Storyteller: Have you ever grow some plants by yourself, such as flowers, veggie, or tomatoes? I do. I grow some tomatoes in my small backyard. How do we look after the plants and help them grow? It’s a lot of different work, indeed. Watering, fertilizing, flood, heat, disease, insects, wind, cold, weed, etc…, there are lots of things to worry from plant to harvest.  That’s just for casual plant lovers like me, for the farmers whose lives are totally associated with crops, things could be even harder. No wonder a …

Storyteller: Days ago, when I chatted with roommates, I played with my comb trying to unbend it. Suddenly, I broke it into two pieces! My heart broke up, since this boxwood comb was a gift from my father. And I’ve already kept it well for twelve years! I cursed myself and prayed that there could be a miracle as if I didn’t do that stupid thing. Yet, nothing happened. Real life is not as digital world, in which when we press “undo” button or “Ctrl-z”, the things we lose will …

Storyteller: You must remember this: in the end of infamous “TITANIC”(1998) movie, old Rose walks alone to the stern of the salvage ship and opens her hands to reveal the necklace, which she has kept all of her life. She lets the necklace fall from her hand and into the water.
When I was in the cinema, I definitely felt how disappointed and regretful the audiences were when they saw the diamond lost deep into the ocean — Oh no, it’s lost forever.
Have you ever dropped something into the water when …

Storyteller: Last month, I told a story “Satisfying Hunger with Picture Cakes“. It tells people not to rely on unrealistic fantasy. Today, I will tell a similar story: “Quenching thirst by watching plums”.  The idea within this Chinese idiom is pretty close the “picture cake” one.  Sometimes, people use these two idioms together, and in most cases, one can replace the other in a dialogue or context. However, given the stories behind the two idioms, there is a little difference between the exact meaning of two idioms. “Drawing a picture …

Storyteller: Look at the pie picture on the right. Isn’t it delicious? At the moment of looking at it, probably you start to secret saliva and your stomach starts to rumble. But stop! You remind yourself: “It’s just a picture. Don’t feed on illusions”. In english, we use this phrase “to feed on illusions” to describe unrealistic fantasy. In Chinese, there is a idiom and a story for the same idea.
Satisfying Hunger with Picture Cakes
During the period of Three Kingdoms (208-280 A.D.), there was a man named Lu, Yu in …