Change: The Essence of Existence

     Hmm.. I need to do something to fill this blog.. I guess I'll just post some of my essays that I have written at school and been checked by my English teacher :) I made them a few weeks before the O level examination, in a desperate, last minute attempt to improve my English so that I could obtain the ever-elusive A1. Uh, well, not a very good idea, as it is very difficult to improve your language in such a short time -.- Well, another lesson to be learnt: not every thing can be done in the last minute (although there are myriads of others that can be done, mugging, for instance :p). Anyway, here is the essay:

Change, they say, is ‘the essence of existence’. How has your world changed since you were in kindergarten? (MGS – Preliminary Examination 2010)
           Charles Darwin once said that it is not the “strongest” nor the “most intelligent” of the species that will survive. It is the one that is “the most adaptable to change”. I fervently believe in his profound and true as I have experienced it myself. The only reason why I am able to “survive” despite the harrowing trials and calamities in my life and become who I am now is because I perpetually adapt myself to my ever-changing world. It has changed so drastically since I was in kindergarten. It kept changing throughout my primary and secondary school years, and I believe that it is still changing even now.

My kindergarten school days were filled with tears and resentment. I loathed school from the moment I stepped into it. I hated having to part from my mother and father, my “comfort zones”. I wailed many times at school at even the slightest provocation. For instance, I would burst into tears when I realised that I had forgotten to bring my pencils. My unforgiving friends aggravated my predicament. Instead of consoling me, they made a circle around me, teasing me. What a ‘pleasant’ experience at school! Since then, I resented school so much that at one point, in my childishness, I told my father that I would rather sell newspapers around traffic lights: something that is commonly done by extremely poor children in Indonesia who could not afford to go to school.

Fortunately, I did not stay the same. Primary school was a new chapter of my life, one that I started with iron will and determination. Thanks to my parents, kindergarten school teachers and friends, I was now able to realise the importance of school. I faced a new world of education, one that consists of more challenging subjects and lessons. Hard work had become an integral part of my life. Moreover, I could no longer play the whole day long as I had an insurmountable amount of homework. Naturally, I also came to realise that there were more facets to school life than just academic matters. I got to know more friends with multifarious characters and personalities. There was Amanda, the brilliant one, Ellen the bashful one, Malvin the rude one, and many others. Of course, adjustment on my part was crucial for me in order to be able to befriend them all. I learnt to handle different people differently.

Canisius College, a renowned single sex secondary school was the next phase of education that I underwent. By that time, I had become quite adept at doing whatever academic matters required by the school. Nevertheless, as the saying “change is the only constant” goes, once again I had to go through various changes in order for me to be able to survive in this new environment. I learnt that the topic of conversation of my friends had evolved: from just talking about our favourite cartoon on television, we now started to talk about more mature things, such as sexuality, a ‘hot’ topic for teenagers with raging hormones. Dirty jokes about sexuality had become the norm of this stage. Therefore, I adapted to that environment and started to talk about it too. More importantly, I also learnt to manage my time better so I could still finish my work, study and have sufficient sleep as I had to wake up early in the morning. This was because the school was a long distance away from my house and it took me around 40 minutes by car to reach there.

By the time I started my study in St Joseph’s Institution, a secondary school in Singapore, the talks and jokes about sexuality had become lacklustre. Yet I still had to adapt to another set of situations and challenges. The diverse backgrounds of my friends who had come from various countries, such as Vietnam and Singapore, posed a problem for me who only used to interact with the Indonesians. I discovered that cultural backgrounds had a strong bearing on the way my friends interacted with each other. For example, I learnt that my Singaporean friends would really appreciate it if I told them my name first before asking theirs during our introduction. I knew about this because when I asked my friend’s name before I gave my name, he frowned at me, as though I was an exotic exhibit from overseas. Thus, I had become more understanding towards my friends from other countries.

Change has become part and parcel of my life. Throughout my life, I have experienced a multitude of changes, and without them all, I would not be able to “survive” and prevail over the challenges in my life. Change is indeed the essence of my existence.