I feel rather saddened to see that colonialism has undermined the respect of some Chinese people for their own culture, to the detriment of many young people of the present and future generation.
Parents, teachers and graduating students were elated when their schools were permitted to preserve the language of their former colonial rulers.
I am not rabidly nationalistic, but I believe that every person has his cultural roots from which he learns his values through his own language.
I noticed that when the younger students were questioned on the English-speaking TV news about their 'victory', every one of them replied in Chinese, indicating that they are more at home in their own language. I wondered how former Legislative Councillor, headmaster David Cheung Chi-kong felt when his former school decided to opt for English as the medium of teaching.
He spent most of his teaching career crusading for mother-tongue as the medium of teaching, yet he himself spoke eloquently in English.
Some Chinese who excel at English have told me of the agony of their earlier days studying in a foreign language, and of their problems as government servants expected to use English in everyday life.
Now that the colonial period is over, they speak both at work and at social gatherings in their own language yet can switch easily to English in foreign company.