91-year-old woman relishes learning in retirement

Every day, Du Jingxia will practice oral English and record useful sentences in a computer.

The 91-year-old senior began to study English in 1996 when she was 69 years old in Mudanjiang, Northeast China's Heilongjiang province.

"I felt regretful that I was too busy with the family to study English when I was young," she said. "After retirement, I had enough time to finish my dream."

She began to learn English from her daughter, who is an English teacher in a middle school.

In 2003, she signed up for the English course taught at Mudanjiang University for Seniors.

"In fact, it is difficult for some older people to learn an entirely new kind of knowledge because of poor memory," Du said. "I had to write the letters and words on the paper over and over again to remember them."

Du spends her spare time learning how to use a smartphone, and playing gateball and the keyboard, which makes her life really wonderful, she said.

"I am old, but my heart is still young," she told China Daily. "I picked up my English book in the late fall and opened the doors to a new world."