Just thinking.

Mostly about my friends back home in Malaysia. Got plenty of emails this past week, mostly to figure out if I’m alive, and if I were, whether I would return for the convocation. Here I am, doing my freakin’ master’s degree, and I haven’t even had the graduation ceremony for my bachelor’s yet.

Graduation Day.

Seems like a nice premise. Meeting the old bunch again, dressing up (esp. the ladies, naturally, but trust me, the guys can be equally vain, if not more), taking photos, the evening party, the whole works.

But no, thanks.

And not because everyone tells me it’s gonna be lame. I get emails informing me how much better off I’ll be here in Europe instead of back home, with the umpteenth postponement, with the ridiculous “digital scrolls” instead of giving us decent forest-decimating ones, what with the water crisis, blah de blah.

But no, it’s not that.

Graduation Day.

It’s all about a sense of completion. It’s about finally finishing something, something I would hope to be proud of now and years later. It’s mostly about being satisfied.

I dunno. Getting my bachelor’s was more about fulfilling my parents’ dreams, more about going through the motions, and mostly about relief at finally getting it over with. I was immensely happy, but not proud.

And I doubt it will come in a year and a half when I finsh this master’s course either. This will be just a signpost in the timetable of my life. Something to be done and dealt with. I am incredibly grateful for it, but not moved.

Graduation Day.

It will be the day when I can look back at all my Yesterdays and see only Today.

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Copyright © 2002 Kenny Mah Ying Fye.