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LEARNING TO BE ALONE: ADVICE FOR NEW INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS Mitchell Tung was invited, as the 2019 Sancta Postgraduate Social Secretary, to address a large audience of newly arrived international students at Sancta’s Welcome to Sydney event hosted in collaboration with The University of Sydney. The below is an excerpt from his speech. It’s not easy to move away from home. We all have our different definitions of ‘home’ – the house you lived in, the streets you played on, the people you grew up with. I’m from Canada–more specifically, Calgary. We hosted the Olympics once… I think. People outside of Canada don’t know it very well and from a global perspective it’s a pretty inconsequential city, but it’s where I call home.
BY MITCHELL TUNG 3rd Year Dentistry student at The University of Sydney Senior Common Room Social Representative 2019
When I think of Calgary, I think of three places. There was this one playground just outside my backyard. Lining the perimeter of the playground were slabs of sandstone rocks stacked on top of each other, and in between them was a little space with a depression that perfectly fit the concavity of my five-year-old butt. Whenever things got too heated at home, I would sneak off, crawl through the thick bushes and arrive at my ‘spot’ to have a moment of peace and silence. Then there was Griffith Woods. If I drove out a little from my house down the highway, took a left, and then made my way past the houses of Discovery Ridge, I would arrive at Griffith Woods. After parking my car and walking along the concrete path, I would turn left into the bushes that would lead me to a grand view of the Elbow River, rushing past me, and the Rocky Mountains, standing far away in their silent magnificence.
1 1 Mitchell with Postgraduate Javaria Chaudhry on the Postgrad Boat Cruise 2 Mitchell with Postgraduates George Glass and Hans Wei at Vale 3 Mitchell receives his Vale sash from Vice Principal Brigid Carrigan
Making my way along the river due north, I would eventually enter Tsu-Tina Reserve – unregulated, unsupervised and remote land fit for the pubescent seventeen-year-old boy I was. I’d have nights of bonfires, s’mores and ‘tests of manliness’ with my friends. There was one time where we randomly met a gang of hoodlums – friendly hoodlums, that challenged my friends and I to
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