Alex

Reading a good book is like falling in love. You're happy and content while sitting there with your book in your hands, anxiuos, restless and impatient to get back to it whenever you have to put it down. You're completely unaware of your environment while reading, and can't think of anything else but the book when you're not. You can't get enough of it, neglect your friends for it's sake, and when it ends you feel as sad and empty as when a lover has left you.

I was on my way to work this morning, started working at eight (on a saturday, what a dread). Took the subway to the Central Station to take the commuter train from there. I was at the commuter train platform 07:10, the train was due to 07:20. I read my book (The bell jar) and a distant part of my consciousness noticed that a train arrived at about 07:20 (it was right before my eyes!), but it wasn't until the train started to roll away from the platform that I realized that hey, there goes my train! I called my work and said that I'd be about 20 minutes late, the next train didn't arrive in yet another half hour. Then I stood there, not anxious like I usually are the few times I'm late for work, but  very satisfied with how the morning had developed, because it meant that I could stand there for another half an hour in the morning sun reading at the platform.

30 minutes later when the next train arrived I almost missed it too. I didn't see it coming (it's easy to miss a train that rolls by before your eyes), I did however notice that a lot of people passed me at the same time and in the same direction, so I looked up, saw the train and got on it. Got off the train two stations later and walked half the ten minutes walk from the station to my work reading, until I got to the end of the chapter and was able to put the book down by sheer self-discipline.

I developed the skill of reading-while-walking when I was quite young. The whole business was a bit wobbly and I walked into things a lot before I got the knack of it at the age of twelve. By now my walking/reading is almost an art in itself. It's like bicycling, once you've learned it, you'll never forget it.

This is the severe effects good books have on me, this is why I don't read so much when I'm busy. Just like love, you avoid it when the timing is bad. Sometimes you just stumble over it, a good book, or love, and then there is nothing one can do but to ride out the storm. And when it comes to a good book, or love, no matter how bad the timing is you can never really be sorry that you've found it.



/Alex

My firmly rooted school stress and examination angst is finally starting to let go of its grip, I'm starting to relax and act lika a real human being again. I went to the library today to catch up on some reading I've been intending to do. It feels like I haven't read a book in months and months. It was probably ten moths or something as bizarre as that since I last read a good book, I just haven't had the time to get started with good books. I've read some not-eqally-good books during that time though. I can't let go of a good book until I've finished it, so when I don't have time to spend two, three whole days (and nights) in a row just reading, I don't even start. Reading mediocre literature on the other hand is no problem, I can put it aside when I have something else that needs to be done. I had a discussion about this with a friend in Beijing. There was one evening when I had nothing to do, and he asked me why I didn't read my book. He gave me a quizzical look when I said that I didn't want to start reading it, because I thought that I would really like it (and I had to much to do in Beijing to spend a couple of days just reading). I've always considered that to be perfectly normal, but when I put it down like this it do sound a little bit... weird. Maybe I'm just crazy (Could it be? Nah!).

I was a little dissapointed when I left the library though. Almost none of the books I wanted was in, I did order one from their magazine, I'll pick it up tomorow. I borrowed the very surprising Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach. I didn't know what to expect, but I surely did not expect a book in which the main character is a seagull. A new experience for me. It was cute and wise and had a message that might not be totally unfamiliar yet worth some consideration, but it wasn't fantastic. Worth the trouble though. It was some fifty pages and I read it through in an hour. Finding myself on square one again, with nothing to read, I went and bought Sylvia Plath's The bell jar. I've only read two chapters, but I'm loving it already. READ IT!
It's amazing that I've been able to put it aside to write this text, maybe it's only because my need to express myself in words is bigger than anything else (it could have something to do with my enlarged ego). Unlike eating, for example. I've noticed that you don't really need to eat when you have a good book, if eating means that you'll have to cook and you can't read while doing it.

They did have The bell jar in Swedish at the library, but I can't really see the logic in reading a book in translation if you can read it in it's original language. That's because I've been studying nothing but language the last two years, it has made me realize how disturbingly insufficient translations are, there is just too much that gets lost in the process. Translations are a kind of necessary evil, of course the work needs to be translated, otherwise one would be completely limited by one's own skills in foreign languages, too much good work would get lost. But even in the best cases, a translation is only a more or less bleak version of the original.

Every language is idiomatic, this means that every language have expressions that can not be directly translated, because the word-for-word meaning isn't the actual meaning. Like the Chinese "nihao", which literary means you-good, but actually means "hello", or the Swedish "hej då", which literary means hello-then, but actually means "good bye". Then we can start to analyze the literary meaning of "good bye" and if we continue from there then we'll be at it all night long. On top of that there is the difficulty in the fact that the equivalent word in one language for a word in an other language very often don't have the exact same nuance, it makes it very hard to make people of different languages to get the same impression of a sentence. Even when you can translate a word directly to another language, there is a big risk that the translated word isn't as loaded, more loaded, or differently loaded than the word in the original language, which gives the translated sentence another tone than originally intended. 

What I've come to realize is that it is actually impossible to translate anything from one language to another. You can get a translation close to the original, but you can never get it exact. And the biggest pleassure in reading the works of a good author is, in my point of view, the pleassure in reading hers or his personal use of language and formulations. If the language sucks but the story is really good I don't think a translation is too disturbing, because you won't miss any pleassurable language-use anyway.

I personally hope to translate some work of fiction from Chinese into Swedish some day. I don't want to work full-time as a translator, but I still hope I'll do it at least once. It is a scary thought, but one can only do the best one can do. I'd rather put forth an insufficient translation than let the fact that the large majority of the Swedish population can't read Chinese stop the good work of one or another autor to get spread in Sweden. As I said: translations are a necessary evil. Hence the fact that I think one should avoid it when possible.



/Alex

Standing in the Central Station in the middle of Stockholm, god how I hate that station, taking the green subway line, train 19 going south, getting off 20 minutes later at the station before the last stop, and I'm home. Farsta, no place like it.

It takes me five minutes to walk from the station to the house where I live. Following the crackled asphalt lanes home in the sunny afternoon makes me happy. I can't resist to walk with the tips of my fingers touching the top of the bushes on the right side, the branches covered with frosted ice spikes in winter, explosive green buds in spring, white delicate flowers in summer, and blood-red berries in fall.

I pass the three-storeyed apartment buildings with the small gardens in front. When me and my best friend and flatmate Sara where new-comers in the neighbourhood and walked by in our most hung-over teenage-rebel looks (leather jackets, strange hairdos, jeans with holes in them, tired expressions and what not) the parents of the small children who lives there used to look at us with worried expressions. Over a year has passed by now, and there have still been no ritual animal slaughter on their front steps, their seven year old kids have still not been transformed into miniature hooligans because of our drug dealing and general bad influence, so they don't bother about us anymore.

In this time of the year, this short lane is edged with fruit trees, bushes and borders covered with light violet, lilac, white, yellow and pink flowers. The only thing more beuatiful is the same lane in winter, when the ground is covered in one foot of the purest snow, every branch covered in frost, soft cotton-like snowflakes slowly falling from the sky, and the whole world is white, sparkling and enchanted.

I walk over the small parking lot, a proof of that a lot of asphalt doen't destroy the cosiness of an area if there is enough vegetation nearby, and I'm home.

Home is a 66 square metres apartment on the first floor with a double set of messy bedrooms, a small kitchen with a table screwed on to the wall and a leaking tap, a livingroom with three white and one clear blue wall, a hallway, a bathroom and a balcony. And a low rent, suited for two poor students (well, one and a half poor students, Sara studies half-time and works part-time). Home is great, inspite the always half-empty refridgerator, the thin walls (I listen to my neighbours TV for hours some nights when I can't sleep) and the fact that the whole building needs a through renovation (like, ten years ago).

I haven't even left yet, and I'm already being nostalgic. I love this place, and the area. I think I'll even miss the otherwise ever so annoying leaking tap in the kitchen. Being homesick is a part of the appeals of being away, I guess. This is a home that I will never come back to though, Sara'll move back to her mom's when I leave.

We'll see what the future holds for us.



/Alex

Well, ain't this just the cutest? But I'm a restless kind of person,
so I photographed the hair I had...

...and went right into the bathroom and shaved it off.
But honestly friends, doesn't this look great? I'm very satisfied.
Still not my real haircolour though, ain't no redhead.

(The reason these pictures are so big is that the pixel quality ain't the best,
and it looked like shit when I tried to make them smaller.)



/Alex



_{(Click on "Kommentarer" below to leave a comment.)}

So, giving it a shot in english, so that I can spread the word to my non-svenska friends too. I lived in the illusion that I could convert my entire blog into english, but apparently not. I could only convert the date and time. I don't think this whole thing is too difficult to understand though. For example, it's not too hard to guess what "Kategorier" means, or "Arkiv" (and very often it helps to just think that the K is a C). You'll just have to use your imagination when it comes to the rest.
I know it's better to just rock on and pretend like I'm not bothered by my sometimes doubtful english spelling and strange use of words, but I am (even now, when writing this simple text, I have the dictionary by my side). I don't mind to be corrected either (how am I supposed to learn correct english if no one corrects me?). Just click on the little word "kommentarer" (comments, that one was hard to guess to, wasn't it?) and write a line. It's okay if you just say hello too.

Tried to get a vaccination today, there was about a zillion persons before me in line, and when it was almost my turn, then I remembered that I had forgotten my little yellow book at home (it's a small booklet in which they put stamps and stickers every time you get a new vaccination). Of course, I could have gotten a new one, but I figure that if I have two there's a double chance that one of them little buggers'll get lost.

Summerbrake is finally here! I had my last exam for the semseter today (I don't think it was a complete disaster). It seemes as if every one else quit school two weeks ago, but not me, no no. Even the majority of my classmates have had summerbrake for almost three weeks now. Life ain't fair. This is because of the fact that I studied Chinese at Uppsala University last year, and then switched to Stockholm University. The exam I had today was about Chinese literature, a course that the rest of my class had during the first year. But now it's done anyway! Yay, freedom! Let's not mention that I'll start working on tuesday, sssch!

Going home to mamma later, she's out of town over the night, and, you know, my kid brother is only 16 (17 in September), so, you know, he needs a babysitter. I don't mind though, and neither does he. I kind of panicked when I had ordered my one-way ticket to Beijing, it was first then that I realized that I will have to leave my family for a very long time. I've known that for a while now, but it just hadn't dawned on me that it would be... well... so difficult.
Anyway. We're gonna eat popcorn, drink soft drinks and watch movies all night long. That'll be nice. But he don't get to choose which film we'll watch, cause he's got a really crappy taste when it comes to that. It's nice to have someone who appreciates the value of shallow, american action as much as I do, it's just that he always pick the bad shallow american action.
Me on the other hand, I have an excellent taste. Like xXx (that didn't have anything to do with Vin Diesels tattoos, I promise!), or Underworld (that didn't have anything to do with Kate Beckinsales latex outfit, I promise!) , or Resident Evil (okay, that one's too obvious, that was only because of Milla Jovovich's red dress). Hmmr... maybe it won't make too big a difference if he chooses the movie when I come to think about it...

Better quit now, I don't want to keep the little shrimp waiting all night. (I am now referring to my little brother, if someone didn't get it.)



Take care!
/Alex

Så, jag följer den allämna trenden och Fridéns senaste idé och skapar mig en egen blogg. Jag har ett syfte med min blogg.
Jag har nu studerat kinesiska i två år på heltid vid universitetet, och om 51 dagar flyttar jag till Kina. Jag mottog ett stipendium från Svenska Institutet (SI) tidigare i vintras/våras som kommer sörja för mig i ett år vid ett eller annat kinesiskt universitet. Jag fick önska mig tre universitet som jag vill till, och valde tre av de topp-rankade universiteten i Beijing. Jag har ännu inte fått besked om vilket universitet jag får studera vid, beslutet tas av en kinesisk stipendiemyndighet som har rätt att placera mig vart som hellst i landet. De försöker efter förmåga att placera stipendiaterna efter våra önskemål, i den mån det är möjligt. Men alla kan av naturliga skäl inte få sin vilja igenom, och trycket på plater vid universiteten i Beijing är högt. Jag ska få beskedet i juli, i bästa fall i början av juli, i värsta fall i slutet. Den finns en liten risk för att den kinesiska stipendiemyndigheten inte godkänner de stipendiater som SI rekommenderar, men både docenten och studievägledaren på min avdelning (Institutionen för orientaliska språk, avdelningen för kinesiska) reagerade på den nyheten med stor förvåning, eftersom att det aldrig tidigare har hänt att någon utav de rekommenderade stipendiaterna inte har fått sitt år i Kina. (Jag hoppas bara att de inte får reda på att jag brukade smugla opium från Hong Kong och var aktiv medlem i Falun Gong när jag var 13!) Jag är ganska säker på min sak med andra ord, och jag hoppas att det inte är någonting som jag kommer se som arrogans i efterhand, för flygbiljetten är redan beställd och jag har ingen back-up plan. "Carpe diem!" säger jag om saken med ett brett flin och tror att alla situationer går att lösa, medan min ömma mor sitter och rynkar pannan och oroar sig över vad i hela fridens namn hennes lilla flicka ska ta sig till om någonting slår fel.
Så, min intention med den här bloggen är att familj och vänner, gamla som nyfunna, och allmänt nyfikna ska kunna hålla sig uppdaterade om mina öden och äventyr i det stora landet i öst. Inom kort kommer jag börja skriva på engelska, med hänsyn till kategorin "nyfunna" vänner, jag finner det osannolikt att många av dem kommer vara svensktalande. Än så länge övar jag lite på hela bloggandet och håller mig till svenskan. Jag erkänner att det är en fegstart, jag känner mig som en vinglig liten fölunge när jag försöker formlera bra text på engelska.
Jag börjar idag, för idag spikade jag mitt utresedatum (även om jag mer ser det som "inresedatum"). Jag gick in på Jade travel och frågade om priset på en enkell biljett till Beijing, och gick därifrån med en avgång ställd till söndagen 23/7, ankomst morgonen efter. Jag betalar ynka 4700:- för ett direktflyg på ungefär 8 timmar. Jag finner det så fascinerande, äventyret är inte längre bort än 8 timmar ändå.

Sprid budskapet! Alex har börjat blogga! Hallelujah!



 /Alex