From Being The Youngest To Becoming The Oldest

Thirty three years ago, I moved from the East Coast and took a job
in Northern California. Even though I retired one and a half years ago,
I am now still staying with this job, working two to three days a week.
I came back to work for one simple reason, and that is: I love my job
and my co-workers, and they want me to stay working there with
them as well. We have maintained excellent working relationship and
have shared mutual trust throughout the years.

When I started my job there, I was the youngest physician, and
almost half of the staff (nurses, secretary, etc ) were older than me.
Now, thirty three years later, I have become the oldest physician
there, and the staff are all much younger than me. As a matter of fact,
some of the staff were not even born when I first came to the job, and
I often remind my young co-workers, joking and saying, “Janice (or
John), you were not even born yet when I started working here.”


Yeh Tze

Class Directory

Class Directory

Confucius once said "人焉廋哉,人焉廋哉", which, in modern terms,
could also mean “You can run, but you can't hide”. He probably did
not expect that his words of wisdom would still hold very true two
thousand years later. What I am trying to say is that the internet,
with all the search engines like Google and Yahoo!, has proven his
wisdom "人焉廋哉 ". Internet technology has played a role in helping
our high school class to complete a class directory in just a matter
of 2-3 weeks.

Fifty years after our graduation, some of our "建中" high school
classmates started to think about creating a class directory. We, the
former "建中 高三 4 班 ", graduated in 1961. Most of us have lost
contact since that time owing to numerous reasons, which, of course,
included a common one, " 忙 “. Now, half a century later, many of us
are either retired or semi-retired. We are now referring to ourselves
as the group called L.K.K., "老 庫 庫", or "老 酷 酷 ", depending upon
whether you want to consider yourself to be "庫" or "酷 ".

Accordingly, "庫" means storage places, like "車庫" or "倉庫", and "酷"
means “cool”. So, are we old “storage places”, or old “cool” persons ?
Regardless, when you start to think of your old classmates of half a
century ago, you are old, and believe me, you are pretty old.

With the hard work of a few of our classmates, "承渝 ", "遠通 "(You
would already know his ability by just looking at his name), "正俊"
(who is good at "人肉搜索“ and has earned a title "四班的007", given by
遠通 ), and others , the class directory is almost completed. Then, I
believe, the phone will start to ring, the e-mail box will be crowded
with warm greetings, and, of course, our newly created class website
is going to be lively. We will probably be able to see the photos of
the classmates on our class website, and start to guess "Hey, who is
that old man, or who is that young man in the old photos, he looks familiar, ..............."


Yeh Tze

Traveling With Old Classmates

Power of Nature - Iguazu Falls
(The Most Spectacular Waterfalls in the World)


Traveling with old classmates makes me feel young and energetic.

While traveling with our old classmate friends, we spoke the same
way with those familial voices, tones, gestures, interests, humors
and laughs, exactly the way as we used to during our college days
of some forty plus years ago.

Over the years, we have travelled together so frequently that we
even don’t pay attention to each other’s greys and wrinkles.

Many of our NTUMC1968 classmates in the US have travelled
together around the world, at least once a year, over the past
eight years. Initially, we had a regular “gang of six” plus their
spouses, then, a few more couples, from both the US and Taiwan,
joined us on different trips. We call each gathering a “Mini Class
Reunion”.

We have even noticed that our spouses have since become good
friends, some are like sisters in the family. During each trip, they
shared with one another their life experiences and tales of their
grandchildren. They exchanged ideas and opinions, and consulted
with each other before making purchases in the souvenir shops and
stores. More importantly, they shared information when they had
something “bad”, as well as something “good”, to say about their
husbands, although we did the same among our own classmates
regarding our wives as well.

We love to travel together in the company of our spouses, and do so
as frequently as we can. During each trip, we would even discuss,
vote and make a plan for our next travel destination. Classmate
Shin-Fu has been our main trip organizer and has done a great job
over the years.


Yeh Tze

A Walk On the Falkland Islands

Many people found that taking a cruise to the Antarctica was a high
point in their life.

Last year, some of our classmates heard the news that starting August
2011, most large cruise ships will no longer be regulated to sail
Antarctic waters. The International Maritime Organization, a special
agency of the United Nations, will restrict vessels carrying heavy oil
from intruding on the Antarctic environment. Heavy fuel oil is slow
to break down, especially in cold water, making it more
environmentally hazardous than other marine fuel oils. Cruise ships
carrying more than 500 passengers will no longer be able to sail in
Antarctica.

In view of the above, our NTUMC1968 classmates, a total of ten
couples, decided to join the Celebrity Infinity Antarctica Cruise
sailing on Feb. 13, 2011, which would likely to be the last cruise
ever to Antarctica given its magnitude.

We started with a 4 days’ “pre-tour” to the South American countries,
mainly Brazil and Argentina. The visit to the Iguazu Falls was a
memorable one and it was actually the main purpose we took the “pre
-tour”. The scenery was magnificent. The views before our eyes were
simply beyond words to describe. In the new "Seven Natural Wonders
of the World" contest, Iguazu Falls was selected among the finalists.

The cruise ship departed from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Although we
spent many days on the open sea, we had a few shore excursions.
One of them was Port Stanley, in the Falkland Islands.

The Falkland Islands (pronounced /ˈfɔːlklənd/; Spanish: Islas
Malvinas) are an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean, located
approximately 250 nautical miles (460 km; 290 mi) from the coast of
mainland South America. Ever since the re-establishment of British
rule in 1833, Argentina has claimed sovereignty. In pursuit of this
claim, which is rejected by the islanders, Argentina invaded the
Falkland Islands in 1982. This precipitated the two-month-long
undeclared Falklands War between Argentina and the United
Kingdom and resulted in the defeat and withdrawal of the Argentine
forces. (Wikipedia)





While most of our classmates and their spouses preferred to do
sightseeing and shopping around Port Stainley, six of us (two
spouses included), and as a matter of fact, probably the very few
of the entire cruise passengers, chose to have a walking tour to
Gypsy Cove, which was a total of 8 miles round trip journey, or a
half-day out. It was a sunny day with a light breeze. We walked
over the soft native flora, and along the shoreline where the old
battlefield used to be. We enjoyed seeing various seabirds, wildlife,
and passed by many shipwrecks. Finally, along the Gypsy Cove trail,
we saw the Magellanic penguin colonies, the most lovely creatures
on earth.

During the half-day nature walk on the Falkland Islands, I realized the
true meaning of “ 路遙知馬力“ and admired our classmate Michael Lai
for his “箭步如飛“. He had recently stepped down from the 成功大學
校長 position. He has been well known to be a daily jogger (每天清晨5
時就會到校內操場慢跑, 每次約跑6公里), and once requested the
students to ”跑完3千公尺” as one of the NCKU college graduation
requirements. He was always way ahead of us on this road trip.


Yeh Tze