Biography
(This is a required page in the application form of the MSW program. Despite its purpose, 99% of it is true to my heart.)
Early Childhood
Born on August 21, 1980 in Shanghai, I’m the only child of my parents – a couple of so-called “intellectual youth” sent to Chinese rural areas in their teens to “receive re-education from the peasants” during the Great Culture Revolution. Right after my birth, my parents returned to their work place in Si Chuan province and I went there with them. When I was two years old, my parents’ factory moved to Yi Chang, Hu Bei province, a small town along the bank of Yangzi River where my earliest life memories started to form. I was a curious little girl, eager to explore the nature and fascinated by everything in it: rivers, mountains, trees, flowers, worms, birds, crabs, frogs, etc. In summer, I sheltered myself with other children under the bridge across the river surrounding our school, searching for small water creatures; in winter, when it snowed, we made snowmen, had snowball fights, or went skiing on self-made ski boards. I developed a very close relationship with the nature and have always wished to live harmoniously with it. Later on when I came back to Shanghai, I was stunned by how much the city’s Su Zhou River had been polluted and was quite uncomfortable with the distance that the residents here keep with the nature.
Adolescence
Thanks to a special policy dedicated to people who used to be “intellectual youth”, I was able to earn a “Shanghai Hukou” when I was 14 and came back to Shanghai by myself to continue with my secondary study at Changzhi Middle School, 20 minutes walk from my grandparents’ home where I stayed. It is a good transition although at first it didn’t seem that way to me. I felt seriously homesick. I couldn’t catch up with my classmates in English – although I excelled at all other subjects. There were always so many residents in one tiny building and people were able to look at you from all directions. I also saw plenty of laid-off workers hanging out all day, messing around, cursing, or playing cards and did not go home until late at night. I saw a metropolis so big and developed yet so crowded and polluted and filled with losers frustrated by their incompetence or anxious people who were afraid of potential failure of catching up with the fast pace of the city’s development.
After the initial shock was gone, I began to like the city gradually. When I was sixteen, I went to Fuxing High School – one of the bests in Shanghai. There I met a lot of respectable teachers – people who were not only professional at their specialization, but also enlightening in the ethics of life and worked hard at broadening our visions. I developed great passion for liberal arts: I read many literary works and wrote essays and stories myself. The preponderant theme in my articles was “the meaning of life”. I still remember in one of my writings I expressed frustration by the fact that once a person dies, all he has achieved in the world go empty because he no longer owns them. I mentioned that Leo Tolstoy – author of Anna Karenina – wrote about a solution to the problem of that empty feeling, that a person can only survive emptiness and touch eternity by helping other human beings in his life.
University
With an ambition to become an expert in English and Chinese literature and culture, I went to study English at Tongji University. I failed to fulfill my ambition because I couldn’t exempt myself from the utilitarian atmosphere dominating the university life. It was not long before I rushed into the rat race and strove for scholarships and a variety of certificates that could assumably prepare me for future work. The happiest thing I did during the four years was to have attended many clubs: the drama club, the movie club and the books club, etc. I communicated a lot with people who had common interests with me and even participated in making a movie by ourselves. The movie was about a college student coming from a very poor area of China who had to work on night shifts to earn living expenses. His younger sister quitted school and entered into marriage in order to lessen the burden on his family. However, his interest in liberal arts contradicted with what he learned as a major and with his parents’ hope for him to prosper. He experienced disillusionment after the literary journal he founded was closed down for lack of capital and under censorship. He quitted school at last.
It was quite impressive to me that in my own class, there was a student as miserable as the character in that movie, but in another way. She experienced great anxiety before examinations and blamed herself a lot for not doing well in exams. A daughter of a middle school headmaster and younger sister of a multinational company employee, she worked very hard in order to live up to the expectation of her family members. Yet no matter how hard she tried, she failed to pass many exams, let alone earning any scholarships. I tried to help her to ease herself by talking with her many times for hours, but it never worked. Her situation worsened with every passing day and she had to visit psychiatrists and take medicines frequently.
Work
After graduation, I first became a translator, then an editor. Now I have worked for almost three years. I have often kept in my mind the idea of making some solid contribution to the well being of citizens in our community and society. Although I’ve just heard of the word “social work” quite recently, it seized me immediately after I found out its nature and purpose. Social work, by its nature, is a very practical specialization, by which I wish to settle those problems I have encountered, or witnessed in my former experiences and even more in the future. I want to possess the professional skills of social work in order to enable people I care to develop their full potential, enrich their lives and prevent them from dysfunction.
Reason for interest in this course
By definition, the social work profession promotes social change, problem solving in human relationships and the empowerment and liberation of people to enhance well-being. In my former experiences, I have encountered and witnessed many problems such as people’s relation with the nature, the frustration and anxiety people experience in a cosmopolitan environment, the contradiction between people’s own will and that of their families, or the erosion of relationship between people, etc. Since I have always kept in my mind the idea of making some solid contribution to the well being of citizens in our community and society, I want to take the course of social work to possess necessary professional skills to help people I care to develop their full potential, enrich their lives, and prevent them from dysfunction.
(This is a required page in the application form of the MSW program. Despite its purpose, 99% of it is true to my heart.)
Early Childhood
Born on August 21, 1980 in Shanghai, I’m the only child of my parents – a couple of so-called “intellectual youth” sent to Chinese rural areas in their teens to “receive re-education from the peasants” during the Great Culture Revolution. Right after my birth, my parents returned to their work place in Si Chuan province and I went there with them. When I was two years old, my parents’ factory moved to Yi Chang, Hu Bei province, a small town along the bank of Yangzi River where my earliest life memories started to form. I was a curious little girl, eager to explore the nature and fascinated by everything in it: rivers, mountains, trees, flowers, worms, birds, crabs, frogs, etc. In summer, I sheltered myself with other children under the bridge across the river surrounding our school, searching for small water creatures; in winter, when it snowed, we made snowmen, had snowball fights, or went skiing on self-made ski boards. I developed a very close relationship with the nature and have always wished to live harmoniously with it. Later on when I came back to Shanghai, I was stunned by how much the city’s Su Zhou River had been polluted and was quite uncomfortable with the distance that the residents here keep with the nature.
Adolescence
Thanks to a special policy dedicated to people who used to be “intellectual youth”, I was able to earn a “Shanghai Hukou” when I was 14 and came back to Shanghai by myself to continue with my secondary study at Changzhi Middle School, 20 minutes walk from my grandparents’ home where I stayed. It is a good transition although at first it didn’t seem that way to me. I felt seriously homesick. I couldn’t catch up with my classmates in English – although I excelled at all other subjects. There were always so many residents in one tiny building and people were able to look at you from all directions. I also saw plenty of laid-off workers hanging out all day, messing around, cursing, or playing cards and did not go home until late at night. I saw a metropolis so big and developed yet so crowded and polluted and filled with losers frustrated by their incompetence or anxious people who were afraid of potential failure of catching up with the fast pace of the city’s development.
After the initial shock was gone, I began to like the city gradually. When I was sixteen, I went to Fuxing High School – one of the bests in Shanghai. There I met a lot of respectable teachers – people who were not only professional at their specialization, but also enlightening in the ethics of life and worked hard at broadening our visions. I developed great passion for liberal arts: I read many literary works and wrote essays and stories myself. The preponderant theme in my articles was “the meaning of life”. I still remember in one of my writings I expressed frustration by the fact that once a person dies, all he has achieved in the world go empty because he no longer owns them. I mentioned that Leo Tolstoy – author of Anna Karenina – wrote about a solution to the problem of that empty feeling, that a person can only survive emptiness and touch eternity by helping other human beings in his life.
University
With an ambition to become an expert in English and Chinese literature and culture, I went to study English at Tongji University. I failed to fulfill my ambition because I couldn’t exempt myself from the utilitarian atmosphere dominating the university life. It was not long before I rushed into the rat race and strove for scholarships and a variety of certificates that could assumably prepare me for future work. The happiest thing I did during the four years was to have attended many clubs: the drama club, the movie club and the books club, etc. I communicated a lot with people who had common interests with me and even participated in making a movie by ourselves. The movie was about a college student coming from a very poor area of China who had to work on night shifts to earn living expenses. His younger sister quitted school and entered into marriage in order to lessen the burden on his family. However, his interest in liberal arts contradicted with what he learned as a major and with his parents’ hope for him to prosper. He experienced disillusionment after the literary journal he founded was closed down for lack of capital and under censorship. He quitted school at last.
It was quite impressive to me that in my own class, there was a student as miserable as the character in that movie, but in another way. She experienced great anxiety before examinations and blamed herself a lot for not doing well in exams. A daughter of a middle school headmaster and younger sister of a multinational company employee, she worked very hard in order to live up to the expectation of her family members. Yet no matter how hard she tried, she failed to pass many exams, let alone earning any scholarships. I tried to help her to ease herself by talking with her many times for hours, but it never worked. Her situation worsened with every passing day and she had to visit psychiatrists and take medicines frequently.
Work
After graduation, I first became a translator, then an editor. Now I have worked for almost three years. I have often kept in my mind the idea of making some solid contribution to the well being of citizens in our community and society. Although I’ve just heard of the word “social work” quite recently, it seized me immediately after I found out its nature and purpose. Social work, by its nature, is a very practical specialization, by which I wish to settle those problems I have encountered, or witnessed in my former experiences and even more in the future. I want to possess the professional skills of social work in order to enable people I care to develop their full potential, enrich their lives and prevent them from dysfunction.
Reason for interest in this course
By definition, the social work profession promotes social change, problem solving in human relationships and the empowerment and liberation of people to enhance well-being. In my former experiences, I have encountered and witnessed many problems such as people’s relation with the nature, the frustration and anxiety people experience in a cosmopolitan environment, the contradiction between people’s own will and that of their families, or the erosion of relationship between people, etc. Since I have always kept in my mind the idea of making some solid contribution to the well being of citizens in our community and society, I want to take the course of social work to possess necessary professional skills to help people I care to develop their full potential, enrich their lives, and prevent them from dysfunction.
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