My One-year Leadership Journey in HC

If the studying in HC is like a journey as titled, then we have been on our trip for almost one year already. What we not only have experienced here is not just gathering together to learn what leaders are and how to become leaders, even though it is what is written in the official introduction of the UM Honors College, but also have obtained the specific meaning personally, I believe. When this journey just started, we are almost all strangers to each other. As time goes on, we get to know each other, have laughter and tears together and help each other to achieve what seems too hard to be achieved for us. For me, I always have this habit of imaging that I were really old already, and thinking “What have done in my whole life up till now?” I would love to say, there can’t be anything more amazing than this journey. This journey for me is a beautiful view itself. Thank you guys so much for being around me and keep me company to witness all this.

I want to make this opening with some words in my heart. I have been looking back to think about this two years in the University of Macau. What I figured out is pretty overwhelming for me. This semester my academic grade is the worst out of the four I had. I know that I did not work very hard this semester and I could have been doing better. But actually I could not. Before Year 2, I throw myself into the course work of EEE. I spent my leisure time in computer games and stuff and sometimes go out to watch some movies or something, and labeled myself as an “excellent” student with great proud of myself. The pictures of me being angry about myself just because of failing to be the best in some of the tests is still clear in mind. I dislike communicating with the people I am not familiar with or have nothing common in my mind with me, like a lone wolf walking in the campus. The stable steps of this kind of life style stuck and there is no motivation for me to make a difference. I once was confident to believe that I was living a more meaningful life than people around me. I got great grades, and somehow was called a “legend of FST”. How come? I have no idea what I did to be called that.

Then the second year of university life started and as everyone expected, I was chose to enter the Honors College. When I first come to this place, I did not give up my “belief”. The life in Honors College did not affect me that much in the first place actually. I was still determined not to be involved into too much “less important” activities. Up until the 2^nd Retreat, in which I was lucky to be the one picked up for Sky Jumping, was I leading my self-involved life. I felt the eyes focusing on me, the words people had with me, the attention our guys paid to me and the joy that I could bring into this group. When I was watching the photos taken at the time, especially the one that I had in my Sky Jumping costume with Aggie, another lucky girl and all other people in the retreat, I could tell myself that I actually am a part of this group. Then the best experience for me in HC, the HC Talent Show, comes as no one expected. Honestly, it is just our professor’s quick idea mentioned several times in the class at first, which means more or less some assigned task. However, what we went through is much more amazing than we expected, which is really hard to be understood by the professors and the audience, I think. It is the first time for me to be joyful to accomplish something non-academic with a bunch of lovable classmates and get to know them as well during the process ever since I entered the university. Sounds sad, doesn’t it? Well, don’t be, that is not necessary. That is actually what I felt. Fanny, Kim, Aggie, Alisa, Mirror and Hannah, you were all non-familiar to me before, but I would be so happy to see you accidentally in the campus, my dear friends. We tasted confusion, tiredness, endeavor, comfort, surprise and laughter together. It is so unforgettable for me that every time I recalled that, I could not help but smile. We paid, and we succeeded, together all the time, not for money, not for reputation, but just for an object ahead of us. This feeling is so great. However, everything is obtained for a price. But there is no regret for me personally. If I had not tried another way of living, then there would have been no way for me to think about my life status right now and made a difference. Just because I paid less attention to the formulas and textbook content, then I failed in my old values, thus it can be seen how fragile what I was pursuing is. Did I really learn a lot academically during these two years? Not really, I can say. I could have just pasted through my four-year university life falling into pursuing some fictional reputation. However, I made my choice to influence others and let others open to influence me. I still have my dreams. I still want to have all the things I wanted before, but maybe in a very different way. This is what HC has brought me, a new belief, founded on the basis of the crossing of different individual lives including me and people around me. Well, what I treasure the most here? Haha, I would like to say that it is the special bonds we enjoy.

Now, I can finally put down the heavy load put on my shoulders by myself. When I feel no jealous to hear that Tiffany, Victor, Janir and other classmates have past the TOEFL test for their first try while I did not, I realize how much I have grown. It might look too stupid for others, but it is true pleasure for me. As I was in high school, my class teacher taught us a Chinese poem which says “When you are capable to accept failure and success and treat them both in the same way, then my son, you can finally become a human.” Back in high school, this poem meant almost nothing to me, considering that I had no idea about what it was talking about. Now, it finally comes down to me. During our growing up, there are a bunch of people telling us to live your own life without paying too much attention to other people’s opinion, but sadly nothing is that easy as said. It is a difficult task and very hard to be accomplished personally without support, only if one can experience enough in his journey. The process could be tough, but the gain is worth the fight.

After so many years, after I have been trying to be locating myself so many times, I can eventually conclude it as followed: I am just a normal young boy who dares to do something that freaks people out, like speaking out in class or something. I am not smart at all, thus still necessary to learn and work hard to accomplish what I want to obtain. I have a pretty tough spirit to do that, which I am so happy about. The HC life grants me this evaluation for myself. I cannot think of anything better to be appreciated.

For the next two years, I will try to accomplish my dreams left behind for quite a long time. What I have to train for myself is the capability of concentration on separate things in series. This is all personal and I will try to handle it on my own.

If you asked me about how I could possibly influence my classmates in the future journey, well, I would say that what I have got the spirit of accepting both optimism and pessimism. Nowadays, the most serious problem that I have realized is that there are less and less ears there willing to listen to people’s negative feelings. Anger, jealousness, hate, distrust, these feelings are true and are sometimes buried all the time. However, I am not sure whether it is because that people here in Macau are all enjoying such a rich and happy life or something, it seems that most of them cannot understand these feelings. As the so-called “future leaders”, we are supposed to solve a lot of problems. World peace, no hunger and so on, those are all good dreams to fight for, but there are still so many problems around us that can barely even be seen or paid attention to, considered to be too small, too personal or too none-of-my-business-and-why-I-should-care-about. I still remember that in our HC classes this semester, our professor has been trying to tell us to give smiles, to show optimism and to open our heart to the world. In one of the last classes the professor even granted an award called “the best smile” to some our classmates. Wow, I cannot say how stupid that award is. It is like giving an award to “the happiest people” in the world. What is wrong of no smiles? Another thing that is worth to mention is that in another class this semester, the professor was talking about being free to open our heart and without any control I put up my hand and asked about being free to close our heart. I gave an example of parents bothering the children by the forbidden of closing the doors of their rooms. The professor said “Well, I don’t know what your problem is with your parents…” From this detail it can safely be concluded that our professor has no idea what kind of problems that could bother the young, and in his mind these problems could not be serious and apparently not that significant compared to smiling and being optimistic to influence the people positively around us. I would have to say that is only proper for student leaders in campus, but not for the society. A future leader needs the patience to listen to people’s problems and give the sympathies to understand them and comfort people’s hearts, as the Catholic Fathers do. I can tell you guys that sometimes smiling is torturing if there is no happiness that people want to express in their heart. And forcing people to smile could be really cruel. Life is not always full of sunshine and there is darkness everywhere even though it is always tried to be ignored around us. A strong spirit does not just take a path around and avoid the darkness and leave for the sunshine but capable of carrying both of them, revealing the truth of the reason of the darkness and trying to pull the souls out of there, and this spirit is something that we need to learn in our class, not just being optimistic all the time. However, what is really sad is that, this issue has been always ignored in our classes and we have been learning no real solutions to real problems. Simple question, a child is arguing severely with his parent, mother or fathers, or just with his friend, what should we, the future leaders, do to help them out? Any idea where to start?

I have been trying to listen to people’s problems and give them the biggest hand of me, sometimes just to let them feel some support and comfort. This awards me some real friend who could give me a real hand as I were in trouble, and I think that is what leadership means from the very beginning. Being patient to listen to people, warm-hearted to help with the problems is what I am good at and I could influence my classmates in this aspect in their leadership journey, if needed.

I am just that kind of person who would like to say my opinions out loud and that is one of the good spirits of Honors College, right? I am just doing my job, anyway.

The journey of exploring leadership will never end ahead of us and I am all prepared to move on. Good luck, guys and wish you a nice day for every day.

HC Talent Show--Never expect to experience anything like this

Well, the HC talent show has been long gone, but the memories are still hot and clear like that it just happened yesterday. I can still see the days when we were busy discussing the drama script with totally no ideas, the days when laughter was full of the room as we were in rehearsal, the nights when the tired look appeared on the face of everyone of us for the thinking of the details of the play, the nights before the formal rehearsal of the show when we suddenly decided to change the plan totally and everything should be restarted for us, the figuring out the lines, the choice of the background music and the interaction with the audience and so on. It seemed at the first place that this performance is just one of the assignments that the professor gives us. However, as the preparation of our drama going on, it was becoming increasingly clear that this is more than just an ordinary assignment, but more often than not a precious experience for us to get along with each other, the opportunity of which is really hard to obtain from HC classes. During the organization of the play, the pleasure acquired for myself, personally, is really out of my expectation and to tell the truth, I have never been so involved in any activities. Well, what can I say? I, as titled, never expected to experience anything like this before.

To talk about the feeling of me to this show, it cannot be avoided talking about the members of our drama group. I want to start with Fanny. She is responsible to the drama part of the show. This is pretty surprising for me because she seemed so quiet in the classes. It turned out that she is involved a lot into student activities and may have some experience of organizing or something, and not quiet at all, lol~~. It is during and after the show that I find out that she is the kind of person who needs to be known gradually. She is responsible to the drama for almost all aspects, the script and music stuff. One thing that really moves me is that she is so surprised and happy to know that I actually followed her instruction to write down the script after she told me to. I think it is very cute, haha~. Also as a member of the committee she needed to focus on more things than us. Anyway, the drama team could not have made any work done without her passion and responsibility. Surely after this experience, she becomes one of the girls that I admire the most.

Kim, the core member of the drama performance and of the whole show as well, as he suddenly became the person in charge of the general affairs of the show. I don’t know the details, but considering that he is one of the members from the workshop group, the scene of his running here and there for this additional work on him really touched my heart. The enthusiasm of a man to a group reveals that how much he cared about this group and it is always moving to see such a busy figure around us. For the drama, Kim was always very shy, because according to the ordinary arrangement, he played the boyfriend of Fanny. The problem is that he did not seem to like his “girlfriend” at all and was really shy to express it out. Even though this does not meet the requirement of the performance, we can safely conclude that Kim is good man who is not used to flirting with girls, lol~~.

Aggie, the talent of whom is well witnessed on the stage, is the most significant actress in our group. She is the one who gives most of the ideas of the final version of the story that we played. She is the one who was running in front to make the opening of our performance vivid and attractive and the atmosphere exciting. Without her, there is no way that our drama could be such a big success and to some extent, be the most successful part of the entire talent show. The preparation work, like the discussion and other things, took a lot of time of her which should have been used on her homework. I still remember that night that I saw her fall asleep on the sofa in our EAC TV room when I went down to pick up Alisa. Her devotion into this play wins the huge success and she cannot deserve too much compliment.

Mirror, another professional actress in this drama group, shared a lot of ideas about the details of the performance on stage. Her voice is so natural on stage and so are her gestures. I have to say that before this show I thought she is a little bit hard to get accessed, because for some times in the past, I was trying to have a word with her but failed to get the kind of response I expected. But through this play, I learnt that she is also a talking kind of girl and cares a lot about others as well. It is always a pleasure to have a conversation with her, because from my point of view she is very interesting and shares a lot, which is maybe something that one can only enjoy when he gets known to this girl.

For Alisa, haha, as I mentioned in the last HC class in this semester, she has a huge requirement for others to protect her and I strongly agree with the comment that Fanny has for her, how can anyone not like her as he starts working with her? She is just so responsible, so patient and such a gentle girl as well. And her quick reaction to accidental affairs is really admirable, which, by the way, I heard after the show, when Roddick and Fanny mentioned it in the control room. One thing that I might never forget in my life about her is her “unreasonable” huge fear for Aggie’s really lame “taking out her eye” magic. Aggie was almost doing nothing but putting her hands one her eye frame and doing the gesture of digging something out, but Alisa could not help crying out loud for being afraid that Aggie’s eye had been really taken out by herself. We told her again and again that nothing could ever happen, but the sad looking on her face just didn’t go away. I fairly cannot think of anything cuter than that that a girl has ever done in front of me, haha~~. She is a very lovable girl and being together with her is a great joy.

Last but not least, Hannah, another member from workshop group, came and helped us as one of the assistants of magic performance in the first place. Personally, I really appreciate her being here because I could finally find a mainland student who doesn’t understand Cantonese just like me, lol~~. Even though it was a busy period with them as well with all the assignments and stuff, pretty heavy load on them, I can tell, but she still presented almost every time we had a meeting of discussion. It is a great help from you, Hannah, really, maybe more than your own expectation.

For me, this is a wonderful experience in which I learnt a lot. The most important thing I have learnt I think is the real joy of life. I used to be a student buried in the formulas from what I am learning and fight nothing but for my GPA. I didn’t realize it, but my getting tired of this life style is growing increasingly and it is right after the HC talent show proposal was launched that I have finally found out what real joy is about life. This is an age in which individual value is well focused on and respected, but as individuals in this society we are not totally separate from each other. The lives of us interact at certain points on the time axis, and the pleasant moments just flash out of our expectation. The sharing of joy and sorrow, the common goal to accomplish and  the hard time to go through together combine to make the lives of our own colorful and memorable. When we look back to the foot prints we left together in the past time, there will be no regret but pure pleasure fulfilling our heart.

Thank you guys so much for just being around me. You make me happier than I ever expected.

We are and always will be standing together, forever ever. 

A start could be the end, and vice versa.

I remembered that last Wednesday, our professor said that his course for this semester is coming to the end. Well, I have to say that after such a long time, finally, I can find myself able to calmly sit down, trying to think about something that I really like. Just a moment before I was watching the one open course from Harvard, the well-known What is the right thing to do by Michael Sandel. The open courses from Harvard are really rare, I have to say, which just happens to make this courses extraordinary, lol. To be honest, it is so good to feel that I am actually doing stuff for myself, rather than doing things for professors for nothing but grades.

Well, this also explains why I am going to upload this blog after the professor has announced that the semester is coming to the end. I think it is my personality that determines that I prefer to do the work I appreciate and enjoy with no external instructions. I believe that this might piss off a lot of people including my parents. Well, then I have nothing to do with it, because I am not there for them to accept. Maybe it is because of the circumstances that I was brought up that assign me with this thought. I used to live under rules just like other Chinese students do now. I can still remember that when I was in elementary school, our teacher asked us to put our hands behind our back in the name of our preference to focus on the classes, or just for a kind of collective good-looking. What the hell is that? If the class is interesting to be listened to, would the students wander their mind? Who can believe that a boy, who used to be so shy, will act this way when he has come to 20 years old? You can call the “20 years old” as a charm. In fact, it starts when I was in junior. I don’t really want to give details, but the result is pretty interesting. Who can safely conclude that the world is going along a path that they set up? According to my culture, there is no definite end or start. A start could have be the end, while the end could also be a start. Who know? The young is passionate about the mysterious aspect of life. It is of more fun, isn’t it?

I have been so tired of listening to instructions. For so many cases, it is referred to nothing but “boring”. If I don’t cooperate, there is nothing that others can do. I take what means to be important to me, which I will judge for myself, but don’t take granted to think that I am not going to raise my voice.

Tired of being afraid to say no, young boys are moving on.