Hi friends!! This Lily (Yiwen Wang), a graduate from Luwan High School over two years ago. I’m now in the third year of my Bachelor of Music at Queens University. I am here to talk about my life, mostly academically, here overseas.

I was lucky enough to be accepted by the School of Music, but this is really a challenging new start for me. Language pronunciation might be the biggest challenge for me. So as to sing better in English, I have been trying to put myself into the environment by literally not speaking Chinese any more. My English speaking has in fact improved. That has also been a way for me to build up a “second home” here with people around me. Being the only Chinese student in the entire school, I have so many chances to speak English with my Canadian friends that I don’t even want to go back to speaking Chinese anymore. So don’t feel weird if I you see me next time only speaking English at Luwan. I really want to encourage you to speak as much English as possible at Luwan. It will not only be good for your language exams, but you are also going to become a better English speaker before you know it!

I have really been helped by many of my friends as well as my professors. The first year music theory course, for instance, wasn’t too hard for me as I had some theory background before coming to Queens. But still, the course wasn’t easy at all. Thankfully, my professor ran tutorial sessions and helped us with assignments himself. Other than that, for my other courses, I found that office hours helped as well. It is too bad that I didn’t have time to go every time, but I always got concepts clarified whenever I went. I have heard that, in many other departments, it is only teaching assistants (TAs) that run tutorial sessions rather than the professor(s) themselves.

On campus, I have a lot of opportunities to perform and contribute. I love being busy all the time; and I am happy to be busy working on something I like. This past August, I got a chance to go to Herstmonceux Castle, located in England, for a two-week summer drama program. I was interested, but hesitated because it meant I would have to complete all my assignments prior to my trip. Having that in mind, I still chose to do it as this program really attracted me and right now I am pleased that I went because the acting skills that I learned during the rehearsals really applied well to the course Opera Ensemble. I know that most of you likely aren’t going into either the drama or music departments for your post-secondary education, but my point here is really to use your elective credit spaces to try the courses that you are really interested in taking, as chances are you are going to discover a path for your real future.

It is good to be excited about everything at the beginning of the school year, but I always find it hard to persist, especially towards the end of the term. I have been trying to keep myself busy by getting myself involved with many things, and tired myself out as a result. I’m still seeking a good balance of life. The most important reason I chose this major, other than being able to get adequate rest, is that I have passion for it. This kind of positive reminder is definitely the main source of my motivation to keep going. It’s nice to be excited and willing to do everything, but don’t ever stress yourselves out because you have given yourselves too much to do.

Okay, it is probably time to end this now. It would really take a little book for me to talk about everything. Good luck with the final month of your semester!!! Again, it’s probably hard to keep going but, you guys got it!!!!