Inspiration

It has been quiet for recent few days as the orientation week is going to the end. New students start preparing their new lives in a new environment. In this period, I love to spare some time to reflect on what my teachers of the English bridging course have done to their classes and write something about them, as I am really inspired by the values they spread.

I am really impressed by one of them. In her class, she not only taught about useful academic English skills, but also lead students to think about what life is, and even asked students to read out aloud "Life is hard, pressure is everywhere", which make me recall some memories of studying as a children, since it is similar to the way how primary Chinese teachers help children to learn some basic knowledge by heart.

Some experiences she has are very hearten, making me change the view of time management. Nobody in class realised she wasn't born in English speaking country until she revealed that her age of 19 is when she immigrated from an eastern European country and started learning English from nothing. The most surprised thing is she only spent 3 years to master advanced English, and she has been qualified enough for teaching English for years. The answer to how she could archive that is hard working. During the period, she was working in factory, while taking evening English class and doing English practice exercises on weekend. It means there is no spare time for recreation. I asked why she could do that without feeling boring and with a large amount of depressions. The reply is that she enjoyed it as that's life, nothing is worth complaining, and why not just try to love it.

Yes, it's truly a "bridging" course before enrolling into the course of my major. Tomorrow is the beginning of 1st semester 2008, and I really want to have a hard try on study and see how far I will be able to go, instead of doing things like watching TV and movie, this kind of time costly things.

Friendly Australian

I've been Australia for 3 months, experiencing various interesting things, which make me really think about the differences between a developed country and developing country. From the beginning to now, the most impressive thing to me is always the friendliness of Australian people. Sometimes, they are so friendly that made me worried about whether they planned to trap me, as before coming to Australia I didn't face a stranger in a unknown place who is so kind of willing to drive me home when I just wanted to have an ask for a direction, didn't make a friend on the first day who could tolerate my poor English and took me to the city and show me around some interesting places.

I can't understand why they are willing to do this except for the reason that they really love just doing a favor for someone else who need it and make a little bit contribution to their society.