Bulletin Autumn‧Winter 2000

A Truly Special Rhodes Scholar Hong Kong Rhodes Scholar for the year 2000, Jade Lai Wing-yu is thethird Chinese University student to have won the award in three consecutive years since 1998, or the fourth CUHK awardee in five years since 1996. fade is also a very special young lady. Her Choice of a Major A p s y c h o l o g y - t u r n e d - s o c i o l o g y major at The Chinese University, Jade i s n o w r e a d i ng English L a n g u a ge a n d Literature a tthe University of Oxford. Why this choice? 'My ultimate d r e a m in life is to be a creative writer o r engaged in anything that involves creative an d not only analytical thinking,' she said. She neve r studied English literature i n secondary school, nor did she take ma ny electives i n English literature at t he University. She has rea d and wa s Very impressed' by Golding's Lord of the Flies, in fact, but does not claim to have read wi d e l y . A n d like m a ny artistically- inclined youn g people, she has written h e r s h a r e of p o e m s t h a t a r en e v e r published. Her choice of a major was simply driven b y passionate interest. ' I ' v e always followed m yheart wh e n choosing subjects. Re ad i n g novels i n secondary school, I was fascinated by people's thoughts and th e inner world of emotions. So I chose psychology in the first y e ar of m yu n i v e r s i t y s t ud i e s. H o w e v e r I s o o n r e a l i z ed t h a t t h e a p p r o a c h es i n p s y c h o l o gy a r e t o o scientific for my taste. They do not focus on wh at I f ound mo st fascinating abou t people — their sensibilities. I changed my major t o sociology a nd fell in love with it. But I have always liked art and literature. It wa s just that I h a d felt a bit inhibited abou t changing m y field s o drastically,' she explained. Her Parents Jade's idealistic a p p r o a c h t o her studies even got her into trouble wi t h her pa r en t s , w h o m she described as ' v e r y t y p i c a l H o n g K o n g p a r e n t s ' w h o s e k n o w l e d ge of c a r e e rs w a s l i m i t e d t o l aw, m e d i c i n e, a n d accountancy. They could no t imagine w h a t c a r e e r s s u b j e c t s s u c h a s CHINES E UNIVERSIT Y BULLETI n Autumn • Winter 2000 30