Liliane's Playlist (Part 4 of Many...)

Songs from your Family...

From Mommy

張懸 - 寶貝

Our mom used to sing this song to Liliane and because she wasn't sure what the actual lyrics were, she would come up her own and personalize them so they were about Liliane.

From Daddy

劉若英 René Liu【很愛很愛你 Love you so much】

This is one of the songs from the Smilebox presentation we showed at Liliane's memorial. 

From Jiejie

The Sister Song (from Barney)

Possibly the first song I ever sang to Liliane.

Love You, Liliane!!!!

Happy Birthday Moo

Pictures taken 2/16/14 - First celebration of Liliane's 20th Birthday

Make a Wish Liliane!!!

This is THE VOICE

I have to thank The Voice for providing me with a lot of happy times & memories with Liliane. Like many other viewers, we enjoyed seeing the hilarious camaraderie & competitiveness between the coaches, the insane level of talent, and just the overall positive, feel-good vibes of the show. During the blind auditions, Liliane & I would like to compare the different coaches' pitches and try and guess which coach a singer would choose. (Both of us thought we were "amazing" at this - myself more so than Liliane probably...)

Hope you can join us in enjoying some of the funny moments from the show...

Season 8 of The Voice premiered today. Not sure if I'm quite ready to watch the show again yet but I do recommend checking out the show, if you haven't done so already.

Happy (belated) Presidents Day

Apparently I am a week behind on all the posts I've been meaning to write. Luckily I am a subscriber to the saying "better late than never" and I suppose it can still be appropriate to be posting this today as it is George Washington's birthday.

For those who don't already know, I am currently working at Polaris Charter Academy, reportedly the first Expeditionary Learning charter school in Chicago, in the 5th/6th grade Expedition classroom. This month, we started in on our Slavery/Civil War Expedition with students and it has inspired me to do so much incredibly fascinating, thought-provoking, and cringe-inducing research that I wish I could have directly shared & discussed with Liliane. (To those people who have been hearing me go on and on about Crash Course, this is how that obsession got started. I've also been taking full advantage of the massive open online courses available on Youtube and enjoying the writings of incredibly smart, learned people.)

So what is the point of me writing all this and how exactly does it relate to Liliane? I hope people can forgive me for coming off sounding terribly unpatriotic but the fact of the matter is America is a country that was founded on hypocrisy. One need only look at the massive institution of slavery that was allowed to develop and exist in this country for over 200 years to realize the truth in that statement. Liliane, however, was someone who always tried her very best to avoid being a hypocrite (or "hippo-butt" as she frequently would call me out on), and that is something I think worth being proud of. Of course, I am certainly not trying to say my sister was perfect - (in fact, I'm pretty sure it's my job as her older sister to occasionally point out how she's not perfect) - but as her friend Fadwa so eloquently put it, "Lili’s capability, ambition, and personality were far from simple. However, her kind, humble, innocent nature was what is simple." I hope people can find comfort in knowing that the Liliane you knew is most likely a true reflection of the person she was with no duplicity, insincerity, or pretense attached to it. And that's something she arguably had figured out even before some of our Founding Fathers.

There is a picture of Liliane & me at Mt. Rushmore that I wanted to include on this post although I can't seem to find it at the moment. Hopefully I'll be able to track it down sometime in the near future.

Here's to the world being filled with less human hippo-butts, and more actual hippo butts!

新年快樂

Wishing everyone a blessed Year of the Sheep/Goat!

Quick Chinese Lesson: one of the Chinese characters for kindness (善) is topped with the Chinese character for sheep (羊).

With that in mind here's hoping we can all enjoy a year where we both receive much kindness and, more importantly, are able to spread much kindness wherever we go & to everyone we meet.

Pictures dated 5/21/98, taken on our first trip to Beijing, China

新年快樂，恭喜發財

做人羊眉吐氣

生意羊羊得意

前程羊關大道

煩惱羊長而去

羊年發羊財

天天喜氣羊羊！

Happy (Belated) Teddy Bear Day!!

Apparently Teddy Bear Day is so awesome that it gets to be celebrated on two different days. While "National" Teddy Bear Day is on September 9, Teddy Bear Day is also (reportedly) celebrated on the fourth day of the Valentine week, which apparently means that it is... just about a week ago. (Also, from the quick research I did on this subject, it would seem that India is quite big on celebrating this February version of Teddy Bear Day.)

To celebrate this day of beary goodness, allow me to introduce you to Teddy, the big, stuffed, 32-lb, ~$100 bear that our Aunt 如 娟 (Rujuan) bought for us when she was visiting us in Japan. As the story goes, our dear 5'2" aunt saw Teddy in a store and instantly knew she had to take him home. After a harrowing and hot journey through Tokyo's public transportation system - (where Teddy took up his own subway seat) - he finally made it back to our Tokyo apartment and Liliane & I have loved him ever since. (He makes an excellent nap buddy.)

('')...('')

( ' o ' )  

 ('')-('')  

(''')--(''') 

Liliane's Playlist (Part 3 of Many..)

A friendship-themed version of Liliane's playlist...
(Will be trying to get translations of song lyrics up in the near future)

"A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words."

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となりのトトロ  (Tonari no Totoro) - My Neighbor Totoro

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Count On Me - Bruno Mars

(I remember being first introduced to this song by my friend Ashley while I was in Malaysia. Not sure when Liliane first heard this song, but I know she definitely heard me singing it around the house/apartment every now and then...)

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七個朋友片尾曲 摩天輪 - 任容萱 (Seven Friends OST Ferris Wheel, Kirsten Ren)

(The lyrics aren't directly about friendship but given the title of the drama series, I figured we can include it on this list...)

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范瑋琪 - 一個像夏天一個像秋天 (Christine Fan - One is like Summer, One is like Fall)

(One of the Chinese songs that frequently gets stuck in my head when I think of my sister... both Liliane & I really love this song)

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In wanting to make sure I include a classical piece on this playlist, I did some research to see how the subject of friendship has been represented in classical music. Through this research, I came to learn more about Franz Schubert and the intimate circle of friends he enjoyed throughout his life. (As a sign of true friendship, he was given the affectionate nickname "Schwämmerl", which apparently translates to "Tubby" or "Little Mushroom.")

1868 drawing of a Schubertiade by Moritz von Schwind - (famous Austrian painter and friend of Schubert)

The following pieces are ones Schubert composed in honor of his friend, poet Johann Senn, who he never got to see again after 1820 for political reasons. Schubert took the words from Senn's poem, Schwanengesang (Swan Song) & Selige Welt (Happy World) and set it to music. (FYI: This Swan Song is not to be confused with the song cycle of the same name, Schwanengesang D957, which are believed to be some of Schubert's last compositions...) Although my guess would be that Liliane never heard these pieces before, I think she would have appreciated the story behind them...

Schwanengesang (Swan Song) D744

(The translation of these lyrics can be found here: Swan Song by Johann Senn.) 

Selige Welt (Happy World) D743

(Original poem & translation can be found here: Happy World by Johann Senn)

And in one of those life is stranger than fiction moments, here's a picture of the stuffed animal Liliane affectionately nicknamed Schubert - (the only stuffed animal I'm aware of that she named after a composer, although we did name one of our parakeets Puccini.)

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I've deliberately held out on not posting videos from the Voice yet (for reasons which should be become clear in a week or so) but this "friendship playlist" simply wouldn't be complete if I didn't include this song...

Lean On Me

(Will explain the significance of this particular version of an all-time classic next week...)