Bed of roses?

Ted asks:

Please explain “bed of roses” as in: “Life as a foreign student here is not a bed of roses.”

My comments:

Close your eyes and visualize a bed, king/queen-sized if you please, fully covered with rose petals.

Now, imagine the same bed, this time, full of twigs and thorns.

Naturally you prefer hanging onto that bed of roses. That picture is, well, a rosy picture, one that exudes peace, ease, comfort and, of course, happiness.

And when the foreign student says that life is not a bed of roses, he means to say that life here is not all smooth and easy, but with struggles and hardships – what with the language barrier, different food and culture shock in general.

Bon Jovi, I recall, sang a song of the same title (Bed of Roses) back in the 1990s in which he sings instead of a “bed of roses”, he sleeps in a “bed of nails”:

I want to lay you down in a bed of roses

For tonight I sleep on a bed of nails

I want to be just as close as the Holy Ghost is

And lay you down on a bed of roses

Bed of roses the phrase, by the way, was coined in the 16th century by Christopher Marlowe, a contemporary of William Shakespeare. In the poem Passionate Shepherd to His Love, Marlowe wrote:

And I will make thee beds of roses

And a thousand fragrant posies,

A cap of flowers, and a kirtle

Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle

Well, enjoy your bed of roses everyone. That is, enjoy them while they last because nature has a way to even thing out. And so, hang onto your bed of roses the best you can and avoid the “bed of nails” in the Bon Jovi song.

Here are two recent media examples:

1. Heat forward LeBron James candidly labeled Tuesday as “Hater Day.”

What started as playful response to critics turned into James receiving a racist Twitter message. James addressed it after Wednesday's practice, saying “it doesn't affect me at all.”

“I think Twitter is definitely somewhere you can reach out to your fans who don’t get an opportunity to see you on an everyday basis,” James said. “It’s not every day that I’m using things as motivation. It’s once in a blue moon when you need the world to see that no matter how many good things you do, you're always going to have people that [downgrade] what you do. You use it to get better every day.”

James started a Twitter account in July as a way to interact with fans. In three months, he gained more than 900,000 followers. His updates range from basketball-related items to concert pictures to videos of his son’s first day of school.

Then he sent out a “tweet” Wednesday claiming it was “Hater Day,” and expressed his love for doubters. One response prompted James to “retweet” so the rest of his followers could see. It used a racial slur and described him as “big nosed big lipped bug eyed.” It continued, “Ur greedy, u try to hide ur ghettoness.”

James, who will start Thursday’s game against Atlanta, said he relayed the message because he wanted others to notice what he and other celebrity athletes experience. Racist Twitter comments hurled at athletes have grown as the website gains popularity.

In March, an unnamed Seattle high school basketball player was the subject of threats after racist comments were posted on a fake Twitter account that purported to be his. Earlier this season, University of Miami football player Jacory Harris received a message that suggested the school would never win with a black quarterback.

“I just want you guys to sometimes see it also,” James said. “To see what type of words that are said toward me and toward us in general as professional athletes. It’s not always ... everybody thinks it is a bed of roses, but it’s really not. For me, I have enough motivation but it’s always good to have a little bit more.”

- Heat’s LeBron James responds to racist ‘tweet’, Sun Sentinel, October 21, 2010.

2. Academic and author of a new book Dr Edwina Pio says many New Zealanders think immigrants long to stay in Godzone but this simply isn’t the case.

“It’s not all a bed of roses living in New Zealand. Immigrants face huge challenges around gaining equal access to employment, and are finding that their friends and family are not excelling with the world’s elite achievers.”

Dr Pio adds that while New Zealand is a very generous country, New Zealanders continue to be startled by migrants, particularly those who look, speak and behave differently.

“While New Zealand provides many wonderful opportunities for migrants,” she says, “the best of the best cannot achieve their full potential here.”

The AUT University Associate Professor of Management’s book ‘Longing & Belonging’ will be launched tomorrow on Race Relations Day at Te Papa in Wellington.

- New Zealand ‘Not A Bed Of Roses For Immigrants’, Scoop.co.nz, March 21, 2010.

About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.