August. Onwards.

And so.
The month of August came. June and July pass away just like that.

Months and weeks fly by, there are many things that I have learn in this life.

I am 21 years old.
Sometimes I slap myself for thinking I'm still young, which is actually wrong. The reality is that there isn't much time left. Youth life is real. And it is short, but memorable.

This is the age.
Where we ourselves decide our very own destiny, at whatever chances of fate there might be.

I worked in a retail company for my semester break job.
I feel it's not worth it. I've worked here last year for 3 months and if I stayed for another month, I could be promoted.
But I didn't want to because I wanted to pursue my degree in Politics.

This year however, is different.
I was supposed to be working for straight 2 months and half. But I decided to cut it short to August 16th. I didn't want to face too much of a hassle. I decided to leave here as soon as possible.

I had dreams to carry forward and move on.
And I decided this would be the last year of me, being in the retail industry.

Getting up calls, filling up stock quantities. I've learned a lot while working here. But to be stagnant in the same place as I've worked before, it gets scarier day by day.

I started to think about my future. True that I earned salary while working here, even tips from the services I offered to customers. At the same time, what I really wanted to search for was experience. And I believe it is already enough of me to work in retail shops.
It's scary because the things I did started to become the same routine everyday. Getting "washed" by random customers and my bosses. Arriving home close to 0000H. True this is an experience, but it's not something for what I searched for.

Hau, hau, hau.

Last June I was chosen to attend "Maybank Go Ahead Challenge". Seriously, me and my friends thought that this is a joke and us filling up the forms, we wouldn't even stood a chance. And then we just walked off from the booth.
It came to me on that day I was the only one chosen. Supposedly another one is coming with me but he got exams.
Out of 8 people, I was the only one who went there hahaha.

I met lots of people working on different fields. And I was the only one who is 1st year student. The rest, are ending their lives as varsity students. And most of them are doing business and economics related fields. Others are doing engineering or pure science fields.

I'm the only odd one: Politics.
I get that a lot. A lot of "Woah man."

I wasn't chosen for nationals. But having to accomplished it until the end, it was really worth it.
I wasn't looking forward in the nationals though. Even if the chances of working as an apprentice in New York or USD 10,000+ or whatever are enticing to me, I wasn't looking out at the prize.

It was the experience. Working my ways through people who I have never met and as for me, it immediately became an eye-opener for me. I was the only first-year student there and luckily my experience as MUN and debater did helped me a little to suit things up there. And economics class? Haha luckily it was the only class I had full attendance.

Our tasks and assignments were pretty much close to working in corporate are. Meetings can be tiring and stressing. CEOs, people demanded you all kinds of ideas and endless questions are being thrown upon at you.
What became clear to me was this is how everything works in a higher level of working in a corporate world suppose to be.
Perhaps this is only a tiny fraction, perhaps only a small gist of them giving an idea what is it like working in a corporate world suppose to be.

What was weird is, people weren't looking forward to create friends or people they met here. Contrary to what I've been through whether as Model United Nations (MUN) or debater or whatsoever competition I attended, they were more focused on what they really want. It was either to kill time, experience, money and et cetera.
People were more focused on the competition rather than creating a team to work together. And that wasn't until they were forced to work in a team. I had no problems working as a team. But it is hard because each one of us is different.

I went through the first stage to the final stage. There were only 5-6 places for nationals. I wasn't one of them.
But I think I did prove myself that I can do it if I was into it. And this is just the first big step.

I think, that's already enough for me to be here. And I ain't signing up things like this anymore haha.
But I certainly wanted this kind of experience. More of it. Not in a competition like this.

Rather than that I should aim for something that is closer to what I am doing for my degree. I believe this is the time for me to change and do what I love, what I wanted to really do.

I'm working just so that I'll have enough funds when I'm back in Sarawak. I didn't think much of "gaining experience".
This was a mistake for me, for not thinking of collecting experience.

I found out I wasn't the only one, who was thinking one should be doing with something he is interested into at here.

Radhi, my coworker thinks the same.

He's been here for more than two years. He was here with me when I worked here last year of course.
Basically one of the reasons I worked here too, was because I knew certain people. Some quitted, some stayed. Others like me worked here again for very much the same reason; the pay.

He pursued in electrical and wiring skills. But he went here for the pay too. It's not much of what we earned, really.
Cukup makan jer. Not much for savings, but still no good no better. Just fine.

I told him he should go for something he wanted to do; foreman.
Being stagnant at one place when you know you can't develop yourself into a better place, I don't think one should stay
for a very long time. Studying, finding what you wanted to always and finally staying motivated is the key to achieve your goals.

I'm not looking forward for customers or what anymore. For me, this is enough and I'm thankful.
I got nothing much to say, but I'm thankful for people who had been generous and helpful while I'm working here.
Either from last year or this year, it's been good I guess.

I'll write more for later.
I haven't seriously started my fitness. Fook.

Ciao.
Asyraf Amir. 20150806.