許清曉(Clement C.S.Hsu, MD): 自言自語錄 Monologues

筆者2013年一月出版的 "微生物學史--開天闢地的醫學拓荒者" (微生物學史介紹 http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/ccshsu-clement/article?mid=10110&prev=10767&next=10078)，已經有修訂版。這一版比初版，除了有些錯誤的修改，還多了三位學者的傳記，以及十位朋友的簡短推薦序文及書評，印在書背或是內封的背面，如下。希望這些書評會讓要評估這本書的人，比較容易看出書的好處。這本書不是一般的教科書，而是有很多歐美歷史故事的傳記集、短篇小說集。相信讀者不會失望。

2013年4月26日星期五

Boston Marathon Bombers and inescapable(?) human nature

When we see those Boston
Marathon Bombers, we start to wonder how could there be such a deviation in human minds
and behaviours. Those young men who committed the evil act (2 bombs resulting in 3 dead, near 200 injured, and about 10 amputations) had loving and
caring parents. They are not from broken families with psychological problems
during their childhood. They are the product of human hatreds out of religious
fanaticism.

I kept wondering what is the
religious fanaticism, the definition. Most of us are part of a religion. People
who believe in their own form of "god", may feel that they believe in
"true god", and most may feel that theirs is superior to other
"gods". And here comes the difference. Most will keep the feeling to
themselves, because the religion is to heal one's own soul. There should not be
any comparisons with others. Why should you care? However, some will be more
vocal: loud chanting, persuasion of others that "you have been mistaken",
"repent and believe in our god", start calling others infidels,
pagan, or scoff with disdain, perhaps out of some feeling of inferiority deep
inside their own minds. And, the religious extremism is the kind that put the
religious superiority into action and devote their lives to these actions,
hurting the other's soul or body.

Christian crudades in the past
continues into Islamic Jihad's terrorism in recent decades, the latter
probably mixed with some feelings out of jealousy of the Western prosperity, I
believe. Religious persecution has been going on for centuries in history.
Development of medicine has been hampered for more than 13-15 centuries because
of it. And behind all those religious superiority, there is the human ambition.
All religious leaders are humans and have the human instinct "to be better
than others", obviously or insidiously, consciously or unconsciously. As
long as we are human, we cannot escape from this "survival of the
fittest" instinct that came with the creation of the individualized life form.

However, there is still hope. We
have seen the amazing, heart-warming social advance during our lives. We saw
flagrant racial and sexual discrimination, and the discrimanation of the
physically handicapped, before 1960's, gradually disappear. The sympathy for the poor
and those stricken by natural disasters has been put into active
assistance by many organizations around the world. Though equality is not
universal yet, but it will be, sooner than we think because of the advance in
communicaiton technologies.

My classmate, dentist Johanna, has been working as a missionary in the underdeveloped part of Northen China for decades, soon after the passing of her husband, our classmate Francis. She is one of the best models of unending human endeavor to do good for fellow human beings! Hope for the future!

While we feel happy to be in the most advanced society in the world, we should help to eliminate this inequality in the world, bigotry of religion, as much as we can and as soon as possible.

To talk of models, here are the
Korean models competing to be a Miss Korea. Look at their pictures. You would
think they are from identical twins. Just cannot tell who is who. Though I feel
regret that they have lost their individuality, I can understand those ladies's
wish to have facial reconstrustion, which is so advanced in Korea. Which young
women do not want to look beautiful?

That is also a human nature.

2013年3月17日星期日

Desert Willow around Tom Muehlenbeck Recreation Center---休閒中心停車場的沙漠花柳

(Difficult to focus in the wind!)

In April of 2012, over the
parking area of the Tom Muehlenbeck Recreation Center where I go to swim every
week for the past 6 months, there are about 40-50 small trees with many
clusters of pale pink flowers. The
flowers, like many others that I have noted on the side of the suburban
city of Plano, are very exquisitely designed by nature.

These trees and flowers
on the parking lot, although all look alike, narrow leaves, trumpet-shaped
flower trunk, and ruffled flower petals, there appear to have two slightly
different kinds: one has paler flowers with broader leaves, and the other more
pinkish or reddish purplish flowers with narrower leaves. I started to notice them when they bloomed in
April and May, and took some pictures of them with my iPhone camera.

I inquired the Rec Center
personnel the name of the trees. They
called some office right away and gave me the name. It is called “Desert Willow”. From there I got more information via google.

This short tree is called Desert
Willow because it is heat tolerant, required little water, and the leaves shaped
like those of willows (Salix spp.). It
is also called Flowering Willow. Chilopsis linearis is the scientific name. It
is heat and drought tolerant, and is spread around Southwest US. It is also
considered Texas native flowers. It is a favorite kind of tree for public
places because of its ease to care. It can be pruned to make any shape or size
(I doubt it can become a tiny bonsai).

The paler and slightly larger
flowers should be a hybrid between Chilopsis linearis and Catalpa bignonioides,
called Chitalpa tashkentensis, or Morning Cloud (a somewhat different colored
ones is called Pink Dawn.) Pretty names. (The name Chitalpa is also the hybrid
of Chilopsis and Catalpa)

But it seems some experts do not
seem to think Chitalpa and Chilopsis are different. U of Texas, Austin website
showed the Chitalpa picture as the Chilopsis linearis, the leaves of which is
much wider than the willow that I attached earlier.

The flowers persisted through the
fall, though the number became less and less.
Finally, in January, leaves are all gone. This reminds me of human life. Stronger ones
live longer. However, though we took it granted and never gave it a second thought, amazingly, the same trees
will come back to life again only after a few months of rest.

Oh, how man wishes to have plant's vitality,

reborn to the world anew after only a brief sleep

bustling with spirit and beauty,

waving and singing,

dancing in the wind, that spreads the seeds,

of life and hope, joy and felicity!!

前年的秋天開始到德州Plano社區休閒中心 (Tom Muehlenbeck Recreation
Center) 游泳。起初幾個月車子開進露天停車場，一下車就走進建築內去了。但是過了半年的四月，注意到這個露天停車場，種植了四、五十株的矮樹，每一株都開滿了花。仔細一看，是很艷麗紫色或粉紅色喇叭型波狀皺邊的花，樹葉是窄長型的，像是柳樹。尤其是紫色花，特別有吸引力，只不知道是甚麼花樹。心中好奇，不知道這種花樹的名字叫做甚麼。想到這種樹應該是Plano市政府集體重植的，應該可以請休閒中心櫃檯人員向市政府負責人員查詢。他們立即拿起電話替我查詢，到我游泳完畢時，就有了答案。

這種矮樹叫做Desert
Willow (沙漠柳)，因為葉的形狀像是柳樹葉，又叫做Flowering
Willow。Google一查，它的學名叫做Chilopsis
linealis，是在美國西南方雨量少的地帶生長的落葉花樹，如果年雨量超過十英吋，就要種植在高處。它的高度不會超出五米左右，寬度也是是差不多。因為耐熱，又容易修整，不需要多少功夫照護就能生長，所以是Dallas地區公共場所常見。

(風中搖曳的花很難對準焦距)

(手機照的，相片需要旋轉90度，但轉不過來!!)

仔細看，花樹有兩種，一種開的是比較紫色、紫紅色，花朵較小的，樹葉比較窄長；另外一種是花朵較大，顏色比較淡的。查了Google資料，得知Chilopsis linealis還會和另一種Catalpa bignonioides混種，成為Chitalpa tashkentensis，又叫做Morning Cloud “晨雲”，呈稍微不同顏色，又叫做 Pink Dusk “粉紅的黎明”，好美麗的名字! 從google images看來，停車場裡比較大、比較淡色的花樹，應該就是Chitalpa tashkentensis。不過我從各個學校網站的花，越看越不清楚哪是哪。只能確定的是紫色、紅紫色的叫做Chilopsis linealis。

(February, 2013)

雖然是落葉樹(deciduous tree)，經過春天、夏天、秋天，這些花一直撐著，到十一、十二月，還有一些殘留。到一月就只剩下樹枝。不禁想到這些花樹的開花週期，似乎是一個人生。強韌的，可能開得久一點，有更長久的傳播花粉的機會。

和人不一樣的是，這些樹到了四、五月又將是一顆新樹，又會長出使人心醉的紫色、紅紫色花朵。像是對我們大聲叫喊， “你們看，我只過四個月休眠，現在又是一條好漢!”

The parking lot. You have to tilt your head!

Chilopsis linealis

Morning Cloud = Chitalpa tashkrntensis; 又一種則稱為 Pink Dusk

Chilopsis linealis

2013年3月13日星期三

NTUMC-1963屆畢業五十周年紀念冊感言

親眼見証了共產主義消失、專制政權垮台、台灣民主化、人群遷徙；驚見legionnaire’s disease、MRSA、HIV epidemic、SARS等的出現；又感受到傳真、電子郵件、無線網路、數位影像、smartphones等科技改善生活品質，在我們這一代，半世紀來所發生的，自然的以及人為的社會演變及進化，和過去二十幾世紀的人類歷史比較，直令人感到震撼。

以後的進展將會是甚麼???

敬祈各位同學維持身體健康、每天快樂過日子!!

許清曉

2012年12月11日星期二

Stanford University campus tour with Ongko on 2012-12-09

We held FAPA Board meeting at SanJose this year, from 2012/12/07-2012/12/09.

The last day, after the meeting was over, Ongko, who lives nearby, took me to Stanford University campus, and then had a Peking duck dinner. The campus was beautiful, particularly the chapel was magnificent. At the campus students' cafe, we sipped coffee and chat for a long time. We never held these talks before. It is strange that we got acquainted this well 48 years after the graduation.

The photos uploaded here are not in the order of its time sequence. But the time is printed on the photos.

The publisher of Pacific Times, 林文政

李青泰夫婦， our two years junior

張清吉used to work at 公共衛生示範中心 in 1962-1963。 He recognized me that I worked there on El Tor Vibrio cholera

Ongko couple, Wen-ping couple, and his elder son with his wife

Wen-pin couple were awarded twice for their most generous donation to FAPA. The amount was the second largest that I know of.