Ron's ESL Blogs

My Family and have been living in the United States for almost five years. At the first half year, we lived with my wife’s uncle in the city on Buena Park in Orange County. Later, we moved to the city of Monterey Park in Los Angeles County. We have now lived here for over four years, and we are very happy with our neighborhood.
My neighbors living at the left of our house are a couple of Italian. The husband named Martino is a very handsome man and his wife Lydia is a very nice smiling person. They don’t have children, and they moved to the US over 20 years. They bought the house 10 years ago. The Martino’s grow a lot of bamboos in their backyard. The beautiful bamboos attracted many birds, so I can hear the sweet songs singing by birds every morning.
The neighbors living at the opposite of our house are Mexican. Thee husband, I don’t remember his name, which is difficult to pronounce, is a strong man with bare. He drives a Mercedes Benz, so we always call him “Mr. Benz”. Their son Antony is in the same class with my son. My son often plays with Antony and they do homework to gather. The “Mr. Benz” family also has been living here for over 10 years.
The neighbors living at the right of our house are new immigrants from China. They just moved in a few months ago. They speak Mandarin and know very little English. We call the couple Mr. & Mrs. Bian. They have a child of four years old. My younger son is four and a half. I recommended the preschool which my son is attending to Mr. & Mrs. Bian. They felt good about that and let their son study in the preschool. We help them a lot in daily life as they are new comers to this country. We became good friends, and we often spend weekend together.
In general, I am feeling good I have all these nice neighbors. Having good neighborhood brings me more joy and happy in my life.

My High School Friend – Jun Xu
I had a best friend when I was in high school in Guangzhou, China. His name is Jun Xu. He is living in Vancouver, Canada now. We still keep in touch even we are all over 40 years old.
I clearly remember that Jun Xu joined in our school in the second year of high school. He moved from Shanghai to Guangzhou with his parents. Jun Xu was a good-looking tall guy. He was almost a head higher than me. When we walked together, other classmates said we looked like father and son.
At first, Jun Xu didn’t understand Cantonese, you know, in our school we all spoke Cantonese at that time, even we were taught in Cantonese in classes. That was a big problem for Jun Xu. He could speek Mandarin and Shanghai dialect only. So, after school, I needed to explain the main points of the classes to Jun Xu and help him to complete homework. I did lose much time for entertainment after school, but I spent more time in helping Jun Xu’s studies. There was an old saying in Chinese “Teaching is the Best Way to Learn”. We both made a lot of progress in studies.
Jun Xu was a very smart guy. He learned things very quickly. After one year, he became one of the top three students in our class. Furthermore, he could speak Cantonese in daily life, but with a strong accent. He always made me laugh when he spoke in Cantonese.
After having graduated from high school, we both attended the same university and studied the same major. We were classmates again. After graduated from university, Jun Xu went to Germany to continue his studies and I worked in Guangzhou. For the next few years, we hadn’t kept in touch as we usually did. A few years later, I was told Jun Xu married a Canadian nurse.
We contacted again when Jun Xu immigrated to Canada. I am planning to visit him this coming Spring Break.