Ron's ESL Blogs

In my memories, I have so many favorite places. However, one place is important to me and that influenced my whole life from childhood until right now. It is a temple-Shaolin Si of my childhood.
Right now, I live in the U.S.A., some tine meet some of challenges, but I can strong up, that main reason is the temple-Shaolin Si gave me a lot of support which spirit in my heart.
I remember when I was a young child just seven years old, I went to school on the way, I always taken a watching on the Shaolin Si where I respected. Shaolin Si is a well-known place in the world. When people talk about it that first one is Chinese Gong Fu, but so many people don’t know it original from Kaifeng city, Henan. In my childhood, I really don’t know that I just saw a golden place on the sun, it was shining and so many people from China and other countries visiting it, such like they to the farm market, they burned the stick paper and make a wash, the smoke became some cloud that coming from the Temple, I saw them had a red face when they left the temple. I felt so proud of Shaolin Si because it gave the world a place to visit and that gave them support of spirit else.
When I do something and meet some problems, I have courage by the temple; When I had difficult time, I would think shaolin Si; When I need more time to study, I would say some words to the temple.
Shaolin Si is my neighborhood of mother place in my whole life. I will remember and respect it forever!   — Chen, xinqing

Before I came to LA, I already decided to live in Pasadena. There were more than 80 cities in LA, and the reason I chose to stay in Pasadena not only because there was more safety, but also there were a lot of Americans, I could feel about real America.

In Pasadena, there were a lot beautiful and different kinds of road. Everyday, when I drove a car, and passed by those beautiful houses, I always imaged that someday I could have such a beautiful house, and I must be very happy. Now, trees,flowers in spring, and you can smell the fragrance of the flowers everywhere. I enjoyed walking around when I finished dinner. At first time, I was shocked because all the strangers gave smile to me, they were so friendly that even didn’t know who I am. I thought maybe this was exactly America culture.

One day, someone knocked my door. I was so scared because there were a lot of bad things happening in LA. I didn’t know what should I do, so just stood here and kept quiet. I couldn’t heat clearly what they talked about, but I guaranteed that they were a couple. After they left, I thought I should open the door, and made sure they didn’t left some special marks on my door. I was very careful to open the door. Suddenly I found a bag of candies and a letter in front of my door. I picked it up, and the letter said that they would  move in during those days, they were very happy that we could be neighbors. But they had a baby just 2 months old, they were afraid that the baby’s crying would influence my life, so they wanted to make an apology to every neighbor. It was not a big deal in China, they just gave me another America culture class in my life. I didn’t know which room they would move in, but I never heard baby crying when I was home.

I told this story to my friend. He said it happened in America, not only in Pasadena. In my opinion, this country was the strongest country in the world, not only the economy, but also the people’s mind. I like stay in here, I like stay in US. It ‘s a kind of feeling that I was one of their friends who live in Pasadena.

I’m unable to describe my neighborhood in the present time, but I can describe my neighborhood in Taipei during the past. I still can remember how Taipei looks like in the past, I’m not even sure how the city look llike right now since I haven’t gone back to Taiwan for many years.

In my neighborhood, I used to go to the library near my old home. That library was very big, and I still remember it very well. Because I heard a lot of books in there, and to me, it was the biggest building in Taipei. There were also a lot of places that I went to in my neighborhood, such as my favorite restaurant, bookstores, a video store, and a big park.

It’s been a lot of years that I have no idea whether those places still remained in Taipei or not. But I think that they might change a lot and even better than in the old time. But this neighborhood still in my memory forever.

Having to describe a neighborhood is a difficult thing. It is more difficult when you haven’t been there for seven years. However, when I think about my neighborhood, I see a small village, because that’s what it is. But within this village, a place that I spent most of my childhood, lies a computer center where kids, teenagers, and adults go to play games or chat with relatives that live in another country. And because of this computer center, my friends, cousins, and I could have the most fun time of our childhood.

Before my friends first discovered the computer center, we did nothing but lied around in our house all day. But once we went to the computer center, we were hooked. Because, in side, there were so many computers, not to mention the cool temperature. However, to use the computers, we need to pay money, and it depends on how much you pay to use it. Because we can only use it for a certain amount of time. For twenty minutes, it cost us one dollar in Vietnamese money. Forty minute for two dollars, an hour for three dollars, and so on. Since we didn’t get allowance that often, we had to watch the person that had the money, play. But at times, we saved our allowance so that we could all use the computers and play together.

I remember one time, one of my cousins tricked me into using the computer without paying. When they caught me, my cousin had already left. But there was one more cousin who came along, and he had to go back home and asked for money to pay them back. When we got home, we were really mad, but we couldn’t blame him because we were caught using the computer without paying. After all, it was our fault for believing in him.

In the end, we were never allowed to go back there. But lucky for us, another computer center was opened a few weeks later. But this time, I learned my lesson: don’t play if you can’t pay.

-Thai Tran

I came to the United States in 1989. When I was only seventeen years old. The first place I lived in was an apartment complex. They were twelve buildings with four apartments each. These aprtments were in the city of Highland Park. That place had a nick name; they caled it the “HOLE” maybe because it was under ground. I lived there for six years until I got married. It was like a litlle world, where people know each other very well. At that time I didn’t have a car so everytime I had to go to work or go to school. I had to walk up the steep street to take the bus. It took me 15 to 20 minutes to get to the bus stop. and that was twice a day. Because I worked in the morning and went to school in the afternoon.

I feel homesick every time I remember that place. I made my first friends there. there I found out that not only mexican people lived there. Mexican amercans, Mexicans, Central America,,and Peru. In the back of my apartment was this huge tree. I used to sit down under the tree talking to neighbors for hours.. We barbecue there so many times. My nephews used the shade of the tree to play with thier litlle “Ninja Turtles” every day, and I had to baby sit them. I sat there for hours to do my homework, I read alot of books and wrote letters to my mom every week. Every time I felt sad missing my mother and brothers, I just went to that little space in the back of my house and cried, and cried until I felt better.

I still remember that in that neighborhood I celebrated my eighteen birthday. A lot of friends came to my party. That was the first plaace I lived in. I will never forget it. I still remember the people that lived there. the nice color of the aprtments. the smell of the food when neighbors cooked. The parkings behind the apartments, the type of cars nieghbors used to drive. There was not tooo many fancy cars like today. The whole neighborhood was like a family to me. A ll the people gave me so much good advice. I still wonder what happened to all that people. Sometimes I go there and I drive around hoping someone still living there. The neighborhood looks diferent now, it is painted and has a gate. I will never forget that place, and I will keep those memories forever.