The Doors that Are Open to Us

　　good morning ladies and gentlemen:

　　the title of my speech today is “the doors that are open to us ”。

　　the other day my aunt paid me a visit. she was overjoyed. “i got the highest mark in the mid-term examination!” she said. don't be surprised! my aunt is indeed a student; to be exact, a college student at the age of 45.

　　last year, she put aside her private business and signed up for a one-year, full-time management course in a college. “this was the wisest decision i have ever made,” she said proudly like a teenage girl. to her, college is always a right place to pick up new ideas, and new ideas always make her feel young.

　　“compared with the late 70s,” she says, “now college students have many doors.” my aunt cannot help but recall her first college experience in 1978 when college doors began to be re-opened after the cultural revolution. she was assigned to study engineering despite her desire to study chinese literature, and a few years later, the government sent her to work in a tv factory.

　　i was shocked when she first told me how she （had） had no choice in her major and job. look at us today! so many doors are open to us! i believe there have never been such abundant opportunities for self-development as we have today. and my aunt told me that we should reach our goals by grasping all these opportunities.

　　the first door i see is the opportunity to study different kinds of subjects that interest us. my aunt said she was happy to study management, but she was also happy that she could attend lectures on ancient chinese poetry and on shakespearean drama. as for myself, i am an english major, but i may also go to lectures on history. to me, if college education in the past emphasized specialization, now, it emphasizes free and well-rounded development of each individual. so all the fine achievements of human civilization are open to us.

　　the second door is the door to the outside world. learning goes beyond classrooms and national boundaries. my aunt remembers her previous college days as monotonous and even calls her generation “frogs in a well.” but today, as the world becomes a global village, it is important that our neighbors and we be open-minded to learn with and from each other. i have many fellow international classmates, and i am applying to an exchange program with a university abroad. as for my aunt, she is planning to get an mba degree in the united kingdom where her daughter, my cousin, is now doing her master's degree in biochemistry. we are now taking the opportunity to study overseas, and when we come back, we'll put to use what we have learnt abroad.