Traveling

Yesterday while on the bus to BTP, I met a guy at the Singapore customs. "Excuse me", said he, and pointing to a Singapore map in a small book, he asked whether he was waiting in the correct bus lane to go to Queen street. "Yes, correct, you take this bus all the way, and you will be at Queen street."

"Are you Japanese?" I asked, as I noticed that his book has some Japanese on it. The book is what I will call a map-book. It is roughly A5 size, easy to fit in any bag, and on its pages are rectangle cut outs of maps, something like what my dad uses to find his way around Singapore, a primitive, hard-copy GPS (my dad's map-book is way larger in size though)

"Yea, yea, I'm Japanese" he said, and in a rather broken English, told me that he's here in Singapore to tour, and he'll be in Singapore for two days. Then he'll go to Malaysia, and visit the Penang island.

"You have to go to the beaches!" I said, knowing islands sure have beaches, but partly because I can't remember what other tourist attractions does PP have xD

And he went on to tell me that he'll be touring South-east Asia for one whole month. And that's not all. After South-east Asia, he will tour Europe for another month. Alone. Orz. And he's just 22 years old.

He's so young, and he's doing exactly what I want to do: travel. Which made me think, I'm still young too, and I still have a lot of time left. My dream of going overseas may not be realised so soon, but it is certainly not dashed. I can, and I will tour the world another day.

An update of my life:

我到了我人生中一转定终生的十字路口。
- NTU Chem engineering with ASEAN scholarship?
- SUTD with ASEAN scholarship?

NUS has not given their reply.
Because of financial woes, I am not going to Imperial College London for its Chem Engineering course, unless I receive a scholarship. 我可不想为了一张文凭、几年的狂欢，而欠上一大屁股债。

I do want to try out SUTD, but if they do not deliver what they promise, I'll be really let down. Then again, the government will not allow SUTD to fail.

In SUTD, I believe, you have to create your own university life. It has a tiny campus. It does not have the crowd. You have to create your own CCA. This translates to either a boring uni life if you do not have any initiative at all, or a very exciting one if you are enthusiastic. Then again, it also depends on the people around you, your peers. I believe that those who choose SUTD are like-minded people who really wish to try out new things, and who are passionate about creating something different. Face it, SUTD is pretty unorthodox.

If my concern about SUTD is about the uncertainty regarding the teaching staff quality, I shall put on my 啊Q cap, and realise that SUTD has really good staff, which I probably would not get in Malaysia. And of course, the staff will be trying their best too. Effective learning relies on the effort made by both parties- teachers and students.

If my concern about SUTD is about the people around me, I hope to eventually realise that they are all similar people who are trying to challenge themselves, to put themselves into foreign land and see how much they can learn from it. Those who have subscribed to SUTD will not let themselves fail.

If my concern about SUTD is about the probable lack of depth in engineering knowledge, I shall compensate that with knowledge I gain from independent studies and reading. I know I can do it. This is a very brave claim, but whatever.

If my concern about SUTD is the small campus and the lack of facilities compared to other universities, well, size is not everything, and hopefully they provide quality over quantity.

If my concern about SUTD is the fact that I may not be used to the curriculum, well, it is invalid. Adaptibility, if not already inherent, is best aquired for your own good.

If my concern about SUTD is the lack of reputation and the uncertainty whether its degree can get me what I want, well, it may not be as easy as the traditional paths, but I believe it will eventually work out.

OK i need to stop thinking. My dandruff is coming back.