Monday, July 28, 2008

The hidden meaning of words




Một vài từ tiếng Anh rất quen thuộc mà hầu như tất cả các bạn, dù đã học tiếng Anh lâu năm hay chỉ mới bắt đầu, đều biết là từ "understand" (hiểu), "history" (lịch sử) và "patient" (bệnh nhân).

Tuy nhiên, nếu đặt câu hỏi tại sao lại gọi như thế mà không phải theo cách khác chúng ta sẽ thấy được ý nghĩa sâu xa hoặc ngụ ý tế nhị của nó.

Vì sao gọi "understand" (hiểu) = under-stand --> why stand under not stand above, tại sao phải đứng dưới chứ không phải đứng trên để hiểu!?

Vì sao gọi history (lịch sử) ~ his story (câu chuyện của anh ta) mà không phải là herstory (her-story, câu chuyện của chị ta)!?

Vì sao patient đồng thời vừa có nghĩa là bệnh nhân vừa có nghĩa là kiên nhẫn. Điều đó có ngụ ý gì!?

Có bạn nào giải thích được 3 câu hỏi vì sao ở trên không? Trong cuộc sống, có những từ thường nhật (cả tiếng Anh và tiếng Việt) nhưng nếu nhìn khác đi 1 chút có thể giúp mình nhận thấy nhiều điều thú vị, bạn có biết từ nào tương tự như vậy không?

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Carry on till tomorrow

Carry on till tomorrow (Badfinger)

Friday, July 25, 2008

Finance Literacy

I shortly composed a slide about finance literacy followed the concepts of Rich Dad & Poor Dad (Robert Kiyosaki). Applied Finance is the topic I've loved to learn since I was in 2nd year of university and have been practicing so far.

view presentation (tags: finance)

Related entries:
1. Tài sản và tiêu sản (asset vs. liability)
2. 7 ways to be rich or at least not poor
3. Steve Job's speech
4. George Soros' business motto
5. Lạm phát (Inflation)
6. Motivation
7. Ngèo, giàu và sang

Monday, July 14, 2008

Valse




Cuối tuần tình cờ nghe được 2 bài hát hay và thật trùng hợp là cả 2 bài đều sữ dụng điệu Valse mà mình rất thích.

Thu Vàng (Thơ: Cung Tiến)

Trích bình luận: "Tiết tấu điệu valse làm bài hát trở thành nhí nhảnh hồn nhiên, nhưng ngược lại, ca từ của bài hát cũng lại là một tâm sự buồn...Một bài hát hay, nhưng dường như dấu trong tiếng cười trong trẻo là nổi buồn xa vắng bâng quơ... Như là bài hát đã thóat khỏi vòng quen thuộc trong cảm nhận, nhưng cái "bóng" của những suy nghĩ cũ vẫn trùm lên trên thân phận mùa thu."



Wednesday, July 9, 2008

A simple tool of Time Management




  • quadrant I — manage: the quadrant of necessity; things are both urgent and important
  • quadrant II — leadership and quality: the quadrant of focus; things are important but not urgent
  • quadrant III— (AVOID): the quadrant of deception; things are urgent but not important
  • quadrant IV—(AVOID): the quadrant of waste; things are neither important nor urgent
A No uttered from the deepest conviction is better than a Yes merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid trouble. (Mahatma Gandhi)

Learning 2.0 with Web 2.0

I couldn't believe learning could be (in fact has been and will be) so much fun, convenient and enjoyable like this with Web 2.0







Wednesday July 9, 2008 - 12:01am (ICT)


Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Motivation




What is motivation? Yep, it's just the simple word and is so straightforward that everybody can say right away its meaning. Say, motivation is encouragement, is just what motivates, right? Yet, if we think more about it, we can see how important motivation is to our life.

"Motivation is which makes us take action towards our desired goals and which gives purpose and direction to those actions." Thus, what motivates a poor student to get high scores? What encourages an employee to work? What inspires an artist to be creative? What urges an entrepreneur to develop and run their business? No matter who they are, successful people share a common thing that they all have strong passion, strong motivation that like a power, long lasting, unlimited-energy engine to boost them overcome any challenges and advanced many others. If one wants to be successful, they must always keep motivated. People see someone got top graduation, award; someone got rich from limited availability and wonder how did they do that? Don't learn from their tricks, luckiness, their available advantages because you're different, situation changes overtime and it may not happen to you. Instead, figure out what are their motive forces and try to make your own ones. The underline factor is just motivation which includes passion, inspiration, love, competition, responsibility... anything which can naturally push you to get started and go ahead.

Every now and then, we lose our motivation and we allow procrastination to dominate our life. Without motivation, we stop taking action, lose focus, wander around, circle our thumbs... We feel we're in the middle of nowhere, useless, dumb, inane, stupid, ugly... all the worst thing we can think and feel about. Just along with motivation, we feel that we have to do something, learn something to achieve our goal and enjoy our lives with happy working, studying and entertaining. We start to try, achieve things that we really want to and believe that we are capable of becoming whoever we want to be.

So just brainstorm and list out anything which can motivate you. Favorite songs, compliments, intimate friends, caring, meditation, sight-seeing, competitors, lovers, parents, self-esteem, ego, ambition, money, comfortable working environment, kind and talented coworkers, classmates, movies, successful stories... or just some motivation quotes sometime for a while. Every successful people have motivation quotes to whisper to themselves and share with others. Pick some for your favorites, the ones that you contemplate the philosophy and stir up your desire to get moving and take action.
-- (Khuong Nguyen)

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. (Mark Twain)

The best motivation is self-motivation. The guy says, “I wish someone would come by and turn me on.” What if they don’t show up? You’ve got to have a better plan for your life. (Jim Rohn)

People become really quite remarkable when they start thinking that they can do things. When they believe in themselves they have the first secret of success. (Norman Vincent Peale)