Worldwide of my life (Yalin Hsiao)

Worldwide of my life

My life has always been stimulated. I have studied in four different countries, since I was young. This experience gave me more opportunities to widen my point of view about the other countries and know more about other cultures. In addition, I also had a chance to meet many people from various backgrounds. Studying aboard not only gave me a chance to gain extra language skills, but also I learnt a lot of things while I was studying in foreign countries.
I was born in Taiwan and lived in Taipei for around ten years with my family. My parents were often going to Tokyo for their business purpose. When I was ten years old, my parents sent me to Japan to study. I was really afraid of going to Japanese elementary school as I have never spoken Japanese before. I could not understand any Japanese even for one single sentence. Hence, the first few weeks for me were really tough to attach into the new environment. I could not speak, read write any Japanese. Therefore it was really inconvenient for me to live in Japan. Therefore I was really afraid to go Japanese element school as I knew that no one would understand what I was saying. However, Japanese students were extremely kind towards me. They always came towards me, took me to a lot of different place. They always tried their best to teach me how to speak Japanese step by step. When I could not understand what they were saying, they drew a picture to show me what they wanted to say patently. I was able to speak Japanese and understand what the other people were talking about in a short time. Without having such a good friends, I could not be able to speak Japanese immediately. Furthermore my Japanese friends also bought me to Japanese festival and taught me about their culture. I join in a volleyball club, after I graduated from elementary school. However our volleyball club was not as strong as I was thinking to be. The volleyball club was a really strict club. Our volleyball coach is really professional. She taught us how to play volleyball from the beginning and we practice it from Monday to Friday. Even at the beginning we did not really know how to play volleyball well and our team was really weak. We were able to get into first place. When I was fifteen, my parents insisted me to go to England for studying English, as they think English is one of the most important languages nowadays. However, I did not really want to go abroad again, I wanted to stay in Japan with my friends. I went to international high school with one of my best friend. There are so many people from different background. This let me know more things about the other culture. English is not as difficult as Japanese to learn, but I was not able to improve my English quickly. As they were so many people who speak Japanese and Chinese. So I did not really use English even though I went to school in England. I applied some university in England and America when I was in second year, as I always wanted to study in America since I was young. Though, my parents want me to stay in England for my university education so I was going to go to university in England. I wanted to stay in England with my friends but at the same time, I was really fascinated to have education in America. Therefore I told my parents what I was thinking about. My parents allowed me go university in America. At last, I am allowed to make my own decision.