Xiao Hua Issue 18

XIAO HUA

校話

18 | JUNE ’18

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CONTENTS

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XIAO HUA EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Ryan Chiao MANAGING EDITOR Angelina Wang HEAD OF ADMINISTRATION Hannah Guo HEAD OF BUSINESS Elysia Ye Staff Cheryl Ting

FEATURES EDITOR Katherine Wu Reporters Jaspar Chan, Ian Choi, Katherine Yang, Emily Xia, Josephine Yip, Francisca Lam, Kaitlyn Wells, Eugenie Ahn NEWS EDITOR Catherine Ding Reporters Shannan Liu, Chih Ning Kuo, Phyllis Lam, Jacqueline Ho, Raghav Goyal, Tiffany Ng, Eugenia Chow CHINESE EDITOR Justin Ngai Reporters Ophelia Sung, Calvin Gu, Stephanie Sze, Elaine Hua, Jennifer Zhang, Larina Cong, Joyce Jiang, Christy Tang, Faith Lee, Jocelyn Kwok SPORTS EDITOR Isaac Um Reporters Indya Steains, Alex Okita, Rahul Melwani, Michelle Keoy, Stephanie Kung DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY Xavier Banson Photographers Karen Chan, Cheryl Ting, Lara Carolan, Eloise Oliver, Ethan Chen, Isaac Yee, Chih Ning Kuo, Evelyn Kwan, Philippa Yuen DIRECTOR OF ILLUSTRATIONS Kristen Wong Illustrators Adam Wang, Catarina Jacobelli, Bertha Ho, Gabrielle Hioe, Tracy Lee, Ashley Tuen

DIRECTOR OF LAYOUT Gioia Cheung Layout Designers Stephanie Kung, Gabrielle Hioe, Jocelyn Kwok, Vanessa Chan, Bertha Ho, Whitney Deng, Colin Huang, Elysia Ye, Tienne Ip

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MANAGING EDITOR

ANGELINA WANG

XAVIER BANSON

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY

KATHERINE WU

FEATURES EDITOR

“Who are we, who is each one of us, if not a combinatoria of experiences, information, books we have read, things imagined?” — Italo Calvino

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I’m amazed by all of the improvements made by my team this issue.

I have had the privilege of seeing them grow both as photographers and as people. This role has taught me countless lesson on how to lead, take better photos and provide support; it’s been a truly amazing ride.

I’m really proud of all of the photos this issue, hope you enjoy!

This year in Xiao Hua has been truly remarkable. As the final brainchild from the Editorial Board of 201718, Issue 18 was a joy to create from conceptualization to realization. I bid my sincere thanks to every person that expounded any ounce of effort to the genesis of this collective work. Finally, I thank Xiao Hua for being a formative cornerstone to my growth as a writer, as an editor, and as a part of a phenomenal community.

All the illustrators working on this edition demonstrated considerable amounts of skill, talent and motivation. A surplus of quality material was produced during the making of Xiao Hua 18, and all those who worked under this, and all other departments should be incredibly proud of themselves for accomplishing such a feat.

Another school year has gone by, and with it, two new issues of Xiao Hua, the latest being this Issue 18.

Despite having some ups and downs throughout the year, the entire Xiao Hua team pulled through by collaborating with each other, producing quality content, and by placing so much time and effort into this issue. I am honoured to have worked alongside such talented and hardworking members of our CIS community, and am excited for what the future of Xiao Hua may bring.

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EDITORIAL BOARD

DIRECTOR OF LAYOUT DIRECTOR OF ILLUSTRATIONS HEAD OF ADMINISTRATION

GIOIA CHEUNG KRISTEN WONG HANNAH GUO

This year we’ve decided to change Xiao Hua’s style and layout! The whole layout team has worked extremely hard on creating a cohesive and simplistic design for this issue, we hope you enjoy!

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E-sports is the future.

SPORTS EDITOR

ELYSIA YE

BUSINESS ASSOCIATE

ISAAC UM

(It’s been a great two years!)

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Working in Xiao Hua Issue 18 has been one of my best experiences this year. The role of a business associate has really helped me grown by strengthening my persistence and improving my communication. I am extremely thankful for all of our Xiao Hua members, since they were the ones who provided help when I first joined and had little to no experience in similar fields. I am excited for what I am able to provide Xiao Hua in the upcoming issues next year.

CHINESE EDITOR NEWS EDITOR

CATHERINE DING

JUSTIN NGAI

切記：多讀書，多看報，少吃零 食，多睡覺。

This year, Xiao Hua has been an exciting part of my academic life and I hope it’s representative of the CIS spirit. This magazine is truly a platform for conscientious students brimming with creativity and individuality. Despite the challenges of putting together such an ambitious magazine, the process has been incredibly fulfilling. This current issue is a testament to everyone’s hard work, so I hope you enjoy it, CIS!

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EDITOR’S LETTER

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As the longest-running bilingual magazine at CIS, tradition forms a crucial part of our identity. As a result, Xiao Hua has largely looked the same on the outside, diverging from the rapidly changing content within. For our eighteenth issue, the Editorial Board has decided to strive to redefine ourselves. The layout of the magazine (most noticeably the cover) has been beautifully redesigned with an eye for simplicity. Through an increase in the depth and number of the Chinese articles, we’ve tried to reestablish contact with our bilingual roots. All in all, we’ve decided to respect and acknowledge our foundations, while simultaneously building upon them.

ing to formulate both a cause and solution to the problem. In ‘What Was Important: Excavating the Artifacts of a CIS Education’, ex-Head Girl Yi-Ling Liu (’13) rummages through her old school work, taking a retrospective look at her time at CIS, evaluating what really was important to her after all these years.

In Issue 18, we chose to draw inspiration from within our community; events close to our lives, topics of interest, as well as arising points of discussion.

As the current Editorial Board publishes its last issue of the academic year, we can say with confidence that we are proud of how far we have come. Our only wish is that in the years to come, future generations of Xiao Hua will continue to innovate, building upon years of hard work.

Ian Choi (’19), in “School Spirit in CIS”, investigates the state of spirit within CIS, discussing the unfortunate undeniable apathetic nature of the (senior) student body towards house events, while simultaneously attempt-

宋穎臻（‘20）提取她來漢基前在本 地學校的經歷來與現在的經歷做出 精巧的對比，也討論了兩個學制給 自的利與弊。湯淑棋（‘20）有創意 地從一個經濟學的角度切入探討了 富裕的物質生活是不是最美好的生 活呢？畢竟：「錢不是萬能的，但 沒有錢卻萬萬不能。」

Happy reading, Ryan Chiao Editor-in-Chief

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FACULTY LETTER

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Dear CIS Community, First of all, I would like to thank and congratulate Ryan Chiao and his remarkable team of student journalists, photographers, and editors for their exceptional hard work and commitment in producing another wonderful edition of Xiao Hua. It is a privilege to contribute in a small way via the Faculty Letter.

Over the past couple of weeks (7-18 May 2018), the Secondary School has been much quieter than usual, what with almost 500 members of our community travelling to Kunming, Yantai, and Yangshuo for the Year 7-9 CEP trips. The Year 12 and 13 students have been busy writing their end of year, and DP examinations, while the Year 10 and 11 students were engaged in Arts Week and the Hong Kong Experience Programme Week.

Experiential learning has always been a key component of any educational system worth its salt. One of the main purposes of the Year 7-9 trips to China, and the Arts and HKEP activities for the Year 10 and 11 students, is to provide our students with experiences and challenges which will, ideally, take them out of their comfort zone at times, and engage them in learning by doing, as well as learning by teaching each other.

Whether it’s our Year 7 students interacting with and teaching three and four year olds at a Kindergarten in Kunming, or our Year 8s and their kite making, pottery, calligraphy and puppet show activities, all in Putonghua, in Yantai, or our Year 9s rock climbing, caving, and cooking in Yangshuo, these are all experiences that our students will learn from and remember for years to come.

Consisting of workshops, taster classes, trips and the opportunity to work in depth with professional

Arts practitioners, Year 10 and 11 students fed their curiosity and immersed themselves in the Arts for a full school week. This allowed students the chance to stretch their creative muscles and provide the time to contemplate the nature of innovation through a myriad (25 to be exact) of exciting Arts experiences which included; Art and Wellness/ Mandalas, Art Journaling, Upcycle and Sculpt-Off!, Watercolour Introduction, Animal Portraiture, Welcome to the Jungle (Madagascar - Primary Production set design), Skate and Surf Board Design, Furniture Jamming, Activist Art, Snap Story, Fly Me To The Moon (aerial/drone cinematography), 48 Hour Film Challenge, swing dancing, Musical Theatre Workshop, Big Band Blow Out, Perfect Pitch (a capella singing workshop), HipHop K-Pop dancing, Songwriting Workshop, Character Voicing, From Stage To Film Acting, and Chamber Music Party.

As the Head of Arts, Ms. Alison Wong wrote to the students at the end of the week, “The Arts demands that we engage with the world - why do activists make art? How do films make us question our cultural identity? Yet the Arts also requires us to dig deep within ourselves - to know our bodies and how they move, but also how to be brave and to be vulnerable, through acting and dance, when all eyes are on you.”

In the following week, Year 10 and 11 students were offered the chance to work on a service component of HKEP from one of the following five strands: Combating Fake News, Environmental Protection, Inequality, Gender Equality Now and Human Rights. A number of trips the students engaged in were; a Plastics Reduction Challenge Workshop via the Jane Goodall Institute, a cage home visit with Society of Community Organisation, an Impact Hong Kong Kindness Walk in Taik Kok Tsui, a Packaging Free Tooth-

paste Workshop at the Lung Fu Shan Environmental Centre, serving at a Soup Kitchen for refugees via Christian Action, and a service workshop from Asociación de Mujeres de Habla Hispana. We also welcomed visiting keynote speakers such as; Jo Ruxton, the producer of “A Plastic Ocean” documentary, Kristie Lu Stout, CNN anchor, on the #MeToo movement and women’s rights, a panel discussion on “The Helper” documentary about domestic workers’ rights in Hong Kong, and the Reverend Kenneth Bae, a Korean-American Evangelical Christian Missionary who was detained in North Korea for over two years.

It goes without saying that experiential learning is a vital component for all of us in terms of our development and learning, and perhaps this is especially the case for a teacher.

If you have any doubts about this, just ask a CEP leader who has overseen the checking in of 147 eleven and twelve year olds, as well as 20 teachers, at Hong Kong International Airport, what they learned from the experience. They will have a tale to tell...

We are all extremely fortunate to learn in an environment such as CIS. Let’s embrace the opportunities we have, and learn through doing and teaching each other.

All the best, Chris Caves

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CONTENTS Photography by Xavier Banson

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VOICES

EDITORIAL

Interview with Chef Callum

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An Insider’s Look at MYP

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Interview with Alumni Cindy Wang

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Breaking Classroom Barriers

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Movie Review: Pseudo Secular

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The Rise of Artificial Intelligence

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淺講周星馳

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其實讀書是幸福的

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語言暴力

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School Spirit in CIS

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One Belt, One Road

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本地與國際學校 —— 我的個人經歷

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戰勝「拖延症」惡魔

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Get Hit? More Grit

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New Timetable: Dr Laszlo Varro

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SPORTS

LIFESTYLE

WFDF U24 Ultimate Worlds: Profiling

Sleep Is for the Weak

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Hot Bites: Hemingways

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10 Questions for Mr. Coyle

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簡評《三傻大腦寶萊塢》

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CIS學生的日常:怎樣做好時間管理

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CIS Alumni representing Hong Kong

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U20 Boys Basketball: A Reflection

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Sports Team Highlight: Badminton

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PARALLAX Spotlight

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CIS: A Division One Contender?

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“與神同行” 觀後感－在對的人身上找 錯的答案

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Battle of the Sexes

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FEATURES

GAMES Guess the CIS Poster & Sudoku

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Marvel Mania Crossword & Word

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Search

Bad & Bougie: Thinking Critically about

Game Answers

Charity

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Fashion Features

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富裕的物質生活是不是最美好的生活

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獲取知識不是通往成功的唯一途徑

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The Living Landscapes of Ethnic Minorities in Hong Kong

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What Was Important Excavating the Artifacts of a CIS Education

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Net Neutrality

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Party Culture

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LGBTQ & Deaf Culture

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PHOTOGRAPHY CONTEST Congratulations to Cheryl Ting, Colin Huang, and William Ma for winning Xiao Hua’s inaugural photography competition.

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WILLIAM MINGZE MA

COLIN HUANG

CHERYL TING

LET’S BE REAL

By Natalie Lin

STAFF ATTIRE IS INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT. NO MORE SHORTS AND T-SHIRTS. ONLY TROUSERS AND COLLARED SHIRTS. THIS IS OUR TOP PRIORITY.

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Divide

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OR

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Interviewer: Eugenia Chow | Photography by Eloise Oliver

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Known to build a friendly rapport with students while upgrading the quality of food in the cafeteria, Chef Callum recounts his experiences as head chef at CIS and the sacrifices he had to make along the way.

Why did you decide to work for Chartwells, and more specifically, for CIS? I’ve been working as a chef for over 11 years now, and I’ve seen a fair share of different kitchen environments. I’ve been in very high level restaurants from those with a Michelin star to five star hotels - but I’ve never really delved into schools, canteens, and other things like that. I just wanted to see what challenges were there, and especially in Hong Kong, in high level restaurants, the work to life ratio is not particularly healthy. It leads to very unhealthy minds and bodies, so I wanted a little break from that environment.

How does it differ: working at a school cafeteria? Is it more stressful?

Do you enjoy it more or less compared to working at a restaurant?

That’s a good question; it’s good to have an introspective look at that. I think it’s less stressful - there are demanding customers, but not as much as in some other restaurants. Also, there is less expectation - which is really nice. It means that you can have a bit more fun with the food without letting people down. I think working at a school is also more meaningful, because you’re actually feeding people who are learning, whereas in fancy restaurants, you usually get people who are going there because it’s a name of the restaurant, and they come here just to fill their bellies. There’s a lot of pressure for restaurants to put out display, to paint a picture and to really get something out of it, and it kind of starts to feel kind of hollow and meaningless.

But here, feeding people who are going to be the next generation, I feel like it’s a bit more meaningful that way.

How do you think you’ve improved the cafeteria menu? Or changed it?

Honestly, I ask myself that question everyday.

Well, I try to maintain basic standards of which all chefs would try to adhere to.

The chefs don’t all come from a strong background like I did, so I test the food, I taste the food everyday, to make sure that things are where they should be, not where the chefs think they should be. I think that’s the basic thing that I always try to do - making sure that the basic necessities are met through safety, and through flavour. I’ve also tried to make things a little more interesting as best I could with the limited tools I have. I do feel some people in the school seem to think we make millions and millions of Hong Kong dollars, and we have an unlimited amount of ordering, but what we can order is severely limited. So, it’s a little bit tricky when it comes to making choices.

Any interesting experiences with picky students?

There are a few very funny students we get: the main thing we always get is: “no vegetables, please”. That one is a constant - usually in primary. Then you’ve got guys, a few of them, who just want rice. And other ones who just ask for really annoying things: we’ll make japanese curries - a mixture of vegetables and meat - and some will say “I don’t want any carrots”. And you’re like, “Mate. Mate, it’s the sauce! There are like, 400 people behind you!”

What are your plans for the future?

Honestly, I feel nervous talking about it. My boss wants me to stay here, because my relationship with the school is usually pretty good. I think it’s very healthy here, I like this place, but it doesn’t fulfill what I personally want in a future. So, my honest plans are looking at something very different. Maybe starting my own small business in the future? Possibly, also moving to Australia in the future as well. It’s got a lot of things that I’m looking for in life: peacefulness (it’s sometimes not peaceful here), it’s an English speaking country so it’s quite easy to settle in there, the quality of life there is one of the highest in the world, it’s got fantastic food and produce, people are genuinely very

lovely, and you also have the different climates in the north and south of Australia that you can take advantage of. So, for me, it’s just a really lovely place. In Hong Kong, there are opportunities, just not as many as you think.

Do you have any advice for aspiring chefs in CIS? Yeah, don’t do it. Don’t do it unless you want to give up the majority of your young life - most of your twenties and that’s serious. If you want to be a top chef, if you want to be working at a Michelin star restaurant, pretty much all of your relationships will disappear.

You’ll have almost no money, and even if you have connections, you go in there thinking you’ll be an amazing chef, but you will be destroyed within minutes. A chef’s life is not easy; if you do a good job, that’s only what you’re supposed to do. It’s a really hard life, and all of these TV shows like Masterchef and stuff, they’re really just glamorising a very hard profession. One of the reasons why I’m quite happy being here, moving on with my life, is because a real kitchen will break you down faster than you’re able to deal with. You are not treated like a normal human being; if you want to have a typical weekend off and go see your granny - no, weekends are the busiest time for the kitchen. Valentines Day? You have to work all holidays! You don’t get holidays! So, if you’re willing to put all that on the line, then good luck to you! If not, you won’t really make it.

So is this a decision that you regret making?

For me, being a chef is something that I wanted to do; I thought it was the right thing to do at the time, and I don’t really have any regrets, because if I changed and did something else, it’d just be another thing that wasn’t right for me. At least I’ve got tools now that I can use anywhere! It’s about finding what’s right for you, and some people never find that. So having a regret about something is just a waste of time.

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INTERVIEW WITH ALUMNI CINDY WANG

By Chih Ning Kuo

Cindy graduated in the Class of 2017 and is well into her second semester at Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. A talented dancer and musician, Cindy has continued to pursue these interests while taking a double major and double minor in college.

Below she shares some nuggets of wisdom: Hi Cindy! Could you introduce yourself a bit?

Hey! I graduated CIS in 2017, I currently go to Penn and my interests mainly include dance and music! I do ballet and play the violin and basic piano. I am double majoring in finance and marketing, and double minoring in music and consumer psychology.

So you’ve been dancing for a while now, and has that carried on in college?

I actually joined two dance groups in my college- Penn Dance Company and Pan-Asian Dance Troupe. Typically people only dance in one at most, so it has definitely been a struggle to maintain my academic standards. It’s important to prioritise and time manage, but regardless there are still nights when I am working till 7am.

Do you ever have to compromise dance or other extra curricular activities for schoolwork?

Definitely, especially since Wharton is such an academic school and everyone’s first priority will always be school, there are times when I need to compromise. But even so, I get out as much as I put in organisations I’m involved in,

so being fully committed to other activities is also extremely important.

It certainly seems like you strike a good balance between school and extra-curricular life. Going into academics, since you go to the Wharton school, I take that you’re going to major in business. Has CIS prepped you well for what you’re studying now?

Right, so I am most likely doing a double concentration of Finance and Marketing at Wharton. CIS has definitely prepared me well.

The amount of workload in IB is very similar to college actually.

Aside from prepping me academically in terms of course content, the IB has also taught me important skills like how to be efficient with assignments, write long fullfledged written works in a short amount of time which has translated into my college experience.

Knowing the fundamentals of economics and calculus (I took Math HL and Econ SL) were instrumental to my relatively smooth transition to Penn. Because the IB is so thorough with the topics covered, it really facilitated my learning in the more basic, required courses.

sary. I would say that the difficult assignments in IB (such as IOCs and IOPs in English and Chinese Literature) really train and improve confidence and eloquence in speaking.

Public speaking is always tough, and becomes all the more daunting especially in a place where you are less familiar with everyone. Going in the same direction, what was your experience with making friends? Do you currently live in a dorm and has it been difficult to adjust to that lifestyle?

I would say that I am pretty close to my roommates, just because we see each other on a daily basis, but my closest friends are from my dance groups, especially PanAsian. It’s like the biggest support system family you can imagine.

One of my favourite moments was when I was accepted into PanAsian: all 35 people stood outside my door with a massive sign to welcome/initiate me and it was very heartwarming.

Is participation and public speaking skills required in college even more so than in CIS? I am the opposite of a confident speaker, but being at such a competitive school, if I don’t put myself out there, nothing in return.

So I am forced to go way out of our comfort zone when presenting, and be able to think on my feet and improvise when neces-

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Is there time outside of academics and activities for leisure and relaxation, and what do you do on weekends?

Free time is not a thing for me right now because I’m pledging a sorority. I am interested in Greek life and joining this sorority, so I go through this ritual known as ‘rush’.

‘Rush’ is a series of social events and gatherings and hope the members will accept me. What happens is you start by rushing a sorority and if they like you, you go onto a closed ‘rush’. Then the next step is that they extend a bid for some of the closed rushees, and if you accept the bid you become a pledgee where you essentially sell your soul for 10 weeks and try to not get kicked out. But prior to that, I went on bike rides along the river and went downtown to eat good food.

What attracted you to Greek life in the first place?

The main thing that made my ‘rush’ is the network that you get being in a certain sorority. Let’s say you apply to a job and someone along the line was also a sister, they will 100% pass you onto the next round.

But aside from that, the people, especially in my sorority, are extremely ambitious and leaders in various clubs, so it’s very inspirational.

The main point of an internship is to learn, so I would probably be exposed to all aspects of the company.

I would probably be keeping tabs with the operations or finances of the company with spreadsheets and charts.

Very cool! Moving away from that a bit, what are your thoughts on study abroad, what country is your dream study abroad destination?

Going into college I thought that I would study abroad in china at 北 大 (Peking University) for a semester to improve my Chinese, also because my grandfather went there.

But now being at Penn, it seems pretty unrealistic because there are too many requirements and courses that we need to take, especially since I double major and minor, so I don’t have the extra time to go. If I were to go, I would probably be in business.

What is the one thing all CIS students should know?

Embrace the CIS building structure and the requirement to run up and down 9 floors to all your classes, because when you are in college, you won’t get such a quad workout without thinking about it.

Speaking of jobs, are you involved in an internship?

I currently am not involved in an internship because I’m not an American citizen so by law I can’t.

If you could intern, what job would it be in?

So I would definitely intern in the operations side of a fashion company, like LVMH (Louis Vuitton) or Nordstrom. I think it is a great application of the business and operations I am currently studying about, but there’s a creative side to it and I don’t actually have to do consulting or investment banking.

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heavily on contemporary mutual comfort and intimacy Pseudo Secular (風景), directed seudo Secular (風景), directed by cuses local by local filmmaker and activist life in Hong Kong, focusing on they both find with each other. a succinct and the socio-economic problems For most of the movie, Ah Yi perc Hui, is is perhaps one of the one r and activist RitaRitaHui, perhaps of the providing most politically loaded movies faced by its characters as they remains in prison, and the intenthe social, political, and cultu tically loaded movies out innavigate 2016. their way through life. sity of her resentment and fury to come to out come in 2016. Pseudo of the Kong towards her situation manifests Secular did not feature at reg- Through its presentation Hong today. ecular did not feature at regular screenings ular screenings across cinema experiences of the characters, in acrimonious diatribes against movie explores its various theThe objects film of her ire: biaschains in Hong Kong; instead, the isthecentred ar ema chains in Hong Kong; instead, smallsmall-scale screenings were in- themes, providing a succinct edness of the justice system, the characters. is a despo and perceptive commentary on cynicismTai of herCho parole officer, termittently hostedhosted at universi- at enings were intermittently ties and independent venues, as the social, political, and cultural the unfettered brutality of the dropout frustrated with the hy es and independent venues, well challenges as a few facing Hong Kong police, the weasel words of the well as a few online as broadcasts Democratic Party—andOnce above a pri organised by activist groups. today. of modern society. oadcasts organised by activist groups. A all her helplessness and irreleA sprawling 176-minute-long disillusionment politics b The film is centred around a few vance in her own with incarceration. the movie deals 176-minute-longundertaking, undertaking, the movie with the social and political main characters. Tai Cho is a following theofjailing of his gir h the social and political tribulations that youth, a university The issues mainlandisation tribulations that befell Hong despondent the hy- and xenophobia examined develo over the past decade, with dropout frustrated with protest.

Tai Cho areslowly ng Kong over theKong past decade, important segments of thewith film pocrisy and inhibitions of mod- through the character Li Lei, ern the society. Once a principled an immigrant from the mainthe occupation Yi’s mother, Wan, a purposele segments of the centred film around centred around of the plaza beneath the HSBC activist, his disillusionment land, via her encounters with daughter her estr evidenther the people in her life, and including headquarters in Central during with politics becomesboth n of the plaza beneath the HSBC the first Occupy Central move- following the jailing of his girl- her Hong Kong-born boyfriend, over the endless hounding by ers in Central during firstTheOccupy ment in the 2011-12.

2007 friend, Ah Yi, at a protest. Tai and Ha Mai, an avant-garde a friend- drifter whom befriends.respec occupation of Queen’s Pier is Cho slowly develops experience due she to their ovement in 2011-12.

The 2007 occupation touched upon, as are the protests ship with Ah Yi’s mother, Wan, Loosely connected to Li Lei’s a purposeless housewife desertis Maxim’s, heir to his mutu demonstrations during late protests Ah Yi, storyline and later through ’s Pier is touched and upon, as are the 2009 and early 2010 over the ed by both her daughter and her grandfather’s soy-sauce busithey find each estranged husband, first overboth ness, who, afterwith a night out with other Link (XRL) nstrations duringExpress late Rail 2009 and conearly 2010 Featuring an ensem- the endless hounding by jour- Ha Mai, brings her to his home.

Ah Yi remains in prison, and Express Rail Linktroversy. controversy. ble(XRL) cast of diverse characters nalists they both experience due Pessimistic about the direction of his life despite the recent the strata of Hong to their respective relationships and fury towards h an ensemble castfrom ofacross diverse characters from resentment Kong society, the movie fo- with Ah Yi, and later through box-office success of a biopic acrimonious diatribes against strata of Hong Kong society, the movie eavily on contemporary life in Hong Kong, biasedness of the justice syste 28 ISSUE 18 XIAO HUA on the socio-economic problems faced by its parole officer, the unfettered b

MOVIE REVIEW: P S E U D O S E C U LA R

By Jaspar Chan | Image Still from Pseudo Secular

about his grandfather, Maxim drunkenly rants to Hai Mai about his lack of success as a heir and the decline of his grandfather’s famous soy sauce brand under his current leadership. In return for staying with him, Ha Mai asks Maxim to give up everything he owns, a request to which he happily acquiesces, ripping up his credit cards and the banknotes in his wallet in an euphoric moment of liberation.

ceptive commentary on ural challenges facing

round a few main ondent youth, a Secular university Pseudo is a very overtly political movie, as reflected ypocrisy and inhibitions in the impact—or lack thereof—that major incipled activist, his events affecting Hong Kong over the past few years have on the lives of becomes evident the characters. The movie is rlfriend, Ahreminiscent Yi, at ofa the multitude of documentaries depicting ops a friendship with Hong Kong’s protestAh culture to come out in the past few years, ess housewife deserted by combining authentic footage of demonstrations ranged husband, first and sitins with fictional scenes that journalistsshowcase theytheboth humanity of their participants through re-enactctive relationships with ments that never come off as or aggressively parual comforthackneyed and intimacy tisan. A moment of introspecr. For mosttion of comes the when movie, the movie briefly bears upon the current the intensity of revolving her around the debates strategies of protests within her situation manifests in the pro-democracy camp, with the the objects of her ire: the em, the cynicism of her brutality of the police, the

value of Hong Kong’s protest culture itself challenged in one of these scenes, in which an activist questions the real impact of demonstrations in a time when marches have become a regular occurrence on weekends. In a particularly poignant scene voiced over by Ah Yi, the blindfolded participants of the Prostrating Walk of the Five Districts (a series of “prostrating walks” during 5-8 January 2010 to protest the demolition of Tsoi Yuen village during the XRL controversy) are depicted on screen, marching solemnly in the rain to the percussion of drums. It is a bleak series of shots accompanied by a dissonant, haunting soundtrack composed by the local singer-songwriter Wong Hin Yan. The movie lacks a coherent plot—it does not culminate in some ultimate revelation or achieve any form of closure, nor do the unremarkable characters accomplish impressive feats in their storylines. On its Facebook page, the movie’s own description reads: “They are frozen in place, stagnating without any direction. Around them, things change rapidly.”

The movie takes us into the mundane lives of these characters, in essence ordinary

Hongkongers to whom the city’s political struggles would be little more than passing headlines in the news. Their lives are affected and changed all the same by the political developments and social turmoil of recent years, and while they may not think of their actions as being overtly political, the everyday decisions they make reflect their own complicity in maintaining—or subverting— the social and political order of the city. An embittered Maxim, shamed by his ex-girlfriend for allowing the commercialisation of his grandfather’s story by the media, ends up participating in various occupations of public spaces and protests around Hong Kong and eventually revives his grandfather’s soy-sauce brand by reverting back to traditional methods of production.

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Despite the relationships he cultivates with the activists he meets and the development of his own political worldview, Maxim fails to reconcile with his ex-girlfriend, Ah Man, over his indifference towards the land requisitions in Kwu Tong where his soy-sauce manufactories are based; his flippant dismissal of Man’s outrage over the requisitions as a fact of life reflects the blasé apathy of the middle classes towards the injustices suffered by those less well-off. For her part, Ah Man gives up an offer for a lucrative position as a news anchor, rejecting her editor’s non-critical approach to reporting and joining a lesser news network that allows her a greater degree of journalistic freedom. She interviews elderly immigrants in the low-income areas of Hong Kong, uncovering their life stories and piecing together a narrative of how Hong Kong’s cultural identity came to be. Through her interviews, she provides a much more authentic and realistic portrayal of the city’s local culture in contrast to its fetishisation in the biopic of Maxim’s grandfather; in this way, Pseudo Secular breaks the stereotype of locally-produced movies romanticising the “Hong Kong spirit”, surpassing the superficial and undiscerning attitude towards celebrating Hong Kong’s culture prevalent in the local media industry.

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This movie is not without its shortcomings. The length of the movie could have been much shortened; although the movie’s bleak atmosphere is effectively captured by its frequent use of silent long stills, these scenes begin to feel unnecessarily prolonged in the later parts of the movie, especially as the movie continues to plod through its three-hour long runtime. Ah Yi’s monologues, spread out over the course of the movie, develops her character with equal parts subtlety and bluntness, but at times her angsty tirades feel overblown to the point of mawkishness. The large scale of the movie and the lack of an overarching plot means that character storylines go unresolved, leaving the viewer with a sense of inconclusiveness and melancholy—but then, this may well be the point of the movie.

Yet the movie’s flaws are relatively minor and become trivial when compared to the thought-provoking and perceptive socio-political commentary the movie offers. In addition to those themes aforementioned in this review, the movie touches upon a wide variety of issues; the relevance of traditional family values in cosmopolitan Hong Kong (Wan’s subdued rebellion against her identity as a housewife); the occupation and ‘reclamation’ of public spaces in a highly regulated and institu-

tionalised environment (the movie’s representation of the Occupy movements of 2011 and 2014 and the occupation of Queen’s Pier in 2007, as well as the small occupation sites across Hong Kong that Maxim seeks out and visits); what obtaining true personal freedom really means in the face of suffocating social pressure to conform to social norms (Li Lei’s envy of Ha Mai’s wanderlust, Maxim’s desire for escapism which he fulfills through his participation in occupations of public space, Ah Yi’s likening of the outside world to just a different form of prison, much to the consternation of her cellmates, and the reactionary criticism Ah Man faces for objecting to the fetishisation of the vaunted “Lion Rock spirit”). Being a locally-made movie about the city’s society and politics, there are the usual messages of anti-authoritarianism and pro-democracy (as well as more left-leaning statements attacking capitalism and neoliberalism) present in the movie, but its political subtext is presented in a more nuanced and subtle way than in many other overtly-political movies in Hong Kong. The esotericism of the movie’s themes may be off-putting to casual viewers, but anyone can find something that resonates with them in the groundedness and verity of the movie’s depiction of life in Hong Kong.

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淺講周星馳 喜劇特色 作者： Calvin Gu 藝術： Bertha Ho

新 精 武 門

周星馳喜劇最突出之處是他「無厘頭」的拍攝風 格。「無厘頭」風格源自九十年代香港，當時由 於香港剛邁入經濟騰飛的時期，生活質量提高， 休閒時間也隨而提升。因此人們開始對傳統觀念 產生批判心理，而香港觀眾也漸漸開始對傳統 電影中複復反反的英雄主義感到乏味無趣。也正 正如此，「無厘頭」拍攝風格的滑稽，瘋狂，無 邏輯正符合當時香港觀眾的胃口，而其中的無深 度表現以及遠離正統的行為更是凸顯出當時社會 對傳統觀念的批判及顛覆。而在周星馳的電影當 中，「無厘頭」風格滲透在每一個細節之中。

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“美人魚”，“功夫”，“少林足球”，説起這些電 影，你想到了什麼？相信它們讓你想起的不僅僅 是那些富有深層意義卻又不乏趣味的對白，也不 單單讓你想起那些誇張滑稽的場景，對廣大群眾 而言，它們所代表的更是那位港產喜劇中開闢出 一片天地的 “星爺” —— 周星馳。周星馳的電影 大部分都拍攝於九十年代，但不同於同年代的電 影，周星馳喜劇的影響力，不僅僅在九十年代 止步；所影響的，不僅僅是香港的觀眾；所涉及 的，不僅僅是少數階層的故事。相反的，他的喜 劇不因歲月而褪色，不因地區而收到限制，不因 社會階層而產生隔閡。那麼，到底是什麼賦予他 的喜劇這些異於常“戲”的特質呢？

在周星馳眾多的喜劇中，公認爲最早的無厘頭對 白是周星馳在電視劇《蓋世英雄》中所說的 “你 講嘢呀？”（意思是“你在說話嗎？”），諷刺對 方說廢話。而同樣的在《蓋世英雄》中的另一句 對白 “飲杯茶，食個包”，意思是在危險的時候反 而應該平靜下來，休閒地坐下討論問題。透過這 些滑稽以及不符合常理的對白，周星馳帶出的是 一種幽默諷刺的喜劇風格，不僅創新，又不乏風 趣，以致他的作品中許多經典的無厘頭對白成爲 香港各代觀衆的口頭禪，例如“食神”中的：“你 多舊魚”，意思是你太多餘了，“大話西遊”中的“I

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服了 u”（我服了你），以及 “少林足球” 中的 “你回火星吧，地球太危險了”。這一系列經典 的對白都是周星馳獨樹一幟創新的結晶，不但 融合現代元素，更加入英文以及廣東話口語， 使作品裡的對白更能普及至當時香港社會的每 一個階層當中。

逃 學 威 龍

唐 白 虎 點 祝 英 台

在周星馳的喜劇當中，他所塑造的角色大部分 無論外表和性格都極度荒謬、滑稽、及富有粗 俗的喜劇效果。在他許多的喜劇當中，周星馳 所刻畫的女角與傳統中矜持靦腆的相反，角色 會突然做出誇張的表情，甚至是粗魯不文的動 作，藉此觸動觀眾的神經並諷刺和挑戰舊時代 的傳統思想。最經典的無外乎在 “唐伯虎點秋 香” 中，醜陋女角 “如花” 用中指挖鼻的場面， 首次在銀幕出現，此後廣受大眾好評，而以致 在他其後的多部電影中有類似的角色出現，例 如大內密探零零發中的皇帝后宮三千 “佳麗” 皆 是由男人飾演的噁心女性，濃眉大眼，舉止粗 魯，更是再次犀利地挑戰了傳統女性優雅美麗 形象的底線。又例如周星馳的搭檔吳孟達在多 部喜劇中的角色，如 “整蠱專家” 中的車親仁， 以及“逃學威龍中的曹達華等，皆為猥瑣，貪 財，毫無上進的男子角色。這樣對角色的塑造 不但為電影帶來幽默感，更毫疑問地再次打擊 了傳統男性威猛正義的形象，使觀眾留下深刻 的印象。 然而，除了無厘頭以外，周星馳在他喜劇當中 的另一特點是他所扮演角色的特徵，而總括而 言，他的角色通通為“外小人，內君子”， 意思 是戲中的他通常在表面看起來很狹隘，猥瑣， 但內心深處卻存在良知與正義感。就如 “整蠱 專家” 中的古晶，在劇情的開始是一個爲錢不 惜欺騙陷害對他好的人的騙子，但隨著劇情的 發展他慢慢回歸正途，最後成爲撥亂反正的英 雄。又例如 “九品芝麻官” 中的包龍星，開始 時不學無術，貪財，無法無天，但最後漸漸受 到感化，找回內心深處的正義感，最後成爲一 代清官。這樣的角色特徵變化，讓觀眾可以看 到在善與惡的鬥爭當中，正義永遠是勝利的一 方，藉此讓其喜劇不僅僅可以帶來歡笑，更可 以傳遞深遠的道理。 所以總括而言，周星馳的喜劇之所以能夠在放 映多年後任然受到不同年齡段觀衆的愛戴，其 基本原因在於他電影的拍攝手法符合社會觀衆 的喜愛。“無厘頭”風格的新穎，不受時代認知 的侷限，而電影裡的內容符合當時觀衆對社會 的認知。而電影裡的角色能夠有效地刺激觀衆 的固有認知，並能引起不同階層觀眾的共鳴， 由此才能夠使他的眾多作品廣汎流傳，備受好 評。

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语言暴力

藝術： Kristen Wong

作者： 丛悠然

都說語言是世界上最美最有魅力的事 物，但使用不當也可造成不可彌補的傷 害。隨著社會的發展，以及所謂的言論 自由，大家似乎變的更加口無遮攔，高 舉著 “正義”的旗幟，對他人評頭論足。 小到同學間的相互調侃，大到大規模的 網絡暴力，這隨著社會的變遷而生出的 種種隱患，具有強烈打擊脆弱心靈的潛 力，可能給他人造成心理精神上不同程 度的壓力。 語言暴力這個詞聽起來似乎非常極端， 好像與我們毫不相干，但其實卻和我們 日常生活緊密相連。學校其實就是一個 小型社會，在這個簡單卻複雜的社會裡 少不了的是他人的七嘴八舌。有些人自 稱說話直接，但他們未曾想過那些 “直 接” 的話語最後還是像烙印般在他人的 心中留下不可磨滅的傷疤；朋友間，一 次原諒你，兩次大度不計較，三次安慰 自己說因為你們關係好，一忍再忍，而 殊不知到了第多少次這段友誼才會走到 盡頭。老師無意中的一個批評可能會給 同學造成永久的心理陰影及激起叛逆情 緒，相反同學在背後對老師惡語相向也 會傷透了老師的心。如此看來，這看似 遙遠的語言暴力原來就藏在我們校園生 活之中。 近年網上新傳出來一個新詞，叫做鍵 盤俠，指的是那些躲在網絡的遮擋後 面冷言冷語評頭論足，抨擊他人的網絡 噴子。冰冷的鍵盤敲擊出來的流言蜚語 如針扎般刺在他人的心上，不知道屏幕 前面的鍵盤俠們藉著網絡的掩蓋血口噴 人，長得好看的女孩子就是打玻尿酸整 容針；見到明星了就是家裡有錢有勢有 關係；上個好學校一定不是憑自己努力 自己考上的，不是走後門就是交錢賄 賂；開個網店也要被扣上賣山寨沒原則 為了掙錢不擇手段的帽子。我想請問， 這個社會到底是怎麼了。

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而此事還涉及到了一個更加嚴重的問 題，網絡暴力。輕的使人心情不佳，重 的間接甚至直接導致死亡。比網絡暴力 還可怕的，是很多人開始認為網絡暴力 不是什麼錯誤的事了。眾人皆知的明星 自殺事件，2016年男星喬任梁身患抑鬱 症自殺身亡，而其背後真正的原因便是 網絡暴力。從2015年起，不間斷的罵聲 流言四起，全網黑他揩油。心靈本就脆 弱的他不斷承受著來自路人的壓力，一 開始還在微博發聲澄清，到最後就只剩 忍氣吞聲默默承受。而最後源源不斷的 罵聲也成為了壓死駱駝的最後一根稻 草，造成了不可挽回的遺憾，年紀輕輕 的背負著路人噴向他的滔滔洪流離開了 人世。相似的例子多的數不過來，而曝 光在人們眼前的只是一個喬任梁。 想做個好人真的很難，況且就算你做的 再好，無聊的人總是能找到料子來批判 你一翻。所以作為青少年的我們，到底 是否應該聽信輿論與他人的冷嘲熱諷？ 答案不言而喻。適當聽取他人意見有助 於提升自我修養，但過度聽信他人的品 頭論足則會使你迷失自我越陷越深。 總而言之，最後還是希望身邊的人可以 都可以多一分善良，因為你永遠不會知 道自己無意中的話語會給他人帶來怎樣 的傷害。

ONE BELT, ONE ROAD

By Raghav Goyal | Illustration by Adam Wang

In 1288, Marco Polo became one of the first Europeans to travel along the Silk Road to get to China. He made extensive notes along the way, and later published his journal as “The Travels of Marco Polo”, catching the eye of many in Europe. Marco Polo led the way forward, launching a new age of trade and interconnectivity between the east and the west. Now, 730 years later, China’s President Xi Jinping is taking inspiration from this ancient trading route and creating a revived silk road called “One Belt, One Road”.

The One Belt One Road initiative is a set of land and sea based routes that will link up Eurasian countries with China. Over 60+ countries, including Russia, Pakistan, India, Turkey, Philippines, Japan, Indonesia and Malaysia, are expected to participate, and together they make up over 60% of the world’s population. There are 6 major routes in the “belt”, officially known as the Silk Road Economic Belt: (1) the China-Mongolia-Russia Corridor, (2) the New Eurasian Land Bridge (connecting China to Europe), (3) the China-Central Asia-Western Asia Corridor, (4) the China-Pakistan Corridor (CPEC), (5) the China-Bangladesh-India Corridor and (6) the China-Indochina Corridor. The “road” refers to the Maritime Silk Road and stretches from the South China sea to the Mediterranean sea.

China’s primary goal is one of economic development which will be achieved through connectivity and cooperation with the participating nations. Three

outcomes define the purpose and benefits of the initiative. Firstly, the infrastructure of each nation and between nations will improve dramatically, as the transportation links will create a knock-off effect, leading to an increase in businesses and facilities in the countries along a route. Secondly, trade and economies of countries will grow stronger as products from various sectors reach their destination faster.

Finally, cultural exchange between countries will increase as it becomes easier than ever for people from far away nations to travel and experience another culture.

China has broken down each route in the system into dozens of sub-projects that morphs this ambitious and gargantuan task into a more reasonable action plan. Take the CPEC for instance.

There are projects slated for development along this route, which spans from Xinjiang, China to Gwadar, Pakistan, covering maritime transport infrastructure, such as the port of Gwadar, and land transportation infrastructure, such as railway and roads connecting the two cities. Projects include upgrading and expanding the capacity of Gwadar’s shipping port, and adding more facilities in Gwadar such as hotels, a power plant and even a $230 million USD international airport. China will fund all of these projects for Pakistan with no expectation of repayment.

These efforts will reap enormous benefits for Pakistan as they improve the infrastructure in the country at very little cost. Prior to the CPEC agreement,

Pakistan faced daily energy shortages often lasting 12 hours at a time. Its energy shortfall was a serious hindrance to its economic growth. After CPEC energy projects, some of which were completed in December 2017, Pakistan was able to produce surplus energy and energy shortages throughout the country disappeared.

What is interesting is that the entire project is loosely defined, meaning that China could very well add more projects as it sees fit. These could come in the form of entirely new locations, or changes to the routes. All these changes can be easily altered to fit with the overall direction and goals behind the initiative.

This is an ambitious project. Given the immense technical & monetary difficulties involved, the One Belt One Road initiative is a work in progress and may take decades to be fully realised. However, one day if it is realised in its entirety, China would be successful in filling the void that the United States has left when it abandoned its Trans Pacific Partnership. This would secure China’s position on the international stage as it continues its mission to “dethrone” the US and realise its dream of becoming the “middle kingdom” in international affairs.

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戰勝「拖延症」惡魔 作者： Faith Lee | 藝術： Adam Wang

堆積如山的作業、畫滿記號的行事 曆，把你壓得喘不過氣來。此刻筋 疲力盡的你，面對眼前凌亂的書 桌，心裏不禁冒起一絲困惑......有 人說，世界上最愚蠢的事，就是每 天重複做相同的事，卻期待一天會 有不同的結果。而你的每天都千篇 一律：毫不留情的鬧鐘聲、行屍走 肉般的上學加上沈重的工作量，造 成無數個不眠之夜。如此吃力的拼 搏，到底為了什麼？這份作業，難 道現在就要做？「一寸光陰一寸 金」，大家都知道時間是寶貴的。 但一個奇怪的現象就是，在時間有 限的情況下，我們腦海中反而會出 現這樣的獨白：還有時間的，明天 才做吧！我們寧願執著眼前的一 切，也不願想像未來的各種可能 性，從而推動自己履行責任——很 可惜，這就是人性。 莎士比亞筆下的哈姆雷特是個典型 的悲劇形象，而他最突出的性格特 徵就在於他的優柔寡斷。在《王子 復仇記》中，國王被謀殺，王子哈 姆雷特為了爭取公道，展開命運悲 劇。然而，每次千鈞一髮之際，他 卻拖延時間；每次機會近在眼前， 他卻猶豫不決。一個如此錯綜複雜 的角色，的確令讀者、觀眾們迷惑 不解。有人說，這是社會的壓迫所 導致，哈姆雷特的復仇是因受客觀 條件的影響而一步步推後；又有人 說，他作為一個有道德修養的人， 必須堅守原則，所以一直不忍心下 手......對於他這個角色的看法，見仁 見智，難有定論。 最近，我在英語課上讀了哈金的《 等待》。這本書跟《王子復仇記》 其實有不少共同點：故事的主人 公是一位六、七十年代的軍醫，但 他的態度與行為跟哈姆雷特極為相 似。東北農家出身的他，年輕時遵 父母之命，與一位未老先衰的文盲 女人結婚。軍醫跟她並無共同語 言，更說不上有愛情，於是軍醫毅 然回到城裡工作，在那裡與一位年 輕活潑的女護士談起戀愛來。軍醫 不斷答應娶她，不過必須先跟現任

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妻子離婚。等了十八年，他的優柔 寡斷使他無法促成婚事。終於，他 如願以償，但時隔不久，護士妻子 就患上了不治之症。隨著時間的流 逝，軍醫亦發現自己原來深愛著前 妻，可惜最後，兩個他愛過的女人 都已離他而去。軍醫的「等待」， 背後也許有成千上萬的原因；不單 在文學作品裡，這種行為在現實生 活其實也十分常見。它就是我們每 天最大的敵人之一——「拖延症」 。 拖延症 ，又名「延宕」，是一種 個性行為，是指把所計畫實踐的 任務推遲到稍後的時間。它十分普 遍，是在校學生與就業人士中常見 的現象。相信各位同學與老師，而 有點諷刺地，就連現在寫這篇文章 的我，都必定經歷過延宕。拖延症 的英語“Procrastination”源自拉丁 語： “Pro-”（向將來的）與“ Crastinus”（明天的）。拖延的人責任感 較低，他們會因不想面對責任而感 到焦慮，拖延症就成為了他們應付 焦慮的一種機制。拖延者主要分為 三種：1. 刺激型，喜歡在壓力下工 作，因為最後一分鐘的忙碌會給他 們帶來快感；2. 逃避型，往往迴避 失敗的恐懼，甚至害怕成功帶來的 束縛，因為他們太在意別人對自己 的看法；3. 決心型，無法下定決心 做好一件事情。心理學家用三個標 準來界定拖延：第一、會阻礙你達 到預期目標，它是沒有必要的，僅 僅拖延完成事務；第二、會為拖延 者帶來壓力、負罪感、降低效率、 恐慌，及其他人對你不能完成任 務，不能盡責的不良評價；第三、 會惡性循環，導致進一步的延宕行 為。 拖延症由何導致？早在遠古時代， 人們已經明白生死的本相：一個人 就算今天活著，明天也可能會死 去。畢竟，生命的長短是有限而不 確定的，眼前的利益比長遠利益顯 得更有意義，因此「一鳥在手勝過 百鳥在林」的想法也成為了人類的 自然習性。隨著時代變遷，這種心

態卻變成了短視。有生物學博士認 為，這個現象是因環境發生巨變， 但人腦沒來得及隨之進化而造成。 從經濟角度來看，時間與回報兩者 之間的關係也是導致延宕的因素之 一。完成任務後所會得到的收穫與 現時距離越遠，人們越缺乏動力， 所以越傾向拖延。2001年諾貝爾經 濟學獎得主喬治·阿克洛夫曾受朋 友斯蒂格利茨所托，將一箱衣服從 印度寄到美國。他卻發現：「八個 月裡每早醒來，我都是決定第二天 早上去把箱子寄給斯蒂格利茨。」 他就是這樣，一週一週地推遲做這 件事，直至8個月後，自己都快回 美國的時候才解決問題。不過，考 慮郵寄所需的時間，加上到洲際郵 件的不穩定性，其實阿克洛夫本人 很可能比那箱衣服更早抵美。他便 意識到，延宕不單是一個壞習慣， 它揭示了一個有關理性思考的重大 問題：人們因為過分強調了當前事 情的重要性，忽略了未來事情的重 要。 現今，最受普遍認同的解釋則是： 問題的根源在於各式各樣的心理因 素。延宕，是為了逃避一些令人恐 懼或厭惡的事物。拖延者也許是對 某樣事情失去了興趣，又或者低估 了自己的能力、低估了完成某項目 所需的時間，因此一直缺乏開始或 繼續的動力。但其實，延宕的起因 並非如此簡單：延宕背後可能隱藏 著心理障礙，如注意力不足過動症 （ADHD）、抑鬱症、強迫症等 等，亦涉及了一個人的內心感受。 這可以是一個人對完美主義的追 求，完美主義者往往沈醉於獲得成 就的前景，不願意正視現實；也可 以是缺乏自我價值的認同、害怕失 敗、害怕受人控制.....這些負面情 緒大多來自拖延者的家庭、社會背 景等因素，例如「只有第一名才有 價值」的施壓型家庭或學校環境。 了解問題的根源，才有助戰勝拖延 症。

態度決定命運，拖延足以影響一 生。因為浪費時間，拖延症自然會 耽誤了工作和學業。「還有時間 的」，這句話並非動力，而是一個 人為了逃避責任的防禦機制。舉個 例，作為學生的我們都知道，無論 是一小時內完成的考卷、幾星期後 才要交的報告、或者是需時幾個月 的個人項目，我們擁有的時間都是 有限的。一旦沒有充分利用時間做 準備，理所當然地，就不會得到理 想的成績。此外，拖延一成為生活 習慣，就會為生理健康帶來嚴重的 負面影響。比如說最常見的拖延睡 眠，會導致精神不振、注意力不集 中、思考力下降，影響第二天活 動；長期的睡眠不足更會導致分泌 失調、免疫力下降等，引發進一步 的生理問題。 然而，很多人不知道的是，拖延症 會造成心理傷害。一次又一次的拖 延，導致一次又一次的失誤，最後 只會累積出更多的失望與氣餒，而 承受更多壓力的只不過是拖延者自 己。延宕萬一成為習慣，就會變成 惡性循環，不斷降低拖延者的自專 心。除了影響情緒，延宕亦會破壞 人與人之間的信任，為團隊合作及 人際關係帶來負面影響。試問一個 總是說得出做不到的人，在身邊人

眼中還值得信任嗎？ 無論是學業抑或是職場內，延宕亦 意味著錯失良機。以生涯只有短 短幾年的運動員為例，運動員在運 動場上為國爭光，的確令人羨慕、 嚮往，但背後殘酷的現實卻難以想 像。一般來說，運動員的平均巔峰 期從二十到三十歲不等，泳手的平 均巔峰年齡更只有二十一歲。巔峰 期過後體能狀況會開始衰退，因此 運動員的競賽時間有限；所以追尋 「體育夢」的人，必須在這段「黃 金年齡」努力爭取機會。 難道，所有事情都一定要等到迫不 得已的地步，才動手完成？收到下 一份作業時，不如試想一下：現在 開始做，有何好處？整個過程會否 變得輕鬆得多？ 要戰勝「拖延症」惡魔，其實並不 難，但首先就必須克服心理恐懼： 我們要明白眼前的問題不會隨著時 間流逝而自動消失，需要自己付出 努力才能解決。一個「必勝」的解 決方法就是培養良好的生活習慣， 給自己定下一個目標及完成任務的 日期。若覺得自己的目標太長遠， 可以先把任務分成更容易的小塊， 化整為零。比如有篇作文要在一週

內完成，就可以這樣分配時間：第 一天寫大綱、第二天寫第一段、第 三天寫第二段.....如此類推，就是 這樣一步步地向最後的目標進發。 自我貶低型的拖延者，應不斷鼓勵 自己、接受別人的讚揚，加強對自 己的信心。也許愛吃或喜歡電子遊 戲的你，完成任務後也可以獎勵自 己，把獎勵化為動力。至於完美主 義型的拖延者，則應接受不完美的 存在，明白自己不可能在所有情況 下都不犯任何錯誤，因為達成目標 並非講求完美——進步才是關鍵。 回歸書桌，再次面對著眼前的工 作，你會發現，其實要準時完成工 作並非不可能的任務。只要你擺脫 了內心存在著的那股拉力，你就能 勇往直前。為人處事，固然要努 力，也要能進能退。最重要的是， 我們要抱著樂觀的態度面對眼前的 挑戰。就算沒有得到預期中的成 果，你也會在克服挑戰的過程中獲 益良多。無論最後得到的是成就 感、是知識，抑或是重大的人生啟 發，最後的收穫會化為動力，幫助 你迎接下一個挑戰。想活出精彩充 實的人生，展現出更好的自己，就 要打消拖延的習慣，向自己承諾： 今天的事今天做。

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New Timetable Dr Laszlo Varro

By Chih Ning Kuo | Photography by Chih Ning Kuo

“A new timetable will not come into effect until August 2019.” Dr Laszlo Varro, our Interim Head of Secondary, confirms.

However, minor changes will be taking place in the MYP timetable as of August 2018, our next school year. They are addressed in the Secondary Weekly Circular #20 published on the 9th of February, but here is a recap of these changes.

“As a sign of our commitment to promoting student health and wellbeing, from August 2018 we will increase Physical and Health Education (PHE) class time [for] Years 7-10.” Dr Varro states in the circular. Essentially, the two periods currently used for Chinese X and English X will be replaced by PE lessons. “As a re-

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sult, students in Years 7-10 will have PHE lessons every other day, giving the subject the same status that English, Chinese, Mathematics and other subjects enjoy.”

This also applies to the Year 11 students, but only in their second semester. The MYP Personal Project will be replaced by a Research Skills course which “[aims] to prepare students to be self-directed researchers who can recognize, pursue, and develop research queries that make meaning in their lives and connect to larger global context.” So for their first semester, the Year 11s will have the Research Skills course twice per cycle during the periods currently used for Chinese and English X.

I created and sent out a survey addressing the Eng/Chin X and PE change to all MYP students. Of the 205 responses, 58% of students stated that English and Chinese X were ‘not necessary’, and some went on to explain that while they liked the quiet reading time, they thought standard English and Chinese classes already gave them the opportunity to do so. A decent amount of students were enthusiastic about added PE lessons, as reflected by the 59.5% of students who opted for ‘more PE lessons in a cycle’. The last question in the survey is difficult to answer because it so directly pinpoints the change that will be implemented. 49.6% of students gave the direct answer that ‘Yes’, they would sacrifice English and Chinese X classes for PE classes, which means that they would be satisfied with this change. 6% of students gave uncertain answers, they were either ‘Unsure’ or explained that they wanted only Chinese or only English X to be replaced

by PE. There are different things to consider here. One could say that since PE is one of the 8 subjects in the Year 7-11 curriculum, it is only reasonable that it is now being allocated the same teaching/ class times as every other class, that it has always deserved. This would mean losing the rare peaceful reading environment the English and Chinese X classes have provided, but then again, there are many English and Chinese classes throughout the cycle.

Now, let’s dive into the characteristics of our current timetable and learn if any major changes are proposed by student survey takers. IB and MYP programs have their own distinct timetables, but they are both characterised by a long periods of classes stretched out over the school day, separated by five minute transition blocks, advisory time, break, and lunch.

Indeed, survey results show that people’s preferences are favourable towards the current timetable. When asked about the length of a class, 62.4%

voted that it was ‘Just Right’, and the remaining 37.6% thought that it is ‘Too long’. Of those voters, 74% agreed that a more appropriately timed class would be 1 hour, 15 minutes shorter than our current classes. Regarding the number of classes in a day, a high 80.9% agreed that 4 classes is ideal. Up to this point, it can be seen that vast majority of students are content with the class durations and number of classes set by the current MYP timetable.

And then the classic debate which comes to light when students are asked about the 7:55AM start to the school day. 72.6% of students think this is ‘Too early’, however, when asked to come up with a better time to start class, responses are quite scattered. While there is quite a common and obvious trend in the opinion that school should start at a later hour, students struggle to fall on a consensus for the exact time it should start. 32% propose 8:30AM, and 23% propose 8:15. And then there are outliers, such as the 10:00 AM start, which in all honesty sounds very pleasant in an idealistic world because students then get a much desired 8-hour rest, but in reality may prove to be impractical because school would end much later.

To conclude, 54.1% of students said that they would like the current timetable with improvements made. There are some major points made, such as having the 12-day cycle to be 10 days instead, ‘so it isn’t confusing and different each week’, and having ‘longer lunches and shorter advisory time’.

But the majority of students made comments about minor changes, for example ‘10 minutes of transition time between classes rather than 5 minutes’.

Most notably however, 67% of these students made a remark about wanting school to start later, and some went as far as to explain the implications of having a later school start. Two student noted that the early school start would be problematic especially to those who lived a distance away from school and had to wake up ‘at 6:00AM,’ and

that we could all do with more sleep and ‘[not have to end up] sleeping in class’. Two other students pointed out that going into academic functions of the brain so early in the day ‘hinders [one’s] learning and performance’, and one admitted that they ‘found [themselves] too tired to focus in the morning’, so it would be more effective to simply shift the entire day back by 15 to 30 minutes (school would end later), so that students would get sufficient sleep and at the same time fully complete the 7-hour school day. One student as-a-matter-of-factly stated that ‘we need at least 8 hours of sleep’, a well-worn piece of knowledge passed down by parents, doctors, and science teachers alike and which the medical journal Sleep attributes, however this is a golden/prime of sleep for adolescence difficult to achieve given the early school start.

On the flip side of the coin, are there negative implications of a later school start? Perhaps, the original 7:55AM start was designed so that CIS buses and private cars wouldn’t clash with the flurry of Braemar Hill traffic. Maybe, the 3PM end couldn’t be compromised due to the CCA system, bus company obligations or other logistical considerations (after all, most other international schools end at 3PM), and if the concern was about maintaining a 7 hour school day with lengthy breaks and lunch in between, then the 7:55AM start was inevitable.

There really is no perfect model that befits everybody’s needs and wants, so a consensus/compromise has to be reached. And MYP kids, one of the very many privileges of the IB is that there are two days in the cycle where you have first (or first and second consecutive) periods off, and it is in your freedom to come to school at 9:20AM or later.

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SLEEP IS FOR

By Phyllis Lam | Photography by Philippa Yuen

for the caffeine to wear off before bedtime.

Studies in the United States have shown that sleep Have you ever seen your businesses friends nod-to lose us to deprivation have caused anwake up with a clear mind. Fur- During this phase the brain reorganding off in$100 class, with annually, their eyes due halfto the thermore, plays crucial izes friends information, boosts our memory Have you aever seen your nodding off in estimated billion lack of sleep also open and their heads against their role in memory consolidation.

This is and facilitates neutral growth.

Thereclass, with their eyes half open and their heads efficiency and performance. It is recommended by desk?

A lot of them bearing dark and a process that maintains and strengthfore, without the slow wave sleep and against their desk? A lot of them bearing dark and experts that most adults should be aiming for 8 heavy eye bags that make them appear as if they heavy eye bags that make them appear ens long term memories.

As a result, REM sleep phases, the body will start hours of sleep per night, while children and have not our slept in weeks or even as if they should have not slept in more. weeks But or how insufficient affect ability to “die” andmonths. will notAs be able to recovteenagers need even does sleep can teenagers andmemstudents, spend most ourcause late our imsleep The of sleep determined a even work? months.

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Sleep just becomes which can the Thus, risk ofthe diabetes down” ritual before going to and weekends just because never seem to befrom enough. external stimuli, is essential for the one of the thingswhich we feel willing to andrenewal heart disease. nights Thus, sleep is vital bed the light laptop and But have you ever wondered what is sleep? and repair of the body.

On the other hand, the give up. Thus, the amount of sleep we to our health and well being. phone screens can cause the producScientifically speaking, is our quiet state of means “the process of REM sleep when thejust brain comes to get on school nights andisweekends tionit of melatonin, which hibernation in which an average adult will spend life.

During this phase the brain reorganizes never seem to be enough. But have you Studies in the United States have body isn’t preparing the hormones it 36% on his or her life in. information, boosts our memory and facilitates ever wondered what is sleep? Scientif- shown that sleep deprivation have needs to enter the sleep phase”. Furneutral growth. Therefore, without the slow wave ically speaking, it is our quiet state of caused businesses to lose an estimated thermore, using relaxation techniques, Sleep serves many purposes that are crucial to the sleep and REM sleep phases, the body will start to hibernation in which an average adult $100 billion annually, the lack suchpurpose as meditation and exercise can braindue andtobody.

Its main is restoration. “die” and will not be able to recover physically. This will spend 36% on his or her life in. of efficiency and performance.

It is recaid in better sleep.

Studies have shown According to James Clear, “The Science of Sleep”, will cause our immune system to weaken and the ommended by experts that most adults that 50% of insomnia cases everyday the brain accumulates metabolic wasteare due to brain to become foggy.

Sleep serves many purposes that should be aiming for 8 hours of sleepnormal high activities. levels of Although stress. As this students while conducting is we are crucial to the brain and body.

Its per night, while children and teenagers are often too busy to sleep early, so completely normal, if too much of these waste To fall asleep fast, you should develop a “power main purpose is restoration.

Accordshould need even more.

But how does instead we should develop daily habproducts have been accumulated, it can link to down” ritual before going to bed because the light ing tolaptop Jamesand Clear, “The Science quality of sleep is itssuch for better sleep. Firstly, we can aim disorders as Alzheimer’s disease. from phone screens can of causesleep the work? The neurological Sleep”, everyday the brain accumudetermined by a process called sleepto spend at least 30 minutes Therefore sleep is essential for cleaning out the under the production of melatonin, which means “the body lates metabolic waste while conductwake cycle, which can betoxins separated sun each as it lessens stress and brain’s each night.

This day, “waste-removal isn’t preparing the hormones it needs to enter the ing normal activities.

Although this into 2 components: deep sleep and aids in better health and sleep. Addisystem” is called the glymphatic system, which sleep phase”. Furthermore, using relaxation allows to wake up tionally, with a clear mind. is completely normal, if too much rapidcan eyeaid movement sleep.usAccording we can turn off the lights and techniques, such as meditation and of exercise playsblue a crucial in in better sleep.

Studieshave have been shownac-that to 50% of Science ofFurthermore, these waste products “The Sleep”, duringsleep this also “reduce or fullrole spectrum light in memory consolidation.

This is a process Lastly, that avoid cafinsomnia cases arelink duetotoneurological high levels ofprocess stress. As cumulated, it can of deep sleep, the body relaxes your environment.” maintains and strengthens As anot be students areasoften too busydisease. to sleep early, sobrain becomes disorderswe such Alzheimer’s and the less responsive feine long after term noonmemories. or there may can affect ourthe ability to to wear instead we sleep should habits for better stimuli,result, Therefore is develop essential daily for cleanto external whichinsufficient is essential sleep enough time for caffeine and emotional memories. sleep. we can aim to spend at least ing outFirstly, the brain’s toxins each night. for 30 the renewal andform repairconcrete of the body. off before bedtime. Lastly sleep is also important minutes under the sunsystem” each day, as it lessens This “waste-removal is called On thestress other hand, the process of REMfor our metabolic health.

Insufficient or life. fragmented sleep can lead to insulin and in bettersystem, health which and sleep.

Additionally, we the brain the aids glymphatic allows sleep is when comes to insensitivity and metabolic syndrome, which can can turn off the lights and “reduce blue or full increase the risk of diabetes and heart disease. Thus, spectrum light in your environment.” Lastly, avoid sleep is vital to our health and well being. caffeine after noon or there may not be enough time

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HEMINGWAYS

By Eugenia Chow | Photography by Chih Ning Kuo

With the recent rise of curiosity With the recent rise of curiositydeaimed towards documentaries aimed towards documentaries tailing the complex problem of detailing the complex problem of global warming, wanting to conglobal warming, wanting to serve our environment has become conserve our environment has an utmost priority for many. This inbecome an utmost priority for cludes Gary Stokes, the co-founder many. This includes Gary Stokes, of has unveiled theHemingways, co-founder ofwho Hemingways, awho newly designed menu: the first in has unveiled a newly Discovery Bay to turn entirely designed menu: the first in meatfree.

As a bold convert the Discovery Bayattempt to turntoentirely way peopleAs eat, Stokes phased meat-free. a bold attempt to out all seafood his restaurant last convert the from way people eat, Stokes August, andall this January, theyhis have phased out seafood from restaurant lastleaf August, and this turned a new and transformed January, they have turned into a newone the beach-side restaurant leaf can andbe transformed the beachthat entirely enjoyed by both side restaurant into onealike. that can be vegans and vegetarians entirely enjoyed by both vegans and reasons vegetarians alike. meat from The to eliminate one’s diet can be categorised into The reasons to eliminate meat three simple factors: health, ethics, from one’s diet can be categorised and the environment. Firstly, vegan into three simple factors: health, diets areand proven to be beneficial toethics, the environment. wards heart health Firstly, vegan diets by aresignificantly proven to reducing the risk factors that conbe beneficial towards heart health tribute to heart disease.

Secondly, by significantly reducing the risk more billion to animals factorsthan that150 contribute heart are brutally every year disease. slaughtered Secondly, more than 150to fill our animals plates. Thirdly, animal agbillion are brutally slaughtered every year to ourof riculture is responsible forfill 30% plates.

Thirdly,consumption animal agriculture all freshwater in the is responsible for 30% world - water that couldofbeallinstead freshwater consumption the Adused to hydrate those in in need. world water that could be instead ditionally, 82% of underprivileged used to hydrate those in need. children are starving in countries Additionally, 82%of ofthe food is fed where the majority underprivileged children are to animals who are raised to die for starving in countries where the well off individuals in developed majority of the food is fed to western animals countries. who are raised to die for

well off individuals in developed western countries.

Although the idea of abstaining Although of abstaining from meat the is idea daunting to many, from meat is daunting many, Stokes spins a creative totwist onto Stokes spins a creative twist onto the usual dishes served at Hemingthe usual dishes served at to expeways, tempting non-vegans Hemingways, tempting nonrience the realistic Beyond burger, vegans to experience the realistic shepherd’s pie, spaghetti bolognese, Beyond burger, shepherd’s pie, and BBQ bolognese, pulled ‘pork’ spaghetti andsandwich BBQ - pulled which‘pork’ shocks customers who sandwich - which discover that it is in fact made shocks customers who discover of jackfruit.

The alternathat it is in factplant-based made of jackfruit. tives these comfort foods remain The of plant-based alternatives of tasty, the impact wouldtasty, have thesebut comfort foods itremain had environment but on thethe impact it would and havebiodihad on the isenvironment versity also largely and reduced. This biodiversity also largely diverts small change ismomentarily This small change usreduced. from the disconcerting truth that momentarily diverts us from meat the if people continue to consume disconcerting truth that if people at an unsustainable rate, there will continue to consume meat and at annot be no seafood left by 2048, unsustainable rate, there will be enough water available to produce no seafood left by 2048, and not food for the expected 9 billion popenough water available to produce ulation in 2050. food for the expected 9 billion population in 2050.

Stokes is a passionate environmentalist who his time to proStokes is dedicates a passionate tecting and defending the world’s environmentalist who dedicates ocean and its inhabitants; his time to protecting and he is also recognized for hisocean work and with defending the world’s Sea Shepherd and Last Straw its inhabitants; he The is also movement. his brother inirecognizedHe forand his work with Sea tiated the Last Straw movement, Shepherd and The Last Straw a movement. and his brother in campaign to He support restaurants initiated the eliminating theLast use Straw of plastic straws. movement, a campaign Being the first restaurant totosupport implerestaurants thegreen use ment the useinofeliminating these bright of plastic straws.

Being the first paper straws, Hemingways enarestaurant to implement the use of bles convenience to its customers, these bright green paper while also protecting our straws, precious Hemingways enables convenience marine life and their habitat. This to its customers, while also protecting our precious marine life

movement is also now supported their habitat.

This movement byand dozens of restaurants around is also now supported by dozens Hong Kong and soon around Asia, of restaurants around Kong and similar to the act Hong of phasing and soonStokes around Asia,itand similar out meat, makes easier for to the act of phasing out meat, people to do the right thing for the Stokes makes it easier for people environment. By providing an alterto do the right thing for the native choice, heBy makes the process environment. providing an easy and impactful. alternative choice, he makes the

process easy and impactful.

Aside from its outstanding initiative toAside preserve theitsenvironment, from outstanding Hemingways also houses antheextremely initiative to preserve enjoyable atmosphere - onealso that environment, Hemingways houses an extremely supports both outdoor enjoyable and indoor atmosphere - one thatseating supports seating.

The outdoor facandisindoor seating. esboth the outdoor beach and coupled with outdoor seating the AltheThe tranquil scenery offaces the sea. beach and is coupled with though this restaurant maythelean tranquil scenery of theside sea.- dishmore towards the pricey Although this restaurant may lean es ranging from $100-$200, you’ll more towards the pricey side be getting all your money’s worth: dishes ranging from $100-$200, from the crunchy potato skins you’ll be getting all your money’s topped (veganpotato cheese worth:with fromcheese the crunchy available) and salsa, or by indulging skins topped with cheese (vegan incheese the flavorful Rudeboy Chillior-by a available) and salsa, classic that has always been meatindulging in the flavorful free.

Rudeboy Chilli - a classic that has always been meat-free.

Hopefully, the transition that HemHopefully, the transition ingways has undergone willthat inspire Hemingways undergone other restaurantshas to do the same,will and inspire other restaurants to do the collectively, Hong Kong will strive same, and collectively, Hong towards fostering a more sustainawill strive towards fostering bleKong and healthy environment.

Hema more sustainable and healthy ingways has done a profound job at environment. has it kick-starting theHemingways movement - what done a profound job at kicknow takes is a small ounce of your starting the movement - what it efforts to keep up the impressive now takes is a small ounce of your trajectory future! efforts totowards keep upa greener the impressive trajectory towards a greener future!

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C MR O 1 2 Y L E 10 questions for…

By Trystin Wong | Interviewee Anthony Coyle

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Mr Coyle, could you introduce yourself to our readers?

Certainly. My name is Anthony Coyle, I was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and have been in Hong Kong now for 6 years teaching history at CIS. Prior to that I taught in Scotland for 10-11 years, Greece for 2 years, Poland for 5-6 years, and I’ve also taught in Ukraine.

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What do you miss most about your place of birth, Glasgow?

What I miss most about Glasgow is the people. Your ordinary person has more than a scant knowledge of history, so you can go into any local pub and if the people there find out you’re a history teacher, they’re only too happy to engage in a conversation in regards to local or international history. That’s one amazing thing about the city, but I also miss the humor and I miss watching my local football team play.

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?

Wow. If I could live anywhere in the world, where would it be. I would love to go and live somewhere in Southern Europe…*chuckles*.

Bali would be nice, in Indonesia.

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What made you want to teach history? Was it something you always wanted to do?

Yes, I always had an interest in history, always. Sure, I had an interest in literature and politics, but history captivated my interest in people, and how people had an impact on their immediate environment. I had an interest in labour history, looking at the labour movement in Britain, so I think it was looking at my own local history that fascinated me at first, which then developed into a love and appreciation for international history. So yes I’ve always had an interest in history, but as a young man I never thought I’d teach it, it just wasn’t something I considered at the time.

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If there were no limitations, where would you take your students on the ultimate history trip?

Since I am a teacher of primarily European history, I would love to take them to the Balkans to see the geographical spread. We’d start off in ancient Athens, travel up through Macedonia, and out through the coast of Croatia, to see the formation of that region through Byzantine times all the way to modern times.

As we all know, comparing grades are a vital part of CIS’s culture.

How do you view the importance of grades and this competitive mindset students have?

I don’t. I don’t view it of any real consequence.

Because I believe in the development of a child into a young man or a young woman. I think the success in their life is to be judged in many different ways, not if you get into a certain university or not. It’s the ability to know what you are, what you want and what makes you happy. If you like something, then I think ultimately you’ll make a success out of it, and a success is knowing deep in yourself what makes you happy.

Which country’s history fascinates you the most?

I’m fascinated by Polish history, as well as history in the Balkans, that primarily being Croatia, Serbia, Boznia, Herzegovina, so i’m interested in Central Eastern European history.

7 Most fascinating historial figures?

I was always fascinated by the revolutionary leaders in the 20th century, people like Marshal Tito, Vladimir Lenin, and Leon Trotsky. Those would be three people who fascinate me by their intellectual ability, but also because they were men of action.

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Many of my classmates are stressed about getting into a prestigious university, do you have any advice to give them?

A: I think what is important is the choosing the university that’s right for them, the one that provides courses and necessary support for each individual student. I understand that each student wants to be successful, I admire that, but ultimately they should choose the university that is most appropriate, and beneficial to them.

Words to live by?

A Scottish novelist once said “the trick of life is to keep breathing”, but ultimately I would say “try to be yourself because you can’t be anyone else, and try to find something in your life that makes you happy.”

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簡評《三傻大 腦寶萊塢》

By Elaine Hua | Illustration by Adam Wang

一說到印度的電影，大家想到的大概就會 是前段時間上映的電影《摔跤吧！爸爸》 （英文：Dangal）了吧。它高潮疊起的劇 情和奇葩的印度風背景音樂，贏下了很好 的口碑。但說到印度勵志電影，也必然少 不了這一部經典。而且，在很多程度上， 它甚至可以說比《摔跤吧！爸爸》更能帶 來心靈上的震撼。 不知道大家有沒有試過在考試之前試過奮 力學習，複習到凌晨，腦中塞滿密密麻麻 的知識點，然後第二天抵抗著強烈的睡意 去考試。在電影中，主角們所就讀帝國理 工大學裡，這樣的斯巴達式教學不過是日 常。校長在開學典禮上也如此說道： ‘一出生就有人告訴我們，生活是一場賽 跑，不跑快點就會慘遭蹂躪，哪怕是出 生，我們都得和三億個精子賽跑’ 就在這樣的一間學校，男主角Rancho是一 個與眾不同的存在。在所有人都被灌輸要 死記硬背時，他更認同自由地對知識進行 理解。同學們通宵達旦背‘機器’一詞的百字 註解，Rancho卻在課上用種種例子，包括 自己的褲子拉鍊說明‘機器’如何是一個幫 助人們創造更加方便的生活環境的工具。 沒想到收到了來自教授的嘲諷，說’你在考 試上也要這樣寫嗎？’後便被教授轟出了教 室。雖然Rancho無法被教授們理解，但他 大膽嘗試，樂天派，不屈失敗的精神還是 感化了他身邊的朋友，Raju和Farhan。電 影講述的便是他們三人在學校中挑戰新思 維的趣事和掀起的一陣陣風波。在這段路 上，他們經歷了眾多失敗和挫折但最終他 們三人還是向世界證明了，只要有了那封 熱情和對知識本身地追求，成功自然會在 不經意間來到你的身邊。

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在《三傻》中最為讓我印象非常深刻的一 句話是，‘人在生下來的時候人生道路已 經被決定好了，男孩就是工程師，女孩就 是醫生。’這可以看出這個職業本身在印 度就代表了人的成功。實際上，電影裡的 Raju和Farhan也是因為家裡貧窮，才希望 能夠讓兒子變成工程師賺大錢，最後回饋 家庭。這種普遍性的想法其實存在著一個 很嚴重的問題，也就是本人的想法。可能 男孩身來就應該踢足球但在社會和家庭的 壓迫下不得不成為工程師。在他人看來他 可能是成功的，但是幸福與否又是又一會 事。就像Rancho勸導想要從事野生動物拍 攝的Raju所說的，‘就這一次，拋開你的恐 懼。要不然以後哪天，你進了棺材都要後 悔。只要一點勇氣，你就會改變生活。’在 現實壓力下，人們往往會選擇大多數人認 為正確的道路，真正去追隨自己的熱情需 要勇氣，而正是踏出這第一步的勇氣，才 是難能可貴。 整體來看，電影格調輕鬆幽默，時不時有 插入濃濃印度風的音樂和舞蹈，魔性但插 入的卻非常自然（笑）。雖然電影的整體 觀感很歡樂，但它卻探討當今印度在學習 制度上的各種問題。其中包括學生缺乏創 造性和過於死板的學習內容和對學生的過 度鞭策。電影中有兩句話是這樣的： “即使馬戲團的獅子也會因為怕鞭打而學會 坐在椅子上 但你們會說這是‘良好的訓練’ 而不是‘良好的教育’。” “你們都陷入比賽中，就算你是第一，這種 方式又有什麼用？你的知識會增長嗎？不 會，增長的只有壓力。這裡是大學，不是 高壓鍋……”

背完幾千篇名詞解釋到底能不能使學生成為一 個優秀的工程師？電影裡給出的答案是否定 的。在走出學校之後，名詞解釋會幫助你，但 真正重要的是如何將知識實際運用到。電影裡 有一幕是這樣的，大雨天裡去醫院的路上水漫 金山，而校長女兒卻馬上需要有人接生。最後 在情況危迫之時，Rancho, Raju 和 Farhan動員 陣間學校，用泵，低塵器和他們腦海中的工程 知識，通過將泵和低塵器連結在一起，調節吸 塵器地力度，他們在一番努力後，成功為校長 女兒接生。如此驚心動魄的一幕在電影裡被表 達的淋漓盡致。其實，這一段想表達的就是這 種知識靈通性的重要性。能夠被下這些機器的

詞語解釋不稀奇，但能實際投用這些知識在生 活中才能體現對知識的真實領悟。 但願每一個人都能成為電影中的Rancho，打 敗恐懼，為熱情而拚搏，帶著樂天派心態面對 面對生活中的每一天。

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CIS學 生 的 日 常 ： 怎 樣 做好時間管理

By Jennifer Zhang | Photography by Evelyn Kwan

在漢基，學生們的生活是忙碌而充實的。除了 需要每天在課上認真聽講及完成課業之外，還 要參加豐富的課外活動和體育運動。充實歸充 實，然而，每天聽到身邊學生們最多的煩惱也 就是作業太多，時間太少，需要完成的種種功 課總是在毫無察覺之中如山堆起，而大把的時 間總在不經意間飛速消逝, 管理時間變成了學生 們普遍的一大難題。人們總是說，時間是擠出 來的。的確，時間管理並不是逼迫自己一口氣 把所有事情統統做完，而是學會更有效地鋪排 事件，通過方法和技巧使日常的學習生活更加 有條有理。 首先，想要有效率地安排和管理自己的時間， 就必須要先懂得時間的重要性，學會珍惜時 間。作為學生的我們，經常會因為繁忙而忽略 時間的流逝，認為擁有時間是理所應當的。這 種對時間無所謂的態度是導致我們無法認清及 面對問題的根本原因，從而不重視時間的管 理。仔細計算的話，“我們平均三十分鐘就會 收到一次打擾，平均每次打擾五分鐘。這樣算 下來，每天大約三個小時就這樣憑空消失，而 一年之中竟然整整一個月就如此從我們指縫流 失。” 這樣一看，時間流逝的速度是否快得瘮人 呢？我們只有洞察了真相，才能懂得去珍惜。 所以，無論在我們學習的時候，或者休息的時 候，都要知道和察覺時間正從我們指尖消逝。 有了時間概念，才能真正開始對時間進行規劃 管理。

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時間管理的方法又有哪些？ 第一，需要以事為先。在我們的學習生活 中，必定既會有緊要的事件，又會有繁瑣 的小事需要完成，所以不一定能第一時間 內完成所有的事情。這種時候，最容易開 始產生煩惱和混亂，會因為覺得自己時間 不足而感到焦躁。這時我們要做的，就是 給所有如同亂麻的事情分一分輕重緩急， 重要的事一定保證最先完成，而相對沒有 那麼重要的事，就稍微往後放一放。每天 早上上學之前，就花一到兩分鐘思考和整 理出這一天最重要的三件事情，而這三件 事情便會是當天必須完成事情。這樣有了 清晰的思路和安排的話，忙碌的一天反而 就不會覺得異常的慌亂而更有條理了。

作為學生，我們還可以有效的利用 學校日程中的碎片時間。一天內，我們經 常會忘記日程中那些零散的時間是可以拿 來好好運用的。這些看似微不足道的零碎 的時間其實都可以拿來做許多短時間內可 以完成的事情。例如，早晨坐校巴到達學 校的十多二十分鐘可以用來背單詞，考試 前的課間休息時間可以趁機溫習功課和課 堂資料，等車或排隊的時間能用來回覆和 整理電子郵件。無論忙還是不忙，每天的 這些碎片時間，與其讓它流失掉，還不如 利用起來完成日常瑣碎的小事。若是利用 好了生活中的零散時刻，便會發現自己節 省了許多時間，那些似乎因繁忙而來不及 做的事情也在不經意間早已完成了。

說到這裡，時間管理最重要的一 點並不是效率要多快或是生活要安排的多 嚴謹，而是要找到生活的一個平衡點。我 們的日常雖然因學習而忙碌，但是也不能 為此而忽視了生活中另外的方面。我們還 必須要將時間合理的分配和平衡，不光只 把時間預留給學習，也要留一些時間給家 庭，朋友和自己。如果能找到生活中學習 於學習之外的黃金平衡點，並且堅持這樣 合適和規律的時間安排，那麼與時間的賽 跑，便會必贏無疑。

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By Joyce Jiang | Illustration by Ashley Tuen

“與神同行” 這部電影一開始便已注定離奇。故 庭有異曲同工之妙，陰間大王是法官，亡魂是 被告而地獄使者們是律師為亡魂辯護。這含蓄 事起篇於男主角金自鴻的意外死亡，而真正的 “與神同⾏” 這部電影⼀開始 ⾃鴻闖過地獄的層層審判，⽽ 故事卻在他犧牲後展開。身為消防員的金自鴻 的比喻，引導我們對當代法律進行深刻省思， 便已注定離奇。故事起篇於男 最終只有無罪通過全部七層審 因公殉職、墜樓犧牲，因此被以 “貴人” 的身份 意味深長。 主⾓⾦⾃鴻的意外死亡，⽽真 判，才得以投胎轉世。在影⽚ 帶進了陰界。在途中，他遇見了三位來自陰界 的使者分別是老大江林以及解怨派和李德春。 身為一位壯烈犧牲的勇士，卻被帶入地獄進行 正的故事卻在他犧牲後展開。 中的地獄，死者要在四⼗九天 他 們 負 責 幫 助 亡 魂 金 自 鴻 闖 過 地 獄 的 層 層 審 罪惡審判，這也是本片的巧思之一。金自鴻在 ⾝為消防員的⾦⾃鴻因公殉職、 內，接受⼀共七層的審判，⽽ 判，而最終只有無罪通過全部七層審判，才得 剛被帶到陰間的時候，就被三位使者因為救人 而犧牲的壯舉扣上了 “貴人” 的光環，然而在經 以投胎轉世。在影片中的地獄，死者要在四十 墜樓犧牲，因此被以 “貴⼈” 這七層審判對應著七種不同的 九天內，接受一共七層的審判，而這七層審判 歷層層審判的過程中發現了他所背負的罪惡。 的⾝份帶進了陰界。在途中， 場景及⾃然元素：⽔，⽕，鐵， 每一次審判都是對主人公一生的細節回顧；每 對應著七種不同的場景及自然元素：水，火， 個細節都像是側面反映主人公的生存現狀；在 鐵，冰，鏡，空氣，沙漠。每層審判都是由不 他遇⾒了三位來⾃陰界的使者 冰，鏡，空氣，沙漠。每層審 同的陰間大王分別主持，同時審判的內容也截 對這些細節進行善惡評判的時候，也不禁引起 分別是⽼⼤江林以及解怨派和 判都是由不同的陰間⼤王分別 然不同，分別為：謊言，懶惰，不義，背叛， 觀眾的疑惑：“這個社會，想活成一個堂堂正正 李德春。他們負責幫助亡魂⾦ 主持，同時審判的內容也截然 的人，容易嗎？” 。“與神通行” 講的是陰間的審 暴力，殺人，天倫，審判的順序是按照罪行由 小至大而排列的。審判的形式與人間的公訴法 判，但渡的卻是主人公陽間的歲月， 有時候反

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過來看一個世界其實還是一樣的。這部影片 中，開始的金自鴻是所謂的“貴人”，經歷了地獄 無間的惡與罪罰，審判背後的愛與救贖，我們 才發現，“貴人”這名稱的虛幻。觀眾逐漸恍然大 悟，貴人也好，罪人也罷，人類終究背負著不 可逃避的命運，都疲於為生計奔波，也都有著 些許情境所迫、在所難免出格的行為。就如金 自鴻在 “謊言” 那一關中，冒充小女孩早已在火 災中喪生的父親與她通了十幾年的書信，目的 是為了小女孩可以茁壯成長。“人生在世孰能無 過”， 這樣對普通人的情感刻畫讓這部影片有了 溫度。因為對於觀眾來說，只有常人的生活細 節，才具備擊中常人的溫度。 隨著影片進入高潮，而主角金自鴻的審判也進 入了最終兩關，他最深層的罪行指控也即將被 揭露。“暴力” 地獄的法官揭露出他在高中時， 在深夜曾經毆打營養不良虛弱的弟弟。而在最 後一場天倫審判的內容中，地獄使者李德春竟 不可置信地發現金自鴻竟在同一晚曾因生活的 艱難，意圖殺害得了重病且瘖啞的母親再與弟 弟自殺，然而未遂後因深深的愧疚離家十五 年，寄錢回家無顏面對家庭的生活。在這一場 審判中，閻王給出了最殘酷的真相：當晚母親 是清醒的，知曉也接受自己孩子的行為。這是 金自鴻永遠無法磨平的遺憾，對母親的歉意也 使他自願沉降也於無底的刑法。然而，這時， 在託夢裡，母親說話了，無邊的愛包容了這些 大罪，小罪，母親早就原諒了自己的孩子。而 按照冥界最高指令，“人界被真正原諒的罪狀， 到冥界一律不追究”。最終閻王也感嘆到 “人生 在世孰能無錯，但只有少數的人能鼓起真正的 勇氣祈求原諒，而少數人中的更少數人能得到 真心的原諒。” 卒章顯志。這世上有太多人不願 於自己和解。那些生前沒做好的事，死後才想 要彌補和懺悔。而金自鴻不知道的事，母親從 來沒有怪過他，等了十五年，只為等他回家。 存活在這世間，並沒有絶對的 “對的人” 也沒有 真正的“錯的答案”。人生有太多灰色地帶，在善 與惡，罪與罰，天堂與地獄間都是人心的顯現 而非客觀的事實。也許 “種什麼因，得什麼果” 這些都是個人栽種的結果。本片也不免俗地告 訴大家 “生命有限，請珍惜當下”，學會與自己 和他人和解，畢竟 “過去的事情不值得浪費新的 眼淚”。

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BATTLE Nowadays, it’s typical to hear our society frequently discourse about the difference of capabilities between both genders, questioning whether or not one gender is more skillful than the other. In the 2017 drama/comedy Battle of the Sexes, directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris explore one of the most serious sporting contest of modern times the 1973 tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs, both of whom has been previously titled World No. 1 tennis player. The film wonderfully encapsulates how the tennis courts of America became a gender battlefield in the early 70s, making the film politically intriguing and dramatically gripping.

The film explores the most watched televised sports events of all time - the 1973 tennis match between Billie Jean King (Emma Stone) and Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell). Trapped in the public’s attention, King and Riggs faces each other on opposite sides of the tennis court, battling for the title of ‘Best US Tennis Player’. However, both were fighting personal complex issues outside of the tennis courts - King struggles to come to terms with her own sexuality, while Riggs finds himself thrown out of his own house due to his gambling addiction.

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T

F HE

S

HE EXES

By Jacqueline Ho | Illustration by Gabrielle Hioe

Battle of the Sexes does an excellent job of portraying the tennis match between King and Riggs make in 1973, and provides the audience with a better insight into the private lives of both tennis players. Emma Stone and Steve Carell’s superb acting cannot go uncredited – their ability to portray the distress and pain outside of the tennis court allow the audience to empathise with both characters in regards to their ongoing private battles.

Emma Stone, prepared immensely to mould herself from actress to athlete. In order to better prepare herself the role, it is reported that she went to the gym almost everyday for three months and gained 15 pounds of muscle, just to have a body build similar to that of a professional tennis player!

audiences of the 21st century simply because it serves as a reminder of the past and provides a sense of nostalgia for those born in the late 20th century.

Retro filmography is getting increasingly popular nowadays, and Battle of the Sexes surely does not fail to incorporate this aesthetic element. Like many other directors of recently released films such as I, Tonya and Jackie, directors Dayton and Faris integrates a vintage look – a collective imitation of the 1970s trends and visuals – into this film. One might ask why the retro comeback is so popular nowadays? Perhaps the retro aesthetics appeal to

With its fascinating plot, vintage filmography and intensifying music, directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris expertly recreates a gripping film that unravels the famous tennis competition between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. Battle of the Sexes truly was enjoyable to watch, and I highly encourage you to distract yourself from the stress and work of school by grabbing a bag of chips and watching this movie.

However, some might argue that the movie is not an accurate representation of this competition as it only scrapes the shallow surface of the sporting event.

They argue that Battle of the Sexes is too focused on the private lives of both Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs, which should not be the focal point of the movie because it deviates from the movie title.

Battle of the Sexes should have placed a heavier focus on the on-court actions, and how the competition was a true struggle for both players as their skills were neck to neck.

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Bad & Bougie

T H I N K I N G C R I T I C A L LY A B O U T C H A R I T Y

By Jaspar Chan | Illustration by anonymous

The “Three Big” Limits of Neoliberalism Neoliberal ideology calls for: 1. Limited government interference with economics 2. Limited regulation of corporate behaviour 3. Limited government responsibility for maintaining social welfare - this is a responsibility that is passed onto the private sector It is an undeniable fact that through our acts of charity, the greatest virtues of humanity are hence extolled: compassion, empathy, generosity, altruism, amongst others. The lower strata of society - the impoverished, powerless, underprivileged, dispossessed - are given a helping hand by those better-off, good Samaritans acting on their most noblest intentions. It can even be argued that it is intrinsic in human nature to help out those in need, and that the underlying instinct is to forego our own inclinations to act in the interests of the greater good - we humans are social animals, after all. But perhaps today, in this age where neoliberal capitalism has become the order of the day, we should at least start reflecting on the practice of charity and how we go about doing it, and the implications for society that it entails.

Today it is estimated that there are over 37,000 international NGOs of considerable size, with presumably many more minor NGOs operating on smaller scales. The largest of them wield considerable power on par with corporate mega-conglomerates and governments - Oxfam, the Gates Foundation, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. In Bangladesh, the NGO BRAC (Building Resources

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Across Communities), has accumulated such power and influence that it has come to supplant the government in providing welfare and social services. However diverse in scope and purpose they might be, these NGOs are collective in the fact that they receive much of their financial backing from wealthy philanthropists and corporate sponsors. The corporate-funded nature of major NGOs means that they are invariably beholden to their sponsors; they are obliged to act in the interests of the sponsors and are wont to adopt a watered-down version of their message, their compromised ideals made palatable and non-threatening in their efforts to appeal towards high-profile corporate sponsorship.

Part 1: Criticising Corporate Charity Sometimes, the very sponsors NGOs court are responsible for perpetuating their own self-made injustices at home and abroad - Microsoft, a company which has consistently provided aid to Africa and other lesser-developed regions throughout the past few decades through partners like the British Council and Microsoft’s own 4Afrika initiative, has also left thousands of their Americans workers out in the cold through their out-

sourcing of production to Africa and China, and engages in exploitative business practices that leaves their foreign factory workers struggling to subsist on Microsoft’s minimum wage.

Another striking example is Uber’s highly-publicised support for No Kid Hungry, a campaign run by the nonprofit Share Our Strength aimed at combating child hunger in America. Does this act of corporate charity on Uber’s part excuse their track record of corporate sexism and misogyny, as well as their unsavoury business practices that hugely disadvantage their contracted drivers and staff, threaten the livelihoods of taxi drivers, and delegitimize market regulations for fair competition?

Corporate charity also empowers a neo-colonial ideology implicitly endorsed by the Global North, the effects of which can be seen in the involvement of prominent western NGOs in developing, postcolonial countries. Take for instance the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, a G8 initiative funded by the World Bank, the IMF, and the Gates Foundation. With the ostensible aim of spurring local agricultural development, the NAFSN supports state-

capital partnerships in developing countries that advocates the use of GMO seeds and the attendant fertilizers and pesticides that are tailored for intensive farming - farming methods which have been proven to degrade the soil and poison the surrounding environment.

Local farmers’ organisations representatives of those who the NAFSN ostensibly sought to help - were excluded from the negotiations between the Tanzanian government and NAFSN to secure foreign aid. Subsequently, the Tanzanian government’s signage and acceptance of the quite unreasonable and arbitrary conditions of the aid provided by NAFSN went without the acknowledgement of those who would be the most affected by them.

The resulting legislation, which green-lit the developmental assistance offered by the NAFSN, greatly benefitted agribusiness giants, such as Monsanto, at the expense of small-scale farmers. Intellectual property laws on Monsanto’s GMO seeds outlawed the selling or trading of seeds between farmers – transgressions may result in a prison sentence of 12 years and a fine of over €205,300. These new laws have introduced the alien concept of private intellectual property rights and criminalized the exchange of seeds in a vast informal system that comprises of neighbors, friends and family; farmers now have to pay a high fee to certify their seeds if they wish to continue their ages-old tradition of seed exchanges.

Moreover, if traces of Monsanto’s GMO seeds are found in the seeds of traditional farms as a result of inadvertent cross-pollination, those farmers are liable to be sued by the

multinational for stealing its intellectual property, as has happened in its legal battle with US organic growers in 2013.

These underhand tactics foster a dependency on agribusiness corporations in Tanzanian farmers, as they are now encouraged to depend on foreign corporations for their sustained agricultural development.

They suffocate the efforts of local NGOs to pursue locally-spurred development, driving a wedge between those NGOs that seek food sovereignty and those that seek corporate partnerships. Indeed, the agenda pushed by the alliance of global North countries, powerful multinationals, and philanthropic private foundations is reminiscent of the unequal treaties forced onto indigenous peoples by colonial powers.

This practice of corporate charity and the provision of development aid is in itself questionable, as it propagates the paternalistic conception that those in need are passive victims requiring the voluntary patronage of benevolent corporations who know better. Regional and local NGOs are forced to tone down their activism once they are co-opted by foreign sponsors, and grassroots movements fighting for reform and self-sufficiency are in effect neutered once those in need have become complacent to remain dependent on foreign aid from NGOs. Instead of fighting for radical and structural change or engaging in grassroots activism, NGOs co-opted by their corporate sponsors instead turn to professional organisation and fundraising activities, operating along a careerist model of organisation dominated by an exclusive leadership of a few

highly-paid experts instead of being an inclusive, grassroots-led mass movement consisting of a diverse variety of marginalised peoples.

Concerned with maintaining funding from their sponsors, NGOs are incentivised to address immediate, short-term concerns with measures that consistently provide quantifiable results, such as food drives to keep the homeless from starving, instead of pursuing transformative strategies that take aim at the roots of social problems: fighting against wealth inequality, oligarchs’ monopolies and the state-capital collusion that pushes up the cost of living in cities and leaves people starving on the streets. It’s as if patients with wasting (but ultimately curable) diseases were just given painkillers by their doctors, who are inclined to put off having to develop a cure since they’re already quite content with their profitable deals with painkiller manufacturers.

This practice of charity is ignorant at best and cynical at worst, with NGOs deliberately bypassing and therefore weakening local government welfare services to implement their own aid projects - a practice characteristic of the neoliberal tendency to encourage the diminution of governmental oversight in favour of benefitting the private sector. In addition, this approach stifles potential for locally-driven development and growth and fosters an area’s dependence on foreign aid, in essence allowing NGOs and other foreign actors to maintain their control over that area in a form of neo-colonialism.

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Part 2: Charity and the neoliberal state The conscionable appeals made by charities - “Your $25 could buy warm clothing for a Syrian child refugee” masks the complicated and murky reality of how NGOs distribute their resources. Most of the time, how NGOs use the funds at their disposal is left to their discretion, allowing for lapses in judgement that result in corruption and nepotism; the current unfolding controversy around Oxfam’s misconduct in Haiti comes to mind. Moreover, the top-down model of charity dictates that it is up to NGOs to decide what issues they think are worth diverting funding to, the flaws of which manifest in single-issue campaigns that overshadow or ignore equally pressing problems facing the recipients of humanitarian aid. For example, an aspect of the current interdisciplinary curriculum in the Hangzhou Chinese International School features a Film - Digital Design - Individuals and Societies unit with the prompt “there will be a charity gala attended by rich donors & you are in charge of

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promoting a social cause to receive funding”. The unit, centred around creating a marketing campaign championing a social cause to secure funding from wealthy elites, is emblematic of the competitive marketplace where social causes have to stand out as if they were glamourous products on supermarket shelves in order to be considered worthy of support. In essence, this propagates the narrative that it is the most heartrending issues eliciting the greatest emotional response that determines which causes receive attention and what other causes don’t.

Perhaps the best example of the aforementioned NGO-led single-issue campaigns can be found in the role of food banks in developed countries.

In Hong Kong and other countries which favour small-government and laissez-faire policies, food aid from charities and NGOs often outstrip that provided by government authorities, and at times supplant them altogether. There are some problems with this governmental practice of outsourcing food aid to charities, mainly: the de-

preciation of what would otherwise be a structural societal issue to a matter of charity, and the inherent fact that such methods of food aid provide only short-term relief at best, and do nothing to solve the underlying problems that cause food poverty in well-developed countries in the first place.

In Hong Kong, NGOs such as Feeding Hong Kong, along with smaller charities and a few truly noteworthy, altruistic individuals, are those who take on the responsibility of feeding the poor. Unintended consequences of this approach include an acute lack of government attention towards the issue of food scarcity amongst the city’s lower class, as well as the legitimation of food as a commodity rather than a basic right and the entailing diminution of the Right to Food - we may not see anything wrong with having to pay more for higher-quality foodstuffs, but we have to consider that this also means that those less well-off only have access to low-quality, unhealthy and potentially unsafe foods due to their lack of spending power, meaning that what should otherwise

be a basic human right - that to reasonably nutritious food - is only attainable to those who have the money to do so. This same argument also applies to other commoditizations of basic human rights, such as the rights to housing, education, medical care, legal representation, and political participation.

The outsize role of foodbanks in poverty-alleviation efforts also gives credence to the implication that social issues garnering the most public attention are those that are addressed with a disproportionately large amount of public and private resources, usually at the expense of other interrelated social issues. In Hong Kong, the stifling of local community spirit, as well as the growing radicalisation of low-income youth, are both under-regarded issues linked to the worsening socio-economic prospects of the city’s lower and working class.

These symptoms of Hong Kong’s larger wealth disparity problem are equally as serious and as deserving of attention, and while single-issue campaigns aimed at alleviating specific social problems are not undesirable, without recognising the overarching problem of the city’s wealth disparity these campaigns can only have a limited effect on affecting meaningful change.

The social inequalities plaguing developed societies (food insecurity in this case) are direct consequences of decades of consistent implementation of neoliberal policies, enabled by the collusion between the state (the government) and private business (capital). The consequences of this state-capital alliance include the cutting of wages, the growth of precarious un/underemployment, the contractualisation of labour and the entailing weakening of unions and

workers’ rights, the brunt of which is experienced by the marginalised this referring to the diverse lower and working classes; for instance, Hong Kong’s own (disproportionately poor) Nepalese underclass. It is crucial, when we think about the benign contributions made by NGOs such as Feeding HK, that we do not become placated by the platitude that these NGOs are at least making an effort to alleviate such social problems. However benign the focus of their charity may be, the obligations to their corporate sponsors hinders their ability to achieve a larger degree of change beyond that of providing a limited degree of aid, which belies the true nature of the labyrinthine, well-entrenched socio-economic disparities that continue to aggravate these social problems - consider the high-profile relationships between prominent charities and their corporate sponsors; for example, that between Feeding HK and one of Hong Kong’s largest property conglomerates, the Sino Group. With the cost of living and housing prices continuing to rise, the Group is part of the mega-conglomerates’ monopoly on the city’s housing market, responsible for the growing wealth inequality in the city and some of the social problems they purport to be alleviating. These conditional relationships limits the ability of NGOs to provide meaningful criticism of current socio-economic injustices due to the fact that their corporate sponsors are often responsible for creating and perpetuating these injustices.

The reality remains that, despite their outwards pretense of neutrality, NGOs operate in a highly politicised environment. Conflicts of interest are inevitable, but some might argue that it would be counterproductive and perhaps overly-idealistic to reject funding from wealthy philanthropists

and corporate sponsors altogether. Is it possible for NGOs to transcend a pious, paternalistic patronisation of those in need, and move towards efforts to achieve self-sufficiency and equality in the developing world?

The piercing criticism of neoliberal globalisation offered by the prolific NGO Mission for Migrant Workers, alongside its invaluable assistance to migrant workers in Hong Kong, gives it legitimacy as an ally to those in solidarity with the marginalised. Indeed, their grassroots and community-based approach to organised activism, as well as their lack of aversion towards critiquing prickly socio-economic issues, proves to other NGOs and aid organisations that it is possible to be a meaningful benefactor to those in need without being beholden to funds or publicity from corporate sponsors.

As individual activists or volunteers, our contributions might only be drops in the ocean, and perhaps that sentiment is not entirely unfounded - after all, while doing things like doling out gifts of cash or SIM cards to struggling students may seem like conspicuously benign gestures, how much of a difference does it really make on a wider socio-economic scale? The least we can do is to actively reflect on our work and how it affects (or perpetuates!) the situation of those who we seek to help; thinking critically about our practice of charity, and getting other people around us to do so too, may well be the first step towards precipitating lasting and meaningful change in society through the development of a perceptive public aware of the reasons behind poverty and other socio-economic injustices.

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F A S H I O N F E A T U R E S “Fashion features is back! Well, unfortunately it was never really here in the first place...

This is a general spread hoping to appeal to those people with an interest in fashion, photography or even aesthetics. This is a pleasant interruption from the dense and wordy material to give some flavor to the magazine as a whole. Sit back and indulge yourself in these lively photos from the talented Gioia Cheung.�

- Catherine Ding

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富裕的物質 生活是不是最 美好的生活 By 湯淑棋 | Illustration by Kristen Wong

經

濟學中有個基本的概念叫 稀缺性，意思是個人或社 會的資源有限而不足以滿足人類 無限的慾望。而正是因為人類本 能中有想要去填飽自己慾望和需 求的那個念頭，我們努力賺錢， 希望有更多的購買力，從而過上 富裕的物質生活。但富裕的物質 生活是不是最美好的生活呢？不 見得。 但首先不可否認的是富裕的物質 生活固然好。在擁有大量金錢的 基礎上，人們的生活條件絶對居 於基礎之上。他們無需顧慮一些 雞毛蒜皮的小支出，甚至對於大 開銷也只是瀟灑地一甩手，消費 負擔輕如鴻毛。在衣食無憂，溫 飽不愁的情況下，人對於維持生 計的壓力自然而然就減輕了不 少，從而開始追求馬斯洛金字塔 的更上一層。試問有多少人想做 比爾蓋茲，巴菲特？在電視機前 看著福布斯排行榜的我們，突然 就變得好渺小。是啊，誰不想活 得更光鮮亮麗，令人艷羡？

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先下主流“錢是王道”，在這物慾 橫流的世界裡，人們勾心鬥角， 在權力的遊戲中試圖踩著弱者的 頭往上爬，撐破頭皮也要想盡辦 法變富。可，有錢，做個有錢 人，真的是脫離枯燥和痛苦的解 藥嗎？為了掙錢拚死拚活地工 作，這股奮鬥勁兒可圈可點，但 若是純粹因為想賺錢而犧牲了一 些也許對於你來說真正重要的東 西，那還值得嗎？當腦中迴響 著“錢錢錢”的主旋律，你是否想 過自己也成為了萬千帶著銅臭的 失魂者了呢？盲目的追求物質生 活，很可能會走入歧途，背馳而 行。也許有一天，當你坐擁金山 之時，你試圖用金錢詮釋幸福， 卻發現天平的另一頭滿載的是空 虛。人類的慾望會永無止境地膨 脹，所以即使擁有富裕的物質生 活，我們並不一定快樂。 那怎樣的生活是最美好的生活 呢？每個人對美好的定義都不 同，可我相信精神世界的富裕遠 比物質上的富裕來得更加可貴。

錢乃身外之物，若你整個人的價 值都只是在依賴你龐大的家產的 話，那麼當你有一天被剝奪了 一 身華袍，你將 一無是處。 可精神上的富足則能常伴你一 生，你看過的書，走過的路，接 觸過的人，經歷過的事，得到的 知識，所持的思想觀念，這些都 不能用金錢或者物質去衡量，他 們會融進你的人格，成為你的一 部分。古代多少詩人懷才不遇隱 居質樸，卻留下了成千上百首膾 炙人口的詩歌，這告訴我們啊， 人即使無榮華富貴也可以活得悠 然自得。一個人再有錢，但內心 冷漠，見死不救，也許他是很有 錢，但他的內心和品行窮的只剩 下錢。

即使沒有富裕的物質生活，溫馨的 家庭，難得的愛情，真摯的友情， 這些都可能彌補缺乏的物質生活。 若一個人再有錢，但他的家庭卻支 離破碎，他必定不會幸福。若一個 人再有錢，他周圍的朋友全都不走 心，笑裡藏刀背地擺道，拿他必定 生活在欺騙和巨大的心理壓力之 下。

錢的人不一定開心，土豪不一定懂 得享受生活，窮人也可以窮的嘻嘻 哈哈。 錢不是萬能的，但沒有錢是萬萬不 能的。可若只有物質富裕，那生活 一定不是最美好的。

都說知足者常樂，學會感恩，苦中 也能做樂。當我們放下快節奏的生 活，我們也許能找到 很多被我們所 忽視的美好。雖土豪可饕餮大宴穿 金戴銀，但當你手捧一杯在街頭打 折買的奶茶，與志同道合的好友在 冬日裡 呡下千古絶句時，你也許就 是世界 上最快樂的人。比起打工 仔們每天寒酸地吃著一些快餐或是 沒有衛生保障的路邊小攤，有錢人 大可去一些承諾食品安全的豪華餐 廳，享受更高一層的味蕾盛宴。但 小人物也有自己的幸福，放工後那 一杯淋滿醬汁的咖喱魚蛋雖稱不上 是什麼山珍海味，卻承載著和工友 們一起填飽肚子的歡笑和回憶。有

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获取知识 知识 成功 不是通往成功 的唯一途径 By 施君怡 | Illustration by Kristen Wong

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所谓知识，就是人类透过自 身的联想或是他人传述而累 积的经验。英国哲学家培根 曾说：「知识就是力量。 」可见古人从很早以前便认 为，知识对我们的人生有著 巨大的影响。这句话随着历 史的长河流传至今，许多人 也就因此认为 —— 获取知 识是通往成功的唯一途径。 可事实真是如此吗？ 无可否认的是，知识与成功 两者之间有着一定的关联， 但并非是绝对的因果关系。 就像父母常说：「学好数理 化，走遍全天下。」没错， 在某些特定场合，像是考场 上，知识便是唯一的法宝， 可它并不等同于走上康庄大 道的绝对保障，相反，更可 能使人原地踏步，永远无法 脱离「知识」的枷锁。如今 人们讲究的是经历和创新， 一个人的品德，意志力才是 有力的竞争因素。 首先要明白，充足的知识库 并不代表着智慧。也许在几 十年前，知识显得难能可贵 因为并不是所有人都有获得 知识的条件。但随着现代社 会的急速发展，人们的文化 水平逐渐上升，资讯发达让 知识快速传播：它不再是你 最大的筹码。一手知识好牌 如果不懂得适当整理并实际 运用，到头来也只不过是纸 上谈兵。人类是一种群体动 物，在互相的扶持合作下才 能将进度最大化。你的为人 处事决定了別人对你的态度

及是否愿意信任、接纳并帮 助你。世间有许多巧合，幸 运的人总有他的可贵之处， 否则中了六合彩也不能保证 你一辈子的奢侈。路遥知马 力，日久见人心。品德上的 缺陷随着时间逐渐显现，就 算是一张完美的履历也无法 让你受到別人信服，从而踏 上成功的途径。 其次，在千变万化的大千世 界里，敢于跳出「知识」的 框架，创造出与众不同的事 物在成功道路上至关重要。 虽说爱因斯坦自身对物理学 的了解及认知十分关键，可 没有足够的发散性思维和想 像力，他也无法创立「相对 论」的理论。奥地利经济学 家熊彼特曾说：「创新就是 创造性的破坏。」知识讲求 的是过去的经验累积，而不 是未来的前瞻。长江后浪推 前浪，旧科技逐渐被淘汰， 取而代之的是方便快捷的新 科技。一个人单靠著现有的 知识是无法为世界做出贡 献。敢于想像，做出大胆而 合理的决定，也许会有出乎 意料的收获。

是从失败中吸取教训，发掘 更多的潜能。华特·迪士尼 曾被批为没有想像力和好点 子的废物，受到报纸社的解 雇。但他并没有因此放弃， 最终创造了闻名世界的迪士 尼公司。可怕的不是失败的 滋味，而是到头来从未瞭解 过自己当初失败的原因。个 人的实践比他人的意见更为 有效，只有亲身经历过，才 会知道这个世界的多彩和自 己从未发掘的能力。 总的来说，获取知识不是通 往成功的唯一途径。正所 谓「条条大路通罗马」：每 个人都有自己成功的方式， 它并不是一个绝对的程式。 一个人的品德，创意以及意 志力在成功的道路上都是必 不可少的。找不到良好的运 用方式，知识终究止步於 大脑，永远无法成为实际 行动。

失败乃成功之母，你的态度 对你人生的影响至关重大。 「成功开始于想法，但是， 只有这样的想法，却没有付 出行动，还是不可能成功 的」— 比尔盖茨。没有一 个明确的目标并为之奋斗， 知识的存在也依旧无处可 用。每个人都要经历人生道 路上种种的坎坷，可重要的

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THE LIVING LANDSCAPES OF ETHNIC MINORITIES IN HONG KONG

By Kaitlyn Wells | Photography by Karen Chan

In Hong Kong, seeing ethnic minorities is a commonplace, namely the populace of Southeast Asian migrant workers, many of whom work as domestic helpers. We are all familiar with the people who are hired to care for children and the elderly, do cleaning and housekeeping. They come from places including but not limited to Indonesia, the Philippines, Cambodia, and Thailand. Statistically, foreign domestic helpers are overwhelmingly female at 99%, and in total constitute over 4% of Hong Kong’s population at just over 330,000 people1. To be frank, the story of a female foreign domestic helper in Hong Kong takes many shapes, and is not always kind.

Demand for domestic helpers in Hong Kong is strong, having one of the highest densities of foreign domestic workers where approximately 1 in 8 households employ a domestic helper. This need has seeds in multiple areas. For one, Hong Kong has no universal child care system, and the forms of child care that is offered isn’t accessible, convenient, and affordable for all households in Hong Kong. This makes things difficult especially for dual-income families that lack an adult figure to watch and nurture their young children during the work day. Hong Kong is also demographically skewed, with a quickly aging population that is currently entitled to minimal and outdated governmental support. There are insignificant government subsidies, shrinking family sizes, and lack of quality public senior centres.

As the cost of living in Hong Kong increases, so does the need for more than one income to support a household. This, combined with the growing level of education and availability of jobs for women, is leaving vacancies in the female-oriented familial role covering domestic labour, thus countering the typical and traditional family hierarchy that designates the female solely as housewife and mother, and the male as financial provider. The women impacted seek jobs outside of the domestic service sphere, where wages are more promising. The domestic work left behind is for this reason marketed to foreigners from the global South to fill in, for HK-cheap salaries they would gladly accept. But what is unfair is the fact that domestic work continues to be devalued, mostly due to the lack of respect for the industry. This derives from society’s systematic sexism and gender stereotypes that associates domestic affairs with adjectives like nurturing, simple, feminine, and simultaneously, inferior.

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Experts estimate that Hong Kong will require 240,000 additional domestic helpers within the next three decades to support its unproductive citizens: children, the elderly, and the disabled. In a nutshell, the shortcomings of the government as well as the natural direction of development of Hong Kong society, is what fuels the demand for domestic workers, and hence the need for the importation of labour.

To understand for why certain Southeast Asian countries export labour in the first place, let’s study the Philippines as an example. They are a formerly colonised nation, at the hands of Spain and then the USA, although the Philippines still haven’t fully escaped from the influence of their past colonisers. When they were granted independence from the United States in 1946, the wounds of World War II were still raw, and the country desperately lacked the finances and aid it needed to rejuvenate. Therefore, the Philippines naturally turned to their former imperialist, the USA, for help. Henceforth, the USA and large Western organisations, namely the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, had leverage over this new and unstable economy through periodically supplying the government with hefty loans. These loans were abused further, but by the Filipino president-dictator of the 70’s, Ferdinand Marcos. Except, the money loaned to the Philippine government was knowingly being transferred into Marcos’s bank and power cluster. It pushed the Philippine government into huge debt. This corrupt exchange was at the fault of both parties, and by 1983 had plunged the Philippines into a debt of 24.4 billion USD, thus causing extreme devaluation of the Filipino currency (the peso).

However, this wasn’t the only thing that led to the outpouring of workers from the Philippines. From 1962 onwards, the Conservatives, who constituted the majority of the elected Philippine Congress and were backed by the World Bank and the IMF, imposed policies that were in accord with the neoliberal framework Washington encouraged. These new and radically different policies started the process of deregulation, which devastated the Philippine’s economy and eventually led to their chronic debt dependence. Furthermore, in 1974, President Marcos, in a scramble against a poor economy with high unemployment rates and social discontent, enacted what is called the Labour Code of the Philippines. This established a governmental structure for overseas employment, which in turn kickstarted a drastic increase in the country’s labour export. Enforcing the Labour Code was Marcos’s way of dealing with the immediate situation at hand, and although the Philippines has pulled through the crisis, their colonial and meddled-with past to this day continues to evolve and bear weight on the national economy.

ment and portray their outgoing migrant workers as economic heroes. Privately, licenses were issued to agencies based in the Philippines to recruit labour for employers in other countries.

Publicly, the government established the Philippines Overseas Employment Agency to provide direct contract labour to foreign employers, enterprises, and governments. Filipinos migrants are encouraged with subsidised benefits including life insurance, pension plans, prior training on overseas social and work environments, medical insurance and tuition assistance for the migrant’s family. It’s also an outlet provided for people, particularly women, who live in rural areas or places with little job availability.

The bigger problem that results is that valuable people that would be working in other sectors of the Philippine economy are instead being pushed into overseas jobs, and the domestic industry in particular. Domestic workers that would’ve thrived with other careers have their qualifications and education deprived of their use and worth, and it’s their native country, in this case The Philippines, which loses out. The cash flow and rush to repay national debt is why cheap labour on a mass scale is the current path of action supporting the country.

Several migrant worker organisations including Mission for Migrant Workers and the Asian Migrants Coordinating Body have proposed effective ways of fixing this, such as by increasing social spending and developing infrastructure, all to create more work opportunities and better equip the people with the necessary skills, in order for the Philippines to regain autonomy and relinquish foreign sway.

As time and the domestic industry grew on, Singapore, Taiwan, and Hong Kong have all become popular destinations for Southeast asian domestic workers seeking foreign employment. A crucial lure these leading international cities possess is the pay—one that can be multiple times what the average salary achievable would be back home. Hong Kong’s minimum wage for domestic helpers of $4,410 HKD per month (560 USD) is unquestionably seductive, especially in comparison to the same positions in less prosperous Southeast Asian countries, for example the monthly salaries of 100 USD for full time workers in Cambodia. Foreign domestic workers make the long and tough journey and complementary sacrifices all in hope for a better standard of life that’d be made possible by the higher incomes that aren’t available in their own countries.

Now, four decades later, what Marcos intended to be a temporary labour export model has stayed and become a institutionalised part of the Philippine economy. The Southeast Asian women involved in Hong Kong’s domestic industry are lucrative assets as well as targets in the eyes of their native governments. A sheer 10% of the entire Filipino population—10 million people—is currently employed overseas, a debatable yet functioning utilisation of human capital responsible for 10% of the country’s GDP. Philippine government advocacy has over time been tailored to incentivise overseas employ-

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Regarding the employment agencies that act as merchants between migrant workers and employers in Hong Kong, a study by HKU in 2017 found that more than 70% of them subject Indonesian and Filipino domestic workers to employment terms abuse. Unethical employment agencies break the law by overcharging migrant workers (commonly by crazy amounts), lying to them, cheating them, or withholding identification documents as leverage to make them pay out their debts.

Many if not most domestic workers first arrive in Hong Kong with several months of debt to overcome from their employment agencies’ fees. If they change their mind about wanting employment in Hong Kong, agency fees generally start at a shocking 30,000 USD. There are indeed pure employment agencies in Hong Kong such as Helper Choice and Fair Agency, that advocate for transparent and ethical employment practices that uphold the rights and wants of the worker and matches them with the right employers.

What is known as the Live-In Policy has since 2003 required all foreign domestic helpers to live in the same residence as their employer. This regulation was made in the name of protecting local domestic workers and preventing international battles for part-time jobs. There have been quite

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a few lawsuits from foreign domestic workers to eliminate this rule on the grounds of essentially having to be on call 24 hours a day, and infringing on the migrant’s rights by having the employer determine their living standards and work parameters.

In addition, despite how long a foreign domestic helper has been employed and lived in Hong Kong, be it seven or twenty years, they are not entitled to become Hong Kong citizens if they wanted to. Even legal experts view this as unconstitutional, as there is no mention of this in the Basic Law. Yet, foreigners that aren’t domestic workers are able to apply for citizenship at any time. In its essence, this law is an embodiment of Hong Kong’s class and ethnic prejudice. Undeniably, and shamefully, there is some unspoken racism in Hong Kong towards people of colour, including Southeast Asians, as well as South Asians and mainlanders. Also, Hong Kong immigration law only permits foreign domestic workers to stay in Hong Kong for a maximum of two weeks if they quit their job or are fired. That’s 14 days!

An incredibly short and stressful period of time in which they must sustain themselves with food and shelter while finding another employer to sign a contract with, or else face deportation, and a loss of all the money it took to the move to Hong Kong and

run through the employment process.

Foreign domestic helpers also are assigned a scarce number of opportunities to travel overseas. In addition to 12 days of statutory holidays a year, they legally have 7-14 days of annual paid leave, which the large majority of whom choose to spend in their home countries. Foreign domestic helpers make enormous sacrifices in order to make and provide financial subsistence. They endure separation from spouses, parents, children, siblings, friends; of the female foreign domestic helper population in Hong Kong, 64% are also mothers. It’s just too unrealistic and difficult to bring family members overseas with them.

These women take care of other people’s children instead of their own.

“I wish I could kiss them goodnight, every night” says one helper in reference to her two children back in the Philippines, seen in Joanna Bower’s very enlightening documentary, The Helper. It’s an unimaginable maternal sacrifice. It’s also not something people in Hong Kong address, because the distress of not being able to fulfill both professional and maternal shoes at once is too relatable and downright unfortunate to think about; rather than humanising such foreign domestic workers about these grievances, skirting around such topics weighs much lighter on the conscience.

While their prevalence is unclear, abuse of foreign domestic workers is something that regrettably exists. Some stories of mistreatment are extremely brutal. A 28 year old Indonesian woman was beaten by her female employer for a period of four months (which she cleverly documented in videos and photos on her mobile phone), and during this time forced to sleep in the bathroom and work 16 hours a day, at some points even dragged across the floor by her hair. She would be yelled at and repeatedly slapped for mistakes like forgetting to put butter on the table. Another domestic worker, a 40 year old woman from the Philippines, was forced to drink dirty water from a mop by her employer, while being verbally degraded with “you are very stupid, you are so dirty,” all as punishment for simply wringing the mop in the sink. One woman’s employers had a camera in her bedroom to monitor her—a complete invasion of privacy. Another woman described how her female employer had been worked up and jealous of how the husband treated her well. She was forced to stay in standing position and forbidden to sleep for two consecutive nights. One of those mornings, she was hit by her female employer, who also cut off her hair, and poured bleach on her. Cases of violence or law violation against foreign domestic helpers are repeatedly dismissed by the Hong Kong Police and government officials, who label the claims as rare or exaggerated.

Furthermore, it can be tough to make new friends in a new city. In Hong Kong it is really easy to feel excluded where every adult seems to know their place and mind their own business. Especially when you are socially reduced to the

confines of your nationality or your language. Good thing for public events and workshops that domestic helpers can to participate in on their days off, the perfect opportunity to find friendship through activity with people who share the same interests. Such activities can include photography workshops, dance classes, singing groups, sports teams, potlucks and so on. Example organisations that cater towards Southeast Asian domestic helpers are Dance the Day Off, which provides free community dance classes, and Unsung Heroes, which is a free community choir group.

There are also those who’ve been lucky enough to be able to create and innovate from working as a domestic helper. Like an Indonesian woman and former domestic helper in Hong Kong who saved enough money to create a food business when she returned to Indonesia. She made investments in gold that paid off, bought land for herself, then started her own brand that processes and sells cassava, a root vegetable, with a consumer base in Hong Kong and plans to expand her network into Taiwan, Singapore, and Malaysia.

Legal gestures that would improve the wellbeing of foreign domestic workers include increasing the minimum monthly food allowance of $1,053, or increasing the minimum number of days of paid leave, or simply enforcing the law to rigorously protect their rights. The Hong Kong government has taken some measure to protect migrant workers, such as issuing a Code of Practise for employment agencies in 2017, and increasing the overcharging offence penalty.

Plus, instead of saying ‘my helper’, or reducing them to nameless and invisible figures, to household necessities, everyone in Hong Kong and elsewhere should strive to create welcoming and inclusive environments for foreign domestic helpers. Strengthen relationships by asking questions, or being understanding and appreciative and receptive and essentially, normal. Approach someone that lives with you like a family member, and refer to foreign domestic workers like so in front of anybody. This is the easiest and most genuine way anyone can deliver personal respect, as well as prove that differences can be dissolved.

As for alleviating Hong Kong’s dependence on foreign workers in the domestic industry, creating universal childcare and elderly support institutions will fulfill two of the largest tasks that domestic helpers are hired for. But this isn’t just a matter self-sufficiency. There would be impacts—on the foreign workers themselves who need these overseas jobs to support themselves and their families, on their neighbourhoods, and on their economies at large.

Foreign domestic helpers, they work hard to create a better future for themselves and their families, identical to the popular ethic of Hong Kong. Out of respect and decency, Hong Kong must strive to be a gracious host, free of discrimination, free of divide, and full of gratitude for the women and men whose incredible sacrifices the people of Hong Kong are beyond indebted to.

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WHAT WAS IMPORTANT: EXCAVATING THE ARTIFACTS OF A CIS EDUCATION

By Yi Ling Liu In the closet of my childhood bedroom, I keep two large plastic MUJI bins labelled “School Stuff.” And by school stuff, I mean the documents, essays, notebooks, readings that I’ve accumulated over the years — the paper trail of an educational experience.

This September, returning home after graduating college, I went through all this stuff. Going through the papers, I felt less like a teary-eyed graduate wading in nostalgia and more like an objective, curious historian on an archeological dig of sorts, hoping to unearth and pick apart the thirteen years of my life spent at Chinese International School. Like any historian sorting through the rubble, I was driven by a question: what was important?

But the act of excavation was as forward-looking as it was a turn to the past. Today, my little sister walks through the Moongate every morning, a lankier, smarter, shrewder doppelganger of my fresh-faced Year 7 self.

I wanted to know what was important to my experience so that I could know what might be important to hers, or perhaps to any young person graduating from this school in the near future, spat out into a city in flux, a society of fake news and Harvey Weinsteins and technological disruption and orange-haired Presidents.

So here it is. Raw evidence, accumu-

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lated, archived and analyzed. Physical artifacts, some of which would perhaps yield clues. What was important to shaping my experience as a CIS student, in determining the person that I’ve become today?

[Disclaimer: I draw personal conclusions from the life experience of one — an adrift 22-year old with minimal life experience and little idea of what I will be doing with my life months from now. (And anything but financially independent, if you are wondering what an Ivy League degree might buy you.)

So I hope you take everything I write with a grain of salt.]

Footholds of Solace — Every English Paper and Reading Inside the white-walled, 8th-floor English classrooms, I learned how to read. I learned not only to read for the sake of analysis, for the ability to think critically, or for the cadences and rhythm of language. I learned to read for guidance and solace. To figure out how other people lived their lives, so that I could better live mine.

I also learned how to write, which I now know to be very tangible, practical and urgent skill in the business of life. I learned to write my way out of confusion, to write order out of chaos, to manipulate words as my primary way of making meaning out of expe-

rience.

I’ve kept all of the texts that I’ve read and written, remember each poem, novel and essay with perfect clarity.

The texts and ideas that introduced to me then have become maps to navigate myself with, lighthouses of hope, footholds of support as I stumbled through college and now through early adulthood, such that I could stumble just a little more gracefully.

I am forever indebted to the English department, which always seemed to be a hub of creativity, independent thinking and an infectious enthusiasm. I learned to love things I never would’ve touched (provincial France, the domesticity of giraffes, poems about dead people in bogs) Every single English teacher that I have had at CIS, given the autonomy to teach what they were the most passionate about, has left an imprint not only on what I read and write, but also how I behave as a human being in this world.

Take Pablo Neruda’s “Ode to an Artichoke,” recommended by Heather Brubaker, the second week of Year 8 when I told her that I liked poems “about random things like potatoes.”

To this day, I have turned to Neruda, but also Billy Collins, Francis Ponge, On Kawara, as a reminder to cherish the banal, the everyday and ordinary.

W.H. Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts,” about a painting called “The Fall of Icarus,” brought to my attention by Brian Kern, informs how I understand collective pain, and how I aspire to navigate the world, not as a passive bystander, but always, always as an active observer.

And of course, every single text introduced to me by Ms. Yeo, I have carried with me to this day, but especially Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family, a book I ended up writing a senior college seminar on under the guidance of Caryl Phillips, a friend of Ondaatje’s. I remember one moment in Year 13 English class, Ms. Yeo read an opening passage from Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family, about missing the humidity of Asia. She started to tear-up, and I felt myself starting to cry too. Ondaatje anchored me, year after year of flying back and forth between Hong Kong and New Haven, a source of comfort when I felt my most adrift and untethered.

Community reared on Conflict and Compromise: The CIS Human Rights Group

Half of the “School Stuff,” comprises of posters and notes from a group that I joined in Year 11, that would shape and continues to shape my life: the CIS Human Rights Group.

CIS, outlining areas we believed the school needed to improve (and still does): democratic decision making and socio-economic diversity to name a few.

What does it mean to be part of and contribute to a community? To enact real and substantial change?

In each of these initiatives, I found that real change is born from honest criticism of our most immediate communities, through disagreement and compromise, conflict and collaboration. I spent many an hour arguing with fellow members, and now realize that it was through argument that we were able to better stand by our own convictions, change our minds, weave together different ideas and arrive at something better, a voice that was truly communal. Only through constantly engaging with ideas that challenged our own, that made us uncomfortable, were we truly able to grow.

With the HRG, we started conversations on how we could improve Hong Kong, but also the very space we were inhabiting — the school itself — in the realm of LGBT rights, labor rights, and foreign domestic workers’ rights.

We collectively wrote a thorough and critical human rights audit on

That kind of honesty was also the bedrock of long-lasting friendship. Many of the peers I have remained most close to, with whom I continue to have unfinished conversations with, were those I had met through HRG, because so many of our core values were formed during those years.

Through the human rights group, I understood what it means to take part in a community. Participation. Contribution. Community. Even writing these words down makes me instinctively cringe, because of how hackneyed they have become from overuse, thrown around so casually that they have all but lost their significance. At times, the “Community” in C.A.S, feels buzzword without substance.

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To this day, I continue to visit Brian Kern, our group leader at his warm home in Lamma Island, where we join his family for dinner and conversation. My inbox flows with emails sent to and received from Kern who has continued to be a mentor to me all these years, brimming with exchange on everything from the novels of Min Jin Lee to the dangers of a social credit system, from the future of Hong Kong to the cultural diversity of Minneapolis.

standing of Chinese history, for example, was solid thanks to History Higher Level Paper 3 and the careful tutelage of Mr. Caves, which gave me a comprehensive developmental arc of modern Chinese society, from Qianlong to Mao. But still, everything I read and wrote was entirely in English. And I knew next to nothing about Chinese poetry or its philosophical tradition.

A little about Confucius, and nothing about Zhuangzi. Absolutely zero about Hong Kong literature.

Am I a global citizen? Five years out of CIS, I can hardly hold claim to that title. What I do know is that I did not come any closer to global citizenry because I went on a project week trip to Sri Lanka to paint a slide for local primary school kids with my DT-taught lacquering skills. Nor am I a global citizen because I have sampled various culinary delicacies from different cultures, or can navigate my way through the various SOHOs and NOHOs around the world.

Trilingualism and a Mongrel Identity: Language Skills, IB History Higher Level Paper 3 and Poor Cultural Literacy of the City of Hong Kong

Which brings me to point out a glaring absence in the box: any kind of substantial and coherent understanding of the city and culture of Hong Kong.

The haphazard smattering of Chinese and French readings in the box of School Stuff reflects the equally fragmented grasp of two cultures that CIS had given me.

To this day, I feel like an outsider in the city, a status that I feel even more acutely having returned as a journalist, coming to terms with just how little I know about a city that I have lived in for 18 years. How does the Basic Law work and how is it being challenged? Why was Chris Patten important? How does this city in flux fit into thousands of years of Chinese history?

The CIS Human Rights Group left a small puncture in what we refer to as the CIS bubble, but it certainly was not enough.

In striving for cosmopolitanism, we have fallen into the danger of producing a rootless mongrel, with little idea of the deep well of tradition and history that we are are born into. This is not a Trumpian call for nationalism or neoconservative back-to-your roots rhetoric. What I saying, rather, is that when peers from around the world ask us about the place we are from, we need to be able to answer them and answer them well. It is the fine line between belonging everywhere and belonging nowhere.

Linguistically, I am in debt to my CIS education, for giving me the raw tools and for sowing the seeds to further explore two deep wells of cultural tradition in the future.

But I continued my studies of Chinese and French in college for two distinct reasons.

The curiosity sparked in French class at CIS, drove me to study abroad in Paris freshman summer, and to take a class surveying the history of the modern French novel, to more deeply immerse myself in a culture wholly foreign to me. My limited exposure to Chinese literature, and my dissatisfaction with how little I knew of the nuances of my own mother tongue, propelled me to spend 3 months in Taiwan the summer of my junior year, to better understand a culture that I called my own.

Reading six hours a day of Chinese literature, from Quyan to Tao Huayuan to San Mao at the National Taiwan University, I was shocked by how little I knew.

I was not totally clueless. My under-

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Detachment from the home city is common among international school “third culture kids, ” the term coined by sociologist Ruth Useem to refer to young people reared in the culture different from that of their parents.

But Chinese International School does not advertise itself as the breeding ground for embassy brats or Skibs the Kids. We are allegedly a pioneer among Hong Kong schools that nagivate biculturalism and bilingualism.

We allegedly come from both the East and the West. We do not need to learn about the way LegCo works like American kids learn about Congress, because we are being nurtured for an education abroad, being reared into “global citizens.”

It also means that we must take the word “diversity” seriously. The most basic neural structures in our brain thrive and develop as a result of exposure to thoughts, ideas, belief systems, ways of living that are different from ours. We must engage with difference, must see the world through the lens of the other or we will be unable to live in a world that is constantly trying to divide and build walls instead of bring people together.

No Report Cards: A Shift from External Validation There is another absence in the box: report cards. I’ve kept not a single one.

But this absense is a good thing.

Grades were one of the greatest sources of anxiety for me at CIS; now I have no idea what the difference is between criteria a and b and x and y and z.

At college, I realized, to put crudely, that I could give two hoots (I don’t ever use the term hoots, but using it here in lieu of another, more commonly used term) about grades. I weaned myself not only off the satisfaction derived from grades, but all sources of external validation: grades, salaries, awards, accolades, MVP medals, sports day medals, instagram likes, facebook likes, approval from anyone else but yourself.

I attempted to anchor myself, slowly and steadily, in some kind of adhoc, self-fashioned system of internal validation — hazier, much more difficult to quantify, and something that each person must fundamentally arrive on their own. The makeshift definition one that I’ve arrived at this point in my life comprise of 1) to tell stories about stuff that matters 2) a sense of belonging to community, comprised of individuals excited about what the world has to offer 3) to push my capacity to love.

I’m not standing on a pedestal above and beyond the pleasure derived from external validation. I love seeing my name in print and a little sickening flutter in my heart when an instagram post starts raking in the likes. But I also realized that if these things were to serve as primary engines of motivation, at some point down the line, I would be screwed.

The default way most schools pres-

ent the experience of learning is as a mountain that must be climbed, with final peak and destination. A friend that I met this summer, who works as an educator, compared the experience of learning rather, to steering a ship at sea — one that must be constantly navigated, with no clear end goal in sight, towards a shoreline in the misty distance. It is hard to know what the shoreline looks like, and sometimes you need the wisdom and humility to allow someone else to give you a hand, to point out a better direction of course. But at the end of the day, it is your two hands that must hold the steering wheel.

Letters and Cards: A Beautiful and Messy Web of Relations Buried at the center of the box is another tin box with a metal clasp, where I have kept every letter I have received, every birthday note, every postcard.

It is the beating heart of all of all this stuff, residue of old friendships that have faded, evidence of new ones that have blossomed, artifacts that remind me of the people that I have had the privilege of knowing, the relationships that we have built, of the people that I met at CIS that I became a fully-fledged human being with, people that I will call up and feel ok being my most ridiculous, embarrassing, unabashedly weird self with.

Friends. These people give me this sense of belonging to a place that I no longer recognize, their words hold together the fabric of memory and community that I hold dear, and love for these people compels me to put pen to paper, finger to keyboard, to compose this piece of writing in the first place. Both the handful that I have kept in touch with, as well as the countless more that I have lost contact with, have left a lasting imprint on the person that I am, have been, and will become.

David Foster Wallace said in his over-cited but nonetheless ever-relatable speech at Kenyon College, that the purpose of education is the freedom to choose what you want to worship. What do you worship?

Worship is a lofty word, taken out of context, so a better way to understand worship is the word prioritize. What do you prioritize? What do you spend many a waking hour thinking of, fussing over, working on, seeking to improve, deriving happiness from?

What I “worship” will be subject to change; I know this. If there is one thing that I am certain of it is the pervasiveness of uncertainty. But for now, as it has been for the last few years, I’ve held onto these letters and postcards as my totems, and have chosen to worship community, friendships, love.

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NET NEUTRALITY

By Ian Choi |Illustraions by Caterina Jacobelli

BACKGROUND Internet is a relatively new service, and one that has seen astonishing growth. From its roots in the US military in the 1960s when it was called ARPANET to the 90s’ “early internet”, the Internet now serves just over 50% of all humans on Earth, allowing anyone to access information stored thousands of kilometres away at the click of a mouse. When lawmakers first beheld this beast, however, they had one question: how do we make sure that people who use the internet are properly protected? This is the central question behind the debate around Net Neutrality. It is a question that has perplexed lawmakers for years, and is also the question that we will be tackling in the next 2000 or so words.

Thankfully, that question is quite difficult to answer, or else this article would be very short indeed. At this debate’s core is the understanding that Internet is a public service, one that is essential for daily life: in this way, it has been grouped alongside water, electricity, gas, telephone, and sewage systems in its importance to society. While public services can be financed by the government, they can also be run by private, capitalist companies. However, these endeavors must then be regulated by a legislative commission to ensure that companies don’t exercise any their capitalist intent, and make it harder for members of society to access Internet’s breadth.

Here, it is important to make a distinction between Internet and ISPs. Internet is, as we know it, a series of interconnected networks (hence the name) that spans the globe. However, when you type www.moongate.cis. edu.hk to hide your Tetris game from the librarian, your computer doesn’t connect directly to Internet: instead, it connects to an ISP that controls

the access. There used to be three methods to connect to the ISP: cable, which uses cable TV infrastructure; dial-up, which used telephone lines to dial a number (but not make calls at the same time); and DSL, which also uses telephone lines, but also allows you to use the telephone simultaneously. Nowadays, the large majority of internet access is through DSL and cable, with dial-up largely rendered obsolete.

We are going to start by looking at what the United States has done and is doing, but in recognition that we live half a world away from Washington, D.C., we are then going to examine what we as Hong Kongers can learn from their successes and mistakes, and how America’s situation differs from, or is similar to, our own.

That brings us to today, where net neutrality has reached yet another historical turning point. In December of 2017, the 5 leaders of the FCC voted 3 to 2 to undo the reclassification of ISPs to Title II, just two years after the FCC imposed harsh regulations on ISPs in order to treat all internet traffic fairly. The vast majority of relevant net neutrality legislation (e.g. restraining ISPs from creating fast and slow lanes for internet traffic, prioritizing their own traffic, and blocking specific apps and services) is now gone, with only the requirement that ISPs must publicly disclose their actions. The FCC argued that doing so would “facilitate critical broadband investment and innovation by removing regulatory uncertainty”.

Now, ISPs can wreak havoc on both consumers and internet companies alike: by giving companies the right to block traffic, ISPs can now legally charge Americans for ‘packages’: if you wanted to access Facebook, for example, you would need a “Social Media Package” to do that. It gets

worse for internet companies: now, ISPs can effectively force a company such as Netflix to pay them if they want their content to be streamed at a watchable speed, thus creating a slow lane. If this didn’t create the desired outcome, they could also directly threaten the blocking or limitation of content to pressure the organization into doing so. In essence, the new regulations would be exploiting the inevitable fact that users being unable to access their website would cause the company to lose profit.

Now, in America, all hope is not lost.

In the few months since the FCC repealed its own regulations, numerous courts have filed lawsuits that opposite the FCC’s decision. 75 mayors in the first week of March signed a letter asking the FCC to reconsider its decision on repealing Net Neutrality laws.

In New York, Oregon, Illinois, and Massachusetts, multiple lawsuits were announced, all centered around suing the FCC for its issuing of “arbitrary and capricious rules”. In Washington, Governor Jay Inslee announced in January that the state would continue enforcing Net Neutrality regulations regardless of the FCC’s repeal. Finally, in the Senate, democrats put forth a Congressional Review Act, which would allow the senate to nullify the FCC’s orders, which presently still needs one more vote to pass. Unfortunately, the Review Act is most likely going to fail, given that after passing the Senate, it would still need to pass the House of Representatives, which is majority Republican and against regulating ISPs (and thus against Net Neutrality).

The issue of neutrality has its own proponents and opponents, who perceive the benefits of regulations very differently. We will be going through them and seeing what merits they do and don’t have.

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TEAM PROPOSITION

People on this side believe net neutrality is a force for good. Firstly, it protects consumers by making sure they are being granted Internet speed they are paying for, and makes sure that people don’t need to pay above their monthly fee for a service that is necessary for modern 21st Century life. This makes sense—as a public utility, people should be able to get the same internet speed regardless of what they do.

Secondly, on a level of principle, net neutrality is essential to free speech.

Since Internet is a platform for free discourse, it is a place where Antifa can exist right next to CNN, the Alt-Right, and liberal media and all be treated equally. If ISPs decided that they were now politically biased towards, say, Democrats, they could choose to block or heavily slow-down content from rightwing news sources to make their users focus only on liberal news. Those people writing on the right-wing news sites would be having their right to speak their opinions violated, and regardless of whether or not they are right, everyone’s opinions should be given an equal chance to be heard. After all, in a different world, your opinions could be the ones being silenced.

Thirdly, net neutrality encourages competition between internet companies like Netflix. By enabling internet companies to freely have access to Internet, smaller, better competitors would be able to rise to the heights of their corporate counterparts based purely on merit alone. That is how small internet services can grow to such a large size: after all, if you needed to pay a gargantuan sum of money to ISPs every month just to make sure people see your content, it would be a serious financial burden and render your site unprofitable and uncompetitive when compared to Facebook, which might be able to afford the money.

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THE USA

Nowadays, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulates ISPs. Throughout the early 2000s, the FCC continuously tried to regulate internet service providers, to ensure that they did not limit access by decreasing speeds or blocking online content from its users. One example would be in 2007, when Comcast, the largest ISP in the US, was found to have delayed BitTorrent uploads on their servers. In response, by 2010, the FCC had implemented a set of guidelines preventing ISPs from blocking access to internet services. However, this was criticised for being too “soft” of a combative approach. Things only got worse in 2014, a court ruled that the FCC did not have the right to regulate cable companies because they were not considered “common carriers”— people or companies who transports goods for the public. ISPs were, in fact, classified in the 1934 Telecommunications Act under Title I as generic “Information Services”, and consequently they were subject to very little regulation. The tables were turned, yet again, however, after intense lobbying from internet activists resulted in the reclassification of ISPs under Title II of the same Act as “Common Carriers”, which put them directly under the FCC’s oversight and finally allowed them to be regulated properly.

TEAM OPPOSITION

On the other hand, some argue that net neutrality gives too much power to the government. Because in a world with net neutrality, the government would need to install software and hardware in order to be able to monitor the actions of companies. This arguably gives way too much power to the government, which could maliciously access the content. I understand the concern, especially given the fact that democratic governments can turn tyrannical (like in Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy), and giving too much power to any government, even a democratically elected one, may only

make it easier for them to become dictatorial and oppressive.

Secondly, some argue that net neutrality improves competition between ISPs: by removing regulations on ISPs can and cannot do, this will allow them to develop better services: for instance, if AT&T offered free internet when you used Instagram, the consumers of their competitors would see the better services and change over to them. This in turn would encourage their competitors to improve their services (for instance, offering free internet when using Snapchat). This cycle of trying to beat out their competitors would drive innovation and development, improving the internet we use.

Thirdly, some also mention how net neutrality actually artificially hurts companies: because internet services have to be handled at the same speed, a youtube video has to be treated in the same way as a blog (which is a smaller file size than a blog), and that means that video streaming superficially hurts ISPs. Thus, allowing ISPs to charge more for loading larger files seems to be a reasonable thing to do.

WHY SHOULD WE CARE?

On the surface, it would seem that both sides have some very good points.

However, within the arguments pitched by the opposition, there exist some very flaws. Firstly, the argument that we can’t give too much power to governments does have some value, but in any nation, a government must have some degree of control, and I think that in this case the government should have the ability to moderate the internet, since it is a public utility, which the government has an obligation to provide to the public properly. It is the same reason why governments also have control over our water supply: sure, they could use their power to poison their civilians, but they also use their power to make sure that companies don’t redirect their pipes and leave you without water.

Secondly, the argument that repealing Title II classification would increase competition actually would make sense… just not in the US, because ISPs have a monopoly over the market in the States. Nowadays, in the US, the large majority of people have 2 or 1 ISP options, and so even if someone was dissatisfied with their services, they wouldn’t be able to change. Thus companies don’t actually compete with each other, and wouldn’t even if these regulations were removed. Now, since most ISPs know that their users don’t really have another choice, in the absence of regulations they would be able to do whatever they liked to squeeze every penny out of their customers, and since they provide a service essential for modern life, people wouldn’t be able to resist them.

Finally, the argument that net neutrality hurts ISPs is a little shaky given that you’re paying for the speed at which an ISP downloads content to your computer, so regardless of if you watch a youtube video or load a blog, that information is still coming into your house at, say, 5 megabytes per second. This means that youtube videos, which are large files, simply take longer to load than a small website. So this doesn’t really hurt internet traffic.

HONG KONG

The situation in Hong Kong regarding Net Neutrality is very concerning. At this point, Hong Kong does not uphold Net Neutrality, a point which it has in common with many other countries worldwide. The internet’s governing body in Hong Kong, OFCA, has looked into designing a neutrality-positive system, but currently the system operates without much regulatory oversight. Thankfully, ISPs in Hong Kong are more competitive than in the US: just from my home, my family have the options of PCCW, Hutchison and HKBN. In this case the free market has more of

a role on ensuring that these options don’t act against users. Even in this case, though, I would be skeptical of the industry’s capacity to change, primarily because Internet is a necessity in the modern age. Even if people don’t like any of the options given to them, they still have to pick one given the importance of Internet in our daily lives. And in some outlying areas, people are forced into situations similar to the US, where they only are given one ISP to choose from. So in that sense, the industry still holds immense power over our choices in our own city.

In Hong Kong, this has resulted in the ability for ISPs to partner with internet companies to provide extra services: for instance, Three offers data plans that allow people to be able to use Whatsapp for free. By doing this, companies may be able to heavily influence Internet market, so other newer applications that don’t have as much funding can’t compete with Whatsapp, since Whatsapp could pay companies to give their customers free data use.

So, what can we do to make sure that Hong Kong does not fall to the same fate as the US? In some aspects, we already are there—there is very little regulation and companies can do anything they want. However, there is much we can do as responsible citizens. Understand what net neutrality is and the factors that affect it. Keep up with whatever regulations OFCA tries to do (and maybe even look into your own mobile or internet company), and understand the situation.

If you’re feeling really brave, send OFCA a message telling them how important net neutrality regulations are to you. We may have it better than the USA, but it is no reason to be complacent.

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PARTY CULTURE

By Catherine Ding | Photography by Xavier Banson

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The philosophy and attitudes within every school are assuredly distinct, but this rule extends to party culture as well. It also is contingent on the individual, and the individual’s group of friends. The extreme of this situation is encapsulated in SkiBs iconic song ‘Hong Kong Kids’, which nails the feel of a night at Lan Kwai Fong or Sunny’s.

The rapper himself is from Hong Kong International School, but that is only a fragment of the many teenagers from various International Schools who partake in this culture. CIS, with its reputation of high achieving students may seem less involved in the party scene at first glance, but this might not be the case.

‘Going out’, is more often than not financially strenuous. The majority of CIS kids get ample allowances for the many economic hurdles a night out may produce. A taxi back home is the price one pays to stay safe and may be the only way to get home, since most public transport closes after 1 am. Fake ID? Not a problem. Round 2? Bring it on. An interview was conducted anonymously among 3 people in various years to reach a consensus about the general party culture at CIS. On the surface level, youngsters going out clubbing and drinking can appear as a naive, uncivilised route into the adult dominated world of hedonism - a form of escapism. However, Person A claims that the true essence of partying is to broaden your social horizons and spend more time outside of the classroom with classmates at school. They also claim it as an an effective way to destress from the piles of IB work and the pressurising atmosphere at CIS. This is what unifies most international schools in their reason to ‘go out’ for a night, neglecting their responsibilities.

Person B says there are a few stages of stress that occur. When you’re partying, the stress is temporarily relieved, but the next morning is when the reality of school hits, intensified by a hangover and an inability to concentrate. Overall these effects post-party are detrimental

to schoolwork and a student’s academic performance at school.

Person A, B and C were all asked which groups they mingled with when they went out and whether or not people from other international schools were part of their social circle. Unsurprisingly, schools like South Island, West Island, CDNIS, HKIS frequently emerged. It is hence tempting to stereotype ESF students into less academically rigid, party-goers, based on rumors and social media. But are CIS kids any better? An interview with two people attending South Island School verified our integrity, if only a bit. One student, currently in Year 11 and taking his GCSEs there, said that ‘everyone starts going out and partying around now, all of my friends do it and it’s quite normalised here.’ When another SIS student in Year 13 was asked whether he thought CIS were part of the party scene, he responded, ‘Honestly, I feel like CIS kids are mild and I don’t see them out too much. There’s a general agreement opinion amongst my friends that people from CIS are pretty sheltered from the party culture, but hey, at least they’re hard working.’ This student in particular mentioned “Wanchai Wednesday”, a collection of bars and clubs in the centre of nightlife, but mentioned how Central has overtaken the place as the ‘real place to party’, and not on Wednesdays, since it interferes with school the next day.

Person B at CIS reported that there was a pattern with the people who went out on a regular basis. The friend groups themselves are quite exclusive, and it is therefore explicit who goes out and who doesn’t. The end goal for each individual may vary, ranging from wanting to have spent quality time with friends or if you’re single - to catch the attention of someone else. Hooking up can be a beacon of hope for many; this reward which can be categorised as the three F’s : fun, flattering, forgotten. The haziness from drinking and the slow dwindle of one’s personal parameters as well

as instant gratification may attract teens to this idea. At the end of the night, a significant amount of hookups can saddeningly - boost ones ego or make them feel that they’re complying with societal expectations. Usually, those who are more Western minded seem to feel the urge to go out more, based on cultural influence or comparably lax parents. It is not uncommon to see CIS people at events like Clockenflap, Dragonland and Ultra, which provide a large playground for dancing, god-awful singing and drinking.

Social media has largely changed the entire game. Now, it’s apparent from Snapchat stories and Instagram stories which individuals partake in the party scene. Feats such as drinking the most shots or winning a game of beer pong are recorded, and people can quickly see whereabouts their friends are off of Snapmaps, a map showing the locations of miniature avatars called Bitmojis. For many International School students, humiliating pictures of one drinking or abusing substances is a real end-game for one’s reputation. It is not at all outlandish to hear university admission officers rejecting a certain student based off the content on their social media accounts, as social media makes it just that much simpler.

Students at CIS typically do not prioritise party culture over their academics and for a majority of students there is no need to rein it in, compared to students at some ESF schools. For CIS students, it is less about the alcohol and more about the destressing element and social facet, which, on an optimistic note might not be so bad, as it teaches students what to look out for once they attend university. Guaranteed, it comes with its own threats and negative traits.

If there is one thing to watch out for, it is the new threats social media has brought to the table regarding the indecorous content that is posted, sometimes without one’s knowledge, onto a public platform.

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LGBTQ

&

DEAF

CULTURE

By Katherine Yang Photography by Ben Chan

It’s an integral part of your identity.

It’s a continuing fight against stigma and discrimination. It’s an invisible thing that people can’t figure out just from looking at you. It ties people together in a community rich in history and indefatigable in spirit.

These are only a handful of parallels between two uniquely fascinating minority groups in society: LGBTQ people and Deaf people.

At first glance, these two groups seem wholly unrelated, with one being an anthropological and sociocultural feature, and the other being simply an audiological condition.

However, upon further inspection, being LGBTQ and being Deaf are surprisingly similar: both share many common qualities, have developed similarly throughout history, and shape an individual’s experiences in similar ways. M.J. Bienvenu, a lesbian professor of ASL (American Sign Language) and Deaf Studies, asserted: “What we have experienced is so similar: if you are Deaf, you know almost exactly what it is like to be gay, and vice versa.” These two identities parallel and intersect each other in a multitude of ways, allowing us to gain insight into the nature of minority cultures and the phenomenon of ‘found’ identities.

The similarities begin from the first discovery of the identity, with a stigma of conflating identity with defect—in other words, an assumption that Deafness and gender or sexuali-

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ty need to be ‘fixed’ or ‘cured’.

To the uninitiated, the idea of curing Deafness seems an unambiguous blessing. Lacking the faculty of hearing when most people converse by speech, listen to music, and navigate by auditory cues seems, from an average hearing perspective, to be a distressing tragedy, from which a Deaf person could only hope to be rescued. Indeed, Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone and father of oralism in American Deaf education, argued that without speech, Deaf children would never be able to fully participate in society, and opposed Deaf-Deaf marriages that led to “the production of a defective race”. Even today, cochlear implants are lauded as an obvious and necessary solution to Deafness.

This belief, entrenched as a societal norm, causes the opposite argument to be shocking: many Deaf people would choose to remain Deaf. The key to unpacking this conflict lies in both practicality and ideology. Practically, a cochlear implant (CI) is an electronic device that can help provide a sense of sound to a profoundly Deaf or hard-of-hearing person, while a hearing aid merely amplifies sound for the hard-of-hearing. However, a host of reasons prevent or discourage many Deaf people from undergoing this surgery. Firstly, depending on degree of Deafness and physiological status, not everyone is eligible for a CI. Secondly, because a CI bypasses the cochlea to directly stimulate the auditory nerve, it may

cause a Deaf person to lose any natural sense of hearing. A ‘sense’ of sound, indeed, is what cochlear implants can provide at most. Audiologists have found that 20% of implant recipients receive no benefit from implants at all; conversely, their situations have worsened through frustration and demoralisation from lack of improvement. Furthermore, many Deaf people with cochlear implants attest to the physical exhaustion and effort required to interpret the imperfections and inconsistencies of the artificial sounds. Finally, some Deaf people see CIs as an unnecessary hassle and an affront to their identities, especially in the idea that spoken language is automatically superior to sign language.

Curing homosexuality, to both the medical community and most modern sensibilities, is widely denounced as an outdated mode of thinking. In 1973, the American Psychological Association (APA) determined that homosexuality was not a mental disorder, and removed it from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). More recently, the Pan American Health Organisation stated in 2012 that “homosexuality is a normal and natural variation of human sexuality and cannot be regarded as a pathological condition”. However, there still exist factions of society—mostly evangelically religious—that believe in sexual orientation change efforts, such as behaviour therapy, and religious methods. Here, as with Deafness, the

issue of ‘choice’ is a point of fierce debate. Traditionally, many in this group assert that identifying with a sexual or gender minority is merely a choice, and that LGBTQ people can be ‘rescued from sin’ by simply choosing to ‘straighten themselves out’. Recent trends show that arguments have evolved to recognise that these identities are natural and not voluntary, but still maintain that they can be defeated or overcome. Thus, both Deafness and homosexuality are seen as undesirable and ideally cured, but these views are generally fought against vehemently by the respective communities.

A more obscure commonality is one of language and its power to liberate and empower both Deaf and LGBTQ people.

This is perhaps easier to understand in the case of Deafness: prelingually Deaf children, or children born before learning speech, may live life without knowing how to communicate or understand that ‘milk’ is the creamy white substance they drink, or that ‘love’ is the way that their parents

take care of them. Oliver Sacks, a renowned neurologist, wrote in Seeing Voices: A Journey Into the World of the Deaf, that “to be defective in language, for a human being, is one of the most desperate of calamities”.

Indeed, the inability of the Deaf to learn the spoken language used by the rest of the hearing world, and thus their perceived mental deficiency, was one of the primary reasons why the concepts of “deaf” and “dumb” had been used in conjunction throughout history, and still remains a stigma today. The proliferation of sign languages across the world gave Deaf people the tools to create a Deaf world completely paralleling the hearing world in complexity, richness, and beauty. For example, a common misconception is that sign language is singular and universal—that a Deaf Brazilian and a Deaf Korean could meet and be able to understand each other. However, even three English-majority countries—the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia—have each developed unique forms of sign language that extend beyond mere pantomime and that are capable of expressing anything from

poetry to politics. Sign language thus allows Deaf people to fully express with their body and hands what they cannot with their ears and mouths.

In the case of homosexuality, there isn’t such a clear delineation between lacking or having language. However, the point becomes clearer when considering the abundance of LGBTQ terminology, and the confusion, even backlash, that surrounds them. The ‘LGBTQ’ umbrella initialism is itself a common point of parody: ‘lesbian’, ‘gay’, ‘bisexual’ are well-understood, but ‘trans’ is less so, ‘queer’ even less so, and it can seem ridiculous when additional terms materialise like alphabet soup, such as ‘transsexual’, ‘questioning’, ‘intersex’, ‘asexual’, ‘ally’, and ‘pansexual’. However, when a boy grows up paying attention to boys while those same boys flirt with girls, or when he feels like an alien in his own male body, having no words to describe and validate his feelings often results in internalised homophobia, meaning self-hatred and internal conflict. And perhaps even those example are insufficient

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in demonstrating the power of language, but imagine being confident in being a girl, only with ‘manly’ hair and clothing; imagine feeling like a boy one day, a girl the next, and something entirely different another day; imagine wanting close friendships, but finding romance unappealing and off-putting.

The LGBTQ community boasts an eye-opening vernacular that encapsulates all these experiences and identities. In The Miracle Worker, a film about the Deaf-blind Helen Keller, her teacher, Annie Sullivan, finally makes her understand the concept of language, and exclaims, “It has a name!

And the name means this thing!” In the same vein, LGBTQ-specific language can liberate people from feeling alone in their differences, and reveal collective experiences across an ever-expanding community.

Indeed, one of the most striking features of both LGBTQ people and Deaf people is the community. Unlike most linguistic, ethnic, and religious minorities, minority status, culture, and history for LGBTQ or Deaf people is rarely passed down through generations, and one would rarely find belonging and solidarity within one’s circle of family and friends. Instead, these communities and subcultures are formed by seeking out others who can relate to one’s experiences, thus creating unique bonds outside of traditional ties of race and background, that are centred around the principle of supporting and celebrating diversity.

According to the National Association of the Deaf (NAD), “[a]t least ninety percent of deaf and hard of hearing children are born to hearing parents who usually want their children to be like themselves, to understand sound, to use their voices and verbally express their thoughts through spoken language, and to hear the voices and spoken language of those around them.” The support that Deaf children receive from hearing parents varies drastically: some parents may take up the mantle enthusiastically by learning sign language and interacting with the Deaf community, while oth-

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ers may reject the community entirely by using only spoken language and making all efforts to make their child hear. Though one may be lowercase-d ‘deaf’ from birth (denoting the audiological condition), one often becomes uppercase-D ‘Deaf’ (denoting the cultural identity and practices) later in life, upon attending Deaf schools, joining Deaf clubs, or meeting groups of other Deaf people. Generally, this means using sign language, following Deaf-specific etiquette, utilising technology, engaging in Deaf literature and arts, respecting Deaf history, and recognising Deaf institutions. Though seemingly complex, these practices all originate in pride in one’s Deafness.

For example, the phrase ‘Deaf gain, not hearing loss’ captures the community’s preference for the term ‘Deaf’ over ‘hearing impaired’—in other words, the adamant assertion that nothing significant is missing in their lives simply because of their Deafness. In fact, a landmark event in Deaf history was the 1988 Deaf President Now protest, when students of Gallaudet University, the only higher education institution specifically for the Deaf, successfully protested against the appointment of a hearing person to president of the board over other highly-qualified Deaf candidates.

In comparison, the LGBTQ community is much more visible and recognised more widely, and perhaps requires less explanation. In public, there are clear markers of their presence, through euphoric pride parades, spectacular drag shows, and vibrant nightlife. In private, the community bonds over paradoxically personal but shared experiences, such as being closeted, coming out, and facing oppression on a daily basis. Similarly, there are landmark events in LGBTQ history of protest and community, most notably the 1969 Stonewall riots, demonstrations against police raids on LGBTQ spaces.

It‘s even more intriguing to examine not just the parallels of the two, but their intersections.

Though both are minority groups, and it is estimated that there are 15% more LGBTQ people in the Deaf world than in the hearing one, there exist both strong homophobia in the Deaf community and audism in the LGBTQ community. For example, a number of LGBTQ signs in ASL are rooted in homophobic origins, such as a limp wrist representing ‘gay’. In a different sense of the word ‘intersection’, it has been found that Deaf LGBTQ people face particularly strong discrimination and oppression. In a journal article titled “Considerations on Deafness and Homosexuality”, Jean Phaneuf reported that Deaf LGBTQ people faced increased risk of sexual, physical, psychological abuse and assault, higher rates of emotional and behavioural problems, lack of access to support networks, and lack of access to information. This is supported by evidence such as the disproportionately high HIV rate among the Deaf.

So what does it mean that LGBTQ and Deaf identities and communities exist, thrive, and continue to grow? As described in the SAGE Encyclopedia of Lifespan Human Development, Deafness can be viewed as a “difference in the human experience that, although isolating from mainstream culture, is not a disability in need of a cure.”

Similarly, in a 2016 VICE article that asked gay men if they would “rather be gay or straight”, one respondent mused: “Even if everyone were straight, we would still find ways to discriminate against one another. You can’t always be trying to fit into the mainstream. Where would it end? I think I’d rather stick to my otherness.

In the end, it made me who I am.” In a society where people inherit identities and cultural baggage like hand-medowns through generations, there’s something compelling about people who discover their community and choose to embrace it as family. Perhaps, simply put, liberation is found amongst people who share the same difference in their human experiences as you do.

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AN INSIDER’S L O O K AT M Y P

By Josephine Yip | Illustration by Bertha Ho

The Middle Years Programme (MYP) has come to be known as a liberal and challenging programme, a handy system of criteria and academic frameworks for schools to base their curricula on. Though originally designed for the elite, it has garnered global recognition, now adopted by over 1400 schools around the world. Typically followed by the The International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma programme, it aims to educate well-rounded students who are able to draw from multiple perspectives and be global citizens, eventually becoming academically honed to study higher educational programs.

This all-too-perfect mission, however, begs the question: how truly beneficial, holistically, is MYP to its teenage pupils? Does it harbor any shortcomings when achieving its task of helping student transition to higher education?

For students, a school is not purely a place for academic learning—it should also serve as a place to venture and explore one’s social life.

Socially, MYP yields many benefits for its stu-

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dents that other traditional curricula (such as peer interaction and class engagement) may not emphasize. It offers an abundance of opportunities for collaborative learning; from group projects in Humanities to partner laboratory work in Science, it allows students to interact and learn from each other proactively. Small group discussions are often emphasized as a part of MYP classroom culture, and serves as a discussion space where students can share knowledge, express their opinions, and seek like-minded peers. The occasional dispute may arise from group projects, with problems including some students having more input than others, or claiming credit unjustly. This is hence an opportunity for MYP students to learn how to stand up for themselves and ‘fight’ for justice, thus effectively encourage self-awareness and important social skills. With relatively smaller class sizes, class discussions also provide the valuable opportunity for students to interact more intimately with their teachers.

The requirement of community service is yet another witness to the social develop MYP yields. By helping others in need, students can genuinely learn moral values and empathy with others, something that will inevitably bleed into their daily lives. The social benefits are thus effectively paired with both scholastic and practical skills. All in all, MYP provides opportunities for students to interact with people around them and learn valuable life skills within a safe school environment.

Instead of tedious memorisation and stringent catechism, MYP offers project-based learning. One could argue that this form of learning causes students to be more interested and motivated to learn. Analytical and deep learning-style work, for one, is inherent in the programme, challenging students to dive deep into each topic and learn to effectively express themselves through writing. It hence logically follows that formative assessments and tests aside, MYP does not focus on preparing students for major exams, especially ones of a caliber similar to an IB exam. The tests in MYP cover much less depth than a typical IB paper; this dismisses the potential pressures of having to recall large amounts of information under time restraints, which may be overwhelming for many (ask any IB student), as they are accustomed to working at a more gradual pace. In fact, the most important deadlines in an MYP student’s career often always seem to be some number of weeks away, and tests are usually predictable, simply requesting the regurgitation of information.

At Chinese International School’s MYP programme, there are 8 subjects, with the school putting equal emphasis on all subjects. This effectively promotes an exposure to a variety of subjects and possible interests, which differs immensely from the heavy bias IB students may harbor towards the perceived value of particular subject categories.

With longer lessons and fewer subjects, MYP’s style of learning is one that is

distinctly characterized by an accommodating, liberal way of education.

The average MYP student is 11-16 years old—with the programme’s target audience lying within the prime of one’s teenage years, it is often less frequently less considered how truly beneficial MYP is for teenagers, all its social and learning benefits included. There are several ways to evaluate such a question through the eyes of an MYP student such as myself. Firstly, there are more summative than formative assessments in most MYP subjects, thus making time management fundamental to success. If a student practises poor planning, his/her final product of learning will almost certainly be negatively impacted. This can pose a difficult challenge, as for many students, acquiring the hard-earned skill of time management is a process of trial and error, a simple matter of maturation over time.

Time management is nonetheless necessary skill for producing high-quality work, therefore an early start in practicing time management is surely advantageous for IB, college and life beyond.

But we cannot neglect the difficulties this would pose, perhaps prematurely, for some students. Apart from time management, MYP also demands evaluation skills. Students need to not only be able to critique others’ work, but also write self-evaluations and reflections.

For teenagers, criticising themselves may be something that happens daily, a voice that is subconsciously nagging at their imperfections. However, evaluations are more formal and specific to a certain task. Many students find writing reflections challenging as they are used to focusing only on the result, not the process, so reflections compel them to think about areas for improvement that they would not otherwise give thought to. However, some students find that the grading of reflections is unnecessary and having a standard or model of what makes a ‘good’ reflection only makes them more unwilling to write reflections. These are just a few of the

instances where the effectiveness of MYP in its execution of goals could be questioned. Of course, within every framework exists flaws. In my opinion, the MYP is very subjective in nature.

As it does not have a specific curriculum (only a general framework and criteria) there is much room for interpretation on what buzzwords used to assess students such as ‘consistently’, ‘some’ and ‘limited’ mean. A student’s grade could be biased, based on other factors such as in-class behaviour, participation or even just a general impression and ‘gut feeling’. Given this, personal comments and constructive feedback from the teacher can become much more significant than the objective grade level. In essence, the learning is very much teacher dependent; the same subject may entail varying class materials as well as differing types of assessments based on the teacher’s preferences. As MYP only mandates the teacher to follow a vague criterion (one that is universal and applies to any topic), the grading standards are also, in essence, set by the teacher. Even with the frail safety net of moderation, different teachers could ascribe different grades to the same piece of work. This grading system with much room for interpretation could hurt students in the future when taking IB or other courses, as they may tend to write answers that are more vague, unlike what the answer key or mark scheme requires: specific points and details, especially for exam papers. As a result, measuring a student’s progress over two academic years by looking at his/her grades can become a very arbitrary process, as are the grading methods.

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Additionally, MYP puts more emphasis on acquiring a skill set than accumulating knowledge, possibly because it was originally designed for the elite. For instance, in Geography and Science, instead of teaching facts about topographical features or the transformation of energy, the MYP focuses on human geography, experiment design, or equipment usage. The emphasis on real life skill applications, or knowing how to evaluate something with diverse toolbox of skills and perspectives, thus prepares students for high achievement in liberal art subjects. After all, the MYP started with the creation of a history syllabus. It is understandable that there are four criteria to assess that a student has a thorough understanding of a subject; however, this might not the best way to teach more rigorous, factual subjects that prize the “cold, hard facts”, namely the natural sciences.

Yet in light of students pursuing a career in the Maths and Sciences (many careers require this anyway), a middle years education emphasizing factual teaching thus becomes necessary. If a student wants to

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pursue a science in future education, knowing numbers and memorising facts is essential for a strong foundation. Yet the MYP is more writing-based. In Science, students write essays on the impacts of science, focusing on factors such as morality, economics, politics, culture, and design research questions for their own experiments. As there are no upcoming major exams (such as IGCSE), the MYP is exceedingly liberal in this aspect, which induces a strain in IB or college in order for students to catch up with peers who did not go through the MYP. In Math, MYP uses Criterion B “Investigating patterns” to develop logical thinking and pattern-seeking skills in students. However, these Criterion B assessments tend to drift from the current unit of study. In the short term, Criterion B, C and D in Math and Science appear to be useless, as IB tests are graded based on knowledge and overall understanding; however, these criteria can help students acquire skills that will be helpful in further academic pursuit.

In conclusion, MYP solves some flaws of traditional curricula, therefore fulfilling its original purpose to be innovative and distinctive. It provides many opportunities for students to develop their individual characters through working with their peers and less privileged citizens of the world. It also allows students to explore the world from different perspectives and find peers of like mind. Apart from that, it ensures that its teenage pupils learn time management and reflective skills.

However, as it is only a framework, its vague criteria and focus on skillset rather than knowledge causes it to have a subjective nature and arbitrary grading system. All in all, MYP has less focus on academics, enabling students to develop in other aspects.

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By Francisca Lam | Photograph by Cheryl Ting

BREAKING CLASSROOM BARRIERS

Teacher-student relationships have always been a grey area – administrations globally have struggled to find a balance between an appropriate, yet healthy teacher-student relationship. In an academic setting, what is appropriate between a teacher and student has often been blurred – different societies perceive appropriateness differently. This tension often leads to discussions on how far teachers and students can push the boundaries of a healthy, working relationship; after all, teachers are bound to students by a contract or trust. Having any form of an “unprofessional relationship” can breach the trust, despite the consent involved. Research has often shown that teachers can offer support for students when seeking different academic and vocational routes; moreover, studies have shown that it can cut the rate of students dropping out of school by up to a half. Emily Gallagher of NYU Steinhardt demonstrates that teachers “do play an important role in the trajec-

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tory of students throughout the formal schooling experience”. These findings demonstrate that regardless of schooling background, affluence, teachers should develop measures to enhance and establish a positive discipline climate in a classroom.

The concept of a “teaching relationship” to some, like parents who only care about the number on the transcript, solely believe that teachers are only meant to pass down knowledge to students. But in actuality, benefitting the student requires support outside of classroom walls. David Chan, from the Department of Educational Psychology in The Chinese University of Hong Kong finds that the basis of a strong teacher-student relationship is based on if the student wants to learn, and if the teacher wants to teach. A good student-teacher relationship ultimately contributes to how much the student will get out of their educational experience.

Of course, appropriateness is hard to determine in the situation between an individual teacher and student. A platonic relationship in one community could be an inappropriate relationship in another. Professionally, teachers are expected to only develop relationships with a student within the boundaries of a classroom. Simultaneously, teachers are allowed to develop bonds with students beyond a regular classroom setting. Professionalism is supposed to ensure all teachers and adult staff have proper relationships with students that don’t cross so-called personal boundaries.

One of the key benefits from harvesting a relationship that is part of regular professionalism is for teachers to get to know their students on a more personal level, to understand the student’s problem while fully supporting the student who needs it. People perceive “regular professionalism” as passing down knowledge from a teacher to a student but on a deeper, more interpersonal level. However, when does this become too personal - will interacting with a teacher on a more personal level reach an inappropriate stage?

To what extent can a more person-

al relationship, a friendship even, between a teacher and a student be educationally and experientially profound for both parties? The conversation between a pair is worth having, to always put the students best interests in mind, but to also protect both parties.

However, it’s worth noting that a student can never be a teacher’s best friend, and vice versa. Even if a teacher-student pair exchange friendlies and nitty gritties of their lives on top of their working relationship, that doesn’t mean that they suddenly become best friends. But developing a healthy friendship allows the student to foster a bond with their teacher, and to see them as a more sincere figure. It isn’t to say that a teacher should be their peer, but a strong working relationship requires an interpersonal backbone to support it.

Gallagher lists substantial research to stress the importance of teacher-student relationships, especially during the transition years during the period from middle school to high school or during - a period of stress for a student. She lists motivation as a link towards student perceptions of teach-

er expectations. Studies demonstrate that high school students formulate their expectations based on how they perceive their teacher’s expectations.

Students who perceive their teachers to have high expectations of their academics are more motivated to try and reach the standard set in comparison to their peers who perceive low expectations from teachers. Motivation is an influencer towards academic achievement, and the link depicts the importance of a strong teacher-student relationship in order to breed further academic achievement.

“Some of the main concerns for a teacher getting too close to a student is favouritism; when the rest of the class knows that a teacher is particularly close with a student, naturally, the teacher will devote more of their attention towards the one student.

This may be a generalisation that I see based on what I know from teacher-student relationships as a whole, but it’s one of the things that I’m worried about when thinking of reaching a more friendly relationship with a student. I don’t want to be perceived as biased since I know that it’s a concern that a lot of students have, so I try to maintain neutral and open-

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minded with all my students. ”

- anonymous member in CIS Although there isn’t an official rule against teacher-student fraternisation in CIS, it is a social convention that is generally frowned upon - very rarely will you see a teacher engage with a student outside a classroom, even with something as simple as eating lunch. Society asks for teachers and students to be wary of the fact that there should be no interposition mingling, even though teachers know that they always should bear the consequences if something wrong happens. The age-gap that is inherent in teacher-student relationships creates a power imbalance that is irreversible. Considering that a student will always be significantly younger than a teacher, both teachers and students should contemplate the boundaries that need to be established. They need to explore the boundaries that need to be taken in order for both the teacher and the student to enjoy a platonic relationship. Regardless, any friendship with a significant age gap leads to a power imbalance and it should be discussed between both parties and with the older person automatically assuming all responsibility from it.

“Back in Hangzhou, it was really easy to get to know anyone, even if it was an adult to a student. The policies were extremely flexible and each coach mentor was trusted to set their own mentor-student boundaries. Coach mentors were encouraged to view the students as younger friends. It was helpful for a lot of students that coach mentors were close to them since a lot of the students needed a older familial figure while they were away to, in a way, substitute for their parents. The flexibility that coach mentors had offered opportunities for students to confide in an older figure that had gone through experiences similar to them, and to seek advice from an adult figure that they could trust. For a lot of the students, the coach mentors became sibling, even friendly figures that the students learned to trust over the period of time that they were in Hangzhou.”

- anonymous member in CIS

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When looking back at CIS, students aren’t seen often interacting with teachers outside of classrooms. Occasionally, yes, there will be “hello’s” that fly around the corridor and there are scenarios where students engage in polite conversations with faculty members.

But it’s almost jarring to see students engage in genuine, interpersonal conversations with teachers.

As an example, the way the school is designed contributes to the lack of student-teacher interactions. Take the new staff-rooms; their located in the top two floors of the building, and inaccessible from most students. Teachers are located in their own suites, separated from students in the lower levels. Students need to go into the “green room” to ask if their teacher is here, and then ask them to come down from their cubicle, and then give them help in the “green room”.

Although the teachers are now theoretically more accessible because they’re all in the same office, the creation of the suites creates a physical divide. Previously, the old, scattered staff-rooms that represented the departments on each floor allowed for students to freely walk into find a teacher to ask for help, or even to have a conversation. The fact that students have to use a system to talk to teachers can instill fear into the students, and the task that seemed so straightforward previously now is so much more daunting.

Considering the generation gap between teachers and students, the fact that teachers are considered as the heads of students, it’s natural for students to already feel existing pressure from asking teachers for help - especially when they are not as approachable as they previously were.

“I personally think that teachers should get to know students better because of the culture that we have at CIS. I don’t think that it’s completely wrong to build a better relationship with my teachers because I know that in a school like CIS, teachers will know when to draw a line. I trust my teachers in when I know that when I ask for help, teachers will be offering help because I want my academics to get better and not because of

another reason. I trust my teachers to have my best interests in heart academically and I know that since they want us to get better. I understand that having a friendly teacher-relationship doesn’t give me an extra advantage, but I know that teachers have got my back when I need help with studying.”

- anonymous member in CIS Would students benefit from time with teachers that extend regular classroom boundaries? As of current, the only time that students have with teachers is during advisory, where students have limited time with their designated teacher supervisor. Although advisory is mandatory, it would be plausible for the administration to explore methods where teachers could open classrooms during their downtime in order for students to seek help in a casual fashion maybe, students could even use these opportunities to socialise with teachers beyond classroom walls. Students could benefit from the extra time - some of them are reluctant and fearful to initiate conversations with teachers to start conversations about seeking help.

Generally speaking, teacher-student relationships are a difficult subject.

It’s hard to manoeuvre and determine whether or not a teacher should cross the line of ultimate professionalism to dainty friendlies with a student. According to social constructs, a teacher is meant to be building a connection with their students. However, society deems that a minor/adult relationship in Hong Kong should be legally and biologically bound, and that professionalism in a teacher means to impart knowledge onto a student and for them to remain supportive and involved with a student’s endeavours - when doing so, this is known as professional friendliness. However, the society that we live in inhibits opportunities for minors to be friends with an adult. Citizens are wired to think that the only appropriate minor/adult relationships should be between family, while in school, everything academic related should be between a teacher and the student and should remain totally professional.

In order to be truly effective to help students achieve their potential, teachers should cultivate strong working relation-

ships with their students. There is nothing unprofessional about reaching out to a student when a student needs help or is facing a hardship; helping a student in need falls under the definition of professional. The bond between a teacher and student leads to potential success if the teacher is successful in motivating and assisting the student.

Although fostering relationships is already something that teachers do, it still needs to be mandated in order to foster interpersonal links with students. It is something that teachers should work harder to do as the years pass by to offer more support to the students that shape the community. Teachers need to be encouraged to foster an interpersonal link, not because they have to, but for the benefit of the student. It’s important to maintain appropriateness but it isn’t wrong to be friendly in a professional manner. Both parties need to offer ways to reach a compromise in order to maintain healthy professionalism.

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THE RISE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

By Emily Xia | Illustration By Ashley Tuen

AI has long been an interesting and exciting asset to our society, now regularly utilized and explored by experts in the rapidly advancing fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Alongside the exotic and often controversial ramifications of AI, discourse has also elapsed about the big-picture pros and cons, with a major concern on the latter side being AI’s potential to render the value of human work useless.

Emily Xia, a Year 9 student, argues for the proponent side of this debate. In a more lucid, yet arguably more important facet of AI literature, Emily explores big-picture ideas in the following article, The Rise of Artificial Intelligence.

- Katherine Wu

As our civilisation continues to advance, more and more people are beginning to pay attention to the subject of artificial intelligence (AI). So, what is AI? Artificial intelligence is the study of creating machine to imitate human behavior and emotions.

While this has sparked interest among many—from universities creating more AI courses to new companies hoping to make AI breakthroughs—others have gravely declared that it would bring ruin among us all.

One popular question about AI has been: “Is AI killing our jobs?” I believe that AI can indeed replace many of the jobs that do not require complex decision makings or human instincts.

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When I say jobs that do not require complex decisions, I meant jobs lower on the food chain, such as manual laborers, call operators, office assistants, and more. These jobs only require simple actions, which can easily be replaced by AI. After all, they can already calculate complex math problems, drive a car by themselves, and even beat world chess champions at their own game! AI is so highly developed that they can essentially “kill” lower level jobs. When that happens, people with less socioeconomic mobility will find it harder to earn money, since they may lack the qualifications or education to apply to higher-level, more sophisticated jobs, such as being a politician, CEO of a major company, game developers, and more.

However, this opinion of mine is not entirely shared by all. Major news outlets have released discussion everyday regarding this question. In a news article titled, “Smart machines look to disrupt the future of work for humanity,” the CEO of Alibaba, a major Chinese online sales company, states that, “artificial intelligence and robots will kill many jobs.” When the CEO and visionary of a pioneering digital company declares this, one may be inclined to believe that therein is a grain of truth, since he obviously has ample experience regarding issues of economics and employment.

“I think AI should support human beings. Technology should always do something that enables people, not disable people,” Jack Ma added.

Jack Ma is not alone in his warning, however. Multiple influential figures in the modern world have spoken up, all warning against the danger of developing AI. These modern prophets include physicist Stephen Hawking and investor Elon Musk. Both foretell the irreversible deterioration of human civilisation. They believe that

“with the advent of artificial general intelligence and self-designed intelligent programs, new and more intelligent AI will appear, rapidly creating ever smarter machines that will, eventually, surpass us.” This situation is visualized in the movie “Terminator”, in which cyborgs, advanced creatures of AI, dominate and seek to end all humanity. These modern prophets are worried that humans will eventually be suppressed by their own creation, and become extinct.

The famous Oxford Martin study, conducted by Frey and Osborne in 2013, concluded that “according to [their] estimates, about 47 percent of total US employment is at risk.” The remaining 53 percent, consisting of jobs with high salary and strict educational requirements, are the ones that still might be “safe” for a good amount of time. This conclusion, while reassuring to the elites of society, can sound not so welcome to people belonging to the lower socioeconomic ladders of society. However, in reality, both parties are at risk— it just a matter of time. Just look at how fast technology develops—the internet was only conceived in the 1960s, but less than a century later, it has now sprung into something infinitely more complex and wide-spanning.

On the other side of the debate, many believe that AI will not destroy all our jobs. Some people think that we should focus on AI’s value to helping humans in their daily lives. As Jack Ma said, “Technology should always do something that enables people, not disable people.” For example, for more mechanical/methodical processes like copying text, printing papers, calculating data, and manual labor, AI would be used so that humans could spend their time pursuing higher-level, more fulfilling tasks.

Essentially, this could be a doorway to a new era of science, where even less economically mobile people can

obtain the education needed for better jobs. The creation of sentient AI entities could also allow more jobs in AI research, development and teaching to come into being. Furthermore, as long as we moderate and utilize AI so that makes it help humanity, the threat can be controlled.

It is safe to believe that jobs involving manual labor, computing and calculation will gradually be replaced by intelligent programs, while jobs involving creativity and emotions will last longer. A possible point of weakness that I cede is that means the poorer will get poorer, while the wealthier will get richer, since high levelled jobs will not be affected as much— after all, being the boss of a company involves more than just knowing what risks to take. It also involves establishing good relationships with other companies, judging the character of your employees , and more, all of which would be difficult to be as effectively accomplished by a mere algorithm.

In conclusion, only you can decide what you think. As with any fiery and controversial debate, there is no absolutely correct answer. Although my opinion is that AI will kill some of the lower levelled jobs, others may still argue otherwise. Artificial intelligence is like a knife; it is not evil nor good. What matters is who uses it, and what it is used for. While AI could help humanity significantly advance through the expansion of markets, its ability to fill vacant posts and expediting work, it also brings the threat of it surpassing humans, and as prophesied in the movie ‘Terminator’, may even create deadly cyborgs. All in all, most benefits come with risks, and it is possible that we shall only know the ultimate “right answer” after we wait for AI to run its course.

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其實讀書 是幸福的 作者 Jocelyn Kwok 插画 Allyson Chan

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小學四年級的我手中經常捧著 有關青春嵗月的小說，也不 難看到我正陶醉於小說的內 容。 [躍青春系列]、[超凡同學 會]、[心靈成長系列] 等的青春 小說，我無一不知。看著書中 所形容的青春生活生動活潑， 行與行之間的文字漸漸在我小 小的心靈種下對中學的各種幻 想。當時的我迷上了青春系列 小說，無法自拔。由於我還在 小學的階段，我經常都會暗暗 地羨慕著小說中的主人公，心 想: 「如果我現在在中學，我該 有多幸福、多快樂呀!」 如今回 想起六年前的我，真覺得我是 有多傻! 在中學已經「呆」了四 年的我，早已看穿了那仙境般 的夢境，體會到了中學的「殘 酷」，聽過了無數個中學生的 抱怨。

無論你生於外國家庭還是傳統 的中國家庭，相信你的長輩 都曾向你提過一個字: 「孝」 。 「孝」是一個概念: 我們要 孝順父母；要孝敬長輩；要順 從大人的教導。當長輩說一， 我們不說二。我們要如此做是 以免惹他們怒氣，免得他們大 罵自己。之所以他們脾氣如此 暴躁，不難猜想是因為上班賺 錢養家如此沈重的責任都壓在 了他們雙肩上。可想而知其重 任可以帶來巨大的壓力。上班 除了賺錢養家，也很有可能在 上班時受了不少的氣，心裡不 忿，卻又不能與心智還沒成熟 的孩子們傾訴。與壓力山大的 成人世界對比，讀書看此易如 反掌，不該因此一件幸福無比 的事嗎？

說到這裡，可能你們已經怒火 中燒，難道我們沒有壓力嗎? 難道我們讀書學習不辛苦嗎? 我可以堅定的說，讀書一定比 上班幸福，壓力也自然比較 少。雖然不是說作為學生的我 們完全沒有任何壓力，但是要 意識到讀書是幸福的，而有些 許的壓力是理所當然、不可避 免的。誰的學校裡沒有因成績 而產生的勾心鬥角；誰的課室 沒有「小圈子」；那一個中學 生沒被同學標籤過呢？除了學 業和成績所帶來的壓力，同學 帶來無形的壓力也是無處不在 的，它們都曾給學生們造成極 大的困擾。除了四方八面的壓 力，其實在學校中還有一群可 以依靠的知心好友與永遠支持 你的老師。現在你還覺得讀書 帶來的壓力讓你喘不過氣嗎？ 還是有些許同意其實讀書是幸 福的呢？ 在漢基就讀了將近四年的我， 多多少少也有親眼見識過家長 們的「厲害」。漢基學校作為 香港數一數二的國際學校，其 中就讀的學生自然出類拔萃，

代代畢業的也都在社會上混 的頗有名氣。許多同學的家長 都出身於世界頂尖、一流的大 學，可想而知，他們是他們年 代裡才華橫溢的一批學生。身 為人父人母的每一位，都希望 自己的下一代青出於藍、更勝 一籌。因此對其兒女有極高的 期望，從而給孩子們隱隱之間 施下巨大的壓力。但有些學生 面對甚大的壓力時，他們的腦 子只剩下：「我考不到八分的 話，爸媽就會一個月不會讓我 打遊戲。」或者「其實我根本 就不喜歡讀書，我只想過的開 心幸福，簡簡單單的生活。」 其實我何不曾有如此想過？每 天看著沈重的計算機，去計算 這學期在各科所獲得不同分數 的機率。到底化學裡的H2O 加CO2會變成什麼，讀完化學 其實會不會明白人生中的化學 呢？雖然我已經記住了那十條 公式，可是它們對我將來邁出 校園走進現實社會的新生活到 底有什麼幫助？在學校積累的 種種知識，是否能協助我們計 算到我未來會發生什麼嗎？有 時候真想問成年人一句：「大

人們，其實你們有讀過書嗎？ 你們知道有多大壓力嗎？」但 懵然回頭一看，要是成年人不 用功，沒有天大的壓力促使他 們想改變的話，相信我現在會 困於屯門的一所公立學校，被 迫把考試材料通通背下、失去 了思想能力。所以年輕的同學 們啊，我們的父母都是過來 人，為們把他們給的壓力當作 磨練吧。 各位年輕人，讀書有起有落， 抱抱自己，跟自己說一聲辛苦 了，讀書就是這樣。當幻想 過著一個幸福快樂的生活時， 相信你也不想他平淡如水吧？ 其實沒一件幸福的事情都有利 與弊、開心與悲傷，而讀書便 是一個最好的例子。有時候跌 倒了，無所謂；拍拍身上的灰 塵，再次爬起來，繼續努力。 因為你有跨過了一個難關，同 時也獲得了新知識。只要牢記 「讀書是幸福的」道理，你的 學生生涯便會更加幸福快樂。

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SCHOOL SPIRIT IN CIS

By Ian Choi | Illustrated by Allyson Chan

Let’s paint this scene: you’re in advisory. Your house representative tells you there is a house event coming up tomorrow. Pick up your sword and shield and prepare to battle for the honor and glory of your house! You tell them: “Sign me up! I’m ready for this.” the advisory cheers, ready to support you in every way possible.

Best fantasy story since Lord of the Rings.

Yet today, in our school, we have lost our pride in being CIS students. Why is it that when we bring up sports day, we can so easily make jokes about skiving the whole event? Why is it that we groan during awards assemblies? Why are so many of us reluctant to take part in inter-house competitions? These questions reveal a massive problem at the heart of our school community: school spirit is in short supply.

I would first like to preface this one-sided discussion (since I am talking to you, the reader, who is not able to rebut my points) with the obvious fact that student leadership groups, numerous hard-working teachers and advisors, parent groups, and many students love CIS, take great pride in our school, and actively work to promote school spirit. However, I still stand by my observation that in the broader scheme of things, it is, for some reason, difficult for the wider student body to take pride in being a part of Chinese International School.

To begin, let’s look at the house system, which to my belief should be the core of fostering a sense of solidarity within CIS. Ultimately, a house system in any educational institution is designed to divide up students into groups where it can promote loyalty, learning and student wellbeing, as well as friendly competition. I would argue that this should provide a strong framework for school spirit. If students are loyal to their houses, which are a part of the greater school apparatus, the pride that students feel towards their own house should extend to the whole school as well.

The two most important events in CIS are the two that give students the greatest chance to earn house points, which are effectively a currency for house spirit: Sports Day and Health and Social Day. These giant events, which the school allocates entire days to, promote a great amount of house spirit. And to their credit, they do achieve this goal to some extent: the mini-events that comprise these days, especially the ones that happen on the stretch of track in front of the stands, give us opportunities to cheer on our friends and shout house chants; the feeling of standing in a group of people, 100 or so strong, chanting together, can indeed create a sense of pride and belonging. I mean, Sports Day, at its most fundamental, is a celebration of athletic talent within the CIS student body, whether it be in running, jumping, or throwing. Health and Social day tries to achieve a similar effect, but executes this by organizing people into smaller teams; it encour-

ages an extra sense of closeness that Sports Day lacks, making the solidarity people feel more personal. Furthermore, he fun and competitive aspects of both events make them a great way to develop pride within one’s house.

However, while these large-scale events are times set for the school to come together and have fun, many see it as an opportunity to schedule some revision or relaxation time at home, as they would rather not attend at all.

I have often heard students posing a common cost-benefit analysis: are the costs of going to sports day, namely time away from work or personal endeavors, worth the benefits of engaging with the greater school community? Many think that they are not.

Unfortunately, from my perspective, these two major events are the only times during the school year where house spirit can be promoted (something that I will get into later on), but for now it must be said that missing one—or both—of these events means that many students will miss out on the biggest opportunities to experience house spirit. Of course, people who don’t go to school sports events are in the minority. The vast majority of students, I would imagine, do go to these events. Yet, very clearly, there is still some problem with the way that we feel pride in our school.

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There is an interesting idea that I have heard circulating around quite often: that the lack of enthusiasm in the school can be traced to the relative apathy that house captains and other student leadership groups feel towards CIS. We hear a lot of talk about how house captains, the Student Council, and head students are all just “doing it for the CV”. Given that a lot of people do regularly consider a given event’s positive impact on their resumé, it begs the question of whether this factor might have caused the lack of enthusiasm. Yes, house captains are responsible for making sure houses remain enthusiastic and excited for events, but to be honest, I don’t see how we could make sure students don’t mix in unhealthy ulterior motives (such as CV-hunting) in the selection process, or just ensuring that the people in these positions genuinely value and understand their responsibilities. As for the other student leadership positions, while I do not doubt that there are some people in the various councils that are simply there for the title, these positions still are a massive time-sink in their own right and require commitment and energy.

Either way, though, these groups, in their own ways, try to promote school spirit: the student council hosts events like dances and inter-house competitions, the house captains get students excited, and the head boy and head girl let the school bond through disapproving groans at their cheesy puns every assembly. I think that the power that these leadership groups hold over the student body’s perception of CIS is limited at best, especially with their supposed promotion of school spirit not yielding any results at the present.

Aside from events and the facetious qualities of student leadership, let us take a further look at more concrete markers of school spirit: logos and emblems. These have a lot of potential; they can be plastered on walls, posters, and attached to pretty much anything. Attaching a visual representation of CIS to everything is a surefire way to create unity and pride. Let’s take a look at the use of logos in our

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school. They’re actually pretty good.

We have the CIS logo, which features Chinese characters in a book, and we have the Order of the Phoenix logo, which showcases a colorful phoenix. If we wanted to talk about giving CIS a central icon for school spirit, I think we would have to start with logos, because they are the easiest way to give a broad definition as to what an institution represents.

So, how often are they used?

Perhaps this is just my own observation, but I never see the CIS phoenix logo anywhere around school. We don’t even see it on sports day—the one day that is supposed to unify the school for a day of fun. That is just the beginning, however. The underuse of school iconography makes it difficult for students to link any event to the institution called ‘CIS’. Take a courtyard concert. They are a great way to create an atmosphere where everyone is happy and feels connected to everybody else. We all enjoy the performances, sure, and we end lunches with some happy smiles on our faces; but ask yourself, have you ever associated that event with CIS as a school? I would wager that the answer is a no. There is a great amount of school pride that could be generated from these events, but in the end, these feel less like school events and more like events organised by a random group of people that have nothing to do with CIS itself.

Ultimately, school spirit is nothing more than the pride that we feel towards being members of CIS. I think that the magnitude of this pride is dependent on two key factors: the willingness of students to go out of their way to support the school, and centralized promotion of school spirit.

The former essentially refers to what the school has to offer that students can be proud of. This doesn’t just go into extracurriculars or events—this goes into classes, academic rigour, the perceived ability to make meaningful and long-lasting change, et cetera. Ultimately, students need to have something to be proud of—whatever that

thing is, it has to be personal. If students feel that their lives are being improved by being in CIS, they naturally will, at the very least, be predisposed to supporting it.

The latter is about how our school markets itself to us, about how often it brings up the fact that we are indeed one school, under the same logo and sharing the same building. Students need to be made conscious of the fact that even though we are always split up into houses and year groups, we are all still students of the same academic institution. Right now, the problem is twofold. Students don’t care nearly enough about the school, and the school is unable to make students connect all the things that they do in CIS with the school itself.

So, what should we do?

To be honest, given the current attitude towards school spirit and school pride, I see very little value in having just one or two leaders or authority figures spearhead any campaign to liven up the school. A few teachers trying to do something isn’t going to work. What I think we need is change from both sides: the students and the leadership.

As I mentioned, the problem as I see it stems from apathy and thus a consequent lack of unity. Students need to be more enthusiastic about our school; they need to participate more in house events and treat inter-house competitions with importance. The school also has its own role to play. Aside from making students’ lives more enjoyable and fulfilling, it also needs to understand how to market itself to its students. That means more promotion of school activities. It means making every activity feel important and special. It means putting up a CIS logo at all CIS events so some people will make the connection between the two.

If we can give the student body some part of our school to be proud of, and promote it vigorously, I think we will be well on our way to fostering true, lasting school spirit.

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本地與國際學校 ——我的個人經歷

By Ophelia Sung | Illustrations by Bertha Ho 二零一五年九月一日早上六點三十 分，我床頭的鬧鐘響起了。我把自己 埋藏在被子裡，不願意從暑假這美夢 醒過來。當我終於願意起床的時候， 我懶洋洋地穿上那條全白色的及膝 裙，那條膠的深藍色「皮帶」，然後 沖忙地打好我的領帶。望著胸口上學 校的標誌，我知道惡夢真的開始了。 我跑進廁所，趕快地刷牙洗臉，然後 把頭髮紮成一條整齊的馬尾。我看看 手錶，七點鐘。快要遲到的我連早餐 也沒吃，就背上書包，不情願地跑出 家門。 我是一個曾經就讀本地學校的國際學 校學生。我的同學經常都會感興趣地 問我有關本地學校的問題，更會說： 「如果我就讀過本地學校，那麼我的 中文就一定能拿7啦！」。走過學校的 走廊時，我偶爾也會聽到不同年級的 同學說自己多麼想嘗試一下在本地學 校上學。而我聽到這些話後，只會對 自己笑一笑，然後心裡想：「唉，你 們太天真啦！」。 我從小學一年級（漢基的 Year 2) 到中 學的二年級（漢基的 Year 9)都是在同 一所本地學校讀書。這所學校是一所 女校，可以說是陪伴著我長大，但我 並不喜歡這個同伴，並希望能早日跟 她說再見。

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在本地學校上學不需要昂貴的計算 機，更不需要蘋果手提電腦，只需要 文具，一部最簡單的計算機，和數不 完的課本。可想言之，我們每天上學 的時候都是像機器人一樣坐在一個可 以容納四十人的課室裡，聽著老師講 課，然後嘗試挑戰著數不完的數學題 目，科學題目，中文作文……。我們 沒有好玩的課堂遊戲，小組討論，所 以很多同學也會選擇在上課的時候做 別的事情：睡覺。可是，平時的上課 日也不算是我們的惡夢，一月和六月 的考試周才是我們的惡夢。考試周前 的一個月，我們都會放棄我們所有的 娛樂，專心複習，因為所謂的「考試 周」，就是在一個星期裡考完你在所 有科目中學過的所有東西。為了得到 合格的分數，我們會用盡乘車和吃飯 的時間溫習。為了更上一層樓，我們 會犧牲自己睡覺的時間，所以翌日上 學的時候課室裡也會有很多「熊貓」 ，而很多同學都會因為壓力過大，又 得不到足夠的休息而生病。雖然本地 學校的生活的確給了學生非常大的壓 力，但我們也有快樂的時光。我們每 天上學都會期望午飯時跟朋友一起到 外面吃午飯，順便到附近的商場逛逛 街。除此之外，學校也會舉辦不同的 活動，例如是旅行日，運動會等，而 這些活動總會為我們留下無數的美好 回憶，為我們緊湊的校園生活增添一 點樂趣。

一直在本地學校生活的我，覺得自 己的生活壓力實在太大。看著跟我 一樣年紀的鄰居（她從小就在國際 學校讀書）每天快樂地從學校回 家，做自己喜歡的事，我真的非常 羨慕。於是我碰碰撞撞的，就考進 了漢基國際學校。由於我從小就習 慣本地學校的工作量，所以我個人 覺得自己現在的生活比以前的輕鬆 得多。我的生活不只是圍繞著數不 完的課本，我開闊了自己的眼界， 參與不同的活動，偶爾也會在放學 後跟同學一起去銅鑼灣吃東西，回 家的時候我也有足夠的時間跟家人 互動，我再也不是那個每天放學立 即衝回家把自己鎖在房間裡溫習的 學生。除此之外，我可以肯定地跟

所有人說，我現在的校園生活比之 前的有趣得多，而且我感覺自己比 之前學到更多。雖然我個人比較喜 歡在國際學校上學，但我相信本地 學校也有它的優勝之處，只是某一 些學生不適合在本地學校的教育制 度下「生存」。

要的是那位學生喜歡自己的校園生 活，在學校有效地吸收到足夠的知 識。畢竟，這兩所截然不同的教育 制度最終的目的是一樣的。

在這兩年間，電視的新聞偶爾也會 報導香港中學生的自殺案。這些學 生全都來自本地學校，而且很多都 是因為學校壓力太大而選擇逃避現 實。可是就算一位學生就讀國際學 校，我相信他也要付出努力，才會 獲得足夠的知識去應付往後的社 會。所以無論一位學生是就讀本地 學校或者是國際學校都不重要，重

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GET HIT? MORE GRIT

By Trystin Wong | Photography by Karen Chan

Failure is the stepping stone to success.

We’ve all heard this before, but what exactly does it entail? While it is true that failure plays an important role in success—to help us learn from our mistakes—this phrase fails to mention a key attitude throughout this process, grit.

But what is grit? Grit is the courage to embrace failures, to admit mistakes, suck it up and move on. Grit is having stamina in the face of defeat, it is maintaining a hard-working attitude and staying resilient when on the brink of despair. Grit teaches us to look beyond the horizon, because fueled passion and persistence will lead to achieving ones goal. Hence, the “gritty” mind values long run over short run, and each failure merely strengthens the resolve of someone that is determined. Many things in our lives require grit: whether it be studying for an exam; graduating high school; or breaking a personal best. It is the mindset that will put you through every bad test, tight deadline, discouraging comment in high school, through college and beyond.

Angela Lee Duckworth, a pioneer in in student psychology once conducted a study on students across a band of Chicago high schools, focusing on a group of seniors. These students were given questionnaires about work ethic, social life, time management, and a year later, she she observed that there was in fact an inverse relationship between talent/ intelligence and graduation. Why is this? Duckworth hypothesised that gifted students were unable to accept failure as well as less intelligent students, and therefore couldn’t learn from their mistakes. Furthermore, she also found that it wasn’t the smartest students, but the

most gritty that finished school and went on to pursue their dreams.

This study indicates a silver lining to failure. When failing to complete a task, the most efficient recovery technique is to review what was done wrong and correct the mistakes. Gritty students have the advantage over merely intelligent students in the sense that they have humility and perseverance, they are more able to accept their failures and focus on the long term goal. Everybody starts the race from the same place, but it’s the mindset one takes to the starting line that propels them across the finish.

Childhood is the best time to learn, our minds are still developing and we are hungry for knowledge, so it is also the best time to develop lifelong traits such as grit. This raises the question: How can I develop more grit?

1. Practice First is practice, repeatedly doing a task is the fastest way to get better at doing something. As you practice more and more, you learn from your failures and receive feedback from your experiences.

2. Purpose Find purpose in what you’re doing, set a goal for yourself. Unless you can find purpose in what you are doing you’ll never have a meaningful goal to reach, and continuing to practice would be pointless.

3. Hope Failure is inevitable, so embrace them as opportunities to learn, so that we can succeed in the future.

Hope is important because it allows us to look beyond our shortcomings and

focus on the goal.

4. Time Everything good takes time. To develop more grit, it’s important to spend time practicing, failing, and improving, there are no short-cuts.

Of course, it’s not easy to apply grit to everything we do, sometimes we do things that we just can’t help disliking because of the sheer lack of enthusiasm, which makes it difficult for us to see purpose in doing it. In that case, whatever you’re doing will probably not benefit you in the long run, and you’re better off spending that time on something you enjoy doing. On the other hand, if the task is ultimately beneficial, view everything you’re doing as part of a larger goal this provides a lot of incentive to put in effort. One example is going to the gym - after gritting your teeth through countless sets, you start to see changes to your body which are exciting. Each workout from then on motivates you to strive towards a larger goal to improve the way you look and how you feel about yourself.

Overall, to be gritty, it’s important to understand that a lot of what happens to us in the present, is merely temporary, and the difference from a 6 to a 7 on your math test will probably not matter in the long run. Grit can not only help change the way you tackle school, but college, future careers, relationships and beyond.

It is one of the most important tools of success, and is a must for any driven student.

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WFDF U24 ULTIMATE WORLDS: PROFILING CIS ALUMNI REPRESENTING HONG KONG

By Rahul Melwani and Alex Okita

“Just because Hong Kong is a small city compared to some of the big names like USA and Team Canada, you shouldn’t pass up the opportunity to represent your hometown just because you think the team will get destroyed by other nations. Our team lost to USA 15-1, but everyone still thought that that was the best game of the tournament, trumping games against China where we won by universe point and coming back to beat Denmark 14-11. Our game against USA was unanimously the favourite of the tournament because of how hard we pushed ourselves despite the odds.

The 1 point we scored felt like winning the tournament, and the 15 points we lost weren’t for a lack of trying. The sheer intensity we played that game with, and the satisfaction we all got after made the entire tournament for me.

Worlds isn’t about the amount of wins and losses you come out with, but more about playing your heart out knowing that you’re representing Hong Kong.

It’s about putting the small city of Hong Kong on the map and shocking the other team not only with our heart and intensity but also with our

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spirit. As our captain Derek told us time and time again, play each game like it’s your last game because we’ve got nothing to lose, and regardless of whether we’re winning or losing to always look like the winners on the field.

U24 worlds was an experience that I will cherish for life. The opportunity to play disc against the best of the world, form strong bonds with my teammates on and off the field, and learn new tips and strategies from players who have played frisbee for their entire lives is something that I will always be so grateful for. A lot of the players I played with can never compete in U24 again because of their age, which made me as grateful as ever knowing that I still have another opportunity to represent U24 Hong Kong. You are the next hope for the growth of ultimate in Hong Kong, and you have even more time than me to learn, improve, and enjoy the game of frisbee. Not a lot of people have the chance to represent their country on a national level, so seize this opportunity and don’t look back.”

- Jasper Ng CIS ‘17

How did you join the team?

Although I am not entirely sure how the selections for the team were made, I believe some members of the selection committee had watched me play before and were kind enough to entrust me with representing Hong Kong U24.

Many of the players were from abroad, so we did not have any official training sessions until we got to Perth a few days before the tournament. I think we had 3 or 4 days of actual training as a team, which was not merely enough, but I think our team made the best out of it.

What was the biggest takeaway from your experience?

I think that the main thing I got out of Worlds was experience. Experience playing alongside the best youth players in Hong Kong, experience playing against the best youth players in the world, and experience competing on the big stage. As one of the younger members of the team, it was such a pleasure to play with teammates who had much more experience than I had. Whether it was watching them on the sidelines, or asking them questions about what I could have done better, these were all essential towards my growth as a player throughout that week. Not to mention I got to play with my longtime friend and CIS teammate Jasper Ng. Whenever we had a connection for a score, the rest of the team would yell “CIS Connection!�, which I thought was quite amusing. To realise that you are still just a frisbee plebeian compared to players from other countries is so inspirational. It made me realise that there is so much more I can improve on, and it motivates me to want to train harder and get better at the sport I love.

CIS have been a pretty strong team in the youth division in Hong Kong and China for the past years, so transitioning from being the favourites to the underdogs was a big change for me. I definitely prefer being the underdogs though, because playing against better teams is the best way to improve.

Do you have any tips for aspiring students?

For any students who want to represent Hong Kong and play at the big stages, my main advice for you would be to reach out to the ultimate community in Hong Kong and play with them on a regular basis.

Whether it’s pickup or league, it is quite a different experience from school training.

I believe school training is a good place to start developing your frisbee skills, but if you really want to take ultimate seriously, you have to commit to more than just trainings on a Friday afternoon, and play as much as you possibly can.

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U 2 0

B O Y S

B A S K E T B A L L : A

R E F L E C T I O N

By Alex Okita | Photography by Cheryl Ting

The CIS U20 basketball team consists of mostly Year 12 students, and due to the lack of sufficient players for a U16 team, we also have 2 Year 11 students. Our season mainly occurs during the early months of the school year, and ends usually before Chinese New Year. We compete in the Hong Kong School Sports Federation and the International School Sports Federation Hong Kong. This year, we also went to Bangkok in December to compete in a tournament at ISB.

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HKSSF is the first tournament we participate in, usually it runs from the beginning of the season up to around the end of October. It is for all schools in Hong Kong, and doesn’t exclude any schools. This year we won most of our games during the season, and then it came to the playoffs, which we were eliminated during the first round.

ISSFHK is the second tournament we participate in, it runs from the end of the HKSSF season, and all the way through nearly the beginning of CNY. This tournament is only for international schools, and we competed in the second division of this league. This year we competed all the way to the semi-finals, and we lost, so we ended up third place in this division.

Finally, we competed in the tournament in ISB in Bangkok. As a team we are incredibly young, and compared to the other teams we were much shorter. Despite this, we still ended up fourth place. It was an incredible experience, and we are excited for the next year when we come back.

However, there are always things that could be improved. Our team needs more access to gyms and weight rooms in order to get much better physically. It would also be great if we got taller, but that can’t be determined by us.

Finally, the continual support of people at CIS is essential, it really changes the atmosphere of the game.

In conclusion, the sport at CIS has a future, and over the next year we should be able to come back with some more silverware. This silverware goal however requires us to improve our team, and improve ourselves, it also requires constant support from the CIS community. I do think it is a possibility for us to win the ISSFHK and HKSSF tournament for our division, and the Bangkok tournament would be difficult tournament, but is also a possibility.

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S P O R T S T E A M H I G H L I G H T : B A D M I N T O N

By Hadrien Chong and Indya Steains | Photography by Evelyn Kwan

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In this article, Hadrien Chong (‘19) reflects upon the sport’s development within CIS as well as outlines the team’s goals for the coming year.

In the CIS community, Badminton is seen as a recreational sport, known for not only just fun and games, but perhaps as a minor of the racket sports. This will change given due time as people usually neglect the agility, the nimbleness, and the heightened spatial awareness one has to develop in order to excel in this particular sport. This year, we have given badminton a more serious approach in hopes of nurturing a mindset of victory within our players, especially for those who have less experience in the younger years. The tryouts were more rigorous this year and we are extremely proud to have formed a team of elite players who are both passionate and skilful.

Not forgetting our phenomenal coaches from the Hong Kong National Teams, the badminton team is on its way to an exceedingly successful season.

In other sports, strength and ability could get you far, but in badminton, we try to place emphasis on tactics. A clear and tactical mind is the direct way to victory. Players are trained to instinctive react to different scenarios during a competition, to be

prepared for different play styles, or to perform different shots at the exact moments. On the court, especially at an increased skill level, the ability to foil the opponent with tactical positioning is the only way to win.

Badminton is a mental game as much as a physical one. Players learn to be humble through our victories, but optimistic through our defeats. We are trained to uphold a strong mental fortitude, to persevere and to suppress our emotions to not give our opponents the upper hand. A game till 21 points is not an easy feat as it requires not only endurance, but motivation to continue.

We also focus on teamwork and trust, especially with the doubles players, who are not only responsible about the outcome for themselves, but for their teammates as well.

We will be competing in the ISSFHK competitions this year, and as a team, we will strive to do our very best.

On a lighter note, you can’t really be good at ‘bad’minton; the most you can do is try.

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P A R A L L A X S P O T L I G H T

By Angelina Wang | Photography by Candace Law

Regardless of social factions and cliques, age or background, size or shape, a love for music and dance can transcend all.

We as a group have become increasingly cognizant of that fact throughout the process of conceiving and nurturing our grass roots dance group, PARALLAX. Initially, we were united through a mutual love for the genre of K-pop music and dance. Since our humble antecedent as a small group of like-minded individuals, we have expanded, developed, and thrived in this endeavour.

From our first time watching the music videos, to learning and practicing the dance, to final video production, we persist through an onerous yet enjoyable process in each project. First and foremost, a few of us learn the dance ourselves by examining and following the video. Then, we teach the others and “clean”, which entails focusing on and improving details, enhancing our synchronization, and working on our formation (as we change places numerous times in each choreography). From then on, we practice frequently, and coordinate all the minutiae necessary to film ourselves dancing. Finally, we shoot and edit, and our efforts culminate in complete videos on our Youtube channel.

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On top of our Youtube channel, we manage an Instagram account as well. We primarily post teasers, bloopers, and short clips of our upcoming projects.

Managing a social media presence is another fortunate and educational aftereffect to establishing our dance group. It allows us to manifest and evince who we are as a group and what we do. Find us at parallax.hk on Instagram!

Outside the digital realm, we also perform our dances live at events such as Art Lunchboxes, Winter Ball, and so on. We prepare substantially, and then showcase the fruits of our labor to an audience. We have performed the songs ‘DNA’, ‘Whatta Man’, and a mashup of ‘As If It’s Your Last’ and ‘Peek-A-Boo’, with more to come in the future! While performing is undoubtedly nerve-wracking, ultimately all of us grow immensely and experientially, both as performers and as people.

Thus, it is through the amalgam of all these varying elements– stellar team members, an outstanding videographer, and amazing supporters– that has helmed PARALLAX into becoming the marvel and family it is today.

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CIS: A DIVISION ONE CONTENDER?

By Michelle Keoy | Photography by Eloise Oliver

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CIS currently primarily takes part in the International Schools Sports Federation Hong Kong (ISSFHK) and Hong Kong Schools Sports Federation (HKSSF) as its main source of competition between sports teams.

These are organisations which hold a range of inter-school competitions.

The manner in which rankings are allocated are based on the placement of the school in relation to other schools.

The top two teams in Division Two are promoted to Division One, whereas the bottom two teams in each division are relegated to a lower division. Currently, volleyball, basketball and badminton are Division 2 sports in ISSFHK, whereas tennis and cross country are Division 1 sports in ISSFHK. There are several key issues hindering CIS’s entrance into Division 1 for many of its sports teams.

Although the Hangzhou programme is an incredible learning opportunity for CIS students, the departure of a year group results in a number of key athletes being subtracted from B-Grade sports teams. The impacted performance of our B-Grade teams impedes CIS’ ability to earn enough HKSSF points for promotion, preventing CIS from attaining a higher holistic status despite the success of their counterparts, such as the A-Grade Boys Football teams who placed first in Division 3 this year.

Students also have to readjust to training and team dynamics upon their return to the Hong Kong campus. This intermission makes it difficult for CIS to form cohesion between players of different year groups. Familiarity with players across ages and consistent training ensure a synergy that can be maintained even after the yearly goodbyes of athletes who have to graduate or move up to another age group.

The U16 Girls Volleyball Team, the youngest age group CIS is participating in for the sport, will be promoted to Division 1 following their victori-

ous season in the ISSFHK. However, this team mainly comprises of Year 11s that will transfer to the U20 team next year. The incoming Year 10s, who will have just arrived from Hangzhou, face the difficulty of not only competing in their first season, but the level of play required of them in Division 1, questioning the ability for CIS’ U16 team to maintain their position in the league.

Even though CIS’ Hong Kong teams face the struggle of location differences and the constant construction of inter-grade cohesion, the small and safe community of Hangzhou is conducive to the development of personal skill and camaraderie between players of the same year group. Hangzhou shows that well-equipped teams can be produced given two conditions: a robust program that provides players with competition and training, and interest in the sport.

The Frisbee team, which boasts over seventy dedicated members, has consistently been one of the top teams in the league. The team originated from the Hangzhou Programme and continues to provide waves of skilled Y11 players every year. Their success derives from a self-cultivated culture of frisbee, where students would pass frisbees in their free time. This interest was facilitated by coach Wang Lu, who entered teams into tournaments and organized friendlies.

However, it is still generally hard to recruit enough interested members to form teams. CIS’ program has a diversity of sports available, but aside from some sports, there isn’t a large enough population who wants to play in each year group for each sport.

Often, the frequency of training does not serve to fulfil our athletes’ passion and dedication to their sport, with many requests coming in for having preseason training or extra training during the most competitive months of the season. While at other schools,

training intensity and frequency may pick up during weeks prior to an international competition, such as SEASAC or APAC, the lack of such competitions at CIS mean an absence of the extra challenge our teams need to consistently succeed.

The school has also recruited professional basketball coaches from Top Flight Basketball Academy, and athletic trainer Chandler Kurtz who is a certified sports medicine professional.

Aside from the full time job of helping out students’ rehab from their injuries, he also works closely with athletes and is happy to talk to players about their internal improvements like team dynamics and strategy. The addition of the fitness room and two gyms in the New Tower, has been immensely beneficial for the training of athletes.

With the sheer amount of activities students participate in outside of athletics, topped off with their dedication to academics, participating in team sports can often take a back seat. This can result in differences within the team itself in terms of how dedicated everyone is to the sport and consistently attending practice. Conflict can arise between players who make the team their priority and players who may be forced to put other commitments over their position on the team.

There is no easy solution to this problem, however there are many benefits of being on a sports team that can be promoted which will hopefully inspire full commitment from teams. By creating an environment conducive to sports at CIS, we can inspire athletes to participate in sports and play to their full potential, which will allow for more Division One playing opportunities for the school.

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GAMES ANSWERS

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