[RP] Piano teachers

Baha. Even though I have already done response posts on my friend Angela aka ero jiji's already, the topic of one of her posts still caught my attention.

This quote is taken from her post “Piano”:

When I saw those people who plays perfectly in the video, god knows how much I want a piano and how much I want to play that well…I used to lose my interest on piano because the day-after-day practices frustrated me.

I agreed with her so badly. Like Angela, I have been learning to play the piano since I was a kid. In Hong Kong, the city that I grew up in; piano has been one of the most learned instruments by most children in my generation. In order to be accepted by a good school, one must actively participate in multiple extra curricular activities and is able to play at least one instrument. When I first started learning the piano, I had the worst teacher ever. She hit my fingers with a pen (yes it hurt) and yelled at me whenever I played something wrong or couldn’t follow the beat. She was the reason why I started to hate this instrument that I once loved. I was stuck with this woman for six miserable years, and I only continued playing the piano just so I can have more to put on my resume for a good school. Even if I switched to another piano teacher, she gave up on me once she heard how terrible I played.

However, the situation changed when I was twelve, when my second piano teacher had a stroke and her daughter became my new piano teacher. Her daughter was different them my previous teachers, she was young and pretty and nice and patient, she is the big sister I’d longed for. She didn’t mind listening to my crappy piano playing, and encouraged me every time I got discouraged. I felt my passion for piano rose again, my playing improved, and piano practices felt less painful. Her care for me paid off, for my level six exam of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, I received my highest score ever, with a pass of distinction.