By Jessie Su
And it’s not Santa Claus either, in case you’ve only laid eyes on the title and haven’t had the time to take in all the lovely graphics surrounding this article. Yet it’s the same thing that brought the universal image of the chubby “Ho-ho-ho” fella to the world. At 117 years old this genuine American emblem has made itself known to an astonishing 98% of the people on Earth. For what could better represent the U.S. of A. with its patriotic colors—Coca-Cola? A Star is Born The birth of this legend, like many others, was unintended, for it just popped out of midair, according to its creator, Dr. John Pemberton. Well, what’s for sure is that it certainly popped—out of a three-legged pot in the doctor’s backyard, anyway. It was the period when soda water was a national sensation in the U.S. Other than that, people tended to take medicine (no, not drugs, medicine—like aspirin pills and such) frequently. In search of a headache painkiller, the doctor tinkered around with medicinal products at home and, to his surprise, stirred up a caramel-colored liquid with a wondrous taste. He brought it several streets down to the neighborhood pharmacy, where it was mixed with carbonated water and given to customers to sample. Indeed, they had never tasted anything like it. The rest, as they say, is history. They gave it a name, put it on the shelf, and the existence of this new creation soon spread across the city of Atlanta. But that wasn’t all—the extraordinary formula came into the good hands of natural-born salesman Asa Candler, who, upon first savor, said abruptly: “This is something the whole world should get a taste of.” He turned the invention into a business across the nation by literally making everybody see Coca-Cola everywhere, and later the next company president, Robert Woodruff, promoted it to extend globally. Today, Coca-Cola is enjoyed in nearly 200 countries worldwide. What’s in a Name? If you ask a Coke addict how the name of “Coca-Cola” came about, you might hear: “Oh well it’s got cocaine in it.” Surely people would be rather appalled at this (wouldn’t you, if you realized for the first time in your life what you’ve been gulping down with your hamburger and fries is actually an illegal drug?). But have no fear—the real scoop is that Dr. Pemberton’s bookkeeper, Frank Robinson, had been inspired by two of the ingredients in the formula. So, he came up with “Coca” for cocaine leaf and “Kola” for an African fruit. All he did, really, was to replace the K with a C and draw a dash between the two words, and voila!—the world’s greatest soft drink had a name. And you thought there was a fascinating story behind it; pretty disappointing, huh? Coke and You! Don’t you think Coca-Cola’s Chinese name—"delicious and have fun"—coincidentally matches the objective of the drink? On the Coca-Cola official website, people from all over the world have left messages on the company guestbook describing their special “rencontres” (French for encounters) with the drink and how it has made a certain moment in their lives special. There are romances, military stories, family reunions, childhood memories, get-togethers with friends, advertisement funnies, and much more. For Americans abroad, Coca-Cola served as the one means of communication between them and foreigners—since it was probably the only thing on earth that they all knew. One guy wrote that when he was little, he used to hate school, and that his dad had to use Coca-Cola to bribe him into going to school. Another guy used “Hey, I see you’re drinking Coca-Cola, I like it, too” as a pick-up line. Just for the fun of it, I did a little market research and asked around randomly for impressions of Coca-Cola, and here are some of my results: “It makes me burp” “Gotta have it!” “The bottle is a classic!” “The world’s most valuable brand—worth $80,000,000,000 U.S. Dollars!” “Vanilla Coke is yucky” “Dig it with pizza!” “Bubbles, bubbles, bubbles” “For washing toilets; sorry, but its acidity is way too strong” “Individuality” “I like Hey-Song better” “The symbol of American imperialism” “Can’t stay for more than 30 seconds in the mouth” “Coca-Cola?…I think, it defines American culture…even more influential than Michael Jackson; it’s America in a bottle.” The replies I got were indeed polarizing. Yet we have all been more or less Americanized in our wearing jeans, drinking coffee, playing basketball and such, and out of all these things that represent Americanism, Coca-Cola best reflects the liberating and dynamic impression that Americans have branded upon their culture. Despite the fact that the drink’s content and its taste have induced some good and bad sentiment among people, it is nevertheless undeniable that Coca-Cola continues to appeal to the world as the American image. Bottoms up!
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By Christine Chang
7:03 p.m., July 24th, New York City. Loitering around the jukebox in an Irish bar, I whispered anxiously into a woman’s ear, “Are you with the mob?” She answered me with a knowing nod and a nervous giggle. By 7:05, a man was surreptitiously handing out instruction leaflets. When I read it I turned to the woman again and asked, “Are you sure we’re gonna do that?” I had read about flash mobs before my trip to New York. It’s a gathering of strangers who simultaneously partake in a silly and harmless activity for a short time and then quickly disperse. Meetings are arranged via web sites and e-mail, and the designated prank is explained in detailed handouts, distributed on location. The very first flash mob took place in June 2003, when over 100 people assembled in the home furnishings department of Macy’s department store in New York. As instructed, the participants claimed that they all lived in a warehouse together and consulted the bemused sales assistants about purchasing a “love rug” to play on. I just couldn’t imagine what it would be like to take part in this kind of “trick-and-run”; so when I got an e-mail invitation that said, “You are invited to take part in MOB, the project that creates an inexplicable mob of people in New York City for ten minutes or less,” I decided to give it a try. 7:15: by now there were about 300 people gathered on a grassy knoll in Central Park, all waiting excitedly and at the same time trying to act as casual as possible. Our prank began at 7:18 pm precisely, when a man standing beside me started to do what the script instructed–making birdcalls. At first there were only faint calls, but within two seconds the park was full of boisterous birdcalls. Pedestrians stopped to see what was going on, shopkeepers ran out of their stores in amazement. After a minute the birdcalls were replaced by the chanting of our slogan, “Nature here! Come get some nature.” Before I could figure out whether it was really fun or really dumb, everyone shouted “Nature” one last time, cheered, and dispersed. And our many witnesses, or should I say our audience, burst into applause. The flash mob project became the subject of heated discussion and spread like wildfire. Later that June in New York, a huge crowd of people rushed into a Toys ‘R’ Us store, stared at a giant artificial dinosaur for three minutes, then fell to their knees and moaned and cowered for another four minutes. In Tampa, hundreds of customers suddenly formed a line in the food court of the International Plaza shopping center, quacked like ducks, and trooped toward the down escalator. In Brazil, flash mobsters took off their shoes and hit the surface of a main street. Says the phenomenon’s creator Bill, who sent the first e-mail to form a flash mob, when interviewed by CNN: “It’s a spectacle for spectacle’s sake. People feel like there’s nothing but order everywhere, and so they love to be a part of just one thing that nobody was expecting.” That’s very true. Surely no one, not the passersby, not the shopkeepers, not even me myself, would have expected to see people making birdcalls in Central Park–until we made it happen. It was incredible. I had done something totally out of the ordinary, something I would otherwise never have done, and I enjoyed it. It’s not that I’ve always wanted to be a bird, but allowing myself to relax and participate in a harmless, funny, even silly activity with a huge crowd of strangers somehow made me feel better, and allowed me to blow off some steam. Three weeks after I came back to Taiwan, I could still remember the look of joy on people’s faces. Having fun in a flash became one of the most interesting memories of my summer trip. However, when I saw on TV the two initial flash mob gatherings in Taipei, I realized that the flash mob here would fail. The first one happened when less than 20 people shouted shyly, “We’re heading back to Mars!” in front of a department store, and the other one was carried out by a couple of young men, who wore paper bags on their heads when taking the MRT. The event ended up with the young men being dragged out of the station by security guards before they actually did anything. Far from the original idea of “an unexpected nature and lack of apparent agenda,” the local media already knew about the activity, waited, and were able to interview some of the pranksters, even though flash mobsters are not supposed to be identified. Perhaps people in Taiwan are still too shy to act freely so as to form a real flash mob, perhaps the leaders of flash mobbing are not creative enough to cook up any appealing plans, or perhaps the rooted concept of regularity makes people regard flash mobbing as insane behavior. In any case, flash mobs here are just a three-minutes-of-fame fad that will never succeed. Flash mobs are also faring poorly on the international front. For even as the mobsters continue to amuse and bewilder people all over the world, more and more voices are warning that all mobs have the potential for danger, and could easily become politicized. The current debate is whether a mass of people standing out from the crowd is a form of performance art or a new social movement; the common fear is that flash mobs might be twisted into some kind of anti-social riot. Already, the over-zealous media and over-reactions from the police have forced some flash mob gatherings to be cancelled. It seems that this phenomenon may soon die out in the same fashion it was born—all in a flash. By Sabrina Wu
Case no.1: Lily has been dating Marco for twenty months. They live in buildings that are two blocks away from each other, and Marco used to call Lily every single day to tell her how he wished all the buildings between their windows could disappear so that he wouldn’t miss one moment of seeing her. Now, after twenty months, Marco has another wish. All Marco wants now is that Lily give him some space, rather, a break so that he could watch an NBA game and enjoy KFC at home, by himself. Case no.2: When Paul started his relationship with Mandy, his girlfriend, he told Mandy that her short haircut made her unique and the most lovely girl in the world. However, apparently Paul has changed his viewpoint after fifteen months. When they walk on the street now, Paul casts his eyes on the sexy girls with their long hair swinging and complains to Mandy, “Why do you make me feel I’m dating another boy? Can’t you be a woman sometimes?” Such cases happen around us everyday, everywhere. What has happened to these relationships? What makes people lose their passion when their relationship has lasted for a certain time? Can we find a logical explanation for the sudden disappearance of passion? If Love is something more than an abstract feeling, have you ever thought about what it might be? Well, according to a series of studies on the human brain, scientists have proved that when people fall in love, it is chemistry that actually evokes all the love emotions: dopamine, a kind of endocrine secreted by the brain. This chemical reaction produces human beings’ sexual desire, and the intensity is in proportion to the amount secreted. In other words, if Love is really something more than an abstract idea, it would be a chemical substance. Chemistry and love? That doesn’t sound romantic at all! However, it gets even worse, since this chemistry called Love dies away after around two years. How should we react to this kind of scientific study? Does it mean that when people tell you that they will love you forever they are lying? Does it mean we shouldn’t believe in love and give out our hearts anymore because, according to these scientists, being in a relationship simply means waiting for the day it dies? What’s the point of being in love anyway? Well, some couples’ passion might transcend into habits, feelings of responsibility, and so on, and these couples can still stay together for their whole lives. So my suggestion would be: How about just seizing the day in love and enjoying your relationships? We don’t really need to worry about the “two-year itch,” as if it were true to say “You cross it, you die!” Love is bittersweet itself, and to enjoy all the emotions such as jealousy, the expectation of seeing each other again, the forgiving kisses after fighting, these are the most fascinating part of being in love. All we need to do, or rather, all we CAN do is to do something to make it last, before it disappears. |
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May 2024
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