Just can't get enough

Just can't get enough
By Hailey Au

Ling is a 17 year-old girl from Hong Kong. She had a lot family pressures about her study. Her story happened two years ago, when the Hong Kong government decided to change the education system. She was one of the first students that followed the new system. After a year, she has to take a very important test to graduate from high school and go to college.

She had pressures to study because she was one of the first students who followed the new system; everything was new for her, even for the teachers. When everything became strange, Ling thinks this year was the hardest year in her school life.

However, while she was having a difficult studying, her parents didn’t support her at all. They only gave her a lot of pressures. Her parents are builders; they owned a small company. They bought property from scratch; they also had a very difficult time when they were young. Ling’s parents thought her brother and her were lucky because they were born at the right time. Her parents also thought her brother and her had responsibility to get good grade on their study. They never praised Ling when she did a good job, but if she didn’t get a good grade, they would add insult to injury. Every time when her parents were being mean to her, she felt sad and became depressed for a few days. Fortunately, she had a brother who understood and inspired her.

On the other hand, she made a plan to get a good grade and make her parents feel proud of her results. She went to sleeps at 1 a.m. every night because she bought a lot of extra exercise books for every subject. She woke up at 5 a.m. or even earlier to review her homework and test books. Saturday and Sunday were relaxed for her, but she had a tutoring teacher help her on her homework at 8 or 10 a.m., sometime she would goes to the library by herself. She didn’t have enough rest, but she thought she was not smart enough to finish the homework very quickly and she needs more time to study, so that she can have a good grade.

She thought her pressures could push her to work harder, but in a very negative way. She felt frustrated because her parents never cared how hard she had worked; they just want to see a good grade on her report card.

People make Ling feels like a failure; she always felt bad about herself and their words. But their words are not strong enough to bring her down, because those people are not meaningful to her. On the other hand, her parents always made her feels like a failure. She was wondering why her parents can’t pay attention to her work. Even they are busy on earning more money, why they can’t spend a few minutes on her? She was extremely sad because of this.

However, she has fear when she thought about overcoming her pressures. She didn’t want to make a plan to solve the problems that she had between her parents, because she thought that her brain had no room for problems other than studying.

Therefore, she wanted to study in university very badly, because she worked very hard but still can’t get what she wants. Ling thought that she would commit suicide because of failing her dream to get to the college.

Fortunately, Ling had friends that could support her, and one of those friends is me. Seven months ago, a month before she left Hong Kong, she called me at 4 a.m. She was crying because she had a problem with her parent again. Then, I took a taxi to find her and pick her up to take her to my home. We talked a lot at that night, she loves me a lot, and I love her too.

Ling told me a story about her parents treated her brother last year in July, her brother received his result of the test to go to college. He worked very, very hard on it, and he almost made himself crazy. Unfortunately, he didn’t pass.  Ling’s brother locked himself in his bedroom. Ling told her parents not to mention anything about college in front of him, but they just blurted it out when they got mad. Ling tried to stop them, but her parents yelled at her and said she had no right to talk to them. They told her, she is trash too. Ling was dumbfounded; she was too sad to talk. A moment later, her brother held her hand and ran out of the door. They didn’t go home the whole night. She called me at 2 a.m. and asked me for help, because her brother was drunk. When I saw them in the park, her brother was crying. Ling knew that it was good for her brother to cry, at least he could release some of the negative emotions, but she can’t. She could only hear her parents’ word repeating over and over in her mind. This was horrible.

Luckily, she doesn’t want to commit suicide now, because I told her that people never solve problems by suicide. It is just an attempt escape from their problem and these people are loser. After I told her that, she thought twice at home. Finally, she realized her thought were ridiculous and she will try to become brave and mature, and face her family problems.