Monday, January 23, 2012

Happy Lunar New Year + A Thought For A Good 2012

I know that I've already wished everyone a Happy New Year but it is now the Lunar New Year. I would write it in Chinese but I've seen it written so many different ways that I'm a bit confused now. I decided not to even attempt to figure out which is the most correct way since I am not Chinese and don't know where to begin.

HAPPY LUNAR NEW YEAR! Let's all band together and make 2012 be a good one!

A floral arrangement for the lunar new year:


There are 3 small lanterns in the arrangement. Can you see them? There is actually a button on the top of each latern, which when pressed, will light up the lantern. It changes colors after a short while.

I think that in order for 2012 to be an awesome year, we as individuals, need to be proactive in the process. Of course, there are things that we can't control, like Mother Nature for example. A good friend of mine wrote an excellent blog post at the end of 2011. I hope that you will take the time to read it. It is written by Sheila of Maddy Loves and is titled "Blogging & Cyberbullying".

The internet has certainly expanded my world, as well as everyone else's. The world has become a smaller place as we are now able to communicate, find information and make purchases online. Internet, for me, is a wonderful tool and I've made so many wonderful friends in all corners of the world. Unfortunately, there is also an ugliness to the internet and people do feel much freer in doing and saying things that they normally wouldn't do in person. The internet allows you to remain anonymous and hide behind profile nicknames. I was appalled when I watched a YouTube video some months back. It was a tutorial by a well-known beauty blogger and I always appreciate the hard work that goes into doing those. I normally don't read the comments but I happened to and was shocked by the amount of mean comments. While I think that constructive negative comments are okay, mean and vindictive ones are not. I then went to another beauty blogger YouTube tutorial video and checked out the comments there and saw the same things.

As was mentioned in Sheila's writeup and was probably one of the main reasons why she wrote it, is that one of her friends, who happens to be a friend of mine, was being targeted. I believe some things were written as comments on her blog but most of them were in beauty-related forums. I did find it quite interesting that these were in countries where what you say and do are significantly monitored by government.

While these wonderful people who are being targeted seem to brush it off and ignore, one cannot deny that it is hurtful. Let us please remember the famous quote: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Hiding behind your profile nicknames and vindictive commenting as "anonymous" is cowardly. Negative comments are not unwelcome as long as they are tactful and constructive.

It is my hope that we can all be a kinder, gentler person. What goes around, comes around and if we can "pay it forward", just think of how much nicer this world will be.

*Kat*

10 comments:

Sheila said...

Amen to everything you said!!

Happy 2012 and may this year be a whole new, and even more awesome year than the last <3

Anonymous said...

Cyber bulling is one of the most cowardly way a person can ever act... I'm going to read up on Sheila's article :)

Happy Dragon Year Kathy!! Hope it brings you great health and happiness:) Beautiful flower-arranging there!!

Anonymous said...

Beautiful flowers!

Happy Dragon Year!


Sandy

Jamilla Camel said...

You know I totally agree :-)

Happy New year - love the floral arrangement!

tiffyama said...

Happy Lunar New Year!! The arrangement is beautiful!!! My mom would think so too~ did I ever mention that she loves flower arranging? :] The lanterns are super cute too.

-sigh- Those people have no lives and are so insecure. Guess they don't have a life based upon the effort they put into bashing those on the internet. Why watch when the person's intentions are all but good. Those cyber bullies need to realize that words hurt just as much, especially when the person being attacked has done nothing wrong to them personally. Even so...why can't we all just get along?

Cheers to a fantastic year of the dragon. <3

. said...

Aww, you really make some good points in this post. I read Sheila's post before too, and it's definitely worth reading. Unfortunately the sad thing is that the majority of the cyberbullies won't read these posts :(

I love the flower arrangement with the little lanterns! :)

Happy new year!

Yumeko said...

people need to stop assuming they know wat another person is like based on what they read or see on their vids

i find its this assumption tat leads ppl to think they can say whatever they want because they are "friends"

of cos there are the flat out cyber bullies aka trolls but i find the faux friends the worst of the lot

galpal.hi said...

Thank you to everyone for your comments and input. Let's hope that we can all become a kinder person to each other. Actually, all of you are wonderful, awesome people and I'm so glad that we have met through blogging and twitter. Let's hope we can slowly change the mindset of others who are not so kind.

*Kat*

Beauty Box said...

Happy Lunar New Year to you too!! What a beautiful flower arrangement. You are very talented ;-)

A thoughtful post indeed..Call me too straight-laced but one should behave the same online and in person...and with integrity too!

galpal.hi said...

@Yu Ming--Thank you. So that there is no mistake, I did not do the arrangement. My worker did. I'm not that talented. Unfortunately, all the designs are in my head but to actually create it, I'm pretty pathetic.

Thank you for your input too. I totally agree!

*Kat*