Underground City????

Will there be an underground city in the future? I think if there is something like the underground city in the future, the only difference from the world as we know now is that the skyscrapers are built the way around - into the ground.

I think this idea is quite possible as we are now tending to the problem of not enough space and air pollution. With a city underground, we can stretch the area as large as we can, so we don't have to care about over population as we will have endless space for humans to live. Also, we can rid the air pollution problem and get fresh air underground by ventilation system.

This might really be the future for mankind.

By Greyrocks

PaRenTS VS OurSelF

Should we listen to our parents or ourselves? In my own opinion, i think that what parents say are really great and to the point. They are experienced in many fields as they are older than ourselves. But are they always correct? That i think not. I think that we should listen to ourselves more and do things on our own instinct. Even though we might trip and fall, but we will learn how to stand up again.

Also, we can use studying as an example. Many of you (if you are students) will know that when parents tell you to revise and revise makes you angry and think they are annoying. However, the worst thing is you know your parents are right. At this point i think that we should learn to study, learn to learn things by our own self but not only from parents.

By Greyrocks

This look like ToNg TONg!!!

Union

uh oh, they look really alike...

Maybe?

Many teenagers nowadays used to say maybe to their parents and friends. but if they are really right? Maybe tomorrow will be a better day. Maybe there will be flying cars in the future. Maybe, maybe, maybe...... We don't know what might bring tomorrow, but we know that everything is possible. A person who is not hard working can be hard working over the night. Because there are maybes in this world. Never trust your own instinct, cause there are things that happen that will not be what you think of. However, knowledge is a thing that is totally controversial of maybe. Maybe is an idea, a thing that doesn't exist. But knowledge can be touchable, either by books or by other things. Think before one acts, that's what is real important.

Some employers in Hong Kong have stated that they prefer to employ Hong Kong people who have graduated from local universities rather than those who have graduated from overseas universities. What is your view?

2^nd March 2012

The Editor,

South China Morning Post,

PO Box323,

Tai Po, NT.

Dear Sir/Madam,

Some employers in Hong Kong have stated that they prefer to employ Hong Kong people who have graduated from local universities rather than those who have graduated from overseas universities. I wish to help analyze the problem and put forward my views.

First, let me talk about why employers in Hong Kong want to employ Hong Kong people who have graduated from local universities. In my opinion, the employers want to employ people that had already been familiar with the atmosphere in Hong Kong. If they employ someone that is familiar with Hong Kong, then the employee doesn’t have to adapt to a new environment again. Also, if the employer is a HongKonger then he might want to employ someone from Hong Kong as to help the growth of the Hong Kong society and so that they can communicate better. These all might increase the effectiveness in production.

However, are people from Hong Kong who have graduated from Hong Kong Universities really the best? Many people that had graduated from overseas universities might be better, because they experience more in their life. For example, if a Hong Kong student went abroad to America or some other places, they will experience more than students that stayed in Hong Kong for their whole life.  People who graduated from overseas universities might also come from better and more famous universities, however, Hong Kong universities may not hold a position as high as some universities overseas.

Therefore, I think that a degree from a university in Hong Kong is worse than a degree from a university overseas. First, because if a person that had been born in Hong Kong and stayed in Hong Kong for his whole life, that person only lives in a box. He hasn’t seen the big picture yet. If an employer employ a person that doesn’t know what is happening out of Hong Kong, then it will be the employer’s loss. However, if that employer employs a person that had graduated oversea, that person will have more exposures and is more independent. That person will help a company more than a person who graduated from local universities. Second, when a person is too adept with an environment, they might not perform their best. The reason is that they doesn’t have to uncover the environment and cannot uncover their potential.

After a long and through analyze, I conclude that a degree from a university in Hong Kong is worse than a degree from a university overseas.

Chris Wong

Flat 9C,

Hong Kong Building,

20Cannon Street,

Causeway Bay.

Many people believe that employers should be responsible for their employees’ mental health. What is your view of this situation, and how do you suggest we solve this problem.

In my point of view, I think that employers should not be responsible for their employee’s mental health. Many people think that work pressure caused mental health for employees. However, we can see from pass experience that mental health problems are not necessarily caused by work pressure.

Mental health can be caused by different kinds of pressures and problems, for example, family problems, economical problems, relationship problems and last but not least work stress. Hence we can see from this that work stress is not the only pressure that may cause mental health problems. For example, depression can be caused by family problems as well as relationship problems, but seldom does working stress cause it. Mental health problems can be caused by other factors in employees’ everyday life, therefore employers should not be responsible for employees’ mental health. If employers are to be responsible for their employees’ mental health than it will increase the company’s financial burden and may decrease employees’ salaries due to the company being responsible for their mental health. Although employers being responsible for employees’ mental health may sound very great to employees, but if you stand in the view of employers, it is not anything to be happy at all.

However, mental health of employees is still a problem to the whole society, I will give a few suggestion below to help solve the problem. My first suggestion is that the government open up a mental health clinic with business companies. Companies may choose to join this plan as they wish, but they will have to pay half of the costs of the clinic, and the government will pay the other half. After they joined the clinic, then their employees may freely use the services in the clinic, which includes mental health help from mental health specialists to help cue employees mental health problems. My second suggestion is to make a law on maximum working hours for employees. For example, a maximum working hour 12 hours a day, if employees exceed that working hours, then employers have to compensate for the time the employees worked on, and also they have to be responsible for any mental health the employees have. If both of my suggestions are put into action, I think that the problem of whether employers should be responsible for their employees’ mental health.

As a conclusion, in my opinion, I think that employers should not be responsible for their employees’ mental health, as working stress may not be the sole cause of mental health problems. Also two suggestions I made is to first found a clinic funded by both the government and business companies to help deal with mental health problems, second to create a law to restrict the employees’ working time. I think these two suggestions can well solve the problem.

By Greyrocks

In many parts of the world.....

In many parts of the world, people have become increasing fond of living together before marriage, what is your opinion on this matter?

In many parts of the world, people have become increasing fond of living together before marriage. In my own opinion, it has both advantages and disadvantages, which I will talk about in this essay.

         First, the advantages are the following. Living together is a simple and easy way to communicate with your boyfriend or girlfriend. With communicate so easy, they can help with a few things, like increase the understanding for each other and also the increase the bond with each other. The relationship between each other can steady and consolidate and bring the relationship to a higher level than is possible through everyday life. It also gives the lovers time to understand more about each other. This chance of living together may be a huge help in the near future, as when the lovers were married, they will know about each other very well by that time. Also, with the relationship between each other so strong, this may reduces the chance of the couple being divorced. This promises a steady and beautiful future for the couple.

         However, everything with advantage must have disadvantages. When the lovers are living together for some time, they will know a lot about each other. When that happens there might be a few outcome. First, they know a lot about each other’s weakness and their “ugly” side. Which might make one of the lovers wants to leave the other. Second, they may get bored of having to look at the same person for a very long period of time, and might go out and have a mistress. With this happening, the relationship before will be ruined and end terribly. Also they might only care about their selves and forget about the whole world, like their families and friends. They might fail to care about people around them with their ignorance when all things in their eyes are each other only.

         Therefore, for conclusion, I can see that there are more disadvantages than advantages for living together before marriage. Living together before marriage can both ruin relationships and destroy the family relationships and also friendships. A person with only love for one person is not a person who should be valued in everyday life. A person should learn to love everyone and to care about everyone in his or her life. Living together before marriage is a bad thing.

By Greyrocks

Do you think Hong Kong has a positive or negative future? Give Three reasons.

Hong Kong may have a positive or negative future to different person and different point of views. I will discuss about whether hong kong haas a positive or negative future in this essay.

One of the point that i think determines whether hong kong has a positive or negative future is whether there is an opportunity to work in hong kong. From the information on the Census and Statistic department website, the people who were employed in 2011 to 2012 has increased about 0.027%. We can see from that, the job opportunity in hong kong had been increasing throughout the year. Therefore, we can know that Hong Kong may have a positive future based on that point.

On the other hand, from past statistics, the hong kong government had over 22% share in public expenditure on education only. We can see that the government really cares about Hong Kong’s people education. This expenditure includes formulating policies, overseeing education from kindergarten to tertiary level as well as manpower planning, training and retraining. In other words, if Hong Kong’s education is done well and people from every level in social status gets the best education the society can give, then Hong Kong is sure to have a positive future. Why? Because students now are the people who will take care of Hong Kong in the future, teach them and educate them better, then Hong Kong can be a better place.

The other thing that determines whether hong kong has a positive or negative future is it’s relationship with other countries. Hong Kong is a special administrative region of the People’s republic of China. Under the basic law, Hong Kong diplomatic relationship should be made by Hong Kong itself. Hong Kong has its own power to make diplomacy with other countries like Singapore, Japan, America, etc. With that as an example, we can see that Hong Kong can make its own choices with which country they want to make diplomacy with and without taking permission from the central government of China first. Also, Hong Kong can have its own laws. Basic law is a good example, most of the laws in the Basic law of Hong Kong was set by Hong Kong people, and wasn’t following China’s laws. Therefore, i think that Hong Kong has a open and self democracy giving chances for Hong Kong people to give their opinions without fear of being caught. Therefore, i think that Hong Kong has a positive future.

Summarizing the above points, Hong Kong has a positive future.

Written by: Greyrocks

Write an email to your friend...

Write an email to your friend and tell him about the radio program and give him your opinion. Friend called chris wong,you are called andy pang.

Dear Chris,

It’s been a long time since I last talk with you, how are you? I’ve just listened to a radio program about English in the east. It talks about English as seen by people who lives in the east, like Chinese, Vietnamese, Singaporean, Malaysian, etc. English has been the dominant global language as America was the global economic center. All business were done in English, that’s why people has to learn and practice their English before intensely. However, after the rise of China, there were changes to different countries, will English still be the global language in the future? I will tell you about my view in this email.

The interviewer in the program had interviewed people with different backgrounds from different places about their views of English. The person interviewed in Malaysian and Singaporean thought that English would no longer be the dominant language in Asia, while the interviewed Vietnamese didn’t think so. A Malaysian official said that the Malaysian government had tried to develop policies to make people to use Malaysian as their main language. For example, students don’t have to speak as much English as before, and only used English in core subjects, not in other subjects. For the person from Singapore, he thought that due to the rise of China, most business were now done in Chinese, rather than in English. That’s why they don’t have to put too much effort in English contrast to Chinese. The government also subsidizes to encourage people in Singapore to lean Chinese. There was a 10-year-old boy interviewed in Vietnamese. The boy is totally fascinated with English; he does TV shows to teach smaller children English. He also teaches his mother English, although his mother is a professor in a university. We can see from that, even parents have to learn English in order to talk with their kids.

We can take some examples from the radio, from South Korean. South Korean is very near to China, in the radio, people that were interviewed said that learning Chinese is very important, because China is the future market. That’s why they have to learn Chinese and increase their learning in language and to also increase their chance of having a business opportunity. Another example, as China rises and makes its stand in the worldwide market nowadays, their language also rises with their stance. To trade or do business with China, you will first have to learn mandarin.  Leaning the language means a higher place in status, as having learnt the language you can do lot more things without it. English has been dominated throughout of the centuries; other language such as Chinese had taken its place. However, there is a newer language that catches our eyes – “Tsinglish”. This language consist English that is said in Chinese grammar. It is a bit strange, but it is just another culture.

Let’s take different places’ economy as an example. In America, there was a recession that made the value of America dollars drops. In Europe, after the Eurozone debt crisis, people are hesitant to invest in Europe, innovating the economy of Europe to drop even further. Business is bad in both America and Europe, both the global important economy centers. However, over the other side of the globe, China, a country that had been increasing and improving its economy. China’s official aims to have an economical growth of eight percent each year, which means there are still a lot of space for its economy to grow. Learning Chinese may help you gain a high status in social in the future as you may have more opportunities than some other people.

The radio program is really fascinating a full of information of the world around us. I really like this radio program and wish I can share it with you! Thanks for reading through my long email.

Patiently waiting for your reply,

Cheers,

Andy

Written by: Greyrocks