Life

== = = = **Life Is All About Guts** = 

It is nearly the end of the semester, and when I looked back, I had a quite emotional moment. Being in America is the first risky thing that I have ever done, since I went through such a hard time with GRE, TOEFL, application and the whole VISA thing. I still can recall that I once sat to study GRE for successive 5 hours everyday until I memorized 8000 words after a week; I still can recall that I woke up at 5 am and went to bed at 11 pm; I can still recall that I posted many sheets of paper with words that were hard to memorize on the wall of bathroom, on the table, on the computer screen, and beside the pillow, so that I could see them wherever I go. During that time, I kept losing hairs everyday because of the pressure that going abroad had brought to me, and my parents were really worried about me. Nevertheless, I made it finally.

I can’t express how excited I was when I first arrived in America. Everything was completely new to me. I started to look at the world around from a whole new perspective. Everyday, I was so eager to go to class, listen to the lecture in a whole English environment, and talk with my new friends. However, I found out gradually that 90% of my classmates were employed teachers. Whenever there were topics about teaching, they always had so much to say, while I could only sit with fidget trying hard to understand what they were talking about. The more I wanted to think out something to say, the messier my head became. I felt so dwarfed by their rich experience and talkative attitude. There even was a time that I was afraid of going to class, because of the topics I could never find words to communicate and the classmates that I could never fully catch up with whenever they started to talk. These happened so fast and I was not ready to accept any defeat then, considering how excellent I was when in China.

But I would not give up anyway. If I give up, how about those great efforts I have made? I can’t see them gone without crying. How about the promises I have commited to my parents and grandparents? I will never allowe myself to let them down. How about the future I have dipicted? Would I destroy all the beautiful things in my life just because I was challenged and intimated? No!!! I was born to be a fighter, and I would never back up in front of the trouble that I might be capable of overcoming. English to me is a second language, and I should not compare myself with the native speakers in English and underestimate myself. What I should do is to have more practice in English listening, reading and speaking and make native speakers as learning models. I am only 22, which means I still have plenty of time to improve myself and finally become as great as my teachers!

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__** I still believe that one can achieve everything as long as he or she has the guts–the guts to imagine freely, the guts to fight against the conservation, the guts to say aloud, the guts to create things that nobody wants to try, the guts to discover the unknown, the guts to face up to contemptious eyes, the guts to say “I can” everytime after a failure… **__======

__** Life is a journey, and only people with guts can climb over all those steep cliffs and high mountains. **__
** //Created by: Julie Wang Date last edited: May 4th Course Name: ISTC 655 Email: zwang2@students.towson.edu// **