| 201502643 Lee JiWon
Our housefather
I used to call him "Shouting" as a joke. It was because he literally shouted a lot to me and my friends and it became kind of his nickname among school students. Every night, he had to shout above the noise of the students who chased around at the dormitory corridor. Yes, he was a housefather at my high school. No one ever knew how much we would miss that shrill voice saying, "It's time for bed everyone! All lights have to be out by twelve!" in those immature high school days.
He was like a pine. Just like the green color of pine trees lasts all year, he always put on the same green colored T-shirt and cargo pants regardless of the season and the weather. But it is more because of his consistent diligence than his appearance why I see him as a pine-like person. For three years during my high school days, every morning at 6 a.m., I said good morning to him and he replied, "Good morning. No matter how busy you are, don't skip your breakfast!" While I myself was consistent too in terms of getting my green grape juice out from the refrigerator every 6 a.m. in the morning, I could always watch him sweeping the yard in front of our dorm; the trash, the fallen leaves every autumn and even snow every winter for three years. Now that I think of it, how consistent and diligent he was and still is!
One day, I had a bad cold and headache in the middle of the night so that I could not stand it anymore. When students have to leave the dormitory at night to go to the hospital, their parents should come and take to a nearby hospital, but I picked the wrong day to get sick. My parents were not in Korea since they went on a trip to China to visit my uncle's house that morning. I was at a loss what to do but it was he who drove me to the emergency room and waited for about 40 minutes until I finished getting an IV injection. I can't forget the conversation we had during that time. When I disclosed my mind that I felt like I'm becoming obsessively jealous to my friends who have better grades, he gave me such wise words of advice that I could not understand then but I completely do now. "Be a missing piece of the puzzle so that it cannot be completed without you, but what's more important is that to expect the puzzle to be totally completed, I should be, you should be, and we should be here all along."
"He always nagged us for a trivial thing, but I know how much he cared about us and now I miss him very much." Every graduates of our high school praise him with one voice whenever we meet each other at a high school reunion. Now I also truly understand how every little word and advice he gave to students enabled me and my friends to become a better person. He was always there for us with a sympathetic ear like The Giving Tree, and he was all of our father. How can I thank him enough for his dedication to us and our school! It is not too much to say that he was part of our precious school memories and lives.
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Monday, October 17, 2016
Lee JiWon/ Character Sketch Essay First Draft/ Thursday 1-3pm
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To sum up the person you described, your housefather is very diligent and warm-hearted person. Through the sentences such as ‘While I myself was consistent too in terms of getting my green grape juice out from the refrigerator every 6 a.m. in the morning, I could always watch him sweeping the yard in front of our dorm; the trash, the fallen leaves every autumn and even snow every winter for three years.’, ‘Now that I think of it, how consistent and diligent he was and still is!’, and ‘I was at a loss what to do but it was he who drove me to the emergency room and waited for about 40 minutes until I finished getting an IV injection.’, I felt like that. You described what the person looks like by the sentence ‘Just like the green color of pine trees lasts all year, he always put on the same green colored T-shirt and cargo pants regardless of the season and the weather.’, what the person says by "It's time for bed everyone! All lights have to be out by twelve!", what the person does by ‘It was because he literally shouted a lot to me and my friends and it became kind of his nickname among school students.’, and what other people say about the person by "He always nagged us for a trivial thing, but I know how much he cared about us and now I miss him very much.". These sentences made your writing more vividly and there are nothing that I couldn’t understand well. I think you wrote this descriptive writing well in a specific way. In my opinion, you might chose to describe this person because you felt very thankful and missed him a lot. As I read your writings, I also thought about my high school days. Also, I would like to ask you that are there any other experiences that you felt as if he was part of your school?
ReplyDelete201502384 LeeSooKyung
I love that you picked someone who gave you strength in a way maybe no one else could at the time. He is a very unexpected character but I can see how much he means to you just by reading your essay. Your description of him as a pine was very interesting and I wasn't able to picture just exactly in what sense he was like a pine. However, as I was reading your essay I could see how 'pine' is an apt word. I also think you did a great job with your direct quotations but I did get confused with the quotation in the last paragraph. I suppose it was a thought so maybe you could change the punctuation to indicate thought. You mentioned how you could not understand his words back then and that now you could but perhaps you could explain how. What exactly was it that made his words appear so profound to you. Lastly, because this was a character sketch you definitely could have added more details about physical features. I could get a general sense about who he was but it could have used more structure. Anyways it was a great read. Thank you :)
ReplyDelete-Su Yeon Kim 201500568