This afternoon, during a meeting with my advisor, Matt and I was asked to read more in English as ( I guess so) he might think our writing was a mass. This was not the first time he mentioned this. Ever since I started to meet regularly with him, he has kept testing us upon an article from New York Times right before each meeting. For quite some time this act was forgotten by him, but now it's retained again... He strongly recommended NYT over others, as he reckons that it's the most well-established publication among all in the U.S.

But don't expect that's enough to improve English skills--especially writing one. He also 'suggests' that we read paper books, such as novels, regularly from now on. Actually I like this suggestion coz I do like reading. Thus right after that meeting, I went to a bookstore with sis. I looked through almost all the shelves but failed to find any title that I was quite familiar with... How should I decide which one to buy? Picking up a book randomly or by reading the introduction? --That's the suggestion from sis. But I don't want to do that. If the book I selected is not my dish, it's unlikely that I will persuade myself to keep reading it. Then I decided to go back home first and do some searching job to learn what books I might have interest in.


Now I am trying searching. But there seems not to be a good website in English for me to see the comments of books from other readers. I found one named 'goodreads', which looks similar to the Chinese website I use a lot to find interesting books -- www. douban.com. But apparently this American is not that well-designed as douban... Amazon may be another option, but it suffers the same problem with goodreads. Anyway, I will try to get used to them as long as I need to find English reading materials.


Paper-based reading materials? Apart from my academic books and papers, I have not read in this type for quite a while. Don't need to doodle on Chinese-version twitter, or FB, or Renren before get asleep. Isn't that an exciting news?

Yesterday when mom was video-chatting with me, we randomly talked about a girl of her colleagues who has just got admission to college. She chose journalism as a major which her mom did not agree on. She once asked me about suggestions for majors. I simply told her to follow her heart, as what others could give was merely information about job markets in related fields.

Then mom asked me, ‘do you feel regretful for choosing your current major? is it really where your interest is?’ I could not tell a word. I realized I myself was not even sure about the answer. I might say no to the former question, but I guess my answer for the latter should be no either. Here comes the contradiction: if I am not interested in my major, is it possible at all not to regret? Especially considering that I am a Ph.D. student, a female Ph.D. student? Well, according the logic of most Americans, unless one is extremely interested in one field, he/she won't bother to carry out a half-decade (or so) ph.d. program for it.

For me, I did have great interest in mathematics as a freshman. It's this interest that motivated me to switch from biology to maths after the first semester of college. But later on I gradually realized there are far more talented people who seem to be born for maths. I could not even use one week to digest what they can master well in one class. Frustration kept accumulated and I deviated from the road of maths more and more. At that time, statistics was fairly easier to handle compared to theoretical maths. Of course, just relatively. So I chose this major naturally.

Now looking back, I know statistics should not be a subject which I am sick of. Sometimes, when I am in good mood, when I have a peaceful mind, I am really delight to What I am reluctant to confront, to be honest, is a self-motivated Ph.D life >_<. I am too lazy to think, to act, to motivate myself. And laziness further led to procrastination. That is, always leaving tasks until deadline is rushing towards. It's a frequently quoted name nowadays as many Chinese undergraduates/graduates have symptoms of it. But indeed, if I can develop some small but good habits, like strictly accord to my schedules & plans and never entertain when working intensively, things will be much different.

Moving forward on the path of statistics, only three options are available: drift along and pretend not to know the situation at all; force myself to dedicate to my major study, which generally will seem like a long-term prison; or, try to find my original love for maths and apply it to statistics, do everything out of interest, not just responsibility. The last way, of course, is the ideal one.