Cheng Yuet-yi, of St Paul's Co-educational College, shows off her DSE scores.Cheng Yuet-yi was one of the nine students that bagged seven 5** when the results were announced last Monday. The score for Spanish language, the eighth subject she studied, was released on Sunday.
"I was surprised to receive an A in the Spanish exam," says Yuet-yi, who has been studying the language at school since Form One with two native Spanish speakers and a Guatemalan Chinese teacher.
Cheng, who wants to be a lawyer, said she started studying Spanish just for fun. "It is the third most spoken language in the world. I hope it will be useful in my career, too," she said.
The student said the most challenging part for her in mastering the tongue is the conjugation of Spanish tenses and pronouns.
Speaking is another problem for her, she added, because she rarely has the chance to practise outside classes.
A total of 245 students took language subjects, including Spanish, French, German, Hindi, Japanese and Urdu, in this year's DSE. Japanese was the most popular, with 114 candidates sitting the exam. Almost half of the 20 students who took Spanish got an A.