Life – Page 40 – Tiana Feng

Being An Imperfect Musician

November 19, 2012March 10, 2013Art, Entertainment, Inspiration, Life, Music1 Comment

I played piano today, and I enjoyed it. This was a statement I had not been able to say for a long time.

Over a year ago I had posted about rekindling my love for the instrument, but it never really happened. Life got in the way- or so I thought.

I blamed a lot of not playing on being busy, which I was with various internships. I also pushed the piano aside because Teddy (my precious little puppy) hated the sound and would howl whenever any instrument was played.

Though the above were contributing factors, none of them really explained why I was avoiding the piano. The truth was that in fourth year after a rather disastrous jury, I was tired and frustrated at the piano.

I am a big cognitive science junkie. In Levtin’s book This is Your Brain On Music he talks about how 10,000 hours of practice makes a great musician. I calculated that if I started piano when I was five and averaged about 2 hours a day since then (with the long hours in my advanced years evening out the early years and holidays) that it amounted to something like 12,410 hours. This was approximate number of hours I had spent at a piano from when I was 5 up to the day of my piano jury when I was 22 (I am currently 24).

It was disheartening having put in more than the required 10,000 hours and be far from “perfect”. This anxiety had caused me to be afraid of performing in front of other people. “What if I mess up?” was a constant worry during the hours spent in university practice rooms. The consequence of this unease was more intense practicing and the development of carpel tunnel (which I am happy to say I don’t have any more).

Today I sat at the piano without too much thought about it. I picked up a book of Chopin waltzes and simply started playing. I realized some of my strengths:
1. I am a great sight reader.
2. If I played a song once, my fingers will remember it forever no matter how long it’s been since I last played it.

Though imperfectly, it was nice to be playing again, especially the music of my favourite composer. Now that I am out of school (and finished RCM exams), I don’t have to be playing under the pretense of needing to be perfect or performing for somebody else. I can also explore pieces that excite me and not have to drill them to perfection. I want to continuously enjoy performing for myself. And for me, imperfect is okay.

Comfortable Silences

November 11, 2012March 10, 2013Life, Relationships1 Comment

There is a famous quote from Mia in Pulp Fiction that goes something like:

Don’t you hate that? Uncomfortable silence. Why do we feel it’s necessary to talk about bull in order to feel comfortable? That’s when you know you’ve found somebody really special. When you can just shut the hell up for a minute and comfortably share a silence

I’m surprisingly (or not really) a semi-awkward person. Are’t we all? When I’m in an uncomfortable situation I tend to feel obliged to talk , blurt out something even if it ends up being really stupid because silence as the alternative is just too uncomfortable.

Luckily, I found someone who I can have comfortable silences with. That doesn’t mean we don’t talk (hell we can talk for hours), but we can appreciate quiet moments. Whether it’s staring into each other’s eyes and smiling or sitting in the same room on separate laptops, talking is not a requirement.

Photoset: Thanksgiving 2012

October 8, 2012March 10, 2013Art, Life, Pets, Photography, Teddy1 Comment

Since last year, I’ve been cooking the family turkey for Thanksgiving. I did this year too.

Here are some random photos I took of food, teddy and fall scenery.

Turkey before:

Our house:

Turkey after:

We didn’t notice this sign until after:

Photoset: Teddy Learns to Swim

September 4, 2012March 10, 2013Art, Life, Pets, Photography, TeddyLeave a Comment

This weekend we went to my uncle’s cottage. Teddy’s afraid of water but we threw him in anyways and apparently he swims. Here are some photos.

You can also follow Teddy’s adventures at teddydoggy.tumblr.com.

Thanks For Putting Up With Me

August 13, 2012Life, RelationshipsLeave a Comment

Me and Nash’s anniversary is coming up. We think it’s tomorrow, but we’re not the type to count days. It seems more indefinite this way. Indefinite seems like a strange word. Like forever, but possibly a longer time. That’s a really long time to be with someone.

Then I realized, he must put up with a lot. The dude wrote me the most beautiful letter thing on my Facebook wall, so I thought I’d return the favor with this blog post thanking him for the myriad of things he must put up with while being with me.

Thanks for…

Not sleeping and coming to late night shows with me. Many of which have probably made you question my taste in music.

Eating burgers with me. We’ll probably grow obese and both die of heart-attacks, but it’ll be the best death ever.

Waiting to meet parents. Asian parents, enough said.

Being patient and waiting to watch the latest episode of Breaking Bad and Adventure Time with me. Even when their facebook pages contain spoilers.

Dealing with my social media addiction. You’ve let me instagram my food, foursquare places and twitter our stories. This is probably the third wheel in our relationship.

Losing video games on purpose. You must be losing occasionally right? I mean you can’t seriously get beaten by a girl in Tekken.

Letting Teddy lick your balls

Love you.

An iPhone Without 3G Is Like Popcorn Without Butter

August 7, 2012August 7, 2012iOS, Life, TechnologyLeave a Comment

willitblend — Without 3G you might as well blend it.

I went over my 1GB data plan today. I decided to turn my phone off instead of incurring any more fees. I’ve only had a smartphone since Christmas but I already feel like a cripple without it’s data-eating ways. Having an iPhone without 3G is as pointless as popcorn without butter.

Here are some things you can’t do without 3G:

iMessage: By default, iPhones running iOS 5 and higher send iMessages. I couldn’t receive messages from any one with an iPhone or send any without manually clicking “send as SMS” first. In addition, without data you can’t sent people pictures of your dog.

Social Networking: Can’t tweet, Facebook, Pinterest, Chime.in, Tumblr or Foursquare what I’m eating.

Find Out Where I am: I had to go pick something up in an area I’m not so familiar with. I took a streetcar, but didn’t get off on time. I even turned on my 3G (getting lost seems like a valid reason to). However, the service must disable itself after you too much over your data plan, because it would not work. I was stranded and had to ask Nash where exactly I was in relation to where I wanted to go.

Without internet to distract you, here are things you end up doing:

Looking at people on the bus: Since my head is not down and immersed in some sort of social network, I have to focus my eyes somewhere. Looking out the window resulted in a lot of sand in my eyes so I started looking around inside the bus. There’s a ton of funny looking people in the world.

Reading other people’s things: I ended up accidentally reading part of someone’s erotic novel.

Listening to brown people talk in circles: “you know?” They seemed to be having something delicious for dinner though.

Thinking to yourself: Sometimes I write blog posts while I’m on the train, but today I thought this one up in my head.

Thank goodness my cellphone billing period restarts tomorrow. One day of this nonsense was enough.

Photoset: Like A Cloud With A Face

August 6, 2012Art, Life, Pets, Photography, Teddy1 Comment

Long weekend here in Ontario. The weather is lovely and not too hot, so I let Teddy run around outside. He’s so white and puffy that sometimes he can be like a little cloud with a face.

Check out the rest of the set on Flickr.

The Not-So Strangers in My Life

August 1, 2012January 11, 2014Life, RelationshipsLeave a Comment

There’s many people in my life that I see on a daily basis. I smile at them. Sometimes we exchange greetings. On the rare occasion I even know their names. They’re not friends, but they are not complete strangers either. Or at least I don’t consider them so.

I saw this posted at my nearest train station.

This post is for all the not-so-strangers in my life. The morning coffee girl who knows my order before I say a word. The Santa Clause-like train conductor – who I think is named Stan – who greets me every morning. The man who owns the golden retriever who Teddy thinks is his best friend. It’s the kindness of these people that give me the positive energy I need to start my day. Thank you.

What Sisters Are For

July 12, 2012Family, Life, Relationships4 Comments

Today is my little sister’s 22nd birthday. I remember like it was yesterday when we used to pile all our stuffed animals and jump in them. I can’t believe that I have known a single a person for 22 years but I am grateful to have.

Here are some reasons why sisters are awesome:

they’ll pick you up at 3am in the morning
you can steal their candy
someone to put the blame on
someone to be retarded with
laughing at things that nobody else understands
teaming up against parents
someone to steal clothes from
they listen to you when no one else will

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LIVIA!!

5 Ridiculous Was to Reduce Tears When Cutting An Onion

July 4, 2012Food, Life3 Comments

Are you one of those people who cry when cutting an onion? I am when the purple ones are involved. I decided to google up ways to lessen the tears when chopping onions and this is some of what I found.

1. Cut onion over an open flame.

2. Chill your onion in a freezer.

3. Wear gas tight goggles or a mask

4. Stick your tongue out

5. Whistle