future is so near

Here's something i got from a theoretical senior of mine. It really makes me rethink my intention, my purpose, of wanting a scholarship to go overseas. I know i want to go overseas, to broaden my life experience and to develop my intellectual and spiritual character in a more stimulating milieu. I dread to stay here, a land where a shallow and brainless letter of HM can be published in the national newspaper. I know eventually I might still stay here, coz my chance of going abroad (with a scholarship) is very very slim. Sure the people here are nice. Friends are good. I am familiar with the cultures and the practises. It is safe. It is closer to home. But I feel an instinctive need in me to immerse myself in a different environment ( exposing myself to a different selection pressure?), one that would really stretch my intellectual thinking, one that would really make me mature cognitively and spiritually. I want to go beyond. I want to reach a different quantum level. I want a rebel. A rebel against my old self.

On taking scholarship, after reading his predicament, I would really have to think twice, and think hard, about getting a local (S'pore) scholarship. I totally empathise with him. The type of chagrin you feel, when you are deemed or seen as a person who gives up his citizenship, and takes up another, just to get the money to study. The kind of reluctance, and the tinge of guilt, to give up your identity, in exchange for a guaranteed bright future? It really boils down to my own values, my beliefs. Some people are very relax about citizenship, and some are very serious about it. For me, it is the sense of root that matters. Would I feel as though I am a man who loses his root? Would I feel a sense of satisfaction, fulfillment, to live in this society? Should I guard my past,my identity,my root valiantly, or should I embrace the future with an open arm and an open heart? And very importantly, would I be happy to work for a company for 6 years and more? Would I enjoy my work or would I merely see it as debt-paying? I want to have a work that I love and enjoy. How is that possible with being bonded to a company? Hmm that depends on how I view the scholarship and the bond. If I view it as an opportunity for me to have an exciting work experience, then I would be a happy man. If I view it as a route for me to go overseas, and as a "bond" that shackles me to working in the company for my youth, then I am sure I would not be as happy as I would wish to be. Job satisfaction is clearly a big part of a happy life. It would surely be nice If i have a clear notion and what do I wanna do in the future. But as usual, I have no idea. Not the slightest idea. My friend, 10 years later when you see me, don't be surprised if i have become a philosopher/psychologist/doctor/accountant/ politician/researcher... To accept a scholarship from a company, I really do need to find a reason, a purpose, a strong belief, in joining the company. Thus, the most ideal scholarship for me would be a bond-free one, as I do not like to be tied down, to be part of a system, a plan.

For now, I juz have to focus on my SATII. Cannot afford to blow it up like my prelim. If it is screwed up, it is really GG liao. as gnoy said: "GG, no RM" (which stands for "Good Game, no ReMake", a term used in DotA)




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Empty!

I left USA, full of nothingness. And yet I'm not as cool as that Xu Zhimo who left Cambridge saying 我挥一挥衣袖 不带走一片云彩 that's so different! That's saying that he is content leaving without even a wisp of cloud - but I'm leaving with no sign of contentness, no sign of being able to bring anything fruitfull back - all that's left is the same luggage and my trombone that counts for nothing, that went to US with me 5 years ago and came back the same.

Why can't this transition be like the transition from Chen Moh to CHS, full of anticipation of all things great in music? Or from CHS to HCJC, full of adventure away from home at last? Or from HCJC to CMU, finally a chance to be a global citizen and conquer the world? Or from CMU to Stanford, full of hopes for better food and weather? Or like the transistion from Stanford to Amazon, full of anticipation of a great working environment with smart people that you're supposed to make history with?

Why is this transition so empty? With nothing, almost nothing to look forward to?

For the whole morning, the only explanation I can come up with lies in the fact that I'm walking the path towards getting a Singapore citizenship. From the point I chose to return, I have chose to continue the relationship with a company that I promised my youth to 5 year ago, of which part of the relationship requires me to relinquish something that I've only treasured more and more as time past, an identity that I've fought to forge more and more as I move out globally.

Do you know how many weird faces I have to go through when I said I come from Malaysia and yet I have to work for a Singaporean company for 6 years? Do you know how many shock faces I have to elaborate to when I said a study scholarship has consequences of giving up one's citizenship? Do you know how many angry faces I need to appease when they heard the story or read the contract?

Can this simple matter drain me like a dementors? It's hardly believable when I think of it in ths past. Now I can't think so I can't verify this thought again. Maybe it's too late to think now. But then it's going to be very sad if I were to take up something that I have no passion, derive no happiness, see no reason. I'm very much the same emotional being that I was since 3 years old. I cry, I get agitated, I beat people up. And it's as if I'm doing that to myself.

Perhaps it's this irrationality that has beaten me into pieces. I create systems, in fact I'm master of creating systems that works. But I also know how it feels to be part of a system. It's a hopeless wander with rules to follow. It's a manisfestation of beauty at the expense of freedom to be irrational. Everything is a pair of cause and effect, reason and consequence. Every vector is a story that has a beginning and an ending; every state is a logical moment of the big picture. Now that I've written this down, I wish that some wind can just blow this whole thing away.

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