Life sometimes poses such obstacles to individuals that in the end they
simply cannot choose what they really want to do. The most common
obstacle happens to be our own families. And when tensions build
between us and our family, we are often left powerless and frustrated.
I
had a terrible experience when I was a senior high school student. In
order to prepare for the Joint College Entrance Examination, I had to
study many textbooks and take numerous exams. But my parents assured me
that I could do anything I wanted to do when I became a college student.
So I studied hard with that beautiful dream. The JCEE came and went; I
happily threw away my textbooks and began to play with my classmates,
watching TV or fooling around. In July, I got the report card and the
grades were not good. My family began to worry about my choice of
colleges and the frustration caused several quarrels between us. I had
studied the arts in junior high school and senior high school for six
years, and my parents thought that I should continue to study art. But,
my grades weren』t good enough for the art department of the good
colleges, so I thought I should choose some other departments. In
particular, I wanted to study tourism because I had traveled by train,
by bicycle or just hiking all around Taiwan and I also enjoyed studying
about the customs of the places I invited. At the last minute when I
handed in the card, I ignored my parents』 hope that I would pick the art
department of any teachers』 college. I changed the ranks. On August
8, Fathers』 Day, my family got a notice from the college and learned
that I had filled in the tourism department of a private college. My
father was so furious that he yelled at me for quite a while. My mother
also felt depressed to get the result. I told them that I wanted to
major in tourism because I was interested in tourism. My parents were
not convinced and they demanded that I take the JCEE again the next year
to enter a better college and a better department.
My
parents continuously tried to persuade me to take the JCEE again and a
lot of my relatives also joined my parents. I insisted that tourism was
my interest and would suit me very well in the future. There were many
quarrels between my parents and me all through August. My parents
always shook their heads and told the relatives about my bad grades with
a sigh, while I was standing at their side. These occasions made me
angry and indignant. My parents didn』t allow me to go out to play and
they would say harsh words to me whenever I watched TV in the living
room or ate at the dinning table. I even brought in information about
the tourism department of the private college to show my parents that I
would study the practical foreign languages in the tourism department.
They were strongly opposed to any opinions I brought in. They thought
that it would be a waste of the money to study in a bad private college.
My relatives also tried to persuade me to take the JCEE again to get a
better grade; they even said that many of the students who studied in
the tourism department just became waiters or waitresses cleaning up
messes in restaurants.
Finally, I was
forced to enter the cram school in order to prepare for the JCEE, and I
was forced to give up the tourism department of the private colleges. I
had to study the textbooks again and take numerous exams again. For
three hundred days, I spent almost every day in the crowded cram school.
It was a terrible experience for me.
I am a college student now. However, the terrible
experience was still unforgettable. I have seen the cruelties between
parents and their children clearly, and I also realized that I could not
choose what I really wanted to do because I was powerless at the time,
both financially and psychologically. That is why when I entered
college, I was determined to be my own master--an independent person. I
am working to support myself and I am studying on my own in order to
prepare myself for a future career in tourism. My parents may be able
to dictate my formal education, but as to my personal dream, I will
never let them take that away from me again.