Name: Chiu Yee Priscilla Tsang

Who is Chiu Yee Priscilla Tsang? Which part of the name exactly is my first/middle/last name? A lot of people have been confused by the name and so mix the whole name up such as swapping part of the first name with the last name, etc. So, here is the clarification: "Tsang" is my last name, "Chiu Yee Priscilla" all together is my first name. "Chiu Yee" is translated from Cantonese, and "Priscilla" was added when I was in elementary school because the school required students to have an English name. So, no, "Priscilla" or "Yee Priscilla" are not my middle name. This seems to be a little bit lengthy just to explain my name, but I really think it is worth it just to reduce the number of mistakes people make about my name.

Hometown: Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR)

I am an international student from Hong Kong, arriving here in 2004 as a freshman in college. My first language is Cantonese, a dialect of Chinese. As you may wonder, is Hong Kong itself a country? I am not going to bring up historical and political issues here - but no, Hong Kong is part of China - it is however an SAR and is not directly under the rule of the Central Government in the mainland China. It is a wonderful and cosmopolitan city with a size of a little dot in the world map. No sales tax, no tips (in most restaurants), bilingual (Chinese and English), and now with the partially opened (as by year 2006), the world's smallest Disneyland.

Institution: Carnegie Mellon University, School of Computer Science (May 2007)

I am an undergraduate student in CMU, majoring in computer science with a minor in music technology. I have been interested in computers since our family got our first computer when I was in elementary school. But I have not learnt programming until I was in high school, St. Francis' Canossian College, Hong Kong. The first programming language I learnt was amazingly, Logo. It is a high level functional language, where there is a turtle with a pen that will receive instructions to move and thus draw on the screen. Then I got the basic concepts of programming when I started to learn Pascal.

Although there was no computer science courses in my previous high school, Li Po Chun United World College, I still chose CS as my major and I am really glad that I have made a rarely wise decision. I have enjoyed my life in CMU with its excellent CS program, and I am expecting to concentrate on computer graphics in the future.

Diversity: Music

I have enjoyed playing and listening to music since I was little. And similar to many other people, I started my musical life with piano when I was 5. Then under my mother's influence, I started to learn a Chinese instrument called yangqin in 1995 and get into Chinese music culture. Throughout the past years, I have also tried learning many other instruments, such as violin, erhu, percussion, etc. I have also been actively participating in several Chinese orchestras in Hong Kong since 1997, such as the Hong Kong Youth Chinese Orchestra (HKYCO), which has made one of my most enjoyable days.

After coming to the States, although I brought my yangqin with me, I have never thought about having a chance to perform in the public. But luckily and to my surprise, I found that a Chinese orchestra actually existed in Pittsburgh! Since then, I have joined the New Moon Orchestra and have a chance of performing in the public.