A Humble Beginning

Ramblings.

2008-07-30T22:06:00.000-07:00

I'm in Lasalle now, serving internet while waiting for a faculty talk at 2 pm. All the Pcs here are Macs. Gosh, I felt so noob, struggling to even find that small button that supposedly on the PC. Well, first of all, the reason for my consistently late posts is due to the lack of adequate computers. You see, my old buddy Dell, is almost as old as my journey in Singapore, not to mention that it was even bought second-hand to begin with. So now, the dear cursor part got mad and start to move and roll by itself without anyone controlling it. As you can imagine, it becomes hard for me to run a laptop with a cursor that has mind on its own. There, I think I deserve a new laptop. A Mac perhaps, or tablet PC. Wow, would that be cool.

Oh my, excuse my ramblings please. I'm so bored and trying to post something, anything. Bleahh...

Updates

2008-07-03T00:25:00.000-07:00

I'm so terribly sorry to have abandoned this new blog..again. Well, in fact, a lot has happened during these few weeks. These are my updates:

I've completed my short graphic design course at Roxy, earning a bona fide certificate with an excellent grade. Haha, seriously, having accomplished this makes me proud of myself because despite the poor learning condition, I've shown my determination by never missing any of their lessons!;p
I'm having private Mandarin tuition from Monday to Friday. Sounds tiring, but is actually very fun..
I permed my hair again!!! Although the cost of service had seriously robbed me out of my angpao money, it proved to be worth the splurge. I lurrvvve the result!!! Kudos to Cay cay team..(:
The party was a blast. The lilac dress I wore on that day remains the prettiest dress I've ever seen.. I was glad that some of my dear friends made it to the party; Tasya, Andre, Anita, Pepi, Flegon, Yessi, thank you all for coming!! I really enjoyed the night chatting (and taking pictures) with you guys. Love y'all..(: (:
My big family is currently staying at my house. That means extra gossip, extra happiness, extra fun. O yea..and extra tired...;p
I just got back from Lembang yesterday. My big family and I decided to have a short vacation there. So we rent this big house fit for 14 ppl plus tennis court in a place called Ciater Highland Resort. It was perfect for a get-together time like ours. Our two-days were spent riding horse to nearby tea plantation and villages, shopping, eating, chatting, playing badminton and basketball. What a lovely vacation!
Now back to Jakarta, exhausted and down with a flu...:(

That was it! For now, I'm packing up for this Sunday's plane to Singapore... Hope I can find a nice flat there..(:(:

Untitled

2008-06-11T04:35:00.000-07:00

Found this very nice quote,

“Everybody has difficult years, but a lot of times the difficult years end up being the greatest years of your whole entire life, if you survive them.”

__Brittany Murphy

I will get through this. I will definitely get through this. (: (:

The Funny Story Of My Tuition Centre

2008-06-04T03:32:00.000-07:00

Studying something related to art is definitely something new to me. The last time I took art as a subject was like..umm sec 2?? Haha.. So as you all know, my knowledge of art and its tools such as photoshop, corel, freehand, etc, were all Greek to me. Since I've decided to take comm design, it becomes a must to at least understand a few tools (other than just photoshop alone). So in the end, out of curiosity and willingness to learn, I decided to take a short course on graphic design.

Fully supporting my idea, my mom asked around to find out which tuition centres offer graphic design as one of their courses. To be frank, finding one near my house area is quite difficult since I practically live in the outskirts of Jakarta. In the end, she came up with a few names of tuition centres (of which all are located in the centre of Jakarta). But to my disappointment, all of them were asking for very, very high prices! (More than Rp 1 million?? Cheat my money!). It was then when I looked at the advertisement pages in Kompas. There was this "Professional Institute", located at Roxy, which offers exactly what I wanted. It was the cheapest of the pack, offering price half the others, with teaching time twice a week, three hours each! Without thinking much, I quickly signed up for the limited spaces. Pheww... Finally I was saved! (At least, that's what I thought...)

When I first arrived at that place, I had to say that it was nothing like I had in mind. It was small, half-dilapidated, and looked teribbly old. When I stepped in, the place looked gloomy and smelled like a very old and dusty sofa. The toilet was disgusting and the air-con was not even cold at all! I was then ushered to a room at the second floor which happened to be the classroom. It was as dimly lit as the so-called reception area downstairs, thanks to the old and broken window sills that were supposed to protect us from the heat of Jakarta city at noon. There were several pentium 3 desktop computers, accompanied with a chair each. And so I sat down quitely and tried to feel the air-con that apparently didn't work.

After a while, the teacher came to class. He looked like a typical "Guru SD", the one with moustache, batik shirt and long black trousers. Then came my other "classmates". They all looked like the ordinary "Mas mas Jakarta"; worn out Tshirt and jeans that looked as if it had been washed a month ago. Worse still, as I tried to listen to my teacher, I kept hearing the noise of trains that came from the railway just outside the institute. What a conducive place to study.

So I thought to myself, "Nevermind.. The place might be a disaster, but the teaching might be good." But to my amazement, my teacher apparently doesn't understand English at all! Just imagine, he kept pronouncing "paste" as "pas-te", "move" as "mop", "main" as "ma-in", "previous" as "prifiu", "smudge" as "smut" and many more.. He's got to be kidding me!! Masih jaman yah hari gene ga ngerti Inggris?? Huahaha...

Yeah, everything was different from what I expected, but I still show my commitment by coming for every lesson. The teacher, apparently, turns out to be a good teacher. He's kind, patient, and teaches really well. He develops my interest in graphic design even more and builds my confidence in this particular field. The place... Well, it's still the same as it was the moment I first stepped in, but hey, now I'm getting used to it.

Haha..:p

A Humble Beginning

2008-06-02T02:23:00.000-07:00

So this is it! The new blog, with a brand new name and a brand new address. Well, actually it feels kinda hard to leave my old blog behind and start a new one, but hey! As my title suggests, this is a humble, new beginning for me. If my life were written in a book, then this would be the beginning of a new chapter.

First of all, life has been nothing less but hard. With the most important exam laid in store for me last year, I had little time to socialize, let alone writing a blog. And so began a morph from the once sociable and carefree me into a mugger and distressed me. I gave up everything to achieve that one goal; my friends, families, and even myself. But apparently, this obsession had consumed me more than the way it should be.

I have experienced lots of failures in my life, simple ones, like failing tests, getting terrible grades for assignment, inability to do something.. But none of it has ever let me down.
But for this failure; it's hard. Damn hard. If you know me well enough, you may find that I'm actually a person with a high ego. Thanks to this particular experience, my ego had been crushed and shattered into pieces ever since. I was already insecure to begin with, and with this experience, I started losing my confidence even more.

As if those experience is not hard enough, I then face another rejections, and rejections. "The Secret" tells me to think positively. But really, when you are in my situation, it's gonna need gazillion more energy to think positive during this time, than when you are in a generally happy mood.

I had two choices at that moment; to pity myself and my life, or to continue being positive and looking at the brighter side of life.

I chose the second one.

Despite everything that has happened, I'm still thankful that God still give me a great family and friends to rely on. He doesn't let me fall too hard on this. I still get an acceptance letter from Lasalle, which is really, the one that I want to go to most. I am thankful that, even though I don't get any more scholarships, my family still have enough money to fund my education overseas. I am also thankful that, I finally realize what I want to do most in my life, instead of following prestige and other people's paths. Last but not least, I am thankful that, from this experience, I learn to be more mature and know myself much better than I ever did before.

If I hadn't experienced this failure, I would most probably go to NUS or NTU just for the sake of having the prestige and following what is considered to be the "safe" path to success. But I know that this isn't what I want. I could never be a scientist that dwells in labs all the time, nor could I be a banker who sits behind the desk and sees numbers and figures everyday for the rest of my life. That is just not me. One failure is enough for me to predict what's gonna happen if I persistently chose that path.

From this experience, I learn to be more mature. I learn to accept myself; the good and the bad, the pretty and the ugly side. Before this, I realize that I have been living a life imagining who I want myself to be instead of acknowledging who I really am. And so I proudly say that I do like the "Grace" that I am now. So what if I'm no good in science and maths? God has blessed my with other talents which I should thank of everyday. So really, all these are process of growing up and I'm grateful that God has allowed all these to change me.

The more I think about everything that has happened to me, the more I find His ways more apparent in my life. What if... this is what He wants me to do in my life? What if... by entering Lasalle, I could glorify Him more than I would ever do in other local universities? God only knows. But whatever His ways are, I must learn to trust His plan and rest everything unto His hands.

To quote Whitney (America's Next Topmodel cycle 10 winner),

"This isn't where I stop."

Although I've failed many times before, it doesn't matter as long as I keep on trying. This really isn't where I stop. This is just the beginning!

So why do I call my first entry, a humble beginning?
Well, this is the beginning of a new Grace with a brand new attitude towards life. There is no more "Grace the scholar", but more of "Grace, the foreigner who is studying design in Lasalle."

Haha. That's why I call it humble.