(Written by a freshman at the University of Macao)

          With the help of a friend of my parents, I made contact with a volunteer tutor in America almost three years ao and began to practice writing articles.  We communicate by e-mail, and most of the time I write on weekends.  One or two days after I send an article, I receive a response with corrections and advice.  During those years, I published an article in an American multicultural magazine named Skipping Stones and was also able to practice speaking in English during the conversations we had by phone.

          During this process, I found that it was becoming much easier to express myself in English, and I always wanted to share my excitement with my family and friends.  I told them that I'd found a good tutor who was making my writing skills boom.  Sometimes I'd talk about my stories with them to get their advice, and invariably they'd say something like "Are you really writing all this in English?"

          From their surprise, it was obvious that the classmates I talked with needed help.  Students in China study English, but they don't read enough English articles, and it's very difficult for them to write freely about what they're thinking.  As that was the case, I began talking with them about what they might do in order to begin writing sentences in English, and they were so serious in the way they went about it that I began having the wonderful feeling called happiness.

          It was challenging to squeeze in that work in my busy life at the university.  I have to read a great deal in all my courses, and helping others meant that I had to reduce my study time.  In addition, it wasn't just a matter of telling them about my experience with a tutor, I had to help them improve their writing so that their grades would improve.

          My mother suggested that I should be paying more attention to my own studying, but I continued to work with other students.  In order to provide the time for it, I listed learning strategies for each course and got up an hour earlier.  I found a quiet restaurant at the university where I could do necessar reading in the early morning and a corner of the library where I could review my courses every evening.  My times for studying became more effective so that I would have time to work with others.

          Recently I helped a classmate get a good mark on a presentation at his English class.  He had drafted an article about touring abroad, and over three days we spent four hours editing it.  In order to help him feel the pride of authorship, I encouraged him to tell me in English what he wanted to include in his article, and then we corrected the sentences and improved the vocabulary.  I did all of this with him in the same way that my American tutor had helped me.

          When his presentation in class was followed by applause, both he and I were very pleased, and I knew I hadn't wasted my time.

          There must be some kind of fantastic power within me that forces me to help others.  I've probably always had it, but it has become much stronger through working with my American tutor.