I loved writing before I enjoyed reading.

It took me two years and a few cases of having nobody to play with during recess and lunchtime that I was able to read pictureless novels. Before a group of boys welcomed me into their group, a pile of books was readily made next to me, waiting to keep me company for the next hour on a mint concrete floor inside the toilet stalls. Back then, I heavily relied on reading books that had images to consider the book a worthwhile read (and to have a general idea of how the novel was progressing). I guess it was because the ten year old me was still coming to grips with understanding English as I was still heavily reliant on communicating in Cantonese. This constant translating back and forth between two languages as I read a novel was taxing, moreover made it difficult for me to set up the scenes the author has crafted through text.