Hong Kong University Taster Days (7 - 10 June 2011)

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From 7 to 10 June this year, three Pre-University students, Hong Qiting (Pre-U 2 Joy), Li Yuchen (Pre-U 2 Joy) and Yuan Meng (Pre-U 2 Excellence) were selected to attend the four-day University Taster Day at Hong Kong University.

We were fortunate to be selected by HCIS to attend the Taster Days Program organized by Hong Kong University (HKU) from 7 to 10 June. Not only did we have the opportunity to experience the sights and sounds of cosmopolitan Hong Kong but also the chance to be immersed in some of the college programmes offered at the university.

HKU’s Faulty of Engineering offers a wide range of courses. During our visit there, we had a hands-on experience in a civil engineering workshop under the watchful guidance of the experienced lab technicians. The participants were required to build a ‘bridge’ using spaghetti and glue. It was quite an experience having our fingers all sticky and gluey with spaghetti.  We were elated when we managed to build the strongest ‘spaghetti bridge’ and won the first prize.

Our exciting journey continued outdoors with a site visit to Hong Kong’s sewage treatment plant. Our chemistry lessons came ‘alive’ for us as what we had learned in environmental chemistry on primary and secondary treatment of sewage came back to us vividly. How we appreciated this chance to see the real-time application of textbook knowledge!

In the Faculty of Arts, we visited the oldest yet most ornate building in HKU. We could not help but marvel at each staircase, each door and each corridor in that building. At the Faculty, we were introduced to Dr. Yoshiko Nakano, is an elegant lady who answered our questions patiently and in great detail. We were then divided into groups and sat in the foreign language classes.  We had lots of fun learning some greetings in Korean, Japanese and German. This was followed by a more formal lecture about linguistics by another professor. The lecture was quite intellectual but we tried our best to listen and participate actively. Questions like, "What is so interesting about human language?", "What do linguists really do on a day-to-day basis?", "How can an understanding of language enrich humans and society" were discussed during the lecture.  Last but not least, we also had a peek into the world of philosophy. We discussed what happiness means and whether the best life is also a happy one.  Certainly food for thought!

The icing on the cake was the ‘Birthday Cake-Making Contest” to celebrate HKU’s 100^th anniversary. We proudly took the second place among the eight groups that participated.

Our short stay at HKU was memorable in many ways. Besides the knowledge gained, we have also made new friends from all parts of the world. We are certainly better informed now than before about the joys and wonders of what an undergraduate education has to offer.

By Hong Qiting (Pre-University 2 Joy)

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