As a first-generation Malaysian Chinese American with a college-educated parent, a big part of my upbringing was preparing for college. Or, at the very least, instilling the idea that a successful life starts with a four-year college degree and any other degree after that. So evidently, the first 18 years of my life were lived with the purpose of studying to get into a good college. However, life happened. When I was a youngin’, my idea of success was getting into an Ivy League and then buying a big house with a golden toilet. Specifically, the golden toilet was my idea of success for some odd reason. After experiencing life for 18 long years and going through experiences that have allowed me to mature, my idea of success has changed from a golden toilet to a more modest life. Now, my idea of success is financial freedom. To me financial freedom is the ability to live my life, to be able to do what I want without looking at my bank account. I want to own an animal with short legs. Perhaps a raccoon, a British shorthair cat, a chinchilla, who knows. THIS BEING SAID, going back to experiencing life and maturing, college has been a sobering experience (metaphorically, of course).
I always imagined college to be a grand time with partying, drinking, and every other fun thing you can think of, and for the first two weeks of school, it was exactly that. Going out to parties, clubbing, and doing a bunch of other things my parents probably wouldn’t approve of. Life was great until the inevitable happened. I came down with frat flu. While I wasn’t unprepared for sickness, it didn’t make the experience any better, unfortunately. I recovered after about a week of suffering. However, something I noticed is that everyone got sick. It is a little more comforting knowing that I wasn’t the only one suffering. Hearing the collective sniffle and the patented death cough made the experience of dying in bed a little better. As many would call it, the freshman class catching frat flu is a “canon” experience every year. Some could even go as far as to call it the most tame hazing for the inauguration of the freshman class into the school. While my era of sickness is coming to an end, I know some are just starting; thug it out.
As every Mind of a Freshman article up until now has been me crashing out about something, it feels only right to continue that tradition. It pains me to admit that on my very valuable Saturday, I spent around nine hours doing homework, mainly CS 115. While some would say, “Oh that’s great he’s being productive”, I would argue that it only took nine hours due to my own incompetence and inexperience in coding. I would like to point out that my incompetence at recursion and Python is not due to any lack of effort on Profesor Zumrut. If anything, I actually love Prof. Zumrut’s class, and it is a high point any day I have the class. HOWEVER, that factor did not lessen my suffering by any amount. After a long and tumultuous amount of time slaving away at writing code, I had finished and started to wonder the question that every tech major asks themself. Why did I choose this freaking major? I have no prior experience in coding. I think math is all right; I’m not a whizz at computers. Seeing how it looks right now, I am not built for these streets. I remember when I told my mom about my major; my mother told me that cybersecurity was not an easy major and that a lot of people give up and transfer their major. When she told me this, I scoffed and told her not to worry. So in the interest of preserving my pride, I am determined that if I do not succeed in this field, it will not be from a lack of effort on my part. As the Koreans say on their variety shows, “fighting” *fist pump*.
As I am sure many people have noticed, especially if they use Gradarius, there is a paywall now for doing homework. LIKE I BARELY WANT TO DO HOMEWORK ALREADY, so which Ph.D professor’s idea was it to charge students around 20 dollars to do CALCULUS HOMEWORK ON AN ALREADY FRUSTRATING PROGRAM? What ever happened to uploading a nice calm worksheet where I can do work with a pencil? Instead, now I need to deal with Gradarius giving me a big red EXCLAMATION MARK when I try to say that the derivative of x^2 is 2x. Like, please, man, do you know what I can get with 20 dollars? I can get so many snacks, or even a Chipotle bowl of guac and chicken AND A DRINK AND CHIPS. Instead, I’M SPENDING MY 20 DOLLARS ON QUITE POSSIBLY the most QUIRKY math program. Gradarius is like Desmos if Desmos was a pick me. Anyway, I’ve already gone over the word count, so until next time, I will use Toodles.
