Building Character through Education

More than one-fourth of people’s lives are spent in school, but even that amount of time is not enough for them to build their character. There are things that could not express by white paper and black pink but understand by experiences. People might think that moving to another country, as a student, weakens a person, but the experiences I face have only given me more character. Character is not simply developed by listening to lectures; it must also be learned through experiences.
Homesickness is a sickness that cannot cause death. Instead, it causes loneliness and anyone can catch it at any time, at anyplace, except when they are “home”. It has been two hundred and fifty nine days that I have left my home to study aboard. I realized a valuable thing that I had never noticed: I missed my family. The feeling when my mother woke me up every morning for school or the strict look of my father when I went out too late started to come back to my mind. Even my dog appeared in my memories; I longed for him to welcome me back with his waving tail. I craved that feeling again. I missed class and stayed inside playing “Nine Dragon” instead. Nice Dragon is a game online that give players an imaginary life where they can find themselves as superheroes. I buried my head to that game for two months and try to put myself away from the real world. Being a hero in such an illusory world could not help me hold my homesickness forever. I did not have the energy to do anything after that. However, I realized that my life in Vietnam was behind me and I moved to the U.S. to move forward with my education. With this in mind, I felt stronger and never forgot my purpose or why I came here.
Traveling across the globe from Vietnam to live in American city, Lake Charles, was not great as I expected. Everything seemed very new to me. Unlike a vacation, I had to adapt to this place and the most difficult part was the huge culture shock. When I first ate American food, I became sick because