All posts filed under: Thoughts & Opinions

Post #8: BART

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Welcome to the eighth post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. BART trains are cool. They look like portals from the future, prepared to take you back with them. Even the horns sound digital. Harrison Ford caught one in Blade Runner. Or maybe I just made that up. But he totally would have. Each day, I ride the futuristic cars to work and back. BART is my preferred form of public transport, and mostly an enjoyable experience. The system is known for its large, comfy seats, and has a completely different feel from the hard plastic seats on trains in New York and London. I am a creature of habit and each day, I make a beeline for my preferred seat: the reverse-riding left …

Post #7: University at 17?

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Welcome to the seventh post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. Thanks to Maia for the topic suggestion. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. I was 17 in my final year of high school, and took to telling those who asked me what I was planning to do with the rest of my life that I was looking forward to becoming an astrophysicist. They’d reply with an exaggerated “ooooh!”, raise their eyebrows and change the subject. Most were probably conscious of the fact that they had no idea just what an astrophysicist does, so they thought it best to seem impressed and move on. Truth is, I never knew what I wanted to do. I just told people that so they’d stop asking me. My mind changed more frequently than …

Post #5: The Gym

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Welcome to the fifth post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. With the new year, brings a renewed vigor for trying to achieve a balanced life. This is something I usually attempt most years, but I’ve usually failed before the first week is through. But not this year! 2012 is the year of Doing, and here are seven things that are helping me get on the right track: Ask the tough questions. First thing I did was address the problems (eg “I feel gross. And I’m not happy with the way I look” etc). I followed up these problems with why questioning. (eg “I don’t look great because I eat ridiculous amounts of chocolate each night.”). It’s important to be truthful – you’ll only …

Post #3: Write Something About the NFL

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Welcome to the third post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at therebeccaproject [at] gmail [dot] com. I live in a city that has two NFL teams, neither of which have been any good since I have moved here. I have trekked down to see the local soccer team, the San Jose Earthquakes, and I have seen the greatest team in the world (FC Barcelona) play Mexican side Chivas at Candlestick. I have even watched the Superbowl live in Australia, New Zealand and Ireland (if mostly for the half time entertainment), but never have I been to a Niners or Raiders game in the flesh. And I’m totally fine with that. Coming from a sports obsessed nation, particularly one that likes to remind you that we’re such an athletically gifted …

Post #2: The American South

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Welcome to the second post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at therebeccaproject [at] gmail [dot] com. In a recent New York Times posting, ‘An American Dream – In Switzerland?’, it discussed a photographer Yann Gross’ travels around a section of Switzerland where the locals have adopted what I would associate as the culture of the American South: honkey tonk, tattoos, Confederate flags, line dancing, motorbike clubs, drag racing, trailers, roadside diners. Gross published a book, Horizonville, of his travels through this industrial region of one of the world’s most scenically breathtaking countries. His subjects have woven a fascination for American culture into their lives and produced a Swiss-American hybrid, and Horizonville explores the connection to America in the context of living life in the Rhone Valley. What’s interesting to …

Post #1: Why I’d love to own a minivan

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Welcome to the first post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at therebeccaproject [at] gmail [dot] com. *** It was Dexter who convinced me that I needed a minivan. With his low, slightly awkward voice, he told me my life would be so much better. The footage of Happy People Doing Great Stuff in the advertisement sealed the deal. So here I am. A city dweller, minus the tribe of children, with no parking space and hankering for a ‘mom van’. Totally practical. But think about what you could do with it: I would chase the sunset down Geary, and watch the sun disappear into the Pacific from my comfy position in the boot/trunk. Of course, with some Martinelli’s Sparkling and camembert. I would go to Ikea and haul my …