i didn't get to say goodbye to some staff ~

i mean technically, i still have two more days to work but they dont come in on fridays and im not sure how many i will see in office tmr (thursday)...welp its been a good year regardless ig..

Q70: if I were given the opportunity to start a new life, leaving everything and everyone behind, would I take it? 

no, even though there are many things that i regret and i am not the most socially pleasing person to be around sometimes. i can be awkward, i can be un-vibeable (to the popz standard), i so often do stupid things in life that i will regret sometime down the road too. but there are also so many people that i've met that are rly nice, that keep my world revolving, and i am too sentimental to be able to let them go just so i can reset myself and live another life

true, i still dont know what my career path is gonna be like, and i dont know if i will marry (or find a partner). but i think that life is sometimes more about enjoying the little things, like being there for ur friends when they need u, or just being able to say hi and make small convos to make ur day just a bit brighter (and same for the other person too) along the pavement. maybe i don't have the largest number of close friends (okay i do NOT have the largest number of close friends), but i think that i trust enough people to be there for me if i rly need help (though it just so happens that i am unwilling to burden people with my problems most of the time). 

but yea, i wouldn't leave everything behind, and i wouldnt leave everyone behind too. the mistakes made and subsequent lessons learnt r all part of life, and i think its best to just embrace and grow with it

Q71: what was something my parents told me as a kid that i didnt realise was true until now? 

grades are important. like, okay not AS IMPORTANT as they were previously, but i think a lot of people still think that grades primarily define how qualified u r in a given job scope and how compatible u r in that company too. and i really hate it, because some people just aren't meant to be good at studying, and if they cannot adapt, then they will struggle and have to work harder than they would otherwise need to to succeed. or at least, try to succeed. 

i mean, sure, success isnt guaranteed in life because there is always bound to be a loser, even if all our definitions of success vary. but i think that what u learn in school, after secondary school, is mostly useless unless u r pursuing a degree related to that particular field. like, being a business management degree graduate didnt need me to study complex numbers or macroeconomic factors affecting inflation. and i didn't need to know orbital fields or fleming's left hand rule too. 

maybe it is that society itself is so fixated on being the cream of the crop for BOTH having the best job and also being the best in said best job. so ur handful of lucrative occupations are something like

1) doctors

2) dentists

3) lawyers (of which there are varying pay grades depending on what ur specialty is)

4) (bio)chemical engineers (i don't count aerospace or nuclear etc. because it's not viable in sg)

5) and a few more that i can't think of off the top of my head

and for these jobs, the best way to assess how good u r is how well u r able to identify, for example, a tooth condition. or an x-ray and the patient's illness. or defend ur clients. or to advance the development of chemical ingredients required for the various industries in and outside of sg. there is a fixed way to do things, of which there are little variances in solutions. 

but if u think about a generic business management graduate, or a IT graduate, there are so many ways to handle a specific problem. a hr grad isn't gonna follow the textbook entirely and go strictly case-by-case, but rather assess the entire situation as a whole to see what the best way is to resolve, for instance, employee disputes with their pay. but there is no easy way to grade this. and that's when the grades kinda become muddled - did u memorise for the sake of it, or do u actually internalise and understand the nuances between each solution and know what the better methods are to arrive at a complete resolution? 

and so, back to the overall arching theme, grades are so important, yet so superficial. my gpa could be a 2.8 rn (it isn't), but i could be someone who has such a generous heart to communicate with people and settle disputes as amicably as possible. it's just that i flunked all my modules not related to, say, comms or hr, and i end up being regarded as a 'less well-versed' employee/graduate

- steve, who hated the schooling system since young (and also ranted in his strat final paper about it)