Graduation

finally, i wore the square hat, and the robe, which defined me having gone through successfully the stage of a university life as a student. i passed the exams, not too well, but in my case, probably not bad. today, was the graduation ceremony.

Follow up:

the students were split into 2. the full time students, whose main priority were to study, only. and the part time students, in which i am one of them, whose main priority would be work, and perhaps family. study was important to us, but definitely not the first of all priorities. nevertheless, i guess, we all work hard, especially for us part time students.

and as normal of part time students, failure rates were significantly higher than full time students. half my clique did not manage to wear the square hat with us. i hope, they would be able to wear it next year.

and as we were sitting there, listening to the speeches given by the important people, my friend noticed one thing. the full time students, which were separated from us, were listening quietly to the speeches. the part time students, on the other hand, were all busy pressing their phones or calling.

'the file is under the table. inside the drawer!'

the lady beside me was busy texting on her phone for a period of time as if her life depended on it.

my friend went 'so the unit xxx at the place xxx is selling for $xxx is it?' and 'what is the unit number of the flat?' immediately right after we ended. in that short period of time she had 8 missed calls. and she was busy entertaining the buyers and sellers and other agents for the next half an hour. in case you want to know, my friend is a property agent.

i guess, if i looked further, i can be sure that there are more part time students busy handling their work in this graduation ceremony. probably, to the full time students, we are strange. i have no idea. but to us, this is work, and this happened in classes all the time. a guy suddenly stood up and walked out of class, a phone in his hand. a lady answering a call from her boss in the middle of class, even though our classes started from 1900h and ended at 2200h. my director used to work from 0700h all the way till 2000h, nearly everyday.

people in full time class sometimes get chased out of class if they came in a bit late. but for us, to expect all students to be early is like asking the examiner if he or she could give us the questions 3 days before the exams.

and as we were talking about our school, we went around the school looking for places where we got most of our memories. she suggested the canteen, where sometimes, if by some miracle we reached early, we would eat together. if not we would eat at 2300h or probably, skip straight to tomorrow's lunch. i think, most of us, don't eat breakfast. or rather, our breakfast is a cup of coffee, or for me, tea or plain water.

we ended up in the classroom, because i suggested it and it was agreed that was the place where we got most of our memories. even though we just picked a random classroom, since our classrooms changed all the time, i think, the significance was there.

she started to talk about old times, how we met and stuffs. we talked about how it is a pity that only 2 of us, which is half of our clique of 4, turned out for the graduation.

the food. it was okok to me, but apparently she felt it was nice. 'worth the $16 per guest ticket that we paid for!' seriously, i think, with that kind of food, charging $16 for one adult ticket is too much, but i guess, the school is a profit driven organization.

each of us were only allowed to bring in 2 people as guests, due to the limited space, which i could understand. and i thought the guest tickets were supposed to be free. but nothing is free in this world. oh wells, i guess, $16 could be earned back anytime. yeapx.

it could be more fun if there were more people who turned up. but i think, in the end, it was just me and her, and her husband which occasionally joined in.

and we bent the square hats when we threw it up, and failed to catch it. she bent it worse than me, and she went on and said, 'since it is bent, throw it up till all 4 corners are bent!'

3 years. throughout it, everyone was complaining. the bosses suck, the work was horrible, the schoolwork was tough. 'ahhh i have to waste away my leave for the exams!' 'tomorrow is the exams and today i have to work!'

and when exams ended, people celebrated it by going out to play or to tour. we celebrated it by reporting to our bosses the next day. it doesn't really matter, seriously. exams, in our eyes, they don't mean too much. failing it, of course would mean disappointment. but it did not really put us down too much. passing it, would make us happy. but it would not mean we would be very happy.

3 years, but when it is over, i think, it is kind of worth it. i did not mean that i learnt something academically. i returned to the lecturer everything he or she taught me. black scholes model, marx theory, markov process, first order differential equations, information systems, porter's five forces, profit/loss and balance sheet ... etc, i forgot all of them. every, single thing. probably except for lagrange multiplier, because of some reason i am forced to revise them, again. what a pain.

i made good friends, i managed to cope with more things in life, without really complaining. oh well we grumble and complain, but we don't really think we had it hard. there are people out there much better than us. you think working and studying is very tough and you think that if you do it you are very great? look at her, she had to add in her romantic relationship as well. you think this is hard to balance 3 things at one go? look at the other! she had to take care of her family on top of all 3! and there are more, and more. it made me realized, that as humans we can be proud of our achievements, but we really cannot think we are really very good. someone out there, despite their appearances and behavior, had it much harder than us, yet, did it much better.

overall, i am glad that i have gone through it. and even though they won't see it, i wish the other half of my clique, all the best in the coming exams, so that you two can wear the square hat, and the robe next year, if you decided to go. but as of part-timers, most of us, don't really bother to go. i nearly, did not go as well. i nearly backed out at the very last minute if not for the fact that i had promised the only friend who graduated with me that we would take a lot of pictures together, as well as the fact that her husband's ticket was with me, since i bought it for her. 2 tickets were too much for me. i had 1 to spare. but i am glad i did manage to drag myself out of my house wearing that troublesome formal wear in the end. haha.

graduation, can be fun, even when there is only 1 friend who made it with you. both of us, did not bring along any friends. i guess part of the reason is the limitation of spaces, and part of the reason, well, people are busy. she brought her family which left soon after, and i did not bring along anyone with me on my side.

ceremonies, or those so-called important days, they are just another event or another normal day if you are alone. but they can be quite special, if the right people do turn up.

just that, i had really hoped she would turn up. but i guess, where humans are concerned, you can never know what is going to happen. because, humans are not like computer programs - easily controlled and completely predictable.