“The period from primary school to middle school was a very challenging time. I am dyslexic, so I didn’t do well in Hong Kong’s education environment where exams usually involve a lot of writing. When I was in high school, I had a few great teachers that really helped me a lot, and changed me for the better. Starting from Secondary 3, my grades started to improve, though in the end I still wasn’t able to get into university. But in a surprising turn of events, here I am studying for my license as a Chinese Medicine practitioner.
“My grades were really bad in middle school, like really, really, bad. Let me put it into context: In my grade, there was a kid that had Down’s syndrome and was mentally handicapped. We were the two students that had learning disabilities, so we were usually grouped together in the same class to facilitate our learning. We had to do ability tests regularly, and the results showed that his language abilities were actually better than mine. He scored higher in both the English and Chinese language assessments.
“My teachers were very patient, and would insist that I work hard and not to give up on myself. My English teacher would stay behind after school to help me revise, to do my homework. My Chinese teacher taught me what’s in the books, but also philosophies on life. I wasn’t very physically fit either, and lacked hand-eye coordination. My teachers would have me train with the school teams, even though my ability did not qualify me for the teams. It was just so I could train and improve myself. I remember that I couldn’t consecutively skip a rope ten times, and my Chinese teacher would make me try again and again until I hit a certain number of rope skips. I would just be frantically skipping on the playground.”