i would like to be unflappable but i don't think that's a goal i can achieve soon. i always get caught up in the moment and get myself all riled up.

yet i was telling a friend today (she's into Buddhism) that i wanna feel extremely, because only then will i deem myself as having lived.

got so affected by the following incident that i wrote an email to my hons class...havent imposed upon others' email boxes in that way for a long time, i think
***********************************************

hmm, today was my first day of eliciting data from hearing-impaired
parents..so i arrived at NACLI, in which a KODA camp was held.

i distributed my lang background questionnaires. while i was prepared that
some parents might not understand written English, i didn't expect that they
didn't even understand the local variety of sign lang (SEE) either. i
thought being exposed to the hearing-impaired community, somehow everyone
would more or less learn how to communicate in sign lang

these parents use Home Signs when communicating to their children

was a tad depressing for me when i realised the severity of the situation.
can you imagine going through your whole life, not able to communicate your
feelings/thoughts to anyone else except your immediate family? you don't
belong anywhere in this world, no one can reach out to you--it must be
darned sucky always feeling alone. and you may not even enjoy solitude,
because being deprived of lang skills, you don't even have the requisite
vocab to conceptualise whatever thoughts you may have

it drove home how lucky i am and how much i take stuff for granted. cliched
maybe, but we all need to take time out to give thanks for the little
blessings we enjoy in life--in this case, the ability to think, to
conceptualise, to interact with a fellow human being, to feel connected, to
make enemies even

sorry, just got to get this off my system. and i thought you guys might
understand this better since you all are EL majors. besides, so many of you
are future teachers-to-be, so in the case that you encounter a hearing child
with deaf parents while you are teaching, perhaps you will remember this
pesky email by kaile and be in a better position to help...*grins*

thanks for reading,
ah le:P