(1) Phan Hung was 31 years old when he walked into a classroom for the very first time. Then, eleven years later, he was ready to receive his master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering. Phan Hung is a lesson in determination for all people. His life is a remarkable story.
(2) Hung was raised by his grandparents in a small village in Thailand. For many years, they lived in poor circumstances in a rural community in the northern mountains.His grandfather did not want him to go to school.Instead, his grandfather taught him carpentry,the family business, so he cloud help earn money for the family. From a young age, Hung made a living with his hands. Nevertheless, somewhere and somehow, Hung taught himself to read from comic books and old Buddhist prayer books. He then began to look for something to read outside his home, and that is when he found the most wonderful thing: a library. The Thai king had built a library in a nearby village a decade before, and Hung was shocked to see all these books in one place.
(3) Back then, few people in Hung’s community knew about his love of reading and learning. In fact, most people thought he was predominately just a carpenter, and his future held nothing but making furniture because he was not smart. He always dressed in old, worn-out clothes. He spoke to almost no one, and he lived with just his grandparents, separate from the rest of the village. However, one person did realize Hung’s capacity for learning-the librarian, LalanaDao. She talked to Hung when he came to the library and saw what a dynamic person he actually was. For instance, whenever he learned something new, his face lit up and he could talk about it for hours. Ms. Dao said that Hung devoted all his time to reading, and he actually read every book in the library.
(4) Ms.Dao also suggested to Hung that he needed a formal education. She encouraged him to take the test so he could get a high school diploma. He studied all aspects of the test—namely, Math, Science and even English. Although it was a challenge, Hung passed the test with flying colors. He showed his result to his grandfather and told him that he had applied to Bangkok University. His grandfather was very reluctant to let Hung leave the family and the business, but he family agreed that Hung’s education was important. A year later, the new pupil entered Bangkok University.
(5) The professors at the university “adopted” Hung. They sent him to the dentist, bought him clothes and helped him understand the machines and technology around him. Hung had never used an elevator, operated a cell phone or gotten coffee from a machine in the school cafeteria. Hung felt quite uncomfortable at first, but with the help of his teachers and classmates, he soon felt right at home. Not only was Hung successful at making many new friends, but he also graduated number one in his class
(6) The teachers at Bangkok University urged Hung to continue his education, and helped him enroll in extra language classes so he could study abroad. One year after graduating in Thailand, Hung received a scholarship and enrolled in the graduate program in Mechanical Engineering at MIT in Massachusetts in the United States. This was definitely the furthest he had ever been from home. Three years later, when Hung was ready to graduate with his master’s degree, he thought about his futures. The first thing he was going to do, he said, was go back to his village and teach his grandfather how to use some more modern machines to help in the business. He was/also going to thank the librarian.