Good Sai, Bad Sai…
Let’s talk about the bad side 1st.
Had a bout of allergic reaction at 11pm, prompting me to sneeze non-stop throughout the night I tried to prepare for the presentation.
Morning, I started out REAL early to prepare for the worst. 9am presentation, I reached school at 7:40am.
After tagging my notes, I went to print out the edited powerpoint slides for my examiner, only to realize I lost my cashcard again last night while doing the same printing.
How I wished I knew more friends in school so that at least someone will happen to be at the right place at the right time when I was in trouble.
No lah. No such thing for me. I called and called (no gg, I didn’t call you, cos I am sure you won’t even be awake this early…) but ‘water is too far away to fight my fire’. Ironic, cos it started raining until I couldn’t see the Clementi Road from engin bridge.
I went to co-op… Co..? Oops! They don’t open at 8am. I went to the library; argh! My matric card was at the AVA office for booking the tutorial room. Had to waste time waiting for the lady to type my matric number manually.
Then… ya… photostating room in CL not opened yet too.
Went back to Comp Centre, and decided to ask an ang moh lady to borrow a cashcard. She was a kind soul. THANKS! I actually got help, not from a friend, not from a local, not from an asian, but someone who most prob came from halfway across the globe!!
Printed my stuff, went to set up. Oh… I didn’t have the system password. Turned out I was not supposed to use the PCs in the rooms. Gotta hook up to my lappy (which thankfully I brought). And I spent the next 5 minutes figuring out how to turn on the projector.
By the time my examiner came, I had no time to fix the problem where my lappy screen was blank.
Whatever.
Suffered some criticisms, which made me feel depressed, not cos they were meant to hurt me, but cos they were meant to correct me.
I am such a goner, I suppose.
If classrooms are the places where we can train our skills for the outside world, then perhaps I am done for.
Some quotes from my profs:
“You always say it never occurs to you, how far in life can you go when nothing ever occurs to you?”
“All engineers know that units are of the most importance.”
“You beat around the bush to describe something that can be said in 2 sentences.”
And of cos, he wanted me to half the size of my report by final submission.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
The words really made me felt weepy on the spot. But I think I was half-trained to maintain my ‘composure’. Half-trained, cos I would still show signs of unhappiness initially, but 5 seconds later, I would resume my high-pitched voice.
Crying on the spot won’t help lah…
After wandering about the school for some time, to return keys, to take IC photos, I returned to my room. The words they said were still swarming over me.
I am bad, I know. I didn’t make full use of the training in classes.
A hearty sleep later, I began to look on the bright sai of things.
ya… Perhaps what I’m not suited to be is an engineer engineer (saying this, cos I most prob can still be financial engineer or procurement engineer).
Yes, it didn’t occur to me to show the units alongside the figures, but I realize that I show clearly the currency of the amount of money I write anywhere in forms. It was natural of me to include the 2 decimals so that the amount of money written was final and fraud is minimal.
It is not that nothing ever occurred to me.
It was just that I wasn’t really as specialized as I should be in the field of engineering to really know that certain stuff is obviously needed to be included.
But I excel in other ways.
Looking at the engineering people around me, I think what I don’t have that they have, it would be the same the other way round.
The knowledge to shut up at the appropriate time. It will never occur to most engineering people that they hafta shut up sometimes!! (cos most prob they didn’t realize they were talking too much)
Yes, I will never go far in life if I go down the road of being an engineer engineer. But I can’t be absolute about going down the road outside of the engineering field.
Before the sleep, I was really reproachful for rejecting CSM. Now, I am glad I did.
Instead of proving myself, I may end up disproving myself being an engineer there! I can just ruin my reputation in one year. 80% chance.
Outside, I will have an 80% chance that I can build up my reputation as a good worker.
I can’t believe I am that bad.
I can’t.
