the grass is greener where you water it

I really wish time would suspend just for me right now. Currently living in a state of blissful limbo, spending most of my waking hours watching whatever show I'm into at the moment, doing nothing much except for a few tasks here and there, etc. Zero responsibilities, maximum freedom. 

I know I sound disgusting as shit and my dad is going to give me hell if he ever reads this. An idle mind/idle hands are the devil's workshop, etc. 

I guess I'm taking a gap year (again), and I can't decide if it's voluntary or involuntary. I think it's leaning towards involuntary. I got rejected by all the local universities, yet I didn't apply for a private degree because I can't justify paying more for a degree that's worth considerably less. And if I'm honest with myself, even if I apply to the local universities again next year, I can't say my chances are great. 

What lies ahead of me after I come back here on the 20th terrifies me. I see everyone headed along the well-trodden path, the one that everyone is expected to and expects to follow. Everything is going according to plan for them. And here I am, going to embark on a route that I never expected to walk. Perhaps I was too naive and foolish to think that life would go smoothly.

Never did I expect that I would have to enter the working world with simply a diploma. I've been conditioned to think that I will not amount to anything without a degree and now, I'm getting frustrated and perplexed at the situation I am in. 

Obviously, I'll have to find a full-time job when I'm back. And I am apprehensive towards the thought of it. 

Right now I feel like a full-time job is going to suck away all of my freedom. As childish, simple-minded, and asinine as it is, I wonder if having a full-time job means not being able to watch my shows? OK I'm fully aware that I sound like an addict. If you choose this moment to brush me off as someone frivolous, I understand.

I do think that the only reason why I'm so reluctant to work is because most of my peers are heading off to university and it's a case of how the grass is greener on the other side. 

To me, being a student is now a privilege that I cannot have, as much as I desire it. As a student, your time is yours and yours alone. There may be numerous projects, quizzes, exams, and assignments, but it is entirely up to you to decide how you want to deal with them. You can choose to prepare for them early and thoroughly and ace them, or you can choose to leave them to the last minute and fail them. You can even choose to do something you like in between assignments. If you don't feel like you could stand going to classes on a certain day,  you could choose to cut class - especially if you planned your absenteeism rate well. Not only that, you get to look forward to term/semester breaks. 

And that's what's bugging me.

As a student, with breaks and such, you see an end in sight. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. Once you clear this date, you get a month or so to let your brain die, if you choose to let it. You look forward to graduation, the end that signifies the end of all ends.

The other day, I went to the hair salon for a hair cut. The lady who was helping me with my hair asked if I was studying or working, and she went on to say how studying was so much better. “做工是永逺的” Working is forever. 

Once you work it's never going to stop. You can look forward to quitting jobs, but in the end you will always have to hold a job, plainly for survival. Unless a person has a guaranteed chance of being a billionaire, it's fair enough to say everyone is going to work for the rest of their lives. 

I've always read, "Find a job that you love and you will never work a day in your life." I used to think this ideal was achievable. I used to aspire towards this phrase. As of now, I don't think so. For one, I'm not 100% sure what I want to do with my life. And secondly, finding and getting a job that I love doesn't seem easy. Especially since finding a job in itself is already a challenge in this economy.

After the 20th, once I find myself a job, I don't know when I'll ever return to further my education. And that scares the shit out of me. 

I used to scoff at the notion of conforming to society. I used to bristle in anger at the thought of conforming to what society expected me to do. Get a degree, get a stable 9-5 job, and work through the rest of your life. I was so vehement on taking a gap year, or going overseas to study, or simply doing what I wanted. 

Now that this gap year has been forcibly dropped into my hands, I'm not so sure I want it anymore. 

At 18 when I was convinced I couldn't get into a polytechnic, I wanted to stop studying to become a NAIL TECHNICIAN. I was fucking fearless. I questioned everyone. My parents, my friends, and myself. Why the hell did anyone need further education to be successful? I could make my own success for sure. Especially if success equaled happiness. I could be content even if I didn't have a job that granted me affluence. So what if society would think less of me, or judge me because I took an unconventional route? 

I don't think that way anymore.

Perhaps growing older has forced my thinking to change. Or perhaps growing older has made me more fearful for the rest of my life. 

Looking back, I would call 18 year old me stupid and foolish. And I don't know if that's sad. My ideals now and then seem to be completely parallel to each other. Once, where I would have been indignant at the circumstances, I now subject myself to it. Correction. I am begging to be subjected to it.

At 21 years old, I've finally been granted what I wanted so badly at 18 and now that I have it I've become too scared to take a risk. I wonder what my 18 year old self would think, if she could see me now. 

TLDR; I'm scared out of my wits of all the uncertainties that becoming a working adult is going to bring. I'm scared because I'm doing something that I completely did not expect. I'm scared of losing my freedom, something that I cherish and value entirely. I'm scared of how I've become so worried about what society thinks of me. 

I don't ever want to be as jaded and bitter like how my dad is now, but seeing as how I've lost that plucky 18 year old me along the way while growing old, I don't know what future me is going to be like. And I don't know if 21 year old me would like future me.

I digressed all over the bloody place but I needed this. I don't think I feel better in any way but it just feels good to word everything I've been feeling. It's just that this feeling of impending doom has been cloaked over my mind like an uncomfortable sheet of dust ever since I got my final rejection letter and I don't think I've ever managed to voice it out completely to a person and have that same person fully empathize with me. 

Everything still seems like a mess though. I mean, I'm reading through this pile of words and I don't fully get the point of what I was trying to say when I first started typing. The title doesn't even link to anything I've written. I think it's time to sleep.

happy graduation

Had my graduation ceremony on the 29th May! It was pretty boring and my fats were threatening to spill out of my dress most of the time. Can't say that I felt a lot of excitement graduating, especially since I got rejected by all three local universities. It was just a nice opportunity to see my friends for one last time in NYP. I didn't upload all of the pictures, so a lot of people are missing. It's not that they're less important, it's just that I'm too much of a lazy shit hahahaha. So out of convenience, I just uploaded the group pictures.

It feels so surreal that three years have passed just like that. After withdrawing from SP I never imagined I would end up at NYP. I didn't even consider applying to NYP even though I got rejected by all the courses I applied for (rejection seems to be a strong recurring theme in my life). I was just so against NYP because I thought it wasn't a very good polytechnic. It was only till the very last moment that my mom made me write an appeal letter to NYP and I got accepted two weeks before school started.

I met a whole bunch of great people in NYP and I'm so glad to have them as my friends. I think I did a lot of growing up in NYP. Although school work mostly seemed like a chore and project work was the absolute worst, in some ways, all of the time and labour I put into them made me a  better person. Also, I wouldn't say ALL the lecturers in NYP are great, because some are pretty shit ass terrible and useless. However, there are a few whom I truly respect and admire and will always be thankful to them for their help and guidance.

NYP presented a lot of great opportunities too, the most significant one being starting up the webstore. When I left SP, it was simply a casual thought to start up a webstore. I wanted to do it, but never got the push. Finally, in the last year, it was a project for a retail module and it gave me all the push I needed. A bit too late considering the market is so saturated, but it's better late than never right? 

There was such a vast difference coming from SP into NYP. I was a lot happier even though studying business was never in my life plan. I got along well with my classmates, more so than with the people in SP. In SP I was clueless, and felt pretty useless when it came to project work. In NYP, I knew my shit (most of the time), and NYP showed me what I was capable of. 

Sitting in the auditorium that day, it was like being in a safe haven within a bubble that was about to burst. In those few hours of being in school and among my friends, my current problems and worries were distant. Being with people whom I cherished made me feel happy. For those few precious hours, I felt calm inside. 

Everything will be different now. No longer will I be able to sing in empty tutorial rooms or gossip about all sorts of people with my classmates. No longer will I sit outside the lecture theatres playing whatever latest card game with my friends and chattering so loudly that the lecturers had to come out of the theatres to shush us. 

I never thought I'd miss everything with this much longing, but I do. 

Thank you for everything NYP. Despite all my complaints about your flaws, you did give me an awesome three years and a bunch of people I will never forget.