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Students and Cellphones

Should students be allowed to bring cellphones to school?

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Taiwan Makes Its Mark – A Short History of a Thriving Island

The history of Taiwan traces back to 7,000 years ago when the Austronesians, the ancestors of the island’s indigenous people, arrived in small groups and became the earliest known inhabitants of Taiwan. During the 16^th century, western sailors arrived to set up colonies and conduct trade due to the fact that Taiwan is located at the conjunction of Eastern Asia, meaning it holds great importance in strategic and trade position. Taiwanese history is a constant alternation of different ruling countries, including the Dutch, Spanish, Japanese, and Han immigrants from China. The past couple hundred years of alternating countries in power has given Taiwan a great burst of color and diversity in culture, ethnicity, and religion. Because of the abundance of natural resources and the sub-tropical climate of the tiny island, western countries have been drawn to Taiwan like hikers to the majestic Jade Mountain since the early 16^th century, and the historical background of this diamond in the Eastern Pacific has never lost its shine.

In the first half of the 17^th century, the Dutch established missionaries in Anping, which is the modern day Tainan city. The diversity in religion and the success in international trade of Taiwan began from there. Business in the trade of various goods such as rice and sugar brought in great sums of income for the Dutch. By recruiting a good number of Han immigrants from the eastern coast of China, productivity of food production increased at a large scale. While the Dutch ruled in the south, Spaniards dispatched part of their Armada to take power in the north from Quelang to Keelung. They created a political struggle between the north and south by using Taiwan for developing economic and trade relations with China and Japan; and relied on the labor of the Han immigrants or the indigenous people of the island. In the end, the Dutch, who were having complications in respects to allegiance with the natives, were able to overcome the issues they had with them, while the Spanish were facing hardships concerning problems that occurred during alternating political regimes in the Philippines. The Spanish were soon forced to retreat from the island due to unsuccessful Taiwanese colonial administration. The 17^th century had been difficult for the natives and immigrants, yet it also opened up the tiny piece of land to more possibilities and dynamic changes.

By defeating the Ming Dynasty, the Manchus, indigenous people of Manchuria, indirectly brought Taiwanese history into the modern era. After the fall of the Great Ming, numerous Han immigrants from China began settling on the south-eastern coast of Taiwan. Zheng Chenggong, a rebel against the Qing Dynasty also known as Koxinga, retreated to Taiwan after a few failed rebellions against the emperor. He overthrew Dutch power and established a short term Chinese government in the modern day Tainan in 1662. A few years after the settlement, the Yongzheng Emperor of the Qing Dynasty and his followers took control over several areas of Taiwan, and Koxinga was soon driven off of the island. The Chinese brought trade to the not yet civilized piece of land, but also caused a lot of injustice that led to uncountable occurrences of deadly conflicts between the people and the government. During the Sino-French War of 1885, the Qing Empire designated Taiwan as the 22^nd province of China. In just ten short years, Japan, who had been hungry for domination over Taiwan since the 16^th century, gained full sovereignty over Taiwan through the Treaty of Shimonoseki of 1895 that was signed between Imperial Japan and the Qing Dynasty. The Japanese brought new technology that boosted Taiwan in areas such as farming and trade, and they were also able to introduce modern day justice and healthcare systems. The new Taiwan was then prosperous and vigorous.

In 1927, the Kuomingtang party and the Communist Party of China, who were both part of the Republic of China but came to an ideological impasse, started the Chinese Civil War, a major conflict that deepened the rivalry between the two opposing sides and created a controversy between China and Taiwan that has lasted until today. The fighting continued until 1937 when they formed an alliance to face a vigorous Japanese invasion of China. Using their deep understanding of their homeland and keen military instincts, the alliance was able to hold off the onslaught until Japan’s great defeat in World War 2. As a consequence of their unsuccessful attempt to win the war, the Japanese had to relinquish the power it had over territories that belonged to China.  Immediately after World War 2 ended, the Communist Party of China and the Kuomingtang resumed with a battling with another four years of intense fighting. It was after the four years did the fight slowly subside. The outcome of the Chinese Civil War was the founding of a new Communist Party of China controlling the mainland and the Kuomintang being forced to retreat to Taiwan. Mao Zedong, responsible for the defeat of the Kuomintang and also the head of the new CPC government from the mainland, made further attempts to liberate Taiwan by military force, but never succeeded. Until today, no formal documents have been signed declaring the stop of the Chinese Civil War. Therein lies the problem between the mainland and Taiwan. Today, controversy is sparked between the debate over the sovereignty of Taiwan. The Chinese believe that Taiwan has always been a part of the mainland, therefore the land and its people belong to the mainland and is a part of China. People that support the independence of Taiwan claim that since Taiwan had been under Japanese control when the Republic of China was established in 1912, it is consequently not a part of the Chinese Republic. Interpretations of the sovereignty of island are not yet certain, which has resulted in cross-strait tensions and differing global perceptions of the relationship between the two governments.

Over the past 60 years, Taiwan has been through numerous struggles and international disputes, but has persisted and progressed into the thriving island nation it is today. The series of hardships began near the end of the Chinese Civil War. Taiwan was being supported by the United States in order to prevent communism from spreading in Asia, so while the PRC led by Mao Zedong invaded Taiwan, the USA led the 7^th Fleet in the Taiwan Strait to prevent the attacks from succeeding. The US provided military supplies and resources that greatly boosted the morale of the tiny island country. This friendly overseas relationship came to an end when China became an official charter member of the United Nations in 1979. After the UN recognized the People’s Republic of China, government ties between the United States of America and Taiwan were forced to come to an end, though the two countries have maintained unofficial relations through the Taiwan Relations Act since 1979.  In the meantime, crises between the PRC and the ROC only began to worsen. In August of 1958, the intense artillery bombardment of the island of Kinmen left cross-strait relations in ruins, and it wasn’t until the establishment of diplomatic relations between the PRC and the US that the bombardment of Kinmen ceased. Taiwan has come a long way since then, with successful rural land reforms, which entailed the redistribution of land between farmers, and a wave of newly-established industries, which ensured that the economy of Taiwan took off, earning Taiwan a spot in the top four Asian Tigers, along with Singapore, Hong Kong, and South Korea. Along with blooming economic growth, the democratization of Taiwan has progressed from its humble beginnings in the era of Chiang Kai-shek to its dramatic reform in the time of governing by Chiang Ching-kuo, Kai-shek’s son, all the way to the first presidential election where Lee-Tung Hui took power and ushered Taiwan into the modern era until the present where Ma-Ying Jeou has governed since 2008. With modernizing economic and democratic growth, Taiwan is now one of the top four leading countries in Asia; it is a complete package with not only a foreseeable bright future, but also an intriguing past that adds to its value.

The National Palace Museum

All year around, Taiwan overflows with tourists from all around the world, and the 11.8 billion NT it made in 2012 is no better proof of the rich culture it has that attracts tourists to pay visits. As an ideal shopping, culinary, and tourist paradise, the beauty of Taiwan ranges from natural magnificence to artifacts and relics stored in prestigious national museums. One of the most famous attractions is the National Palace Museum, a profound museum of antiquities and art located in the city of Taipei. With an astonishing number of more than 690,000 permanent pieces of ancient Chinese artifacts, it is one of the biggest museums in the world. Most of the pieces are highly distinguished artifacts from emperors that encompass more than 8,000 years of Chinese history.

Though the extremely impressive National Palace Museum is located in Taipei, Taiwan, it was actually a part of the Beijing Palace Museum in China. During the Chinese Civil War, General Chiang Kai-shek made the decision to evacuate some arts to Taiwan, but when the struggle worsened in 1948 between the Communist and Nationalist armies, the Palace Museum and five other institutes decided to move the most prized pieces of relics to Taiwan. It was later in the 1960s when the United States Agency for International Development donated 32 million dollars to the Preparatory Office of the National Central Museum. The Republic of China government also donated more than 30 million dollars to establish a special fund to create this majestic museum in the suburbs of Taipei.

In all of the priceless, exquisite artifacts of the National Palace Museum, the most well known piece is the Jadeite Cabbage, which is a lovely piece of somewhat translucent jadeite carved into a shape of a cabbage head accompanied by a grasshopper. It’s divine colors and delicate details have attracted tourists from all across the globe. Aside from the precious artifacts of the museum, it also contains several Chinese Song and Ming Dynasty-styled gardens that are complimented by a few touches of feng shui, water management, and landscape design. There is no better place to be than in the National Palace Museum under the influence of rich history and art and the perfect combination of nature and culture.

Guidelines of Decision Making- Traditions and Religions

The human race has evolved based on the traditions and the religions we have either innovated, or left behind by our ancestors; the Romans were Catholic and followed the path of Jesus Christ; the Chinese were Confucian and learned Confucius’ words and wise knowledge by heart; many Africans were Islamic, and followed the Shaira faithfully. Catholicism brought order and gave birth to breathtaking architecture that people still gush over today. The traditional cardinal human relations created by Confucius note the respect and relationship between ruler and the ruled; between parents and children, between siblings, between husband and wife, and between friends. People still follow this basic saying now, creating a much more civil and peaceful society. The Africans following the Shaira have learned the most basic idea of what esteem is, and it has also had a great impact on their population. Even though the religions or laws may have passed away along with a lot of our culture as time has passed, what is left of these traditions still guide how people think, becoming a rule people are bound to, affecting how they make their decisions, or who they decide to be.

As a student, one will be given the task to learn to have the correct values in terms of what is good or bad, or what is right or wrong. A major part of these values were decided by our ancestors, and they start to differ as religion and people start to change or separate. Chinese values, strongly affected by Confucian thinking, put most of its importance on family. Therefore, a lot of the choices and decisions Chinese people make will take in huge consideration of what their parents think, or what brings the most light to their family heritage. Expectations related to family life account for many difficulties that the first generation of Chinese immigrants met. The second generation found it hard to cope with the demands of their parents. As time went on, these Chinese children wanted to fulfill their own potential, so they moved out from the traditional position of children and went in search for their dreams, causing guilt on the children’s part and shame on the parents. Traditions may have weakened, but the fact that people make their decisions based on these rules of society have not.

With a different kind of religion, the traditions and values often affect decision making differently. Unlike the Chinese, Catholic thinking focuses more on social morality. Catholicism has brought religious unity to western civilization; a great example being how the Church rose to overthrow the Roman Empire. As the religion has transformed, many parts of it has shed away, but the belief in unity, uniqueness in individual, and bringing justice to this imperfect world still remains. These ideas are vague, but the ideas they stand for reflect on real life. People believe that they are different, and they make their decisions based on what their difference is good for. Our society was able to evolve to what it is today because of the uniqueness each and everyone in it contains. All religions affect the decision making of the people who believe in them. From the Catholic Church of the past to the faithful followers of the many religions that exist today, all have been basing parts of their lives on the ideals of what their religion stands for.

Traditions and religions are guidelines and encouragements that people today base their decisions on. Through their transformations, they have become beneficial in preparing people for society today. The Romans, Chinese, African Americans and much more have proved that the guidance and order brought by these religions and traditions are essential in the development of the communities. They help mature the minds of many people, and teach them the balance between themselves and their society. Our daily lives reflect on how ubiquitous these rules of our society are. These rules may not be government enforced, and may not have a 100% effect on our actions, but they are always there within our conscious, telling us what is right and what is wrong. These beliefs and customs are our values, and the motivation to keep us moving. In conclusion, there are no free choices or ideas that are not bound in some way by our rules of society.

The Answer is Just Not Enough

The newer generation of young children have been edified by the education system today to be capable of having the skills to find out the answers to a question very quickly. The reason why children are putting more of their focus on the answer is to satisfy the urge to score higher points, or to gain confidence. To solve a problem means to first understand the situation you are in and to familiarize the conditions or terms you are given. One has to comprehend concepts that this process may involve, in order to unravel the problem most effectively and smoothly. Without completely being in possession of these particular skills, people begin to become indifferent and unsympathetic towards the process of problem solving, which reflects on their actions when they continue to mature and results in some of the apathetic and unsociable atmosphere in our society today. By not having faith in the process, he or she often does not arrive at the solution. Without fully trusting your ways of solving a problem, you do not fully understand the concept leading to the discovery of the solution to the problem and can lose the chances of noticing the enjoyment solving a problem can have, and most importantly, letting go of the chances to learn. When someone can fully come to an understanding of the process, they can gain experience in solving different types of complications. This can lead to a discovery of a variety of different methods to solve a single problem, and can even uncover the pleasure there is hidden in the progression of solving a problem.

As our society has evolved, the competiveness has increased exponentially, since people all around the globe are fighting for the opportunity to take hold of the occupation that best provides them with the resources needed in life. In order to grasp those opportunities, people often look for the most effective way to reach the goal. This attitude of life usually starts to develop during the formative student years, when the most important goal is to receive high grades. I remember times when I memorized methods in order to solve problems quickly, and since knowing that a lot of this knowledge wouldn’t be useful for my occupation in the future, I memorized ways leading to the answers just to manage the tests. I had no confidence in solving the problem since I didn’t know what this monotonous and complicated process would bring me, so I focused more on finding shortcuts that would help skip over the steps I would originally have to go through if I really went through the process. This approach of learning led to the momentary memorization of a lot of knowledge without full understanding. The memorization of the methods meant not fully grasping the variables and conditions given to me. This meant I never solved the problem, I just got to the answer. Many people today put more of their focus on the answers rather than the process of solving the problem due to the apathetic attitude towards what may not be useful for them in the future. By doing this, most members of our society are missing the point of learning from what Gruber calls, “the game, or the wonderful process, if you will, of thinking”.

In the public eye, the process of solving these problems may seem tedious and uninteresting, but what the eye is missing is the feeling of achievement reachable only through personally experiencing. By looking superficially on the outside, one could miss the joy of peering pass the complications on the outside and looking into the discovery of more doors and windows leading to different results and solutions. Emile Berliner wanted to solve the problems related to the bad quality of the phonograph invented by Thomas Edison. The original one was built together with a series of tin foil and wax cylinders. Emile modified the phonograph by using a variety of different materials from glass, to zinc, and eventually plastic. Through the process, a completely different device was invented called the gramophone. It reads and records groves and melodies by reading the vibration of different sounds. There could be no better example than Emile Berliner to explain how much knowledge and insight one could gain from the process of problem solving.

In conclusion, by not just being concerned about the answer, you could experience discovery, confidence, or how to react to failures or times when you don’t succeed. But at times when people do not have enough confidence or faith in the process of solving a problem, they tend to just put more focus on the answer rather than the process. In order to reach a higher level of understanding of your problems and potential in problem solving, one just has to learn how to be more effervescent and more receptive to the process behind the problem.

Choices in Life

Life choices such as to lie or to tell the truth, to live or to die, to be loyal or to betray, are all difficult choices that we are bound to face sooner or later in our lives. As a teenager, at this stage of growing up, the two most difficult options to choose between is whether one should be assimilated or to show one’s uniqueness or true personality. As our society has evolved, it has changed some of the values and perspectives of what teenagers should do or be; and a huge part of it is making the decision to choose to fit in or to express who you truly are. The complexity behind making these choices derives from the risk that is involved in the decision making. One could be extremely successful if you chose to live your life in pursuit of expressing your personality, yet you could end up being mocked and ridiculed; but you could still live the ideal life even by conforming to the norms of our society, although you could live without taking full control over your lives. Deciding whether to express yourself or to conform to the ideals of the people around you is the most difficult choice to make, since it may affect your actions, your confidence, and your values for the rest of your lives.

“He who trims himself to suit everyone will soon whittle himself away.” The famous playwright Raymond Hull made it clear to the world what he chose to live his life by. He proved to the world that living by this ideal is nonetheless the right choice by having successful careers as a television screenwriter, a lecturer, and the author of numerous non-fiction novels. Another well-known and successful icon, Lady Gaga, also explained in an interview about how she was thought to be too provocative during her school years. She toned it down at that time, but later in life she discovered that this diversity is what led her to her accomplishments today. Herbert Aptheker, born in the year of 1915, was a Civil Rights Activist who belonged to an extremely wealthy family in Brooklyn. Even when growing up in a racist environment, when peonage was enforced in many states in the US, he chose to draw himself away from the prejudiced thinking. Rather than being assimilated along with his four brothers and sisters, he joined William L. Patterson, a lawyer who gave up law and became the leader of the Communist Party. They later formed the “Abolish Peonage Committee”, and managed to rescue many black women from a brothel in Georgia and move them to Chicago and New Orleans. Therefore, people who choose to express their true intentions and personalities often are able to accomplish and fulfill their dreams or goals, but the process will be difficult and may not always end up successful. While Lady Gaga was experimenting with music performances that involved provocativeness and drugs, her parents wouldn’t look at her for months. During the process, she also experienced intense depression when being dropped by her record labels a couple of times. Herbert Aptheker also didn’t have such a smooth process while fighting for Civil Rights. He didn’t have the chance to start a family, or even stay in the same place for a week; he was rejected and brusquely pushed aside by many black men and women who didn’t accept what he was doing, as well as people who were not thankful for what he was throwing his entire life into doing. Even by putting all his effort and time into setting the Civil Rights into action, he wasn’t able to change the fact that many black people were still treated badly. Though it had been hard times he had been through, he managed to leave a true mark in challenging racism. Expressing your true self gives you a chance to experience a process that is worthwhile of your time and effort. The results may not always end up how you want it to be, or what you expected it to be, but the knowledge you or others have about how much contribution you have made for your dream is permanent.

On the other hand, if rather than expressing yourself you choose to fit in and go along with the people around you, you enter through a completely different door than when trying to express yourself. By trying to fit in, you are hiding the most important part of you, the part of you that is irreplaceable, the part of you that is most precious to this world. If Lady Gaga were to tone down and hide her provocativeness forever, would she be able to achieve and stand in the position she is at now? Bernard-Henri Levy has written for Newsweek many times speaking up for disadvantaged people who are trying to live in the dangerous environments of the war in Syria. If he stops writing, intervening, or talking against the bloodstained killing process in Syria, and just goes along with the French and Chinese government who are backing this war, would the consciousness of people around the world to stop killing in Syria be aroused? Nonetheless, even if he chose not to live his life without fighting for these people in Syria, he would still live well off without the critics constantly assessing his interpretations as biased, reckless, and without merit. People can live their life with their uniqueness buried inside and still be well off, but that would be living without reaching their potential.

In all of the hair-pulling decisions you could face in your lives, I strongly believe that the choice between choosing to fit in or to express your originality is the most difficult to make. In both situations, you could either receive precious opportunities or lose priceless chances. You can pick a fruit that is unchanged and help it grow, or you could tinkle with its DNA, modify it, experiment with it, and make it bigger and juicier. It may be unsuccessful, but when it does work out, the results may be more appealing. It is up to yourself to decide whether you would like to live a life that is safe and typical, or to live one that may be challenging and unpredictable that could lead you to living your dreams.

Question Yourself

Baltasar Gracian believed that self-knowledge is the beginning of self-improvement, and that is accurate from many perspectives. By gaining understanding about yourself, it increases the possibility to make better choices and decisions based on your personal qualities and needs. There is an old saying expressing the fact that no one understands you more than you do. This saying encourages people to dig past superficial understanding and focus more on their true nature. By gaining understanding about yourself from others, a person can also reflect on what their true personality is like. This instruction sounds simple enough, but the actual process involves true willingness and persistence. It may be painful sometimes recognizing the numerous flaws you may have. While recognizing good qualities in yourself, the process can also bring you a false sense of confidence and make you more careless, thoughtless, or arrogant. Either way, without truly understanding ourselves, we are never successful. Our lives may seem wonderful and joyous in the eyes of the public and the scale formed by our society, but we may never be truly happy according to our own meter because of our lack of understanding for it.

From the uncountable amount of ways to understand oneself, one of the most efficient and most thorough ways is allowing yourself to make mistakes, to have the tolerance to accept your flaws, and to have the courage to face all your strengths and weaknesses. Knowing one’s strengths and weaknesses can decrease the pressure on life in many ways. By knowing what you are good and not good at, you can easily adjust to your environment by choosing an occupation that suits your strengths, or to just simply know where your limits are and to prevent yourself from getting emotionally and mentally depressed or anxious. What is good about knowing your weaknesses is the fact that you will be able to pick out what needs to be improved. Like a math equation, by knowing a mistake, you could just fix your calculation error rather than redoing your entire equation. For example, Olympic Swimmer Michael Phelps succeeded in fulfilling his own dreams because with help from his mother accepting his ADHD, he was able to use it as a motivation. This way, his mom was able to get him the proper help he needs, and aid him in discovering his interests, rather than sulking about the fact that his child may not be “normal”. They were also able to encourage parents or families who are in similar situations as them to become more fearless in accepting flaw and taking action in improving it.

Nikki Giovanni stated, “If you don’t understand yourself you don’t understand anybody else.” So in order to introduce yourself to others, you need to first introduce yourself to you. An effective way is to use the people around you as mirrors, using their views and opinions of you as a reflection of who you are and what you are becoming. This mirror helps you better understand what flaws you have, and allows you to view the flaws closely.  But you needs to remember that an imperfection does not always have to be changed, because imperfections are the building blocks of both who you are and your unique personalities. Another important part of using the people around you as mirrors is the self-examination afterwards. You cannot always rely on other people’s perspectives to decide what is good or wrong; you must consider your own ideas and points of view in order to mold yourself into who you are destined to become.

The most successful peoples are those who don’t have any illusions about who they are. They know themselves well and they can move in the direction of their best talents. They know the kind of culture they thrive in and how they can benefit from that culture. In conclusion, it can be difficult to understand yourself, but through accepting your own imperfections and strengths, you can move in the direction that most benefits your future. By using socializing as a change for self-understanding and examination, you can increase the speed in finding your true direction. To know and understand who you are, stare fearlessly into your soul. That is when you can truly live as you.

A City In Progress

Kaohsiung, one of the jewels of Taiwan, holds great importance in both the past and future of its country. It has led Taiwan into becoming a major trading destination in the eastern Pacific Ocean region, and is bringing the heavy manufacturing of this tiny tropical island to a global scale. Kaohsiung, one of the major cities located in southwestern Taiwan, faces the Taiwan Strait on the west. It is divided into thirty-eight districts. It is the second largest city in Taiwan, with a population of around 2.9 million, and is a center for manufacturing, refining, shipbuilding, and many other heavy industries. A major port and the Kaohsiung International Airport make Kaohsiung one of the most important cities in Taiwan. Based on my experience of living in Kaohsiung for over ten years, I truly believe that Kaohsiung is one of the most well- structured cities in the world. With bountiful resources in terms of transportation and roads, accompanied by lush, gorgeous parks, there is no problem in showcasing the well thought-out layout of Kaohsiung.

As one of the most crucial cities in Taiwan, Kaohsiung needs transportation to keep people’s daily lives organized and efficient, which is the reason why the city has focused a lot on public transportation for the past decade. Advanced public transportation has been added to the busy metropolis; the Kaohsiung Mass Rapid Metro System was introduced in March, 2008, and a light rail line that circles central Kaohsiung City was approved in 2007. In 2004, the Kaohsiung City Government and Siemens built a temporary two-station circular light rail line along with one train to traverse it. This was meant to improve some residents’ concerns, such as excessive noises and delayed traffic flow in the Central Park Area. There is also the Taiwan High Speed Railway, located in the northern district of Zuoying, which connects to other parts of the country. Public transportation has increased the effectiveness and comfort of the city, adding to the reasons why Kaohsiung is a well thought out city.

Another one of Kaohsiung’s special features is the ten roads that run from west to east, laid out in numerical order from YiSin Road on the southern side to ShihChyuan towards the north. The position of the roads gives tourists a good reference for navigating the city. All around the city at every traffic light, signs are hung, displaying the direction and the location of each road in addition to providing directions to some of the popular tourist destinations near the area. The unique part of the ten roads is that each one of them holds part of the special culture of Taiwan and each has a story or moral behind their names. For example, LiouHe (the sixth road) is famous for its night market that has been operating since 1950. It is known that about one third of the 170 food stands have been offering their services for more than 40 years. Recently, it has become an all-pedestrian space, free from the existence of scooters and motorcycles. In Mandarin, LiouHe means both harmony and the qualities demonstrated by being an individual. At night, CiSian (the seventh road) is like a small slice of Las Vegas with its neon lights and wide-varied entertainment. Originally, CiSian meant the seven talents or scholars who would gather in the bamboo forest during the Jin Dynasty. Now it just means good friendship.These roads are the key to some of the most beautiful parks and malls there are in Kaohsiung. The Love River, Central Park, and the Chihou Fort are only some of the famous spots the roads lead to that displays the rich culture and history of Kaohsiung.

The roads, the parks, the public transportations all sum up to the fact that Kaohsiung is a well thought out city. This charming seaside city in Taiwan proves to the entire world that the importance of comfort, convenience, and organization is essential to a community, and that all these elements will eventually bring prosperity to a place. Kaohsiung represents a new generation of cities, showing everyone that even with a limited amount of area and an enormous amount of population, a city can still be orderly and convenient.

People Matter

Relating to our society is building a stabilized supporting base for your life that lifts you higher in social relations or workplace status, and at the same time, is there to cushion your fall. The special skill of empathy can allow you to show the more friendly and devoted side of you, increasing the intimacy you have with many different types of people. Whether it is at your workplace, or anywhere you go in life, sympathizing and tolerating others can provide you with more feeling of security and confidence. Knowing that some of those people will be there to support you, they become part of the support structure of your life. Empathy can also earn you more respect and show a more responsive side of you to not only your boss, but to your fellow colleagues. This increase of respect in your working environment can boost your efficiency and self-esteem. Trying to balance out being amicable and respectful to most people around you may seem impossible to do, but this method is applicable and accomplishable, and the results are appealing.

George Washington Carver, having been a successful research scientist during his years at numerous research centers and colleges, was despised by many of his colleagues due to his level of fame, fortune, and success. Being one of the most demanding and stubborn scholars many administrators have ever worked with, he distinctly left a strong impression on the people around him. Born as a slave, he knew what it was like surviving in a surrounding where everything was lacking. With these hardships in mind, he was motivated to create a method to increase the efficiency of the growth of their staple crops, which consisted of cotton and legumes. By teaching farmers how to restore nitrogen back into the soil and to practice crop rotation, positive results could be seen in farmers’ alternative cash crops. Carver was able to connect with the people whom he understood. He was once one of those hardworkers who plowed the land nonstop until his hands bled. With that connection, many people of his kind supported him and rooted him on when the colleagues around him loathed him. On his grave was written “He could have added fortune to fame, but caring for neither, he found happiness and honor in being helpful to the world.” These words are the best proof of the love and care people can receive from being sympathetic to the people around them.

Having a sympathetic attitude towards the people in the working environment is just as vital as being compassionate to the people in your comfort zone. Unlike Carver who treated his colleagues brutally and sacrificed the relationships he could’ve had with his coworkers in order to achieve the goal of making the lives of the everyone who was suffering easier, the board of directors at Google has been able to balance out maintaining a professional attitude towards work and treating their employees of all age and gender with care and consideration. Through constructing hospitable workplaces that welcome all employees, they managed to encourage people to have fun during their workday. A strong sense of community develops in organizations where people feel that they are part of a team and a family, which, connected by common values and purpose, results in cooperation within and across departments. Google helps prove that by displaying hospitality and openness to coworkers and employees, a workplace can be more efficient; they are able to spark more creativity and originality. Also, through treating employees with generosity, they are able to gain respect from the people who work for them, upgrading their workplace status and making sure that others will work faithfully for them. Respect in both the social life and the workplace can be difficult to balance, yet when balanced can help a person reach their ultimate potential.

Varg Vikernes once said, “People are like books, and the world is like a library.” By interacting and socializing with all different types of people, or to even step into other’s shoes and take a look at what the world is like from their position, a person can be surprised at the contrast there is in the world from their perspective. Through socializing and commiserating with the wide spectrum of humanity around themselves, a person will gain strength from the growing number of people who care about them and are willing to catch him or her when they fall. Taking small steps in tolerating diversity, being tender and compassionate to humankind, and being sympathetic to everyone’s needs are what help our society function. Whether it is in life today or life in the past, one tiny step is a big step to opening up hearts to accepting divergence. It not only blesses us with smooth sailing for the rest of our lives, but also pushes our community forward towards a new level of humanity.