UltraCrepidate

While my partner is away studying for finals….

My life is slowed down to a halt. Gone are the busy schedules, the insane hours, the super tired body all the time and the constant feeling of getting pissed off after a big fight during practice. Not to mention, having to deal with her PMS if it happens on the day we are practicing.

I find myself at a lost of what to do. There's nothing challenging to figure out, nothing challenging to do. I live and that's it. Pick up the phone, don't know what to say to my friends anymore because we are out of touch for so long. I dance in the day, work at night, come home around midnight. Not a good time to call people.

Now, i got the whole day to myself. Trying to start some project, baking cookies, making my own curtain, but nothing complicated, because in a few days, the whirlwind will come back.

Looking for job can be depressing. Especially so when you call someone up and ask what they think about your resume, only to learn that you are overqualified for it. This is the curse of engineering, curse of my personality actually.

Interviewers ask me :”What makes you special and that we should hire you?”. I replied ” Because I am not afraid of new things, in fact I embrace them with the utmost curiosity. I need new things, new challenges and complicated…” Then I froze realizing that the job I am applying for is a brain dead job that doesn't need this.

They almost always ask me: “What… is an engineer like you doing applying for this job.”

All these probing questions, rendering me speechless during the interview. I know in my heart that I am just there for the money, that's why they stunned me so. Still, I tried my best to answer them but I am very sure that she knows my real answer too.

It stunned me because I know what I'd say instead for a job I really want. I'd answer: ” Are you kidding me? Half of my life is spent preparing to work in a job like this, what do you mean why do I want to work here?”

I am seeing the perks of having an engineering degree when applying for other jobs, but it doesn't matter that much when actually applying for an engineering job.

It's time to send out my resumes like crazy

Now that the chance is gone, I feel at peace writing about it.

Being asked to give out my transcript always scares me, because honestly it looks bad. Not bad as in getting all C or barely passing with D, but I have flying colors all over. Some classes I get A+ and some I get D. My dance partner asked me an interesting question. How did you get an A and a D in the same semester. It occured to me at that moment that others didn't have to do what I did.

I was forutnate enough ( or unfortunate if some wish to call it) to have discovered competitive dancing before I started university. It makes an interesting life studying working and competing at the same time. It pushes me to be very efficient with my time and learnt to use the most powerful tool ever, an agenda.

Because i had no time, I often have to decide which course that I will study for. It makes me distressed, but it has to be done… Being a strong believer of no cheating also made me do all my homeworks and projects myself, never cheating. That also takes alot of time away from being able to study, but I learnt in the process how to learn new things without help. Still, I find myself letting my group partners do the cheating at the last semester of my university. There just wasn't any time to complete 4 different projects with the same deadline. It was a class called robotics control. I had, at the same time, Path tracking mobile robot project, a networking project and a multi processor simulation project to finish. The deal was, that I do these 3 and they finish the other 1. Can't be helped.

My transcript reflects exactly what my abilities are I am glad of it. Danny once said something “I'd rather be 6th in the ranking and be happy knowing that I get there myself than to kiss everyone's ass in order to get 1st”. I am happy that I got through myself, but the harsh reality is, how I get there doesn't really count. For engineering, why does it matter if I did it while competing in dancesport, starving, working the graveyard shift to get the money for it and picked myself up after failure in all areas hit me at the same time?

I chuckled when I was asked for the transcript, because I know what they'll see and because I also know what they will not see. More so, for the fact that it has come back to haunt me, 2 years after I graduated.

I have received a job offer from a translation group. It's not the full usage of my skill, but it is something I can do naturally without thinking. The pay is better and at least I won't have to be bossed around by the druggie gay guy at my work who looks down on everyone who works under him. 2nd interview today, sounds like they really want me.

Wow, everything that can ever go wrong, went wrong. Times like this is a test of my person. It is times like these that I have to go that extra mile to be more because everything I am feeling is the exact opposite. I have to hang in there, where every single thought is about giving up.

Once again, I find myself without anything constant to hold on to.

Such a delightful action. Laughter, making the person in front of you feel like the top of the world…. or the worst junk that can ever be picked up.

I was practicing standard by myself in the gym, like what Richard did in the movie “Shall we dance”. Out of the glimpse of my eye, I saw two guys sitting on the mat staring at me and laughing. This is the reality I live in. This is also why, there are so few guys in dancing.

For girls who dance, their fellow species look up at them with envie. Unfortunately for my own specie, the same cannot be said.

Danny told us during the lesson, that he'd prefer that his daughter doesn't participate in dancesport. He knows too much of a dark side to it. I agreed.

Jesse: “So what are you going to do”
Me: “Don't know, the state has a few openings and Toronto seems to be filled with possibilities, my dance partner doesn't seem to be as committed to dancing as I do, so no reason for me to stay in montreal. I know I need more money to support the expenses of this passion.”
Jesse: “Damn you are a drifter”
Me: “Not that I want to, most competitors I know eventually become one. Moving from city to city, country to country, working crappy waiter/waitress jobs to support their dreams for greatness and for the perfect dance partner.”
Jesse: “Crazy…”
Me: ” I used to think so too”

The lone figure sat idly in the café, a loaf of white bread laid haphazardly on the table in front along with a jar of half used peanut butter. As he quickly browse through the ads in the classifieds section, a flash of past memories whipped him out of reality… “How did it become like this?”

Not that he likes to drift, but what's one to do, when the home he wishes to return to is no longer there.
Who to share the longing with, when those surrounding you has never experienced that life.