http://www.ijs-global.com/class09/vivianguyidanfinal/final%20project/final%20project-main%20website.html

The Prague Spring  was a period of political liberalization in Czechoslovakia during the era of its domination by the Soviet Union after World War II.

Prague Spring began on January 5, 1968, when reformist Slovak Alexander Dubček came to power, and continued until August 21, when the Soviet Union and members of its Warsaw Pact allies invaded the country to halt the reforms.On the night of August 20–21, 1968, 200,000 Warsaw Pact troops and 2,000 tanks entered the country.By the morning of August 21, Czechoslovakia was occupied.

The Prague Spring reforms were an attempt by Dubček to grant additional rights to the citizens in an act of partial decentralization of the economy and democratization. Among the freedoms granted were a loosening of restrictions on the media, speech and travel. Dubček also federalized the country into two separate republics; this was the only change that survived the end of the Prague Spring.

The reforms were not received well by the Soviets who, after failed negotiations, sent thousands of Warsaw Pact troops and tanks to occupy the country. A large wave of emigration swept the nation. While there were many non-violent protests in the country, including the protest-suicide of a student, there was no military resistance. Czechoslovakia remained occupied until 1990.

After the invasion, Czechoslovakia entered a period of normalization: subsequent leaders attempted to restore the political and economic values that had prevailed before Dubček gained control of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ).Gustav Husak, who replaced Dubček and also became president, reversed almost all of Dubček’s reforms.

The Prague Spring has become immortalized in music and literature such as the work of Karel Kryl and Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being.

(Hong Kong-February 12-IJS-Global-Gu Yi Dan)

Newspapers, magazines, subways… Losing weight advertisements are everywhere in Hong Kong.

Let’s have a look at a Vox Pop we did this afternoon in Festival Walk in Kowloon Tong. See how Hong Kong people think about these advertisements.

“It’s too much. All the slogans are creating this kind of blind value that thin is beauty. They don’t care about health at all“, a 23-year-old salesman Mr. Chu told us. “Do you think that Hong Kong girls are too thin?” We asked. “Well, not exactly. But most of them are under average weight.”

“They are so cheap”, a modern girl who wore high heels and a sexy dress said immediately when asked her opinion about those advertisements, “They are very low-class. I think that those stars on the advertisement are too slim. I can’t tell whether their figures are real or fake. Any way, I don’t believe it.’ This fashionable 23-year-old university student Ms. Keung continued.

An middle-aged woman, Mary, who were wandering in the shopping mall told us that her little sister had participated in one of the losing weight course but it didn’t work out. Her friends also paid thousands of dollars to lose weight but also failed. She said she didn’t believe that kind of advertisement at all. “If you want to lose weight, just do more sport, why go to the ineffective course.”

We also encountered an old man, Mr. Liu, who was nearly 80 years old. He showed little interest in those advertisements “I have six daughters. I told them not to lose weight. If you want to keep fit, just eat more healthy food”.

Prague is such a beautiful place that everything here could be a piece of art.

Surrounded by numerous architectures that survived for thousands of years, from Art Nouveau to Baroque, from Renaissance to Cubist, from Gothic to Neo-classical and ultra-modern, even a normal tourist could write an ode. Charlie Bridge, Old Town Square, the sense of romantic is around everywhere. Lovely songs came out from a guitar in a street, artists draw pictures on the old bridge, the sun set slowly behind the castle. All these scenes were telling us an old legend, recalling the feeling of old times. Walking in this city, I couldn’t help praising: this city’s beauty is beyond words.

It is true that great place nurtures great artists. We ran into one when we were in Prague. We were shopping for postcards when some extraordinary ones came to our sight. They had those beautiful paintings that we fall in love with at the first sight. Then we found these painting were everywhere. Not only on postcards but also on T-shirts and other souvenirs. We found the author and interviewed him.

The painter’s name is Jiří Votruba, a nice middle-aged man who always carries a lovely smile. He invited us to his home, a simple place with paintings all over. After a little chat, we knew about him a little. He was born in 1946 in Prague. He worked in an architecture research institute for ten years after graduated from university. He started painting when he’s 18 and continued to engage in it thereafter. It was just his hobby at first but developed to become his most important occupation. His works were mainly paintings, illustrations, graphics and designs.

“Paintings are the most free ways of my expression. The illustrations are mostly for the literatures. They should respect the stories. While others are already commercial”, he said about his series, “The series of ‘much of love’ is about the artificial love I had for commercial consumption. There are massy paintings with small things in, pop icons something…”

One of the series "Too much love"

What he talked as “too much love” was a series made up by many abstract paintings. Their characteristics were quite similar. Messy lines and dots combining with bright colors with many vague small things in. Those paintings expressed what he called as ‘artificial love’ of excessive consumption brought by capitalism. But when asked which regime he prefer. He said capitalism. “The change of regime in 1989 brought commercialization and consumption. But we are much freer now. At least we can refuse it without being put in prison”.

“When we were still in the Communist regime some 19 years ago. I was looking for the beauty of nature, for example, a grey house with an opening…at the end, the shining nature, it’s like freedom. I am looking for freedom in the nature.” He said about his old paintings, and when talked about the newly ones, things are quite different. “Each artist should reflect the world he’s living in. Today I think painter should not paint just one theme because the world is changing so quickly. My last paintings are kind of pop art. It’s because since 1989, capitalism brought consumption. Pop art is a method to laugh at the mass consumption and pop-culture. “The series of ‘swimming pools’ are about lives in consumption. Things are all shiny and beautiful but all because that someone wants to sell it”, he laughed.

Hotel Asterias, one from "Swimming pools"

When we asked him why his painting were so popular, appearing on so many products. He told us that he had a manager who took care of the business. The manager successfully brought Jiří Votruba’s works to many media and also acquired lots of commercial job for Jiří. “The paintings on postcards and T-shirts are very visible but it’s just a small part of my works. I also do books for children, CD covers. They are less visible but sometimes they are more important for me.”

There was a huge painting of colorful flowers hanging on the wall behind him when we were having this interview. He told us it was inspired in Madagascar, a very poor country. People there were going out wrapped with those flowers. He thought that people there still find beauty in the nature. He dragged his collar and pointed at the label, saying,“ But we are finding the beauty in brands…here”.

Z projektu „Dokouřeno“, Flowers in Madagascar

“It is painting. It’s for myself. But graphics are different”, he showed us one particular picture, “this is a typical one”. It was a picture of a Lacoste shoe confronting with a traditional Japanese maid. “The Lacoste, it is the beauty of today’s world, the confrontation is what I am always thinking, the idea of the beauty”.

Before we were about to leave, looking around at these bright pictures, we can’t help asking, “Why are your paintings always being so colorful, all the colors are so bright and clear?”

He answered with a shiny smile, “I don’t know. Maybe it’s my personal attitude. I like very colorful life. I also like to go to southern countries and tropical countries. I think beautiful colors are always very positive for people’s thinking. I think it’s due to my family when I was growing. There’s a lot of fun, very optimistic atmosphere”.

Surely, all the bright pictures brighten us up that day. After the interview, what he had said was still in my head.

“Art for me is looking for the beauty in the world. Each human being is looking for beauty. Painting is just my way of expression”.

Jiří Votruba

(Jingjiang,Jiangsu-February 2-IJS-Global-Gu Yi Dan) It’s a historical tradition for Chinese people to celebrate Spring Festival, which is one of the most important holidays in Chinese culture. It is known widely as Chinese Lunar New Year. Of all the customs, the family-gathering dinner on Lunar New Year’s Eve is seen as the most inevitable one because it is a symbol of harmony among all the family members.

“Our family keeps the tradition very well, we prepared for the dinner several days ahead. Fish was the most important dish, which symbolized that our family had favorable balance every year because ‘fish’ pronounces the same as ‘profit’ in Chinese. The dinner last two hours, we talked and laughed, every one was having a wonderful time”, Jie, Xu told me with a lovely smile. She is 41 years old and from a traditional family. She lives with her husband’s family, including her mother-in-law and brother-in-law. “We had many dishes which had strong local characteristics, it is important for our children to inherit our own food culture. This dinner is the best opportunity”, she continued.

However, traditional families become much rarer these days. “I miss the traditional style of family gathering dinner when I was little. My grandparents would get the entire original foodstuff ready the day before New Year’s Eve. Three or four hours before the dinner, we would all come to their home and all the family members will cooperate to do the dinner.” Zhao, XU a junior student in SU Zhou University, Jiang Su Province told me, “for the last six years, we had our dinner in restaurants”. Rapidly as Chinese economy grows, more and more families now choose to eat out, instead of doing the dinner together in that the preparing job is quite tiring. “Many dishes were cold, there was not enough time for the restaurant to make every dish delicate because of so many customers”, Xu zhao said, “nowadays it’s more like a formula, we went there, we eat then we left. Unlike ten years ago, we don’t have that kind of holiday atmosphere now”.

China’s new generation don’t seem to buy the tradition any more. “I doubt the future of the dinner. China’s one-child policy makes every family smaller than the last generation, we are not so close with our relatives as our parents were, the dinner doesn’t have much meaning to us ”, a 16-year-old boy, Yixin, Gao told me.

“My hometown is a small city, which has very prosperous food industry with more than one thousand restaurants. Our family can’t book a table on New Year’s Eve because all the restaurants were out of supply. None of them could spare one table”, Lei, Zheng, a 22-year-old girl, said, “The economic recession doesn’t seem to influence the industry at all”.

Does the recent financial crisis have any impact on the catering industry? Yingshi, Wei, an owner of one of the top restaurants in town has different opinion. “It is true that my restaurant is all full, but people tend to order less expensive dishes comparing with last year. People who ordered a set of dishes which worth 1800 RMB last year only ordered 800 RMB dishes this year. The profit of my restaurant had reduced by half. Additionally, the competition is fierce, the war of price become even worse during this recession”. But when asked the future of her restaurant, she seemed quite confident, “I believe the financial turmoil would end soon, China has the ability to go through this worldwide crisis, my business would rebound in a short term”.

Talking to some of my friends, I could feel their optimistic attitude towards the economic crisis. Though the economy still stays in winter, people here welcomes another spring with firm confidence.

There are many lovely postcards in Prague, a city which has lots of tourists. Who designed these cards and how they designed them? Our story was about an artist whose pictures were used widely on Prague postcards.

First of all, I’d like to describe a nice postcard to start the report. What is it about? What colour does it use? What scence does it draw? Is it popular in Prague?

Secondly, the body of the report will be maily about the interview we had with the specific artist–Jiri Votruba. It was taken place in his home. The body will include 3 parts.

1) What’s he like? An middle-aged man. Kind and smiley.

2) What’s his home like? Tidy and with simple but nice furniture, which shows he makes money and he is an organized person with good taste.

3)The interview: questions and answers. He talked about an art festival he went annually in Japan, his favorite pictures. His life as a painter and his opinions about prague.

This article devides into two parts. The first part is to define plagiarism. The second part is to answer a question.

A.Here are three quotes of definitions of plagiarism.

1)Take (somebody else’s ideas or words,ect) and use them as they were one’s own. (Page1118,Oxford Advanced Learners’ English-Chinese Dictoinary,Fourth edition,2001)

2)Plagiarism means taking someone else’s words or ideas and passing them off as your own. (HKBU guidelines on plagiarism), you can find it in the introduction chapter of the guidelines by clicking the link below.

HKBU’s hyperlink on plagiarism:

http://buar.hkbu.edu.hk/index.php/current_students_and_alumni/academic_guidelines/avoiding_plagiarism

3)Plagiarism is the presentation or submission of another’s work as your own. It’s taking someone else’s ideas, words or statements or other works as one’s own without acknowledgment.

Examples:

Word-for-word plagiarism: copying exactly from someone else’s text;

Section-by-section plagiarism: lifting phrases from someone else’s text;

Select-term plagiarism: selecting a special term from a text not one’s own;

Paraphrasing: using someone else’s ideas as if they were one’s own thoughts;

Using facts, statistics, graphics, photos etc without permission.(‘Credit it right’,Page40,The Courier Mail (Australia),
February 6, 2007,lexisnexis@academic,)

link:http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.hkbulib.hkbu.edu.hk/us/lnacademic/results/docview/docview.do?docLinkInd=true&risb=21_T5583827249&format=GNBFI&sort=RELEVANCE&startDocNo=1&resultsUrlKey=29_T5583827252&cisb=22_T5583827251&treeMax=true&treeWidth=0&csi=244788&docNo=2

B.The question is “can I legally post any picture on my blog that I have downloaded from the Internet as long as I credit the source?”

My answer is:

1)According to what was published on the guidelines on plagiarism, students can cite published sources on the internet as long as they followed the rules below:

Provide name of author (if known) , title of article, date of article, full http address of website.(II,How to Avoid Plagiarism,HKBU’s guidelines on plagiarism)

With the photos, I think you should provide name of author, title of the photo(if it has) and also the full http address of website.

2)However, when you are using another person’s photos on your blog,there’s one more condition besides the first one. You should make sure that you have the permission of the author. It will be also considered plagiarism if you post something without permission.