side, yes I did bring a pair of flip-flops and a pair of heels (yes heels! I’m glad I brought them even for a two-day trip) and have pretty much all of my essentials with me (kindle is a plus! though it’s running out of battery soon and I do NOT have the charger with me…) In my predicament, though, I am learning a cardinal lesson, a great lesson for life.

Sometimes you think you need everything you have to live. Well, this is a time for me to realize just how little I need to be happy. Today I spent a wonderful afternoon with my friends whom I haven’t seen for so long (which I wouldn’t get a chance to do because I hardly stay for very long in Toronto), chatting up and enjoying each other’s company, while sharing some of the good but especially bad experiences from the past year. Then when we look back, it is always that life has made us stronger, and happier, and the predicaments somehow worked in our favour to sculpt our personality.

We always want more things, better things; that is why we can never take a vacation off. We work so hard, and don’t have time for things like appreciating just the moment we are alive. I know all these things are such a passe, but really, when your life in on an abrupt halt, you can either be upset and stay so, or look at it appreciatively.

Sometimes I would spend the three months of summer elsewhere – Banff, Tibet, Lijiang, and that’s when I seem to be able to say to myself, when you return to your “other life” you should always remember this stress-free time because that’s where your life is. Not wanting more, not needing more, but simply be. I think perhaps we should all switch the default mode of living from the “working day-to-day me” to the “vacation me” in our bifurcated lives.

I am stressed, of course, about my current situation. But I hope I’ll always remember where my real life truly lies.

When I met up with him for lunch today, I couldn’t even recognize him due to his decision on breeding a full beard – a bit of an unfair game here, since men can veritably change their look drastically within such a short period of time and us women cannot (well, unless you go overboard with the makeup, which definitely takes longer than shaving).

Within a the span of the time it takes for a lunch, I got to hear about his travels (only briefly) in Europe, or I should say all over Europe. Then we inevitably decided on a few pieces to learn together over the summer – which always makes me so happy! Summer is a great time for chamber music, and for relaxing with not many deadlines for learning pieces which means I can usually take my time and work on the things I have always wanted to work on.

New York has been drizzling and raining on and off for the past few days, and I can only say that I am absolutely taking delight in the the permeating of water through the sky.  Something about rainy days that connects one’s memories from the distant past and put them all together, sometimes as disparate as they may be, into one big harmonious Cosmo of  scent, sentiment, sound, love, life.  On rainy nights I am always transfixed.

One of the most recent memories of rainy days was one day in New Haven – which is where J will be going this fall to attend Yale. I am thoroughly happy for him, and he looked at me and said, half jokingly, I am definitely not feeling guilty about any of this after all that has happened to me this year. I said, why would you feel guilty? He chuckled, and said, ‘cuz I’m Jewish?

Now, that’s a culture I have only heard about when I was growing up in China but only got to know better and more personally recently.  You might remember when I wrote about my friend Mindy, who is also Jewish, who during her last visit recommended me this book called The Inextinguishable Symphony: A True Story of Music and Love in Nazi Germany. I think the title introduces the content pretty concisely. I am going to start reading it today and we’ll see what kind of a journey it will take me.

Ten years has past, I am now living in New York and able to communicate freely in English, meeting her again feels not only like meeting an old friend, but also gaining a new one. The loud, happy laughters and exaggerated emotional outbursts are still there, but I am realizing that she has so many stories to tell and so much intellectual insights to offer. Time sculpts us into such interesting pieces.

Mindy was born in Washington Heights, and she loves that area dearly. Today I went there, discovering it for the first time in my life, this peaceful beauty on the Manhattan island.