Literacy Narrative
Having been given the advantage of studying in an international school since a young age, I have had the opportunity to meet people from all over the globe, experience different cultures, and share some of my own; I was self-assured that moving to a new, better middle school would not at all be a challenge for me. I was wrong.
Though everyone speaks English, the majority of the students in this school was Korean, and I was one of the few that is Vietnamese. Making new friends had never been easy, especially when people already had their groups, and worse, most of them spoke a different language that I did not understand. During break time, lunch time, or PE classes, I would have to try so hard to keep up a conversation with someone (in English of course) in order to be not alone. I felt extremely lonely. Everyday after school, I would come home crying to my best friend on the phone, telling her how much I miss her, and how much I wanted to move back, where I had my amazing group of friends. One time while wandering in the school library, I came across a book called “How To Win Friends and Influence People”, written by Dale Carnegie, one that I have read a few years ago. Since there wasn’t much work to do at the time, I decided to borrow that book and killed some time on reading. It was one of the best decisions I had ever made in my entire life. I realized the easiest way to blend into a group was to understand and speak their language, and so I spent a few hours everyday learning basic communicating Korean. After approximately two months, along with achieving the skill of speaking another language, I gradually made more friends, and was much more confident. “How To Win Friends and Influence People” might just be a good book for some people; however, for me, it was a life-saving tool that led me to the right path. Just then, I understood why successful people such as Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and many more said that all successors have one thing in common: they read.
One of my favourite quotes about reading is “A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies” by George R. R. Martin, and I sincerely agree with him. Three years ago when I moved to the U.S. to pursue better education, leaving my parents, friends, and family behind, I was depressed. All alone in a new country, I thought about all the good things I used to have and regretted how I did not enjoy those moments to the fullest. Before school started, I would spend all day in bed watching Netflix, called my parents, and not much more; my life was boring, meaningless, and miserable. While unpacking one of my luggages, I found a book that I believed my father had put in, it’s called “How To Stop Worrying and Start Living”; he probably understood me too well he could see this scenario of mine coming. Unsurprisingly, I could see myself in so many stories written in the book: people were sick because of worrying about things that didn’t even happen, people spending time doing nothing then ended up worrying about unnecessary things, and many more. Just then I asked myself, “What am I doing with my life? Am I living or am I just surviving?” The answers scared me. I realized I was too busy being miserable, being regretful, too busy thinking about “what if” rather than “what to do” that I forgot about the reason why I had to leave behind so many great things in the first place: to better my future. It could be said that I was ‘dead’ for a long while, and the book had brought me back to life, awakened me with the facts of his own experience. I applied to a nearby shop, went to work, and made friends there; at the same time, I was getting ready for school, choosing classes, joining virtual calls. My life has had a purpose to it again.
Life definitely has its ups and downs, but it is how we choose to deal with it that decides the outcome: I decided to not give up, to fight back, to put emotions second, and most importantly, to read. Through many events in my life, I recognize the importance, the power of reading to one’s mind, or at least, to myself. It has taught me so many valuable lessons that I could not have learned anywhere else.
