zt: 韩寒关于烟草部门韩锋局长的一点文字

最近广西烟草部门韩峰局长的日记很热门，我认为在和谐和视频充满网络的年代里，突然来一些真人纯文学的描写，如沐春风。这应该是 2010年最具文学价值和社会价值的文学作品了。我看了局长日记以后，觉得我们不应该讨伐这位局长。我们假设局长日记日记是真的，我敢说这其实是一位好干 部。

1， 这位干部在半年的时间内仅仅受贿6万元，这是我近几年第一次看见受贿两次后面跟的是一个5位数，现在哪里去找这么清廉的局长。

2， 在他已玩，正玩，稳定的玩和待玩的那些床伴中，无一人属于包养性质。

3， 这位局长不赌博，不嫖娼。在公共场合办手机卡的时候按顺序排队，一排就是两个小时。

4， 在他的日记里，我们看到了一个以最小的成本在泡妞的国家干部，在其他干部都送二奶房子车子的时候，他送给自己的女人最贵重的礼品仅仅是一个手机或者一个 MP4。

5， 他应酬喝酒仅89次，我知道的大部分的村干部一年喝酒应酬都要超过365次。但是他多次喝醉，酒量一般，这点没有达到一个国家干部的要求。

6， 虽然他玩女人多次，但是陪老婆也有25次，给父亲购买手机，其中也没有发现利用职务之便给自己亲戚走过后门。

7， 他会自己安装电脑软件，爱好数码，爱好摄影，爱好体育，用微博体写日记，属于一个比较与时俱进的领导。

8， 在他的日记里，完全没有看到一个国家干部对于豪华汽车，房产奢侈品，书画古董收藏所表现出来的应有追求，甚至连个念想都没有，只是默默的玩着他的手机和电 脑。在日记里，他甚至写道，今天买了一个160元的XX耳机，真好！多么知足常乐的干部。

9， 至于工作方面……虽然尚且没有看出这位领导进行了任何的工作，但是所谓干部干部，只要干了自己的部下，也就完成了这个这个名词赋予的意义。

综 上所诉，在现有的国情下，他绝对是一个标准线以上好干部，这样的干部属于自娱自乐容易满足型，对国家和人民造成的危害是最小的。我们看到了一个仅 仅几个千把块钱就能让他乐不思蜀的国家干部，当他买了一部手机后，连续三天的日记内容都是“在家玩手机”，连女人都不玩了。在他这个位置上，比他罪大恶极 的干部多的是。我强烈的建议网名们放过这位干部，让他继续在他的工作岗位上研究他的数码产品，如果他下台了，接替他的人很可能比他对社会的危害要大很多， 唯一的区别就是人家不写日记。

我是认真的。

-- by 韩寒

To transfer or not, that's the question...

When I was in AIESEC last year, my fellow AIESECers taught me all about culture shock.

Typically, the culture shock is represented by a U-curve: when someone arrives in a new environment, he/she will be amazed by basically, everything new. This is the honeymoon period that usually lasts a week to a month, depending on the person. The initial high is followed by a downward spiral, when the person encounters difficulties adjusting to the new home. At its worst, the bottom of this emotional fall reaches an abyss. Some call it homesick, others short-termed depression. However, as long as you hold yourself out of this pitfall, everything will be fine again. This signifies the time when the person adapts to the culture and knows how to get his/her way through.

My last semester looked like this U-curve. The first month of excitement of coming to Cornell ended in a depressed state where homework, social pressure, declining weather and the thought that most of my exchange student friends were leaving sent my mood to a record-low. Initially when I knew few people here, the lack of social activities affected my academic performance. I can be either sociable and get good grades, or getting neither. US is not what I expected it to be. When Jonas told me about his wonderful life in Cornell a year before, I believed him. As it turns out, what worked for a Swedish version of Brad Pitt doesn't necessarily work for me. The neediness of getting to know people never works in your favor. You've gotta play cool even when you can't.

This semester, I'm working in a lab, taking classes I'm really interested in, got a bunch of good friends, so I'm out of the hell. Cornell is becoming my reality. These days I just can't imagine living in Sweden again. The same thing happened when I first went to Sweden. Getting too attached to your new habitat means you forget your old home. Last year before coming to Cornell, I felt I was leaving Sweden and get a brand new start stateside. Right after coming here, I felt I was on the way of leaving again. Being a modern day nomad sucks.

So, the shocking news is: I'm considering the possibility of transferring to Cornell, stay here for another year and graduate in 2011. Since I don't want to let you down, I'm not saying I'm transferring, and I won't promise anyone anything. Yesterday I talked to Christine Potter, my exchange advisor. She said I need to take 36 credits next year and fulfill the graduation requirements. I have to figure out the latter with the faculty advisor. If I transfer I can put my home degree on hold, transferring Cornell classes back, write a thesis and get the Swedish M.S. There's nothing to lose. As for financial aid and stipend, there's no answer right now. My full tuition will be 37k USD a year. I never asked my parents' for money since 19, and I'm not gonna let them pay my tuition. If there is no scholarship, not even a token financial aid then screw it. I'm not staying. The application deadline is March 15th. Whatever is gonna happen next year will be decided.

虎年 + 情人节

今天是2010年2月14号周日，虎年大年初一。

今年的初一与情人节恰巧赶到一天去了。在这周六，有很多事情都凑到一起去了。冰球队Cornell Big Red要与Yale Bulldogs在Lynah Rink厮杀，大年三十CSSA在Statler Hotel举办活动，CSA在某处搞Speed Dating，就连棒子们也要过年。他们不管这个叫Chinese New Year，只是说Lunar New Year。几天我们那个废物到家的国足赠给人家三比零的大礼，棒子在气死之余要还说是Chinese的年那就太孙子了。既然人家敢说孔子是韩国人，本人建议他们学学阿Q精神，把此次失败归总于“老子被儿子打了”吧。

其实我很想去Speed Dating玩玩儿。可惜本人还要跟FantAsia唱歌，那就算了。一周前Carolle问过我这学期是不是还要留在FantAsia，我那一阵子有些犹豫，她问我的时候就干脆来个顺水推舟，说这学期没空了。不过如果小乐队演出需要一个男低音的话，我随叫随到。就这样，本人虽然quit了还是跟FantAsia藕断丝连。Carolle挺理解我，说我作为交换生应该多体验些别的事物。昨晚唱了FantAsia今年代表作，Tension的“我们的故事”。听上去总体感觉比去年中秋唱的要好，唯一的不足是我们的女Solo在开始唱得太高了。由于时间关系，我们演出的视频还没有出来。现在先放上一段去年的，同样的一首歌。那时候Hywel还在，我们两个男低音一个挑大梁，另一个助唱。Hywel不久退出了再也没回来，我就成了男低音的老大。

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WF3WhWZ2jc0

好了，不提FantAsia了。Yuan前几天说，一个人如果是Fresh Off the Boat（FOB），那她/他在这个社会的地位和现状会与此人在当地混的时间成正比。作为交换生，如果你跟当地人攀比的话很多方面比不过，诸如认识人的数量，朋友圈子的大小，死党的忠诚度，以及有没有那另外一口。我有时候觉得我住的Von Cramm有个很大缺陷，那就是人太少。一栋楼里三十多人，总是这几个面孔来回晃悠。如果你要跟其中有些人相处不来那就很别扭。Von Cramm的好处是，价钱便宜，活动挺多，你会跟数量较少的人很熟，而不是像住在大宿舍那样，认识人多可是相处的人少。我们楼里的主管很有可能是个同性恋。此人就是我几个月前写过的以为足球比赛场上有九个人的那个家伙。Henrik说我们宿舍比西校区好得不止一个档次，听他这话就知道此人在百步以外的西校区没有任何朋友。以后要是有人问我来Cornell住哪里好，我不会光跟他们说Von Cramm，像某些不知好歹的瑞典傻X。Maria来了一学期才得知西校区的楼里有图书馆和电脑房，打印文献不需要爬Libe Slope。她反应也忒慢了。Von Cramm就是个封闭的小群体，原先住这儿的有些人出了宿舍就没朋友了。虽然本人很讨厌宿舍主管的态度，但他有一句话说得很好：如果楼里的人把眼光向外转一下，就会发现在宿舍开会争吵是没意义的，因为俺们人民公社委员会的决定往往说服不了外界任何人。以后有交换生来康乃尔我会推荐他们去住北校区的HILC，人多气氛好外加近水楼台。

这个情人节本人就落单啦。虽然大过年的不该说些不吉利的话，可我还要说：我恨这个Ed。你不用去猜此人是谁，Ed是化名。他看见个我喜欢的妹妹就上去贴，聊了不几句就搂住人腰。操蛋的是那个妹妹情人节有约（要还他妈是Ed就得有人玩儿完），本人没排上队。老子要是香港古惑仔，非得像生蕃处置大二天那样，带上一票小弟去。No she doens't know what she's missing！各位如果看见我说这些话觉得有些怪异，请你找个没人地方撞块豆腐。或者听本人一句忠告：please come back to reality！Leo Kinmann不是圣人，更不是周润发版的孔子，有周迅那样的女友还“光曰不日”（听说他老人家到死还是个童子身，真是清高到连女人都不惜得看）。这是我的博客，你要不喜欢可以离开。

昨儿晚会结束后，我跟一个哥们Keenan出去买酒。本人要买醉，他给我捧场。说实在的，身为男人，有一帮这类贴身兄弟是很好的。此人跟上学期的澳洲死党不同，他年龄比我稍大，能去夜总会，能买酒，成年人们玩的他都玩得来。上学期的好友们就是年纪太小，怎么玩儿都小儿科。我们出去比较晚，等到了Wegmans他们已经不卖酒了。Ithaca当地法律，凌晨一点之后不准买酒。于是我们回家打游戏唠嗑，聊了很久。Keenan说足球队里一帮中国学生曾经问过他，为何中国男生从来不会向白人哥哥那样泡MM？他的结论是：中国人都太含蓄了。男生不敢上前跟女生打招呼，有人喜欢你你也不会看，女孩子阵阵秋波送来仿佛对牛弹琴。有时候真的希望有一种组织，把内向含蓄的中国男孩子们（又名曰“乖孩子”）接进去，指导他们在酒吧，舞池，夜总会，派对，街头，甚至是公司校园，如何接触异性，打动她们的心。传授他们这类技巧，从而让他们成为真正的男人。在我看来，这项人生本领可是比啃书本还要重要啊！在美国校园，最接近的事物是fraternity，兄弟会。可惜本人在康乃尔只是个过客，时间不够。行，废话少说。在这剩下的一学期，迎接新一轮的挑战吧！

请各位再看一遍Yellow Fever：
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOyRWuklsiQ

混乱之日，道别之时

昨天小小杯具了一把。

早上离家前楼里的姚远正在做饭。他突然提出让我把饭带到学校。原计划他要跟人在食堂会餐，刚做好了饭又想到带饭看上去十分地不专业。这两天他其它几顿饭都有人管（有一顿是我跟黄蕾请他的，黄蕾是男生。第一次写出他的名才发现此人的名字竟然如此屌，黄色的花蕾），所以这饭轮不到被他吃掉。本人大喜，借了饭盒，盛上他的土豆丝炒辣椒，再顺便拿上了前晚剩下的lasagne，赶快跑去赶车。等上了车就座之后，忽然感到从书包内部飘出一股辣香味。等本人开包检查时，第一个看见的就是掉在一边的饭盒盖和蠢蠢移动想要蹿出牢笼的意大利千层饼。

这下坏了。

于是下车，找地方处理。冲进Goldwin Smith Hall 的洗手间拿纸擦。幸好只弄脏了一本书。本人用擦手纸把饭盒包起来，到下一站的Cornell Diary Bar 要了个塑料袋。解决了！接下来只需要背上饭香扑鼻的书包上课就是了。

这学期我要学拉丁舞。Dance studio 设在北校区的Helen Newman Hall，每周二九点半到十一点。今天晚餐时间我兴致勃勃地宣告所有见到的人，说这小子要飞黄腾达，进入社交界了。后来走到Newman 才发现傻X了：拉丁舞蹈下周才开课。走之前我给我的舞伴发了封短信提醒她去跳舞。我的舞伴竟然在我快到场的时候才慢条斯理地打电话跟我解释说本周没课。晕。。。可能是这两天没睡够才杯具重重。

今天和黄蕾请姚远上海鸿吃了顿饭。记得学期初有一天晚上我们三人聚在Von Cramm 的饭厅里，分享着本人买的速冻小包子，一边聊到了桃园三结义。不过我们这哥仨性格和刘关张三人差得很远。黄蕾年长，他应该算刘备。我是关羽，姚远为张飞。可惜上学期在忙碌中匆匆过去了，我们三人好像没有怎么干些特“古惑仔”的事就到了今天。而姚远明天一早就要走了。时间不饶人。也许有一天我们还会在世界某个角落相聚。

"Goodbye", says the man to Von Cramm Hall,
the wanderer leaves Ithaca, in the snowy spring.
Now I can dare to say, since the world is small,
In summer, expect the return of the King.

----- Leo Kinmann to Yao

好了，既然世界如此之小，暂时的悲欢聚散没啥大不了的。在这个时代能把人们分开的只有生离死别，没有天涯海角。

Hi again!

I haven't written anything since last year. When I was travelling in CA and NYC during my winter break, internet access was a rare luxury. Once you are done with checking out my pictures, I'll get you updated.

Winter Travelling in US - Part 1
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=1836&id=326100011&l=fada7112f4

Winter Travelling in US - Part 2
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=1873&id=326100011&l=d8c3c657f4

Winter Travelling in US - Part 3
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=1878&id=326100011&l=1eb3bad88a

So when my friends Gunnar and Erik visited me, they realized I've adapted somehow to match a commoner's style in US. I started to watch sports, mostly NBA, and also Ivy League games cos I'm a Cornellian. I've also noticed the importance of economy to our daily life, following foreign exchange rates using the Windows Vista gadget on my desktop. One night in San Francisco, when I wanted to hide inside a bookshop from the windchill, I found this interesting book. It's called "Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street". In the wake of the subprime mortgage crisis in early 2008, the investmentbank Bear Stearns was among the first to fall. A few months before the financial apocalypse, Bear Stearns stock was valuable, with a prize of $133 per stock. In the end, when the Bear was being purchased, JP Morgan Chase's CEO Jamie Dimon set a prize of $2 per stock. The Bear, founded in 1923, had seen more than a handful of Wall Street companies rise and crumble. Just like any predator in an unforgiving, merciless process of natural selection, the Bear finally took its last breathe and joined the long list of casualties. Months later, Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy, pushing the financial crisis onto a whole different level. While this was happening, the common idiocracy in the liberal Sweden was trying to portray US as an empire in its last days, ready to be replaced by the "righteous" EU. What they failed to understand is the way world economy functioned. The American banks are "too big to fail"(a phrase popularized by Ben Bernanke, the Chairman of Fed. Congrats Ben for your second term!). When the big guys fall, they fall hard and crush the small men underneath their weight.

NBA is a good thing. It's the common denominator of Asians and Americans. In China, 9 of 10 guys either follow NBA, watch the game, or play basketball. Those 1 who dont are most likely the social outcasts. Besides, being a national sport in the states, there is no reason you dont know anything about it if you live here and are an Asian dude. Back in Sweden I only cared about World Cup, the Olympics and EUFA. The Swedish television never broadcast NBA games! They only show you soccer, handball and hockey. Hopefully, things are gonna change with one man: Jonas Jerebko, the Detroit Pistons' rookie, supposedly the first Swedish NBA player. (in reality, he's neither the first nor Swedish)

I found this funny article on Aftonbladet, the least credible paper in the world. Take a minute to read it.

If you can't understand Swedish, let me explain it to you in short. The author praised Jonas Jerebko's performance in a losing game, repeatedly calling his first game "an everlasting part of the Swedish sports history", and this guy the first Swede in NBA. The fallacies are:

Jonas Jerebko's father left Syracuse in his early years, moved to Sweden and got married. Ethnically, Jonas is only half-Swedish. Jerebko is not a Swedish lastname. The laughable word they used on Jonas is "västgöten", it's the journalist's lame attempt of putting him into the same category as the fictional "Arn the Knight Templar".

Per definition, if Jonas is a Swede, then NBA have drafted two other Swedes before Jonas: Joakim Noah and Maciej Lampe. I have nothing against Jonas personally. He played well as a rookie. If this guy keeps up, he'll probably even become a candidate for MVP in the near future. With him in NBA, hopefully the basketball will get more media coverage in Sweden, making it easier for me to talk about it with people once I go back. What keeps getting on my nerves is the Swedish way of enlarging the penis with magnifying glass. Since Sweden is a small country with limited influence, what people do to raise the publicity is pinpointing one or few Swedish figures in any field, where they are either relatively famous, or related to something/somebody famous(the latter case occurs more frequent). In music, we got ABBA, Roxette, and Young Folks. In bussiness, IKEA. We also had Ericsson, Volvo, Saab, ABB, Autoliv, but these companies have more foreign stockholders than Swedish. In Hollywood, Stellan Skarsgard and Peter Stormare have been around for decades and are still playing supporting characters. In fact, when "Mamma Mia" was in the theater in US, Stellan's name didn't even appear in the ad. Jonas Akerlund is a good MV director, however, he's not as famous as his music videos. The archetype of this sentimentality is perhaps the reality show, "Swedish Hollywood Wives", the most-watched TV show when it aired. So if you consider yourself less generic than the Americans just because you are Swedish, take a second thought. Cos we are not.

Considering NBA, when Yao Ming was drafted by Houston Rockets in 2002 as the first-pick, the NBA industry exploded with the billion-class viewers in China. Recently, the zeal of seeing a Chinese NBA player has died down. Partly because it's somewhat trivial now. Since Yao's year, China had sent more players into NBA. An Asian face in the court just doesn't make you feel the same anymore. Conversely, you can say: since US is dominating NBA and FIBA, they wont brag about having Kobe and LeBron. They are just two players of the entire league. The act of exaggerating Jonas Jerebko's role in the Pistons proves Sweden's lack of talent in basketball. If you go on, the list could be made much longer:

IKEA: the only rich, successful bussiness
ABBA: the only famous band
Volvo: the only car people knows is from Sweden
Fugelsang: the only astronaut
Jerebko: Sweden's only player in NBA
Zlatan: the only talented "Swedish" soccer player
Robin Soderling: the only active Swedish tennis player
Bjorn Borg: the only tennis world-champion
J-O Waldner: the only world-champion in pingpong
......

In the future, this might happen: if Jonas' team is doing good, the Swedish media will focus on the few shots and steals achieved by this guy, calling them the winning stunts. If his team is bad, then either NBA will not be mentioned at all, or the blame will be placed on his teammates, until Jerekbo gets traded. Oh, the last thing I want to mention is: after hearing the Swedish news reporter pronouncing NBA as N-B- "aaaaa" a dozen times, only idiots remain sane.

Bahston!

Ok, I'm finally writing this blog about Boston. I went to Boston with all of the exchange students from CALS. The trip was organized by Christine Potter, our dependable exchange advisor who always has a friendly smile on her face. She prepared the trip for months. In the beginning, it turned out there was no hostel to accommodate the 30-ish crowd so she booked a four-star hotel in Cambridge. Yeah that's right, the hotel is on the Hahvahd and MIT side.

Taking a bus, the journey took us 6 hours from the backwater of Ithaca to the buzzing metropolis of Boston. According to Christine Potter, the drivers in Boston are insane. Most of the time when a car is trying to get over an intersection and fails, it ends up standing on the crossing, blocking the way for the poor pedestrians. The first night we went to a restaurant for dinner, Jonas ordered a German Guinness and got a pilsner, which was surprising cos pilsner should be Czech. Back in the hotel, me, Kedar, Jonas and Omar had to share the room and its two queen-sized beds. So we got both roomies and bedmates for the night.

On Saturday, we went to Harvard and MIT. Harvard Yard is such an oasis in the town. If you are lucky enough to get "The Hahvahd Tour"(Hahvahd is how you say it in South Boston accent), which we did, you'll get to know some interesting facts about the university. Our guide showed us the dorms where Matt Damon, Tommy Lee Jones and Al Gore lived. It turned out that Tommy and Al were roommates back in the 60s. When walking into the Harvard Yard, we never went through the main gate. The story here is for any Harvardian, you can only walk through the main gate twice: once as an incoming freshman, and once as an outgoing senior. Otherwise bad fortune will fall upon you, especially on the academic side. Matt Damon walked through the main gate too many times so he never graduated. However, if you get an Academy Award, you are pardoned from your failure.

Another landmark inside Harvard Yard is the Widener Library. It was opened following a solemn ceremony on June 24, 1915. The building commemorates Harry Elkins Widener. A 1907 Harvard graduate and book collector, he purchased and brought books from England to US year 1912. As you may've guessed, he took the fastest passenger liner he could find, and it happened to be RMS Titanic. Since Widener bought the first-class ticket, he was put onto a lifeboat when the disaster occurred. At that moment, Harry realized he had to go back and fetch some books from the cabin. By the time he made it back, all the lifeboats were gone and this guy became one of the 1517 casualties. Harry's mother, grief-stricken, donated $ 3.5 million to build a library after his son. According to the campus legend, three stipulations were imposed by the Widener foundation: first, the exterior of the library can never change, or its ownership will revert to the town of Cambridge. Second, there must be a reading room inside with a vase of flower, in memory of the late Harry Widener. Third, since Harry's mother never watched the Kate Winslet version of Titanic, she thought if her son could swim he could survive. As a result, all Harvardians have to take a swim-test before graduating. At Cornell we got something similar.

For more of my Harvard photos, please check out my album. We also went to MIT. If Harvard Yard is a garden, then MIT campus is an industrial complex. My first impression of MIT is that every student there is a tech-nerd. Another thing that MIT is known for is the hacks. Inside the campus building designed by Frank Gehry(the same architecture that designed the Dancing House in Prague), Stata Center, you can see the "police car" that was placed on the top of the MIT Great Dome back in 1994. That vehicle itself was actually a junked Chevrolet painted to match the campus police's patrol car. A similar hack was pull off on September 11, 2006. This time it was a "firetruck". I can consider MIT or Harvard as a place to get my PhD or postdoc, if I make it that far.

In downtown Boston we walked along the Freedom Trail and stopped at Quincy Market. Inside the market we found food from all over the world. Japanese sushi, Italian cuisine, Chinese stir-fry, and Boston lobsters. I bought a lobster roll for 15 bucks. But the day after, I found a 1.25 lb lobster for only $10! The lobster totally made my day. The lobster place, this Irish bar called Purple Shamrock is really good. If you have more time and money than I did, seek out Union Oyster House.

I'm off to Boston

Yo. Tomorrow I'm going to Boston with all of the exchange students from CALS. Since I won't be able to update my blog over the weekend, I decided to write something today, just so you know that I'm still alive.

Talking about life and death, Cornell has such a bad reputation. Earlier this week, Cornell Daily Sun reported the death of a PhD student, Lucas Wooster. According to the report, the police didn't suspect foul play or illness, which leads to only one logical conclusion: suicide. However, for a 32-year-old like Wooster who was scheduled to receive his doctoral degree this spring, a suicide attempt is completely irrational on the victim's part. At the end of this paper, a spokesperson from Cornell's health service urged students to seek support at Gannett's counseling and Psychological Service. The last line pretty much proved the point that Wooster committed suicide. Because Cornell is known as a place where students kill themselves, the school's newspaper purposely avoided using the word "suicide". For any of my beloved reader who may be reading this blog, don't worry about me. I'm not going to join the Club-of-No-Return.

Right now I kinda envy my exchange student friends who stay here for only one semester. They never have to worry about pre-enrollment, socializing or whatever. No matter how good or bad it goes for you, after one semester it's over. You can come here as a visitor, and after that, get back home and forget about everything. Lots of the things you see in the states are pretty fucked up compared to European standards. Having five students dying over one semester is something that never happens in Sweden. Things can get pretty hot around here.

Lately I encountered this smart-ass who kinda annoys me. Initially when we actually talked, he seemed to be a cool guy. I don't know what happened. Probably since I never had the time to talk to him again, or he considers me not "knowledgeable" for him, we grew apart. I for one, don't try to cram the whole wikipedia into my brain. If you don't know much about federal reserve for example (cos you are a foreigner from a non-English speaking country and never heard about it before), then the smart-asses take you as an idiot. Our smart-ass asked me once if I knew that Germany was number 4th on export, I said I didn't know but it won't surprise me cos Germany has advanced automobile industry. Guess what I found out the other day? Germany is the world fucking top exporter! He once claimed soccer has 9 players at a time. But the truth is, both American football and European football have 11 players on the field, I don't know where he got 9 from. He once said he knew Basshunter, when I showed him the video of "Boten Anna", the artist's major blockbuster, he said he never heard the song. For engineers and scientists, it's generally more important to get an understanding than reciting facts. A Swedish friend of mine who started off as freshman this year said he hated PSYCH 101 for its overwhelming factual content, cos "he came here to learn what makes sense, not becoming a walking database". The smart-ass talks with such a conviction as if he's never wrong. Anyway, he is quite unique, I've rarely seen anyone like him before.

Now to the conclusion. Recently I discovered some popular myths. They are not necessarily scientific ones, but related to the society. The Swedes generally consider Sweden as a high-ranked country in suicide rates. Statistically, however, Sweden is not even among the top 20. The prevalence of suicide is far worse in East Europe and Asia. Even in the developed part of Europe, Sweden is not that suicide-ridden. Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, France and Denmark all come before Sweden. It might have to do with seasonal depression, that's why we think we are the most suicidal society on Earth. For anyone of you Swedes who hates Sweden for its mediocre economic impact, mediocre political influence and mediocre life, guess what? Now you'd better start hating Sweden's mediocre suicide rate!