The banner hangs down between the two columns of main gate is fluttering in the strong wind. It gets too windy at this time of the year. Everyone hides their face in muffler or clothes. I'm also wearing mask so no one can't get a tense look on my face. Yes, today I'll take the CSAT. Lots of people await us at the main gate to cheer for students. Walking through a tremendous crowd, I'm lost touch with reality. It is noisy out there but the school is peaceful and quiet. Not a creature was to be seen in the school playground. A few horizontal bars that seem to have been chipped away are in there. Also there are old baseball courts and goalposts. I twist my head around to look at school buildings. I cannot detect movement of people inside the building. It is like a dream. Completely desolate playground and two somber shade of grey brick buildings, 5 stories high.
I step inside and look around. It is the first time that I observe the interior of another high school. It does not differ much from my school. Stairs, stairs, and a huge number of stairs, corridors, restrooms, classrooms. The air smells powerfully of dry dust as is the way with other public schools. The only difference is that this school is about 30 years old. All that concrete is sort of ugly and dismal. My eyes wander towards some crude paintings and pictures on the concrete wall. One of them is a reproduction of Sunflower by Van Gogh but it had not achieved the intensity of real Sunflowers. To me, chrome yellow color seems to be gray. The corridor echoed from my footsteps.
Seven girls are preparing CSAT in class. One student is writing something down, some are reading and the others are watching their cellphones. I'm finding my desk with sticker which is entered my name and test identification number. All desk are bruised and not hardwood furniture but very clean. Maybe teacher order them to paint out the scribbles for this test. When I sit down, I see four large pieces of paper are on the blackboard. But I can't see the words on the paper clearly.
1. I liked the descriptions of the school which gave me a feeling of dreariness. All the descriptions successfully piled up to create an atmosphere of such that made me become heavyhearted. It reminds me of how I felt on the examination day; I had felt a similar feeling, too.
ReplyDelete2. I think there are some grammatical mistakes that need to be corrected. The very first sentence of your writing is eye-catching, but it confused me a little. 'The banner hangs down...'could be changed into 'the banner hanging down... ' or 'which hangs down'. Also, I think more information about the horizontal bars could help; where are those from?
3. I think you could give more details using the five senses. I liked how you mentioned the smell of dust and other descriptions using sight. However I think it would make your work seem more realistic if you had added descriptions about sound, touch and taste. Perhaps you could add a description about the cold weather in the morning, to add up to the whole impression this writing is conveying. Did also you get nervous, like I had been, when you heard the clocks ticking in the unfamiliar classroom?
4. The mood of this place was dry and unfamiliar.
5. I think the you chose to write about this place because it was where one of the most important events in your life had taken place. Such things are unforgettable as we live.
6. From the last paragraph, I get that you were nervous for the test, and was feeling tense. However, I think it is because I had also been through the same event. If it were a non-Korean reader, or anyone who has little understanding of Korean SAT, I doubt that he or she would be able to understand exactly what I had been able to understand. An explanation of the importance of the day and the event- how it can effect a Korean student's whole life, or how hard you prepared for the exam- would help readers understand the overall feeling of the essay well.
201502398 Subin Lee