My love for fishing began when I was just 7 years old. Little did I know at the time, what once was a curiosity and a simple hobby would blossom into a passion that would play a dominant role in my life. My family attended a summer camp located in Western Massachusetts called Chinese Family Camp, or CFC. The camp was located on Center Pond in Becket, MA and we would go there for one week every August. Since I was only 7 years old and my younger brother Charles was 6 years old, we were one of the youngest kids at the camp. As a result, it was hard to make friends because most of the other kids were older. My dad had bought 2 fishing rods from Walmart on our drive to camp and since my brother and I did not enjoy regular activities like arts, card games, or sports, we had lots of free time. He taught both me and my brother the basics of using a fishing rod on a 15 feet by 15 feet floating dock near our cabins.
People would occasionally fish off the dock and throw food into the water and because of this, a school of around 40 bluegill fish would congregate near the dock and hungrily greet any piece of food that had been dropped in the water. Using small balls of bread or worms we had dug up from the ground, the bluegill were easy to catch and provided hours of fun. Beside us, we had a little green bucket filled with water that we would put the fish in for a couple minutes before releasing them. I’d sit there, watching them swim around the bucket, intrigued and amazed at how effortlessly their fins moved and how they seemed to glide through the water, as if they were flying. Day after day we would stand on that dock, catching an endless number of bluegills and would only leave if we needed to eat or sleep. Ultimately, it was on that very dock where my passion for fishing began.
