吾輩諸棣所生者，誠卓絕之時矣；襁經朝代之更，幼歷千禧之替，大哉易然莫易也。昔甲子年間，前途將定焉；滿城飄搖，羅保動議，中英未解，王霖有言：「當不變者，非虛謂其表也；況時移而狀易，獨其精神始如一。」噫，顧不如東坡赤壁之神悟耶？曰：「逝者如斯，而未嘗往也；盈虛者如彼，而卒莫消長也。蓋將自其變者而觀之，則天地曾不能以一瞬；自其不變者而觀之，則物與我皆無盡也。」念乎聖保羅男女為學九載，卒明斯理焉！故深銘小學校長君今之盛意，恭書此道彰於母校之二三也。時癸巳初春美利堅普林斯頓謹序。
靦腆孩子喜獲取錄
「下一位，盧安迪！」
十年前那個風雨飄搖的春天，在已經不復存在的聖保羅男女（麥當勞道）小學校舍裏，一個文弱書生戰戰兢兢地走進了鄔淑賢校長的辦公室進行插班生面試，我在聖保羅的奇妙旅程就此展開。不說不知，當年的我是一個含羞答答的孩子，面試時靦腆得很，以致鄔校長在事後還問爸爸媽媽我的廣東話是不是不太流利呢！不過，多虧校長和老師們的信任，我終於給聖保羅取錄了！
在一眾老師和同學的關愛下，我很快便適應了新環境，而且在聖保羅校園充滿朝氣和活力的氣氛中，我也變得愈來愈開朗。當時小學的人數不多，大家的關係都十分親近熟絡，就像一個融洽友愛的家庭。每到小息時間，操場上便會洋溢着同學們「玩捉」的歡聲笑語，我則喜歡到旁邊的乒乓球台跟朋友們切磋切磋，有時更會跟「棋王」校工豪叔大戰一局。另外，我還參加了奧數校隊、電腦興趣班、游泳校隊、還有製作 LEGO 機械人的 LEAD Project，過着充實、輕鬆又快樂的學習生活。
突破羞怯的oral presentation
我尤其印象深刻的，是小五英文堂上發生的一件事。話說每人都要到全班面前做一套電影的一分鐘口頭介紹──天啊，害羞的我最怕 oral presentation 了！只記得我拿着講稿走到課室前面，然後低着頭一股腦兒地讀啊讀，好不容易讀完了，終於鬆一口氣。正當我對成績不存厚望之際，豈料老師 Ms. Chau 居然宣布給我9/10分！她說：“Everything was excellent; the only point off was for your eye contact.” 正是這次鼓勵大大增加了我的自信和勇氣。此外，我還有幸在班際足球比賽擔任現場旁述，在90週年校慶 Extravaganza 扮演敲擊樂舞台劇中的老師兼指揮，還有在畢業禮擔當鋼琴伴奏和致辭。通過這些寶貴的鍛鍊機會，我終於突破了自己的羞怯和緊張。
告別色彩繽紛的「麥小」校園，踏進旁邊那座古老的紅磚樓，多了一層歷史的厚重感，教學語言亦由中文變成英文。
In the long history of our school, only a few generations of St. Paulians have been granted the privilege to witness its hour of maximum change. We are one of those special generations. It was in the year we entered the secondary school that the School Improvement Program (SIP) building rose into the sky. The two primary schools became one and embraced a new home in Wong Chuk Hang. The MacDonnell Road primary school campus was brought down and replaced by a brand new secondary school annex, and even the old red bricks will wear fresh smiles after the main building’s renewal. With the turbulent advent of the New Senior Secondary (NSS) curriculum, a lot of our classmates sailed across oceans to chase their dreams. At the same time, some of our juniors pioneered our school’s International Baccalaureate (IB) adventure. All these we not only watched, but lived.
Throughout my years at SPCC, I learned that true excellence and confidence are to be seen not in swagger or bluster, but in tolerance and humility. When I was in Form 1, I was an impetuous young man who would answer every single question in class and never cease to pour out my allegations. But thanks to my teachers’ guidance and my classmates’ support, I gradually internalized the virtue of modesty. I am also genuinely grateful to the anonymous College Council member who once remarked “Andy Loo is arrogant in his bones.” I will keep that criticism in my heart so that it can constantly ring a remindful bell. For tolerance and humility, I believe, are the noblest St. Paulian characters.
My SPCC career ended at the very place where it began as we moved into the new Li Chong Yuet Ming Building in the last year of my secondary school life. As I set foot on where used to be my primary school, sudden bursts of vivid memory haunted every corridor of the building. Everything has changed, and yet something is still the same. For the same spirits of faith, hope and love have always remained in the air of our campus throughout all the eventful years, and the goal of all the changes is precisely to keep these spirits alive and let them thrive in the ever-changing world.
On the mathematician Jacob Bernoulli’s gravestone was marked his Latin motto, “Eadem mutata resurgo.” It means, “I rise again, changed but the same.” I believe my alma mater truly lives this motto. Rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, SPCC has defended and reinvigorated the spirits of faith, hope and love in the midst of all the changes of the past century. These are the spirits that transformed timid kids into confident children; these are the spirits that transformed impetuous students into mature young people. These are the spirits that connect all generations of St. Paulians; these are the spirits that unite all St. Paulians surrounding the globe. These are the spirits that echo the ancient command of Isaiah, to “undo the heavy burdens and let the oppressed go free;” these are the spirits that illuminate what the Greek wrote so many years ago, to “tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.”
SPCC, it seems to me, needs not be glorified in this eulogy beyond what I have always felt it to be. It is a school that sees talent and tries to breed it, sees darkness and tries to light it, sees suffering and tries to heal it. Like so many forebears, and as I hope my children also will, I take great pride to look back upon my times in the red bricks and say as people said of Plato, “Joy was, in those days, but to live.”
本文2013年應聖保羅男女中學附屬小學校長邀請撰寫，刊於其家長教師會會訊。標題 We Change But Thou Art Still The Same 為校歌歌詞。現適逢聖保羅男女中學百週年校慶，特此轉載，以誌其盛。
（封面圖片：聖保羅男女中學校徽）
