Goodbye university, Goodbye friends!
"Please stop writing. The time is up. Please remain in your seats until your examination answer booklets are collected and you are allowed to leave hall" announced the Chief Invigilator. A great feeling of relief filled my heart......The submission of this answer booklet marked the FINAL examination that I would be sitting for in university, signifying the completion of my four years of studies! (Hooray! No more exams for now )
Phew....fours years of exciting classes and lectures ( though some were not so all the time), challenging assignments, scary pop quizzes, stressful midterms and 3 final exams in an academic year, pleasant meal times and chit chats with friends and classmates, church services and young adult Bible studies.....over, just like that!
Right after the exam, it did not feel so bad because my wonderful friends had plans for the following few days to chill out at a cafe, enjoy food together and so on....just like what we always did after each finals before I returned home for holidays (my friends here are mostly locals). We snapped many pictures together, spent several hours together chit chatting, recollecting our experiences together. The particular cafe we went to was a really nice place to just relax and chit chat, with the dim light setting and comfortable sofa. We shared with each other our plans for the future, where we plan to work etc. The 2 angels and I had fun posing for photographs underneath the big round lamp that looked like a moon. We took turns to direct each other to position each other to make it look like we were holding the moon in the photograph..We got close to perfect shot:)
We also had a memorable time with our German exchange classmate/ assignment groupmate..Drank "Baba Nyonya Cendol", ate "Satay Celup' till we were stuffed and went to Jonker Walk....She'll be returning to her home country...wonder if we'll ever meet again.
When the time to say goodbye finally arrived, this time each of us knew things would not be the same again. In the past, when we said "Good bye!," it would be accompanied by "See you next trimester!" This time, it was , "All the best! Take care and keep in touch!".
Let me tell you about the angels ( we call our selves the 3 Angels, by the way - "Syiok Sendiri" angel, "Uncalculated Risk Taker" angel, and "Religious" angel (this is me).
We always lose our sense of direction, as she sometimes forgets where she parked her car...he he..Cute:P Guesse who?-(Uncalculated Risk Taker)..My my...what would we do without her? She's our official transport provider for outings and assigments (really appreciate it, my friend:)
.....and there's this other angel, loving to be lavished with praises and complements and wants positive comments..he he:P (needless to say, "Shiok Sendiri")...Our official trimester planner for the best combination of lecture and tutorial sections for our subjects ( I will never forget the day we were returning from KL by bus after interviewing the National Union of Hotels, Bars and Restaurants Union Leader for our Industrial Relations assignment - when we were on the bus heading back to Malacca, so worn out after out adventurous trip, the was "Syiok Sendiri" angel, keeping herself busy even in the dark, trying to get the best combination for lecture and tutorial sections, trying to make Friday an off day, as we had to do our course registration the next day.
And at last but not least, me.."Religious" angel - While i was sipping my delicious Red Plum Sorbet and savoring my chicken shop at the cafe (during our final class gathering), the 2 other angels ganged up against me and asked me to guess the probable only guy that could attract me to adore him (pardon me if these are not the exact words used). I couldn't really guesse.. I asked if i knew him and if he was a university student...They said no sleeping that night without answering and gave me some clues..."Everybody knows him. He is very famous."...I still didn't get it:(...Then they said, "They recently made a very controversial movie about him"....Then it struck me..."Jesus Christ?" i asked with a sheepish smile...And that was the answer:P..I'll take it as a complement :)...Religious angel- they don't call me that for nothing, he he:P
My closest guy friend & brother in university ( a very nice and caring guy with a charming personality, coupled with good looks and popularity as well:) ) has also given me several unforgettable pleaseant memories...like supper together on New Year's eve in a stall ( when it started drizzling and we had to rush our food from the open air area into the sheltered part of the shop)...chit chatting, sharing experiences and dreams..Saw the first shooting star in my life, by the sea, under the moonlight ( while admiring the lights adorning the cruise ships, and being timid enough to be bothered by the black thing floating on the sea... he he:P) (I hope he's keeping that drwaing... And there were many cute little puppies on the road which lead to the place where I saw the shooting star..He volunteered to stop so I could touch them, but I declined because i feared the 'mummy' of those puppies may think i'm treading their territory and threatening their safety. Now, whenever I see puppies I think of him:)... He gave me several nick names which i actually use..And discovered that my hand shivered) We made it a point to meet up at least once in a trimester to keep in touch...and I share a lot about my life to him. I made it a point to give him my handmade birthday cards for his birthday since I got to know him...I always remember his birthday, but my beloved brother has such a 'wonderful' memory that he tends to remember my birthday many months later, and gives me a belated wish out of the blue!:P....But it's alright:) I love my brother just the same.
There's also this Christian close friend to whom i share alot about life and relationships with..She finds it really interesting and that has inspired me to write a book about my life and relationships...He he:) Just kidding! ...We were classamates and groupmates for various subjects until we both choose different majorings. We went to church and bible study together throughout our 4 years here...People everywhere always mistook us for twins as they say we look really alike and find it really hard to differentiate us - we are of the same race, both thin and small sized, similar smile (they say)..Practically, we admit that the words to describe us is the same, but we feel that we don't really look alike.
I will also miss the dinners and chit chats I had with another close girl friend of mine. Got to know her through another very close guy friend. Started asking each other out for dinners, and pretty soon became really close friends. Shared our problems and experiences over our early dinners and all...will surely miss her.
When my housemate loaded her last piece of luggage into her car, I stood by at the grill to say goodbye. It felt so awkward for the both of us..to know that we will not know when we will be meeting again. Even our convocation ceremony falls on different days. In the past, we would plan what we would like to do together in the next trimester, like hiking, jogging, the kind of food to try etc...My housemate and I could just sit down together and talk...over a broad range of topics; life, relationship, music, movies (she's the only one here that tells me the story line of entire movies that she thinks i'd like (as i'm not as fequent a movie watcher as she is)..sure going to miss that) economic, politics, education etc....for hours! (Once we went for dinner around 6.45 pm and got home only around 11pm!...see what i mean..he he:P) Even during class day, we would just run into each other in the hall while either of us are having a drink or a meal, or even just standing...we would start talking and before we know it, time would have just whizzed past us! So we made it a point to limit ourselves during the exam period:P Will miss her a lot...all those late night chats in her room, in the hall etc....
I do miss my exroommates too.The first one, for abour 4 months for my early entrance program to university..At first we lived in an off campus shop lot and shifted to a house later. She happened to be my schoolmate and we didn't know we were enrolling for the same program until we me during the registration in the university. It was nice preparing our constumes together for our outdoor presentation..with all the glitters on the floor...Our late nite chats (till early morning, when we had an 8 am class the next day!) while lying on our individual beds...our dinners with her naughty boyfriend.he he.., sightseeing, helping her shop for a dress, visiting pet shops and playing with the animals etc... We also founded an Arts Club in university together last year, and despite being an infant club, made it into the Malaysian Book Book of Records for the Longest Rangoli. Miss all the fun times we had during the event...the whole night long preparation the night before the event, the overcoming of challenges faces, the fun time with all the committee members and participants, our meetings etc...I do miss my occasional stay over at her new place as well.
My roommate after her, when I entered university again several months later, was my best friend in school. We were sitting side by side in class since Standard 4 in primary school till Form 5 and had a lot of experiences together. We were already placed to be roommates by the uni hostel management before we arrived, not on our own doing..Cool huh! In uni, we would watch "The Nanny" and "Bewitched" together on Saturday midnight in our so called "TV room" aka "Common Room". It was ussually just the 2 of us in the TV room at that time every week..I guess other hostel residents went out on Saturday nights or were just not interested in the only 2 shows available at that hour. So we made ourselves really comfortable on the sofa, brough blankets, tidbits and a mug of hot drink. switched on the air-con full blast and ENJOYED the show! We were roomates for year, and then she left for the other campus while i remained here. And we played a mischievious prank of a friend, who doesn't know that we are the culprits until today...he he:P
We also got acquainted with really nice students from Ghana who came for their industrial training to Malaysia, and spent long hours into the night chit chatting together on the bench right outside our TV room... in front the woman guard and her table, who loved to feed the cat while eating with hand!
I could never forget some of the funny experiences my 3rd roommateand I shared together in our room and house -my only roomate which wasn't from my hometown and school (for 3 years) ...with the various insects (bees, coackroaches, beetles etc) and animals (cats, "biawak", frogs etc) that entered our house and room, giving us such challenging tasks of getting them out..I did several animal chasing and insect catching) Many times, calling my neighbour boys to the rescue:) The funniest and most embarassing one happend in this trimester. It was 4 o'clock in the morning when we heard the sound of someone using our bathroom...water flowing and the sound of scrubbing..It felt like it was directly coming from the bathroom in our room. My roommate thought it was me, and I thought it was her..But when we both realized it was neither of us, we kind of freaked out as there were a number of break in cases in my area during that time. I our 'blurr-ness' during that hour, we both tried to wake up our housemate to tell her about it but since she was sleeping like a baby and not at all responding to our calls, we took the last resort to ask my chinese neighbour guys for help. We went out through the back door, and called out to the guy staying in the back room, through his window. It was so dark and freezing cold...I was practically shivering in the mist...Finally, 3 guys came to our rescue...One carrying a brick, one a mop and the other, an iron pole (Aww....our superheroes!) in the mission to shed light on the mysterious sounds in our bathroom...
Slowly and cautiously, they tiptoed into our room..... and.....it was so quiet, totally contradicting our description of noises..They switched on the light.....and slowly opened the bathroom door......to find.....NO ONE!!!!! NOTHING AT ALL!!!! The guys told us that we must have been dreaming or imagining things...but they didn't want to scare us...and didn't mention things like 'ghosts' i guess...He he...
But we were confident we heard what we heard...But anyway, we just dismissed whatever it was and try to get back to sleep...I could, pretty easily as I was really tired....The next day, my roommate and i talked about it and felt that we should have checked it our ourselves first and that it seemed pretty far fetched to think of it as a break in- for goodness sake, the sound of someone brushing teeth, scrubbing, water flowing etc! Would a person breaking in do all that!But were just defenseless girls who could only think of the worst possible reason behind the sounds at that time, and thought we needed help.
When my roommate ran into one of our heroes the next day, he told her that one of his housemates was cutting polystrene and washing something at that hour outside the house. And he noticed my room light being switched on (that's when we got up and switched on our room light) shortly after realizing that neither of us were in the bathtoom) shortly after he was done it it and went into his room. Ha ha ha!!!!!....That explains the sounds huh! Since it was totally silent that time, we could hear the sounds too clearly as if it was coming from our bathroom(which is kind of facing the porch-close to the neighbours porch) And since the water pipelines are interconnected, the flow of water sounded like it was coming from ours instead of the neighbours......What a joke!!!:P He he...but at least we gave them a chance to become heroes for a day! That incident became the joke of the day in my neighbours house the next day, as we heard them relating that incident to their friends over the steam boat gathering that they were having at home...So embarrassing...but memorable:)
Boy, I could go on and on talking about all the wonderful people that have taken their place in my heart in university!...There are so many others that i have yet to share about...But i have to stop here...
Will be making my way back to my hometown today....Waving a goodbye to my university life and my friends..forever cherished in my heart! And i tell myself that i must not lose touch with them.....
This is not the end...Just a beginning of a new phase of life...
All the best to all my graduating friends out there, whatever the future brings!!!!
God bless you! :)
Phew....fours years of exciting classes and lectures ( though some were not so all the time), challenging assignments, scary pop quizzes, stressful midterms and 3 final exams in an academic year, pleasant meal times and chit chats with friends and classmates, church services and young adult Bible studies.....over, just like that!
Right after the exam, it did not feel so bad because my wonderful friends had plans for the following few days to chill out at a cafe, enjoy food together and so on....just like what we always did after each finals before I returned home for holidays (my friends here are mostly locals). We snapped many pictures together, spent several hours together chit chatting, recollecting our experiences together. The particular cafe we went to was a really nice place to just relax and chit chat, with the dim light setting and comfortable sofa. We shared with each other our plans for the future, where we plan to work etc. The 2 angels and I had fun posing for photographs underneath the big round lamp that looked like a moon. We took turns to direct each other to position each other to make it look like we were holding the moon in the photograph..We got close to perfect shot:)
We also had a memorable time with our German exchange classmate/ assignment groupmate..Drank "Baba Nyonya Cendol", ate "Satay Celup' till we were stuffed and went to Jonker Walk....She'll be returning to her home country...wonder if we'll ever meet again.
When the time to say goodbye finally arrived, this time each of us knew things would not be the same again. In the past, when we said "Good bye!," it would be accompanied by "See you next trimester!" This time, it was , "All the best! Take care and keep in touch!".
Let me tell you about the angels ( we call our selves the 3 Angels, by the way - "Syiok Sendiri" angel, "Uncalculated Risk Taker" angel, and "Religious" angel (this is me).
We always lose our sense of direction, as she sometimes forgets where she parked her car...he he..Cute:P Guesse who?-(Uncalculated Risk Taker)..My my...what would we do without her? She's our official transport provider for outings and assigments (really appreciate it, my friend:)
.....and there's this other angel, loving to be lavished with praises and complements and wants positive comments..he he:P (needless to say, "Shiok Sendiri")...Our official trimester planner for the best combination of lecture and tutorial sections for our subjects ( I will never forget the day we were returning from KL by bus after interviewing the National Union of Hotels, Bars and Restaurants Union Leader for our Industrial Relations assignment - when we were on the bus heading back to Malacca, so worn out after out adventurous trip, the was "Syiok Sendiri" angel, keeping herself busy even in the dark, trying to get the best combination for lecture and tutorial sections, trying to make Friday an off day, as we had to do our course registration the next day.
And at last but not least, me.."Religious" angel - While i was sipping my delicious Red Plum Sorbet and savoring my chicken shop at the cafe (during our final class gathering), the 2 other angels ganged up against me and asked me to guess the probable only guy that could attract me to adore him (pardon me if these are not the exact words used). I couldn't really guesse.. I asked if i knew him and if he was a university student...They said no sleeping that night without answering and gave me some clues..."Everybody knows him. He is very famous."...I still didn't get it:(...Then they said, "They recently made a very controversial movie about him"....Then it struck me..."Jesus Christ?" i asked with a sheepish smile...And that was the answer:P..I'll take it as a complement :)...Religious angel- they don't call me that for nothing, he he:P
My closest guy friend & brother in university ( a very nice and caring guy with a charming personality, coupled with good looks and popularity as well:) ) has also given me several unforgettable pleaseant memories...like supper together on New Year's eve in a stall ( when it started drizzling and we had to rush our food from the open air area into the sheltered part of the shop)...chit chatting, sharing experiences and dreams..Saw the first shooting star in my life, by the sea, under the moonlight ( while admiring the lights adorning the cruise ships, and being timid enough to be bothered by the black thing floating on the sea... he he:P) (I hope he's keeping that drwaing... And there were many cute little puppies on the road which lead to the place where I saw the shooting star..He volunteered to stop so I could touch them, but I declined because i feared the 'mummy' of those puppies may think i'm treading their territory and threatening their safety. Now, whenever I see puppies I think of him:)... He gave me several nick names which i actually use..And discovered that my hand shivered) We made it a point to meet up at least once in a trimester to keep in touch...and I share a lot about my life to him. I made it a point to give him my handmade birthday cards for his birthday since I got to know him...I always remember his birthday, but my beloved brother has such a 'wonderful' memory that he tends to remember my birthday many months later, and gives me a belated wish out of the blue!:P....But it's alright:) I love my brother just the same.
There's also this Christian close friend to whom i share alot about life and relationships with..She finds it really interesting and that has inspired me to write a book about my life and relationships...He he:) Just kidding! ...We were classamates and groupmates for various subjects until we both choose different majorings. We went to church and bible study together throughout our 4 years here...People everywhere always mistook us for twins as they say we look really alike and find it really hard to differentiate us - we are of the same race, both thin and small sized, similar smile (they say)..Practically, we admit that the words to describe us is the same, but we feel that we don't really look alike.
I will also miss the dinners and chit chats I had with another close girl friend of mine. Got to know her through another very close guy friend. Started asking each other out for dinners, and pretty soon became really close friends. Shared our problems and experiences over our early dinners and all...will surely miss her.
When my housemate loaded her last piece of luggage into her car, I stood by at the grill to say goodbye. It felt so awkward for the both of us..to know that we will not know when we will be meeting again. Even our convocation ceremony falls on different days. In the past, we would plan what we would like to do together in the next trimester, like hiking, jogging, the kind of food to try etc...My housemate and I could just sit down together and talk...over a broad range of topics; life, relationship, music, movies (she's the only one here that tells me the story line of entire movies that she thinks i'd like (as i'm not as fequent a movie watcher as she is)..sure going to miss that) economic, politics, education etc....for hours! (Once we went for dinner around 6.45 pm and got home only around 11pm!...see what i mean..he he:P) Even during class day, we would just run into each other in the hall while either of us are having a drink or a meal, or even just standing...we would start talking and before we know it, time would have just whizzed past us! So we made it a point to limit ourselves during the exam period:P Will miss her a lot...all those late night chats in her room, in the hall etc....
I do miss my exroommates too.The first one, for abour 4 months for my early entrance program to university..At first we lived in an off campus shop lot and shifted to a house later. She happened to be my schoolmate and we didn't know we were enrolling for the same program until we me during the registration in the university. It was nice preparing our constumes together for our outdoor presentation..with all the glitters on the floor...Our late nite chats (till early morning, when we had an 8 am class the next day!) while lying on our individual beds...our dinners with her naughty boyfriend.he he.., sightseeing, helping her shop for a dress, visiting pet shops and playing with the animals etc... We also founded an Arts Club in university together last year, and despite being an infant club, made it into the Malaysian Book Book of Records for the Longest Rangoli. Miss all the fun times we had during the event...the whole night long preparation the night before the event, the overcoming of challenges faces, the fun time with all the committee members and participants, our meetings etc...I do miss my occasional stay over at her new place as well.
My roommate after her, when I entered university again several months later, was my best friend in school. We were sitting side by side in class since Standard 4 in primary school till Form 5 and had a lot of experiences together. We were already placed to be roommates by the uni hostel management before we arrived, not on our own doing..Cool huh! In uni, we would watch "The Nanny" and "Bewitched" together on Saturday midnight in our so called "TV room" aka "Common Room". It was ussually just the 2 of us in the TV room at that time every week..I guess other hostel residents went out on Saturday nights or were just not interested in the only 2 shows available at that hour. So we made ourselves really comfortable on the sofa, brough blankets, tidbits and a mug of hot drink. switched on the air-con full blast and ENJOYED the show! We were roomates for year, and then she left for the other campus while i remained here. And we played a mischievious prank of a friend, who doesn't know that we are the culprits until today...he he:P
We also got acquainted with really nice students from Ghana who came for their industrial training to Malaysia, and spent long hours into the night chit chatting together on the bench right outside our TV room... in front the woman guard and her table, who loved to feed the cat while eating with hand!
I could never forget some of the funny experiences my 3rd roommateand I shared together in our room and house -my only roomate which wasn't from my hometown and school (for 3 years) ...with the various insects (bees, coackroaches, beetles etc) and animals (cats, "biawak", frogs etc) that entered our house and room, giving us such challenging tasks of getting them out..I did several animal chasing and insect catching) Many times, calling my neighbour boys to the rescue:) The funniest and most embarassing one happend in this trimester. It was 4 o'clock in the morning when we heard the sound of someone using our bathroom...water flowing and the sound of scrubbing..It felt like it was directly coming from the bathroom in our room. My roommate thought it was me, and I thought it was her..But when we both realized it was neither of us, we kind of freaked out as there were a number of break in cases in my area during that time. I our 'blurr-ness' during that hour, we both tried to wake up our housemate to tell her about it but since she was sleeping like a baby and not at all responding to our calls, we took the last resort to ask my chinese neighbour guys for help. We went out through the back door, and called out to the guy staying in the back room, through his window. It was so dark and freezing cold...I was practically shivering in the mist...Finally, 3 guys came to our rescue...One carrying a brick, one a mop and the other, an iron pole (Aww....our superheroes!) in the mission to shed light on the mysterious sounds in our bathroom...
Slowly and cautiously, they tiptoed into our room..... and.....it was so quiet, totally contradicting our description of noises..They switched on the light.....and slowly opened the bathroom door......to find.....NO ONE!!!!! NOTHING AT ALL!!!! The guys told us that we must have been dreaming or imagining things...but they didn't want to scare us...and didn't mention things like 'ghosts' i guess...He he...
But we were confident we heard what we heard...But anyway, we just dismissed whatever it was and try to get back to sleep...I could, pretty easily as I was really tired....The next day, my roommate and i talked about it and felt that we should have checked it our ourselves first and that it seemed pretty far fetched to think of it as a break in- for goodness sake, the sound of someone brushing teeth, scrubbing, water flowing etc! Would a person breaking in do all that!But were just defenseless girls who could only think of the worst possible reason behind the sounds at that time, and thought we needed help.
When my roommate ran into one of our heroes the next day, he told her that one of his housemates was cutting polystrene and washing something at that hour outside the house. And he noticed my room light being switched on (that's when we got up and switched on our room light) shortly after realizing that neither of us were in the bathtoom) shortly after he was done it it and went into his room. Ha ha ha!!!!!....That explains the sounds huh! Since it was totally silent that time, we could hear the sounds too clearly as if it was coming from our bathroom(which is kind of facing the porch-close to the neighbours porch) And since the water pipelines are interconnected, the flow of water sounded like it was coming from ours instead of the neighbours......What a joke!!!:P He he...but at least we gave them a chance to become heroes for a day! That incident became the joke of the day in my neighbours house the next day, as we heard them relating that incident to their friends over the steam boat gathering that they were having at home...So embarrassing...but memorable:)
Boy, I could go on and on talking about all the wonderful people that have taken their place in my heart in university!...There are so many others that i have yet to share about...But i have to stop here...
Will be making my way back to my hometown today....Waving a goodbye to my university life and my friends..forever cherished in my heart! And i tell myself that i must not lose touch with them.....
This is not the end...Just a beginning of a new phase of life...
All the best to all my graduating friends out there, whatever the future brings!!!!
God bless you! :)
posted by JJ at 8:44 PM
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