#3-11 Four Principles for The Open World

http://www.ted.com/talks/don_tapscott_four_principles_for_the_open_world_1.html

 The Speaker, Don Tapscott, said the digital age generation (The Net Generation) is not afraid of the technology, just like he is not afraid of a fridge. It was quite funny. As he mentioned like that, I'm not afraid of using it and I'm using it almost everyday. On the other hand, my parents don't know how to use them... I'm afraid of that. But they seem like they don't have any problem about it.

 It might be different from what Tapscott was talking about medicine, but I use the Internet for Sharing, mostly. I become someone who share some ideas or information and I collect some information which someone share on the Internet. About the Transparency, I have to be careful about what I put on the Internet.

I agree that the Openness is a good thing unless every single person cares about what they spread through it, and also, everyone who receive the information have to be careful about misjudging from a wrong information.

#3-10 Endangered Cultures

http://www.ted.com/talks/wade_davis_on_endangered_cultures.html

 Since I'm a student of SIS(Student of International Studies) and its object is to develop students who actively involve in international business or society, I think globalized world is a good thing. We can learn a lot from the other countries, share the ideas and help each other. Also, the globalization make it possible to buy products from the other countries when it's needed, or to watch or listen to a live coverage.
 On the other hand,　I agree to Wade Davis's idea that we need to stop pushing traditional cultures out of their homelands. If one culture became same as the other, this world become boring and one country cannot learn about other things from other countries which they don't have. Also, the traditional cultures can be found when it's compared to the other cultures.
 Therefore, I think the globalized world is good although the different traditional cultures should be saved. Furthermore, there must be different cultures which could be difficult to be accepted to the other countries. For example, the bathing custom; even though I'm ok with taking a shower, I like to take a bath using bathtub especially in Winter. Another custom is food; I told my friend that some of my friends from foreign countries say that melon soda tastes like a medicine. Then he told me that Japanese people say that Root Beer tastes like a medicine (a compress?). I found it's interesting.
 

#3-9 Fitting In

I took a lecture called "Student guidance" last year and there was a lecture about bullying. The professor didn't talk about the character of the victim much, but talked about why people bully someone. There are two aspects. One is a revenge, and joking/prank is another. For the revenge, there are opinions like the victims is conceited,  a liar, move away from the other students and etc. For joking/prank, the victims are likely to be weak, slow in movement and etc. It was said that the weakness of the victims is the most powerful cause of bullying. In this case, the weakness means that the victims cannot defense themselves.

So, why the victims not fit in? There are lots of reasons for this and not only one reason, but in my opinion, one of the reasons is because the victim doesn't have similar interests to share with the other students. Even though I wasn't bullied or anything, I used to be the one who was kind of isolated from the other student. I don't know why that was happened. Maybe it happened because of environmental changing. I was playing dodge ball or tag with boys when I was in elementary school. Then, I went to girls' junior and junior high school. I didn't remember about much, but my mother told me that I usually didn't eat lunch at school and brought back the lunch box with full of food. I didn't like the lunch time. Students usually eat lunch with groups of people who are good friends. I talk to anyone, but I wasn't sure who to eat with, at that time. I was the weird one, I know. I don't know why I did that even now.
Also, I was interested in western musics or movies when I was in high school while lots of students were interested in and talked about TV dramas or some Japanese actors or actresses. In this case, I felt a bit lonely too.

However, I could survive because the other students didn't say to me that I was strange or something like that. Further more, I found someone else out of school who can talk about my hobbies and so on. 

In my opinion, ONE OF THE REASON why bullying widespread is the spread of cell phone. These days, even elementary school students have them. They can communicate through email even they don't meet and it cannot be seen by anyone if the parents didn't check. Therefore it can be difficult for teachers to control students' bullying problem. But, parents and teachers might be able to suggest an outlet for victims like another activities which one can enjoy or another community that one would fit in, although it could be difficult.

#3-8 Equality in The Home

 The system in Taiwan that wives can be paid for doing housework is not fascinating for me. It might be worth paying, but a housewife or househusband is not a maid. Also, I have to do my housework if I live by myself even it cannot be paid.
 Talking about my parents, my mother is a housewife and my father works. So, my mother does all of the housework. They never complain about this and I think it's successful system for them. However, my father cannot cook, clean and doesn't know how to use the waching machine. Therefore he always eats unhealthy meals and snacks when my mother is out of the home. I'm worried about it. Aditionally, my father didn't cooperate much in childcare and I usually go swimming, camping or skiing with my friend's family. Although I'm now grown up and I understand he was very busy with his work, I was so sad and I felt envy of my friend's family when I was in elementary school. If I had children, I don't want them to have a similar experience like me.
 How do I deal with the issues of houseworks? well, I do what I need to do. I want to be a good cook sometime, but I have almost no chace to cook since my mother always serves meals. However I'm sure I'll try to do anything when I have to. I don't want to eat or serve conveni-bento everyday and don't want to wear dirty clothes!!

#3-7 Gender Discrimination

Since I went to a girls' junior high and high school, there was almost no discrimination at my school. However, I've just remembered one thing. It's about a club activities.
An exchange student from NY state was staying at my house for about 3 weeks until a few weeks ago. One day, she asked me why this school had no soccer team? She goes to a same school where I went, by the way. Then I thought, "yeah, why not??" Is it not so popular sports among girls or women? Are there not enough girls' soccer team to join a competition? I'm not so sure about those questions, but there are girls soccer teams in high school back in the US.
In Japan, women soccer team "Nadeshiko Japan" was not so popular until they won a world tournament a few years ago. These days, it's more popular and TV shows sometimes pick up the topic about women soccer team.

It might be not a serious gender discrimination, but I think it used to be said in Japan that soccer is a sports for boys.

(picture: http://number.bunshun.jp/articles/-/144760 )

#3-6 Japanese Subculture

Do you know a type of group called "Visual-kei"?
Basically it is a genre of musicians or bands, but also there is a group of people who like their songs.
It is not official, but according to wikipedia.com, it's said that  the word "visual" come from one of X Japan's slogans, "Psychedelic violence crime of visual shock".
My image of "visual-kei" was black clothes, kinda dark and they put on make ups and so on. But actually it wasn't right. It was just a image in my head. They says the fans' and bands' styles have been changing.
In 80's, they dyed their long hair blue, red, gold, and they put on showy make-ups.
In 90's, it became more feminine. Then, in the end of 90's, their make ups incited fear in people around them.

It is said that the fans are almost women aged teens to 20s, and they wear the cosplay of the band they support or some other fasions like punk, gothic and etc.

As I mentioned above, they are interested in similar musics. However, there are many different types of musics in visual-kei. There are toooooo much so that I cannot explain about them...

It's said that some people used to be influenced by the songs about self-harm in 90's.

I think they don't have any paticular place to gather, but at the concert, maybe??

In my opinion, I was a little bit scared to see them from their make ups at first, but I think I can be with them if they are not a huge number of people gathering. Because I have some friends who love those kind of clothes and musics, and they are nice.

If I misunderstood about visual-kei, I'm sorry because I'm not 100% sure about this peer group...

#3-5 My Future Plan

At first, I'm going to talk about my Time Capsule which my best friend, her sister and I made about 10 years ago. My friend and I had just graduated when we made the Time Capsule. I totally forgot what I had written when we opened it. We opened the capsule this Summer because we had been planning to open it when we became 20 years old. We wrote a letter to myself in the future. "I" said, "My dream is becoming a social worker. Is your dream coming true? I love swimming so much right now, but what about you?" and some other things. ...Actually, my dream has been changing in this 10 years; like I wanted to be a swimmer or gymnast once, I wanted to do something with welfare work, do volunteer work in other countries, go to Germany and study German etc... and I don't swim right now... However, it was so much fun to read the sentences which was written by "me". We couldn't stop laughing while we were reading them.

Back to reality... Since I'm satisfied with my life right now, I cannot think of anything... I'm trying to have a good time every seconds these days because you never know what will happen tomorrow. Maybe I should write a letter to "me in ten years"!!
My future plan could change depends on my life situation, I think.