The Growing Up of a little girl

The Prologue

On a wintry day, somewhere on the earth, a baby girl was born. (of course there were thousands of babies every day!) It looked a bit like chocolate. With dark brown skin. A bit cute, huh? (who won't say so about a baby?) Everyone welcomed the birth of this little baby girl and imagined what it'd be like when it grew up...

Kindergarten <= I used to have a pair of pony tails

It's a stage which every child enjoys (maybe not for those whose parents ask/force them to learn a lot of things). Not much homework to do; no public exam; few worries (maybe the only worry is whether my mom will buy me a doll or snack!). As I remember, on that first schoolday of my life, I cried loudly in front of my classmates when my mom was leaving the classroom (how embarrassed I was, but of course I didn't know about it), and my schooldays of only playing with other children and learning the English alphabet began...

Primary School

I guess it's the most important stage for me, during which I learnt a lot of things and met my best friends, whom I still keep in touch with and meet from time to time (people always feel surprised when I tell them I still meet my primary school friends). And this is the only stage where students will put their hands up when the teacher asks them a question. (right?) Of course I don't remember what I learnt and it's not important. I only remember that at primary two I had to memorise that mathematical formula (Remember? Two multiplies three equals six; eight multiplies nine equals seventy-two... ) and I didn't know how this was good for me until when I grow up and find that I can work out easily the total amount of my purchase at the supermarket without a calculator. And, what's more important at this stage is, I started loving English since then...

My English was very poor and I couldn't tell the difference between simple present tense and past tense, until at primary five. It's my English teacher, Miss Chan, who changed my life. She told us to do many exercises about grammar, especially tenses. There was homework for English every day. Exercises and exercises. One after one. It seemed I could never finish those exercises. But my English did improve a lot. She taught me at primary five and six and she was one of the few teachers that I respect in my life (All the teachers that I respect and like are English teachers!). I can even say that my life would have been totally different without her...

Secondary School

The length of the secondary schooldays differs with everyone. Some are five years and some seven years. I was lucky to study at the same secondary school for seven years, during which lots of things happened to me. You could imagine that a secondary school student in HK usually spent a lot of their time on their studies. Homework, tests, school exams and public exams. All these could make your life difficult. I was no different from other students and I knew that my only job was to study hard. Why study hard? Because you have to get high marks in the exams. Why is it important to do well in the exams? Because you are told that you can find a good job in future. (it's not necessarily true, right?)

Are my schooldays at this stage only about studies? Of course not. I took part in many extra-curricular activities since form four. One of them was my solo English verse speaking at the Annual HK Schools Speech Festival. There were only me and another classmate of mine who took part in it. The title of the verse I spoke was "From the Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by S.T. I practised it every day and trained myself to speak aloud on the stage. That day came. My mind was blank while I was doing my solo speaking. I did my speaking successfully and I got a Certificate of Merit. It was not important whether I got an award or not; what's important instead was I summoned up my courage to do something new.

University

In Hong Kong

Maybe I had been tortured by those exams for too long and I was tired of rote learning. I was looking forward to my university study, hoping that my life and learning would be totally different from that in my secondary schooldays, and that's why I chose English as my major, which I thought was a subject for which I didn't have to jot down notes, memorise them and then I'd finish my studies without learning much... (to be continued...)

In the United Kingdom (Manchester)

I achieved my dream of studying abroad finally...

It was last updated on 12th Feb, 2002.

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