"Nothing can be worse, then it's getting better"
-----"Hi, doggie, what's up?" my brother Jacky greeted me in QQ as usual.
-----"Everything is out of order, totally a mess actually." I replied and almost cry, since I've been suffering for a long time.
------"Look, I've told you many times that life abroad can't be easy, you should learn to be optimistic and strong."
------"Yes, I know. I'm even struggling to smile, but it turns out to be misery, as bad news hit one by one. I just couldn't help..."
Then I started my entire terrible sotry from the oral presentation. This is require in the the only core unit I chose called "Communication through professional context". Most of my classmates choose to give presentation on academic knowledge or a product, but I took the risk of giving opinion-oriented one with the sensitive and hot topic: women should achieve sense of security via independence (some of you may read this article before). I made full preparation for half a month, but when I stood in front of the platform, everything turned out to be different! I got too nervous! I spoke very fast, repeated some of the words occasionally, and even forgot what to say for a couple of seconds... What's even worse, when it came to discussion, a German guy who used to be a psychologist began to ask me attacking questions one by one, I tried hard to defense not until the last minute the professor stopped him by saying she was in favor of my arguments. I was truly depressed but calmed down a little bit later, as I know speaking is always my weakest point, let alone speaking in public. I wrote to my teacher, asking for her comments, as I wanted to draw lesson from the failure. She was so nice to write me back and said I needn't worry too much since that guy's bad behavior was annoying. Besides, she couldn't comment on my presentation for the sake of fairness to other students (she is going to do so at the end of the term). Nevertheless, I still find it hard not to care about it, since all my efforts seem to be fruitless.
At that time, I happened to read the e-book about the genius young girl Liu yiting, who made great achievements in Harvard University. Her outlook on life impressed me so much, namely, "do your utmost and feel no qualms upon self-examination". As far as my preparation concerned, I did try my best, even though I failed to handle the tension. The same principle made me feel a little bit better about my scores for the first two writing assignments in this course, say both 7 out of overall 10. It's a little bit lower than my expectation, but I didn’t seem to be able to do better job. I eventually accepted it calmly.
A few days later, the score for the seminar paper on two advertisements came out. To my great surprise, I just passed: the sixth lowest in the entire class except five poor dogs that failed in it. It's a destructive shock, since many other of my Chinese classmates achieve quite satisfying score. I didn't mean to compare with them, but I couldn't help. I went back home with tears withheld in eyes. I asked myself whether I could achieve higher mark if I were offered the chance once again, but the answer was no. Once again, I had tried my best. I told my mum about the bad school record on the phone, and added I really hated to face the very fact that I turned out to be nothing abroad. Mum even couldn't believe her ears, as she thought her daughter often did good job in her study. It made me feel even worse. Actually, I didn't want to disappoint her either.
Meanwhile, my PC got infected by unknown virus, and couldn't work for nearly a week, leaving behind many unfinished writing assignments. I stayed up to write, and made many mistakes when taking orders in the next day's part-time job. The boss was furious; once again he said he wanted to send me back home. In his eyes, I don't want to be responsible for the job, but I know that's wrong. I wanted to concentrate on my job, say make no mistakes at all, but I simply fail to manage no matter how hard I attempt. I may easily get nervous, and the entire brain turned out to be blank at these moments. It's sort of suffocating feelings, no matter how hard I tired, and I was still far away from my goal, which was said to be so simple for many others. "Am I stupid? Am I slow in reaction?" I began to ask myself such kind of questions, but the more I asked, the more depressing I turned out to be.
Everything is out of order, my study, my part-time job. I suddenly feel at a loss what I'm here for. My English remains far from efficient for communication due to few chances to practice, to some extent, I even find it's getting worse. I get few real friends, most of my classmates are even reluctant to ask for my addresses even though I've required for theirs (In my opinion, it should be exchange of address, but they don't want mine). I don't know why, maybe I may occasionally sound very diffident or childish, they simply don't want to further contact with me, except simple smiling or greeting when come across in class. Sydney looks as beautiful as before, but I even find I have no mood to look around and appreciate it; actually the falling temperature here makes me feel extremely cold. I love this beautiful city, and meanwhile begin to hate it, as I know I don't seem to belong to it.
I called back home even more frequently; each time when I hanged down the phone, I found my heart was aching. I was sick of being inferior to others, but I simply could do nothing to change it for better, as I said I had already done my utmost.
------"I want to go back as soon as possible!" eventually I spoke out what's truly on me.
------"I can fully understand your feelings, especially how you suffer. Maybe you should have gone to the language school at first to make preparation. But listen, things can't be even worse, and then it's getting better." Jacky said calmly from the other side of the QQ.
------"Really?" I forced a weak smile. What's the worst thing it might be? I lose my part-time job, and even fail in one of the courses? Who knows?
Tomorrow remains a mystery. I aware that all that I can do now is to focus on my present great deal of homework, still try my best, and then anticipate nothing, since I've been proven to be far from competent resulting in serious survival problem.
It looks very much a long and exhausting struggle, isn't it? However, it was my choice to go abroad, and I have no other choice but face it. "Nothing is even worse, then it's getting better." I do hope so!
