2025年1月1日
Happy New Year to all of you. I wish you well in this new year, and the soon-to-come year of the snake. King Ling students return to school to their first two-week exam this school year. I am sure it is difficult for Form 1 students, and may be equally difficult for some Form 2 students. The revising routines must be different from primary school to secondary school. I don’t want to be too harsh on students, but classroom learning creativity is limited with different regulations, outcomes, and concerns to worry about. It is the application of the knowledge learned in everyday life that counts. The everyday wisdom, the personal flair of perseverance and integrity, and the personal attributes of simplicity and diligence count.
It was as though students spent their Christmas holiday for revising the first term exam, then they go over the scripts for the next week or so before they welcome the Chinese New Year holidays. How often do we consider the origins of the festivals or holidays that we keep enjoying?
In Hong Kong, most holidays become shopping mall festivals. We find reasons the celebrate in the form of meals. We spend more time with friends, rather than family members. This is something to think about. It was as though we treasured friends more than family members. But I don’t think this is true; we seem to spend more time with friends because we know family members are always there for us. True, we might have taken them for granted, but it is the trust in family members, those we always turn for help, that makes us take them for granted.
Once we realise why we spend less time at home, we can balance our focus. At the beginning of this new year, let’s make a resolution and spend more time with family members: 10% more in the first quarter, 20% more in the next, something like that. Even at dinner, we can spend more time chatting about the day, and improve the quality time at home. If we understand what parents or children face in their daily life more, we will be able to appreciate the difficulty they face, their ups and downs, and be able to support them when help is required.
Anson Yang