Elementary school was a very important stage in my life. Because of the boarding school, my character building was more or less affected by my teachers and classmates (I met them five days a week). It was also an incident that happened in elementary school that deeply affected me and changed me a lot.
Boarding school life and culture
We got up at 6:45 every day and never stayed in bed. After making the sheets, we had to wash up, change clothes and wait for the room manager to inspect the room. The room manager would hold a whole book for scoring (I wanted to read that book when I was a kid!). After that, we would line up in the hall, and the dormitory would say, “You can go out.” Then we could go to the dining hall to eat. In addition to praying before eating, we also sang a song with a completely different tune. It is very classic. For details, you can listen to the following excerpt at 2:35 for my demonstration:
A variety of extracurricular activities
The visit of the 430 shuttle was hosted by Sister Tan Yuying! The clip shows us attending class and my thoughts on visiting the boarding house. At that time, I said, “Boarding is great. You can see your classmates all the time. It’s not so troublesome for mommy to pick you up and drop you off all day long.”
After breakfast, the school schedule is not much different from that of ordinary primary schools. The special thing is that we have an early reading session, and then after the day students come back from the school bus, they will go to the class room to meet the boarding students and go to class together. There are not many extracurricular activities in the first grade, but after the second grade, I get busy. In the first year, I recite poetry on Monday, recite English poetry on Tuesday, orchestra on Wednesday, swimming or track and field on Thursday (return to Choir during the music festival), and go home on Friday. I only stay overnight unless there is a competition. Looking back, every day after school is very fulfilling.
There is a self-study time before dinner. If you are learning a musical instrument, this self-study time will be easier to pass (when I was in senior grade, I would fall in love with a boy, and said that the relationship was actually just looking at the scenery). The school building environment is very beautiful, with a large sea view, so romantic.
Two years ago, I went back to my alma mater to shoot Snowfox’s Japanese Cherry Blossom White Tea Smoothing Mask. You can see the scenery of my alma mater in this clip.
There is also a night study time after dinner (that is, the time to complete the day’s homework). There are more than 400 boarding students in Class AB. Basically, you will know a lot of people during the boarding time. If you don’t know, you can ask the teacher immediately. There are no cram schools. If you finish your homework quickly, you can borrow books from the library. Every student reads Jin Yong.
My childhood entertainment was “pretending to be a Hong Kong sister?”
If it rains, all extracurricular activities will be suspended. Wear the school swimsuit, present awards, walk around in a circle, get a stick and a ribbon made of toilet paper. I will also play doctor and patient pretending to be cut open, which is quite funny in retrospect.
Can boarding girls have long hair?
There are many rules and regulations in boarding schools. No matter what you do, you have to queue up. It is the same whether you are returning to the dormitory after eating refreshments. You cannot rush in without permission. It was mentioned before that there would be help for junior students to take a bath, and the dormitory supervisors were briefing whether they could wash their hair today because it is sometimes too cold in winter, and they were afraid that children would be prone to cold sickness after washing their hair. There were no hair dryers at that time, so boarding girls were not allowed to grow their hair long! (My current length is the limit) If it grows too long and doesn’t cut, the dormitory supervisor will just use scissors to cut it! There was a very tragic time. The dormitory supervisor said that my bangs were too long, so he cut my bangs with a knife. That time I was so angry that I cried!
Something happened in primary school that had a profound impact on me
This incident happened in the second grade. There was a morning meeting every Friday, and I listened to the class teacher tell some Bible stories, scriptures, etc. A student representative will also be sent to read scriptures or golden verses, lead prayers and other simple tasks.
Unexpectedly, one morning, Teacher Feng suddenly gave me a storybook during morning reading time (between breakfast and morning meeting) and asked me to memorize the story and then tell it out. I was asked to recite a quite long story. I thought to myself: “How is this possible?” I imagined all my classmates in grades 1-3 looking at me! When I was in the audience, I would judge the people on the stage for “Taiwan fever”, but I didn’t expect that I was on stage at this moment! The preparation time was so short, so I had to memorize it. After 15 minutes, I was told to go on stage. When I walked to the microphone peak, my feet were shaking. I couldn’t remember what it was said, but I didn’t forget it or stop and wait. It was pretty good for a first- and second-grade me.
Looking back now, I feel that Teacher Feng has confidence in me? What I can do will certainly help build my self-confidence in the future, but what I can’t do will destroy a child’s self-confidence. As a child, I also started out with fear. After trying and practicing, I overcame difficulties and completed the task, and was rewarded. The whole process of this incident established my can-do attitude in the future of my life!
