Playing the piano gave me a lot of things, such as good friends, good teachers, perfect pitch and it even taught me that practice really makes progress. I started taking piano lessons when I was three years old. I actually have been hated going to the lessons since learning how to play the piano was not my will. It was just one of something very boring which my super strict mother forced me to learn how to play the piano. I was always thinking how I can escape from the boring lessons every week. I once tried to say “I want to give up the piano lessons.” to my mother hoping she would understand my pain that I had to feel every time I go to the lessons, but she just gave me a cold glance at me and said “No”. She burst the bubble of my hope at once. Therefore, even though I made a nice brave try, I wasn't able to quit the piano lessons. However, now I actually appreciate my mom for not allowing me to quit it at that time and “let” me continue going to the lessons for more than 15 years in total, which is more than half of my life.
I had piano lessons twice a week. One was a group lesson and the other one was a private one. It made me feel worse because I had tons of homework from both of them. Sometimes I had to compose music by myself from nothing. What was worse, all the students in my piano school had to take a piano test which was called the “grading test” including improvisation, listen-and-copy, and arrangement. I especially didn't like the private lessons. That is because I had to show how bad I am at playing the piano to my teacher one on one. My teacher often said “Do practice more!!” Sometimes I had to cry and say “I am sorry, but I really don’t have talent to play it” in small voices. She said I shouldn’t give up without any trials. One day, one thing happened and it changed my mind and attitude toward practicing piano. Our teacher gave me and one of my group mates a music score which was made for four hands. It was for a big contest and it was very difficult. At first, we were almost giving up but that was the last contest for my partner because she was going to quit taking lessons after the contest.
It was really hard for me to push myself to sit down in front of my Piano at home at least for two hours. My partner and other group mates in my group lesson encouraged me all the time. Because my friends and my teacher believed me that I can do it even though I couldn't believe myself, I could hold on. We practiced a lot together, and we found that we improved a lot. Even though on the contest we couldn't get any prizes but we were satisfied with our performance because we did our best and of course we enjoyed playing a lot. After that I tried to practice the piano much more. Even though I was still a bad player, but I started to love to play it surprisingly. I learned that the more I do my best, the more I would be able to improve my piano playing skills.
Now I’m in Taiwan and there are fewer opportunities to play the piano here but I still miss playing the piano. Through this experience, I learned that I should not give up things easily and shouldn't underestimate myself. Even though I had a hard time at first in Taiwan because I didn't understand Chinese at all, but I didn't give up. The perfect pitch which I got from the piano lessons actually helped a lot to learn Chinese. I really want to appreciate everyone who supported me at that time. That piano lesson was just like a life lesson for me.
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