You can't trust virtual identities - who knows what is truth n a lie or even fiction or even being the truth of someone other so i take words of virtual world at face value - free Views floating in virtual world not be part of anyone. But what about events and actions and antics? are the real or they r merely part of virtual reality? Is the "I" of real world is same as of virtual world? As said in 2020 - I don't consider both the same - Surely they do take some resources from my side but truly they have their independent presence.

Space is an exhilarating experience for me - As well as a truly painful one. I have too many desires, some desires are too big and desires that usually make a human a human - a true human.

I do want to experience all the planets of this small galaxy - Then ventured out to see other galaxies - How things are formed and come into life - speed of light isn't much of help either- I'll keep this vague but those who think will be able to awake their true human and see where i'm pointing at - and those who have reason to understand do understand - pros and cons and how dangerous and big this is.

This gives me the biggest heartache - If 7.75 billion is the price then i think this offer must be taken at the earliest, that's the responsibility of everyone.

Honestly, I don't think Running Man helped the actors members : Lee Kwang-Soo, Song Ji-Hyo or Jeon So-Min in their acting career. It made them more famous and helped with CF contracts but as an actors I don't think so. Song Joong-Ki was smart to leave the show at the beginning of his career.

*Give a hug*

Sending you good thoughts and good energy, and hoping for your grandmother's swift recovery! Glad you are safe right now, and hope things will improve in India quickly!

Yeah its really hard right now Mani-chan and all Beanies! Take care of yourselves! 🤗

Sending thoughts and condolences your way. Hugs.

*hugs*

I'm hoping for everyone's safety and good health. I'm glad that you managed to reduce your social media time as I think it might be able to reduce the anxiety that might be caused from being overly exposed to news.

There are a few Beans who always post pictures of some beautiful flowers, I found watching those pics soothing and relaxing.

I'm sorry about your friend's father, and I hope your grandmother feels better soon.

Don't put down your reading of chiclit. Reading what you like is good, and there's is nothing wrong or less than about lit that is written and marketed to women. For many reasons that I won't delve into here, things that women enjoy and like to spend time with are almost always seen as less worthy of doing than things that are traditionally enjoyed by men-type peoples, like say, sports or super hero stuff, or well, you get the idea. So, enjoy your chicklit novels, let them give you an escape and a place to be that is not filled with the grim realities of the news. And if you want some recommendations I'm sure Beanies will be ready and willing to give you a long list. (jumping off my feminist agenda soapbox now)

Stay safe and stay well.

Much love to you! Yes, reflecting on what you have and not what is going on is a great coping skill. I hope you stay healthy and that your family will too.

I think of you every time I read the news about the situation in India! I hope you and your loved ones stay safe. I think stepping back a bit from social media is a great idea, it’s so easy to get caught up in a spiral of looking at the same things over and over again and it doesn’t make you feel good.

Hopefully it will peak sooner than later, and no more damage to you and your closest and nearest.

I'm so sorry about your friend's father. Hoping that your grandmother recovers quickly.

I think it's a good idea to limit the news you take in since news usually uses fear so that we'll be compelled to watch. Take care and stay safe.

I'm sorry about your friend's father. I hope you and your family stay safe.

I wish you did not have to go through all of this. I am not as good with words as the others above me, so let me give you a virtual hug, a listening ear and a shoulder to cry on instead.

mani, once again you sound wise beyond your years. The last few years just taught me that it’s good to know the news, but I don’t have to know it alllllll day long.

It's frightening, @manichan and India was doing so well for such a long time. Stay safe and find all the distractions you can. I hope your loved ones stay safe too. We live in disturbing times. Who could have imagined it?

I'm going to join @egads on her soapbox for a moment: Never be ashamed of the things that make you happy,especially not the books that make you happy. We consume media to escape, so never feel silly for what brings you joy, especially not when that content is made by and for women, since we already deal with enough bullsh*t in this world. Chick lit is a wonderful genre (though I have mixed feelings regarding the term for a number of reasons I won't expound on here), especially when you're going through a hard time. I read a lot of fluffy romances after my father died because it was the only thing that kept me totally out of my head for a little while each day.

But also, Mani, you are doing the right thing by limiting your intake of media etc. When things got scary bad here that was what I did as well. Just find the things that comfort you and embrace them. Sometimes we need to unplug even though it feels selfish and uncaring. The situation in India is scary, and it seems like you know what you need to do to take care of yourself. I hope your grandmother is okay and feels better soon. I'm praying for India every day, and hoping things get better quickly.

{{{More hugs}}}

oh yes, and Youth of May. How could i forget that?

Sincerely hoping that things will improve soon in India, and my condolences on the loss of your family member. I hope you are able to find ways to soothe and care for yourself, whatever that looks like. Wishing you all the best. Be well.

I'm sorry about the loss of your family member. I hope the situation in India begins to improve.

I will think about them, and about you as well. Hang in there! And do not feel bad for putting K-dramas on hold, you will get back to them once you feel ready.

My condolences on the loss of your family member.

A tragic situation, keeping all in prayer~

I know, I guess there’s so many other places to comment about stuff these days.

I used to drop by early every week and post big comments, but real life took over and now I am always late with short comments that are no longer what they used to be. Multiply my story with that of many Beanies and we have a possible explanation.

Life does take over. I've currently moved cities to help out members of my family. I don't get to dramabeans as often and I'm not able to watch everything that I'd be watching at home. I also don't want to inadvertently stumble over spoilers so I'm censoring my scrolling through the posts. I'm saving it all for later. Meanwhile I keep reading Korean newspapers in English because the real life political drama is mesmerising. Since Stranger 2 I've been following the politics there and that led me to the Samsung story. I can't put it down.

I grew up in a multilingual household where, in addition to various languages, English was also spoken. So I don't think my parents were too concerned about just speaking English with us. I learned to read/write in the other languages as an adult on my own though.

In contrast, although my husband and I are also multilingual, we chose to speak only English with our child (because he wasn't talking as a toddler, and someone suggested he was confused). Sure enough, when we switched to English-only, he started speaking a mile-a-minute. We have since re-introduced our native language, and our kid can understand what we're saying, but does not speak the language.

much to my chagrin, my mother came to the US as a japanese national married to my 2nd generation japanese american army father in 1951. she brought her two sons and an infant daughter - born in japan - to america, then my sister and i were born here in the states.

because my mother was a recent immigrant, and was rather ostracized by my father's japanese american community for not speaking english -- she refused to teach us japanese. she was trying to learn english, and she later explained "you kids had to live here, so you should speak english and i didn't want you to speak with a japanese accent"....

: [
if only she just spoke japanese at home to us, we would've absorbed it like a sponge...

i'd have to say - based upon my/your elders' experience being immigrants to a country that does not speak their native language -- one can appreciate their efforts to not project the discrimination inflicted upon those who don't speak the native/current resident country's language fluently....

but i wish it weren't that way, for myself. and i hope you and your husband can teach your children their ethnic heritage language.
; )

My best friend's first language is Hungarian, her husband grew up bilingual English/German, and they both grew up for the most part in the US and live there now. Their three American kids speak English, German and Hungarian. The boys (twins) preferred to speak German together, and their English rapidly improved once they hit preschool; their daughter seemed to prefer Hungarian for quite a while. But they're now between the ages of 5-8 and speak all three correctly.

I know that all kids are different, so maybe it just worked out for them, and I know there were moments early on where they were worried about the kids' English. But ultimately she says they're glad they stuck with it. I'm probably so enthusiastic about this because I wish that my dad had grown up speaking Czech like my grandfather so that he could have passed it on to me. Instead, I had to learn all my languages the hard way! 😆

I am multilingual, and being Chinese, I can speak four dialects fluently.
So what happened was when growing up, my parents speaks to each other in dialect 1, to the kids in dialect 2, grandparents in dialect 3, and so on. I ended up picking up all these without formal education in Chinese.
In my opinion, English is very important as a global language but to really know a culture, learning the language is the best way.

Oh, that’s a pity. I see only advantages in learning other languages, even more so if it’s connected to family/roots. Knowing another language and culture is a precious gift parents can give their kids, if they have this possibility.

What kind of memories does your in-law hold from the Netherlands? Maybe he doesn’t remember the country fondly and therefore doesn’t value the language.

As for me, my great-grandparents were the ones who immigrated. They taught my grandparents (well, that wasn’t really an option, since they themselves didn’t speak my country‘s language), my grandparents taught my parents, and my parents taught me and my siblings. My parents always saw it as a gift they could give us, us getting to know another language and culture by default like that.

When it comes to being confused, my parents’ choice was to separate things neatly. They were very disciplined in speaking to us in just one language, at least while we were little, so we wouldn’t be confused. „At home“, with them, we spoke one language, „outside“, without them, another. We naturally learned my country’s language by going to kindergarten, church, school and so on.

It’s great that your boss is encouraging some work life balance! Managing to switch off from work is really important, and (for me at least, you may be different) limiting study time means you use it more effectively and actually retain more anyway. Good luck!

Such bosses are rare. I'd say take their advice but obviously if you feel like you need this preparation before you dive in work then do what you seem right. However, never make overtime or working on weekends a regular habit. Because this way, on certain days when you'll be still doing your best and packing up on time, you will feel like you're being lazy and can work a few more hours. The pandemic has already made overworking a bad habit. Also the general attitude is "if they can handle more work, give them more work".

This is exactly what I am using "Anti-Fan" for. It came at the right time - fun and easy-to-digest escapist fluff.

Funny, for all the many dramas I’ve watched, this slipped through. I will have to check it out, thanks for the reminder.

Noble idiocy is behavior you would never want done to you. I don’t get it. Meh.

Ps I don’t know what that weird date at the beginning of my post is ???