My Journey

My Journey

Education is something that a person can keep with them their entire life. Education is like jewelry that anyone can wear, but no thief is able to snatch it from the person. I was four years old when I got admitted to school. My education was a lot different than my siblings’ and my cousins’ education. My educational base was much weaker than others because I didn’t have the same education as them. It was weak at the level that I wasn’t able to write the alphabet of my own language, Urdu. I was taught very basic things in school, for example, reading and writing the English alphabet and math numbers. Then I started learning how to read Quran. The school I went to was a religious school where my main and only focus was to read, learn, and memorize the Holy Book of Islam. The process of memorizing and finishing it took me about nine to ten years. Due to this, I had so much difficulty understanding the educational system in Chicago and also the language.

When I arrived in Chicago, I was in school after three days, and my English was terrible. I went to all my classes without knowing what my teachers were talking about. I would just blankly look at my teachers when they asked me questions. Not speaking English made me feel like as I was lost in a dessert without a compass. I didn’t know which way to go. People laughed at me because I had no friends and that was because of communication problems, but as time went by, people who laughed at me became my friends for entire time I spent in high school. I faced challenges and problems throughout my years. The first time I had to speak in front of class was very hard. My whole body and voice was trembling, and almost every time I was done with whatever I was doing, my teacher told me it’s over and it’s alright. It’s not the end of the world.

Moreover, a lack of confidence always fastened me back to my seat. I always knew that no one would make fun of me because of something that I said, but the fear of getting embarrassed in front of the class kept me back from taking the step to talk in class, to ask questions, and to answer questions. I always tried to speak, but I felt as the words just didn't want to come out of my mouth. The problem of not asking anything always caused problems during exams or quizzes. I often came across something that I didn’t understand during class. In addition, co-education was also something new and different for me because in Pakistan it was separate for boys and girls. It was another thing that kept me back, sharing classroom with boys.

Furthermore, something that always made me worry was standardized tests. Standardized tests were a lot harder than I even thought. Every part of that test was hard regardless of how much I had practiced. When I took practice tests, I knew that I would have bad results. When I looked at others in the room, I would pick someone whose English was good. While looking at that random person I always wished to have the same language skills as them, so I was able to focus more on what was needed to get higher scores instead of only trying to understand what was written. Another problem was I didn’t had much time to prepare myself for the test because I was trying to improve my language which was more important for me at that time. In comparison to people who have spent their whole life in the United States, and they knew the language better than me.

In conclusion, I struggled and I am still struggling because my educational formation was weak. I got the knowledge of my religion, but I didn’t have any general education and I was behind everyone else whether it was my family or my fellows. However, now I have both, knowledge of my religion and knowledge of world. I have realized that I am not ahead of anyone, and I am not behind from anyone. This experience has affected me deeply. Now I know everyone runs their own race and no one is allowed to change their track. My weaknesses made me stand where I am today, and they made me come out of comfort zone and to accept and to face my challenges. Education is not something that people can take away from me, but something that I can get from others and others can share with me.