Hello and welcome back to my two-posts-a-year blog.
I am dedicating this post to my supposed last semester in school (continue reading to see how the story unfolds), which was also the most intense, challenging and rewarding semester I've had in all my five semesters in school. Oh my God. School. Where do I even begin................
Well, while mapping my modules to Sweden and planning for graduation I found out that I had to overload and take 6 modules because I am doing a minor. Every semester I take 5 modules and I have no life and get real depressed and stressed. I must say though, that it gets easier with each semester. With six modules to clear I could either split it into 4/sem and then 2/next sem which would mean that I am essentially paying an additional $4k to do two modules or I could do six/sem. It definitely made more sense both financially and non-financially to just take one more module and get it over and done with. Although I had my qualms about being able to handle all of it without going mad and/or cutting my wrists and calling it quits. But I rationalised with myself and came to the conclusion that it's my last sem so I really just need to pass everything and get my degree.
Basic Bitch.
Next came the requirements of my six modules- 1 Communications and New Media (my minor), 2 Core Requirements for Specialisation and 2 Specialization Modules and 1 Science General Education Module.
For the CNM Minor, we are given a short list of modules to choose from and there was only one which I had interest in- Advertising Strategies. So I just knew that I HAD to get this module otherwise I would die in some game design or cyber law shit. No.
Next up, my two core requirements were a given so I didn't have shit to choose. The first module is Asian Marketing and something with two Ms. Basically the module is A.M.M.M. I have no idea what the other two Ms stand for. The second module is Consumer Behaviour.
The Specialization Modules provided a lot of leeway to choose modules from. My strategy was to choose to one I had the most interest in. Sounds about right, right? Wrong. #Protip: What the module "sounds like" is never what it is in reality. Also, apparently I am the only one stupid enough to choose modules according to my interests. Everyone else checks the workload/professor/gotprojectornot/howeasyitistoscore and most importantly, whether it fits their timetable. So of course, I was left with a five day week because I wanted to take those specific modules more than I weighted the importance of having a good timetable. I ended up choosing Global Marketing and Product & Brand Management.
For my science GEM, this is where it all blew up in my face and where I found out my cousins are cunts. #Protip: TRUST.NO.ONE. So since it's my last semester I decided to take a module with my two cousins who are also in the same faculty. They are two years behind because Val is younger and Ken had NS. So we decided to take a Science GEM together. After alot of discussion we found one that finally didn't clash with our timetables and despite a shady as hell module name "Search for Life on Other Worlds", we decided on it. Also worth noting is that my CNM exam, which is my only other exam for the semester, is ON THE SAME DAY as the exam for this module. But it being our last chance to be together, I sacrificed. After bidding ended, I get a call from Vallo who tells me that she and Kenboy both didn't get the module because they forgot to raise their bids. So I had to Search for Life on Other Worlds all by myself.
I ended up having a five-day week because it took two lectures a week to Search for Life on Other Worlds and OF COURSE the lectures had to be on my free days Monday and Friday. I ended up going for a grand total of 3 lectures. BUT I stupidly scheduled a tutorial on Monday (in a failed attempt to encourage myself to go for more lectures) so I still had to drag my ass to school four days a week. Apart from six modules, I also decided to finally take up driving lessons because 1) 4 years of procrastination is enough 2) I have no time when I start working
Tuesdays were the worst because I had 6 hours of school back to back. I thought the 15 minutes in between would be enough time for lunch. #Protip: It's not.
I had a total of 8 projects for the semester and had to work with 7 different groups. It was challenging but I made it out alive. Oh and for some reason I managed to get a bunch of extremely horrible groupmates for several projects. Here are several highlights:
#1 There was one module where Claudia and I had to spend the whole weekend re-doing the entire report till 3+am, while the other four groupmates did close to nothing. I gave them an inflated peer evaluation of 30-50%. This girl actually thought she could look at a few different survey questions, create her own summary question and average out the statistics for that summary question and make a pie chart which she put into our report. Gurl......... It don't work that way. She was super rude too.
We gave each other a week to do our separate parts and compile on Friday 10pm when the report which accounts for 40% of our whole grade for the module was due Monday morning. Saturday afternoon this guy had not done his part because he was busy with Japanese TUTORIAL prepwork. Furthermore, his parts were all discussed and in point form already all he needed to do was turn it into prose. I had to do some of his part for him because he was just taking a long ass time. Homeboy needa get his priorities straight. Another guy just did SWOT (table form). I had to re-do it because it was bad. The last girl in our group did Recommendations and basically summarised the case study and regurgitated everything, she asked us to delete her whole part so her contribution Z.E.R.O.
#2 In another project, this Indian exchange fella wanted to argue that 2013 data is old data because we are in 2014. Obviously the 2014 data was incomplete so to properly analyze over a few years we shouldn't use 2014, but no he want to continue arguing for 2 hours over whatsapp that 2013 IS OLD DATA. This same fella told us he didn't know how to analyze the survey data when he was tasked with it for our report, citing that DIFFERENT UNIVERSITIES TEACH DIFFERENT THINGS AND HIS DID NOT TEACH ANALYZING DATA. Well done. Every week we had tutorials which are a group effort he did close to nothing.
#3 Yet another project, this bossy girl wanna ask me to do the exec summary and edit the whole report 30 pages. I said Ok and worked on it from 9pm till 3am. Dropped the whole group a msg to let them know I am done and EXPLICITLY stated that the exec summary was done too. Wake up at 11am to see two messages from BossyBitch91 "Sarah have you done the exec summary" at 8am. "Sarah, have you done the exec summary???" at 10am. I told her IF SHE WANNA KNOW IF THE EXEC SUMMARY IS DONE SHE CAN GO OPEN GOOGLEDOCS AND CHECK BECOZ GURL DAT SHIT ON PAGE ONE OF THE REPORT. PLUS. PLUS+++ I ALREADY SAID I DID IT IN MY MESSAGE. My. God.
I had it good the past few semesters without any such instances but this semester I got it all at once, really. Apart from these unfortunate instances, I am very, veryveryveryvery thankful for the other amazing groupmates I had like Claudia, Jin, Kim, Juliana, JW, Jade, Kelvin, Yeeju, Vance, Patrick, Janne ;) Would have hardcore died without these guys.
Anyway, my Science GEM ended up being a lot on astrobiology + chemistry (the chemical compounds that fuse together and form life). Saying that I was lost does not even begin to describe my experience with this module hahahaha. I had no idea how to answer my midterm at all and managed to scrape together some marks here and there to form the lower end of the bell curve. HAHAHA. Was really worried I woud fail this and have to come back for another semester LOOOL. For finals they said they would test the whole syllabus but I just studied from midterms onwards (living life on the edge). I really had no time. I managed to do the final exam though so I think that saved my ass.
For my CNM, I went for two lectures with Naddy. We talked throughout. For the exam, the GEM was in the morning and I was surviving on 3 hours of sleep. Ended at 12pm and my CNM exam was at 5pm so I took three shots of coffee and redbull and was hardcore crashing. I wrote one page of nonsense for a 25 mark question. (For midterms I wrote 2-3 pages for a 15 mark question LOL)
Global Marketing was extremely similar to AMMM. Asian Marketing was not Asia-focused at all. Global marketing was more like American Marketing. I liked both the professors a lot.
Consumer Behaviour was my favourite module and the one I did the least well for, if you exclude the GEM. Hahahaha. :(
Product & Brand Mgmt was annoying because it had many small graded components and it was more like New Products Management (that was even the name of the textbook), i.e. how to generate a new product and the process from an idea to prototype, etc. Still interesting nonetheless but very, very, very technical and nothing like what I had expected -____- Also, I decided having just ONE 8am class wasn't going to kill me. It did. #Protip: If it seems like a good idea during bidding, it's not. I had to wake up at an ungodly time of 6:45am and was half conscious during the 3hour class 90% of the time. Thankfully after class on thursdays I occasionally meet my new side bitch in school and we have THE BEST N MOST INAPPROPRIATE catchup conversations in the world. HEHE Luv u Ben.
Toward the second half of the semester, I started taking cab all the time because #aintnobodygottimefordabus and #lastsemester. Drained all my savings. But don't worry because I will work soon right? Wrong. Was it worth it? Debatable. Do I regret? No. (One hr vs 10 minutes and a $7 deduction in my bank account)
I had a very unemotional last semester (by my standards... I cry at everything). I didn't feel any tug at my heart over my last project or my last presentation or my last class or my last time stepping into MRB. Just was so glad to be D.O.N.E. Either confirms my suspicion that I FUCKIN' hate school or it's meant to be that I go back for another year. Let's go with the latter. The only thing I was remotely upset about is that Nakhon (thai food) recently opened near my school and I would have gone there to eat all the time if it had opened earlier.
Side note: Alot of people always say that studying is way better than working but so far none of these people come from my faculty and these are the same folks that told me UNIVERSITY IS THE BEST TIME OF YOUR LIFE. I laugh out loud every time I remember how excited I was for university because of this statement which then shat all over my face. I am 65% sure I will enjoy work more than studying but I will check back in two years' time to let yall know. You're welcome.
The very worst part of this graduating-not-graduating fiasco is that I dyed my hair back to black so I don't look like My Little Pony or a member of the Winx Club while I job hunt. Heartbreaking. And now I've dyed it black it's a real hassle to bleach it again ::::::::( I was also thoroughly enjoying being unemployed.
The semester passed in a flash cuz I was so busy all the time. Despite it being the last semester and that my grades don't really count, I still put in my best effort of course. And in the end the busiest and most tiring semester turned out to be my best in terms of grades. Funny how things turn out!!! SO concluding this long ass rant, I am going back for another one year of school to do my honours.
PRAY FOR ME.
PS. Thank you to all my friends who have stayed by my side during these tough and trying times. Yall the real MVPs.
