your life flashes before your eyes

As you do this meme, realising how much time you've wasted reading all these manga.

And then you realise how much time you've wasted doing this meme.

And then you go to sleep.

(I'm so shocked Yuki Kaori didn't even appear in the first 100. What have you been doing, Yuki Kaori fans?!)

( The what-have-you-read manga meme )

So many of them where I've only read one chapter.....

So many of them where I know the title because it's so familiar but can't remember if I've actually tried it or not.....

So many of them with unrecognisable titles because I've read too many in Chinese Orz....

........And yet, so many manga I've read that's not on the list Orz................ (SOMEONE PLEASE ADD SAIYUKI T______T)

This is a ridiculously shoujo-oriented list =___=

a true story

"I practise Chinese medicine here in Australia," she begins in her soft voice.

It was a voice unused to speaking before an audience, and the vulnerability only made it more sincere.

"My mother never knew her father. He was charged as an anti-revolutionary during the cultural revolution and died in jail."

"Because of this relationship, she was met with resistance everywhere she went in life."

"For a long time, she wasn't interested in living; at the same time, she wanted to escape overseas, where it was a world of freedom."

"She wanted to go to Shanghai. It was a two hour train ride, but it took her decades to get there. It took her that long to shake off the past."

"She was strict with her children. She wanted us to achieve well, so we can go overseas, to go live in a democratic country and not have the same memories as her."

"She was so happy when I came to Australia. Later, she was able to go to Hong Kong."

"When the 9 commentaries on the Chinese Communist Party came out, she rang me and said she wanted to go back to Shanghai."

"I tried to talk her out of it. Hong Kong is safer. But she said solemnly, 'no, I am going to Shanghai. My duty lies there.' She has never used the word 'duty' with me before, and at that point I knew it was useless to stop her."

"In 2006, she was arrested," her voice cracks suddenly. The next few words are more forceful as she struggles to resume calmness, "For several months, we heard no news from her."

"Then in February this year, we were told she was charged because of possessing nearly 200 Falun Gong pamphlets and 9 Commentaries."

"They allowed our lawyer to see her only twice, and neither times could any discussion of the case be done. The lawyer was only allowed to see the case files 3 days before it went to trial."

"When other family members saw Mum in court, she had aged several years," her voice tears again, and she pauses, but her voice continues to tremble with suppressed grief when she speaks again, "But what distressed them most was that she was not allowed to wear her glasses."

"Without her glasses, she could not even walk straight," she says, on the brink of weeping.

There was a short silence, and when she resumes, she is calmer.

"To the court, she said 'what has become of a society that would charge an innocent, someone who tries to be a good person? What sort of law can exist? Please listen to your conscience.'"

In a low voice, she muses, "But where is the conscience? She was sentenced to three years jail."

"Within the first week, she was rushed to hospital with a blood pressure elevated to 210 over 110."

"I was shocked. You could easily die at that blood pressure. For one whole week, I rang the jail continuously to ask about her situation, but the warden refused to say anything."

"A week later, the warden played a recorded message at my call. It was a screeching female voice making derogatory remarks about Falun Gong. I abruptly understood why Mum got sick."

"Since then, my relatives have only seen Mum once. In the entire jail visit, she only said one sentence. 'I have been sitting there'."

"I knew. She couldn't lie. But she didn't want to say more."

"Sometimes I feel that she has gone through too much. At almost sixty, she's been imprisoned for something that has no justification. She gave up the chance to realise her lifelong dream of living overseas, just so she could go back to China and tell her fellow Chinese people what is going on."

Her voice disappears into a torn whisper, "And yet, I am proud of her, of her courageous choice."


(From a forum on "Rescuing Wang Zhi Wen", another Falun Gong practitioner who has been imprisoned for 8 years.)