The Second World

I can listen, but I am a dumb person; I can sing, but I am a deaf person; I can walk, but I cannot go anywhere! Nothing was worse than staying in this situation. However, I did. Since I immigrated to the U.S., I have lost myself. When the plane was landing in the U.S., I was holding a pen, looking at the entrance form in a language which came from another world. I couldn’t breathe for a while because I had only filled in my name. I knew I had become a dumb person at that moment. I gave up filling in that interesting form. However, when I was in the entrance, I found out I became a deaf person, too. I couldn’t understand what the immigration officer was asking me until my aunt translated it into Chinese me. Moreover, when we were going back home, I saw all the road signs were changed to the same language that I saw in the entrance form. I knew I was able to register a disability certificate. In the face of different schooling style, misunderstood language, and, no friends, I decided to melt into this country as soon as I could.


The first week when I arrived to the U.S., some immigrants asked me an interesting question: “Have you cried a lot since you arrived here?” And then they told me they all cried because they felt uncomfortable since they arrived in the U.S. However, I decided to start my schooling life here instead of keeping crying at home. I enjoyed the schooling life in China, sitting with the same people for the full four calendar years, waiting for different teachers to come to our classroom following the same schedule, and leaving all exercise books in our own drawer. When a new semester began, all text books were ordered in school, and also we could write them and kept them. It was totally different in the U.S. Before the classes began, we had to spend extra amount of money on all the text books. Even though you were able to get second hand books from somewhere else, you still couldn’t just desert them in your locker or used your ink pens to take notes on it. They were all resalable after the course finish. All students follow their major to take courses, choose their favorite daily schedule and professor, and go to the different classroom to attend courses. I almost lost myself when my first semester began.


Going through all the language problem was the key to starting my new life successfully, and it was also the basic requirement to melt into the U.S. society. My major was Business English when I was in China and I have learned it over three years. I have learned a lot of vocabulary from my major course when I was in school. However, I could say I have learned nothing. I returned all the knowledge I have learned after graduated. The reason that I didn’t learn English well because Chinese students didn’t have much chance to practice English. It was easy to forget what you have learnt if you didn’t practice English frequently. At the same time when I arrived into the U.S., I was turned into the “English Channel”. The courses I have taken, the text books I have bought, and almost every classmate I have met in the school was using English. It was hard to change all the things by using second language suddenly; however, I have learned much English in the U.S. than I was in China.


The other important step to melt into the U.S. society was making friends for myself. Friends were very important to me. They were even more important than my family because we stayed with each other almost six days a week. I remembered the years when we still lived in the dorm; we always sat around with each other, talking about every topic in the world, and we went everywhere as pairs. Regretfully, I lost contact with my Chinese friends since I immigrated to the U.S. because we have a big timing gap. There was thirteen hours and fourteen hours difference between China and the U.S. I have found and tried my best to keep in touch with them, but when I called, they were either taking course or sleeping. It was really difficult to find the balance in the timing gap, so I have lost communication with them. Every time when I felt unhappy, I didn’t have any friend who was as close as my Chinese friends to share my emotions. My friends here mostly come from other countries; sometimes we couldn’t get closer with each other because our language was different. I always told myself, it probably was a good way to practice my speech when we talk with each other.



As the old Chinese saying:” How many things you earned, how many things you lost.” The equal value of immigrating to the U.S. is starting every thing from zero. All new immigrants are new born babies since they arrive in the U.S. Even though it is hard to make transition from one society to another, we have choices for our life. You can either choose to play a deaf, or a person who can speak fluently English with others. I have chosen to be a part of American. I was not good in English; I felt difficult when I talked to my friends who came from different counties; I tried. I tried to do my best to learn more English from school and from the U.S. society. Which role do you want to play? Just start moving your step and explore your second language right now!