Ands

A little bit of books, languages, songs, and some other stuff I love.

[onepolyglotwannabe]

Self introduction time!!

Click here.

[j-exploring-his-own-world]

Day 8: Chinese New Year

I recently learned that you cannot clean the house on Chinese New Year, because if you do, you will be cleaning away your good luck.

It's okay to clean it on Chinese New Year's Eve. It means that you're cleaning away your bad luck and having a fresh start.

Also, it is prohibited to take out the trash, wash your hair, or wash your clothes, but if you really need to clean something, it's okay to do it as long as you don't take it out. It should remain inside the house.

All of these rules only apply for the first day, you can go back to your daily routine from the second day and onward.

My mom told me that you don't need to strictly follow these rules, just don't clean your house and don't take out the trash and you'll be fine.

Happy Chinese New Year to everyone!

[elexuscal]

"it's concerning if university students are genuinely struggling to read full adult-level books for class" and "don't overstate the reporting of a single news article" and "if this shift is genuinely real, it's reflective of broad curriculum changes in lower education levels, probably at least in part due to remote schooling during COVID, and doesn't mean the new generation is being willfully Stupid and Vapid" and "when reading for personal pleasure people should read whatever they like without shame" and "reading from a broad variety of genres, styles, and authorial backgrounds will improve your understanding of both literature and the real world" and "actively mocking people for their tastes in books does not encourage them to become more adventurous you're just being mean" and also "but seriously adult books are not just boringly pretentious nothingburgers padded with pointless sex scenes, and claiming they are just shows how little you've read" all can and should co-exist.

[rosegardeninwinter]

“I hate the way The Hunger Games ended with Katniss forced into a typical domestic life … she shouldn’t have ended up with Peeta … it would have been more feminist if she didn’t end up with anybody”

like okay President Snow I didn’t know you were active on social media

[onepolyglotwannabe]

THIS OMG DID WE READ THE SAME ORIGINAL TRILOGY??? Katniss wanted nothing but a peaceful world -for Peeta’s children to grow up (lol and who married that cutie patootie?- in which all children could feel safe and sound. She never wanted to bring children into a world of chaos, fear, misery and violence. And so she got to be a mom -and not one who would lose herself but one who would work into her trauma- in this safer world she somehow helped create.

Isn’t that the most feminist thing to do? To choose to want to do something you only didn’t desire before because of the lack of choices you truly had? So you made your own path to be able to make a choice?

[runawaymarbles]

Reading Mockingjay as an adult is extra devastating because. Of course the plucky teenager and her ragtag friends aren't going to sneak into a government building to kill the president with a bow and arrow. That's absolutely ridiculous. It's the kind of thing that's only possible in the kind of propaganda that Coin developed. But she's so good at it that in some ways she tricks the reader into thinking that's the kind of story this is, too--even after 3 books reminding us that pretty much everything that Katniss does the second she volunteers is manipulated by adults pulling strings to make propaganda in some form or another.

[batcavescolony]

Katniss is such an unreliable narrator. She says "Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me" girl you deliver strawberries to the Mayor, you hunt and trade for the district, when you fell at Prim being chosen someone caught you, when you went to Prim people parted for you, when you volunteered EVERYONE stopped. Idk how to tell you but I think you're a pillar of the community.

[theflowerunderthewillow]

Katniss loves getting old.

When the first strands of gray begin to appear on her head and decorate her hair with - what to Katniss - looks like silver threads. When the wrinkles form in her eyes on her cheeks and she realizes they are from all the smiles she has given over the last decade.

She begins to truly find herself beautiful, for the first time. Well, she always thought she's average. But today she feels satisfaction every time she looks in the mirror.

There were few she could know who had the privilege of growing old. She is one of those lucky ones. She doesn't feel completely worthy, but she's happy. Especially seeing her love grow old alongside her.

Peeta's blond hair masks the gray, but Katniss can see the slight change from gold to silver.

What really show his age are the freckles. When his skin thins with age, it becomes covered with brown spots on his nose and cheeks. Along with the white beard, he looks just like his father.

Katniss thinks he's so beautiful.

How lucky they are to see themselves weak, wrinkled and old in the mirror. When fate tried to kill them before their time and freeze their childish faces in death.

So every knee pain, every gray hair, every birthday is proof that life can improve.

[oheart]

I'm starting to believe that Suzanne Collins will keep writing hunger games books until every last person on earth understands what she was trying to say with the original series

[theswampghost]

sometimes i’m normal about the hunger games and then i remember that in district 12 there’s a wedding ceremony where the couple toasts a piece of bread together in order to signify the beginning of their shared new life and then the main character and her love interest are the girl on fire and the boy with the bread and their first fucking interaction is when he burns a loaf of bread to give to her

[danyllura]

Peeta Mellark is the type of person to follow a grieving girl to her broken home and plant a garden. But people forget Katniss is also the type to sing a lullaby to a dying girl and lay her in a bed of flowers. Despite being subjected to the cruellest games, they’re two kids who continue to be kind and choose love. Not everyone could find light and love atop a graveyard in a meadow, and that is why Katniss and Peeta have always deserved each other. 

[thedelicatearcher]

i love when on catching fire after katniss' leg injury, she spends days with peeta working on the herbal book. and now i can't stop thinking about an alternate universe where katniss is a writer and peeta is her illustrator

[cinnabrooks-deactivated20240929]

plutarch: hey, katniss! look at this really cool watch with the mockingjay design you JUST said was made popular due to YOUR pin from the games! the one that's being used as a symbol of rebellion? pretty cool right? gotta keep it secret though, just between us ok? wouldn't want everyone here at this CAPITOL PARTY to see, yeah? anyways, i have to go to a secret meeting now.

katniss: how strange... he must not want anyone to steal that design and make a cheaper one... ugh, all capitol people are the same-

[onepolyglotwannabe]

This is so funny because I’m rereading Catching Fire and I just happened to read this specific part and omg my girlie can be such and overthinker and analyze everything too much but sometimes she does The Simple Thinking and underestimates Capitol people.

[onepolyglotwannabe]

So I’m rereading THG and I’ve never been so slow at rereading something because I’m writing a thousand word annotations (hyperbole) and it’s all thanks to the kindle I bought.

I guess I’m an e-reader girlie now. Also, yes, my first choice was The Hunger Games. Which means I’ll have plenty of opinions.

[theswampghost]

sometimes i’m normal about the hunger games and then i remember that in district 12 there’s a wedding ceremony where the couple toasts a piece of bread together in order to signify the beginning of their shared new life and then the main character and her love interest are the girl on fire and the boy with the bread and their first fucking interaction is when he burns a loaf of bread to give to her

[vesteneris]

Guys I don't think they are talking about the same bodycounts

[disgurrr]

When Katniss says “I know this would have happened anyway…what I need is the dandelion in the spring,” do you think this is her admitting that she was crushing on Peeta before the games? Like why do you think she specifically uses ‘dandelion in the spring’? The one connection they had before the games.

To me, she was able to sort out her feelings for Peeta, even the ones before the games. like not only is she saying why she had fallen for Peeta, why she needs him, but she's going “Yeah I felt something before the games.” like not romantic love, but something. Or am I just thinking too much of it, and I'm going off the rails LOL thoughts?

[onepolyglotwannabe]

I love this because it gives a taste of how dystopian societies, war and crisis develop within a person like Katniss, who puts herself as the breadwinner of her family. This young teenager grows thinking she can never have children in this horrible world, so any emotion -and I put emphasis on emotion- that suggests any life like that is brushed aside, even if it’s a silly little crush, because she has to focus on being a provider, not on being a girl or a teen. She has to think about surviving, and so all her thoughts are on that.

And then she ends up in the epitome of horror in a messed up society -the games- with this boy who is nothing but everything sweet and honest and how can she not want to save him too after he saved her all those years ago, right? But no, Katniss, you were a girl, too, with silly little crushes. Your society is just too much of a nightmare and a burden for you to have time to think about it.

[onepolyglotwannabe]

It has come to me that, although I am one of the many people who were changed and radicalized because of The Hunger Games as the book series explored the many sides of society and capitalism, I am also one of the many people who giggles every time there is a cute take on Katniss and Peeta’s relationship.

And, to me, that’s girlhood and womanhood.