2005-6: This year so far …

The English department was happy to welcome our new full-time teacher Eric Mok. At the beginning of October we had a chance for everyone to get to know each other in an informal way at our traditional ‘Welcome party’, which is aimed at helping the new first years to meet the staff and students and staff in the department, and of course to play some games and to eat and drink together. A second party was held later in October at Julie’s place, on the day of the College’s anniversary, which included a quiz, treasure hunt and some Scottish Halloween games.

Eric Mok took a small group of students to Hong Kong University’s open day in October, to show them the largest academic library in the territory, and his alma mater in general. In November, Erik organized another visit, this time to an abridged performance of Shakespeare’s play ‘A Midsummer Night's Dream’ by local group Bareknuckle Shakespeare.

In December we participated in the College’s Athletics Day, and also held our Christmas party and ‘traditional’ carol singing session at the entrance to the College, for everyone to join in. The highlight of December’s activities for us was probably the performance of the play ‘Wizard of Oz’ (adapted by Julie Forrester and acted by the Creative Drama class) before an audience of around 400 primary school children at Shak Chung Shan Memorial Catholic Primary School, Riviera Gardens. The same play was performed again for an audience at the College at the beginning of January.

In February, Eric Mok arranged a visit for us to a concert: 'Metamorphosis', performed by the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra. In March he also encouraged students to attend 'Pen Work, Field Work, Dream Work: A Reading with Commentary': a talk by the poet Seamus Heaney, organised by the Man Hong Kong Literary Festival and Department of English, HKU. This event presented a rare chance for the students to meet a Nobel Prize-winning poet.

Some of the students attended a student conference run by HKU SPACE Community College, in April, where Julie Forrester was one of the keynote speakers. Her paper was entitled ‘Thinking Creatively; Thinking Critically’.