Givology - give to learn, learn to give

Funny enough, I was born May 10, 1995, the year of the Pig. I’ve always despised the fact that I wasn’t born in the year of the Monkey, and instead, I get the Pig. If I was born in the year of the Monkey, how lovely that would be! I would have the powers of the famous Monkey King (like in the fairy tales – Journey to the West), taking my weapons and journeying to the Far West. When I encounter creepy creatures and villains, I would defend my people against them like a true hero. I would be mighty and invincible, and I could answer any riddle. If I had such special powers, how wonderful that would be. Sigh.

But I was born in the year of the Pig. Some people say that means I am gluttonous and lazy animal with big, flapping ears and a long, ugly snout. Anyway, people would tell me that I am unable to speak clearly, am as dumb as a pig… so dumb, that I can’t even answer simple questions. Some would say I’m a big, fat pig. I get negative comments all the time, even right in my ear. I would be so angry and upset, but what good does that do?! I can’t change people’s prejudices, biases. I can only internalize and take it all in and mask all desires for revenge.

My personality is very fiery. For example, if people insult me, even if they are twice my size, I will still fight them until the end. Or if I am trying to solve a difficult word problem and someone bothers me, whether they are a classmate or a friend or even someone older in age than I, I would still tell them to go away. Sometimes, people call me a stubborn cow.

More positive aspects of my personality exist, but I have some bad qualities. I’ll give another example. One time, my teacher passed out the exams. When I perused the questions, I thought to myself: these look easy, and I can definitely get 100 if I am careful not to make any mistakes. I only used 50 minutes to finish all the questions. I began to check my work, one time after another. I was just waiting until the end of the exam after that. After 5 more minutes, the bell rang, and I happily turned in my exam, hoping my teacher would notice it.

Next morning, I walked into class, only to be greeted by my teacher. She had an expression on her face that was unprecedented, and she announced, “This time, people did great!” But she joked that someone forgot to fill out his Class number at the top. It turns out, I got a 98, and that careless student was me. I lost 2 point for not writing in the Class number in my exam book. I was pretty upset. I lost a perfect score because I forgot to write in one simple thing.
I definitely learned my lesson.
My family is enduring hard circumstances so I could be at school, and I mess up the simple stuff. I need to be more careful! I need to be more careful!

Another story. I was with my math teacher gave us word programs, that would challenge everyone. So he wrote the problem onto the black board. Classmates were all jumping to grab their pens and notebooks to copy it down. I didn’t have a good pen, as mine broke, and I had to wait. The student with a pen was sitting too far for me to lean over to ask. I was frantic, but I still waited. After a while, the teacher made an announcement, “there are 6 questions total, not too many. I hope everyone can finish them tonight and hand them in tomorrow!” Then, he turned around and left. I thought to myself, “oh thank goodness! He didn’t keep monitoring us, else I would be in trouble!” I was quite thankful.