On friday and saturday (today is sunday), I attended Taylor's Open Day. There were talks about career paths and different pre-university programs. I have to say, it really gave me bit of a wider perspective about how many options I have, after high school. When I say many options, I mean MANY MANY OPTIONS.
On Friday, mum, jowinn, mel and I attended the Communications : Going The Write Way talk in Lecture Theatre 3. I was pretty astounded by how many types of writers there are. I mean, I used to categorise writers as : a)fiction, and b)non-fiction. But as I learned in the talk, there are script writers, copywriters, legal editors, writers in any specialised field (music, tech, business), general news journalists, online writers etc. I learned that, as much as going into the field, getting interviews, public relations are important in journalism, but you can never get away from it : writing and deadlines are a part of every writer's life. Working in a newspaper, the pressure is on you day by day, you have to finish articles in mere hours. Whereas in magazines the deadlines are maybe one or 2 weeks. Phew!
After that, mum and I attended the talk on Medicine : Why I want to be a Doctor, while mel and jowinn went to Personality and Career. After listening to the talk, I have firmly resolved, that I will NOT be a doctor. Honestly! The piles and piles of studying you have to do! And people's lives are in your hands. If you screw up once, someone dies. And being the very absent-minded puffball that I am, there is quite a possibility that i will screw up and end up removing someone's intestine instead of his appendix, or sth equally idiotic. Not to mention the hours i would have to spend away from my family due to the fact that my patient needs medical treatment in an emergency. Family comes first for me, esp since I'm a girl and may be a mother in the distant future. Oh and did I mention? The doctor who gave the talk was an otorhinolaryngologist. Hilarious isn't it? Oto (ear in Greek), Rhino (nose), and Laryngo (Throat or mouth). He was an ENT specialist.
The next day, mum and I attended the talk on Pre-U programs. There's A-levels, International Canadian Pre-University, South Australian Matriculation, Foundation in Science, STPM, etc. There's such a variety of options to consider that one just feels one's head spinning after listening.
After that, it was the talk on Law. The lady who gave the talk was a pretty good speaker, but then you would expect the lawyer to be a better speaker than the doctor. What attracted me to law was the mooting competitions (debating in a pretend court), presentations and so on. The speaking part. But on the flip side, there's also a lot of studying, reading up past year cases, law journals, laws and acts and articles. It would be rather dry memorizing Article 4(b) and Law of So and So 1980, etc.Oh dear.
After the law talk, we attended a talk by Allan Wu, host of the Amazing Race Asia. This is probably the closest I'll get to see a 'celebrity' in person. He was much taller than I expected, but then this should not have been surprising, considering that he was born and raised in America. The person who introduced him said "I'm sorry to say he is no longer available." Okay, not surprising. People in the entertainment business usually have girlfriends or boyfriends. And she went on to say "He is a father of two." I don't mind saying I was pretty much taken aback. Somehow the word 'father' to me indicates settling down, respectable, dignified. I'd expect him to have a girlfriend. Did you know that Allan Wu actually graduated from the University of Berkeley with a degree in Integrated Biology?! I would have expected the usual sob story : born in a poor family, struggled to survive amid racism towards Asians (He's an American born Chinese), made a breakthrough and became famous!
After that we went to the talk about ADP, American Degree Programme, which I must say I quite favour. It's a four year thing where the student learns a little of everything in 2 years, language, sciences, fine arts(music etc), maths. Then for the final 2 years, the student declares his major and goes on to the States to do studies on concentrated business or engineering or law, whatever his major is. I rather like this system as it's well balanced, exposing you to a little of everything.
Now you see what I mean by many many options. Let's say I've made the very hard-to-make decision of studying law instead of medicine or engineering. I still have to make decisions on what pre-u course I want to take, which law programme I would like, which university to go to, whether or not I want to practice as a lawyer or do sth like be a legal editor. Geez!
What a headache.
(written on 7th December, 2008, Sunday)
On Friday, mum, jowinn, mel and I attended the Communications : Going The Write Way talk in Lecture Theatre 3. I was pretty astounded by how many types of writers there are. I mean, I used to categorise writers as : a)fiction, and b)non-fiction. But as I learned in the talk, there are script writers, copywriters, legal editors, writers in any specialised field (music, tech, business), general news journalists, online writers etc. I learned that, as much as going into the field, getting interviews, public relations are important in journalism, but you can never get away from it : writing and deadlines are a part of every writer's life. Working in a newspaper, the pressure is on you day by day, you have to finish articles in mere hours. Whereas in magazines the deadlines are maybe one or 2 weeks. Phew!
After that, mum and I attended the talk on Medicine : Why I want to be a Doctor, while mel and jowinn went to Personality and Career. After listening to the talk, I have firmly resolved, that I will NOT be a doctor. Honestly! The piles and piles of studying you have to do! And people's lives are in your hands. If you screw up once, someone dies. And being the very absent-minded puffball that I am, there is quite a possibility that i will screw up and end up removing someone's intestine instead of his appendix, or sth equally idiotic. Not to mention the hours i would have to spend away from my family due to the fact that my patient needs medical treatment in an emergency. Family comes first for me, esp since I'm a girl and may be a mother in the distant future. Oh and did I mention? The doctor who gave the talk was an otorhinolaryngologist. Hilarious isn't it? Oto (ear in Greek), Rhino (nose), and Laryngo (Throat or mouth). He was an ENT specialist.
The next day, mum and I attended the talk on Pre-U programs. There's A-levels, International Canadian Pre-University, South Australian Matriculation, Foundation in Science, STPM, etc. There's such a variety of options to consider that one just feels one's head spinning after listening.
After that, it was the talk on Law. The lady who gave the talk was a pretty good speaker, but then you would expect the lawyer to be a better speaker than the doctor. What attracted me to law was the mooting competitions (debating in a pretend court), presentations and so on. The speaking part. But on the flip side, there's also a lot of studying, reading up past year cases, law journals, laws and acts and articles. It would be rather dry memorizing Article 4(b) and Law of So and So 1980, etc.Oh dear.
After the law talk, we attended a talk by Allan Wu, host of the Amazing Race Asia. This is probably the closest I'll get to see a 'celebrity' in person. He was much taller than I expected, but then this should not have been surprising, considering that he was born and raised in America. The person who introduced him said "I'm sorry to say he is no longer available." Okay, not surprising. People in the entertainment business usually have girlfriends or boyfriends. And she went on to say "He is a father of two." I don't mind saying I was pretty much taken aback. Somehow the word 'father' to me indicates settling down, respectable, dignified. I'd expect him to have a girlfriend. Did you know that Allan Wu actually graduated from the University of Berkeley with a degree in Integrated Biology?! I would have expected the usual sob story : born in a poor family, struggled to survive amid racism towards Asians (He's an American born Chinese), made a breakthrough and became famous!
After that we went to the talk about ADP, American Degree Programme, which I must say I quite favour. It's a four year thing where the student learns a little of everything in 2 years, language, sciences, fine arts(music etc), maths. Then for the final 2 years, the student declares his major and goes on to the States to do studies on concentrated business or engineering or law, whatever his major is. I rather like this system as it's well balanced, exposing you to a little of everything.
Now you see what I mean by many many options. Let's say I've made the very hard-to-make decision of studying law instead of medicine or engineering. I still have to make decisions on what pre-u course I want to take, which law programme I would like, which university to go to, whether or not I want to practice as a lawyer or do sth like be a legal editor. Geez!
What a headache.
(written on 7th December, 2008, Sunday)
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