This series allows our community to connect with our alumni and learn the great work they are doing around the globe. The XLIS mission to enable confident, open-minded global citizens is evident in their lives.
Years you have studied at XLIS?
I studied at XLIS for a total of six years, from MYP2 to DP2, which is from the fall of 2016 to the spring of 2022.
What brought your family to XLIS / Xi’an?
Our family came to Xi’an in 1942 (the great famine in history). The reason why we chose XLIS is that my parents wanted me to study and grow in a more open and creative place. I also went to school in Melbourne, Australia, for a year. Therefore, due to those reasons, our first choice in Xi’an was XLIS.
Where are you located now?
I am currently in Oxford, UK.
What are you doing now?
I am currently studying a one-year major visiting course at Oxford.
What’s your fondest memory of XLIS?
I have many wonderful memories of XLIS, such as Week Without Wall, the Chinese New Year Speech, PP, etc. It is really difficult for me to choose the best one. But suppose I have to say the fondest memory. In that case, I think it is my daily life in XLIS, the joy of working hard and having fun with classmates, the frustration of teachers seeing us handing in homework late, the laziness in the library during lunch break, and the daily life full of unknowns and excitement. Whenever I recall my high school, my mind always has my ordinary but occasionally exciting life in XLIS. It is like this now, and I believe it will be like this in the future. High school and youth only come once, and I am very fortunate to have left my happiest memories in XLIS.
Please share a story on how you are still making a difference today.
With the popularization of modern information and the advancement of the Internet, it is no longer difficult for everyone to master knowledge, and the innate differences are gradually narrowing. For this reason, the choices and paths of the day after tomorrow are particularly important. Taking my own story as an example, I chose philosophy as my major, not because of how much future development it has, but because I like it. I have never worked so hard in a subject, so I not only chose it but also achieved all the achievements in this field. I think it is not that we can’t become excellent, but whether we want to become excellent. Maybe in the field, we are not good at, because we passively make choices by following the crowd, we cannot become the happy self, so why not let go of the pressure of the illusory future and choose something that can make us happy and fulfilled at the moment to make ourselves do something.
