Min tibetanska barndom i Zorgay - Life and Culture on the Tibetan ...

26
ENTERING MIDDLE SCHOOL
I
graduated from primary school, where I had learned very
little. When we took the entrance examination for junior
middle school, we could not write a proper composition in
Tibetan because we had only just begun to learn Tibetan in
Grade Four. Our Tibetan teacher wrote compositions for us on
our exam paper while the exam monitor was out. Thanks to the
Three Jewels, I passed <strong>and</strong> entered junior middle school, which
was so far away that I could only return home on the weekends.
The dormitory was better than that in primary school. The roof
did not leak when it rained or snow melted. I was very
homesick, but we could not go home until Saturday. It was my
first time to sleep alone.
We brought our own food <strong>and</strong> our parents brought us
firewood for cooking because the school had no dining hall. The
school was very small with only grades one, two, <strong>and</strong> three.
The new students were the youngest <strong>and</strong> we dared not
raise our heads in fear of being beaten. Five of us had been
classmates in primary school <strong>and</strong> we stayed together in the
same dormitory room, which made it easy for our families to
bring firewood once a month, as our villages were not far apart.
Our parents worried about us <strong>and</strong> sent us good food. The older
students were lazy bullies. They did not make a fire to boil tea
for making tsampa; instead, they came to our room to drink our
tea <strong>and</strong> make tsampa every morning. We sometimes did not
have enough tea to make tsampa for ourselves. We dared not
complain for we knew they would beat us. We even lacked the
courage to laugh loudly in our room, much less refuse them tea.
Much unhappiness was buried in our minds.
Once, before we knew better, we talked to each other in
great joy, <strong>and</strong> our room brimmed with laughter. Suddenly, an
older student stormed into our room, pointed at each of us in
turn, <strong>and</strong> shouted, "Shut up you brats! Don't make me angry or
you won't have a good time here. Underst<strong>and</strong>? Don't make such
noises again. Hear me?" He was also the one who always asked
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