Girl with a pearl earring

By Tracy Chevalier
pages : 233


I found this book while browsing the fiction section in my local library. This novel had been made in a movie in 2003. I remembered I watched this movie a few year ago but I did not recalled the story of it.
This novel took place in Holland in the 1660s. It began with a narration of a girl's feeling. A girl named Griet. She was forced by circumstance to work as a maid for a famous painter. Her life became complicated when she was infatuated with the painter and agreed to be painted. Back then, to be asked to pose as an object of a painter was an honor but it became a suspicion when the object was someone that was a focus of jealousy of the painter's wife. Griet's life was hard as a maid and it was unbearable after she agreed to be painted. But her life was not always gray. A son of a butcher fell in love with her and wanted her as his wife. She knew her life would be better when she said yes to his proposal however she wanted to wait. She wanted to wait for the painter's feeling. And it did not come to her.
This novel also included the life story of Griet's family. Her father was blinded by a work accident and could not work anymore. Her sister was a victim of a disease and died before seeing her again and her brother who hated his job and wanted to run away.
The story was complicated as it involved many characters and yet this novel was very easy to understand and read. It was about Griet's life from the moment she was about to work as a maid until she became a married woman. It was also about her feeling for her master which she had to keep to herself.
It was not easy to describe this book. There were many hidden clues in it, one of it was the feeling of the painter towards Griet. I was not sure if the painter was interested in Griet. At the last chapter, Griet was called to the painter's house to collect a pair of earring she wore for the painting. The painter wanted Griet to have it. I do not understand why, it can be that the earrings are the message from the dead painter that he once loved her or it can be a repay for her service to him.
Nevertheless, the end of the story was to be determined by the reader and it could go either way.

Marrying Anita

By Anita Jain
307 pages
Marrying Anita is a story of a woman's desperate attempt to find a husband. Despite her beauty, Anita had a difficult time finding a soul mate. She was pressed to get married by her parents who believed that marriage should be a part of life. Moving to India was her final effort in finding Mr. Right which turned out to be unsuccessful.
Reading this book reminds me of my close girl friends in Indonesia. Most of them are in their early 40s and are still single. One friend told me, "it was not easy to capture a man's heart".

With an imbalanced ratio of men and women in the world, it is getting harder to find a suitable man, let alone a perfect man. I have known many women who chose to be single than ended up married to wrong men. My best friend is one of them, she said, "it is better to be happy alone, than to have a miserable marriage". My step mother is another example, she chose to stay single until she found a right man, my father, in her late 40s.
Marrying Anita is also about the changes in India. India with 1,156,897,766 people is now more liberal in many aspects. Many young people do not hesitate to have premarital sex and homosexual are readily accepted.

This book describes the fun and sad aspects of the difficulty that modern women faced in finding their soul mates in today's busy world.

Anita Jain is a journalist who has traveled to many cities and currently lives in New Delhi, India.

To know more about the author, please visit : Anita Jain.

Three cups of Tea

By Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
pages : 338
I encountered this book by accident. We were in a friend house in Michigan and I saw this book on my friend’s table. She told me, she was reading this book together with her daughter. I thought this book must be interesting, as my friend’s daughter was only 14 year-old. Honestly, I knew about this book long before I saw this book on my friend’s table but I was not interested in reading it. So when I went home to Erie, I browsed the internet for a synopsis of this book and bought this book from Amazon.
Three Cups of Tea is a personal story of Greg Mortenson. He was a climber. This story began after he climbed K2 in Pakistan and failed. However, his failure was a blessing in disguise as he met a nice family of Haji Ali. Little that he knew, Haji Ali would be in his life for a long time. Mortenson was in the village of Korphe and he learned that this village did not have a school, as the government of Pakistan did not provide a teacher. However these obstacles did not stop Haji Ali, the head village, to educate his people. After seeing the determination of Haji Ali and the children, Mortenson promised to come back and build a school for them.
This story also told us the life of Mortenson as a little boy living in Tanzania. There were many flash back-stories of him and his late sister, Christa.
I was touch by his effort to find money to build schools in Pakistan and about his bravery to go to far away land.
He tried to write to many famous people and asked for a little bit of their money and it was sad to know that big names like Oprah did not respond to his letter
Mortenson later on focused his effort to build schools for girls as not many girls in those county could have higher education. He also continued his work to build these schools in other parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan. This book made me thought of my existence as a female. I was lucky enough to live in a country that allowed girls to study and to be in a family that could pay me to go to university.
This book also made me thought of those people who took education for granted and demanded their teachers to give them good grades easily.
I was in Asia recently and saw the news about flood in Pakistan. My heart went to the people and the children who probably could not study anymore as the flood might damage the schools.
Back to the book. This book is easy to read and the more pages you are on, the more you want to know about the people and the children in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
To know more about the children in Pakistan and Afghanistan and Mortenson's effort to build schools, please visit Central Asia Institute.

What I miss from Singapore

Got this book from Singapore National Day's bag and I questioned myself,

What I miss from Singapore?

1 . The library! We lived not very far from the National Library of Singapore. Amanda, my daughter loved the children section.

2. The convenient to go anywhere within the city. I could take buses, MRT or taxis.

3. The safe feeling I experienced whenever I go. My husband told me, he would let me go by myself even in the middle of the night.

4. Tap water is drinkable. I took this privilege for granted in the USA until I went home to Bandung, Indonesia.

5. Food vendors were everywhere and the food did not give me stomachache.

6. I could walk almost everywhere in Singapore without having to share my walkway with cars.

7. The parks. They were easy to find in Singapore and were clean from trashes and food vendors.

8. And most important thing was No smoke smell! The restaurants and food courts in Singapore are smoke free.

HAPPY SUMMER!!

Happy Summer!

Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice
Jane Austen
268 pages

Many times, I wondered if the Pride and Prejudice DVD that I have just watched had followed the fiction closely. I did not find out until recently.
I have watched the P & P DVD many times and stared at the face of Colin Firth (Mr. Darcy) frequently before I had a courage to pick up the book and read it.
Two months ago, I decided to read “the book”. It took me almost a whole month to finish it.
I found out that the DVD followed the book rather closely. I was amazed that the script writer of the P & P DVD did not leave out any chapters. Of course, like any other movies based on books, many scenes will be cut and altered.
Before I continued, let me tell you a brief story of the Pride and Prejudice. It was written by Jane Austen and published in 1813. It was about five sisters from the Bennet's family who were looking for husbands. Back then marriage was very complicated. The expectation of marriage was different from what we have now. Most marriages in their time were for economic purposes. One had to find a rich husband that could benefit the family and brought good connection for the siblings especially sisters. It meant that it was best to marry someone who was rich and had good reputation despite his look and appearance.
The story started when Mrs. Bennet heard about the arrival of a rich man named Mr. Bingley to their neighborhood. She had a dream of marrying her daughters to rich men. The story continued with the attraction of Mr. Bingley to the eldest daughter of the Bennet's, Jane. Unfortunately, Mr. Bingley's sisters and friend, Mr. Darcy did not approve the courtship. They objected the poor connection that Jane and the family had and the ill-mannered of Jane's mothers and youngest sister. The story also included the attraction of Mr. Darcy to Lizzy, the second daughter. Meanwhile, the other three sisters had not given many detailed stories except for the youngest sister, Lidia. Lidia brought shame to the family by running away with a bad-reputation officer.
The end of the story was rather marry as the two eldest sisters married to rich men to their mother satisfaction.

I really love watching P & P DVD. Although, I prefer reading the book before watching the DVD, I admitted that remembering the movie helped me understand the story easier. For those who interested in watching the movie, I recommend watching The Pride and Prejudice DVD of 1995 and they are available at Amazon.
And for those who prefer reading the book first, have fun and take your time reading.....

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggles by Amanda

Today, my guest book review is my daughter, Amanda Ong.
She is five years old and loves to read. This is her review of her favorite book,
Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is very small. I do not know her age. She has brown hair. She has long hair
She has high heels. She has no children but she has a dog and a cat. There was a Mr. Piggle-Wiggle. He was a pirate. He died after he buried all his treasures.
Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle likes children. She cures their bad habits. She lives in an upside-down house. I like to read Mr. Piggle-Wiggle's books. I have four Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's books. I got two books from a book store and two books from my mother. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle moved to a farm and now she has a dog, a cat and a parrot. Her clothes are all brown. She wears felt hats. Names of the pets: Wag and Light foot . And a farm pet's parrot called Penelope.