Fears...

There are two things that I am very afraid of: loneliness, and darkness.

I am twenty-three years old now, but I haven’t lived alone for more than six months. When I was a senior student in undergraduate, I lived out side of campus without roommates for six months. However, in Taiwan, everything is so convenient that I can call my friends out at anytime or make a phone call to my friends or families. Until these days, all my families go out the United States and I have to live alone for three weeks. It is a little bit hard for me to live alone in the big house. When I come to the house, there is no one here, no light, or any noise. Everything is so quiet like a dead town. When I get home, the first thing I do is opening some lights, and turning on the TV or radio. I don’t like there is no one talks to me when I come home. If I don’t go out, I don’t need to speak any word in whole day. How terrible is it? No speaking in the whole day. I hate being alone for too long.

Second, I don’t like darkness due to the 921 earthquake which occurred at 1:47 AM on September 21, 1999. There were more than two thousands people dead and more than ten thousand people had seriously injured in physics and mentalities. On that day, I was sleeping, and suddenly there was a magnitude 7.6 earthquake happened. I woke up, and there were all black. I also heard a lot of people screaming. Darkness and horrible screaming were scared me. Since this earthquake, I have been scared of staying in the dark, especially sudden darkness. Now, I always have a small light beside my bed when I am sleeping. I need someone to turn off the light for me after I sleep deeply.

I don’t know how can I face these fears because these are mental damage. I am trying now but it will take a long time to overcome these fears.

 

My New Year's Resolution

Before moving to the New Year, I want to recall myself what did I do last year. I got my bachelor degree, but I was failed to get into graduate school. Then, I came to the United States to improve my English; I was studying hard in ALP, however, I still cannot pass TOEFL. It sounds like I am a loser, but this is what life should be: learn form mistakes. Therefore, my goal in this year is passing TOEFL and applying graduate school. First, I need to improve my English ability. Last Saturday, I took my first TOEFL test, but I found out I couldn't finish on time in reading and writing. Now, I think I need to increase my vocabularies, reading speed and typing skills. To reach my goals, I plan to memorize at least ten words and read one 700-word passage every day. About typing skills, I will try my best to hand in my homework in typing rather than writing. Learning a foreign language needs to continually practice, and we cannot see the result immediately. I believe that one day I will reach this goal if I keep learning and using English all the time.

Moreover, I have another New Year’s Resolution: learning how to cook. In my home country, Taiwan, it is very convenient to get food. We just need five seconds to get the food we want, and you also have a lot of choices. In contrast to Taiwan, the United States is more difficult. In America, we need to take our car, drive at least ten minutes to a supermarket, a grocery store or a restaurant. If you go to a restaurant and then find out it is closed, you need another ten minutes to another place. Because every thing is so convenient in Taiwan, I don’t need to learn how to cook. Therefore, when I come to the United States, I am still not used to the living style in here. Now, I think it is a good chance to learn how to cook. I will learn form my mother, auntie, and granny. They all are very good at cooking. When they are cooking, I will be next to them and learn from them. After standing besides them awhile, I will try some practice and maybe cook for them. This year, I hope I can learn some traditional Taiwanese food, like chicken and vegetable soup, steaming fish, and tofu pork. I believe it won’t be difficult if I am willing to learn and practice it. 

   

I am Wendy. Do you know me?

I am very glade to have the same composition class with you. 

My name is Hsiang Ting, and you can just call me Wendy. First, I want to tell you a story. Choosing Wendy as my English name was a coincident. When I was seven years old, I studied my grade one in South Africa. Therefore, I needed an English name, which is easier to remind for the teacher rather than using my Chinese name. However, I was so little that I didn't know too many English names. It was hard for me to choose a name, so my auntie said several names, such as Amy, Lily, and Christine. These names were very easy to remember, but I really want a special name. One day, when my auntie drove me to the school, we passed by the Wendy's burger. My auntie asked me how about Wendy. The trade mark of Wendy's burger, a little girl with red hair and some freckles, was interesting to me, and also I liked the food there, so I choose Wendy as my name. This name and the story really help people to remember my name.

Second, I want to tell you why I come to American Language Program. Before I came to the United States, I majored in finance and got my bachelor degree last June. Due to the bad economics over the world, it was very difficult to find a job, especially in banking, so I decided to give myself a chance to come to the United States, learn English and experience American culture. I have been here for five months, and I am very happy that I made this correct decision. I really enjoy the time that I have been being here. Last year, ALP made a lot of interesting activities, for instance surfing, Disneyland, watching American football games, fun lunch and Halloween parties. I cannot wait for the activities on this semester. No matter you are new students or returning students, I hope we will enjoy all classes and activities in ALP and know each other better. By the way, if you want to know me more, you can go and check Tara’s blog.

Next, I am going to introduce my partner, Tara, a 20-year-old cute lady. She just came here two weeks ago, and she lives with her brother now. Tara's habits is watching move. When she was in Korea, She went to watch a movie every week. She likes all kinds of movies except horrible ones. Tara majors in English education; her dream is being a good teacher. She will stay in ALP in one year to experience American culture and improve her English ability. Then she will go back to Korea and continue her undergraduate. Since she has been here for two weeks, she thinks that the buildings, which are flat and open space, in the United States very differ from the constructions, which are tall and limited space in her home country. During the interview, Kara was easily to talk and maybe a little bit shy. At the beginning, I was always the first person asking questions, but at the end, the more you know about her, the more you would find out how cute she is. You should go and talk to this interesting girl. It is really good to talk to her.