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JacksonFive's
Free Weekly "Learning English" Newsletter
Issue: 30 "Seeing the U.S. by Bicycle... Mostly (p.1)" Oct 8, 2000
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Dear Readers,
Another milestone at JacksonFive has been crossed. This is the
first ADSL JacksonFive issue ^_^ Hopefully, with broadband, our
newsletter delivery time can be shortened. However, I must find
more time to write our newsletter. Otherwise, it might go from
a weekly to a bi-monthly ^_^ There are so many things I want to
teach and share with you, but so little time to write it.
Last week I heard something from my young students that I felt
was very touching. Allen and Wayne are two brothers who study
English at my school in the afternoon. Their father also comes
to study Adult English with me in the evening. Allen and Wayne
both love our school and learning English very much. Their father
does too, but recently their grandma is very ill with cancer.
Their father understandably hasn't been able to come to class as
regularly as before.
Allen told me yesterday that they call their father often at the
hospital. They remind their father not to forget to come to our
English classes. They even said to their father, "Father if you
go to English class today, we will buy you dinner."
(740K MP3 recording,
http://www.path2english.com/Reference/MP3-030-01.mp3)
They told me their story so naturally, as children do, which makes
it even more moving for me. When was the last time you heard
something like this? I've heard of parents saying, "I'll take you
to McDonalds if you are good," but I never heard of children
spending THEIR money to ask THEIR parents to do anything,
especially to learn English. This is certainly a story for the
history books at JacksonFive. Have you heard of anything this
moving from your children before?
You can see a picture of Allen at our school website,
http://www.jacksonfive.com.tw/SummerCamp/WaterPark.htm#Allen.
You can also see many other new pictures that I have posted there.
Sorry, I'm not in any of these pictures as I enjoy taking pictures
too much. I'm always the person behind the camera ^_^ You can
always see me "Live" at my school. Feel free to drop by.
See Yia,
JacksonFive
(518K MP3 recording,
http://www.path2english.com/Reference/MP3-030-01.mp3)
P.S. I'm sure you will enjoy the following excellent cycling
article from our friend Linda in Seattle.
THIS WEEK's FEATURED ARTICLE:
"Seeing the U.S. by Bicycle... Mostly (part 1)"
ARTICLE:
At one time, I had a job that took an hour to drive to each morning.
Not being a person who enjoys automobile travel, this commute was
something to which I could never adjust. Every day I'd be on the
highway, wishing I was riding my bike and resenting the fact that I
was stuck, just sitting, inside of a car. Although it was a good
job, and I had a great boss, I quit. There were many jobs closer to
home, I thought, and figured with enough effort that I could secure
one.
I didn't start looking for a new job right away. With some money in
savings and no children to worry about, I decided that I could take a
break and perhaps a bike trip before jumping into the job search.
Coincidentally, there was an ad in the magazine I had just received
that described a trip going across the United States which would
start soon and end right about when I wanted to start back to work.
I'd always wanted to take a trip across the country but never got
around to all of the planning and organizing that something like that
could take. Perhaps this was something I should explore. To find
out what exactly the ride was, I made a few phone calls.
As it turned out, the more information I got, the better the trip
sounded: Seven weeks in length, detailed instructions on which
streets to ride, a truck to carry the big bags, a van to follow the
riders to be sure everything was OK, sleeping arrangements made in
advance, rest days each week, and most meals already scheduled.
Someone had done all of the work to make this trip happen, and now
all I had to do was sign up. There were a few places still open for
participants so, without much hesitation and with little training, I
decided to sign on. As we say, I decided to "go for it."
After getting together all the clothes and travel gear necessary for
the trip, I set off to meet 49 other people who also thought that
spending many hours a day on a bike, slowly making one's way across
the country, was a neat thing to do. Were we all ambitious or simply
a bit nutty? I hadn't ever ridden my bike more than 60 miles at a
time, yet there were days when we were scheduled to ride 75, 90, even
100 miles in a single day. Could I do it? Well, I thought, I will
soon find out!
What do you think? Would you have signed up for a 3,200 mile bicycle
ride across the United States? Do you imagine you could get on a bike
in California's Disney Land parking lot and then, almost seven weeks
later, ride that same bike into the parking lot of Florida's Disney
World? Write Jackson and tell him!
And stay tuned for my story…
NEXT WEEK's FEATURED ARTICLE:
"Seeing the U.S. by Bicycle... Mostly (part 2)"
(If you benefited from this newsletter,
please share it with a friend.)
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