A thing I value.

"I have come into valley, one like I've never been before...."

Yes, going in to this school is like coming into a valley which I've never seen before.

It is rather full of trials, temptations, problems, and sometimes exceeding happiness which would either trouble me emotionally or reinforce me intellectually.

It is partly exciting - and partly exasperating.

Being part of Dataline, the school's official publication, has actually been what was aforementioned.

I was chosen to be the feature editor. I thought may job would only contain editing papers passed to me but, since we were having our first press conference for the very reason of getting some budget for the paper, I was assigned to different kinds of things, some of which I really knew nothing about.

We have all discussed that it was not a thing to penalize us due to our weaknesses but to help us establish our minds and hearts to something greater than what we currently see. It is to help us sustain our hidden talents and to make us look beyond our helplessness.

It was during this period of time that I started hearing what other people think about me. Some say I'm so strange, weird, and totally out-of-this-world antiquated. Some say I'm strange but in a good way. Others think I'm special the way I am right now.

But it's a really nice blessing to have a good, keen observer E-I-C (Editor-In-Chief) to explain these things to me - to us. He had taught me, showed me, some truths about myself that I've never knew visible to other people's eyes. He opened to me the simple, practical facts that I know would help me through my years here in this school - as a student and as an editor.

Furthermore, my good E-I-C assigned me to be the co-M.E. (Managing Editor), which is totally far from what I expected to be. He explained that I have the characteristics an M.E. must have. The question though, remains: "Do I have the skills to be a good M.E.?"

I think I know what their answers would be. Some would say that it's not a matter of having the intellectual skills, it's a matter of being open-minded, and of being willing to learn more of the things I ought to do. Others would say that it's really a matter of willingness to do that certain thing - willingness is the important thing.

If ever I happen to be the M.E., I will try to do the best I can not to degrade myself in front of my colleagues, but to boost my self-confidence and to try doing something even for the simple sake of having an experience on that thing.

There are some more things I've learned upon joining this little team. Emotional ones - which are totally mawkish it could make you cry if you wouldn't control yourself. What I saw in this little group is not only sympathy from friends about how strange I look but also encouragements for the maintaining of my positive, good characteristics. This little group has taught me some things I've never learned before and I expect that this same group would stay beside me to help me get through the coming troubles in my life.

If there is anything that would help me establish a stronger confidence not only to myself but also to the things I do, say, believe, it would be this little group, the DATALINE officers and staffers who, even this smallest span of time, had taught me great lessons I would value for the rest of my life.