Xiaoping Li

I arrived at my sister’s home in Waterloo on the evening of Dec. 23, 2010, with 3 days of change of clothes, planning to return to Toronto on Dec. 26th after spending the Christmas holidays with her family. On the morning of Dec. 24th, I felt that I would feel more comfortable in my own [...]

MacLean’s article titled “Too Asian” (http://www2.macleans.ca/2010/11/10/too-asian/) misses one important perspective. The reason that Asians and Whites seem to be “segregated” on the campuses of U of Toronto, U of Waterloo and U of British Columbia is not just that Asians don’t make effort to mingle with Whites as the article has implied. It is also [...]

Mid July.  It was the second last day of a seven-day rock climbing and mountaineering course in Jasper.  A couple of my classmates broached with me the idea of paying tips to our instructors.  I declined to participate.  Despite that I liked our instructors very much, learned a lot from them and appreciated their answering all the questions I [...]

A few years back I was chair of and actively organizedevents for the Toronto Tongzhi Club (TTC)– a Mandarin speaking gay men’s club in Toronto.  Many gay men from China met through this club.  Some of them developed long-term relationships.  Tonight I will attend a celebration event by a couple who have been together for 5 [...]

Police man Vu Pham was fatally shot by a retired politician Fred Preston on a rural road when Pham pulled over a truck driven by Preston.  When I first read the news and saw the picture of the Pham’s Asian face, a strange thought flashed in my head for a nanosecond: could it be possible that Pham had done to provoke Preston?   It turned [...]

When watching the Chinese women’s curling team and the Chinese pair figure skating team competing in the Winter Olympics, I realized that I cared more about them wining and less about Canadian teams’ wining.  This is probably because I felt that a Chinese win would help boost my positive image in public as people around [...]

John Tory, the leader of Ontario’s Conservative Party lost in a provincial by-election on March 5, 2009 as he attempted to win a seat in the Ontario legislature after he failed to win a seat in the 2007 provincial election.  He basically resigned from politics the next day.   Some people interpret his resignation as a failure.  He [...]

“All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players…” —- William Shakespear  And sometimes the players play in plays (films).  Here I have a video clip of me in a student film and another in a community theatre play. Two Scenes from Contrary Abettors   Scenes from Carnival (Act I) Scenes from Carnival [...]

I am preparing for a presentation to an audience of Chinese immigrants on the subject of “Master Your ESL Learning Journey for Life”.  My experience shows that socializing outside the Chinese immigrant community has helped improve my English greatly.   The biggest improvement I made in my English proficiency was during my first two and half years I studied at [...]

Certain types of bodies are naturally suited for certain sports.  So I have heard about a climber’s body, a swimmer’s body (like Michael Phelps’), etc.  But the truth is that you don’t have to have a certain type of body to be good at a certain sport. The Japanese women’s volleyball team beat the Soviet [...]