Points of Departure: My Second Language
Yue Huang
In the video above, Beijing native Yue Huang talks about learning languages to strengthen her skills as a journalist. Photo by Melody Komyerov
The daughter of a TV producer, Yue Huang spent much of her childhood in her mother’s newsroom, and she clearly liked what she saw. “In journalism, different things happen,” she says. “Unexpected things happen. I just can’t imagine getting a job where you do the same thing every day.”
A native of Beijing, Huang (COM’11) felt that studying journalism in the United States would give her a sound foundation in a career that could take her anywhere in the world. But coming here, she says, required her to learn a lot more than a new language.
“There are a lot of things people take for granted that I had to deal with,” she says. “Things like having to open a bank account or signing up for a phone contract.”
Huang was a fast learner, and a very busy student. She volunteered at an immigration center, worked on the Daily Free Press, and learned Spanish in addition to English.
“I suddenly felt like my whole world was opened up,” she says of her arrival at BU. “I met people from all over the world—people from Greece, Iran, and Ecuador. It’s something that I never imagined I’d be able to do had I stayed in China.”
Alan Wong can be reached at alanwong@bu.edu.
Additional editing by Chris Maggio.
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