7 o’clock p.m. on 26th of Oct of 2005. my wife and I took off from the Pudong Airport of Shanghai with Wuyang Song (later renamed in English Peter Song) and the next day at 7:30 a.m., we arrived at Melbourne. The ten-hour trip could not excite us, because we came upon some trouble. The ten days before we departed Xuzhou, Meilan Zhang fell down from the bike on the way back after she did some shopping, causing the right wrist to suffer from a slight fracture and having it plastered. Heavy baggage, plane’s taking off behind the schedule, Wuyang Song’s being not used to spending the night on the plane, always making a noise almost the whole night. No all right as it was, it was a great novelty to me to come to the country situated on the south hemisphere.
Li Song and Li Xu rent a house with three bed-rooms, a sitting room and a study. It had a independent court, which was not far from Boxhill. To save some money, they let two Chinese students also live within, occupying two rooms. We lived in the third room, the biggest one and Li Song and Li Xu set a bed in the sitting room. Boxhill had a lot of Chinese and there were a lot of public signs and the shop’s name were written in Chinese. Even if you did not know any English, you could still live there.
|  dining room in the rent house |
Houses in the region of Boxhill
Living in an English-speaking country, I began to look for some things to do. I wanted to teach Chinese, which was impossible, because anyone who was qualified to teach must have a certificate issued by the local authority. Doing some translation work was not possible either, because the ad for it could be published only when the translator had a certificate too. In a word, it was impossible for me to earn the Australian dollars. What I could do was in China, not in Australia.
In Australia, there was not any blockage on the web and I could visit the web pages of the VOA and BBC, downloading the audio breaking news. If I could not understand I could read the corresponding scripts, which was the best way to improve my listening ability. I remembered that I could listen to the Special English Broadcast of VOA once in a while on the radio and I could only understand a bit of it because it was impossible to often listen to it. Furthermore, I could not find the scripts. Now it was quite good that I could download the mp3 files and listen to them again and again. If it was too hard I could read the script and listen to it again. I was determined to download and listen every day. In a short period, I could understand almost all that the Special English Broadcast pronounced. Later on I began to download some audio files of normal-speed news and comments. Such practice had an advantage over the class training in listening ability, performing the principle of individuation. The news came to me that the English entrance examination to the high school or colleges and universities would change and the listening items would account for 35% in the College English Test Band 4 and Band Six. I thought that MP3 player had already been popular. As long as the students were provided the video files, they could train themselves everywhere and at any time they were free and it was not very difficult for them to improve the listening ability. I began to gather all kinds of listening exercises, for high schools, colleges and universities, Band 4 and Band 6. Furthermore, some TOFEL exercises were also down loaded into my hard disk.
In the English-speaking country I read a lot of public signs, some expressions of which were out of my imagination. I began to write down or take photos of them, tried to understand what they said and arrange them into some categories. I had a dream of publishing a tool book comprising all kinds of public signs in English.
One day Li Song brought us to a used market run by a church, where a lot of things were contributed and sold to finance the church. I found a book, seeming not to have been read by anybody. The author finished writing it in 1998, and was published in 2000. Its cover said it was about how to control one’s blood sugar and one’s weight and how to protect one’s heart in an effective way, which I was taking care of. It cost me only two dollars and I began to read it carefully. Although it was about the medical and nutritional subject I read it and could understand its essentials. I had another dream of whether I could edit a nutritional English course.
Another thing I had done was that I read the information provided by the Australian official website about how to immigrate to Australia or to study in its colleges and universities. I had the confidence in my ability to help those who wanted to come to Australia to go through all the formalities necessary. I could even establish an agent to do such things.
All the things mentioned above were what I thought of in Australia when I stayed there for a whole year, which was quite ambitious.
After a careful consideration I believed I should make full use of the advantage I had and decided to press the scripts of the listening material to sell, equipped with audio mp3 files. The other things would be considered later.
Back to Fenghuayuan, I began to edit the scripts and mp3 files, contacted the printing factory and used my contribution fee to print the listening materials for High-School Entrance Examination, College Entrance Examination, Junior College Practical English Test and College English Test Band Four, each one printing 3000 copies and CET Band Six 1000 copies. In addition, in a desk printing factory, a bit of scripts of VOA and BBC were also printed. Furthermore, I spend some money, asking a student to establish a website, so that mp3 files could be uploaded for the convenience of the user’s downloading them. For the purpose of editing the audio files, I spent a lot of time studying the Cooledit program. As a result, I could convert the forms of the audio files, cut, insert or delete the part I wanted. It became very convenient to edit the digital audio files. In the past it used to be impossible to edit a cassette tape and now it became so convenient as to do whatever you wanted.
I began to market the listening materials. First I tried to sell online, then I asked the teachers to help me to promote among the students. I went to the front gate of the CUMT to distribute my website address to the students. I also contacted the teachers I was familiar with and persuaded them to use my materials in the whole class even in the whole grade. Among them, the scripts for the College Admission Test were sold the most, and the others were sold in a quite limited quantity. I was made tired and it seemed quite different than what I had thought and imagined. All the material books left stayed in the basement of my apartment until November 21, 2010 and were sold to the waste purchasing shop for only ￥2200, which were 1600 kg. Economically, I had gained nothing and also lost nothing, empty business. I laughed at myself. Writing, printing and selling books seemed like a high-jump match, ending in a failure, or I would still jump.
Let me call back the process of writing, printing and selling books. In 1994, Mr. Shihua Li and I began to write our first book “Dictionary of CEE English Words”, published in Jan. 1995, and the broker asked us to sell 3000 of them, forcing us to deal with selling trade, which lasted 13 years. In May of 2008, I got the last two funds of selling books and I was not able to sell any of them. I could not sell the books because the books for the students were overflowing and all the school reinforced the management. It became rather difficult to sell books through the teachers. In addition, I became older and older and had not enough energy and physical strength to print and sell them. I decided to give up. Just like the high jump game, it ended in failure. Only a complete failure could stop me from continuing to do it. Now I became a normal writer, only writing, not printing or selling books. All the things in the world would appear and disappear in the end. In order to hold a feast, a tent may extend to a thousand li, however the feat is sure to end. Printing books let me learn the program of Fangzheng Typesetting and selling books let me contact a lot of teachers and students and make some profits, supporting my family, my research work and tourism. Thanks to printing and selling books, I became a true author.
Sept 30 of 2011, in Xuzhou
Proofreading on March 30 of 2012 in Chicago
Second proofreading on Dec. 30 2018 in Fenghuayuan
Uploading on Aug. 8 of 2023 in Xuzhou
