At the start of the school year, I had to tell everyone about my summer. My voice slid down my throat and wouldn’t come back up no matter how many times I coughed.

That speech only took 30 seconds. But this time, I had three weeks to research and write my speech. When I asked for advice at dinner on the last Friday, Dad said, “Well now, Kyna, a speech is like this table. The top is your topic. Your main points are the legs. If you don’t have enough it’ll just fall over.”

He was no help to me. All I was doing to write this speech was staring at the computer screen. When Mom came to my bedroom that night, she asked, “When is this speech due?”

“Monday. I hate speaking in front of people,” I said.

“There’s nothing to fear here,” she said. “Know what I did when I had to give my first speech? I drew pictures. I showed them what I could do well and talked about it. I got a round of applause (掌声).”

Mom drew so well that you believed it could be real. I have a picture on my wall to prove it-a street leading out of my room up to a castle on a hill that has me traveling there in my dreams almost every night. That night when I went in through the keep (堡垒) of the castle and entered the kitchen, I was blinded by a flash of bright light- Penelope, the princess I imagined living there held up an old-fashioned camera.

When I woke up in the morning, I had a plan for how to prepare for my speech. That Sunday, I practiced the speech until my voice went hoarse(嘶哑的).

On Monday, Mom and Dad drove me to school, and I wore my favorite sunglasses, made out of the lenses (镜片) of two old cameras.

Behind a camera is where I felt the most comfortable, especially with Mom and Dad right there with me, sitting in the back of the classroom with a few grandparents who came to hear the speeches.

When I stood up in front, the whole class looked like they would if I put them on the other side of my camera.

Dad clapped his hands together loud and clear.

Soaring high as the biggest dark horse in the last two months, the school bullying-themed film Better Days raked in nearly 700 million yuan ($99 million) as of Tuesday since its release on Oct 25, which also made school bullying a hot issue again.

There have been frequent media reports on school bullying in recent years. In late April, a video went viral showing a schoolgirl being slapped more than 30 times by a group of older girls. Last year, a boy in a junior high school jumped from the fourth floor of a teaching building in a suicide attempt as he just “just could not tolerate a life being bullied every day any longer.” according to China Central Television.

China’s education authorities have launched a campaign to curb school bullying nationwide, focusing on legal and mental education for students. Schools are asked to improve measures for preventing and handling bulling and establish an emergency plan for serious incidents. Police and judicial staff will be invited to schools.