My First School Day In The US

To this day, I can not forget a bunch of stupid mistakes that I made in the first day when I went to Intrax. Even though I had been living in the US for two weeks, I was not use to life in this strange place at that time. Every step, which I was making, gave me a tension. Because I lived in Glenview, my journey to school was started from a train station. I bought a train ticket after many complications and got on the train. When I arrived in downtown, I was nervous and excited simultaneously because of an expectation for new start in the US. However, this muzzy day stared from in a bus.

I had never taken a bus alone, thus, when I stepped on the bus, I wanted to make sure if that bus was right one to go to Intrax. I remembered that a bus going to water tower place is the one which I have to take and a thought, which I have to get off near millennium park, crossed in my mind at the same time. I was confused while I was choosing which bus stop is better to ask, and eventually, a mention from my tongue was 'Is this bus going to water park?' I did not notice my mistake, so I repeated the same question over and over, because a bus driver asked me back many times. He ended up catching my fault and corrected it 'water tower'. I was so embarrassed because many people in the bus was staring me. But the continuity of mistakes did not finish at that.

The bus was almost getting to my destination, so I wanted to make a stop request. However, I could not find stop buttons and it made me disconcerted again. Luckily, a man found a stop button and pushed it. It was a fact, that I became to know later, that there are strings to make a stop request in American bus. I did not know that, because, there is no string in Korean bus. In any case, the bus stopped at the stop and, the man and I was standing in front of a rear door to get off. But the door did not open. I was in confusion and he looked also embarrassed. I could not say anything to the bus driver, because I already felt humiliated before that. While I was being in panic, the man said to him. "Open!" Then, a passenger said that we had to push the door to open it. Even before having feel a relief, I was ashamed of my English about why I had not been able to say even just one word 'open'. You might be curious why the man also did not know the things that I did not know. He was unmasked as a Intrax new student like me. Anyway, the ridiculous mistake continued in Intax.

After I took a level test in there, I was sitting on a couch to meet a Intrax staff. There was a another new student sitting next me. He started talking to me. He said "The test was so big!" Because he used a word 'big' instead of 'long', I guessed that his English was not so fluent. But I should have judged mine before having judged his English. After I said "Yes. It was long.", he said "I am Tired." So I said "I am Sojung." But he seemed that he could not understand me and I repeated it again. After three minutes, I realized that he had said that he had been tired, not said his name. That was the worst mistake I have made ever.

That kind of mistakes happened for a while in that beginning school days in Chicago. If I look back on the past now, they were so many stupid ones. But, unless I had made that silly mistakes, there might not be who I am at the present. 'Mistake is a mother of success.' My familiarity in the US, my English skills, and many precious friends... I know that all of them was built on that mistakes and thank for being able to talk these funny memories with smile.