Class of 2013

First, coming from a small town, one tends to have certain prejudices. You think people of certain nationalities behave a certain way and you build stereotypes. However, once you see kids from all over the world, you start to think differently.

I had many good friends from Mexico, Japan, South Korea, China, Russia, Spain, Kazakhstan, France, Germany, Poland, New Zealand, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Ukraine and many more. I enjoyed playing, talking, working out, studying with people from all parts of the world. Then I realized an important lesson that I still carry with me, that it’s not about where you come from, its about heart.

There are good and bad people everywhere, and that has little to do with the color of the skin or the cover on their passport. After all, the motto of Bodwell is “Strength in diversity". You know coming to Canada I was a scared little kid, from a small town, from a country most people never heard of. I never had big aspirations or goals and my life was about getting some small job and a small apartment and live a small life. However, once I was in Bodwell, things started to change. I’ve seen students my age or younger achieve great things.

People were preparing for swimming Olympics, were fluent in 7 languages, black belts in Judo or masters of Thai Boxing. I think the greatest thing about Bodwell was the exposure to greatness. You meet kids who are ambitious and who already achieved a lot for their tender age. You meet smart, intelligent, brave and humble kids. It made me realize that I didn’t do anything other than playing video games, and I wasn’t particularly good at them either.

This has kickstarted my “self improvement” journey. Luckily Bodwell provided me with a lot of opportunities to improve. I went on to compete in the cross country team, swimming team, snowboard team. My English classes made me fall in love with reading, and Law classes with intellectual debates. Mr. Chiu made me fall in love with Economics and History. Don’t get me wrong, it was very difficult, there were times when I felt lonely and as if I didn’t belong and that I’m just not good enough and I struggled a lot, but I persevered.

To this day this journey continues and I’m always excited about the future…