The popularity of baseball

     My topic will be the popularity of baseball. In all the sports, baseball is the most advanced one in Taiwan. So, let us think about the question why baseball is so popular in Taiwan first. And why Taiwan considers Baseball as our National sport?

     Well. For Taiwan, it is a small island. Before, lots of foreigners even do not know the existence of Taiwan. What’s more, because of the suppression by China, Taiwan cannot be a member of United Nation. It is hard for us to get help from other countries and enjoy the same benefit that most countries in the world have. But, because of baseball, people start to get to know Taiwan. In 1968, the Red leaves beat the Japanese team which has just won the world championship in a great win with the run 7-0. After this incident, Taiwan starts to pay attention to the baseball.

The picture when The Red leaves are going to have a baseball competition with the Japanese team

The Red leaves' team clothing

     Unlike basketball, the inborn ability matters too much. I mean. The height and the structure of one’s body play a very important role in basketball. And we all know that we are not as high as those foreigners Therefore, it is not so easy to beat them in the basketball field. But for baseball, it is a different situation. Although the inborn ability still matters, it is not as important as basketball. What really matters in baseball are skills. Baseball players need to practice a lot. After all, we need to know that baseball has only 0.4 second to react whether it is a strike or a ball and decide whether or not to hit the ball, because the time for the ball from the pitcher’s hand to the plate is that short. Without tons of practices, it is impossible to do that. What’s more, there are too many unsure elements in baseball. Everything is possible in baseball. No one can say that they can definitely win the game before the umpire calls the end of the game.

Batter only gets 0.4 second to hit the ball

     In 2009, in the Little League Baseball in Williamsport, Taiwan’s team from Taoyuan beats every team which blocks them the way to the championship until the very last game. Finally, they lost their championship to the American team. Although they only get the second place, what they have done is excellent. Especially for 宋文華 and 歐晉, their achievement impresses people a lot. Both of them are great hitters and pitchers. They are the good models. They give baseball player’s mother the faith to keep supporting their children to play baseball and also give Taiwan’s children the power to keep practicing and playing.

In 2009, in the Little League Baseball in Williamsport 

宋文華

    

歐晉

     After we know why baseball is so popular in Taiwan, Then, we can talk about why people enjoy watching baseball so much. Baseball is a popular sport in Taiwan. Professional baseball players are just like super stars. People adore them and want to become just like them. Of course, we know that is not possible. But it is not hard to solve the problem. At the same time when we are watching the baseball, we are playing it by ourselves. We can understand this from the scene that people will raise their hand, make a fist, and yell when they see their supporting players hit a single. We can always witness the scene that after the pitcher strikes the batter out, the fans may stand up and cheering for the pitcher. Why will we or they do that? It is because we imagine ourselves to those players. We think we are them. Therefore, when they hit a homerun, we will feel that it seems that it is us who hit the ball out of the fence.

The time when the Brothers win the game, and the fans are so glad that throws the colored ribbon into the  field

Although recently something bad happened in Taiwan's baseball, I believe that we will get through it. Taiwan's baseball will become stronger and stronger.

the popularity of Fixed gear

The popularity of Fixed Gear

        With the rapid and significant rise of the green awareness, people become more conscious of the importance being environment-friendly.  Therefore, Bicycle, which is a kind economy, eco-friendly and zero-emission transportation, became genuinely and incredibly popular around the world in recent two or three years.  We can see a lot of bikers riding all kind of bicycles on the road.  They are probably on their way to work, doing regular exercising or enjoy the time with their road partners. It is a growing popularity that will definitely continue.

        Actually, there are various kinds of bicycles.  In the categories of bicycles, there is a special kind of bike called Fixed Gear.  In the big cities around the world for example New York, San Francisco, Tokyo, London and Taipei, it has gone vastly popular among the young people who are looking for the simplicity in life and elements distinguishing them from others.  Also, it could be a perfect realization of minimalism.

        Most people might be unfamiliar with this kind of bike.  In fact, we can tell what exactly it is from its name literally.  It can be categorized to a kind of single-speed bike, just like lady bicycle.  

        There several features of Fixed Gear.  First, brakeless could be one of the key features of the Fixed Gear.  Without the brake the Fixed could get rid of brake cable lines on the frame of the bike.  This makes Fixed Gear look even simpler.  Many people wonder how the bikers stop the Fixed Gear.  Actually, it is because of the chain operating mechanism Fixed Gear has.  Second, the simplicity is also a main cause of the popularity of Fixed Gear. Simplicity is an inborn feature of Fixed Gear. Owning to this feature, those have faith in minimalism are attracted by Fixed Gear.

        In conclusion, culture means the beliefs or way of life, art, and customs that are shared and accepted by people in a particular society. Fixed Gear riders hold the same faith in mind and share the similar idea and perspective. This phenomenon could be a popular culture

The following picture will give a quick and brief introduction of Fixed Gear.

With the simplest mechanism, fixed gear could operate as other common bikes do. (Btw, It’s my BIKE!!)

In big cities, like Taipei, Taichung and Kaohsiung, the popularity has gone so vastly. Groups of Fixed Gear riders get together to enjoy the night.

Actually, I ride Fixed Gear, too.  It’s me!!! I joined the big family of Fixed gear this summer2009. I am so glad that I did the right thing to be a part of this popular culture.

In addition to riding, Fixed Gear riders also play fancy tricks with the bike. Just like the one in the picture, he is playing the “stand” trick.

96540320 Annon

Men’s skin care. The trend for men’s maintenance. Only men know what he needs.

95540326 Gary

    Nowadays, the market of men’s skin care products is getting wider and wider. There are many kinds of men’s caring product, and men in Taiwan seem to start to care about their own face and body. Moreover, they start to choose the product that made for men only. Like men’s facial wash, men’s lotion, men’s shaving gel, men’s body wash, etc. To me, the products which have men’s label on it is extremely attractive to me, and I want to introduce you some famous men’s care brands and let you know the significance of men’s own care.

L'Oréal men’s expert

L’Oreal men’s expert wrinkle decrease cream

Feeling old? Can’t stop skin from aging? Now, Loreal men’s expert stop your skin from wrinkling.

Loreal men’s expert wrinkle decrease cream is designed to combat the signs of aging such as crow’s feet, laughing lines and forehead lines. Loreal men’s expert wrinkle decrease cream contains a fluid emulsion enriched with Boswelox, a skin- tautening agent, to visibly reduce the appearance of wrinkles.



Biotherm for men

T-PUR INTENSE


Anti-Shine Facial Cleanser for Oily Skin


Can't bear the oil skin? Biotherm for Men make you feel fresh and cool after everytime cleaning. 
This cleanser is especially recommended to the man who is oil skin. Eliminates impurities to leave facial skin clear of unwanted oil. Helps to matify the skin, leaving it ready for shaving.

BIOTHERM HOMME


Shave Gel

Have you ever shaved your beard? If you do, you must have the experience that after shaving, your skin feels burn and pain. Now, BIOTHERM HOMME find you a solution.



This gel formula is enriched with Biotherm's patented mineral rich concentrate from Thermal Spring Water and BioPrecision complex for a smooth, close shave.

LAB HOMME

Instant Moisture Eye Gel


Do you have the experience that you stay up so late, and then next morning, your eyes are swollen like you are hit by someone? Now, you have the chance to avoid it.



Hydrating gel with Caffeine, Aloe and Cucumber and cooling rollerball applicator reduces the look of puffiness, dryness and fine lines around the eyes. Eyes are left looking brighter and better rested.

CLARINS MEN

ClarinsMenTotal Shampoo

Getting tired of using girl’s shampoo and body wash? Now, Clarins Men gives you an new experience of showering, and you don’t have to worry about carrying too much things with you when you take a bath. With one bottle, everything is done.



For clean hair and a clean body

Boosts your spirits, adds volume to hair and invigorates the senses. For all hair and skin types, even sensitive skin. Contains a water-softening agent and Pro-Vitamin 5 B5 that helps tone the skin and promote healthy-looking hair.


VASELINE FOR MEN

New Vaseline® MEN Body & Face, and Hand Lotion

Your skin is not as strong as you think. Do you know that men’s skin is thicker and oiler than women’s, that is why you need products that are specifically designed for men’s unique skin needs



Fast Absorbing Body & Face Lotion

• Instant relief for everyday dryness

• Non-greasy formula absorbs within seconds



Extra Strength Body & Face Lotion

• Long lasting hydration to help severely dry skin heal itself

• Deeply penetrates surface skin to build healthy skin resilience



Extra Strength Hand Lotion

• Relieves and heals dry, rough skin

• Absorbs within seconds to deeply penetrate surface skin to build healthy skin resilience

• Ideal for rough skin areas such as hands, elbows, feet and knees

     It is a trend that men use their own skin care product. And men’s skin are thicker and oiler than women’s skin, that’s why men should have their own skin protection. Next time, when you choose suitable products for yourself or your boyfriend, don’t forget to choose the best for them. After all, only real men know what they really need.

My favorite Taiwanese-made movie - No puedo vivir sin ti Edited by Frank 96540314

At first, I knew little about this famous movie through news posted by media. This movie won lots of awards in the international competitions, and some actors and actresses highly recommended that Taiwanese people should go to the movie theater to enjoy this movie.

It was a real story happened in Taiwan and adapted by director戴立忍. The story told about a father whose career was a scuba lived together with his seven-year-old daughter. She always companied with her father when he went to work; that is, both of them stayed together all the time. Their life was simple and peaceful, and both of them enjoyed this life style so much. Although they didn’t have lots of money to live in a big house, wear high-class clothing and enjoy luxurious life, they lived in a happy life because they still had each other to rely on. All they wanted to have a simply life which was full of warm and enrichment. However, all of a sudden, the father took his daughter to his friend’s home and they suddenly noticed that the daughter must to go to elementary school to study and the father even didn’t go to Household Registration Office to register her own identity. Because of this incident, a sequence of problem about daughter’s guardianship bothered the father for a long time. In order to complete the whole procedure to register daughter’s identity, the father tired his best to find out a solution. I understood that why the father was so nervous because he really didn’t want to apart from his daughter. Even polices and Bureau of Social Affairs intervene this incident; the father didn’t want to give up. For the sake of living together with his children, the father even went on the street and tried to commit a suicide with her daughter. At the end, the daughter still was taken away by the volunteers of Bureau of Social Affairs. But, ironically, the daughter never told a word with others.

In this movie, I saw the father put all his efforts for the sake of his only relative. The most impressive part was that volunteer told the father the real situation about his daughter. When the father knew his daughter never spoke a word with others, he felt so sad, and either did I. I cried for a few seconds because I didn’t understand why the father and his daughter couldn’t live together even they were bloody-related. Therefore, after I saw this movie, I even questioned to myself. Did I have the power to do everything to my relatives? I hoped my families were all healthy and happy everyday, and I could made them enjoy the world when I grew up.

The music style of Linkin Park 96540304 Steven 四英三

       This time, I want to induce a musical group who mix Nu Metal and Rap Rock in their music, called Linkin Park. I am one of it big fans, and their music can make you forgetting every vexation and unhappy. Linkin Park’s use both singers Chester Bennington and Mike Shinoda to perform their songs and concert. The first one is Nu-metal which sing like roar and the other one is Rap which is like read a statement. This band formed in 1996, sold more than 50albums and won twice Grammy Awards. And now I will give you some information of them from Wiki.

Band members

Chester Bennington is most known for using screaming vocals common in various forms of metal and hardcore, while also using more melodic singing, and was placed 46th in Hit Paraders list of "Heavy Metal's All-Time Top 100 Vocalists"

Mike Shinoda is the group's MC and does all of the rapping. Mike has also done all of the backing vocals live, and in their latest album, Minutes to Midnight, he sings lead vocals on "In Between", "Hands Held High", and the B-side "No Roads Left". Shinoda has also been placed in Hit Parader's list of "Heavy Metal's All-Time Top 100 Vocalists" at number 72.

Bradford Phillip Delson is an American musician, lead guitarist, and one of the founding members of the Grammy Award winning Alternative Rock band Linkin Park.

Joseph "Joe" Hahn, better known as Mr. Hahn, is an American turntablist and director best known as the DJ for the band Linkin Park. He is Korean descent.

David "Phoenix" Farrell is a bass guitar, backing vocals in Linkin Park

        I believe that some people will prefer this kind of music, but some don’t because they may think it is too noisy. Everything has both sides, if you can patiently to listen the way they singing and to know the concept of their songs of lyrics, you will find that this music is also acceptable. Sometime, when you have any pressures or sadness that you want to explore, you can follow this band’s tempo, singing like them and dancing like them. I think that after all, your body will be relaxed and your mind will be released.

Hip-Hop 96540310 Lester

This time, I’m going to introduce you a popular culture which incorporates four elements; it’s Hip-Hop culture. It integrates its spirituality in nowadays society. Being personally fond of this culture, I will show you each elements in a brief but also a clear way.

Prior to its four elements, the origin of hip-hop is worth knowing; actually, it’s a culture originated from rap music and street dance. The roots of hip hop are in West African and African American music. The musical style of West- Africa traveling singers and poets is reminiscent of hip hop. When it comes to the roots of hip hop, we must mention the contributions of The Last Poets and Jalal Mansur Nuriddin, whose jazzy and poetic spiels commented on 1960’s culture. True hip hop arose during the 1970s when block dancing parties became common in New York City, especially in the Bronx. They were usually accompanied by music. (http://www.hiphopgalaxy.com/origins-of-hip-hop-hip-hop-2101.html) At the long lasting evolution of this origin, it develops into four great parts. Break dancing, Graffiti , DJ and MCeeing.

Those teenagers in inner cities were finding ways to work off. This time, they didn’t do gang things. They jumped to show their power; they danced with no effort left. Streets by streets and day by day. I think break dancing represents the hip-hop culture most actively.

Graffiti, people around the world have considered is as a direct way for street artists to distinguish themselves from others, is also a representative for ghetto teenagers to show their own identities. The relationship between hip-hop and graffiti, I personal would prefer the reference from Wikipedia:

The relationship between graffiti and hip hop culture arises both from early graffiti artists practicing other aspects of hip hop, and its being practiced in areas where other elements of hip hop were evolving as art forms. Graffiti is recognized as a visual expression of rap music, just as breaking is viewed as a physical expression. The book Subway Art (New York: Henry Holt & Co, 1984) and the TV program Style Wars (first shown on the PBS channel in 1984) were among the first ways the mainstream public were introduced to hip hop graffiti.

Thanks to DJs, or disc jockeys, we have not only normal music tracks but those live created music. They use turntables, DJ mixers, amplifiers, speakers, and various other pieces of electronic music equipment.

Always companied by DJs, Mcings or those rappers express by microphones, or specifically by the way called Rhythmically Applied Poetry. They sing; however, at the same, they also speak and tell. That’s RAP.

















Hip-hop culture is a complicated phenomenon, indeed. However, through these four mainstream elements, people could simply understand it and enjoy it!

The return of American super heroes!! 96540346 Andy

　　Films about American super heroes are productive in recent years. Even if you are not interested in watching movie, I think you still can noticed that in recent years, movies about Amierican super heroes are very common to see.

　　I'm a HUGE fan of American super heroe\ comics and cartoons. And it is not that easy to have the chance to glance an American super hero comic or cartoon here in Taiwan. So, every time I know that there is going to release a new American super hero movie in Taiwan, I am SO excisted!

　　There are two major super hero comic companies in the united states, one is MARVEL Comic and the other is DC Comic. Both of them were purchased by huge companies; MARVEL Comic was purchased by Disney in 2009 and DC Comic was purchased by Warner Bros years ago. As you can see, these two buyers are all really big companies around the world, which means American super hero comic and cartoon is a big pie that every one wants a bite.

　　

In MARVEL Comics, their icons are

Spider man

Iron man

Incredible Hulk

Fantastic 4

The Punisher

X-men

　　And in MARVEL Comic, super heroes consist a team "The Avengers"

　　

　　In the DC Comic, their icons are

Superman

Batman

　　It is very intresting that also in DC Comic, super heroes consist a team which is "Justicy League"　These are the films that I think Taiwanese people are more familiar with.

　　Super heroes have became the pronoun of the states, whenever you heard any super hero, I bet the first thought pop out in your mind is America. The reason why super heroes comics and cartoons are so common and popular in the states, first, I think the "heroism" has a lot to do with it. As you can see, in many american films "heroism" existed. For example, Die hard (a series of action movies that Bruce Willis as the main character John McClane) and 007 (a very famous series of spy movies), the main characters in these two movies are so "incredible " that looks like no matter what happen they can always solve the problems alone. And I think there is another reason which is because of the "war". An American hero comic was written in the time of the "cold war" in America, The Watchmen which the movie realised in Taiwan last year. After I watched the Watchmen, I think the reason why created Watchmen is because at that time, people in America were all living under the terrible atmosphere of the "cold war", they don't know when the war will break out, they have no idea what is going to be tomorrow, maybe tomorrow is the doomsday, you can't say.  So, someone created a group of  heroes to fight with bad guy, to maintain the peace of the city. Though these heroes don't have any super power except the Dr. Manhattan (the only one who has super power in the watchmen), they are still the heroes that stand up to fight with the bad.

　　

Michael Jackson as a Super Star

By Vinia Huang