Victoria Trip

  I went to Victoria on last weekend.  Although I have been there once, then I couldn't visit Butchart Garden.  That's why I decided to go there with my friends at this time.  When I went to Victoria at the first time (with my girl friend), it was still winter.  I had expected we couldn't see flowers there, so I gave up to go there.
  So I was so excited to go to Butchart Garden. And as I expected before I went, It was so BEAUTIFUL!!!! I couldn't believe my eyes.  Also, it was really interesting for me, because one of my hobbies is to look up to flowers.  I saw plenty of flowers which I had never seen and wanted to see with my eyes!  I really enjoyed walking around there. However, at the same time, I felt little bit sad because I really wanted my girlfriend to see such beautiful flowers.  I hope we will come back to Butchart Garden again.  If you don't know how wonderful it is, I strongly recommend you to go there.    Although the garden costs high, it is worthy!!
  What I enjoyed is not only Butchart Garden but also several famous places in Victoria.  In particular, I love B.C. museum.  Compared to Vancouver museum, it is much more interesting.  As everyone knows, I'm really curious about creatures including those which have already been extinguished.  I was so excited that I took lots of pictures there.  Also, I saw night view in Victoria at the first time.  It was amazingly beautiful.
  I realized that Victoria is one of the most beautiful city in Canada.  Some people say that Victoria is as tedious as Vancouver; however, Victoria is very nice city, at least to visit!!

Amorphophallus titanum

     Today, I want to introduce Amorphophallus titanum (or titan arum). This is the largest flower in the world.  As you guys know, Rafflesia is also very famous for the largest flower. As a matter of fact, titan arum is famous for the largest "inflorescence".  Although people are surprised at the size of titan arum, it has some other unique aspects besides the size.
     First of all, I'm going to give you some basic information about this flower.  Titan arum grows in rain forest in Sumatora.  The big one is about 3.5m tall.  Number of titan arum is really few, so people now are trying to preserve this flower.
     What's interesting about this flower is the fact that titan arums come into flower just once 7 years.  Basically, this plant are just closing inflorescence; that is,it is just a bud.  In addition, even if it comes into flower, it keeps for only 2 days.  Titan arum becomes a flower only 2 days in 7 years!!  Therefore, when titan arums bloom, many people come to Indonesia in order to see this rare flowering.  However, to tell the truth, as you can find it out from the picture, this is not actually beautiful.  In fact, titan arum was chosen as the ugliest flower in the world few years ago.
     Furthermore, when titan arums bloom, they emit terrible smell, which is really similar to smell of dead people.  The reason they emit bad smell is to attract some bugs and make them help pollination.  If titan arums emit bad smell, bugs are supposed to gather on the flower, and they drop into bottom of the flower.  Then, if bugs which has pollen touch stigmas, pollination of titan arums are supposed to succeed.  Titan arums keep emitting terrible smell not to miss rare chance to leave offspring.  Some couples think titan arums are romantic because they can see flowering just once 7 years, and sometimes they really go see it.  But most of them regret seeing it due to deadly smell.  According to some reports, this smell is so intense that nobody can't stand without mask.
     In conclusion, I don't recommend you to go see this bizarre plant, but I want to see it at least once before I die.(Actually once is enough.)  Titan arums make me think over what creature is.  I love this mysterious creatures.  I wonder how the plant come up with emitting horrible smell to gather bugs because they don't have brains.  Or, I also wonder if they have accurate clock in their bodies on not. In other words, how can they count 7 years? (Their flowering is exactly once 7 years.)  That's why creature is interesting!!!!

how to prepare for mid term exam

Hi, guys.

I'm going to introduce proper ways to prepare for mid-term exam.
Because I'm a continuing student, I may know little bit more how mid-term exam is than new students.
Basically, we don't have the best way which everybody can share.  That's because mid-term test is a test which requires our real English abilities.
So, sometimes I don't prepare anything, but it doesn't mean I gave up.
I mean, if you always study by yourself, just do same things as usual.
As Xiaoyue mention in her blog, the most important thing is to have good sleep, to get energy from food, and to have confidence.

If I can add something here, I suggest that we review what we learned in writing class.
For example, we can make sure sentence structure, organization, grammar, and some useful words such as "On the other hand", "To sum up".

You guys can make it!

Argentine ant

  I have so many hobbies, and one of them is investigating weird creatures. I want to introduce Argentine ant, which is the most dangerous creature all over the world. It's actually listed up in "100 of the World's Worst Invasive Alien Species".


  Although their bodies are smaller than general ants, they are extremely violent, cruel and numerous.  In general, animals kill other animals in order to eat them (to live), or to defend themselves or children.  However, Argentine ants frequently kill other animals to just kill.  Some of species which got attacked by them are completely extinguished.  They can easily increase, and make huge colonies.  Once they invade a place, many species are bound to disappear there.  Argentine ants kill not only ants or other insects, but also even birds, cows, sheep, or sometimes human babies.  That's why they are regarded as the most dangerous species in the world.  Although many researchers have tried to find the way to completely drive away Argentine ants, it's still unknown.  I really wonder why they are so violent.  One of universal rules which lie on all creatures is that animals must not kill others unless it's for survival.  But Argentine ants don't eat victims, and they don't stop killing until extinguishing victims.  It's scary, isn't it?


  And be careful, because Argentine ants are  a common household pest, often entering buildings in search of food or water (particularly during dry or hot weather), or to escape flooded nests during periods of heavy rainfall. Argentine ant colonies almost invariably have many reproductive queens, as many as eight for every 1,000 workers, so eliminating a single queen does not stop the colony's ability to breed.  It's really scary, isn't it?


  I want to give them calm mind loving peace.  The reason that I'm interested in such a horrible specie is simple. It's because I find them sad.  I hope there is a way that Argentine ants can live together with other species someday....

What I thought about the movie "Being there"

Although I could watch only a half of the whole story (I'm going to watch it), I'm going to write about what I thought about the movie.  First of all, I really like it.  It is basically funny. It made me laugh many times, but I was moved at the same time.  People who are impressed by Chance look comical, but it was moving that people's mind was getting cured with touching Chance's innocence.  I kinda felt this movie was similar to "Forrest Gump", which is one of my favarite movies.  And "Being there" had a lot of impressive scenes such as "a man walking on warter".  This scene left a misterious aftertaste.  I want to think over what the scene mean.

A Comparison of "Hills Like White Elephants" and "The CLOD & the PEBBLE"

Both are about love. Both made me think of what love is. But these two are describing different aspect of love.  "Hills Like White Elephants", which was written by Ernest Hemingway, seems to be based on realism. Although people have ideals about love like what we can see in fairy tails, they actually have to face to a real.  And the real is not necessarily happy nor beautiful. The short story show us real love through realistic problem which we often see in our life.  On the other hand, the poem "The CLOD & the PEBBLE" is describing fundamental form of love.  It shows that love we want to believe is nothing but a fantasy, and actual love has always two sides.  This quality of love is not dependent on situation, age, or people.  It's universal.  Ernest Hemingway cut off a particular scene, and try to show us a possibility when we are involved in love. In addition, although William Blake obviously show his opinion, Ernest Hemingway pretends as if he was just a cameraman and doesn't have opinion about what he wrote.