集「名校寫手」、「業界菁英」與「總主筆」於一身的『第一寫手張良計』
他的經典作品，與市面上留學顧問公司的文件，又有什麼不同？
「周杰倫」與歌曲「雨下一整晚」，也能融入Essay，橫掃美國各大學？！
・Learning violin was a torture to a child like me: I pulled the bow dispiritedly, just like the cow ploughing fields. What’worse, when my teacher assigned me to play “Ode to New Year“ in our new year’s concert, I felt like being struck by a lighting.
After the ruthless verdict, I forced myself to practice the song. The notes on the stave were like shackles; the sound from my violin wes like execution ropes. I was tortured by repeating these meaningless physical movements.
In a rainy night, I couldn’t bear with the practice anymore. I turned on radio and watched raindrops outside. ”Rainy Night”, a song composed by Jay Chou, was aired. I sang along with my idol and was soothed by the euphonious melody. Suddenly, a whim slipped into my mind. I grabbed my violin and managed to play this song. Sadly, the sound was like horse wail. One hour later, nevertheless, I heard my violin “singing” the lyrics:
"There is a lonely warmth in the window, under the street lamp. Exhale air to the window. It’s your face " Followed my last note, a feeling of contentment filled up my heart.
『台灣第一的張良計』，就可以。
・Since that night, I kept playing “Rainy Night”. At first, I just replayed the song. Afterward, I harmonized the song with my self-made melodies. I also replaced the song’s chords with Dmi6 or Ami9 and played around these “new” song spiritedly, to the extent that my mother asked: “Where is your ‘ode’?”
After my “three-month sentence”, the concert came. I played the “Ode“ in our auditorium. At the end of this song, however, I added FA and SI into the pentatonic scale, and turned the “Ode” into ”Rainy Night”. I could hear countless gasps in the auditorium and students singing:
"There is a lonely warmth in windows…under street lamp…" a familiar feeling of contentment, again, filled in my heart.
Since the rainy night, violin has become my buddy. It teaches me “happiness lies in ‘creation’, not ‘imitation’”; besides, before we can “improvise” in life, we have to work assiduously just like the cow ploughing the fields.
Essay有點「中二」、有點「青澀」，還能變出老美愛看的青春無敵、熱血故事？
・ In 201X, eight top students in math at our school, including me, were selected to participate in the APON math competition. Since this competition was my best chance to showcase my quantitative skill and get a ticket to study robotics in top engineering schools in US, I volunteered to serve as team leader.
Unexpectedly, the entire team were indifferent to the contest. Seeing this problem, I secretly persuaded my teacher to hold an intra-school competition. When our teacher announced the scores, our team beat the runner up by one question only.
Afterward, I said to the team: "By this performance. we better dismissed the ‘varsity’. If we still want winning the prize, let’s organize three training sessions plus a competition per week!” Everyone nodded with shame. "Also, we need a CAPTAIN, the CHAMPION in our school and our eight weekly competitions” I said, and noticed the look of Tommy, our “top gun”, was different.
『台灣第一的張良計』，就可以。
It seemed like everyone didn’t care about their rankings, but it was not. Tommy often was the first place and others spotted the third place alternatively. Because we needed everyone and Tommy in particular to pull his weight for the team, I technically failed myself and made Tommy our captain.
"CAPTAIN, can we count on you?" I asked Tommy. You could see pride in his eyes.
One night, our mood was so low that I suggested: "Let’s play basketball! Best-of-seven wins! The losers will buy meals". I teased Tommy and said: "Afraid of me!?" He shouted back: "Nonsense!" That night, we played until exhausted. We looked at the sky of Beijing, and for the first time, we felt like “a team”.
On the competition day, seeing countless nation-leading talents in the venue made us uneasy. The team turned to me. I said: "Well, it’s a math competition, not a Chinese test, write down numbers, not words; second, see you guys in basketball court tonight. I’ll blast you out ~" Everyone laughed out.
Though we only attained top 20 in the end, I will never forget such a life-changing experience of leading a team from “bottom” to “top” 20.
「施比受有福」，這麼LKK的俗諺，還能創造出美麗的故事、感動美國名校？
Watching my daddy’s back through the emergency room window, the question “why he always chooses working rather than accompanying me?” filled my thought. When he appeared again in the office, I could not hold my question anymore. Though with guilt in his eyes, he answered me: ”Giving is better than receiving. Always ‘give’ when you can.” To a fourteen-year-old boy fond of father, this answer was frustrating and beyond my age.
It was not until an impromptu trip to Okhaldhunga, Nepal, that I realized the wisdom behind this proverb. Initially, it was Nepal’s mysterious cultures that attracted me to participate in the information session of this volunteer program. After knowing the harsh living conditions of this village, however, I hesitated. Such a dilemma eventually came to an end, as my deep-rooted curiosity about Nepal outweighed my worries and concerns.
The mission of this trip was to lay the foundation for locals’ future education by teaching them English. In the beginning, I thought I could communicate with my students well in English and my broken Nepalese, but nothing came out as planned. The language barrier slowed down the progress of my teaching significantly. To enhance teaching efficiency, I asked my students to teach me Nepalese instantaneously, while I was teaching them English. Surprisingly, they were extremely excited and enthusiastic.
台灣第一的張良計，就可以。
Gradually, as our language skills both improved, we started having more profound interactions. In one of my classes, I asked about their future dreams. When many of them stammered out: ” me, like you, teach people!”, I was stupefied. Their words created ripples in my heart. Suddenly, what my daddy taught me in the emergency office surfaced in my mind. And this time, the subtle wisdom of “giving is better than receiving” was no more obscure, but crystal clear.
Bearing with me the “spirit of giving”, “connections with people” and “reward of love”, I stepped on my return journey. In my later pursuit of science, what would distinguish me from other scientists is probably not technical depth, but the way I live up to this time-honored proverb ”giving is better than receiving”
＊ 善意提醒各位好朋友，本文屬張良計智慧財產，未經授權，請勿任意使用，以免侵犯智慧財產權。
