Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction Group 3 | Page 158

A Time to Explore
Korean International School, Tong, Leia 11
Dear Diary,
I could hear the ocean roaring next to me and the wind was as strong as a bear.
It seemed to drag me across the sand and I could feel the sharp corners of the stones stabbing at my feet
making me cry out in pain “Ahhh” I suddenly woke up and even though I knew it had been a dream I also
knew it was a sign that my journey as an explorer was about to begin.
My name is Ying Yue, when I was 20 years old I made the biggest decision of my life, to join my father
onboard the Ming Treasure Fleet. He was a chef and needed an assistant so I pleaded with him to let me go,
he said no so many times until I finally proved I was strong enough to take care of my myself, but that is a
whole other story.
We set sail from Shanghai and our ship was packed with gold, silk and other valuable items that the Jianwen
Emperor wanted to offer to other countries with the hope of building better relationships, in other words
bribing, so they could later trade in goods. The fleet was also ordered to find out about the world, at that
time we knew nothing about how other people lived or what they looked like, not even in my wildest
dreams could I have imagined how different the rest of the world was.
The first place we stopped was a place called India. My first impression was the incredible heat and the
thousands of bugs that followed me like my very own cloud. The people who lived there wore as few
clothes as possible, the women dressed in brightly coloured cloth which was just one long piece of material,
they wrapped it round and round and round themselves, they made it look easy, trust me, it wasn't. I saw
elephants walking down the dusty streets and monkeys everywhere, climbing trees and temples and picking
the bananas from the trees. Some of the rich landowners wanted to buy our silk to make their wives
beautiful dresses, that was the first time that I thought about whether I would ever get married.
Before we reached our next destination we met with a rather nasty bunch of pirates. We thought they were
approaching us to make a trade but suddenly arrows started raining down on us, we were being attacked and
all I was allowed to do as a young lady was hide in the kitchen. My father went out to fight, our men had
swords and our ship had gunpowder when the cannons were fired they were so loud I became deaf in both
ears for many hours, I was so scared that I wouldn't see my father again, but he survived that battle, and
many many more.
We soon arrived in Africa, this incredible land changed my life forever. I thought India was hot but in
Africa the heat could kill you in hours, finding water was surviving another hour. The deserts there seemed
to go on forever and ever but we met people who knew how to survive and they taught us, many things,
such as how to find water, hunt for food and protect ourselves from the sun and the wild animals. We learnt
to respect these incredibly beautiful and dangerous animals, they had learnt to live in harmony with each
other. In return, we gave them some silk to make clothing and some jewels which the women knew how to
turn into jewellery by weaving plants into a string.
The atmosphere was extraordinary, the first time I saw a sunrise across the desert I knew I would never
forget the feeling. Many of our crew didn't want to leave and some of them disappeared and we never saw
them again, I was happy for them and wondered if they had fallen in love with the people or the place. I
had promised myself I was going to see the whole world before deciding where to settle.
On our way to the next country we hit a terrible storm in the North Atlantic Ocean, the storm came on so
suddenly that many of the men were knocked into the water and quickly grabbed by the huge waves and
swallowed by the enormous ocean. It felt like the sea was playing with us like a toy, we had no control over
the ship until the storm died down. One of the ships didn't make it through the storm and I cried many tears
imagining how their families would feel when and if we ever returned with the sad news.
Eventually, we arrived in America, we arrived in the winter time. It was freezing, some of us were sick
which was terrible because we had already used up all the Chinese medicine that our ships Doctor had
brought and he couldn't communicate with the local people to explain what he needed. The first month