Submitted by ciurce on
I started studying mandarin in the year of 2017 during September. It was the first time I had learned mandarin and I was very excited to go on this new adventure. Mandarin or even Asian culture in general had always been of special interest for me so when I saw that I could study this amazing language I immediately signed up.
When we started there were many students and we were all excited to learn. Our teacher was patient with us and taught us the very basics. She would always have time for you when you hadn’t understood and explained to you again and again until you got it. We learned more about the Chinese culture. We learned to play traditional Chinese games.
When I entered high school I was pleased to know that the option of mandarin was still there and of course I chose it without hesitation.The first day of the class we got acquainted with each other and I was glad as I had my last year teacher. During that year we learned more hard stuff than the previous year. We started learning how to read long texts and many more things. To be honest I think that year was way harder than the previous one but overall, it was very nice and fun.
When we finally moved to grade 10 that’s when reality really hit us. We were about to do the IGCSE examination in Cambridge. Grade 10 was quite a tumultuous year for us. First, we got a new teacher who we did not know and did not know our way of learning or understanding as the previous teacher did. Luckily for us the new teacher was very nice and created a comfortable learning environment for us. She taught us all she could and whenever we felt like giving up, she would give us the courage to keep going on. Secondly, we encountered paper structures we’d never seen. This scared us as we felt like we were going to fail terribly. It always opened our eyes to the fact that we had slacked off in that department and that we could fail. I honestly considered to give up mandarin and go for French as I could already speak and it would be easy for me to pass it with flying colors. But when I thought about it again, I realized I had fallen in love with the language and that if I gave up at that moment, I would blame myself for it later on in life and wonder why I made such a rash decision. We worked very hard to try and do our best to cover things we hadn’t covered. We sometimes even came to school during the weekends or stayed at school.
During the second term the mocks arrived. When I started studying for the mandarin mock, I felt confident that I would pass. I tried to study as hard as I could and revised all we had learnt. But when I saw my paper I froze, I got scared. I tried to go through the whole paper but it was a very hard task. Before the mock I thought my mandarin level was quite alright but after the exams I wondered how I was able to fail so badly. I did very badly on the reading and listening part and instead I did well on the writing and speaking part which surprised me.
I honestly do believe that if we had had more time to prepare ourselves we could have done better. But nonetheless even after the disappointing grades we worked harder than before to be able to do better in the final exam. In the end we haven’t been able to do the final exam due to the world crisis of Covid-19 but I believe that if we had done them, we would have passed very well. Because I believe all of us as students tried very hard and did our very best to learn, understand and appreciate the Chinese culture.
This year I attended the Chinese bridge to represent myschool. I tried to study to my very best. This competition helped me reflect more on how studying Mandarin helped me and changed me as a person. The competition helped me realize there are more students out there studying Mandarin out there. It made me want to go out and meet other people who studied the samething as me and become friends with them.
Divine Umurerwa 参加第13届“汉语桥”比赛视频截图
All in all, I think that my journey through the process of learning mandarin has made me very happy. It made me discover that there is a lot I don’t know and it also helped me learn to always appreciate the different cultures of the world. I think it is a memory that I will forever cherish in my heart and soul. I hope I get more chances in the future to learn more about this amazing culture and get to meet more Chinese people to be able to apply the knowledge I’ve learnt.
作者简介：Divine Umurerwa（中文姓名：毛丹），卢旺达青山国际学校中学生。